Philosophy, Science and Divine Action PDF

Philosophy, Science and Divine Action
Philosophical Studies in
Science and Religion
Edited by
F. LeRon Shults, University of Agder
VOLUME 1
Philosophy, Science and

Divine Action
Edited by
F. LeRon Shults, Nancey Murphy and

Robert John Russell
LEIDEN BOSTON
2009
This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Philosophy, science, and divine action / edited by F. LeRon Shults, Nancey Murphy,
and Robert John Russell.
p. cm. (Philosophical studies in science and religion, ISSN 1877-8542 ; v. 1)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-90-04-17787-1 (hardback : alk. paper)
1. Providence and government of GodChristianity. 2. Philosophy and religion.
3. ChristianityPhilosophy. 4. Philosophical theology. 5. Religion and science.
I. Shults, F. LeRon. II. Murphy, Nancey C. III. Russell, Robert J.
BT135.P45 2009
231.7dc22
2009026641
ISSN 1877-8542
ISBN 978 90 04 17787 1
Copyright 2009 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
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CONTENTS
A Philosophical Introduction to Divine Action ........................

F. LeRon Shults
Chapter One Five Models of God and Evolution .....................

Ian G. Barbour
17
Chapter Two The Sound of Sheer Silence: How does

God Communicate with Humanity? ..........................................
Arthur Peacocke
Chapter Three The Metaphysics of Divine Action ....................
John Polkinghorne
Chapter Four Describing Gods Action in the World in
Light of Scientific Knowledge of Reality ..................................
William R. Stoeger
Chapter Five Evaluating the Teleological Argument for
Divine Action
Wesley J. Wildman .........................................................................
Chapter Six Constraint and Freedom in the Movement
from Quantum Physics to Theology ..........................................
Philip Clayton
Chapter Seven Creation, Providence and Quantum Chance .....
Thomas F. Tracy
53
97
111
141
191
227
Chapter Eight Divine Action in the Natural Order:

Buridans Ass and Schrdingers Cat ..........................................
Nancey Murphy
263
Chapter Nine Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action:

The Nexus of Interaction ..............................................................
George F.R. Ellis
305
vi
contents
Chapter Ten Divine Action and Quantum Mechanics:

A Fresh Assessment ..........................................................................
Robert John Russell
351
Appendix: Overview of the CTNS/VO Series ..............................

About the Authors .............................................................................
Index ....................................................................................................
405
427
429
A PHILOSOPHICAL INTRODUCTION TO DIVINE ACTION

F. LeRon Shults
The slow process of the European construction of the spheres of science and religion and the hardening of the boundaries between them
during the 17th and 18th centuries created an intellectual milieu in
which traditional Christian ways of interpreting religious experience
in the world increasingly came into competition with new scientific
explanations of the world. The idea of divine action was relatively
unproblematic and generally presupposed within Western medieval cosmology, with its philosophical mixture of Neo-platonic active principles
and Aristotelian final causes, both of which were ultimately grounded
in the divine (the Form of the Good, the Unmoved Mover).
However, as early modern science (especially classical mechanics)
progressively filled the gaps in human knowledge about natural causes
within a mechanical universe, the necessity (and plausibility) of appealing to divine causation gradually diminished. The rise of deism and
protest atheism in the 18th and 19th centuries was partially in response
to the growing philosophical challenges to the coherence of the notion
of divine action, and its alleged incompatibility with human freedom
and natural evil. All of this is well known. But where does the discussion stand in light of contemporary science and philosophy?
Philosophy, Science, and Divine Action

In our late modern philosophical context might there be new ways to
make sense of the claim that God can act in or interact with the world?
Many scholars still find such questions irrelevant (at best) and dangerous (at worst). Some scientists believe that discourse about events in
the natural world ought to exclude references to theological hypotheses.
Some theologians believe that discourse about the supernatural events
of divine revelation ought to be insulated from scientific hypotheses.
The voices at these polar extremes are often the loudest. In the last few
decades, however, a growing number of scholars have been exploring
f. leron shults
new ways of constructing a discourse that teases the boundaries of these

academic disciplines in order to pursue more holistic and integrated
interpretations of human life in the cosmos.
One exemplar of such interdisciplinary exploration that stands out for
its scholarly breadth and depth is the Scientific Perspectives on Divine
Action (SPDA) project, co-sponsored by the Vatican Observatory (VO)
and the Center for Theology and Natural Science (CTNS). This multiyear collaboration involved over 50 authors meeting at five international
conferences, resulting in as many volumes: Quantum Cosmology and
the Laws of Nature (1993), Chaos and Complexity (1997), Evolutionary and Molecular Biology (1998), Neuroscience and the Person (1999)
and Quantum Mechanics (2001). Each volume carried the subtitle:
scientific perspectives on divine action. The historical background,
bibliographic details, unique interdisciplinary process and impact of
the project and the series are described by Robert John Russell in the
Appendix (below).
This allows me to focus my attention in this Introduction on some
general observations about the function(s) of philosophy within the
SPDA project, which is the main rationale for showcasing these ten
essays in the current book. The 91 essays in the five volumes of the
CTNS/VO series could be classified and analyzed in a number of
ways. For example, we could group them theologically, exploring ways
in which particular themes such as the doctrine of God, creation or
anthropology are treated across the volumes. Or we could examine
the role played by developments or debates within specific scientific
disciplines, such as physics, evolutionary biology or neuroscience. Such
mining of the resources within these volumes has already begun in the
capstone volume to the project, Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action:
20 Years of Challenge and Progress (CTNS/VO, 2008).
Our task here, however, is to provide a more general overview of the
major philosophical themes and developments that played a more or
less explicit role in the SPDA project. The volumes in the series offer
analysis of specific philosophical concepts within both science and
theology (such as space, time, matter and causality), as well as engagement with broader philosophical systems that aim to incorporate both
science and theology, such as neo-Thomism and process philosophy.
As Russell notes in his overview of the series in the capstone volume:
The overarching goal was to engage theology, philosophy, and natural science in a process of constructive dialogue and creative mutual
interaction. He observes that 30 of the 91 essays in the series explicitly
a philosophical introduction to divine action
treated philosophical issues. I think it is also fair to say that all of the
essays involve philosophical engagement at least implicitly, insofar
as they utilize philosophical categories and attempt to contribute to
our understanding of topics that have a long history of philosophical
disputation.
The chapters in the current volume were selected for inclusion first
and foremost because they demonstrate the value of explicitly attending
to the philosophical issues that shape the dialogue between science and
Christian theology about the idea of divine action in the world. Below
I will provide a brief preview of each of these chapters. First, however,
I want to back up and briefly outline three of the classical themes in
philosophy (epistemology, metaphysics, and ethics) and three of the
shifts in philosophical categories in late modernity (relation, kinesis,
and difference), to which we can then make reference as we preview
the chapters.
Classical Philosophical Themes and Late Modern Trajectories

