Jordan J. Ballor

Jordan J. Ballor (Dr. theol., University of Zurich; PhD, Calvin Theological Seminary) is director of research at the Center for Religion, Culture & Democracy at First Liberty Institute.

Posts by Jordan J. Ballor

August 25, 2006

Green Atomic Power

As I’ve written before, you don’t need to be a climate change convert to believe that nuclear power represents a very attractive alternative to nonrenewable fossil fuels. In this lengthy piece in Cosmos magazine, Tim Dean examines the possibility of nuclear reactors based on thorium rather than uranium. Continue Reading...
August 24, 2006

Broadband Abroad

The editors of PC World magazine have done a little survey of how users around the world access the Internet, based on the responses of over 60 worldwide publications that “either carry the PC World name or are associated with us in some way.” Continue Reading...
August 21, 2006

China: The Economics of Religious Freedom

Here’s a summary of a piece over at Forum 18: Economics has a large effect on China’s religious freedom, Forum 18 News Service notes. Factors such as the need of religious communities for non-state income, significant regional wealth disparities, conflicts over economic interests, and artificially-induced dependence on the state income all provide the state with alternative ways of exercising control over religious communities. Continue Reading...
August 18, 2006

Wind Power: Not So Novel After All

How different is this… In a recent WSJ story, “A Novel Way to Reduce Home Energy Bills,” Sara Schaefer Muñoz writes about the possibility of adding windmills to homes in order to cut down on the cost of utilities. Continue Reading...
August 17, 2006

Sharks for Social Change

“Oh, the shark, babe, has such teeth, dear / And it shows them pearly white… Ya know when that shark bites, with his teeth, babe / Scarlet billows start to spread…” –Bobby Darin, “Mack the Knife,” 1959 He asked for it. Continue Reading...
August 16, 2006

The Minimum Wage: A Denial of Freedom and Duty

In this week’s Acton Commentary, “The Minimum Wage: A Denial of Freedom and Duty,” I look at the concept of minimum wage legislation from the perspective of the employer/employee relationship. In his second epistle to the Thessalonians, the apostle Paul sets down a moral principle: “If a man will not work, he shall not eat.” Continue Reading...
August 16, 2006

The Acton PowerBlog Audience

Want to see where other readers of the Acton Institute PowerBlog are from? Check out the PowerBlog Frappr! map. Join the list of PowerBlog friends today. If the GetReligionistas can do it, so can we! Continue Reading...
August 16, 2006

Use GoodSearch, Advance Freedom and Virtue

Don’t forget, you can use GoodSearch to direct funds to the Acton Institute. Simply visit GoodSearch.com and type in “Acton Institute” in the “I’m supporting” field. When you click the “Verify” button, all of your searches conducted with GoodSearch will raise $0.01 for the support of freedom and virtue. Continue Reading...
August 15, 2006

‘The poor people’s God, the sinner’s God’

I’m reading John W. de Gruchy’s Confessions of a Christian Humanist, and despite some rather disagreeable elements to his theology, he does have quite a few valuable insights. Here’s what he says in the context of Nietzsche’s derision of Jesus Christ contained in The Anti-Christ: Christians should not disparage the body, human strength and bravery, or the aesthetic dimensions of life. Continue Reading...
August 15, 2006

Chimera Nomenclature

Another round of stories are out about the possibility of creating a modern-day wooly mammoth, Jurassic Park-style. The process would include injecting frozen wooly mammoth sperm into an egg of a closely related species. Continue Reading...