Ed Feser's Reply to Torley and Cudworth

Ed Feser has posted his reply to Torley and Cudworth. I think this post brings a great deal of clarity to the debate and is very helpful. In fact, I think it shows that there is no fundamental disagreement between A-T philosophy and ID theory. The comment I put in his combox:

Prof. Feser,

I think this post brings a great deal of clarity to the debate, and I think it shows that there does not need to be a fundamental disagreement between A-T philosophy and ID theory. My guess is that if Dembski reads this post, he will agree with what you have said, and correct or clarify his own statements regarding the incompatibility between Aristotelianism and ID. But if I'm mistaken about Dembski, then I would agree with you that Dembski's form of ID is philosophically and theologically problematic. But let's get down to details. You write:

"For something to be an “artifact” in the Aristotelian sense, it is also necessary that its parts have no immanent tendency to function together as a whole, and this is not true of corn any more than it is true of the various dog breeds or of human infants, while it is true of a hammock or of the other examples of artifacts."

Agreed!!! It is patently obvious that the parts of living organisms have an immanent tendency to function together as a whole. I think Dembski would agree with this. If he doesn't then he's mistaken. However, I don't think this is what he meant by referring to living things as artifacts. What I think he meant is that it was exceedingly unlikely that the parts could be brought together and in the right order so that they could then function together as a whole. So unlikely, that a reasonable person would infer that an agent must have brought the parts together and in the right order.

"In the case of a snake or a strand of DNA, for example, there is for A-T simply no such thing as a natural substance which somehow has all the material and behavioral properties of a snake or a strand of DNA and yet still lacks the “information content” or teleological features typical of snakes or DNA. And so, when God makes a snake or a strand of DNA, He doesn’t first make an otherwise “information-free” or teleology-free material structure and then “impart” some information or final causality to it, as if carrying out the second stage in a two-stage process."

Agreed!!! And this provides the answer to Mr. Green's question about the robocow. If a robocow has all the identical parts, arranged in the right way, of a living cow, then it is not a robocow. It is a living cow.

Now whether the living cow evolved from a different kind of animal, without the need of an agent imparting additional information, or whether it evolved with an agent imparting additional information, or whether it had to be specially created is a separate question.

So I see no fundamental disagreement between A-T philosophy and ID. Only, perhaps, between Dembski's version of ID. Let's hope he replies. I'm betting he will correct or clarify his position.

Mike Gene Catches PZ Skimmy-dipping

Go here if you want a good laugh. And PZ also doesn't understand Mike Gene's front-loading hypothesis, which is what you expect from a skimmer.

The Usual Muddle

I was hoping for clarity from Prof. Feser, so that I would finally understand his objections to ID. Instead it was the usual muddle. In answer to a question from Vincent Torley he wrote:

"2. Forming a man from the dust of the ground involves causing the prime matter which had the substantial form of dust to take on instead the substantial form of a man. I'm not sure what "sequence of steps" you have in mind. There's no sequence involved (nor any super-engineering -- God is above such trivia). It's just God "saying," as it were: "Dust, become a man." And boom, you've got your man.

So it seems that Feser is willing to admit that God caused a pre-existing prime matter that had once substantial form to take on a different substantial form. How exactly is this different from the IDists claim that agency was needed for non-living matter to become living matter?

I grow weary of Feser's inability to deal with this issue. I think he's just afraid to admit that he's wrong about anything.

Ed Feser continues his argument against ID

I don't have time to read the whole essay, today, but I will, with the hope that Prof. Feser will finally make clear his objections to ID, which, in my opinion, he has failed to do so far.

