Re: [asa] Has a Christian Evolutionist written this yet?

Isn't God just as involved in the ordinary working of the
universe--gravity, strong force, weak force, electromagnetism--as in the
biochemical, genetic, etc.? What kind of a situation are we in if the
Almighty is involved only in revelation and the like?
Dave (ASA)

On Mon, 17 Dec 2007 23:08:06 -0700 Jim Armstrong <jarmstro@qwest.net>
writes:
> Bernie,
>
> I remain puzzled at the confidence in 1.
> Either God is capable beyond our imagination, or is not. Most of us
>
> would concur with "capable beyond our imagination".
> So how then can we confidently conclude that a design and
> implementation
> by God of something as interestingly complex and fecund as the
> universe
> would necessarily require post-creation interventions to accomplish
> its
> creative intent?
> In our limited human sphere, the concept of design and
> implementation
> usually measures success by whether the design as implemented
> performs
> as intended (from the outset). I confess to not really knowing for
> sure
> much about God. But maybe it's not too great a stretch to think that
> God
> might demand the same of His creative design, at least that portion
>
> which does not operate with ration and free will. Scripture does say
>
> that the Creation was "good". I assume that might include
> "functionally
> compliant with His design concept".
>
> If God is truly capable beyond our imagination, then we cannot just
>
> assert that something that seems "unlikely" just because it seems
> absurdly improbable in the dim light of our very constrained and
> myopic
> ways of thinking and understanding.
>
> I'm not suggesting that you must concede to this point of view, but
> I do
> question the "improbability" premise as a foundation stone for
> "Therefore, evolution happened supernaturally". That is the essence
> of
> the disputed "God of the gaps" explanations, which are diminished by
>
> every new discovery.
>
> I do not intend to say that God might not choose to subsequently
> intervene or even sustain as you describe to guide the course of
> evolution.
>
> But, that does seem to me to be at odds with what is ultimately
> manifest
> in man as free will. Why put in options in the first place if it is
>
> necessary to constrain or override them? That essentially suggests
> that
> biological nature requires some external guidance for it to proceed
> in
> the "right" direction (to achieve the design purpose), but the
> vaster
> non-biological part of creation works just fine as is. Further,
> under
> this picture, the biological evolutionary processes seem to require
>
> intervening "direction", while the consequent more more complex and
>
> unpredictable volitional functioning of man, operating with free
> will,
> does not. Something seems wrong with that picture. The basic
> non-biological nature and human volition extrema do not require
> "direction", while the sub-human biological part DOES require
> "direction".
>
> I'd also comment that the design and functional power of evolution
> and
> natural selection is routinely pretty badly underestimated. This
> amazing
> functional coupling of slight susceptibility to mutation with
> selective
> attrition constantly pushes in the direction of increasing
> sophistication. In elegant simplicity, it trims away (perhaps over
> time
> in some cases) anything that is even at a modest disadvantage with
> respect to a newly altered configuration. Moreover, that one basic
> collaborative process pushes toward increased sophistication in
> every
> form of biological entity, whatever its form or size or complexity,
>
> wherever it is found, and regardless of what constitutes the
> specific
> criteria of "success" or "benefit" or "fitness" in its particular
> context - whatever improves its odd for surviving and thriving.
> Isn't it
> amazing that there is such a fundamental and natural process built
> into
> Creation whereby a vigilant, unrelenting, and dispassionate pruning
> of
> each growing and changing "evolutionary bush" favors anything that
> brings survival and/or reproductive advantage (increased
> sophistication)? Talk about a powerful and all-encompassing design
> element (or is it a creative principle?)! Discovering the elegance
> and
> power of these processes take absolutely nothing away from the
> Designer
> of them! It is quite the contrary.
>
> I recognize that this sensibility will not rest easy with folks
> whose
> understanding of God includes a constant presence, support and
> realization of all of Creation. It will be repulsively squirmy to
> others
> who see God breaking into the evolutionary scenario to bring about
> "new"
> creations, that increasingly are found to have more and more in
> common
> with the "old".
>
> The bottom line for me is that I just don't see the point of putting
> an
> evolutionary process into a dynamic Creation if in-course control
> adjustments are required or desired. There are other reasons I will
>
> touch on in what follows.
>
> But perhaps more fundamentally, I am also troubled by all this focus
> on
