Alvin Plantinga’s new book on Science and Religion is out.

[headheart]

Okay, that's what I thought. Plantinga's books amounts to little more than philosophical gobbledigook. It suggests nothing as a way of correcting the supposed "divide" and offers nothing to get him a seat at the scientific roundtable.

Books such as these are pointless and only serve to keep a clearly useless idea alive by further liberalizing it.

I seldom dismiss a writer/philosophers writings for it's not been the first time that I've found myself eating my words. Peace, Eric

[headheart]

Correction: Everyone except for Craig knows it.

I guess there are evolutionists and evolutionists like there are naturalists and naturalists and ID etc. etc. I changed and I was so hard over to the FC position that when I read back over what I wrote and said it reads like 'garbage' We are all in the business of life and that means we change. Evolve if you like. I'm still not giving ground to reductionists who want to sweep the floor with religion the way that the 4 horseman of new-atheism have envisioned. It's too extreme and fails to take notice of what has come through to us. I'm trying to remain open to both science and religion in the best possible way.

btw. the early part of the book deals with the ideas of these four modern atheists

Peace,
Eric

[Whag]

I seldom dismiss a writer/philosophers writings for it's not been the first time that I've found myself eating my words. Peace, Eric

I'm not really afraid of having to eat my words here. Unless you're aware of some formidable idea that Plantinga came up with, he's easily dismissed as a pseudointellectual con artist. When speaking about religion, Dawkins can be accused of the same thing. Dawkins however can be credited with a large body of work that illuminates the greatest fact of biology. Plantinga only seeks to confuse his audience about that fact. Thanks to his drivel, Kenny and nightbringer are busy defending GOTG as science.

[nightbringer]

There's nobility in recognizing who we are and how we came to discover that. That was through science and not resorting to GOTG.

Do you think that "involving" God in the sciences in any way is always God-of-the-gaps reasoning?

There's nothing noble about philosophers and religionists asking for a seat at the scientific roundtable when they aren't qualified to be there and have nothing to offer in terms of advancing scientific understanding.

Plantinga isn't saying that a priest lacking scientific education should just roll up and tell us how the natural world works.

[Jaecp]

Do you think that "involving" God in the sciences in any way is always God-of-the-gaps reasoning?

In any way? I'm not sure exactly.

In the ways that god has been invoked? Seems like it, any example I can think of off the top of my head of where god was the explanation at one point was either overturned because the god explanation was a baseless assumption or is someone putting forward a current baseless explanation.

God has no explanatory power, basically, when it comes to science. People used to claim god as why stuff happened, we've eventually figured out natural processes for that stuff, and now most people, when it comes to getting practical, usable knowledge, start looking for the natural processes instead of god because, well, thats what works.

[nightbringer]

nightbringer are busy defending GOTG as science.

I refer you to what I said here

"I wasn't out to defend GOTG reasoning. I was just trying to show that the arguments you gave for it not being science weren't very convincing. GOTG, as far as I understand it, probably isn't science."

Please pay proper attention.

Also, even if either myself or Kenny have been defending the scientific status of "GOTG" (and I take it that Kenny thinks there is no good reason not to accord that it status) that doesn't mean we think it is good science. Nobody here has been suggesting that should we take it as good epistemic practise to postulate the existence of God for just any currently unexplained natural phenomenon.

[Whag]

Do you think that "involving" God in the sciences in any way is always God-of-the-gaps reasoning?

Neither you nor anyone here who's read the book has yet explained a concrete example of what "involving God in the sciences" entails (besides extolling the virtues on non-investigation (e.g., Newton's ceasing further investigation of planetary motion). I can only conclude from that and from Plantinga's defense of GOTG in the Discovery Institute article that that's what he means by that particular "involvement."

It's possible I'm missing something, but I doubt it since I asked several times what Plantinga proposes.

Plantinga isn't saying that a priest lacking scientific education should just roll up and tell us how the natural world works.

