george murphy wrote:
>
> Peter Ruest wrote:
... snip some ...
> > If you come to these conclusions, I have used the concept of a "hidden
> > variable" in the wrong way. What I meant was to suggest that God may
> > have decreed genuine chance outcomes for most elementary events, yet
> > reserve for himself the liberty of making a selection among all possible
> > outcomes for certain events he deems of particular importance for a
> > certain goal. In this way, the whole system would not be deterministic,
> > and God's selective acts would not constitute any "miraculous"
> > interventions violating any of his laws (they could not be detected by
> > science).
>
> In interpretations of QM, "hidden variables" refers to the idea that there is
> some kind of sub-quantum mechanism of an essentially classical nature that actually
> determines precise trajectories of particles &c. The statistical character of QM is
> then understood to be like that of classical statistical mechanics - i.e., we deal
> with probabilities because it's not possible in practice to have all the data needed
> for a precise classical description of the system, not because such a precise
> description is impossible in principle. E.g., there is some sort of concealed
> "clockwork" in a particle that determines when it will decay.
> If this isn't what you mean then we're back to the problem I stated to begin
> with: The results of some quantum measurements "just happen" for no reason, while a
> few biologically significant ones happen because God wants them to happen as they
> do. As I said, this is "vaguely troubling."
> But we can go farther. If there are no hidden variables, no mechanism that
> causes measurements to have the results they do, then there is no secondary cause for
> God to cooperate with in bringing about the results God wants. All these
> biologically significant results then must be due to direct and unmediated divine
> action. In other words, they are miracles in the sense in which Aquinas, e.g., would
> have used the term - phenomena which are completely beyond the capacity of creatures,
> even with divine cooperation. Perhaps so - but then we need to be explicit about it.
Why should it be troubling if God specified genuine randomness for some
sets of events? If he decreed such systems and possibilities, such a
quantum measurement would not "just happen for no reason", but because
God wanted it to not be individually specified beforehand, apart from
being an element of a previously circumscribed set. Why should one try
to limit God in such a way?
And why should we require that there _always_ be a "secondary cause for
God to cooperate with in bringing about the results he wants"? I don't
see a reason for accepting "the critical assumption of a kenotic view of
divine action", to which you refer in your parallel post to Bob Dehaan,
as inescapable for _all_ of God's acts. The primary importance of divine
kenosis is in Christ's "emptying himself", although I also see parallels
in biblical Revelation and in Creation, as I indicated in my 1992 PSCF
paper. But I don't think this necessarily requires that God _always_
acts in cooperation with creatures only. In the Bible I see him as fully
sovereign in his decisions and acts, free to do something with or
without creaturely secondary causes, without being inconsistent. Of
course, in the usual operation of the creation, I expect him to work
through creaturely secondary causes. But he certainly is not forced to
do so always, and he may have his reasons occasionally not to do so. In
Christ's resurrection, he hardly just cooperated with creaturely action!
As you can see in my parallel post to Burgy, I can accept the
designation "miraculous" for God's "hidden options", but only in the
sense of God's introducing some new information, and certainly not in
the sense of Aquinas which you indicate. The hidden options are
certainly not "beyond the capacity of creatures", as every one of these
events represents a specific selection from a set of physically possible
events. And how could something be impossible "even with divine
cooperation"? How Aquinas could get such an idea is completely
incomprehensible for me. Note that I don't consider any such elementary
events to be highly improbable. It's the coming together of a precise
sequence of specific outcomes that leads to transastronomical
improbabilities. An improbable coincidence is therefore not the same
thing as an improbable elementary event.
Peter
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