Many of the particular issues within the complex history of the development of philosophy that are relevant for understanding the role of the
idea of divine action in the contemporary dialogue between scientists
and Christian theologians are outlined and analyzed in the context of
the ten essays that comprise this book. For the purposes of this Introduction, therefore, it suffices to note three of the general areas into which
philosophical discourse is often divided: metaphysics, epistemology and
ethics. While treatments of these themes are clearly interconnected, for
the sake of analysis we can distinguish between the kinds of questions
that typically exercise philosophers: What is real? What is true? What
is good? Broadly speaking, we are dealing here with the conditions for
the human experience of being, knowing and acting in the world. Scientists and theologians operate, more or less self-consciously, within and
across these spheres of discourse. One of the main goals of this book
is highlighting the way in which philosophical themes and categories
function within the dialogue among the disciplines.
Like just about everything in philosophy, the meaning of the term
metaphysics is highly contested. In general it has to do with discourse
about being, about the nature and structure of reality. Presuppositions
about that which is inevitably impact both scientific and theological argumentation. Ones assumptions about the order of the world
f. leron shults
(cosmo-logy) constrain ones options for thinking about the relation of

the divine to (or in) that world. On the other hand, theological ideas
about the nature of God (or ultimate reality) shape ones interpretations
of experience within the cosmos. Moreover, concepts such as causality may prima facie appear to be simply neutral scientific notions, but
they are wrapped up within broader (or deeper) metaphysical notions
about the order of things and their intelligibility. This is perhaps most
easily seen in the function of concepts such as space and time. The shift
from a Newtonian to an Einsteinian understanding and use of these
concepts was clearly of metaphysical import; the idea of matter itself
was reconstructed in a new vision of the dynamic structure of reality.
Such issues cannot be divorced from epistemology. How do (or can)
we know what we (think we) know about reality? After the demise of
classical foundationalism and the rise of post-positivist philosophy of
science, we have become acutely aware of the limits of human knowing.
In the most popular interpretations of quantum theory, and in some
interpretations of chaos theory, particular kinds of processes and events
are viewed as unpredictable in principle, which leads many physicists
to acknowledge an intrinsic limit to scientific knowledge. Awareness of
the limitations of human knowing is intensified in theological discourse,
which is distinguished by its attentiveness to the human experience
of being-limited, and the ultimate boundary conditions that ground
this experience. In neither discipline does the rejection of apodictic
knowledge of the object of inquiry entail the denial of any knowledge of
(or valuable engagement with) reality. As a middle way between nave
realism and anti-realism, we find an increasing number of scholars,
including several included in this volume, embracing some form of
critically realist epistemology.
If ethics has to do with acting then we might expect an interdisciplinary project on divine action to have special bearing on this
arena of philosophical discourse. As we will see in the preview below,
most of the philosophical energy of the project was devoted to issues
of metaphysics and epistemology. However, it will also become clear
that questions about morality (divine or human) are almost always
in the background and quite often in the foreground in these discussions. This is particularly evident in the significant attention given in
the project to two specific philosophical issues: theodicy and freedom.
First, there was widespread agreement among the participants that
any postulate of special divine action in the world exacerbates the
theodicy problem. In fact, this is a primary reason that the next series
sponsored by CTNS/VO is focusing on the issue of natural evil.1 Second, if events in the world (including human actions) are completely
(or even partially) determined by God (or the laws of nature), then in
what sense can we speak plausibly of human freedom and responsibility? Clearly metaphysical (and epistemological) claims about the relation between necessity and chance in the world are relevant for moral
discourse as well.
Attending to these three general areas of philosophical discourse
provides a synchronic overview of some of the most significant issues
in the SPDA project. But we can also see the influence of philosophy
if we think diachronically, pointing out historical shifts in the meaning
and use of key categories. For most of its history Christian theology
has been couched in the categories of Platonism and/or Aristotelianism, and has shared the resistance of both of these ancient philosophical schools to Stoicism. Many early modern scientific developments,
however, were motivated by renaissance retrievals of aspects of Stoic
philosophy, including some of its atomistic and deterministic elements.
This contributed to an intellectual milieu that increasingly challenged
Platonic-Aristotelian categories, as well as the Christian doctrinal formulations that relied heavily upon them. Our purpose here is not to
recount the difficulties this caused for early modern theologians but to
point out three specific categorical shifts in late modern philosophy that
have shaped the conceptual space within the dialogue now occurs: the
growing preference for relation, kinesis and difference over substance,
stasis and sameness.
Whence and whither these philosophical trajectories? In Platos
Sophist the visitor convinces Theaetetus that there are five general
kinds (genn): that which is or being (to on) rest, (stasis) change
(kinesis) the same (tauton) and the different (heteron). For the most
part traditional Western philosophy (as well as science and theology)
has followed Plato in starting with the category of being, which has
to do with the essence or substance (ousia) of things, as distinct from
their relations (or accidental attributes). Plato also tended to value rest
over change (or motion) and sameness over difference, tendencies that
were hardened in Neo-platonism and registered a profound effect on
1
Nancey Murphy, Robert John Russell and William R. Stoeger, S.J., eds, Physics
and Cosmology: Scientific Perspectives on the Problem of Natural Evil, vol. I (Berkeley:
CTNS/VO, 2007).
f. leron shults
Western thought. Although Aristotle challenged Platos division between

