Openness in creation

In a recent post, I used this quote from Jeremy Begbie:

... humans are not automatons, bound by iron necessity to their environment, but exercise a freedom, an openness that God has granted them. And this itself can be set in a wider context, for such freedom, presuming it is not an illusion, is part of and testifies to the openness with which God has endowed his entire creation.

I want to come back to this and push it in a different direction.

I posted a while ago with the idea of viewing creation as responding to the God's call. That God's acting in creation can be thought of as a call/summons to the created order. I think this metaphor fits nicely with Begbie's observation of openness in creation. Perhaps we can suggest that one characteristic of calling is a level of indeterminacy. Creation is called to a goal, but is not constrained along a particular route. There are aspects of order -- the call must be obeyed -- and aspects of freedom -- the way it is obeyed is flexible.

Again, this links in with another quote discussed previously, this time from Lawrence Osborn:

True, the creative commands set limit upon creaturely existence -- the impose order upon the formlessness and void. But, at the same time, they hold out the possibility of tremendous variety in the unfolding of creation within those limits.

maths and creating

It's an on-going debate as to whether maths is discovered or created. I was wondering today if we can find a middle way between these. The sketch of the idea is this...

In his book Resounding Truth, Jeremy Begbie emphasises that creation has a flexible order -- there is structure but in our development of the world we are not tightly bound to that structure. Primarily thinking about music, he puts it like this:

Before leaving the issue of the givenness of sonic order, we should ... remind ourselves that it is not to be understood in inflexible ways. For ... we are able to shape it. This itself points to the fact that humans are not automatons, bound by iron necessity to their environment, but exercise a freedom, an openness that God has granted them. And this itself can be set in a wider context, for such freedom, presuming it is not an illusion, is part of and testifies to the openness with which God has endowed his entire creation.

So, perhaps we can put it this way: Maths both discovers and develops the order that God has embedded in creation. It reflects the glory of God that we see order and can follow the consequences of that order in ways that demonstrate richness and beauty. But, also, we are not constrained by that order. We have the freedom to develop it in new directions. So, for example, we can imagine what the world might be like if it had 11 dimensions instead of 4 and we are free to pursue that and discover the consequences of our conjecture. In some sense, we develop the order beyond what is intrinsically given.

Again, in Begbie's words:

We are called not only to discover and respect but also to develop. To be an image bearer of the God who himself develops created realities, improvising through his Spirit freely on the given order as he draws things towards their goal, means we will find ourselves bringing about new entities in the world by selecting, re-forming, combining what we are given. We take cocoa pods and transform them into chocolate; we take blues bass and improvise somthing never heard before. However small our patch of creativity, we are to enable creation to find fresh, perhaps even richer forms.

Smolin on characterising science

At the end of The Trouble with Physics, Lee Smolin discusses the character of science. What fascinated me is that he picked out (at least in name) two aspects that I've proposed here: namely science as an monastic/ethical and imaginative community.

Let's drop in a couple of quotes here and, hopefully, come back and discuss the two ideas again in the future.

So, for the first aspect:

Now that we have put science in its proper context, we can turn to the question of why it works so well. I believe the answer is simple: Science has succeeded because scientists comprise a community that is defined and maintained by adherence to a shared ethic. It is adherence to an ethic, not adherence to any particular fact or theory, that I believe serves as the fundamental corrective within the scientific community.

Of course, you then have to define the ethic. I'll leave that as a cliff-hanger and come back to it ;-)

Smolin clarifies this by going on to say

I would call this kind of community, in which membership is defined by adherence to a code of ethics and the practice of crafts developed to realise them, an ethical community. Science, I would propose, is the purest example we have of such a community.

He goes on to say:

But it is not sufficient to characterise science as an ethical community, because some ethical communities exist to preserve old knowledge rather than discover new truths. Religious communities, in many cases, satisfy the criteria for being ethical communities. ... So, if our characterisation of science is to have teeth, we must add some criteria that cleanly distinguish a physics department from a monastery.

Interesting that we have a similar match up between science and monasticism in mind. Indeed, as Smolin notes, science evolved from monasteries and other religious communities.