A 2nd Example of Lewis using Science in his Apologetics

This one comes from his book, Miracles; a Preliminary Study. He begins his third chapter, "The Cardinal Difficulty of Naturalism,"

... by Naturalism we mean the doctrine that only Nature -- the whole interlocked system -- exists. And if that were true, every thing and event would, if we knew enough, be explicable without remainder (no heel-taps) as a necessary product of the system....
One threat against strict Naturalism has recently been launched on which I myself will base no argument, but which it will be well to notice....Some modern scientists seem to think...that the individual unit of matter (it would be rash to call it any longer a 'particle') moves in an indeterminate or random fashion; moves, in fact, 'on its own' or 'of its own accord.'...Now it will be noticed that if this theory is true we have really admitted something other than Nature. It would be, indeed, too great a shock to our habits to describe them as super-natural. I think we should have to call them sub-natural. But all our confidence that Nature has no doors, and no reality outside herself for doors to open on, would have disappeared. There is apparently something outside her, the Subnatural; it is indeed from this Subnatural that all events and all 'bodies' are, as it were, fed into her. And clearly if she thus has a back door opening on the Subnatural, it is quite on the cards that she may also have a front door opening on the Supernatural -- and events might be fed into her at that door too.
I have mentioned this theory because it puts in a fairly vivid light certain conceptions which we shall have to use later on. But I am not, for my own part, assuming its truth. Those who like myself have had a philosophical rather than a scientific education find it almost impossible to believe that the scientists really mean what they seem to be saying. I cannot help thinking they mean no more than that the movements of individual units are permanently incalculable to us, not that they are in themselves random and lawless. And even if they mean the latter, a layman can hardly feel any certainty that some new scientific development may not tomorrow abolish this whole idea of a lawless Subnature. For it is the glory of science to progress. [Emphasis mine] I therefore turn willingly to other ground.

Notice that Lewis has made it clear that he will not base his apologetics on science, since science can change, but for those who accept the "truths" of science, clearly it can pose serious challenges to metaphysical positions, in this case Naturalism.

Well, if it can pose challenges to metaphysical positions, then there's no reason to think it cannot provide support for metaphysical positions. Thus we saw previously that Lewis thought scientific evidence provided support for the Christian doctrine that the universe had a beginning.

So there is no reason why Lewis would necessarily reject evidence of Intelligent Design as being unable to provide evidence that supports a Theistic worldview.

Next time we'll consider what Lewis would have thought about the "God-of-the Gaps" argument.

An Example of C.S. Lewis Using Science in his Apologetics

From his essay, "Dogma and the Universe," in his book, God in the Dock:

"...I would like to clear up certain points about the actual relations between Christian doctrine and the scientific knowledge we already have. That is a different matter from the continual growth of knowledge we imagine, whether rightly or wrongly, in the future and which, as some think, is bound to defeat us in the end.

"In one respect, as many Christians have noticed, contemporary science has recently come into line with Christian doctrine, and parted company with the classical forms of materialism. If anything emerges clearly from modern physics, it is that nature is not everlasting. The universe had a beginning, and will have an end. But the great materialistic systems of the past all believed in the eternity, and thence in the self-existence of matter. As Professor Whittaker said in the Riddell Lectures of 1942, 'It was never possible to oppose seriously the dogma of the Creation except by maintaining that the world has existed from all eternity in more or less its present state.' This fundamental ground for materialism has now been withdrawn. We should not lean too heavily on this, for scientific theories change. But at the moment it appears that the burden of proof rests, not on us, but on those who deny that nature has some cause beyond herself."

Notice how Lewis briefly mentions a scientific discovery (the universe had a beginning) in order to score a point for Christianity. But then he advises us not to "lean too heavily on this, for scientific theories change."

So yes, Lewis has no problem using science to support his apologetics. But he never made it the major part of his argument and always cautions that science can change.

So would Lewis have used ID arguments in his apologetics? Since ID is still very controversial, Lewis would have been even more cautious, but I have no doubt that in the right context he would have referred to them.

That's "Brouhaha"

For people who don't know how to spell it. By the way, it comes from French. I think it's the best word they ever invented. I wonder how they pronounce it.