The Lab, day 2

Today was the second day of Reasons To Believe's "The Lab" conference in West Covina, California.

Me with the RTB sign

In the morning, the presenters reviewed the three major destinations on the science-faith landscape: young-earth creationism, old-earth creationism, and evolutionism. It lined up the six "days" of creation with biological events, noting how impressive it is that the author of Genesis managed to get the order right despite how a human living in that time might expect the world to be built.

We then all loaded up the vans and went to the Griffith Observatory for their "Center of the Universe" planetarium show. The observatory has a lovely campus. It's up on a hill with trails leading up to the actual building. From there, the Hollywood sign is visible.

With the Hollywood sign in the background

Outside the building, there was a noon detector:

"It's high noon..."

Inside, there was (among many other interesting exhibits) one of those devices that prove that the Earth rotates:

A swinging pendulum that knocks over pins as the day progresses

During the show itself, I was impressed by the quality of the animation. The narration was soothing yet interesting. The show covered humanity's exploration of the universe and how our understanding of the cosmos developed.

Once we arrived back, there was a session about the relationships between the numerous species of life. The presentation contrasted common design with common descent. It showed the difficulties involved in building a tree of genetic development that links all life.

We ended the day hearing about how to effectively engage in dialogue with those who may not be entirely receptive. This presentation was also notable for its use of webcomics (especially XKCD and Ph.D. Comics, which are both amazing).

The silhouette of the mountains at night