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From: bch@mcnc.UUCP (Byron Howes)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: various comments
Message-ID: <2331@mcnc.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 3-Nov-84 19:36:59 EST
Article-I.D.: mcnc.2331
Posted: Sat Nov  3 19:36:59 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 6-Nov-84 05:12:15 EST
References: <pucc-h.1433>
Reply-To: bch@mcnc.UUCP (Byron Howes)
Organization: North Carolina Educational Computing Service
Lines: 55
Summary: 

In article <pucc-h.1433> aeq@pucc-h (Jeff Sargent) writes:
 
>1. Scientism.  It seems that some people view science as a nascent god, or at
>   least as approaching omniscience, by claiming that there every phenomenon
>   in the universe either can now be, or will eventually be able to be,
>   explained *correctly* by science.  Believers in scientism assume the
>   impossibility of miracles (an assumption for which there is no evidence
>   that I know of).  When a phenomenon occurs which, as reported, can have no
>   conceivable explanation according to known science or extrapolations
>   therefrom, they either deny that any such incident ever occurred or else
>   they devise explanations which differ from the observed, reported
>   phenomenon.  Obviously I have the Resurrection in mind.  I think that people
>   try to explain away the Resurrection of Christ because they don't *want* to
>   believe that any such thing as a miracle-working God more powerful than they
>   can exist.

Science and religion have different domains of explanation.  Science confines
itself to that which is (conceptually) observable while religion speaks to
ultimate truths.  The notion that every observable phenomenon is explainable
(I'm not sure what you mean by correctly) scientifically is not an unreason-
able one and is in fact critical to the pursuit of scientific understanding.
If we believe in some set of "unexplainable phenomena" then we have got to
decide where the borders are between that set of phenomena we can explain and
that which we cannot.  

I don't know that those of us who trust scientific explanation believe in the
impossibility of miracles.  That probably depends on how you define a miracle.
What is not possible, scientifically, is the notion of an conceptually obser-
vable event without a conceptually observable process or set of processes
that led to it or allowed it to be. (The obtuse construction of that last
sentence was to avoid the use of the word 'cause' which has implications I
would rather avoid here.)  Simply put, and observed "miracle" will have scien-
tific explanation whether or not an action of the Diety is involved.  It is
within the domain of religion to deal with the relation of Deific actions
to events.

A concrete example:

Recently an important cathedral in England was damaged severely by fire as
the result of being hit by lightning.  This happened shortly after the 
consecration of a Bishop some thought to be heretical.  Science can explain
to a relative certainty the reasons for the cathedral having been hit by
lightning.  This has nothing to do with whether or not there was an active
Deity involved.  The domain of explanation is different.

As to the Ressurection, there are any number of scientific explanations of
how such a thing could happen.  (Maybe that should read naturalistic.)
None of them diminish the enormity of the miracle, if it happened as stated.
The miraculousness of an event is an interpretive attribute, properly decided
within the domain of religious knowledge.

-- 

						Byron C. Howes
				      ...!{decvax,akgua}!mcnc!ecsvax!bch