Walter Bradley

Fellow, Center for Science and Culture

Walter L. Bradley received his B.S. degree in Engineering Science (Physics) in 1965 and his Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering in 1968, both from the University of Texas (Austin).  He subsequently taught at the Colorado School of Mines as an Assistant/Associate Professor of Metallurgical Engineering for 8 years, at Texas A&M University as Full Professor of Mechanical Engineering for 24 years, and for 10 years at Baylor University as a Distinguished Professor of Mechanical Engineering. His research area has been Materials Science and Engineering, with a focus on the mechanical properties of plastics and polymeric (plastic) composite materials, fracture and life prediction.  He has received more than $7 million in research funding (NSF, AFOSR, DOD, NASA , 10 fortune 500 companies) and published more than 150 refereed technical papers and book chapters.  He has been honored by the American Society for Materials as an elected FELLOW of ASM in 1993.  The Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE) honored him with a career-contributions award as the Educator of the Year for the US, Canada, and England in 2011.  His most recent work has focused on converting agricultural waste into functional fillers for engineering plastics to provide new economic opportunities for poor farmers in developing countries.

Dr. Bradley has also explored polymeric issues related to the origin of life, co-authoring The Mystery of Life: Reassessing Current Theories (Philosophical Library, 1984) and articles in the journals The Origins of Life and Evolution of the Biosphere, 18 (1988) and the  American Biology Teacher, Vol. 55 (No.2), February 1993, pp. 78-83.

Archives

Origin of Life: Saved by Time?

Many materialists believe that the severe unlikelihood of the series of events required for the origin of life is not a serious problem.

Crisis in the Chemistry of Origins

The impressive complexities of proteins, nucleic acids, and other biological molecules are presently developed in nature only in living things.

Walter Bradley on the New Mystery of Life’s Origin, Pt. 2

On this episode of ID the Future, Robert Marks continues his conversation with Walter Bradley, co-author (with Charles Thaxton and Roger Olsen) of the groundbreaking 1984 work The Mystery of Life’s Origin. A revised and expanded edition of the book has just been released with new contributions from James Tour, Guillermo Gonzalez, Stephen Meyer, and others, but today Bradley and Marks discuss the book’s first release, including the cultural context that made finding a non-religious publisher an uphill battle, and discussion of some of the endorsements and early reviews, including one drive-by and four positive responses from distinguished scientists Robert Jastrow, Dean Kenyon, Robert Shapiro, and Fritz Schaefer. Bradley and Marks also discuss some scholars who more recently have