Re: [asa] anti-evolutionism and deism

*The problem lies in the claim of full and exclusive competence, a
claim made both from Dawkinsian and ID directions.*
I think Pannenberg makes that clear and ties it together in the final
sentence: "*Yet its very possibility can be regarded as based on the
unfailing faithfulness of the creator God to the creation, providing it with
the unviolable regularities of natural processes that themselves become the
basis of individual and more precarious and transitory natural systems --
from stars and mountains and valleys and oceons to the wonders of plants and
animal life, resulting in the rise of the human species."
*

On 4/20/07, David Campbell <pleuronaia@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >My youth pastor responded by saying, "well there are some things that
> God lets happen," stating that God's ways of working have changed to
> the less-miraculous. I responded by pointing out that this doesn't
> mean that God is acting any less, only differently. The syllabus
> implied that God was acting less today (or at least that is the
> unavoidable philosophical conclusion). I pointed out the many
> instances where the Bible says God did something, yet we accept a
> natural explanation (e.g., meteorology, embryology). <
>
> Another problem with this approach is that it is inconsistent-"It's OK
> to claim that God works through means today, but covert atheism to say
> he worked through means in the process of creation."
>
>
> > Here's also something I read recently by Wolfhart Pannenberg, which
> might be
> > helpful (from "Towards a Theology of Nature, Essays on Science and
> Faith"
> > ed. by Ted Peters ( http://tinyurl.com/2a4kau)):
> > If the God of the Bible is the creator of the universe, then it is not
> possible to understand fully or even appropriately the proceses of nature
> without any reference to that God...To be sure, the reality of God is not
> incompatible with some form of abstract knowledge concerning the
> regularities of natural processes, a knowledge that abstracts from the
> concreteness of physical reality and therefore may be able also to abstract
> from the presence of God in his creation. But such abstract knowledge of
> regularities should not claim full and exclusive competence regarding the
> explanation of nature; if it does so, the reality of God is denied by
> impliciation. The so-called methodological atheism of modern science is far
> from pure innocence. It is a highly ambiguous phenomenon. <
>
> The key problem here is what is being claimed for science. If we
> assume to start with that science is merely the abstract knowledge
> concerning the regularities of natural processes, then designations
> like "methodological atheism" are seen as a muddling of categories.
> The problem lies in the claim of full and exclusive competence, a
> claim made both from Dawkinsian and ID directions.
>
> --
> Dr. David Campbell
> 425 Scientific Collections
> University of Alabama
> "I think of my happy condition, surrounded by acres of clams"
>
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Received on Fri Apr 20 12:46:32 2007