[An aside: as I type this I am intrigued that in this quote ethical corresponds to preservation or discovery of knowledge rather than encouragement of certain behaviours. Interesting...]

Anyway, the need to distinguish science and religion takes Smolin to the additional criteria:

To do this, I would like to add a second notion, which I call an imaginative community. This is a community whose ethic and organisation incorporates a belief in the inevitability of progress and an openness to the future.

Obviously, here we have a similar idea, but probably a divergent definition of imaginative community. Another discussion I will leave to a later date...

Smolin on unification

[I apologise in advance, this may be one of the posts that I am unique in finding of value!]

OK, lets ponder around an interesting quote from Smolin's The Trouble with Physics.

...there are different ways that physics can be unified, and we should be careful to distinguish them. So far we have been discussing unification through a single law. It is hard to see how anyone could disagree that this is a necessary goal.

But there are other ways to unify the world. Einstein, who certainly thought as much about this as anyone, emphasised that we must distinguish two kinds of theories. There are theories of principle and constructive theories. A theory of principle is one that sets up the framework that makes a description of nature possible By definition, a theory of principle must be universal: It must apply to everything because it sets out the basic language we use to talk about nature. ... Because the world is a unity, everything intersects ultimately with everything else, and there can be only on language used to describe those interactions.

The other kind of theories, constructive theories, describe some particular phenomenon in terms of specific models or equations. ... Such a theory cannot stand alone, it must be set within the context of a theroy of principle. But, as long as the theory of principle allows, there can be phenomena that obey different laws.

I've floated the idea before (more that once) that unification might not be a necessary goal from a theistic point of view: Perhaps then it is not unreasonable that we have multiple interlocking theories, brought together by a single mind?

In the back of my mind I had a worry with this line of thought -- it is clear in modern physics that quantum theory and relativity have to be reconciled in some way. This quote settles my mind -- the necessary reconciliation of quantum and relativity theories is, in the first instance, one of principle. On the other had, I think my suggestion is that theism can cope without a constructive unification.

In fact, Smolin makes a closely related point

...it is still possible to ask whether all the forces we observe in nature might be manifestations of a single, fundamental force. There seems, as far as I can tell, no logical argument that this should be true, but it is still something that might be true.

I guess I am proposing that a theist may have less drive towards such a unified theory than others.

--

Postscript: I have a slight query over how this last quote fits with Smolin's assertion "...it is hard to see how anyone could disagree that [unification through a single law] is a necessary goal." On the face of there seems to be a conflict here -- if there is no fundamental force, then isn't there a lack of a single law? Maybe I'm missing his point somewhere.

The Trouble with Physics

I've just finished reading The Trouble with Physics by Lee Smolin. If you are in anyway interested in modern physics then I recommend it. It's great fun and very thought provoking. To describe the content, I guess Smolin has three or four things going on simultaneously.

The motivating theme is his worry over the extreme bias towards String Theory. In his view, given the problems inherent in the theory, there should be significantly more diversity in research other options and rival theories. To focus on this one option is a disaster because of the likelihood that most physicists are following each other down a dead end.

This leads to a parallel theme -- the general need to promote as much diversity in scientific research as possible. Smolin's view is that it is the people with maverick ideas (and who have the boldness to follow them up regardless) who lead us forward in our understanding of the world and our system must find a way to accommodate these people effectively.

To support and illustrate these ideas, the book nicely gives a survey of physics in recent history and as it stands -- including the developement of relativity and quantum theories, the state of String Theory (and M-Theory, etc.) and some of the more interesting alternatives. The discussion of alternatives is very welcome -- they tend not to be covered in many for-the-layman books; certainly not some many alternatives. As for his description of Strings: Despite superficial attempts to be fair, Smolin does not leave the reader with much confidence in them. (And, you have to say, he does stack the deck somewhat in his historical and philosophical discussions.)

