John Penter

According to Amazon reviewer, "John Penter" was the pen name of Hans Camenzind, the engineering genius associated with an early integrated class D amplifier, the loop concept to ICs, the semicustom IC, and the 555 timer. In this work, he puts the religious impulse on trial. Specifically, he questions the Scriptures and existence of a God of the Abrahamic trinity of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Drawing from the wonderful sources listed in a detailed Bibliography, citing both believers and nonbelievers. He presents the well-known "proofs" of God's existence, using both direct and circumstantial (inferential) evidence: St. Anselm's "greatest thing that can be conceived" argument from the Proslogion (with an objection from Kant's Critique of Pure Reason), St. Thomas' "first mover" argument from the Summa Theologica (with three objections from Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion) , and Paley's "mechanical clock". Each argument is countered, for example, by the contradictions, by Darwin and Wallace's theory of evolution, and by the great mass of archeological information which refute the narratives of the holy scriptures. The big picture is clearly and sympathetically drawn -- Penter shows how the views of "God" matched the times and conditions. In the last 10,000 years there is no literary, or material evidence or cognizable proof of a miracle or a theophany. Both religion and science are with us, and both keep changing.… (més)