the realm of (unchanging) Forms and the realm of (changing) matter,
he stillperhaps even more than Platovalorized substance (ousia)
over relation, rest over movement, and the same over the different. For
both of these philosophers the categories of being, rest and identity were
dominant in their metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics.
In late modern philosophy, however, one can trace a growing dissatisfaction with this dominance and a struggle to reverse (or at least
balance) these tendencies through an emphasis on the philosophical
significance of the categories of relationality, dynamism and difference.
These trajectories have been motivated by scientific and theological as
well as philosophical concerns. In the turn from substance to relationality, Immanuel Kant played an important role, explicitly reversing
Aristotle in his first critique by making substance and accidents a
sub-category of Relation. The shift is also evident in physics: from
the Cartesian-Newtonian concept of material substances to post-Einsteinian concepts of relativity and field theories. Although they are not
included in this volume, several theologians who participated in the
SPDA project (e.g., Moltmann, Edwards) also illustrate this trajectory,
articulating ideas of God that begin not with abstract notions of unitary
substance, but with robustly relational (trinitarian) categories.
We can also see a late modern trajectory toward a metaphysical
privileging of kinesis (or motion) over stasis (or rest). This is connected
to the question of the relation between being and becoming, classically illustrated in the extremes of Parmenides and Heraclitus, whom
Plato tried to balance. In his theory of the two realms, however, the
temporal movement of material things is not the Ideal; for Plato true
knowledge is contemplation of the (static) Forms. Newtons laws of
inertia also presupposed a privileged realm of stasisthe unchanging
three-dimensional structure of Absolute Space. Here too Einstein is
the easy comparison. The shift from F=ma to E=mc2 represents a new
awareness that dynamic energykinesisis an essential and generative
feature of the cosmos. According to Einstein (contra Newton), mass,
the inertial property of matter by which bodies resist change of motion,
should be identified with the energy of that motion. Developments in
the fields of quantum mechanics and chaos theory have also confirmed
and intensified this philosophical valuation of the dynamic over the
static. This has led to non-deterministic and non-linear conceptions of
temporality and causality as well, which many believe can open up new
ways to imagine the action of God in relation to the world.
One can also trace a third late modern philosophical trajectory in

which alterity (as opposed to identity) is increasingly embraced as a
key generative category. Here we can point, for example, to Emmanuel
Levinas emphasis on the primordial relation to the other, which always
resists the imperialism of the same, to Jacques Derridas notion of differnce and his broader project of deconstruction, to Gilles Deleuzes
portrayal of the arrival of the Disparate as the force that generates
intensities of difference, and to Paul Ricoeurs reflections on the ipseity of the self as it emerges in relations to others. Each of these thinkers (and others) has been influenced in various ways by Kierkegaard
and Heidegger, both of whom privileged the category of difference in
their philosophical speculations and psychological analyses of human
relationships. Already in the late 17th century attention to difference
began to transform the field of mathematics, leading to a shift from a
substantial to a functional (relational) concept of number. This contributed to the emergence of differential calculus, which had a profound
influence on physics and related sciences. However, the philosophical
turn to alterity (or difference) has not (yet) played as significant a role
in the science and theology dialogue.
A Philosophical Preview
The essays included in this volume are exemplary in several ways. They
are all examples of state-of-the-art contributions to the debate over
divine action among scientists and Christian theologians. They also
represent the work of some of the most active participants in the SPDA
project, and the broader international theology and science dialogue.
Mostly importantly for the purposes of this book, they illustrate the
care with which and depth to which the project attended to the role of
philosophy in this dialogue. The following preview does not attempt to
summarize the complex arguments of each essay; rather, it alerts the
reader to some of the key philosophical concerns and concepts that are
relevant for understanding and assessing the ongoing discussion.
The first three chapters included here were written by the three
scholars who are widely acknowledged to be the leading figures of
the contemporary resurgent interest in international dialogue among
scientists and Christian theologians, which picked up momentum in the
1970s and has grown consistently to the present: Ian Barbour, Arthur
Peacocke and John Polkinghorne. The fourth chapter is by William
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R. Stoeger, S.J, one of the foremost Roman Catholic participants in

and sponsors of the SPDA project. Wesley Wildmans contribution in
the fifth chapter represents an important (but minority) voice within
the project, a voice that challenges the idea of divine agency itself. The
remaining five chapters all deal with the more specific question of special
divine action in relation to quantum theory. It makes sense for the bulk
of the book to focus on this theme, because the desire to construct a
plausible model of special (or objective) divine action was shared
by the majority of participants, and engaging theories of quantum
phenomena was an important part of the majority of such attempts. As
we will see this holds for our last five authors as well: Philip Clayton,
Thomas Tracy, Nancey Murphy, George Ellis and Robert Russell.
This volume begins with a chapter by Ian Barbour, whose influential
taxonomy of Ways of Relating Science and Theology first appeared
in the precursor volume to the SPDA series, and was later developed
in more detail in several places.2 The essay that is included here is the
second of Barbours contributions to the project: Five Models of God
and Evolution. Because theologians cannot avoid using philosophical
categories in the systematic elaboration of ideas, Barbour commends the
explicit and integrative use of philosophy in the engagement between
science and theology. In this context Barbour himself illustrates this in
two ways. First, he explicitly demonstrates the way in which four particular philosophical issues in contemporary biology (self-organization,
indeterminacy, top-down causality, and communication of information)
play a role in various models of divine action in an evolving world.
Second, Barbour attempts to show the illuminative power of process
philosophy, especially the categories developed by Alfred North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne. He argues that this philosophical system
is able both to integrate the valuable insights of the other views and
to move beyond them by better accounting for the human experience
of interiority and novelty. This engagement with process philosophy,
which explicitly challenges substance-accident dualism and begins with
relational and dynamic categories, also illustrates the way in which the
first two late modern trajectories (outlined above) have impacted the
science and religion dialogue.
2
Barbour, Ways of Relating Science and Theology, in Russell, et al., eds., Physics,
Philosophy and Theology: A Common Quest for Understanding (Vatican Observatory,
1988), 2148. The four ways are conflict, independence, dialogue and integration. Cf.
Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science (New York: HarperOne, 1990).
Arthur Peacocke introduces his essay with a reference to the ancient

Israelite prophet Elijah, who experienced the sound of sheer silence
in his encounter with the Lord (1 Kings 19). This story illustrates the
way in which the idea of divine action in general, and personal communication in particular, play such an important role in interpretations
of religious experience, especially in the Abrahamic traditions. Peacocke
wants to maintain this intuition, but to articulate it in such a way that
makes sense in light of contemporary science. He argues that the most
adequate way (philosophically) to account for 20th century discoveries in sciences such as physics and biology is emergentist monism,
which provides a model of whole-part causation that challenges the
ontological dualism and epistemological reductionism of much early
modern philosophy. Peacocke challenges interventionist conceptions
of the God-world relation, which often presuppose a dualism between
immaterial and material substance, and offers a panentheistic model
in which the world is in some sense in God. Here too we see the
influence of the philosophical privileging of relationality and becoming on the dialogue between science and religion. Like most of the
other participants in the project, Peacocke recognizes that his proposal
does not solve the intractable problem of evil, but he believes it does
mitigate the conceptual problem of plausibly imaging the possibility of
(personal and moral) divine action in the world.3
John Polkinghorne should also be counted as part of the trio of
leading figures who have most significantly contributed to the contemporary resurgence of the dialogue between Christian theology and
science. Although the title of his contribution included here is The
Metaphysics of Divine Action, he makes it clear early in the essay that
questions about being cannot be divorced from questions about knowing. Polkinghorne favors a version of critical realism whose motto is
epistemology models ontology. Like most physicists, he accepts the
Copenhagen interpretation of quantum phenomena, which argues that
the indeterminacy displayed in sub-atomic particle experiments is not
a result only of the epistemological limits of human observers, but an
indication of real openness in the natural world. Unlike many other
participants in the series, however, Polkinghorne wants to expand this
3
Peacockes engages these and other philosophical issues (including the epistemological implications of critical realism) in more detail in Theology for a Scientific Age:
Being and BecomingNatural, Divine and Human (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993).
10
f. leron shults
openness to chaos theory, which deals with macrophysical objects and

