From: George Murphy (gmurphy@raex.com)
Date: Thu Oct 02 2003 - 08:31:36 EDT
Walter Hicks wrote:
>
> Jay,
>
> George Murphy often does,........................
A bit of an overstatement! Please note what I said here: "Simply saying 'decay
rates speeded up a lot during the creation week or the flood' is no theory at all. It's
just the "It's a miracle" claim again." I.e., whether or not one believes that
miracles have occurred, an appeal to miracle is not a scientific theory. (Yes, this is
simply a statement of MN.) & since a miracle, as usually understood in such
discussions, makes it possible for anything at all to happen, other aspects of a theory
which _requires_ a miracle become irrelevant: Natural processes + a miracle = a
miracle, just as X + infinity = infinity. (Again, this is one reason why Humphreys'
cosmological model was worthless.)
What I've said here is the point of the well-know "Then a miracle occurs"
cartoon. The caption accurately reflects the attitude of the scientific community toward
such theories. "I think you should be more explicit here in step two."
Furthermore:
1) Christians should, at a minimum, take seriously claims for miraculous
occurences if they are spoken of in scripture. But the Bible says nothing about speeded
up rates of radioactive decay.
2) I have never said that "miracles" don't occur." Please see my letter in the
Dec.'99 Perspectives in which I correct the notion that the resurrection is the only
miracle I will accept. What I _have_ said is:
a. Because scripture contains more than straight historical narrative, not all
stories of miraculous events need be read as accounts of historical phenomena, and
b. When unusual and amazing events _did_ occur, it is not necessarily the case
that they must be understood as having been beyond the capacity of creaturely agents.
I.e., the question is not simply "Can miracles occur?" but "How are miracles to be
understood?"
3) Granted that miracles have occurred, a tendency to multiply miracles is, for
several reasons, unhealthy. Again I quote C.S. Lewis' dictum from another context:
"One magician is better than two magicians."
Shalom,
George
George L. Murphy
gmurphy@raex.com
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
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