Re: [asa] serious talk about ID and TE

Ted,
Are you ready to revise Hebrews 11:6 to read: he that cometh to God can
know that he is?
Dave (ASA)

On Fri, 29 Aug 2008 11:47:44 -0400 "Ted Davis" <TDavis@messiah.edu>
writes:
> >>> "David Opderbeck" <dopderbeck@gmail.com> 8/29/2008 9:00 AM >>>
> writes:
>
> I can't understand why being able to detect design in creation would
> be in
> any way theologically unorthodox. Of course, we have a loaded term
> here
> in
> this words "detect" and "design."
>
> Big <SNIP>
>
> My good friend George Murphy will probably chime in on this, and
> (rightfully) caution us again about the dangers of an independent
> natural
> theology, and of the importance of viewing the creation through the
> eyes of
> the crucified and risen Maker of heaven and earth. George, in
> combination
> with Polkinghorne's emphasis on either the same or a very similar
> point, has
> been very persuasive to me on both points. I sense however that
> George and
> I still do not quite share the same view of natural theology; I
> don't think
> he values it as highly as I do, although I fully accept his
> cautions: I
> agree that natural theology without the cross can lead us to worship
> the
> wrong God, and one of the things I like about most TE positions
> (vis-a-vis
> the official ID view) is that it's so openly theological and
> specific about
> who the designer is, from the get-go.
>
> From my exchanges with the folks at UcD, it's even clearer to me
> that two
> specific theological claims are attributed to TE generally, and
> often by
> clear implication to all TEs, whether or not accurately. These are
> (1) the
> claim that God cannot or must not do miracles in natural history;
> and (2)
> that God must or should "hide" himself within the creation, such
> that it
> can't be possible in principle to find scientific evidence for
> God's
> existence.
>
> Neither of these points of criticism, in my view, is without
> justification
> in terms of specific TE writers, but neither is accurate as a broad
> generalization. Mainstream science is absolutely insistent on (1),
> insofar
> as mainstream science makes theological claims either implicitly or
> explicitly, through the rules it imposes on the study of nature,
> which are
> often glibly taken as rules binding on nature itself. This is what
> Hooykaas
> called the "horror miraculi," and MN is equivalent to this limit
> being
> placed on the study of nature; whether those limits are properly
> placed all
> of the time on "nature" itself (which monotheists believe to be the
> creation
> of a free creator, whose hands cannot be tied if the word "free"
> really
> applies), is the key point here IMO. MN is not IMO the real problem
> here;
> but of course ID proponents very loudly state that it is, and that
> it leads
> inevitably to the view that the creator, if he/she exists, is being
> taken in
> shackles out of the court of rational discourse. I strongly reject
> (1), and
> with it Howard Van Till's principle of the "fully gifted creation."
> Who are
> we, as mere creatures, to tell God how he must create and govern
> the
> creation? I've always been with Newton & Clarke, not Leibniz, on
> this one.
>
>
> As for (2), I'm somewhere in between where ID and this claim come
> out.
> With Einstein, I would say that God does not wear his heart upon his
> sleeve
> (contrary for example to the emblematic tradition of the
> Renaissance,
> according to which there were emblems of the divine presence all
> over the
> landscape); like Pascal and Dostoevsky, I believe that an act of
> faith must
> take reason further than reason alone will go. On the other hand, I
> don't
> think that the divine presence is completely hidden from view, even
> from the
> view of unaided reason. There are what Polkinghorne calls "general
> hints of
> the divine presence," and I believe that science can provide some of
> those
> hints. To go beyond those hints, however, to real conclusions,
> involves a
> lot more than science, and more than science and reason combined.
> One does
> IMO need some idea of the identity of the designer, before the
> design
> inference can be made to stick.
>
> The subtlety of my view about science and the nature of the design
> inference is a source of constant frustration to me--I'm not
> frustrated by
> my viewpoint, not at all; I believe it's the correct view both
> scientifically and theologically. I'm frustrated by those who will
> not
> recognize its legitimacy--by those who insist that I must admit that
> the
> design inference is fully scientific, lacking an essential
> theological or
> metaphysical component; and by those who conclude that I don't
> believe in
> design arguments at all, or that I am a strong fideist who can't
> give
> rational support for his faith--or, even worse, that I won't endorse
> some
> other view, when all is said and done, b/c I can't stand up to peer
> pressure. Perhaps I should not be so frustrated when others are
> frustrated
> with me.
>
> Ted
>
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>
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Received on Fri Aug 29 14:32:06 2008