RDehaan237@aol.com wrote:
> In a message dated 11/30/01 9:33:17 AM, gmurphy@raex.com writes:
>
> <<_Nor do I intend to forbid God to act as God chooses. But exceptions are
> exception, & I think we should guard against using the resurrection of Jesus,
> e.g., to provide a rationale for invoking numerous miraculous interventions -
> especially when they are not things witnessed to by revelation but simply
> scientifically puzzling phenomena. >>
>
> George,
>
> I do not accept the implication that my position requires miracles,
> conceptual spinoffs from the resurrection of Jesus. You keep laying miracles
> on my position. Staged creation is adding capabilities to creation, not
> setting aside the laws of nature, or acting outside these laws for redemptive
> purposes, as I see miracles.
>
> Staged creations are exceptions from your frame of reference, not mine.
> Theologically speaking, I see no problem with saying that staged creation was
> planned from the beginning of creation.
>
> But I think we are repeating ourselves.
Bob -
You are saying that at certain epochs natural processes receive
capabilities that they didn't have before. If this happens at time t1 then there
will be things happening for t > t1 that couldn't be explained in terms of laws
of nature that obtained for t < t1. Suppose, e.g., that the world starts out
with simple force-free Newtonian particles. They'll all move in straight lines,
except for collisions, & there will be no bound (i.e., more complex) systems.
Suppose then that at t = t1 God turns on an attractive inverse-square force so
that bound systems become possible. Something new has been added to the world -
something that allows the development of more complex systems & thus corresponds
roughly with your idea of developmental stages. But the new phenomenon of
gravitationally bound systems can't be explained in terms of the laws that
obtained for t < t1.
The laws of nature were not "set aside" at t = t1 but they were changed
permanently at that time, & changed in a way that couldn't be predicted on the
basis of the previous laws. (The new force could be more complicated than
r^-2.) I won't insist on the term "miracle" for such an event
but it seems to have some of the characteristics of traditional interventionist
miracles. & I don't think that that's changed by saying that God planned this
change at t = 0.
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
"The Science-Theology Interface"
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