On Mon, 10 Jul 1995 10:12:21 -0500 (EST) you wrote:
LH>ABSTRACT: I remain unconvinced that the biblical data
preferentially
>supports Progressive Creation over Theistic Evolution.
SJ>I do not believe the gaps will be closed and I am prepared to
>make the risky, falsifiable prediction that the "gapless economy" of
>TE has not and will not materialise.
>The focus of my original "fits the data better / extra degrees of freedom"
>critique was against versions of Progressive Creation which fail to make
>any risky, falsifiable predicitons about WHERE the "gapless economy"
>hypothesis will fail. I'm glad you're willing to "go out on a limb" and
>make a prediction as to where: the origins of higher taxa. (class,
>phyla, etc.) It looks like we have a simple difference of opinion here
>regarding our scientific intuitions (based on sketchy data). Since
>neither of us are interested in pursuing this particular line any further
>right now, I'll move on.
Agreed. I will continue to challenge TE on the discontinuities of
nature as
support for a PC type model of creation and development.
>Re: fitting the Biblical data
>
>SJ> My main point is that PC fits the *Biblical* data better...
>Again I refer to a fully naturalistic history of Israel..
>
LH>We both agree that a "purely naturalistic" account of the history
of
>Isreal (your favorite analogy) is unscriptural. We both agree that
>descriptions of stellar formation or microevolution (my favorite
>analogies) in terms of the continuous operation of natural mechanisms
>*are* theologically acceptable.
Agreed. But if Israel's history cannot be fully naturalistic, and the
Biblical
evidence sketchy though it is (Amos 9:7), implies that other nations'
history is not fully naturalistic either, why should biological
history be
fully naturalistic? TE's philosophical arguments about God not
planning
it better if He has to intervene fail.
LH>I continue to contend that the Biblical data does not
preferentially
>support a miraculous, rather than a non-miraculous, developmental history
>of higher taxa.
I contend that it does. We will have to agree to differ. :-)
>SJ> I don't believe this is proved that the development of the universe
>can be adequately described scientifically...Just because you can describe >something with a naturalistic theory, does not mean it really happened that
>way. Doesn't God warn us of assuming we can know what really happened >during creation events: Job 38:4 "Where were you when I laid the earth's >foundation? Tell me, if you understand."?
>
LH>No, I don't think this passage is about warning us that we cannot
know
>what happened during creation. (Although, indeed, it may be that we will
>never know.) Rather, this passage is God's warning that our human
>understanding is far too limited to question God's motives or accuse his
>actions (which Job was doing, or at least perilously close to doing). The
>passage you quote ends with (40:2), "Will the one who contends with the
>Almighty correct him? Let him who accuses God answer him!"
I don't disagree. But the passage does warn us about our finiteness of
mind
and being.
>SJ> Of course I agree with all the above. Nothing I say about God's
>> special supernatural work in creation should betaken as minimising his
>> normal natural work in creation or providence
LH>Again, there are instances when it is utterly appropriate for a
Christian
>to hypothesis a _minimum_ of God's "direct" (by which I believe you mean
>"miraculous") involvement. When the Center for Disease Control is puzzled
>by how a new disease organism originated and spreads, I'm glad that they
>stick with the "naturalistic mechanisms" hypothesis despite their puzzling
>data. Based on the biblical and scientific data, I believe that studying
>the origins of higher taxa might well be another such instance.
I agree that normally we should first consider a natural explanation,
but the
creation events (eg. universe, life, life's major groups) are not
normal. The
evidence is that they are discontinuous.
>SJ> If TE fails to make this fundamental distinction between what Erickson
>calls "God's Originating Work: Creation" and "God's Continuing Work:
>Providence (Erickson M.J., "Christian Theology", 1985, Baker, Grand
>Rapids, MI), then it must be judged to be not fully Biblical.
>
LH>I leave it as an exercise to the reader to find a dozen biblical
passages
>(mostly in the poetry books and the poetic sections of the prophets) where
>the text quickly leaps back and forth between God's "creation work" and
>God's "providential work" in nature -- using basically the same language
>to describe both.
There is obviously a much in common between Creation and Providence,
but Gn 2:2-3 clearly tells us that Creation is a "finished" work. Even
evolution belieevs that higher tax are not being produced now.
>SJ> IMHO TE is reductionist to the Biblical data, crunching
>> creation up and subsuming it under providence.
>
LH>I am willing to grant that it may be important at times to
distinguish
>between God's "creation work" and his "providential work." I'm not
>convinced that the developmental history of any particular higher taxa
>should fall any less under "providential work" than, say, zygotic
>development, microevolution, or planetary formation.
>
>Regarding this subject, I am grateful to Glenn Morton for pointing out
>that when God created "genomic phase space" (which is itself a result of
>the laws of chemistry, which are themselves a result of the fundamental
>properties of atoms and nuleii, which are in turn a result of the basic
>properties of the fundamental particles and forces), he created ALL
>potentials genomes for ALL potential living organisms, INCLUDING the
>potentail connective pathways (via mutation) between them.
I don't disagree with Glenn. But the question of whether God brought
the *particular* organisms into being by a purely natural process or
selected them specifically, is under debate.
LH>You have said that you find, in the Genesis 1 narrative, STRONGER
>reasons for hypothesizing miraculous acts in the developmental history of
>plants and animals that for hypothesizing miraculous acts in the
>developmental history of the sun, moon, and stars.
>
LH>Here's what I see in the text: The (human) author had a "flat
earth"
>cosmology in mind. Water was the first, fundamental element. There was a
>horizontal "gap" in these primeaval waters, creating a "sky sandwich" with
>water above and water below, with the "earth" founded and established on
>the lower waters. (Incidentally, it seems to me that when the (human)
>author of the flood narrative says that "the springs of the great deep
>burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened," he was not
>(in his mind at least) using poetic and metaphorical language. He was
>talking about literal, physical structures! The flood was literally a
>(partial) undoing of the second and third days of creation!)
[..]
LH>I just don't see, in the text, reason to hypothesize preferential
>"miraculous" treatment of biological structures over physical structures.
>We may have to settle for a simple difference of opinion here.
Yes. While I agree with much of what you have said above re the
writer of Gn 1's cosmogony, I don't think that is what the text
teaches.
What it teaches is God and His acts in creation. Those acts are both
supernatural and natural as I read Gn 1.
God bless.
Stephen
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