events. In the context of this particular essay, Polkinghorne focuses on
ways in which metaphysical assumptions about the nature of time and
epistemological assumptions about the knowability of the future shape
our conceptions of divine action in (and divine knowledge of ) the
world. The main point for our purposes here is that he too illustrates
the importance of explicitly attending to the philosophical mediation
of the dialogue between science and religion.4
William Stoeger, S.J., was one of the leading organizers of the SPDA
project (representing the Vatican Observatory) and the most active
Roman Catholic contributor to the book series. In the essay included
here, Stoeger argues that the distinction between primary and secondary
causality, which was developed by Thomas Aquinas in his adaptation of
Aristotelian metaphysics, provides us with a useful philosophical tool
for clarifying the nature of divine action. Variations of this approach,
which are often classified as neo-Thomistic, comprise one of the most
significant and widely shared strategies among contemporary Roman
Catholic theologians in the science and religion dialogue. Stoeger suggests that these philosophical categories are more adequate to both
the scientific and the theological data, and lead to fewer difficulties
in explicating the essential differences between God and his/her creation, and the ideas of divine immanence and transcendence. For the
purposes of the current volume, this essay provides a clear example
of an attempt to maintain and refigure a medieval set of categories in
dialogue with contemporary scientific discoveries such as information
theory and top-down causality.
Wesley Wildmans essay addresses one of the key issues that has
dominated the traditional dialogue between science and theology: the
role of teleology in arguments for divine action. Most medieval and
early modern Christian interpretations of Gods creative and providential relation to the world appropriated (to some extent) the Aristotelian
notion of final causality. This way of making sense of the apparent
purposiveness in nature was increasingly eclipsed by the emphasis in
classical mechanics on efficient causality. Wildman demonstrates
how the problem of linking teleology and divine action was further
complicated not only by developments in evolutionary and molecular
4
For an overview of Polkinghornes approach to the dialogue, cf. his Belief in God
in an Age of Science (New Haven: Yale, 2003).
11
biology, but also by the fundamental metaphysical ambiguity that characterizes philosophical discourse. Based on his analysis of the notion
of having an end throughout the philosophical tradition, Wildman
offers several schemata for making sense of this complex conceptual
debate. For example, he distinguishes between four types of teleological views in biology, outlines three stages that must be included in any
teleological argument for divine action, and delineates the way in which
six modes of divine action can be correlated with teleological loci in
nature. Wildmans essay illustrates both the material significance of
metaphysical questions and the methodological value of philosophical
distinctions in the ongoing debate. He also represents the inclusion
within the project of a minority position among Christian theologians
in the dialogue. In light of the problem of evil and other conceptual
issues, Wildman is willing to give up the idea that God acts (intentionally, or in a way analogous to human agency) in the world, and prefers
to speak of God (or ultimate reality) as the ground of being.5
The remaining five chapters explicitly try to maintain the idea of
intentional or special divine action in the world, and do so in a variety
of ways, all of which heavily engage quantum theory. We begin with an
essay by Philip Clayton: Tracing the Lines: Constraint and Freedom in
the Movement from Quantum Physics to Theology. Like most of the
other contributors to this volume, Clayton argues that the Copenhagen
interpretation of quantum indeterminacy opens up new possibilities for
making sense of divine action. However, he emphasizes the importance
of balancing metaphysical courage with epistemic humility as we explore
these possibilities. Clayton suggests that instead of thinking of physics
and metaphysics in dichotomous terms, we should imagine them as
falling at different points on a continuum of abstraction. Questions
about divine action require us to move further along the continuum
toward abstraction, but should nevertheless be connected to (and in
some sense constrained by) questions about the concrete nature of
the physical world. On the other hand, Clayton also acknowledges the
insight of post-positivist philosophy of science that metaphysical decisions are not simply determined by the data of physical theories. Like
Peacocke and others, Clayton commends a panentheistic metaphysics as
5
In his contribution to the capstone volume, Wildman makes this argument more
extensively in the context of his classification of the projects participants. Cf. Wildman,
The Divine Action Project, Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, 176.
12
f. leron shults
offering the best current option for tracing the lines between quantum
physics and theology.6
In his essay Creation, Providence and Quantum Chance, Thomas
Tracy also (like William Stoeger) utilizes the philosophical distinction
between primary and secondary causality. On the one hand, God primarily and directly causes the (continual) existence of all finite things.
On the other hand, God can also act through secondary causes,
producing results indirectly through the operation of finite things.
Tracy suggests that quantum theory has led to a philosophical challenge to exceptionless causal determinism, long accepted by scientists
and theologians, which opens up a new way to think of Gods special
(and objective) action in the world. The kind of divine action in history
that is central for the faith of the Abrahamic religions, argues Tracy,
requires that there be gaps (of the right sort) in the causal structures
of nature. These gaps appear to him to be provided in the indeterminacy of quantum events. For Tracy, such gaps are not created ad hoc
in the world by Gods special acts of intervention but are built into
structure of the world created by God ex nihilo. Like most of the other
contributors who engage quantum theory, Tracy also explicitly makes
the connection between metaphysical decisions (about compatibilism
and incompatibilism for example) and issues that bear on ethics, such
as the plausibility of the idea of human free will and responsibility.
Nancey Murphy was another one of the most active of the participants in the project, serving as co-editor for three of the volumes
in the series as well as the capstone volume. In the paper included
here, Divine Action in the Natural Order, she outlines a theory
of causation that attempts to account for both scientific phenomena
and religious experience. Murphy stresses that the problem of divine
action is, at base, a metaphysical problem. Nothing short of a revision
of current metaphysical notions regarding the nature of matter and
causation is likely to solve the problem of divine action. Murphys
essay also demonstrates the importance of the first two late modern
philosophical trajectories outlined above. For example, in her treatment
of the metaphysical considerations that shape the dialogue, she traces
the role of concepts such as matter, substance, change, and motion in
6
In his chapter in the capstone volume, Toward a Theory of Divine Action that has
Traction, Clayton commends emergence theory as a valuable and viable metaphysic
for incorporating both scientific and theological concerns.
13
the shift from Aristotelian to Newtonian cosmology. In Murphys own

