Re: The language of "punctuated naturalism"

Brian D. Harper (harper.10@osu.edu)
Mon, 23 Sep 1996 17:01:02 -0400

At 10:42 AM 9/17/96 -0400, Loren Haarsma wrote:
>
>
>Here's a topic we haven't discussed in a while: what can we do to eliminate
>the language of "punctuated naturalism" from the origins debate?
>
>What do I mean by "punctuated naturalism"? Here's an example from _Reason in
>the Balance_ by Phillip Johnson.
>
>> Page 14: "The culurally important element in the Darwinian theory is not the
>> claim that there was some process of ancestral descent in biology, nor is it
>> the claim that biological creation was a gradual and lengthy process rather
>> than the single week described literally in Genesis. Such claims have to do
>> only with the method of creaiton, not the nature of the creator. The
>> important claim is the one that substitutes a purposeless material process
>> for the Creator."
>

This is one of those things that confuses me. IMHO, the best way to
counter this type of thing is with methodological naturalism. The
methods of science are incapable of determining whether a physical
process is purposeful or not (or has a purpose-meter been invented
that I'm not aware of?). What better way to oppose the excesses
of Dawkinsonianism than to show it lies outside the boundaries of
science? But yet MN is avoided by Phil (though he apparently
accepted it at one point) and others like a plague? Why? Is it
because MN would also exclude ID?

Brian Harper | "If you don't understand
Associate Professor | something and want to
Applied Mechanics | sound profound, use the
The Ohio State University | word 'entropy'"
| -- Morrowitz
Bastion for the naturalistic |
rulers of science |