The Fine-Tuning Argument For Intelligent Design

| briansabey

This essay does not pretend to break new scientific ground. Rather, it aims to condense and render generally accessible a powerful, science-based argument in favor of an intelligent designer of the universe and of the earth so as to support intelligent life. This essay will proceed in four steps: (1) summarizing (with Claude’s help) the ways in which the universe in general and the laws of physics are “fine-tuned” for intelligent life; (2) summarizing (with Claude’s help) the ways in which the Earth is fine-tuned for life; (3) quoting some Actual Scientists who do not accept the argument for intelligent design, but whose statements in a podcast discussing the fine-tuning problem, to my mind, strongly support it; and (4) my ultimate evaluation of the evidence, arguments, and remaining questions. Continue reading →

Holy Week and the Hope of Universal Reconciliation

| briansabey

I want to put a plug in for us to celebrate Spirit World Saturday as part of the Holy Week observances of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The belief that between his death on Good Friday and his resurrection on Easter Sunday, Jesus visited the world of the dead is not unique to our church. The harrowing of hell is a venerable Catholic tradition that is also found in various other Christian traditions, all of which draw scriptural support from 1 Peter 3, which says that Christ was “put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit; by which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison.” Continue reading →

Dear Republican Congresspersons: Might Does Not Make Right In Greenland Or Anywhere

| briansabey

Dear Republican Congresspersons,

I have always considered myself a Republican, because the issues I care the most about are the “moral” issues of social conservatism—family values, keeping a child-centric society, preserving moral boundaries in matters of so-called self-expression, preserving the various means by which our society tells its best and truest story about itself to the next generation, fidelity to the Constitution, which I believe was divinely inspired in a significant degree, preserving those aspects of traditional morality that I believe to be right, conserving and developing a wholesome sense of American identity, conserving belonging and community in our neighborhoods, religious freedom, etc. I acknowledge many of the values underlying these issues are not unique to conservatives. But the Republican Party—the party of Abraham Lincoln—has always seemed to me the better servant of these values. Like many others of my ilk, I have never liked President Trump. 

I have, to a certain extent, rejoiced in my society’s recent cultural rebuke to what the Free Press is calling the “illiberal Left” (cancel culture, the Left’s identity politics, the casual use of terms like “bigot” when opinions about the Left’s pet moral issues diverge from a moral orthodoxy that cannot seem to stay put for a single year, much less a single decade, etc.). But Trump’s strong-arm way of going about his part in that rebuke has always seemed wrong-minded and polarizing to me. Continue reading →

The Government Should Stop Criminalizing Honest Parenting Mistakes

| briansabey

On May 27, 2025, Judge Vance dismissed criminal charges against me and closed the case on my criminal negligence child abuse prosecution. My crime? Failing to notice that my toddler, Miriam, had snuck away from the van while I was buckling in the crying baby, inadvertently leaving the toddler at the park, and driving home (at which point I noticed she was not present). She was absent from me for roughly 20 minutes before I had rushed back to the scene. By then, two well-meaning women had found her crying at the roadside and called 911. 

Continue reading →

Against Systematic Theology

| briansabey

Tell all the truth but tell it slant —

Success in Circuit lies

Too bright for our infirm Delight

The Truth’s superb surprise

As Lightning to the Children eased

With explanation kind

The Truth must dazzle gradually

Or every man be blind —

-Emily Dickinson

I participate in a theology book club in which we are reading Exploring Mormon Thought, by Blake Osler. Osler is interesting in that he is doing systematic theology, but at the same time he questions the value of systematic theology, doubts its ability to attain its own goals, and admits the limitations of language and the necessity of experiential and relational knowledge in spiritual matters, in contrast to propositional beliefs.

I agree with his questions, doubts, and admissions. I appreciate his work and consider it worthy of our time and attention, but I could be just as good a Christian without once cracking a book of systematic theology.

Now I want to be clear that I am fully in favor of careful thought and intellectual rigor, of seeking greater and greater light and knowledge. Indeed, doing so is a spiritual necessity. If our light and knowledge is not growing, it is shrinking (see Alma 12). Far more than most brands of traditional Christianity, LDS thought enjoins intellectual effort as a duty: we are commanded to “seek out of the best books words of wisdom” and informed that we cannot be saved in ignorance. My target here is not intellectual effort or even theological carefulness, but solely systematic theology. Continue reading →

In Defense of Extreme Views And Political Compromise

| briansabey

It is commonly believed that the truth is always in the middle. Given any two views or any two disputants or any two accounts of an event, both sides have some of it right and some of it wrong; therefore, both sides need to move towards the center.

While this may be a good rule of thumb when it comes to human disputes—divorces, litigation, discrepancies between two people’s memories, etc., it is nonsense as a rule. It often happens that one side is simply right and the other simply wrong.

More importantly, it is utter nonsense in the realms of thought and creativity. When it comes to world views, thought systems, and artistic schools, to make compromise a rule would merely be to abandon consistency and rigor. Continue reading →