Finally, the book ends with a discussion of the philosophy and character of science. Obviously, given my focus in this blog, this was a section I particularly looked forward to. Strangely then, when I got to it I didn't manage to maintain the enthusiasm I'd had up to that point. Not that I didn't enjoy it & there weren't interesting ideas, but perhaps they didn't quite match the radicalness that marked the physics discussions.

But, overall, a very enjoyable read. The discussion of Strings is illuminating and the arguments for diversity are provoking.

Over the next few posts, I'm going to pull out some random quotes that fit with discussions here (in one way or another). These are not particularly representative of the book as a whole, but are thiings that caught my interest...

science, art and religion

I've occasionally dabbled here with the idea of comparing science and art to help characterise science. So, I was interested to see art historian Daniel Siedell doing a similar thing in reverse, using discussions of Science and Religion to illuminate the interaction between art and religion. Have a look and try for some cross-cross-fertilisation.

Science and Grace (13)

OK, I have to finish this before the year is out -- I can't have a book 'review' that lasts more than a year. So let's wind up with an overview of my feelings on Science and Grace...

The first great thing about the book are that it asks the right questions. As I have bemoaned elsewhere, most books on Christianity and science are basically reacting to the discoveries of science and looking at the consequences, correspondences or challenges for Christian belief. Far too seldom is science itself discussed from within a Christian worldview. Morris & Petcher have noticed this lack and have tried to redress the balance. For that alone, it is good to have this book around.

Second, I appreciated the background overviews -- looking, for example, at Christians who, very early on, detracted from the enlightenment perspective. Morris & Petcher's historical overviews are very clear and helpful, and a real highlight. In fact, a book just on the historical figures they identify and exploring their ideas in more depth would have made a great book in itself.

Also, as Steve Bishop noted, it is great to see this book take the post-modern perspective seriously.

However, my enthusiasm for the book waned a little as I went through it. Some of this might have been due to differences of perspective between the authors and myself. However, where I found my view challenged I was not unhappy... I guess I never felt the theology was robust enough or focused enough to allow carry the discussion.

Maybe the core issue for me is that I didn't really feel particularly inspired by their discussion -- the 'big picture' was not drawn clearly enough to make me feel that science has a valuable and exciting place in the Christian view. As I've said, more than once, I'm not sure that the book emphasised the value of creation sufficiently to allow science a signifiant role.

Despite these negatives, I'm very pleased that Science and Grace exists -- it helps immensely to point the conversation in the right direction. I hope that it inspires further discussions to get us to a fuller and richer perspective/theology of science.

Science and Grace (12)

I've said that the lack of a full discussion of creation is a weak point for Science and Grace. This comes out most clearly (to me) in the consideration of what it means to be a Christian in science and especially in relation to God's renewal of creation.

The book asks what difference, if any, there is between two scientists doing the same task. Rightly, Morris & Petcher note that it must be more than one sings hymns while working! However, I think their conclusion has problems. They assert that, in some way, we link the creation that we work with to Christ and redemption.

What we do in faith is pleasing to God and in fact consecrates the things connected to the redemptive web through us.

Now, I don't want to say this is wrong -- although I think it needs a lot a hard theological work to take it from an interesting idea to something of depth -- but I find this unsatisfying. For one thing, it tells me nothing about working as a Christian who is a scientist. If my role is to link creation to the redemptive web, why should I be a botanist rather than a fruit-picker? Further, shouldn't what I believe should impact what I actually do, rather than simply give knowledge of this unseen process?

I think that by missing the call to stewardship we can miss the importance of science as science. We are then led to a description that does not address the tasks that a scientist performs or the reasons that science itself is (or isn't) important.

I think that it would be valuable to add that by the time you get to doing a scientific task, a number of things have already happened -- you have selected to do that task, at the very least. A Christian and a non-Christian scientist may well do the same role, but they may be doing them for very different reasons. The selection of that area of research may be based on different criteria. If we have a clear picture of stewardship of creation then we have a specific motivation for a lot of scientific work. This in turn can influence the research and possible applications that we consider.

Going back to Morris & Petcher's focus on redemption and renewal, I agree that we need to understand better how science (and other cultural activities) fit with these, but I'm not sure they have quite got there.