Hi, Bill:
In response to your question, "...what's wrong with design?" First, I
would agree with you that all things in the universe are designed by
God. However, that is a statement of faith.
I am strongly opposed to the "design movement," "intelligent design,"
and so on for many reasons, but chief among them: (a) it involves no
faith but looks for proof instead (I believe faith precludes proof - I
mean - who needs faith if you have proof?), and (b) it assumes that
design exists objectively. In other words, Dempski does not seem to
share my viewpoint that all appearances of "design" are purely
subjective.
My experiences with cognitive psychology have led me to conclude that
all the examples Dembski provides as objective truth of design are
simply subjective viewpoints. I wish I were smart enough to write a
wonderful treatise on this subject, but I'm not. A couple of other
fellows wrote a nice book on the subject of objective vs. subjective
design issues - geared for cognitive folks and not theologians. In
light of the "design debate," it might be interesting for
science/religion folks to give it a twirl: "Where Mathematics Comes
From: How the Embodied Mind Brings Mathematics into Being" by George
Lakoff and Rafael E. Nunez.
Lucy
attached mail follows:
On Thu, 24 May 2001 08:42:48 +1000 Jonathan Clarke
<jdac@alphalink.com.au> writes:
> A recent example (April 9) was Paul Nelson's refusal to publicly answer
Loren
> Haarsma's question "Are carbon atoms intelligently designed?"
I can't imagine why Paul would be reluctant to answer that one. In my
mind carbon atoms are absolutely designed, along with every other
particle and force in the universe. Why did Loren even ask that question
in the first place, and what's wrong with design?
> In many ways the supernatural-natural split is completely unhelpful for
the
> reasons you state. What matters is that God is always working in the
world,
> whether the results are explicable to us or not. A miracle is not
necessarily
> something inexplicable to present science, or even something
fundamentally
> inexplicable (although they may be both), it is an event that has
significance
> in God's salvation history.
I think our pastor recently made a distinction here between miracles and
what we might call fortuitous events. I think he said something like the
latter is providential, not miraculous.
> Also people use "supernatural" with respect not
> just to God, but also the paranormal and demonic, which muddies the
waters.
Why? Demonic activity is real in today's world, e.g. dowsing for water
or underground utility lines. I would consider dowsing supernatural but
not miraculous.
>
> However, I think there is a need for a word to describe specific
actions by
> God in the world contrary to creaturely processes.
What's wrong with miracles?
Bill
________________________________________________________________
GET INTERNET ACCESS FROM JUNO!
Juno offers FREE or PREMIUM Internet access for less!
Join Juno today! For your FREE software, visit:
http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu May 24 2001 - 00:03:06 EDT