Re: [asa] Creation and Incarnation

I don't think that the imago dei concept adds much to the discussion. What does imago dei mean? The 3 main possibilities - "the 3 Rs" - are rationality, regency & relationship. I.e., creating humanity in the image of God means either that God endows us with reason, that we are to be God's representatives in creation, or that we are created to be in personal relationship with God. (These are not mutually exclusive - z.B., we would have to be rational in order to represent God adequately.) & in order to exercise any of those functions it is precisely the capacities for thought, conscious decision making &c - the things involved in mind - that must come into play.

There is one further thing though, the ability to trust in God. This is an aspect of "relationship" is is one distinguished humanity as God intends us to be from humanity as fallen away from God, justus from peccator - 1st Commandment. & whether or not a person really trusts in God or is a hypocrite can't be determined externally, & certainly not by scientific investigation. All science can deal with is how a person behaves, not why a person behaves that way.

Can science explain the choices that human beings make? To a certain extent it can, bringing out the various factors that influence those choices & explaining why they're effective. But ultimately no - science isn't going to be able to give a precise explanation for why Nebuchadrezar chooses to lay seige to Jerusalem instead of Rabbah (Ez.21:18-22). But does it have to? The fact that quantum mechanics doesn't enable us to say which slit a photon goes through doesn't mean that we have to
appeal to the idea of God to explain what happens. Perhaps our scientific understanding of human choices can be only statistical, like the type of understanding that QM gives us. (N.B. I'm not arguing here that human freedom of choice stems from QM but only that they're analogous.)

But human persons have to be understood as persons, & personal knowledge isn't identical with factual knowledge. (Cf. the German distinction between kennen & wissen.) The better you know a person as a person, the better you can understand and perhaps even predict that person's choices. Some people - pastors, therapists &c - can be amazingly skilled at this.

& finally, however discontened we may be with our inability to understand human choices, appealing to the idea of God doesn't answer the question. It doesn't tell us help us to understand why a person makes choice A or B.

Shalom
George
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
  ----- Original Message -----
  From: David Opderbeck
  To: George Murphy
  Cc: American Scientific Affiliation
  Sent: Tuesday, August 22, 2006 3:11 PM
  Subject: Re: [asa] Creation and Incarnation

  Most importantly - the theological issue ought to be dealt with in terms of "creation" rather than "nature." And whatever your anthropology is, you'd better have the human mind like the body on the "creature" side of the basic re-creator divide. Whatever our minds are, they are not part of God. The theological claim which will ultimately be translated into MN is then that creation can be understood from within creation, without reference to the creator (etsi deus non daretur).

  These are very insightful comments, as always, George, and welcome back. Here's my question about this point: I'm not sure distinguishing intential human action from "natural" causes is merely a matter of mind/body dualism. It seems to me also a matter of theology concerning the image of God in humanity. Can we really refer to the products of conscious human decisions without reference to the creator if we assert that humans are uniquely created in the image of God? I'd suggest this is one of the principal things that distinguishes the products of intentional human actions from "natural" causes: like God, humans are capable of making conscious decisions based on moral and other non-physical considerations (though as you note, of course, are minds are not God or part of God).

  Setting aside angels and other "spiritual" beings for the moment, humans are the only creatures endowed with this level of autonomy, as part of bearing the image of God. If a monistic view of the mind/body question is tied with strict determinism, I'd suggest that isn't a legitimate option for a Christian view of the mind. But for nonreductive physicalists, as you've allude to it, human choices supervene the physical properties in which they're grounded (in Nancey Murphy's terms, human beings exert "downward causation"). It's therefore hard for me to define human choices as strictly "natural," even if I hold a monistic view of the mind and body. Also, if MN allows for this kind of supervenient activity by humans exercising the image of God, it's hard for me to understand why, in principle, it can't allow for supervenience by God as well.

  On 8/22/06, George Murphy <gmurphy@raex.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> I was away for awhile & have been hesitant to jump into the middle of this thread but it seems to me that it's going in some odd directions. So -
>
> To begin with, while I realize that threads can get away from the description given in their subject line, it's unfortunate that "Creation and Incarnation" in being discussed primarily as a matter of philosophy rather than as theology. Perhaps I've missed the references but I don't see anything being said about Jesus Christ. & unless Christ - the one born of Mary & crucified under Pontius Pilate - provides the fundamental criterion, there's little point in talking about either creation or incarnation.
>
> Then there's the question of what may constitute a legitimate "methodological naturalism," & one of the points being debated is whether or not human activities can count as "natural." E.g., when a person is healed of a disease because a physician has given her a drug developed by a pharaceutical company, can that healing be said to have taken place by means of "natural processes"?
>
> I'm going to waive here (unless someone objects) the Aristotelian distinction between "natural" and "violent" motions. The reason for arguing that that healing was not entirely "natural" - & thus a phenomenon that can be understood by MN - seems to be a belief that human minds (of the patient, doctor, ^ scientist who developed the drug) are themselves not entirely "natural" - i.e., not themselves describable by a science consistent with MN. To this I reply -
>
> 1 Mind-body dualism is, IMO, a respectable view but it is not, even among Christians, the only view. (Cf. proponents of nonreductive physicalism.) & it seems strange to make our definition of what constitutes legitimate science depend on a debated anthropological position.
>
> 2) The thought processes, decision making patterns &c of people in different situations can be studied phenomenologically by psychologists without any presuppositions about the relationships between the mind and the physical world.
>
> 3) Most importantly - the theological issue ought to be dealt with in terms of "creation" rather than "nature." And whatever your anthropology is, you'd better have the human mind like the body on the "creature" side of the basic re-creator divide. Whatever our minds are, they are not part of God. The theological claim which will ultimately be translated into MN is then that creation can be understood from within creation, without reference to the creator (etsi deus non daretur). How this gets translated into a definition of science that is meaningful for non-Christians may be a difficult matter, but this is where we should start.
>
> 4) Finally, it should be noted that the question of the naturalness of human agency doesn't come up in situations in which MN is most strongly challenged - cosmology & biological evolution.
>
> Shalom
> George
> http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/

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Received on Wed Aug 23 07:28:35 2006