Re: Paradoxes

On 20/01/2025 8:47 pm, Martin Harran wrote:

On Mon, 20 Jan 2025 07:02:11 +1100, MarkE <me22over7@gmail.com> wrote:
 

On 19/01/2025 11:00 pm, Martin Harran wrote:

 […]
 

Perhaps I need to extend/clarify my position to something like this:

>
You are still not addressing my question. Let's make it simple for
you.
>
Your comments above and elsewhere suggest that you regard acceptance
of OOL through natural process as equating to a rejection of God. Is
that a fair summary of your position, yes or no?

>
No.

 Why then are you so anxious to make them exclusive to each other?
There is nothing in stop anyone *right now* investigating direct
intervention by God in OOL, why should they have to wait until science
runs out of steam?

I'll address this below.

 

>
As I say following, this acceptance is also compatible with what I'm
calling "undetectable theism" (with respect to OoL). In other words, I'm
explicitly NOT excluding belief in God.

 The reason intervention is undetectable is either (a) it's
non-existent or (b) the intervention exists but we are unable to
detect it. You seem to favour (b) but the problem is that you have not
suggested any way in which we might be able to detect it. Until you or
someone else does so, science will treat it as entirely natural
processes because whilst they don't have *all* the answers, the things
they can figure out all point in that direction.

In the context of the structure of the argument, I don't favour a or b as such. Rather, I consider them both as valid alternative possibilities in the case of no detection of intervention (though personally, as a theist, I would prefer b).
Which brings us to the question of detection of intervention. I would define this as observing a phenomenon that does not obey known physical laws, with qualifiers such as (i) there may be as yet unknown physical laws at work; (ii) the observer may be mistaken or deceived; or (iii) some phenomena may break physical laws without action from outside spacetime.
Another definition (which is connected) would be the observation of a break in causality. Again, qualifiers would apply, such as allowance for quantum nondeterminism, the possibility that causality does not always hold naturally, etc.
Examples? If OoL was found to be of vanishingly small probability, or if it gave rise to an impossible paradox, then we may infer detection. Of course, it would be (it is) debated as to whether either of these criteria had been satisfied.
In principle, the best we can do then is accept the qualifiers I've listed, and even then allow for contesting of any potentially qualifying phenomena.
In practice, it's not so bleak. For example, as per my recent post "Pass the multiverse please", some scientists assess OoL to be sufficiently intractable as to invoke a multiverse to increase probabilistic resources to a required level. Again, there's not consensus on this, but it shows it to be a serious option.
And that's inherently just how this all is. On this basis, we each form our own beliefs and make our own choices.

 

>
Your position seems to be described by this. Would you express it
differently?

 My position is that life originates from God but it wasn't a case of
him saying "Right, I want to make man in my image, let's see how far I
get fiddling about with these atoms and particles."
 […]