proposal for understanding divine action in dialogue with contemporary science, chaos theory and top-down causation play a subsidiary
role; God acts at the quantum level, activating one or another of the
innate powers of a quantum entity, from the bottom-up without
changing the laws of nature. As she makes clear throughout, Murphys
philosophical efforts are also motivated in part by a theological desire
to avoid exacerbating the problem of evil while making sense of the
experience of free-will.7
George Elliss chapter is, as he notes, intended largely as a response
to Murphys, with which he basically agrees. Elliss concern is to clarify
and make use of the distinction between Ordinary and Extraordinary
Divine Action. For the purposes of this introduction, two points about
his essay are particularly salient. First, Elliss overview of the relevant
scientific developments, such as chaos theory and emergent order, shows
the significant impact of the late modern philosophical shifts toward
privileging relationality and dynamism over substance and stasis. Second, Ellis provides a more detailed treatment of the role of the problem
of evil in reflections on divine action. He acknowledges that theories of
extraordinary divine action are susceptible to the charge of capriciousness. If God can, and occasionally does act, why does God not act to
stop Hitler (for example), or to alleviate contemporary experiences of
pain and suffering? Elliss own view is that God acts (extraordinarily)
only to give revelatory, spiritual or moral insight, not to alter a physical outcome from what it would have otherwise been. This proposal
offers a clear example of the way in which moral concerns can play an
important role in the treatment of metaphysical and epistemological
issues within the science and theology dialogue.8
The final chapter included in this book is by Robert John Russell,
director of CTNS, and the main organizer of the project. He was the
leading editor of each volume in the CTNS/VO series, and arguably the
person most familiar with the general contours of the ongoing debate
among the participants during the process as a whole. Divine Action
and Quantum Mechanics: A Fresh Assessment was the last chapter
7
Nancey Murphys chapter in the capstone volume explored Emergence, Downward
Causation and Divine Action, outlining several key philosophical issues and evaluating
a variety of approaches to these themes.
8
Cf. George Ellis and Nancey Murphy, On the Moral Nature of the Universe (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996).
14
f. leron shults
in the fifth and final volume of the series, and it offers a summary of
the key issues in the field, outlines a constructive proposal and suggests directions for future research. Throughout the essay, Russell pays
special attention to philosophical aspects of the dialogue, including the
metaphysical and epistemological questions that shape the interpretation
of quantum mechanics. His own proposal involves the appropriation
of theologians like Jurgen Moltmann and Wolfhart Pannenberg, for
whom trinitarian reflection plays a central role in articulating the relation between God and the world. Russell also explicitly addresses the
two main ethical (or moral) questions that shape Christian discourse
on divine action: the problem of human freedom and the challenge of
theodicy.9
Conclusion
Although showcasing these influential essays from the SPDA project
would be sufficient warrant for the production of the current book, its
inclusion in the Brill series Philosophical Studies in Science and Religion suggests that another motivation lies behind their compilation.
Both individually and as a group these chapters illustrate the significant
role of philosophy in the dialogue between science and Christian theology over the question of divine action. This is so amply demonstrated
in the various essays that I have limited myself in this Introduction
to alerting the reader to some of the major philosophical themes and
shifts that shape the general context of the dialogue and the particular
material and methodological argumentation of each contribution.
The project was not intended to offer a final anwer on the question
of divine action but to press the dialogue between Christian theology
and natural science further in light of the significant scientific (and
philosophical) developments of the last century. No single project can
accomplish everything, and the organizers self-consciously focused
their interdisciplinary exploration by limiting themselves to dealing
with those scientific fields that appeared most promising for opening
up new opportunities for reconstructing Christian interpretations of the
experience of Gods action in the world. Although they welcomed and
9
For a more detailed treatment of these and related issues, cf. Russell, CosmologyFrom Alpha to Omega (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2008).
15
encouraged discussion of the ethical issues raised by the problems of

human freedom and theodicy, most of the philosophical analysis focused
on metaphyical and epistemological issues. As indicated above, a new
series that explicitly treats the problem of natural evil has now been
launched, demonstrating that its participants are well aware of the need
for ongoing interdisciplinary dialogue about the various and complex
questions that must be faced in discussions of divine action.
As this dialogue continues to widen, geographically and conceptually,
it will be necessary to complement the insights gained and progress
made by the CTNS/VO series on divine action by examining the topic
from other perspectives and continuing to welcome new voices into
the conversation. This will open up new opportunities for critically
engaging the deeper philosophical presuppositions that shape the very
idea of divine agency in Christian theology. To what extent might early
modern metaphysical assumptions about the dyads natural vs. supernatural and immanence vs. transcendence constrain our options for
interpreting encounters with ultimate reality? To what extent might
western epistemological assumptions about the capacity of reason and
the function of analogy in theological language constrain our options
for conceptualizing the relation between human and divine intentionality? To what extent might individualistic ethical assumptions about the
powerful role of desire for future goods in finite agency constrain our
imaginative articulation of the relation of God to time? Our exploration of these and other challenging questions will be enhanced as we
increasingly engage the resources of the late modern philosophical turn
to alterity and of other (especially non-western) religious traditions.
CHAPTER ONE
FIVE MODELS OF GOD AND EVOLUTION

Ian G. Barbour
Is evolutionary theory compatible with the idea that God acts in nature?
Through most of Western history it had been assumed that all creatures
were designed and created by God in their present forms, but Darwin
claimed that they are the product of a long process of natural selection.
His theory of evolution not only undermined the traditional version
of the argument from design; it also explained the history of nature by
scientific laws that seemed to offer no opportunity for Gods providential guidance. However several themes in the biological sciences offer
promising new ways of conceiving of divine action in evolutionary
history without intervention or violation of the laws of nature.
The first section of this essay traces the development of evolutionary
theory from Darwin himself to molecular biology and recent hypotheses
about complexity. The second explores four themes in recent writing
about biological processes: self-organization, indeterminacy, top-down
causality, and communication of information. Subsequent sections
examine theological models of Gods action in nature based on analogies with each of these four characteristics of organic life. I will suggest
that a fifth model from process theology avoids some of the problems
arising in other models of Gods relation to nature.
1. Darwinism Evolving
Evolutionary theory has undergone significant reinterpretation and
modification since Darwin. First, the growth of population genetics
and molecular biology is briefly described. Then the expansion of
Darwinism is discussed, particularly the recognition that other factors
in addition to natural selection influence the direction of evolutionary
change. Finally, recent theories of complexity and self-organization
are considered.
18
ian g. barbour
1.1. From Darwin to DNA

