scholarly journals Allah versus Setan Laplace: Sebuah Usulan Konsep Tindakan Ilahi Khusus yang Trinitarian, Kovenantal dan Saintifik

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-49
Author(s):  
David Alinurdin
Keyword(s):  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Biblical Theology ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
Physical Processes ◽  
Natural Processes ◽  
Contemporary Science ◽  
Action Project ◽  
Science And Theology ◽  
The Universe

Dalam dekade terakhir, interaksi sains dan teologi dalam upaya membangun konsep tindakan ilahi di dalam dunia natural telah sampai pada satu kesimpulan untuk mencari titik temu kausal di mana Allah Pencipta yang transenden dan nonfisik dapat bertindak di dalam proses-proses natural yang terjadi di dalam dunia ciptaan. Sebuah gerakan akademis yang diakui kredibilitasnya dalam usaha menemukan titik temu kausal dengan cara-cara baru yang memasukkan penafsiran filosofis dari sains kekinian ke dalam teologi adalah Divine Action Project (DAP), yang merumuskan sebuah teori tindakan ilahi yang disebut NIODA (Noninterventionist Objective Divine Action). NIODA berusaha mencari lokus tindakan ilahi khusus yang tidak bertentangan dengan hukum alam yaitu di dalam proses-proses fisik yang dapat ditafsirkan sebagai indeterminisme secara ontologis, seperti mekanika kuantum. Tulisan ini akan mengkaji asumsi-asumsi filosofis di balik NIODA dan memperlihatkan bahwa konsep ini dapat diterima secara saintifik namun tidak memadai secara teologis karena masih terikat dengan asumsi Laplace warisan zaman pencerahan yang menganggap alam semesta ini tertutup secara kausal bagi tindakan ilahi. Karena itu, di bagian terakhir, tulisan ini juga akan mengusulkan beberapa poin penting dalam upaya membangun sebuah konsep tindakan ilahi yang memadai secara teologis maupun saintifik, yang dibangun di atas fondasi teologi penciptaan yang trinitarian dan kovenantal. In the last decade, the interaction between science and theology in the effort to develop the concept of divine action in the natural world has come to a conclusion to find a causal joint where transcendent and nonphysical Creator God can act in natural processes that occur in the world of creation. An academic movement whose credibility has been recognized in its efforts to find a causal joint in new ways that incorporate philosophical interpretations of contemporary science into theology is the Divine Action Project (DAP), which formulates a concept of divine action called NIODA (Noninterventionist Objective Divine Action). NIODA seeks to find a locus of special divine action that does not conflict with laws of nature in physical processes that can be interpreted as ontological indeterminism, such as quantum mechanics. This paper will examine the philosophical assumptions behind NIODA and show that this concept is scientifically acceptable but not theologically adequate because it is still bound by Laplace's assumption of the enlightenment's legacy which considers the universe to be causally closed to divine action. Therefore, in the last part, this paper will also propose several important points in the effort to develop a concept of special divine action that is both theologically and scientifically adequate, built on the basis of a trinitarian and covenantal biblical theology of creation.

William R. Stoeger. The laws of nature, The Range of Human Knowledge And Divine Action [Prawa natury, zakres ludzkiej wiedzy i Boże działanie]

1970 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 285-288
Author(s):  
Jacek Poznański
Keyword(s):  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
Associate Professor ◽  
The Other ◽  
Human Knowledge ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
University Of Arizona ◽  
Theology And Science ◽  
History Of ◽  
Points Of View ◽  
Science And Theology

Can science, theology and spirituality cooperate with each other? Moreover, can each of them help the other to understand reality? Is it possible to create a coherent view of our world emerging from such different points of view? Some theologians, well-educated both in theology and science and aware of questions that arose in the history of relations between science and theology, have tried to build such consistent views. Among them is William R. Stoeger, Staff Astrophysicist and Adjunct Associate Professor, member of Vatican Observatory Research Group, Steward Observatory, University of Arizona, Tucson.

scholarly journals From Divine Action to Divine Presence: The Next Step in an Integrated Cosmology of Science and Theology

Lumen et Vita ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Brodrick
Keyword(s):  
Modern Science ◽  
Social Imaginary ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
Simultaneous Presence ◽  
Divine Presence ◽  
The Social ◽  
Theological Discourse ◽  
Science And Theology ◽  
Narrative Framework ◽  
The Universe

One of the challenges facing contemporary theologians has been an increasingly perceived rift between the disciplines of theology and scientific cosmology.  A common narrative maintains that the incompatibility of these disciplines is a result of the rise of modern science during which the doctrinal claims of theology as they relate to our understanding of the universe as a whole were disproven.  Within this narrative framework, theology is reduced to issues of human experience and moral life.  In contrast to this myth, this paper establishes the claim that the perceived rift between theology and cosmology is not merely due to the advances of modern science but also to particular philosophical and theological developments in the realms of epistemology and the social imaginary.  Furthermore, the author suggests that these sources of the exclusion of cosmology from theological discourse indicate a need for the development of an Irenaean cosmological framework in which the Eucharistic tension between the simultaneous presence and absence of Christ is upheld.