> the physical processes of Creation, with understandings that God
> still,
> for some reason, elects to be directly involved in the physical
> functioning of Creation. Does Scripture really teach that such an
> involvement with basic natural processes is a main point of God's
> interest in us and how WE operate? It seems to me that it is more
> about
> things that transcend the mere physical.
>
> In that light, it seems instead that God's interest in us is more
> likely
> to be more directed at the most sophisticated aspect (level) of our
>
> existence, the abilities to sense, think, abstract, communicate,
> dream
> of what has never been and make it happen. And more to the point, if
> God
> is interested in some sort of interaction with Creation, perhaps His
>
> interest would focus on that aspect of Creation that creates and
> brings
> into play new, UN-natural selection criteria to nuance the course of
> His
> Creation!
>
> Even from our severely constrained points of view, we can see value
> in
> the survival of certain individuals or groups that would otherwise
> be
> susceptible to the unthinking forces of attrition manifest in the
> unsentient functions of our world. We increasingly work hard to
> extend
> the lives and heritages of prominent mathematicians, musicians and
> other
> artists, teachers, healers, and those gifted in many other areas of
>
> human endeavor. But the challenging charge of Christianity is to
> expand
> those definitions of value more yet, responding in a new way to the
>
> image of God imprinted and manifest in each one of us. That's not
> about
> the basic physical functioning of the world.
>
> That seems to me to be supported as well in Biblical revelation when
> the
> physical aspects of Creation were pronounced, "Good".
>
> Mankind in Creation essentially layers very distinctive new capacity
> and
> new opportunity over the functioning of the natural world. This new
>
> layer, spread over the rocks and seas and suns, and over the lower
> life
> forms, and even over the basically instinctive functionings of the
> higher life forms, is not only capable of new dimensions of
> creativity,
> but even of nuancing of the functionings of all other natural
> entities
> to create new trajectories. It is relational and imaginative and
> creative. I have to ask why God's participation and interest in the
>
> framework of the physical creation would be so compelling and
> necessary,
> when there are the alternatives of more sophisticated and more
> transcendant matters of imagination, and hope, and redemption (in
> its
> many forms) and healing (in its many forms). These are new
> possibilities
> embodied in a new layer of Creation, bringing a new capacity to
> significantly alter and even mitigate the mindless operations of the
>
> natural world by blunting its sharp corners and healing its
> dispassionately imposed wounds. In the other direction, we also have
> a
> forward-looking capacity to actually move (probably very slowly!)
> toward
> a more Edenic future, with all the additional "new" that that will
> in
> time bring.
>
> That is the essence of why I surmise that God is not likely to be
> particularly interested in or needed to muddle about in creative
> interactions with a basic physical world construct. Instead, that
> basic
> sub-human world appears to me to be only a necessary foundary for
> new
> evolutionary capacities that are more of a transcendant character,
> perhaps in some very small way more like something of God than is
> the
> physical world. That makes for a shaky predicate for "Therefore,
> evolution happened supernaturally".
>
> Or so it seemeth to me. JimA
>
>
>
> Dehler, Bernie wrote:
>
> >Hi all-
> >
> > Does anyone know of a book that someone has written that
> basically
> >explains that God uses evolution as his design means? I mean, that
> God
> >is actively engaged in messing with DNA code as a programmer
> writing
> >computer code, not simply just starting it all off at the big bang,
> as
> >Howard Van Till would say. I'm thinking of a combination of
> Intelligent
> >Design (not ID as it is now) with Evolution. Basically, the
> conclusion
> >is drawn from:
> >
> >1. Evolution is too unlikely as to have happened naturally (ex.
> >anthropic principle & origin of life mysteries).
> >2. Genome evidence shows evolution happened (ex. pseudogenes).
> >3. Therefore, evolution happened supernaturally.
> >
> > I would call the position "Christian Evolution," and a follower a
> >"Christian Evolutionist." It is the Christian faith combined with
> >evolution... I hope that isn't syncretistic.
> >
> > Atheists may say that "evolution is an unguided process of
> creating
> >more complex life-forms from simpler," but the Christian
> Evolutionist
> >can say it is the "guided" process. Then a tough question would be
> "if
> >God is guiding it, then why is there so much disease and bad
> genes?"
> >Good one.
> >
> >
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> >
> >
> >
> >
>
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>

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Received on Tue Dec 18 23:21:21 2007