Dear friends,
On Oct. 19, Howard initiated the discussion thread "What does the
creation lack?", dealing with my recent paper "Creative Providence in
Biology", PSCF 53/3 (Sep 2001), 179-183, in which I challenged Howard's
concept of "creation's functional integrity" as far as biology is
concerned.
Unfortunately, from Oct.13 to 27, I was absent (on the Canarian islands
of La Palma and La Gomera), having "unsubscribed" the ASA discussion
group during this time, missing the bulk of this new thread. But Howard
was so kind as to forward to me the main contributions.
I am very happy that this topic has provoked quite some interest: to
date, I received a total of 25 postings in this thread. I think it would
be easier, both for you and for me, if I respond directly to each one of
these, rather than to all of them together in one monster file. I shall
do this under the new thread "Response to: What does the creation lack?"
I trust to get through with all of these response postings during the
next few days, and shall mark the last of them explicitely. If any of
you might have remarks to some of them, I think it would be easier for
the discussion if you considered the whole series before reacting, so we
can get synchronized again. Thank you!
The first comment I want to make to this starting contribution of
Howard's is that I don't like the title of the thread, because it
prejudges what is to be discussed. To say that creation lacks something
seems to imply that God was unwilling or unable to give creation
everything needed. I certainly would not suggest such a thing.
The _real question_ is whether God gave everything _at the first moment_
of creation (the big bang) or at various times (or continuously) during
its history.
"Howard J. Van Till" wrote:
>
> Peter,
>
> I started the conversation with this posting. If you cannot get the
> correspondence that followed, let me know and I'll try to forward the
> main contributions to you.
>
> Howard
>
> ----------
> From: "Howard J. Van Till" <hvantill@novagate.com>
> To: pruest@dplanet.ch
> Cc: asa@calvin.edu
> Subject: What does the creation lack?
> Date: Fri, Oct 19, 2001, 10:34 AM
>
> Food for thought:
>
> As we all know, there are in the Christian community today
> many differing portraits (what-happened-and-when-accounts)
> of the creation's formational history. It's probably safe to
> say that the majority of Christians in North America hold to
> some form of portrait that excludes macro-evolution as
> ordinarily conceived by biologists.
Macroevolution as ordinarily conceived by biologists is nothing but
repeated microevolutionary steps. It is called macroevolution when it
links different species. In my opinion, this distinction between
microevolution and macroevolution as ordinarily conceived by biologists
is mostly irrelevant and uninteresting. I have tried to propose a
different definition, calling macroevolution the emergence of a
previously inexisting functionality whose minimal representation cannot
be reached from preexisting structures by a sequence of more than two
individually non-selectable single mutations, see e.g. my paper "How has
life and its diversity been produced?", PSCF 44/2 (June 1992), 80. But
nobody seems to be interested in it, so I'll have to call it by some
other name. For the moment, let me call it macroevolution-T, as its
defining feature is the transastronomical improbability of such a
macroevolution-T step.
Note that I do not claim macroevolution (even macroevolution-T) has not
happened:
(1) Much of macroevolution as ordinarily conceived by biologists may not
require any transitions of the transastronomical improbabilities of
macroevolution-T.
(2) A _proof_ that any part of evolution is impossible by natural means
would amount to proving God, which would interfere with the freedom of
faith decision which he gave humans.
(3) As Armin Held and I showed in PSCF 51/4 (Dec 1999), 231, evolution,
including macroevolution-T, is God's _normal method of further
developing_ what he has created. _How_ he might do it is the topic of
this discussion.
The conventional view of evolution claims that the various known
evolutionary mechanisms are fully adequate to account for all of
evolution. With this, I disagree: in my opinion they are incapable of
successfully producing macroevolution-T. However, for the theological
reason given above, this fact must be hidden in "God's hidden options",
which are not accessible to scientific investigation. At present, the
vast majority of the available evidence suggests that macroevolution-T
is an all-pervasive reality.
