Clinton Ohlers: Two Parables on Divine Action

[swamidass (S. Joshua Swamidass)]

@rcohlers

I am sympathetic to Clinton’s point that we may not understand enough about nature to know when something is ‘natural’ or not.

For the record, I think that was @swamidass’s point. I am much more optimistic that we can discern an event like a resurrection (i.e., miracles) from ‘natural’ events or the regular course of nature. I think it has to so with a coupling of what is know of regularities of nature combined with strong evidence of agency. I believe this leads to valid recognition of special divine action by observers.

And I’d agree with that too, with merely the caveat that “SCIENCE” can’t make that jump. It might point towards it, but it doesn’t have the tools or language to challenge its axiomatic limits. It can’t make metaphysical claims about the limits of the created order.

Science, however, is only a dream. There are other ways of making sense of the world that are valid, logical, rational, and based on evidence.

As human beings in world created by God can make that leap to “discern” the “providential governance” of God, in the language of theology (@jack.collins). We can make that inference, but it is a outside of science that we do so.

@jrfarris

I have several questions and concerns about the definition for methodological naturalism given in the link and the one given above. I do hope to explore that with your help in the future.

There is the coming two days, and any other time you want to talk.

@jrfarris

As for the distinction made between science or scientific cases and the Resurrection, I do find this a bit odd, but also very interesting. I realize that Christians may have a bit of a bias when they see the world in light of the resurrection, but as I have understood the resurrection I have understood it to be a public evidence. No doubt there is something unusual about the event, but it is public nonetheless. One question, how is this different from say the evidence from a scientific case?

Scientific evidence is just one type of public evidence. It is a subset of the whole, and often it isn’t even public. There are other types of public evidence. I use the Resurrection as an example of such public evidence that can only be partly perceived within science, even though it is strong public evidence. There are others too.

The existence of good and evil is public evidence too. Even though there are apologists against it, the evidence is so overwhelming that it begs for an account. Science has no account.

@jrfarris

Two, is it not a publicly verifiable evidence that should be persuasive to all? It seems to me that it should. Now, how people respond to the evidence is a different issue.

Um, no. Public evidence is usually ineffective because we are Fallen and subject to idolatry. That should be obvious.

If that were not true, we would struggle to explain why the entire world is not Christian, why there is disagreement on the age of the earth, and so on. Public evidence is visible to all who have eyes to see, but idolatry is a powerful force the clouds our view of reality. That is why efforts to come to common understanding of reality must engage our propensity for idolatry too. That was Bacon’s theological genius, and its rooted in his theological anthropology.

@jrfarris

I think that Clinton’s notion that there is a difference between ‘natural’ causes/events and events like the resurrection (i.e., miracles) have been assumed throughout history as distinct. In other words, we know or ‘discern’ these unique events (we could call them miracles) because we have an idea of ‘natural’, but that does not eliminate the evidential (or neutral) nature of the event or the public nature of the event.

I would agree. We expect to discern them outside of science. They are a distinct category that science of which cannot fully take hold. Even in the story of New Atlantis, revelation was required to confirm the miracle, as much as the miracle confirmed revelation.

@jrfarris

With MN in mind and this dispassionate stance, one of the benefits you see in science is that science provides us with a neutral starting point, and this is why the findings of science can be so persuasive. I would have thought evidence more generally functioned in that role. Is that not the case? That is one question.

Not precisely. It is not purely neutral, as it is anti-personal bias, etc. It also is not friendly to ID. A better way to put it is that it is a "clearly defined and agreed upon starting point, that has been very successful at bringing understanding about the created order." Because it is so clearly defined, it enables to make strong statements about its limits that are obvious to even atheists:

@swamidass

As the non-theist Eugenia Scott of the NSCE correctly explains

Because creationists explain natural phenomena by saying “God performed a miracle,” we tell them that they are not doing science. This is easy to understand. The flip side, though, is that if science is limited by methodological [naturalism] because of our inability to control an omnipotent power’s interference in nature, both “God did it” and “God didn’t do it” fail as scientific statements. Properly understood, the principle of methodological [naturalism] requires neutrality towards God; we cannot say, wearing our scientist hats, whether God does or does not act.
https://ncse.com/religion/science-religion-methodology-humanism

Science is silent on God. Science is silent on miracles. Do not mistake silence, however, for denial. Silence is not absence.

That is its strength. It is a way forward to build common, though limited, understanding of the created order, with a common set of rules that anyone can pick up and use in the context of science. What we do personally is irrelevant. Science does not care what we believe in our hearts. That is its strength, and why it works as a common ground across cultures and religions and politics.

@jrfarris

This is helpful. I am intrigued by your proposal here. I have read the rules, but I am still trying to understand them. It does seem to me that if there are not metaphysically true or representative of the world, then the rules are social constructions devised by the scientific community. Is that an issue? I do not know. I guess I can play along with them in certain contexts and in certain communities.

That is a big part of it. And we do not need to agree with the rules to play by them. We do not have to like the fact that checker pieces stick to one colored square. As long as we stick to those rules when we are playing checkers though, no one cares what we do on the chess board.

It seems to me that not understanding these rules, and unwillingness to play by them if we did, is the root of much avoidable conflict. If I am right, we have a way forward into a new confidence. We could cast a new type of theological voice in a scientific world, that could be understood in science as we find it.