>It might be useful to discuss some terminology, in particular:
>what is meant by deism and related to this what does it mean to be
>mechanistic.
This discussion could use a glossary defining a number of the terms used.
I frequently find I've made an assumption about someone's point of view
that is unjustified. It comes from looking at the world through different
paradigms, but wrangling over the definitions might help us understand what
those paradigms are.
My simplistic definition of deism is the belief that God did not intervene
after His initial act of creation. IMO a mechanistic point of view could
come in at least two flavors: 1) Mechanism explains everything all the way
back to the big bang; 2) Mechanism explains everything after God's initial
creative act.
>Awhile back I gave a little quote about the mechanistic
>world view collapsing to which David (I think) replied that it would
>be business as usual. I think deism and a mechanistic world view are
>closely tied together. If the universe and life are not mechanistic
>then perhaps the deistic view is untenable. I think also that neo-
>Darwinism is a mechanistic view, thus the fall of a mechanistic world
>view would hardly be business as usual ;-).
>
>More to the point of your comments above, my own caveat is that the
>insistence of God intervening in the "Now" seems to tie God's hands,
>almost as if he "belongs" to the Universe in the same way that we do.
>Isn't it possible (or even most likely) that "now" for God is the
>moment of the Big Bang every bit as much as it is Feb 2, 1996?
I agree. I've often tried to think of analogies which contrast how God
might view time to our view. One of my favorites is the following: for us
time is like a river we float in. Let's assume that we have the ability to
move crosswise to the current, but cannot move up or downstream. Motion
downstream corresponds to the passage of time. By moving crosswise to the
current we can influence which particular channels of the river we pass
through and ultimately which branch of the delta we take as the river
empties into the sea. But since our ability to see what is coming is
extremely limited, there is a great deal of guesswork in our maneuvering.
God on the other hand can view the entire river at one time, and can
instantaneously see the future effect of any maneuver we make.
Obviously this is an imperfect analogy (aren't they all?). I believe God
has a greater degree of independence from time than my analogy illustrates,
but I don't know how to express it.
Bill Hamilton | Chassis & Vehicle Systems
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