In Darwins day, Newtonian mechanics was looked on as the form of
science which other sciences should emulate. The Newtonian viewpoint was atomistic, deterministic and reductionistic. It was believed
that the behavior of all systems is determined by a few simple laws
governing the behavior of their smallest components. Change was
thought to be the result of external forces, such as gravity, acting on
bodies which are themselves essentially passive. Darwin agreed with the
philosophers of science who held that Newtonian physics represented
an ideal for all the sciences, and his theory of evolution shared many
of its assumptions.1
Darwin held that evolutionary change is caused by natural selection acting on variations among individual members of a species.
Under competitive conditions, those individuals with a slight adaptive
advantage will survive better to reproduce and pass on that advantage
to their offspring. His viewpoint was atomistic in assuming that
selection acts on separate traits in individual organisms. For him, as
for Newton, change was the result of external forces; he held that the
direction of change is determined by natural selection, not by the efforts
of organisms themselves as Lamark had believed. The assumptions
which Darwin shared with Newton are explored in detail in a recent
volume by Depew and Weber.2
By the end of the nineteenth century, probability was an important
concept in several areas of physics. Maxwell and Boltzmann showed
that the probability of different configurations of gas molecules can be
calculated even when the motions of individual molecules are too complicated to describe mathematically. Statistical averages can be used to
predict the relationship between large-scale variables such as pressure,
volume, temperature, heat flow, and entropy. In statistical mechanics
and classical thermodynamics, equilibrium macrostates can be calculated without knowing the initial distribution of molecules.
Probabilistic reasoning was also important in the merging of population genetics and evolutionary theory early in the twentieth century in
the theories of Fisher, Wright, and Dobzhansky. Fisher acknowledged
Michael Ruse, Philosophy of Biology Today (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New
York Press, 1988), 6; idem, The Darwinian Paradigm (New York: Routledge, 1989).
2
David P. Depew and Bruce H. Weber, Darwinism Evolving (Cambridge: MIT
Press, 1995), Part I.
five models of god and evolution
19
the influence of nineteenth-century physics on his ideas about calculating gene probabilities in individual organisms and gene frequencies in
populations. The modern synthesis in which Julian Huxley, G.G. Simpson and Ernst Mayr were prominent, continued the Darwinian belief
that the evolution of species was the result of a gradual accumulation of
small changes. If some members of a population are geographically or
reproductively isolated from other members, accumulated changes may
result in a new species that can no longer interbreed with the original
population. In a very small isolated population, gene frequencies may
differ, purely by chance, from those in the larger population; the direction of evolutionary change (genetic drift) would then be the result
of chance rather than natural selection. But natural selection was still
viewed as the principal agent of evolutionary change.3
The discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953 led to the identification
of the molecular components of the genes which population genetics
had postulated. The central dogma of molecular biology asserted that
information is transferred in one direction only, from the sequences of
bases in DNA to the sequences of amino acids assembled by the DNA
to form proteins. It was claimed that the environment has no direct
effect on genes except to eliminate or perpetuate them through selective pressures on the organisms that carried them. Molecular biology
has been immensely fruitful in illuminating almost every aspect of
evolutionary history, but some of the assumptions initially associated
with it have more recently been questioned.
1.2. The Expansion of Darwinism
Most of the challenges to the modern synthesis in recent decades should
be seen as part of an expanded Darwinism (or neo-Darwinism), rather
than as a rejection of earlier insights. For example, it has been claimed
that selection occurs at many levels, and not just on the level of organisms in populations. Dawkins speaks of selection at the level of genes; he
views organisms as mechanisms by which genes perpetuate themselves.
E.O. Wilson speaks of kin selection and others defend group selection.
Both philosophers and biologists have argued that selection occurs also
at the species level. Whereas an organism produces other organisms
by reproduction, and it perishes by death, a species produces other
Ibid., Part II.
20
ian g. barbour
species by speciation, and it perishes by extinction. The speciation rate

of a species may be as important in the long run as the reproduction
rate of individual organisms. Variation and selection occur at several
levels at once, and of course changes at one level will influence those
at other levels.4 Darwin himself stressed the struggle and competition
for survival, but more recent interpretations point to a larger role for
cooperation and symbiosis.
The idea of punctuated equilibrium defended by Gould and Eldredge
challenged the earlier assumption that macroevolution is the result of
the gradual accumulation of many small changes. They point to fossil
records that show millions of years with very little change, interspersed
with bursts of rapid speciation in relatively short periods, especially in
the early Cambrian period when all the known phyla and basic body
plans appeared in a very short period. They postulate that alterations
in developmental sequences produced major structural changes. Their
view is holistic in directing attention to polygenic traits, the genome as
a system, and the role of regulatory programs in development, rather
than to small changes due to mutations in single genes governing separate traits that might be subject to selection. The directions of change
are determined by the possibilities of developmental reorganization as
well as by selective forces acting on organisms.5
Gould and Lewontin hold that evolutionary change arises from many
differing causes, and they criticize explanation by natural selection alone
(panadaptationism). They point out that one can always postulate
a possible selective advantage for any trait by making up a just-so
story of how it might be adaptive, even in the absence of independent
evidence for such an advantage.6 But most biologists probably follow
Stebbins and Ayala in claiming that all the known data are consistent
with an expanded and enriched version of neo-Darwinism in which
variation and natural selection are still the main factors in evolutionary
4
R.N. Brandon and R.M. Burian, eds., Genes, Organisms, Populations: Controversies
over the Units of Selection (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1984); Niles Eldredge and Stanley
Salthe, Hierarchy and Evolution, in Oxford Surveys of Evolutionary Biology (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1985).
5
Stephen Jay Gould, Darwinism and the Expansion of Evolutionary Theory, Science
216 (1982), 38087; S.J. Gould and Niles Eldredge, Punctuated Equilibrium Comes
of Age, Nature 366 (1993), 22327.
6
S.J. Gould and Richard C. Lewontin, The Spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian Paradigm: A Critique of the Adaptionist Programme, Proc. of Royal Society
of London B 205 (1979), 58198.
21
change.7 The communication of information from DNA to proteins is

