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Monday, April 21, 2008

On the Revelation of Jesus Christ and Natural Theology

How ironic that Eric should post a blog on Natural Theology just as I was deciding to do likewise. Rather than responding to Eric in the comments section of his blog I have decided to go ahead and post my blog.

I take the point of Eric (I think) that the term 'Natural Theology' is a bit of a misnomer. The abuses of ignorant atheists and biblical compromisers is insufficient cause to abandon the term but the more I read and understand about the Person of Jesus Christ in His Creation I am increasingly inclined to bring that which has been called 'Natural Theology' under the heading of 'Revelation of Jesus Christ'. That said, I now proceed with a blog and I expect to be posting more on the subject in the future.

We have much to be indebted to our Lord for, not the least being his gifting His Church with some giants whose legacy lives on well beyond their passing from this world. One of the giants has been spoken of elsewhere on this site and I wish to quote him in this blog and invite comment on his proposition. I refer to the late Professor A.E. Wilder-Smith, a man who had three (3) earned Doctorates. He was a Biochemist and among many other credits was an accomplished debater of Naturalists. Perhaps the thing that impresses me most about him is his predictions made twenty or more years ago concerning scientific discovery and applications which are being realised today.

For this blog I quote an extract from his book "The Creation of Life - a cybernetic approach to evolution." I quote from pages 227 to 229 of the third printing (1981) of the book first published in 1970. Having dealt with the inadequacies of (a) the Naturalistic explanation of matter possessing some inherent psychic property urging it up to life, and (b) the emergence of life on earth by an extra-terrestrial intelligence, he proceeds to expound the merit of a third option.

"Of the third account, that the substrate of the first-cause intelligence must be sought in the supramaterial, there is evidence. The fact that materialistic, physical sciences have missed finding such intelligence with physical means is surely proof of its transcendental nature. It is only by reasoning, logic and mathematics, that the gap in purely materialistic Darwinian randomness has shown up.

One cannot see, physically speaking, the intelligent energy that goes into the working out of a vitamin C synthesis. Nor can one physically see the intellectual effort that goes into a suspension-bridge blueprint. Yet no scientist would ever deny the presence of intellectual effort just because he cannot physically see it. He measures it, in so many man-hours to do so much blueprinting and so many man-hours to realize the blueprint in actual tons of suspension[-]bridge. He knows how to measure the work involved in both the encoding process and the decoding or realization (reading), process.

If this is so, why should there be difficulty in accounting for the basic encoding process by which the blueprint for life was drawn up at archebiopoesis or the beginning of life? Or why should there be difficulty about explaining the decoding process by which life is realized by growth regulated by the code on the material genes? In experimental everyday life, both coding and decoding are simply and boldly explained in terms of intelligent man-hours. Obviously then, there should be no difficulty either about the same basic processes in the origin and realization of life. The principles behind both are identical, even though their scale of operation may vary a trifle!

Thus the assumption of intelligence to account for origins and maintenance (or realization) of life, does not present any real difficulties of principle. Whether the intelligence is artificial, biological or even transmaterial does not offer any real impediment to theory. If we have no difficulties in using this same assumption of intelligence when dealing with pattern construction in the laboratory and industry, why should we ba[u]lk at the same assumption when we transfer our field of inquiry to the much grander scale of the universe and its patterns and codes, especially to the code we know as life?

The same principle applies to the patterns and codes behind atoms with their electron orbits (which decide the patterns of their chemical properties). The chemical patterns on DNA spirals, in their turn, decide the patterns and codes behind the genes and their outworkings in various morphological, physiological and metabolic codes. Each code and pattern gives rise to another, but they all revert, eventually, in their origin, to the grand code and pattern-maker known as intelligence.

The difficulties incurred in denying intelligence as the basis of code-order realization are certainly greater than those of assuming intelligence as the author. One is always finally reduced to assuming that randomness gave spontaneous birth to order (the Darwinian position) which amounts to a denial of the laws of thermodynamics and indeed all laws - for randomness is not subject to laws. [emphasis mine]. But to get around and to avoid the necessity of assuming exogenous intelligence (or Deity), scientists have been willing to commit even this type of scientific hara-kari, for to deny law is to kill all science.

