On Mon, 07 Aug 1995 13:46:50 -0500 (EST) you wrote:
>ABSTRACT: I answer Stephen's question about "how exactly God was involved
>with the world in Theistic Evolution."
Part #2
[...]
LH>GOD'S INVOLVEMENT IN "CHANCE" EVENTS.
>One view is that God proscriptively determines the outcome of every
>"chance" event (that is, an event whose outcome is not completely
>specifiable in terms of initial conditions, such as a "measurement" in
>quantum mechanics).
This seems to be the plain meaning of Pr 16:33 - "The lot is cast into
the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD."
LH>Another view is that God designed chance events
>and stochastic processes as part of creation (a consequence of the
>natural laws) to grant a degree of flexibility and freedom to his
>creation
Perhaps in a sense both are true? Scripture indicates that God set
boundaries within which His creation can operate. "Who shut up the
sea behind doors when it burst forth from the womb...when I fixed
limits for it and set its doors and bars in place, when I said, 'This
far you may come and no farther; here is where your proud waves
halt'?" (Job 38:8-11)
LH>God can also, when he so desires, work within the open flexibility
>of creation to have an effect without it being an obviously
>supernatural act.
Agreed.
>THE LEVEL OF GOD'S FORESIGHT AND PRE-PLANNING.
>As this relates to evolution, one view is that God designed "genomic
>phase space" and the chemical laws governing abiogenesis so that
>certain "kinds" of lifeforms (including intelligent life) will almost
>inevitably arise.
I have no problem with this in principle. The problem might be in the
efficacy of a purely "random" search finding the solutions in the time
available. Denton sees this as crucial:
"Evolution by natural selection is, as stressed above, in essence
merely a special case of problem solving by trial and error. This
implies that every evolutionary route followed during the course of
evolution to every adaptive end must have been initially discovered
and traced out as the result of a process which is in the end nothing
more nor less than a gigantic random search. While it is easy to
accept that a random search might hit on mutational routes leading to
relatively trivial sorts of adaptive ends, such as the best coloration
for a stoat or ptarmigan or the most efficient beak forms for each of
the different species of Galapagos finch. But as to whether the same
blind undirected search mechanism could have discovered the mutational
routes to very complex and ingenious adaptations such as the
vertebrate camera eye, the feather, the organ of corti or the
mammalian kidney is altogether another question. To common sense it
seems incredible to attribute such ends to random search mechanisms,
known by experience to be incapable, at least in finite time, of
achieving even the simplest of ends..." (Denton M., "Evolution: A
Theory in Crisis",1985, Burnett Books, pp60-62)
"According to the central axiom of Darwinian theory, the initial
elementary mutational changes upon which natural selection acts are
entirely random, completely blind to whatever effect they may have on
the function or structure of the organism in which they occur,
"drawn", in Monod's words,' from "the realm of pure chance". It is
only after an innovation has been disclosed by chance that it can be
seen by natural selection and conserved. Thus if follows that every
adaptive advance, big or small, discovered during the course of
evolution along every phylogenetic line must have been found as a
result of what is in effect a purely randorn search strategy. The
essential problem with this "gigantic lottery". conception of
evolution is that all experience teaches that searching for solutions
by purely random search procedures is hopelessly inefficient."
(Denton, p308)
"Although at present there is still no way of estimating rigorously
the probability of a random search discovering functional organic
systems, it is abundantly clear that in every analogous system,
unguided random events cannot achieve any sort of interesting or
complex end." (Denton, p348)
I would have no problem with this random search of genomic phase space
for micro-evolutionary events, but I believe that an Intelligent
Designer would need to intervene for new designs and directions
LH>Another view is that God was pleased to design the system with a
>great number of divergent possible outcomes, within the established
>limits, and to work with whatever happened to be the specific result.
See above. I would have no problem with this in some (or even most)
circumstances. But why rule out God acting directly to achieve His
specific ends?
Why do we pray? To request that God retrospectively re-arrange the
universe back at creation, so that what we have asked for now will
happen inevitably? Or do we pray that God will intervene directly in
the warp and woof of the here and now, to achieve something genuinely
new?
Thanks for the discussions.
God bless.
Stephen