scholarly journals A Cause Among Causes? God Acting in the Natural World

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 99-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ignacio Silva
Keyword(s):  
Quantum Mechanics ◽  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Thomas Aquinas ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
Interpretations Of Quantum Mechanics ◽  
Secondary Causes

Contemporary debates on divine action tend to focus on finding a space in nature where there would be no natural causes, where nature offers indeterminacy, openness, and potentiality, to place God’s action. These places are found through the natural sciences, in particular quantum mechanics. God’s action is then located in those ontological ‘causal-gaps’ offered by certain interpretations of quantum mechanics. In this view, God would determine what is left underdetermined in nature without disrupting the laws of nature. These contemporary proposals evidence at least two unexamined assumptions, which frame the discussion in such a way that they portray God as acting as a secondary cause or a ‘cause among causes’. God is somewhat required to act within these ‘gaps’, binding God to the laws of nature, and placing God’s action at the level of secondary causes. I suggest that understanding God’s action, following Thomas Aquinas, in terms of primary and secondary causation could help dissolve this difficulty. Aquinas moves away from this objection by suggesting to speak of an analogical notion of cause, allowing for an analogical understanding of God’s causality in nature. With a radically different understanding of the interplay between secondary causes and God, Aquinas manages to avoid conceiving God as a cause among causes, keeping the distinctive transcendent character of God’s causality safe from objections.

New Organs of Perception

Janus Head ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-126
Author(s):  
Brent Dean Robbins ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Natural World ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Human Sciences ◽  
Aesthetic Appreciation ◽  
Contemporary Science ◽  
Alternative Approach ◽  
The World ◽  
Holistic Conception ◽  
The Universe ◽  
Scientific Framework

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's approach to science is a radical departure from the Cartesian-Newtonian scientific framework and offers contemporary science a pathway toward the cultivation of an alternative approach to the study of the natural world. This paper argues that the Cartesian-Newtonian pathway is pathological because it has as its premise humanity's alienation from the natural world, which sets up a host of consequences that terminate in nihilism. As an alternative approach to science, Goethe's "delicate empiricism" begins with the premise that humanity is fundamentally at home in the world: a notion which forms the basis for a Goethean science that gives primacy to perception, offers a more organic and holistic conception of the universe, and has as its goal the cultivation of aesthetic appreciation and morally responsive obligation to the observed. As an antidote to nihilism and as the basis for a more fulfilling and morally responsive science, Goethean science may serve as a kind of cultural therapeutics, a project which is necessarily interdisciplinary since it requires the integration of multiple ways of seeing from the natural sciences, the human sciences, and the humanities.

Imaginings

2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 17-30
Author(s):  
Kelly James Clark
Keyword(s):  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Fine Tuning ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
First Order ◽  
Natural Processes ◽  
Empirically Supported ◽  
Group Violence ◽  
The World ◽  
The Universe

In Branden Thornhill-Miller and Peter Millican’s challenging and provocative essay, we hear a considerably longer, more scholarly and less melodic rendition of John Lennon’s catchy tune—without religion, or at least without first-order supernaturalisms (the kinds of religion we find in the world), there’d be significantly less intra-group violence. First-order supernaturalist beliefs, as defined by Thornhill-Miller and Peter Millican (hereafter M&M), are “beliefs that claim unique authority for some particular religious tradition in preference to all others” (3). According to M&M, first-order supernaturalist beliefs are exclusivist, dogmatic, empirically unsupported, and irrational. Moreover, again according to M&M, we have perfectly natural explanations of the causes that underlie such beliefs (they seem to conceive of such natural explanations as debunking explanations). They then make a case for second-order supernaturalism, “which maintains that the universe in general, and the religious sensitivities of humanity in particular, have been formed by supernatural powers working through natural processes” (3). Second-order supernaturalism is a kind of theism, more closely akin to deism than, say, Christianity or Buddhism. It is, as such, universal (according to contemporary psychology of religion), empirically supported (according to philosophy in the form of the Fine-Tuning Argument), and beneficial (and so justified pragmatically). With respect to its pragmatic value, second-order supernaturalism, according to M&M, gets the good(s) of religion (cooperation, trust, etc) without its bad(s) (conflict and violence). Second-order supernaturalism is thus rational (and possibly true) and inconducive to violence. In this paper, I will examine just one small but important part of M&M’s argument: the claim that (first-order) religion is a primary motivator of violence and that its elimination would eliminate or curtail a great deal of violence in the world. Imagine, they say, no religion, too.Janusz Salamon offers a friendly extension or clarification of M&M’s second-order theism, one that I think, with emendations, has promise. He argues that the core of first-order religions, the belief that Ultimate Reality is the Ultimate Good (agatheism), is rational (agreeing that their particular claims are not) and, if widely conceded and endorsed by adherents of first-order religions, would reduce conflict in the world.While I favor the virtue of intellectual humility endorsed in both papers, I will argue contra M&M that (a) belief in first-order religion is not a primary motivator of conflict and violence (and so eliminating first-order religion won’t reduce violence). Second, partly contra Salamon, who I think is half right (but not half wrong), I will argue that (b) the religious resources for compassion can and should come from within both the particular (often exclusivist) and the universal (agatheistic) aspects of religious beliefs. Finally, I will argue that (c) both are guilty, as I am, of the philosopher’s obsession with belief. 