If, on the other hand, we assume an intelligence behind the codes and order of the universe, we are more or less inevitably forced to assume the position described by our third postulate - that this intelligence must be transmaterial or transcendent. This position has the great advantage of destroying that old bugbear of the past which has hindered so many intellectuals in dealing with the Christian position - an anthropomorphic deity, and 'old man in the sky'. The intelligence we are talking about is ineffable, supreme, supramaterial and time-transcending. [emphasis mine]

Thus an intellectual stumbling block which has long stood in the way of intellectuals and kept them from believing in a supreme intelligence has been removed in principle by progress in cybernetic science , since it has been shown that intelligence is no longer bound to human biological substrates. Perhaps it may some day be shown that thought and intelligence, even in the laboratory, are not even bound to electrical phenomena; that they are both the activities of 'spirit'. For the Holy Book assures us that God is 'spirit' and that they that worship him must do so in 'spirit and in truth'." [emphasis mine].

Professor Wilder-Smith then went on to explain why William Paley's book 'Natural Theology' for a while held sway in intellectual thought but later succumbed to Darwinism. Professor Wilder-Smith then demonstrates advances in 'Information Science' which have since exposed the paucity of the Darwinian argument.

Now, it goes without saying that a theistic evolution position, being a corrupt hybrid position resorted to by a Church retreating with haste from the battlefront, has no place where the valid contenders for intellectual thought 'square-up'.

In light of the case presented by Professor Wilder-Smith, I find myself compelled to explore, with much caution and therefore requiring guidance from intelligent people, the revelation of Jesus Christ in the coding for all things in creation - for what do the Biblical passages "In the beginning was the Word [or as Professor Wilder-Smith says elsewhere - 'logos or concept'] and the Word was with God and the Word was God' (John 1:1) and "He is before all things, and in him all things hold together." (Colossians 1:17) and "For since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." ( Romans 1:20) mean in the light of our more recent understanding of genetic coding (non-matter) of DNA (matter) and patterns and coding (non-matter) of atoms (matter)?

The answer to such a question is not found in Pantheism for it is clear that the encoder or source of the code is also exogenous to the code carrier.

I may soon have to abandon this pursuit because a respondent may point out a potential heresy. I don't want to pursue a heresy. On the other hand the potential to know our Lord Jesus Christ more intimately, He being closer to us than hitherto recognised, is advantageous over smouldering and not yet extinguished Deism in Sydney Anglicanism.

Could it be that in this proposition a more meaningful explanation is given for the premature death of an 'innocent' child in that the Lord Himself suffers in the cessation of the code for life in that infant? Our Lord Jesus Christ felt 'power' go out from Him for healing when touched by the woman with the bleeding complaint (Mark 5:30) perhaps he feels something of the injury or cessation of life.

What is involved in the "giving up the spirit' when someone dies? What is the distinction between the coding of the 'animate and the inanimate'?

There are many other Biblical statements, events and doctrines against which this concept for the order of life has to be measured. It has a long way to go. One thing that seems to fit is that the miracles of the Incarnate Son of God need not have occurred with the necessity of spoken words. Only thought was necessary to produce the outcome. The words were spoken only to let the audience know through whom the miracle came to pass.

I invite comments.

Neil Moore

9 comments:

sam drucker said...

As I understand it Neil, you are suggesting the possibility of the spirit we have as humans is of the Spirit of Christ. Is that correct? If so, what then of the Spirit of Christ we receive upon becoming Christian?

Sam

Eric said...

Neil, thanks for the thoughts. I'll read through and discuss (... sometime!).

Eric said...

The idea of randomness being able to produce anything gets a lot of airplay these days. But not so, random action is constrained by what is first possible, not what might be impossible. The random does not bring the impossible to fruition.

neil moore said...

Sam and Eric, I must stress I am feeling my way in this and very much prepared to be rebuked where necessary.