What's he saying in a nutshell? Let's say he had his way. How would he involve God in scientific investigation?

[nightbringer]

In any way? I'm not sure exactly.

In the ways that god has been invoked? Seems like it, any example I can think of off the top of my head of where god was the explanation at one point was either overturned because the god explanation was a baseless assumption or is someone putting forward a current baseless explanation.

God has no explanatory power, basically, when it comes to science. People used to claim god as why stuff happened, we've eventually figured out natural processes for that stuff, and now most people, when it comes to getting practical, usable knowledge, start looking for the natural processes instead of god because, well, thats what works.

Let's concede that every time God has been invoked in the past to explain some natural phenomenon, it has always, at a later time, been shown that a naturalistic mechanism is at work. Would that entail that God could not be a useful and even correct explanation for some natural phenomenon in the future?

[Whag]

I refer you to what I said here

"I wasn't out to defend GOTG reasoning. I was just trying to show that the arguments you gave for it not being science weren't very convincing. GOTG, as far as I understand it, probably isn't science."

Please pay proper attention.

Also, even if either myself or Kenny have been defending the scientific status of "GOTG" (and I take it that Kenny thinks there is no good reason not to accord that it status) that doesn't mean we think it is good science. Nobody here has been suggesting that should we take it as good epistemic practise to postulate the existence of God for just any currently unexplained natural phenomenon.

I don't understand why it's so important to go to the mat for ID just to convince people it's a science, though a bad one. Is there some deeper point he's trying to make other than saying "it's bad science but at least it's still science, folks!" Let's say I grant you that it's crap science. So? Where to go after that?

[Whag]

Let's concede that every time God has been invoked in the past to explain some natural phenomenon, it has always, at a later time, been shown that a naturalistic mechanism is at work. Would that entail that God could not be a useful and even correct explanation for some natural phenomenon in the future?

Please postulate a phenomenon whose natural origin we haven't yet figured out. It can be any biological or physical phenomenon, and there are plenty. Please then explain how we'd come to the conclusion that it was God and tell us how useful that conclusion would be.

[Jaecp]

Let's concede that every time God has been invoked in the past to explain some natural phenomenon, it has always, at a later time, been shown that a naturalistic mechanism is at work. Would that entail that God could not be a useful and even correct explanation for some natural phenomenon in the future?

Whag's response is similar to what I'd have said, but heres the gist.

We could replace the word god in your query with, literally, anything that has never had any explanatory power.

[nightbringer]

It would have been courteous, Whag, to openly concede that you had misrepresented my position.

Neither you nor anyone here who's read the book has yet explained a concrete example of what "involving God in the sciences" entails (besides extolling the virtues on non-investigation (e.g., Newton's ceasing further investigation of planetary motion). I can only conclude from that and from Plantinga's defense of GOTG in the Discovery Institute article that that's what he means by that particular "involvement."

It's possible I'm missing something, but I doubt it since I asked several times what Plantinga proposes.

What's he saying in a nutshell? Let's say he had his way. How would he involve God in scientific investigation?

Seeing as you haven't read the book perhaps it would be charitable to not run away with the most uncharitable reading of Plantinga's intentions possible. Given that he is a generally respected scholar and not the obscurantist loon you seem so quick to paint him as, perhaps you should take the time to seriously examine what he has to say. I haven't read the book yet either but he has explained some of his views about how theology and science interact in the past which you can easily access. You might want to head here and here. To summarise, he thinks that inferring that God has directly caused something can't be ruled out a priori, that our prior theological commitments (or lack thereof) factor into our overall estimations of the probable truth of a given theory, that they can motivate what we consider to be important to explain, and that they can feature in hypotheses about the world which we can then explore and test. To warn you though, those articles seem to be addressed to Christians first and foremost. So bear in mind that he takes certain things for granted that he wouldn't had he different interlocutors in mind. (Of course, his current thought may have changed since he wrote those articles but they're probably still a good indication of the sort of direction he's orientated toward.)

