Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar: The Harmony Between Spiritual Principles and Sound Science
    A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar: The Harmony Between Spiritual Principles and Sound Science
    A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar: The Harmony Between Spiritual Principles and Sound Science
    Ebook192 pages2 hours

    A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar: The Harmony Between Spiritual Principles and Sound Science

    By Donald L. Yates

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Who are we? Why are we here? What is the true meaning for our existence? Each of these questions provides a general intention to answer in this book.

    Questions about the purpose of life for human beings are not new as book topics for nonfiction-category book titles. Nevertheless, author Donald L. Yates interest in approaching this and similar, parallel questions is in investigating the links, ties, connections, and other illustrations of harmony, and balance between spiritual principles in their broadest sense and sound science. With such a discovery of connectedness and agreement between science and universal spiritual principles there are thus, the wider implications for humankinds purpose in living and for other, larger questions of humankinds behavior, actions, and existence.

    Moreover, this book is poised to add a particular, significant contribution to the ongoing debate between creationism and evolutionary theory in public education. And while the central theme most recently fostering the debate has been what constitutes good science, what is alleged as being the universal consensus within the scientific community of evolution theory unqualified merit is far from being an empirically verifiable credence. It is this authors view that such an announced state of universal support for what has been described as scientific consensus on evolution theory has no basis in fact. For those who retain the literalist interpretations and beliefs of the origins of the universe as found in Genesis from the Bible, one should fine solace in the considerable evidence that this book brings to the factual basis for creationism, as the framework and foundation for the origins of the world and universe.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWestBow Press
    Release dateJul 8, 2011
    ISBN9781449717995
    A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar: The Harmony Between Spiritual Principles and Sound Science
    Author

    Donald L. Yates

    Dr. Donald L. Yates is a criminologist. His work has appeared in numerous academic journals, including The American Journal of Criminal Justice, The Social Science Journal, Police Studies, Policing and Society, and Free Inquiry in Creative Sociology. He has taught courses in sociology, criminology, criminal justice, and research methods at a wide number of universities throughout the United States. Dr. Yates received his PhD in sociology from the University of Texas at Austin.

    Related to A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar

    Related ebooks

    New Age & Spirituality For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Spiritual Or Atheist? More Nonbelievers Are Saying ‘Both.’

      Mar 11, 2019

      In a letter up for auction, Albert Einstein talked about admiring “in humility the beautiful harmony of the structure of the world.” More nonbelievers say they are seeking a sense of awe and reverence in their own lives.

      6 min read

    • Article

      7 In 10 U.S. Adults Consider Themselves Spiritual

      Dec 7, 2023

      Although Americans have grown less likely to identify with an organized religion in recent decades, Pew Research has found many say they are spiritual in some way.

      3 min read

    • Article

      Atheism, the Computer Model

      Feb 16, 2017

      In the United States, the nones have it. The nones being people with no organized religion and increasingly no belief in God or a universal spiritual power. They have the momentum, attention, and an expectation that in the future they will become a m

      10 min read

    • Article

      Beyond Beliefs

      Dec 9, 2022

      Beyond Beliefs
      5 min read

    • Article

      How To Disagree Well

      Jan 27, 2022

      IT WAS ON CHRISTMAS EVE that I realised I’d been subjected to a social media drive-by shooting. That pinnacle of modern ecclesiastical power, the president of Humanists UK, Professor Alice Roberts had deduced from the headline of an interview I gave

      3 min read

    • Article

      The Ancient Rites That Gave Birth to Religion

      May 30, 2019

      The invention of religion is a big bang in human history. Gods and spirits helped explain the unexplainable, and religious belief gave meaning and purpose to people struggling to survive. But what if everything we thought we knew about religion was w

      11 min read

    • Article

      This Essentially Meaningless Conflict

      Sep 22, 2017

      MARILYNNE ROBINSON’S accomplishments are impressive by any standard: she has won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and the National Humanities Medal, among other honors. But perhaps a better measure o

      8 min read

    • Article

      Are Suicide Bombings Really Driven by Ideology?

      May 24, 2018

      Harvey Whitehouse doesn’t like how New Atheists like Richard Dawkins make religion out to be a mere “set of propositions” amounting to a “failed science.” In a 2013 YouTube video, Whitehouse—the director of the Institute of Cognitive & Evolutionary A

      8 min read

    • Article

      To Understand Religion, Think Football: Sacred beliefs likely arose out of prehistoric bonding and rituals.