My thoughts so far bring me to an understanding that the coding present in the creation, being non material, may be a 'thought' (and constancy of thought) from our Creator. If it is non material then my inclination is to think spiritual. Perhaps our concept of what is 'spirit' needs some reworking because we may have constrained it. Anyway, God is spirit and may have imparted something of himself into the creation which remains constantly of himself while struggling with consequences of the Fall. God has revealed Himself to the creation in three Persons. Perhaps this was necessary in anticipation of the Fall or it may be eternal - I don't know. Activity of Holy Spirit is, historically, expressed in more demonstrable or functional ways viz at Pentecost, at the time of our conversion and onwards and then in times of revival in the Church (Pentecostlike events). Perhaps our coding is a spiritual activity of God through Jesus Christ and our time of being born again is another spiritual activity of God through Jesus Christ which we understand to be reception of Holy Spirit.

Still working my way through it all and, as I have said, am prepared for correction.

Neil Moore

sam drucker said...

Thanks Neil. I think I've grasped where you are coming from. I'll think about it and let you know what I think later.

Cheers,
Sam

Critias said...

I like the idea of the 'code' being immaterial. It is. The language system in DNA is not material, but uses material to do its work. The language is maybe not immaterial, but supramaterial: carried on, but not caused by material. Is this the line you are on?
Check the post from Confessing Reader that I looked at: I commented on both blogs the same thing. Maybe it touches on this idea too.

neil moore said...

Critias, yes, supramaterial if defined as beyond or above matter and not the produce of matter but, rather, the producer of matter.

I am further intrigued by Professor A. E. Wilder-Smith's agreement with Mathematician, Sir James Jean's assertion in the latter's 1930 book "The Mysterious Universe" that "we cannot avoid the evidence that the universe exists in the matrix of controlling thought and consciousness and that this thought is in some ways like our own" and "man's mind and its functioning resemble the functioning of Mind behind reality far too closely to be accidental" and "Mind is eventually behind every code, both its conception and its reception."

Doesn't that fit very nicely with "You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being."? (Rev. 4:11)

I will check out the link you refer to.

Neil Moore

Warwick said...

Last September, as I may have mentioned before, I spoke at two creation conferences with Dr Werner Gitt whose speciality is information theory. In his first talk he discussed man-made creatures, spider-like, which walk. All the material from which they are made is useless without the information which is stored upon a chip. He pointed out that if the chip is wiped clean of information absolutely no weight loss occurs. This demonstrates that information is not material, nor is it the product of material. His main point being aimed at the evolutionist, who are of course materialists, asking where did information come from as it isn't a product of matter? It is obviously something totally separate from matter and imposed upon matter. Who did this?

In all his talks, including universities worldwide, no one has been able to suggest how information can arise in a materialistic scenario. Werner proposes it must have come from God, and his listeners have never been unable to make a contrary proposal. Despite their inability many admited they were unwilling to accept such a religious solution. Shades of Lewontin a professor of genetics and a fierce neo-darwinist who openly admitted that he had an absolute committment to materialism, not because of good evidence but because 'we cannot allow a divine foot in the door.' From 'Billions & Billions of Demons', The New York Review of Books, January 9, 1997, p.31. I begrudgingly admire Lewontin as he has the honesty to admit his prejudice.

Conversely I do not admire those theistic evolutionists who reinterpret Genesis through a long-ages evolutionary mind-set while denying they are doing so. I have found many of them (both here and on the US website I frequent) to be very evasive.

When someone tells me he can see no connection between the 6 days of creation and one of rest in Genesis and the same in the 10 Commandmennts I realize that it isn't that they cannot see the connection but wont see it because they cannot allow a 6-day ‘foot in the door’ because it begins to undermine their non-Biblical starting point. They are very angry with people who challenge them on this point because it plainly exposes their compromise.

I am convinced many of those Christians who promote the long-ages evolutionary belief are genuine Christians who have been conned into accepting the truth of evolution and so feel the need to compromise so to not seem foolish in the eyes of the secularists. The thinking being-as evolution/long-ages is a fact how do we fit this into Scripture? The sad fact is that it cannot be done and the attempt has launched the SAD onto the path to liberalism Is it too late to change? I would pray not.

neil moore said...

Thank you Warwick, for your helpful comments. Werner Gitt's observation of the non-material nature of information is helpful. I will look again at his work.

Neil Moore