> Arguments against an evolutionary portrait of the creation's
> formational history have been based on appeals to (1) the
> biblical text, (2) theological considerations, or (3)
> scientific considerations.
>
> Focusing for the moment only on (3), these arguments
> commonly take the form of providing reasons why evolution
> could not possibly have occurred in the manner envisioned by
> mainstream science. In nearly every case it is argued that
> the creation lacks some feature, property or capability that
> is essential to an evolutionary creation portrait. Here's a
> representative list:
>
> a. Young earth episodic creationism: not enough time
> available; key formational capabilities clearly missing
> (there are capability gaps in the creation's formational
> economy); the second law of thermodynamics would forbid
> evolution even if there were billions of years available.
>
> b. Old earth episodic creationism: not a time problem; but
> key formational capabilities are clearly missing (there are
> capability gaps in the creation's formational economy).
>
> c. Intelligent Design: key formational capabilities are
> either missing (there are capability gaps in the creation's
> formational economy) or not sufficiently effective.
>
> d. Peter Ruest's proposal (Perspectives on Science and
> Christian Faith, Sept. 2001, pp. 179-183): All requisite
> formational capabilities are present (no capability gaps),
> but they are not sufficiently effective. The possibility
> space (for viable material configurations) of the creation
> is so overwhelmingly large that the creation could not
> possibly have come to occupy the information-rich genetic
> portion of it without divine assistance of some sort. Divine
> assistance is needed to hurdle barriers of "astronomical
> improbability."
>
> What sort of divine assistance? Says Peter, "...miraculous
> interventions are not to be expected on theological
> grounds...." In David Griffin's language: no coercive
> action; no overpowering of creatures by the Creator.
I don't propose any lack in God's creative action. Therefore, any talk
of divine "assistance", "coercive action", or "overpowering" of
creatures is inappropriate. God is the agent responsible for:
(1) all explicitely (in the biblical record) creative acts;
(2) all "natural" events and processes (in the Bible often attributed to
God);
(3) all parameter selections in the realm of "hidden options";
(4) all miracles not reducible to "natural" events and processes
("signs").
The only exception to God's activity and responsibility is the free will
he has given to some of his creatures (humans and angels) - in some
circumstances.
If you want to talk of "assistance", God would be "assisting" himself.
Certainly, he would not "coerce" of "overpower" himself. Such concepts
would have a place, at most, in a deistic world-view, in which a divine
creation is separated from its subsequent autonomous development. Maybe
this is why people sometimes had difficulty distinguishing your concept
of the functional integrity of creation from deism. Biblical theism
necessarily includes God's continuous activity throughout the history of
the creation. Now, does this imply that he didn't do it right at the
beginning? Of course not! Neither his initial nor his later acts lack
anything. Sometimes, God's repeated and continuous activity is called
providence, but the Bible even offers many instances of calling it God
"creating". God is perfect, and everything he does is perfect, but his
creatures are not perfect. They need further development, which (apart
from free-will decisions by creatures) is also God's perfect work.
> How might God act effectively without miraculous or coercive
> action? Peter's solution:
>
> First, note that there are several physical processes for
> which many differing outcomes are possible. There are
> permanent epistemic barriers, however, that prevent science
> from gaining sufficient knowledge to predict which
> particular outcome will occur. Events of this sort play a
> key role in the formational history of life forms. Our
> presence as Homo sapiens, for instance, required that a
> particular string of possible outcomes actually occurred.
>
> Second, propose that God, without violating or overpowering
> the natural capabilities of any creaturely system, exercised
> the choice of particular outcomes (from among the various
> possibilities) in such a way that life evolved in the
> remarkably fruitful manner that it did. These exercises of
> divine choice represent occasions for God to inject new
> information into the creaturely system, essential
> information that was not attainable by creaturely means
> alone.
>
> Interesting proposition. Comments?
I welcome critical comments of my views on the scientific and
theological levels!
Peter
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