      Aug 11, 2016

      The invention of religion is a big bang in human history. Gods and spirits helped explain the unexplainable, and religious belief gave meaning and purpose to people struggling to survive. But what if everything we thought we knew about religion was w

      13 min read

    • Article

      To Understand Religion, Think Football: Sacred beliefs likely arose out of prehistoric bonding and rituals.

      Sep 4, 2014

      The invention of religion is a big bang in human history. Gods and spirits helped explain the unexplainable, and religious belief gave meaning and purpose to people struggling to survive. But what if everything we thought we knew about religion was w

      13 min read

    • Article

      The Worth of an Angry God: How supernatural beliefs allowed societies to bond and spread.

      Dec 15, 2021

      A god who knows everything, is everywhere, and wields impossible power, is a potent fantasy. Allegiance to it animates the lives of billions worldwide. But this “Big God,” as psychologists and anthropologists refer to it, wasn’t dreamt from scratch b

      8 min read

    • Article

      The Worth of an Angry God

      May 30, 2019

      A god who knows everything, is everywhere, and wields impossible power, is a potent fantasy. Allegiance to it animates the lives of billions worldwide. But this “Big God,” as psychologists and anthropologists refer to it, wasn’t dreamt from scratch b

      8 min read

    • Article

      Two Complementary Knowledge Systems

      Apr 29, 2023

      Throughout history, humanity has depended on two basic knowledge systems: science and religion. These two sources of knowledge provide the basic organising principles by which individuals, communities and institutions function and evolve. However, ma

      2 min read

    • Article

      Some Americans Consult Religion About Science Questions

      Oct 17, 2017

      When it comes to questions about science, evangelical and black Protestants and Mormons are more likely than the general population to turn to religion for answers. The new study is the first to measure whether people would actively consult a religio

      2 min read

    • Article

      Varieties of Experience

      Sep 1, 2020

      THERE IS A PUZZLE at the heart of my academic work. I am an anthropologist, and among other things, I study the voices (or auditory hallucinations) of people in different countries who have schizophrenia. Their voices are clearly shaped by local cult

      4 min read

    • Article

      To Rescue Democracy, Go Outside: Real spaces, not digital ones, will fix our politics.

      Oct 13, 2016

      When I see a liberal writer’s description of Donald Trump, or a conservative writer’s views of Hillary Clinton, I am embarrassed for them both. I wouldn’t let a 5-year-old child make such impolite and obviously extreme statements—and yet, today, extr

      6 min read

    • Article

      To Seek A New World

      Aug 29, 2018

      To Seek A New World
      8 min read

    • Article

      The Search For Answers

      Apr 30, 2020

      The Search For Answers
      12 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar - Donald L. Yates

      A Life Committed to Its Intended Anchorage and Soar

      The Harmony between

      Spiritual Principles and Sound Science

      DONALD L. YATES

      missing image file

      Copyright © 2011 Donald L. Yates.

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-1798-8 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-1799-5 (e)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-1800-8 (hc)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2011931272

      WestBow Press books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      WestBow Press

      A Division of Thomas Nelson

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.westbowpress.com

      1-(866) 928-1240

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      Printed in the United States of America

      WestBow Press rev. date: 7/1/2011

      This book is dedicated to my loving parents. First to my mother, Mrs. Maggie Bumpers Yates (Mother of our Church), and second to my father, the late Deacon Robert L. Yates, Sr. I am indeed blessed to have been born as one of nine children to their parentage.

      Donald Yates 4/23/2011

      Contents

      INTRODUCTION

      Chapter 1 SCIENCE AND THE ORIGINS OF THE UNIVERSE

      Chapter 2 CLASSIC UNIVERSAL LAW THEORY’S PROMINENCE AS A GUIDING STANDARD FOR ALL AREAS OF HUMAN LIVING, AND THEIR SOCIAL AND PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENTS

      Chapter 3 MORAL THEORY’S MESSAGE OF PHYSICAL AND HUMAN SOCIAL ORDER AND THEIR BROADER MEANING FOR HUMAN BEINGS

      Chapter 4 COSMIC EVOLUTION THEORY’S APPLICATION WHEN APPLIED IN SPECIFIC SOCIAL INSTITUTIONAL CONTEXTS AND TO OTHER LIFE EVENTS WHICH HAVE PARTICULARLY CAUSED UNDUE HARM AND INJURY FOR OPTIMAL HUMAN EXISTENCE AND DEVELOPMENT (FOR e.g., FEAR, SIN, SUICIDE, AND DEATH)

      Chapter 5 COSMIC EVOLUTION THEORY PRINCIPLES’ CONSISTENCY WITH OPTIMAL PRO-LIFE PRINCIPLES AND VALUES

      Chapter 6 HUMANITY’S FIT INTO THE COSMIC EVOLUTION REALM AS PART OF UNIVERSAL EVOLUTION PROCESS AND, SPECIFICALLY, MAN’S PURPOSE IN EXISTING

      Chapter 7 SCIENTIFIC INSIGHTS ON COSMIC REALM RELATED THOUGHT PATTERNS ON NONHUMAN FORMS OF LIFE

      Chapter 8 LIVING AS A NEW PERSON: THE CONTRIBUTIONS FROM BIBLICAL SCRIPTURE ON THIS TOPIC

      INTRODUCTION

      Who are we? Why are we here? What is the true meaning for our existence? Such questions or questioning never grows old, or long for response in my view, or in the view, or opinion, perhaps, of other human beings. This provides a general intent of this book’s subject to answer, to address. This writer is not likely to have been the first person to ask either question. Still, such directness in the attention normally brought to one’s thought or mind when such utterance is stated, will likely cause one to pause, or fix to the mind or thoughts that which is being asked. The effect being the need to absorb, or to become engrossed in that what is being asked. Whatever the history might be to such questions having been posed or asked previously, a fundamental insight offered from this writer, and, perhaps, others whom have appeared to align themselves in principles and philosophies similar to my own, in the sense of personal human conscious thought and being, is the value and benefit after having knowledge of who indeed we are, and why we are here, to attempt to understand, and put forth in practice the larger goals in our very existence. Questions about the purpose of life for human beings are certainly not new in the network of popular read nonfiction titles within the book publishing realm. Probably the most well recognized in this genre of published works, Rick Warren’s The Purpose Driven Life.¹ While any number of other titles will reflect the interest to know who we are as human beings, and why are we here,² the interest in this writer’s approach to these and other similar, as well as parallel questions, is not so much an attempt to engage a particular religion’s or theological doctrine, as it is to investigate the links, connections, ties and other illustrations of what appears as harmony between spiritual principles in their broadest sense and sound science. Such a discovery and its wider implications for human kind’s purpose in living, and other large questions of human kind’s behavior, actions, existence, and what can be described as universe designed ends and goals for man, would, indeed, likely, be more than a matter of mere secondary thought.

      Such a question, and insight, undoubtedly, would be of considerable value in a society and world today where large uncertainty, and much confusion govern peoples’ knowledge and beliefs about such matters of human being’s purpose, what are we to believe, how are we to behave in our daily lives, and what tools fosters our efforts to know happiness, joy, and peace. Reports today from public opinion polls suggest rampant confusion among many who whole to strong religious faiths in regard to fundamental questions of the pathway to eternal life,³ how are we to behave now in this day, age, and culture, ⁴ is there more than one true way to interpret the teachings of my religious, and other central fundamental matters of faith. In a recently released 2009 Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life Survey of 2,003 U.S., adults in the continental USA, the survey found much ‘mixing and matching’ in the beliefs many people of faith in the United States bring to their search for salvation, and its related principles of correct and right living, and other patterned behavior consistent with what some have come to embrace as a higher call or calling in one’s manner of living. This survey was conducted between, August 11-17, 2009. Of the most notable in the findings from the 2009 survey of adults, 26% of those who attend religious services say they do so at more than one place occasionally, and an additional 9% roam regularly from their home church for services. Also, 28% of people who attend church at least weekly say they visit multiple churches outside their tradition. While 59% of less frequent church attendees say they attend worship at multiple places.

