Saturday, September 23, 2006
The Nature of the Divine's Exercise of Power
By faith I am a Roman Catholic, though not a particularly devout one. More on how some bloke from a few thousand years back managed to convince me some other time when the occasion calls for it.
Today I am onto something slightly different. I came across this book review involving the nature of life, universe and the divine. As I have not read these books, I cannot really comment on them. But I have, years ago, read previous books by two of the authors covered in this review, namely Richard Dawkins and Paul Davies.
In Dawkins's case (I digress: I think it is most unfortunate that nowadays most people think that singular words ending with "s" should have an apostrophe at the end without an extra "s" afterwards - so in this case my bosses would correct my "bad" English and turn it into Dawkins'. But they all seem to forget a certain London attraction called St James's Park!), the book in question is "The Selfish Gene). As for Davies, it's "The Mind of God". Comparing their views with conventional views of the divine (whether we are talking about Abrahamic faiths or other faiths), I thought of the following analogy with Government:
1. Dawkins, claiming that there is no divinity and everything happens purely by random chance, is tantamount to saying that we live in an anarchic system of life and universe.
2. Davies, by contrast, claims that whilst there is no God in beard watching over everything, but given the wonderfully logical way in which rules of physics, biology (there are even rules covering probability of random events, or how random shapes and matters develop), there does seem to be a higher order involved with those rules, if not the outcomes. In "The Mind of God", Davies suggested it's a bit like someone inventing the rules of chess but then does not dictate the outcome of the game. To me, that does seem very much like divinity acting as a legislature of sorts.
3. Then there is the view of most conventional religions, which seem to have God (or, in some cases, Gods) operating like Chinese mandarins outside the Imperial Court (those in the Imperial Court have legislative power as well). That is, God exercises a mixture of executive power (by discretionary interventions in individual lives and events) and judicial power (by deciding on the rights and wrongs of individuals and rewarding/punishing them accordingly).
For my own part, I fall somewhere between 2. and 3. Obviously I am biased, but I think Davies's point regarding the beauty and structure of rules of life and universe to be compelling, compared with Dawkins's anarchic perspective. But I think Davies's view is also incomplete, in that he takes a highly positivistic view of these rules, in that they are what they are, without attaching any value to it. Taking his chess analogy, for example, and one can see that the rules of chess operates with a certain set of assumptions about real world hierachies and powers. Similarly, real life legislatures make laws according to a set of values or ideologies.
Against this setting, I think two things can be said:
1. If the rules did indeed come about with an underlying set of assumptions, then there must be every intention for these underlying assumptions to be enforced at some stage. Hence, whilst I find stories of lifetime judgments such as those found in the book of Job to be fanciful, I can see force in arguments about life-end judgments (whether you are consigned to the scrapheap with no afterlife, or you are judged in the Judeo-Christian-Islamic way, or whether you are judged by where you go in your next life).
2. Rules governing random developments is a bit like laws giving an administrator discretion to act, with the random developments being the exercise of that discretion. I can hear you administrative lawyers out there yelling "but wait, isn't that reviewable for failure to exercise discretion by allowing random events to happen by themselves within this structure?" My answer would be that the divine (in whatever form it takes, depending on your faith) is a bit like a minister in that it takes charge over policy and need not bother itself with micro exercises of discretion. Thus, the Carltona exception to the "failure to exercise discretion" rule applies here.
These views are preliminary and are subject to further development as I read more and think about the issues further. But hope you do not find them too mad.
Today I am onto something slightly different. I came across this book review involving the nature of life, universe and the divine. As I have not read these books, I cannot really comment on them. But I have, years ago, read previous books by two of the authors covered in this review, namely Richard Dawkins and Paul Davies.
In Dawkins's case (I digress: I think it is most unfortunate that nowadays most people think that singular words ending with "s" should have an apostrophe at the end without an extra "s" afterwards - so in this case my bosses would correct my "bad" English and turn it into Dawkins'. But they all seem to forget a certain London attraction called St James's Park!), the book in question is "The Selfish Gene). As for Davies, it's "The Mind of God". Comparing their views with conventional views of the divine (whether we are talking about Abrahamic faiths or other faiths), I thought of the following analogy with Government:
1. Dawkins, claiming that there is no divinity and everything happens purely by random chance, is tantamount to saying that we live in an anarchic system of life and universe.
2. Davies, by contrast, claims that whilst there is no God in beard watching over everything, but given the wonderfully logical way in which rules of physics, biology (there are even rules covering probability of random events, or how random shapes and matters develop), there does seem to be a higher order involved with those rules, if not the outcomes. In "The Mind of God", Davies suggested it's a bit like someone inventing the rules of chess but then does not dictate the outcome of the game. To me, that does seem very much like divinity acting as a legislature of sorts.
3. Then there is the view of most conventional religions, which seem to have God (or, in some cases, Gods) operating like Chinese mandarins outside the Imperial Court (those in the Imperial Court have legislative power as well). That is, God exercises a mixture of executive power (by discretionary interventions in individual lives and events) and judicial power (by deciding on the rights and wrongs of individuals and rewarding/punishing them accordingly).
For my own part, I fall somewhere between 2. and 3. Obviously I am biased, but I think Davies's point regarding the beauty and structure of rules of life and universe to be compelling, compared with Dawkins's anarchic perspective. But I think Davies's view is also incomplete, in that he takes a highly positivistic view of these rules, in that they are what they are, without attaching any value to it. Taking his chess analogy, for example, and one can see that the rules of chess operates with a certain set of assumptions about real world hierachies and powers. Similarly, real life legislatures make laws according to a set of values or ideologies.
