George wrote:
<<Cmekve@aol.com wrote:
> Interventionism, whether Paley or circa-1900-style or OEC or ID, is
> stroboscopic deism, and a bad idea.
"Stroboscopic deism" is an excellent phrase which deserves to come into
general use. >>
Last August/September (2001) there was a brief discussion on the ASA list
concerning a quote by Edward T. Oakes in his review in "First Things"of
Phillip Johnson's book _The Wedge of Truth_
http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft0101/reviews/oakes.html
(To jog your memory, the quote under discussion was "Think of the
difference it would have made to contemporary Christianity
if Darwin had read Pascal instead of Paley in his days as a divinity
student.")
That review by Oakes generated several replies and rebuttals that were
also published in "First Things". In Oakes' reply (published at
http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft0104/correspondence-oakes.html )
the term "Deism under a stroboscope" was used to great effect.
Here is the full quote (with apologies to Karl, who suggested a long time
ago that I send this quote to the ASA list)
"Now Prof. Johnson's concession of microevolution to materialist
Darwinism while cordoning off macro evolution as a redoubt of
Intelligent Design is either Creation "Science" on the installment
plan, or (more likely) Deism put under a stroboscope. If one must
conceive of the universe as an artifact (and how odd that materialist
Darwinians and Intelligent Designers both hold that life is a
mechanical artifact), then the idea of a Clockmaker God who winds
it all up and then departs the scene has a certain plausibility, I
suppose.
But the idea that God swooshed down from heaven 3.5 billion years
ago to toggle some organic-soup chemicals into self-replicating
molecules and thereafter, as occasion warranted, had to intervene to
jump-start new species is, quite literally, incredible. Prof. Johnson's
God is not even the recessive Clockmaker God of the Deists. Rather,
his God is one who, with disconcerting inconsistency, intervenes
every now and again. As I say, Deism under a stroboscope."
Steve
_____________
Steven M. Smith, Geologist Office: (303)236-1192
U.S. Geological Survey Fax: (303)236-3200
Box 25046, M.S. 973, DFC smsmith@usgs.gov
Denver, CO 80225
--USGS Nat'l Geochem. Database NURE HSSR Data Web Site--
http://greenwood.cr.usgs.gov/pub/open-file-reports/ofr-97-0492/
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