I don't understand why it's so important to go to the mat for ID just to convince people it's a science, though a bad one. Is there some deeper point he's trying to make other than saying "it's bad science but at least it's still science, folks!" Let's say I grant you that it's crap science. So? Where to go after that?

Well first of all, in the context of the discussion we're having here, holding up a distinction between what is science and what is good science is clearly important for appraising Plantinga's thoughts on science and theology. If we think that when Plantinga says that Newton's invocation of God was science, what he saying is that Newton's method here was epistemically praiseworthy, then we are not going to give Plantinga much respect if we think that Newton's method was plainly not epistemically praiseworthy. But noting that something can properly be science without being epistemically useful (good science), we can see that when Plantinga defends Newton's invocation of God as science, he is not therefore necessarily committed to claimly that doing so was an epistemically commendable thing to do. So we can't make him look silly just by pointing to his defence of Newton in that regard.

Beyond that, as Kenny has alluded to, whether an idea is science or not, even if not important for appraising the truth of that idea, is important for certain political matters. If ID is actually science (good or bad), for instance, one cannot argue against teaching it in a science classroom on the grounds that ID isn't properly science. Of course, there might be other reasons not to teach it (I for one have my own reason why it shouldn't, at least at this stage), but the "it isn't science" objection couldn't factor amongst them.

Please postulate a phenomenon whose natural origin we haven't yet figured out. It can be any biological or physical phenomenon, and there are plenty. Please then explain how we'd come to the conclusion that it was God and tell us how useful that conclusion would be.

You just haven't answered the question. Whether or not we actually have good scientific grounds to infer God as a cause now is completely besides the point of what I was asking. To put the point of my question another way, I'm asking whether the following argument is valid:

1. Every time in the past that God has been appealed to in order to explain some natural phenomenon, that explanation has lated yielded to a naturalistic account.
2. Therefore every time [presently or in the future] that God is appealed to in order to explain some natural phenomenon, that explanation will later yield to a naturalistic account.

It obviously isn't deductively valid. At best, then, you have an inductive/probabilistic argument which clearly admits of the possibility that an appeal to God might not later yield to a naturalistic account.

[nightbringer]

Whag's response is similar to what I'd have said, but heres the gist.

See my response to Whag.

We could replace the word god in your query with, literally, anything that has never had any explanatory power.

You obviously think that to stick to my guns I'd have to gnaw on a bullet here but I don't see it. For one, it clearly can't be the case that for something to be considered as an explanation now, it must have been a useful explanation in the past. If that were so then you could never justifiably appeal to anything novel. Not black holes, nor quarks, nothing. That would plainly destroy science. Perhaps you mean to imply that if something failed to have explanatory power in the past, then we shouldn't consider it now or in the future. But again this is plainly ridiculous. Imagine that prior to the acceptance of black holes into our scientific inventory, some scientist had invoked the idea of a blackhole to explain the movements of a particular nearby galaxy, but this explanation had turned out to be false. Should we then have been motivated not to appeal to the existence of black holes in other areas, even though it seems that black hole are genuinely powerful explanations in these other cases? Of course not. Why couldn't the same happen with God?

Or perhaps you think I would have trouble with the claim that it wouldn't just be God that this logic (good or poor) would apply to. I don't have trouble with that. My whole point is that the principles you seem to be articulating to exclude God rely on generally bad principles.

[Jaecp]

See my response to Whag.

I'll let him respond to that.

You obviously think that to stick to my guns I'd have to gnaw on a bullet here but I don't see it. For one, it clearly can't be the case that for something to be considered as an explanation now, it must have been a useful explanation in the past. If that were so then you could never justifiably appeal to anything novel. Not black holes, nor quarks, nothing. That would plainly destroy science.