      People of faith connected to denominational tagged religious groupings, and other more orthodox religious groupings don’t appear to be any lesser likely to adopt this same manner of mixing beliefs, and compromising, otherwise, spiritual truths in one’s religion or religious doctrines. A Pew survey earlier in April of 2009, found 47 % to 59% of Americans reported to having changed their religion at least once, with the most important reasons being (1) their spiritual needs weren’t being met, (2) they liked another faith more, and (3) they changed religious or moral beliefs. ⁵ Also, telling are results from a March 2009 American Religious Identification Survey which found the percentage of people who call themselves Christian has dropped more than 11% in a generation, and many people declining any religious label, with None, being the third-largest religious identity, after Catholics, and Baptists.⁶ This brings this writer back to what was an earlier mentioned remark in regards to the ‘rampant confusion’ which governs the beliefs of many who are of strong spiritual faith. Pew’s 2008 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, while finding some 92% of Americans’ having an allegiance to God, found 70% to believe that many religions can lead to eternal life, 68% believing that there’s more than one true way to interpret the teachings of my religion. ⁷

      Such confusion, in this writer’s view, provides the need for greater clarity to people vested in systems of faith and belief, that what truth they seek to uncover, that it is made as reliable and available as best as can be. Further, those who are outside of such systems of faith and belief may be inspired to come aboard when given such an insight, and understanding that provoke a response and openness to faith where, perhaps, one had not been previously present, or had dissipated from that person’s experience or life some while back.

      Other writers in this genre have picked up on what can be described as a malaise of unstructured, meandering belief systems when it comes to matters of the spirit, and of faith, and the resulting vacuum and emptiness for those individuals engaged in such religious searching. Julian Huxley (Religion without Revelation) has offered how pluralism has taken over modern communications in making the world a neighborhood. The result is what he alludes to as wandering, deviating, and in other ways migrating fundamental principles regarding one’s religious convictions, where now the believer is likely to hear, and even embrace as a principle or set of principles: (1) all religions are really valid; (2) contradictions between religious systems are fully acceptable; (3) absolute truth does not exist (Huxley, Religion with without Revelation). Others, including Anthony Flew, and John Wisdom (Know Why You Believe the Bible) have suggested how there is the futility for the person who is searching, inasmuch as assertions of such sort, incapable of being tested objectively, are meaningless.

      Where spiritual principles and sound science find connectedness in the universe, and the whole of humankind, this reality (i.e. an objective testing of spiritual truths and principles) may, indeed, provide the igniting of this prospect. The goal of this narrative, thus, is in presenting an informed basis of the merits in seeing the harmony, balance, compatibility and other illustrations of unison and union in the links between man’s purpose for existence, classic theory in universal evolutionary law, and the myriad of anecdotal doctrines espousing the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual value of a life centered in the virtues and benefits of principles emulating service, love, joy, peace, patience, selflessness, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, and self-control. It is the central thesis of this treatise that such principles are to be found as fundamental aspects of the universe, including, in all its essence and matter.

      NOTES (Introduction)

      1. Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life: What On Earth Am I Here For? Zonderus, Grand Rapids, MI. (2002).

      2. Josef Haid, On the Side of Life: A New Worldview and the Ethic for an Optimal Way of Life. Asama AG Publishers, Germany. (1992). Cathy Lynn Grossman, Mixing their Rights, USA Today, December 10, 2009.

      3. Cathy Lynn Grossman, Mixing their Religion. USA Today. December 10, 2009.

      4. Ibid.

      5. 2009 Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life Survey of U.S. adults in the Continental USA, (August); 2009 Pew Forum on Religion & Public Survey of U.S. adults in the Continental USA, (April).

      6. 2009 American Religious Identification Survey, (March).

      7. 2008 Pew U.S. Religious Landscape Survey.

      Out of the night that covers me,

      Black as the pit from pole to pole,

      I thank whatever gods may be

      For my unconquerable soul.

      In the fell clutch of circumstance

      I have not winced nor cried aloud.

      Under the bludgeoning of chance

      My head is bloody, but unbowed.

      Beyond this place of wrath and tears

      Looms but the Horror of the shade.

      And yet the menace of the years

      Finds and shall find me unafraid.

      It matter not how strait the gate,

      How charged with punishments the scroll,

      I am the master of my fate;

      I am the captain of my soul.

      William Ernest Henley (1888)

      Chapter 1

      SCIENCE AND THE ORIGINS OF THE UNIVERSE

      Remarkably, some of the most informed insight from scientific knowledge on the origins of the universe finds profound consistency with the account of the origins

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1