RE: [asa] Science's Blind Spot: The Unseen Religion of Scientific Naturalism

George, I was not really answering the question you posed to Gregory. Rather I was enunciating, I believe, the same question in a different fashion. I suppose if you invoke God as one of the prior information used to explain sociological data, then God may be involved either directly or indirectly. However, if one excludes God from any sort of prior information that is used to analyze sociological data, then by fiat God does not play any action whatsoever. The question is then if the latter supposition can truly answer all sociological data. After all, one is dealing here with the actions of human beings and their exercise of their free will, which system is not purely physical and thus is open to entities, like God, that transcend Nature. Surely, in describing the purely physical aspect of Nature by mathematical models, one need not invoke God as Laplace said some time ago.

Moorad

________________________________

From: George Murphy [mailto:gmurphy@raex.com]
Sent: Sat 7/21/2007 7:48 AM
To: Alexanian, Moorad; Gregory Arago
Cc: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: [asa] Science's Blind Spot: The Unseen Religion of Scientific Naturalism

I'm not going to try to dictate how God may or may not have been involved in a complex event like the 2d Great Awakening. You do raise an interesting point - though a one different from what I think you meant to raise - about this. God's normal means of acting to convert people is through the means of grace, the proclamation of the Word & administration of the sacraments (which should be thought of, following Augustine, as "visible words"). The Lutheran tradition has always been wary of
"enthusiasm" in the technical sense (Schwarmerei), the notion that the Holy Spirit can be expected to act directly, without the Word & sacraments. & of course such enthusiasm often marked the revival movement of the 2d Great Awakening. That isn't to say that it was all bad but that, like many things in church history, involved God's action through the work of fallible human beings.
 
In any case, your example doesn't answer the question I posed to Gregory. Would it be considered acceptable for a sociologist as sociologist to explain the movement you describe by appeal to divine action, direct or otherwise?
 
Shalom
George
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/ <http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/>
 
----- Original Message -----
From: "Alexanian, Moorad" <alexanian@uncw.edu <mailto:alexanian@uncw.edu> >
To: "George Murphy" <gmurphy@raex.com <mailto:gmurphy@raex.com> >; "Gregory Arago" <gregoryarago@yahoo.ca <mailto:gregoryarago@yahoo.ca> >
Cc: <asa@calvin.edu <mailto:asa@calvin.edu> >
Sent: Friday, July 20, 2007 10:24 PM
Subject: RE: [asa] Science's Blind Spot: The Unseen Religion of Scientific Naturalism

From Wikipedia, "The Second Great Awakening (1800 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1800 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1800> > -1830s <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1830 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1830> > ) was the second great religious revival in United States <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States> > history and consisted of renewed personal salvation experienced in revival meetings. Major leaders included Charles Grandison Finney <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Grandison_Finney <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Grandison_Finney> > , Lyman Beecher <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyman_Beecher <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyman_Beecher> > , Barton Stone <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barton_Stone <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barton_Stone> > , Peter Cartwright <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Cartwright <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Cartwright> > , and James B. Finley <http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?titl!
 e=James_B._Finley&action=edit <http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=James_B._Finley&action=edit> > . It also encouraged an effervescent evangelicalism that later reappeared in American life in causes dealing with prison reform, temperance, women's suffrage, and the crusade to abolish slavery." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Great_Awakening <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Great_Awakening> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second> _!
 Great_Awakening>

Surely, this had enormous sociologic impart in America. Was God indirectly or directly involved in this very important sociological event?

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Received on Sat, 21 Jul 2007 12:59:05 -0400