indeed crucial, as the central dogma asserted, but other sources of
information are significant in determining how genes are expressed in
living organisms. Some of this information is in the cytoplasm outside
the cell nucleus, and some comes from elsewhere in the organism or
wider environment. A complex feedback and regulatory system turns
particular genetic programs on and off. Outside influences can also
affect the transposition of genes.8
Some biologists have noted that the internal drives and novel actions
of organisms can initiate evolutionary changes. The environment selects
individuals, but individuals also select environments, and in a new niche
a different set of genes may contribute to survival. Some pioneering
fish ventured onto land and were the ancestors of amphibians and
mammals; some mammals later returned to the water and were the
ancestors of dolphins and whales; some forest woodpeckers began to
hunt in the mountains. In each case organisms themselves took new
initiatives; genetic and then anatomic changes followed from their
actions through genetic assimilation (the Baldwin effect). The changes
were not initiated by genetic variations. Lamark was evidently right that
the purposeful actions of organisms can eventually lead to physiological
changes, though he was wrong in assuming that physiological changes
occurring during an organisms lifetime can be inherited directly by
its offspring.9
Finally, some biologists, including Mayr, Gould, and Lewontin, consider themselves exponents of an expanded Darwinism but insist on
the autonomy of biology from physics. They say that even the probabilistic physics of classical thermodynamics cannot serve as a model for
evolutionary biology because chance and contingent historical contexts
play such crucial roles. We can describe evolution through a unique
historical narrative but we cannot deduce its path from predictive laws.
These authors also defend the distinctiveness of biological concepts
7
G. Ledyard Stebbins and Francisco Ayala, Is a New Evolutionary Synthesis Necessary? Science 213 (1981), 96771.
8
John Campbell, An Organizational Interpretation of Evolution, in Evolution at
the Crossroads, David P. Depew and Bruce H. Weber, eds. (Cambridge: MIT Press,
1985).
9
C.H. Waddington, The Strategy of the Genes (New York: Macmillan, 1957); Robert
J. Richards, Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), chap. 10.
22
ian g. barbour
and their irreducibility to the concepts of physics and chemistry, as I

will note later.10
1.3. Beyond Darwinism?
Darwins theory shared many of the assumptions of Newtonian physics; the modern synthesis was influenced by the probabilistic reasoning of statistical mechanics. Future understanding of evolution may
be enhanced by recent work on chaos and complexity in the physical
sciences. Whereas the linear systems of classical thermodynamics are
insensitive to small initial differences and attain predictable equilibrium
states, nonlinear thermodynamic systems far from equilibrium are
extremely sensitive to very small initial differences and are therefore
unpredictable. Prigogine and others have described the emergence of
new types of order in dissipative systems far from equilibrium. An
infinitesimal difference in initial conditions will lead to alternative endstates and new levels of order described by system-wide relationships
rather than by interactions at the molecular level.11
Stuart Kauffman draws from theories of complexity in arguing that
evolution is the product of self-organization as well as chance and selection. He looks at the common properties of diverse systems, for example
those in embryonic development, neural networks and computer
networks. As we will see in the next section, he argues that dynamical
systems can achieve new ordered states without any external selective
pressures.12 Jeffrey Wicken has insisted that we cannot understand
evolutionary history without looking at the entropy, order, and flow
of energy in the wider ecosystems within which organisms co-evolve.
Moreover, he says, structural and thermodynamic constraints drastically limit the stable combinations when amino acids are randomly
assembled to form proteins. These authors adopt a holistic approach
10
Ernst Mayr, The Growth of Biological Thought (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1982); idem, How Biology Differs from the Physical Sciences, in Evolution at
the Crossroads, Depew and Weber, eds.
11
Ilya Prigogine and Irene Stengers, Order Out of Chaos (New York: Bantam Books,
1984).
12
Stuart Kauffman, The Origins of Order: Self-Organization and Selection in Evolution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993); idem, At Home in the Universe: The
Search for Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1995).
23
that attempts analysis at a variety of levels, avoiding the reductionism

evident in much of evolutionary theory.
They claim that natural selection works on a field of already selforganized systems.13 In the past, the phenomena of embryology and
developmental biology have been poorly understood and have been
difficult to incorporate into neo-Darwinism. How do cells differentiate
so that the right organs are formed at the right place in the growing
organism? Some biologists postulated a morphogenic field which
imposes a pre-existing plan that guides cells in their differentiation. Others postulated developmental pathways which direct growth toward
specific anatomical forms. These hypotheses appear increasingly dubious
in the light of recent research on genetic and molecular mechanisms
in embryological development. Regulatory genes produce proteins that
act as switches to turn on secondary genes, which in turn control
the tertiary genes responsible for protein assembly in cells, tissues, and
organs. In recent experiments, the master control gene that initiates the
program for the development of an eye in the fruit fly was introduced
into cells on its wings, legs, and antennae, and complete eyes developed
at these sites. If the control gene for eye development in a mouse is
inserted in cells of a flys wing, a flys eye will develop, suggesting that
the control genes for eyes in the two species are virtually unchanged
since a common evolutionary ancestor, even though the eye structures
of insects and mammals evolved in radically different directions.14 Our
understanding of such processes is still very limited, but research on
the molecular basis of development holds great promise for broadening
our understanding of evolutionary history. For example, the Cambrian
explosion of new phyla may well have been caused by changes in the
genetic networks that regulate very early development.
Even after recognizing the power of molecular explanations, however,
one can argue that developmental patterns are constrained by principles
of hierarchical organization and the possible forms of physiological
structures. The variability of phenotypes is limited by the architecture
and dynamics of developmental systems. Goodwin, Ho, and Saunders have defended a structuralism in which a relatively autonomous
13
Jeffrey Wicken, Evolution, Thermodynamics, and Information: Extending the
Darwinian Program (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987).
14
George Halder, Patrick Callaerts, and Walter Gehring, Induction of Ectopic
Eyes by Targeted Expression of the Eyeless Gene in Drosophila, Science 267 (1995),
178892.
24
ian g. barbour
developmental dynamic is the main source of macroevolution.15 Their

ideas are controversial and outside the mainstream of current biological
thought, but should not be dismissed if they might be able to account for
observed phenomena more adequately than neo-Darwinist theory.
These authors see themselves as having moved beyond even an
expanded Darwinism. If these ideas prove fruitful they may lead to
what Kuhn would call a paradigm shift, in which the basic assumptions
of Newtonian and nineteenth-century physics will be replaced by an
alternative set of assumptions. Or perhaps we could say, in Lakatos
terms, that the core of Darwinism (the importance of variation and
natural selection) will have been preserved by abandoning some of
its auxiliary hypotheses (such as gradualism and the exclusive role of
selection as a directive force). We could also follow the philosophers
of science who hold that in studying complex phenomena we should
seek limited models applicable to particular domains, rather than
universally applicable predictive laws. Natural selection may be more
important in some contexts than in others. As a minimum we can say
that we should consider other factors in addition to variation and natural
selection, and that we should look at what is going on at a variety of
levels. In the discussion that follows, I will be drawing primarily from
the advocates of the expansion of Darwinism, but I will refer to the
work of Kauffman, who considers himself beyond Darwinism.
2. Philosophical Issues in Biology

