Dave posted:
"Burgy, even if you don't think much of philosophers looking over your
shoulder, we serve a purpose. For example, scientists get so involved in
methodology that many get to thinking that that's all there is to
discover and so espouse naive materialism. You're "doing" philosophy when
you recognize that the scientist's need to look for material causes does
not eliminate alternative approaches. Even among the sciences, that one
can in principle present a physical description of animal activity,
including the mental, does not mean that the physical exhausts the
phenomena."
Sorry if my posts appeared to denigrate philosophers or philosophy in
general. That was not my intention. There is nothing in the above with
which I disagree.
Dave goes on to say:
"We are creatures of time, so enmeshed that we find it almost impossible
to think outside of the temporal parameter. This means that "one who gets
involved with us more often" is likely to be viewed as one who is in
time, a cause among other causes of physical phenomena. This is
compatible with process theology, which restricts God to the present even
as we are restricted to the present: he's smarter and more powerful than
we, but must make predictions (guesses about the future) as we do.
William Lane Craig, "Design and the Cosmological Argument," pp. 332-359
in Dembski, Mere Creation: Science, Faith & Intelligent Design, shows
that this won't work. Consequently, the entire history of the universe is
known, set, complete, etc., at the moment of creation, when time began.
This notion is essential to the recognition that the Creator is outside
of the space-time creation, different in kind from the causes we look for
within the universe. Each regularity and each miracle was built in the
universe's origin. Every moment of time is totally depended on the
Creator's will, even though we often tend to separate creation and
providence."
All of which is philosophy/theology, and as such, I neither accept or
reject it. I am not too much impressed by Craig's arguments, but I'll
confess I have not really examined them as closely as, perhaps, I should.
As you might surmise, I am somewhat interested myself with process
theology, as you have described it above, but not to the extent that I
hold to that position.
"Some folks get all bent out of shape at the notion that God knows the
end from the beginning and think that then God is responsible for all my
actions. They need to recognize that knowing is not equivalent to
causing. He was not surprised when Adam sinned. He did not scramble to
work out how he would provide salvation. Nor did he await my decision
about accepting that gift to start preparing a place for me. This is
because all time and space is eternally open to him. It's hard for us to
take this in, so we lapse into temporal ascription, even when we know
better."
The phrase "bent out of shape" is a bit pejorative, IMHO, and the second
part of your first sentence does not necessarily follow from the first. I
agree with you on the difficulty of conceiving what "outside of time"
really means, much less the implications of that phrase. I am, myself,
not convinced that it is a meaningful (even if very difficult) concept.
I continue to hold that the most rational position I can take is to see
that God does "fiddle" (as with a violin) with the universe from time to
time -- even the word "play" seems quite reasonable. Even with this
position, I can also understand that he "knows the end from the
beginning." As a weak analogy, whenever a great violinist steps on stage
to do his thing, he knows the piece, how he will play it and how it will
come out. I assume he nonetheless takes pleasure in the performance, as
does his audience.
Burgy (John Burgeson)
This is my home page but it has been down for several days. Free web
sites are worth exactly what you pay for them!
www.Burgy.50megs.com
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