Against this setting, I think two things can be said:
1. If the rules did indeed come about with an underlying set of assumptions, then there must be every intention for these underlying assumptions to be enforced at some stage. Hence, whilst I find stories of lifetime judgments such as those found in the book of Job to be fanciful, I can see force in arguments about life-end judgments (whether you are consigned to the scrapheap with no afterlife, or you are judged in the Judeo-Christian-Islamic way, or whether you are judged by where you go in your next life).
2. Rules governing random developments is a bit like laws giving an administrator discretion to act, with the random developments being the exercise of that discretion. I can hear you administrative lawyers out there yelling "but wait, isn't that reviewable for failure to exercise discretion by allowing random events to happen by themselves within this structure?" My answer would be that the divine (in whatever form it takes, depending on your faith) is a bit like a minister in that it takes charge over policy and need not bother itself with micro exercises of discretion. Thus, the Carltona exception to the "failure to exercise discretion" rule applies here.
These views are preliminary and are subject to further development as I read more and think about the issues further. But hope you do not find them too mad.
# posted by Damaskinos @ 3:13 am 
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Interesting! When I studied Biology many years ago, I was simply amazed by biochemical processes. The fact that any of us are here at all is amazing.
Your theory of divinity as legislature/executive is very interesting. I think I tend more towards Davies's view (I also favour another "s"). That is, there is some higher order or some consciousness. The thing that seems amazing to me about the universe is that we can be conscious of it. We are also self-conscious beings. Perhaps we exist so the universe has witnesses?
In terms of the intervention of divinity in our lives, the issue which I have found difficult to answer is: if there is a God and that God is good, why does He (or She or They) let bad things happen to good people?
By your analogy, God is a quasi-governmental figure who makes the rules, but does not turn His (or Her) mind to the minutiae of what happens as a result of those rules. Is the rule making process continuous, or is it like someone turning on a machine and waiting to see what comes out if variable x is like "this" and variable y is like "that"? Do you think God just sits there making rules, or does God intervene in individual people's lives?
As you can probably tell, I don't find these ideas mad - they are the kind of thing I can discuss endlessly.
Your theory of divinity as legislature/executive is very interesting. I think I tend more towards Davies's view (I also favour another "s"). That is, there is some higher order or some consciousness. The thing that seems amazing to me about the universe is that we can be conscious of it. We are also self-conscious beings. Perhaps we exist so the universe has witnesses?
In terms of the intervention of divinity in our lives, the issue which I have found difficult to answer is: if there is a God and that God is good, why does He (or She or They) let bad things happen to good people?
By your analogy, God is a quasi-governmental figure who makes the rules, but does not turn His (or Her) mind to the minutiae of what happens as a result of those rules. Is the rule making process continuous, or is it like someone turning on a machine and waiting to see what comes out if variable x is like "this" and variable y is like "that"? Do you think God just sits there making rules, or does God intervene in individual people's lives?
As you can probably tell, I don't find these ideas mad - they are the kind of thing I can discuss endlessly.
I do not see rule-making by a divine being(s) as a continuous process with "law reform" happening now and again, because to believe in that would violate two basic fundamental rules of divinity:
1. that it is outside of time (thus no issue of discrete or continuous rule-making applies); and
2. it is always right (it must be remembered that even in, say, Greek mythology, Gods are usually only wrong qua other Gods, and not in terms of the happenings or otherwise in the universe).
The other thing is that in my view, once the rules are made, God does not in fact intervene in events as such. Why should it? After all, it set up a level playing field and then the universe can do what it likes within those rules. It's a bit like asking why Governments don't bail out the little provisions store that is being muscled out by big supermarkets.
To the extent that God does intervene in lives, I believe it is not so much in events per se but in people's spirit. In that sense God can be seen as being a bit like an inspiring political leader in a time of war. If you turn to it, there is no guarantee that you will win the war, but it can inspire you to fight harder (though having typed all this, the thought of God looking as fat as Churchill or as ugly as Lincoln is quite off-putting!).
1. that it is outside of time (thus no issue of discrete or continuous rule-making applies); and
2. it is always right (it must be remembered that even in, say, Greek mythology, Gods are usually only wrong qua other Gods, and not in terms of the happenings or otherwise in the universe).
The other thing is that in my view, once the rules are made, God does not in fact intervene in events as such. Why should it? After all, it set up a level playing field and then the universe can do what it likes within those rules. It's a bit like asking why Governments don't bail out the little provisions store that is being muscled out by big supermarkets.
To the extent that God does intervene in lives, I believe it is not so much in events per se but in people's spirit. In that sense God can be seen as being a bit like an inspiring political leader in a time of war. If you turn to it, there is no guarantee that you will win the war, but it can inspire you to fight harder (though having typed all this, the thought of God looking as fat as Churchill or as ugly as Lincoln is quite off-putting!).
So a sort of free will concept of God - God sets up the rules and lets us run with it.
Do you think evil exists? If so, is evil part of the rules? Who is responsible for evil?
Do you think evil exists? If so, is evil part of the rules? Who is responsible for evil?
I think, to draw yet another "natural" analogy, evil is merely one possible mutation of the order that has been created - after all this "order" allows for random development. Sometimes the mutation may not lead to evil but may lead to something that is even more "holy" than the average!
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