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Sheldrake on Dennett: "Bright memes have infected him and taken over his brain. Those memes are now trying to leap from his brain into yours through the medium of Breaking the Spell." Priceless. :-) That's the real trouble with the "meme" meme, isn't it? Methodological solipsism to its uttermost.

It seems that Father Coyne has presented a false dichotomy. Why can't God be an engineer and a lover?

It's not likely that Fr. Coyne had anything like a rigorous argument in mind. I, for one, admire his respect for received science.

Mike, I find his statements somewhat misleading. The author says:

"[Coyne] proposes to describe God’s relationship with the universe as that of a parent with a child, with God nurturing, preserving and enriching its individual character."

But of course, a parent also creates his/her child. Human parents create their children indirectly via reproduction. God, it stands to reason, creates his/her children directly. In God's case, what "can giving life to x" if not "purposefully, and knowingly, bringing x into being." And how could this be done unless God in some relevant sense "designed" or "engineered" x?

Coyne says:

“God should be seen more as a parent or as one who speaks encouraging and sustaining words.��?

But there is an obvious disanalogy here, when a parent stops speaking "sustaining" words, their offspring do not (as a rule) cease to exist. If God were to stop "sustaining" his/her children, they would (I assume) cease to exist. God's act of speaking, at least understood in the Christian tradition, is a creative act. And what can it mean for God to create, but that he/she act with a teleolgy in mind?

Then Coyne says, rather bewilderingly:

“God in his infinite freedom continuously creates a world which reflects that freedom at all levels of the evolutionary process to greater and greater complexity,��? he said. “God lets the world be what it will be in its continuous evolution. He does not intervene, but rather allows, participates, loves.��?

So he does not intervene, but he participates? Is this a distinction without a difference? It seems to me that Christian belief is predicated upon God's repeated and direct intervention in human affairs, most notably in the person of Jesus Christ. What can good father possible mean by "participates" if not that God, through Christ, intervenes in the world, in nature, to bring about the redemption of not only mankind but all of fallen creation?

It seems to me like Father Coyne is trying admirably, though ultimately unsuccessfully, to have his cake and eat it too.

True, he is not making a rigorous argument here. But one would think that he would, if he is going to fault his peer for being, on several points, mistaken in defending ID. I would like to have seen a little more substantive talk and little less kowtowing to the scientific cognescenti this time.

I guess I don't see it as "kowtowing" when it comes what scientists issue as the best science we have. I would not have seen it as kowtowing had Galileo been better received or, for that matter, Newton. And that is given that those views are now believed to be false.
We can pick nits on the aptness of metaphors and how they were intended to be used (but still, I might aptly say "he ate like a horse", without taking so seriously the objection that he didn't use a feed bag) but it is a popular article, not a professional article, and so my expectations on precision are not so high.
Even so, I can understand how someone who took the opposing view (say, a defender of or believer in intelligent design) might be less receptive to Fr. Coyne's not-fully-articulated position and less forgiving of its admittedly vague defense here. It's easier for me, I confess, since I put full credence in the conclusion that evolution (not necessarily Darwinian) is true.

I admit to being put off by Fr. Coyne's comments and, in particular, finding them seemingly inconsistent. However, I am (slowly) learning to to read everyone--even smart or well-educated people--as if they were analytic philosophers.

Note that refraining from criticizing what seems to be sloppy speech is not to say it shouldn't be criticized. I've also learned how badly reporters portray people. I imagine Fr. Coyne would come across much better in conversation or considered writing.

One specific thing: "So he does not intervene, but he participates?" I think the emphasis is on the "connotation" of "intervene" not the "denotation". That is, I think he thinks "intervening" makes it sound like it's none of God's business or that He should just stay out of it having once set it in motion.

For example if I give my daughter advice on what to wear I wouldn't call it "intervening" I'd call in "participating" though it is, technically an intervention. Does that help?

"However, I am (slowly) learning [not] to read everyone--even smart or well-educated people--as if they were analytic philosophers.

Note that refraining from criticizing what seems to be sloppy speech is not to say it shouldn't be criticized."

I'm not sure I follow you, Trent. Since you are learning not to read everyone as analytic philosophers, you are presumably arrving at the conclusion that those standards are inappropriate in certain contexts. But how does that square with the disclaimer that "[this] is not to say that [sloppy speech] shouldn't be criticized"? What is sloppy by analytic standards (viz., roughly everything uttered) is not sloppy by more lenient conventional standards. You seem to rule analytic standards as inappropriately high for certain contexts. But then you seem to urge that such high-end criticism is not inappropriate in those contexts. I'm sure I misread, but where?