snip
> If we adopt this perspective, the notion of physical laws as
> "inviolable," or of miracles as "violations" of such laws evaporates.
That may be right, and there may be a variety of good reasons for
holding that view (in fact, I argued for it in an article some time
back), but I'm not quite sure how it factors into some aspects of
present debate. If the above view is accepted, then perhaps
"intervention" is not the happiest terminology, but can't we still
separate events into the same general sets, and still distinguish
between e.g. TE and PC on that ground? For instance, a TE might want to
claim that the origin, rise and diversification of life all resulted
from "God's typical method of upholding and sustaining the universe",
while a PC would claim that those things did not - perhaps even could
not - arise by such means, but rather involved " 'unprecedented' or
'atypical' " activity on God's part. It thus seems to me that whatever
value that move to 'upholding' and 'providence' might have elsewhere, it
cuts no real ice in some of these other areas.
It does, of course, sound good. But I haven't seen a convincing case
for thinking that it is a theologically demanded move, or for thinking
that admitting that in some sense God upholds all things and
providentially governs all things commits one to denying that God can
give the creation a sort of 'nomic inertia'.
Del