Laws of Nature

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Scientific Theories ◽  
Law Of Nature ◽  
First Time ◽  
The Universe

The concept of a law of nature, while familiar, is deeply puzzling. Theorists such as Descartes think a divine being governs the universe according to the laws which follow from that being’s own nature. Newton detaches the concept from theology and is agnostic about the ontology underlying the laws of nature. Some later philosophers treat laws as summaries of events or tools for understanding and explanation, or identify the laws with principles and equations fundamental to scientific theories. In the first part of this volume, essays from leading historians of philosophy identify central questions: are laws independent of the things they govern, or do they emanate from the powers of bodies? Are the laws responsible for the patterns we see in nature, or should they be collapsed into those patterns? In the second part, contributors at the forefront of current debate evaluate the role of laws in contemporary Best System, perspectival, Kantian, and powers- or mechanisms-based approaches. These essays take up pressing questions about whether the laws of nature can be consistent with contingency, whether laws are based on the invariants of scientific theories, and how to deal with exceptions to laws. These twelve essays, published here for the first time, will be required reading for anyone interested in metaphysics, philosophy of science, and the histories of these disciplines.

Entering the Whirlwind

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
William J. Abraham
Keyword(s):  
Full Range ◽  
Biblical Theology ◽  
Divine Action ◽  
Divine Activity ◽  
Biblical Language ◽  
The 1960S

In the 1960s, Langdon Gilkey raised several philosophical issues regarding divine action in his paper “Cosmology, Ontology, and the Travail of Biblical Language.” This chapter engages Gilkey’s paper, and argues that philosophy can be applied to the initial efforts to deal with divine action in the debate which erupted in the wake of the Biblical Theology Movement that followed Gilkey’s paper. Enthusiastic advocates of divine action in the movement were attacked for failing to attend to the full range of divine action. This chapter indicates how and why efforts to develop a robust vision of divine action in the Biblical Theology Movement fell apart. The author focuses on the specific difficulties in the Biblical Theology Movement with respect to its claims about divine action, and positions this debate in a way that highlights the broad range of divine activity that anyone interested in divine action must attend to going forward.

scholarly journals Time and Life in the Relational Universe: Prolegomena to an Integral Paradigm of Natural Philosophy

Philosophies ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 30 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abir Igamberdiev
Keyword(s):  
Probability Function ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Spatiotemporal Structure ◽  
Internal Logic ◽  
Decision Making System ◽  
Relational Domains ◽  
Relational Order ◽  
Infinite Set ◽  
The Universe

Relational ideas for our description of the natural world can be traced to the concept of Anaxagoras on the multiplicity of basic particles, later called “homoiomeroi” by Aristotle, that constitute the Universe and have the same nature as the whole world. Leibniz viewed the Universe as an infinite set of embodied logical essences called monads, which possess inner view, compute their own programs and perform mathematical transformations of their qualities, independently of all other monads. In this paradigm, space appears as a relational order of co-existences and time as a relational order of sequences. The relational paradigm was recognized in physics as a dependence of the spatiotemporal structure and its actualization on the observer. In the foundations of mathematics, the basic logical principles are united with the basic geometrical principles that are generic to the unfolding of internal logic. These principles appear as universal topological structures (“geometric atoms”) shaping the world. The decision-making system performs internal quantum reduction which is described by external observers via the probability function. In biology, individual systems operate as separate relational domains. The wave function superposition is restricted within a single domain and does not expand outside it, which corresponds to the statement of Leibniz that “monads have no windows”.

A Reading of Westcott's Gospel of Creation: An Early Venture into Ecological Theology?

2013 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 185-202
Author(s):  
Duncan Reid
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Ecological Theology ◽  
Late Twentieth ◽  
Science And Theology ◽  
Doctrine Of Creation ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Late Twentieth Century

AbstractIn response to the contemporary ecological movement, ecological perspectives have become a significant theme in the theology of creation. This paper asks whether antecedents to this growing significance might predate the concerns of our times and be discernible within the diverse interests of nineteenth-century Anglican thinking. The means used here to examine this possibility is a close reading of B. F. Westcott's ‘Gospel of Creation’. This will be contextualized in two directions: first with reference to the understanding of the natural world in nineteenth-century English popular thought, and secondly with reference to the approach taken to the doctrine of creation by three late twentieth-century Anglican writers, two concerned with the relationship between science and theology in general, and a third concerned more specifically with ecology.

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