Not what I'm getting at, though for new explanations to have merit they need to have explanatory power. Attempts to use god as a reason has, in every instance I've ever seen it used, amounted to "we don't know, therefore it must be god"

Perhaps you mean to imply that if something failed to have explanatory power in the past, then we shouldn't consider it now or in the future. But again this is plainly ridiculous. Imagine that prior to the acceptance of black holes into our scientific inventory, some scientist had invoked the idea of a blackhole to explain the movements of a particular nearby galaxy, but this explanation had turned out to be false. Should we then have been motivated not to appeal to the existence of black holes in other areas, even though it seems that black hole are genuinely powerful explanations in these other cases? Of course not. Why couldn't the same happen with God?

Is there an example of this happening in reality?

Regarding god, how many different things that were once thought to be god actively doing stuff are now understood as natural causes, predictable. It's not a single instance of god-explanation being replaced by natural-explanation, but numerous examples and they are all one way. There hasn't ever been a scientific discovery reversed because of something someone gleaned from a religious text, has there? Especially if we expand this to religion in general, and not just Christianity, we see a pattern of ancient civilizations trying to understand the world and, almost inevitably, anthropomorphizing it. It makes sense that they would. Everything that happens, they see an actor behind. Everything on their level they see has people/animals taking action and causing results. So when it rains they imagine "whose causing that" and, bam, storm god. The shifts from animism to polytheism to monotheism is a consolidation of powers, so to speak.

Even in the black hole example, if black holes had explanatory power, then the scientist would then be beholden to show this, facts, arguments, the whole shebang.

Whenever people have tried to do that with god as having explanatory power, it hasn't panned out.

Or perhaps you think I would have trouble with the claim that it wouldn't just be God that this logic (good or poor) would apply to. I don't have trouble with that. My whole point is that the principles you seem to be articulating to exclude God rely on generally bad principles.

What principles are those?

[headheart]

I'm not really afraid of having to eat my words here. Unless you're aware of some formidable idea that Plantinga came up with, he's easily dismissed as a pseudointellectual con artist. When speaking about religion, Dawkins can be accused of the same thing. Dawkins however can be credited with a large body of work that illuminates the greatest fact of biology. Plantinga only seeks to confuse his audience about that fact. Thanks to his drivel, Kenny and nightbringer are busy defending GOTG as science.

I'm not really here to dismiss Dawkins or Plantinga or any pseudo-intellectual con artists speaking about religion or science. I'm not afraid of having to eat my words though I've witnessed pseudointellectual con artists who are. Plantinga can be credited with a large body of work that illuminates Christian philosophers worldwide and I would not be hasty to pass judgement on anyone who is as well read and peer-reviewed as he is. In much the same way -- even though I do not share in a high view of the Christian sacred texts as the majority of Christians do this does not mean that I'm as ready to dismiss them along with those who apply science to belief the way that I've witnessed it being done by naturalists and devotees of the notorious gang of anti-theists. They are extremely valuable documents and were not conceived in a world like ours. It would be the same as burning war records or ancient battle details. It all plays an integral part in understanding our evolution.
Dr. Lahti presented some very interesting ideas about how religion has evolved and it is a lot more adaptable than most are willing to acknowledge. It's not going to disappear, for as difficult as it is for us to see what lies in deep space or in the most microscopic state it is a million times harder to place a God who it is said 'lives in light unapproachable' and yet has managed to slip under our radar and be a part of every aspect of our existence. The fools who imagine that MRI scans will give us a god-spot or that navigating a seance will convince us that spirits materialize therefore demons from the other side are no less stupid than those who argue against it, for God will not be found or believed unless God wants it so. In a way like the memory wipe of Men in Black, there are ways to approach the Lord that require we dispense of such foolishness and come to the Lord with humbled hearts. To refer to God as 'an all consuming fire' or that .no-one has ever seen the Lord and lived. should be enough for us to realize that no matter how sophisticated we become we will never be able to navigate such a landscape unless God welcomes us. We get flickers as he lets us peep but it is only 'through a glass darkly'

Peace,
Eric.