In the context of God's designs, Bill writes:
"I hasten to add that I believe God's designs are intended to be
so elegant that there will be no indications of "tinkering"
anywhere. So my view does not imply that there are any points
in nature that we could study to "catch God in the act" unless
He chooses to be "caught". As Howard Van Till does, I tend to
believe that the design is in the properties of entities in
nature."
This seems to me to advocate a model of "design-for-self-
assembly" whereby complex structures emerge as a natural
consequence of the constituents having the properties they were
created with. The observation I make in passing is that we have
no empirical data to support this view. On the contrary, what
we know of these properties suggests that self-assembly does not
happen. eg: the coding of DNA cannot be explained in terms of
certain amino acid sequences being "natural".
Bill continues:
"In addition (perhaps Howard would agree, perhaps not) I suspect
that complex systems theory says some things about how God may
be continuously involved in nature, guiding its course, without
His oversight being visible to the normal five senses. Complex
systems exhibit sensitive dependence on initial conditions and
disturbances. By knowing exactly where and when to perturb
nature, an intelligent designer/overseer could maintain control
over the direction of nature by means of infinitesimal
perturbations."
This is the real point of my response to Bill's post: is this
point an addition, or should it be a "Conversely, ..."??
It seems to me that these sentences are giving us a version of
intervention which is effectively contradicts the "design-for-
self-assembly" argument.
In Stephen's post to Bill (20th Jan), it was interesting to note
him saying "Totally disagree" to the idea that "design is
[embedded] in the properties of entities in nature", and "Agreed"
to the idea that "God may be continuously involved in nature,
guiding its course,..." Clearly, he sees a difference in these
arguments as well as myself.
But I want to put to Bill the thought that his view of God
guiding the process of evolution would be anathema to
evolutionary biologists. They would want to say to you: Without
God's special oversight of guidance (as distinct from his general
upholding of his creation), would the emergence of complex
animals and plants be possible. That is, is there a genuinely
natural explanation of origins or not? With the views Bill
expresses, I think he would be disowned by the evolutionary
biology community.
I think also that Bill does not fit comfortably in the TE
community - which, in my understanding of them, are committed to
methodological naturalism. I do not see how you can have MN and
God's special guidance of processes (albeit invisible).
I may have misunderstood Bill, in which case I am willing to be
corrected. But from what I read in your post, it seems to me
that you are advocating a form of continuous PC. Is this the
case?
Intending to provide constructive feedback,
*** From David J. Tyler, CDT Department, Hollings Faculty,
Manchester Metropolitan University, UK.
Telephone: 0161-247-2636 ***