Four concepts in recent biological thought require more careful analysis:
self-organization, indeterminacy, top-down causality, and communication of information. Each of these concepts is crucial in one of the
theological interpretations explored in the subsequent section.
15
Mae-Won Ho and Peter Saunders, eds., Beyond Neo-Darwinism (New York:
Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984); Brian Goodwin and Peter Saunders, eds., Theoretical Biology: Epigenetic and Evolutionary Order from Complex Systems (Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press, 1989); see also Robert Wesson, Beyond Natural Selection
(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991).
25
2.1. Self-organization
Evolutionary history does indeed show a directionality, a trend toward
greater complexity and consciousness. There has been an increase in
the genetic information in DNA, and a steady advance in the ability of
organisms to gather and process information about the environment and
respond to it. The emergence of life, consciousness, and human culture
are especially significant transitions within a gradual and continuous
process. But evolution does not display any straight-line progressive
development. For the majority of species, opportunistic adaptations
led to dead ends and extinction when conditions changed. The pattern
of evolution does not resemble a uniformly growing tree so much as a
sprawling bush whose tangled branches grow in many directions and
often die off. Nevertheless, there is an overall trend. Who can doubt
that a human being represents an astonishing advance over an amoeba
or a worm?
Some authors have argued that if the amino acids in primeval oceans
had assembled themselves by chance to form protein chains, the probability of being assembled in the right order to form a particular protein
would be fantastically small. It would be highly unlikely to occur even
in spans of time many times longer than the history of the universe.16
The argument is dubious because amino acids do not combine by
chance with equal probability, for there are built-in affinities and bonding preferences and structural possibilities. Some combinations form
stable units which persist, and these units combine to form larger units.
Organic molecules have a capacity for self-organization and complexity
because of structural constraints and potentialities.
Other authors have used hierarchy theory to indicate how advances
to a higher level of organizational complexity are preserved. Imagine
a watchmaker whose work is disrupted occasionally. If he has to start
over again each time, he would never finish his task. But if he assembles
groups of parts into stable sub-assemblies, which are then combined,
he will finish the task more rapidly. Living organisms have many stable
sub-assemblies at differing levels which are often preserved intact and
only loosely coupled to each other. The higher level of stability often
arises from functions that are relatively independent of variations in the
microscopic details. Evolution exhibits both chance and directionality
16
Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinghe, Evolution from Space (London: Dent,
1981).
26
ian g. barbour
because higher levels embody new types of order and stability that are
maintained and passed on.17
Let us examine Kauffmans thesis that evolution is a product of selforganization as well as of random variation and natural selection. He
finds similar patterns in the behavior of complex systems that appear
very differentfor example, in molecules, cells, neural networks, ecosystems, and technological and economic systems. In each case feedback mechanisms and nonlinear interactions make cooperative activity
possible in larger wholes. The systems show similar emergent systemic
properties not present in their components. Kauffman gives particular
attention to the behavior of networks. For example, an array of 100,000
light bulbs, each of which goes on or off as an adjustable function of
input from its four neighbors, will cycle through only 327 states from
among the astronomical number of possible states. Genes are also connected in networks; in the simplest case, gene A represses gene B and
vice versa, so only one of them is turned on. Kauffman notes that there
are only 256 cell types in mammals, and suggests that this may be the
result of system principles and not merely an historical accident.18
Many of Kauffmans ideas are speculative and exploratory, but they
reflect a new way of looking at evolution. He finds that order emerges
spontaneously in complex systems, especially on the border between
order and chaos. Too much order makes change impossible; too much
chaos makes continuity impossible. We should see ourselves not as a
highly improbable historical accident, but as an expected fulfilment
of the natural order. In his book, At Home in the Universe, Kauffman
calls for awe and respect for a process in which such self-organization
occurs.
2.2. Indeterminacy
Many features of evolutionary history are the product of unpredictable
events. The particular pair of organisms that mate and the particular
combination of genes that are inherited by their offspring cannot be
predicted; genetic laws can only be expressed probabilistically for individuals in large populations. Many mutations and replication errors
17
Stanley Salthe, Evolving Hierarchical Systems (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1985).
18
Kauffman, At Home in the Universe, chap. 4.
27
seem to occur at random. A few individuals may form a small isolated

population which happens to differ genetically from the average of
the larger population, leading to genetic drift. Such unpredictability
is compounded when co-evolving species interact competitively or
cooperatively in historically contingent ecosystems and environments.
An asteroid collision at the end of the Permian period may have
drastically altered Earths climate and its evolutionary history. We can
only describe evolution by a historical narrative; we could not have
predicted its course.
Many of these chance events seem to represent the unpredictable
intersection of separate causal chains. Two causal chains may each be
determinate, but if they are completely independent of each other, no
lawful regularity describes their intersection in time and space. The idea
of a causal chain is of course an abstraction. When we speak of the
cause of an event we are selecting from among the many necessary and
jointly sufficient conditions the one to which we want to direct attention
in a particular context of inquiry. But our ignorance of the immensely
complicated and ramifying web of causal influences in evolutionary
history does not in itself imply that it is not determined.
But an indeterminacy in nature itself seems to be present at the quantum level. In quantum theory, predictions of individual events among
atoms and subatomic particles give only probabilities and not exact
values. A particular radioactive atom might decay in the next second or
a thousand years from now, and the theory does not tell us which will
occur. Some physicists think that this unpredictability is attributable
to the limitations of current theory; they hope that a future theory will
disclose hidden variables that will allow exact calculations. But most
physicists hold that indeterminacy is a property of the atomic world
itself. Electrons and subatomic particles apparently do not have a precise
location in space and time; they are spread-out waves representing a
range of possibilities until they are observed.19
Among large groups of atoms in everyday objects, indeterminacy
at the atomic level averages out statistically to give predictable largescale behavior. However, in some biological systems, especially in the
genetic and nervous systems, changes in a small number of atoms can
have large-scale effects. A mutation could arise from a quantum event
19
Ian G. Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science (San Francisco: Harper Collins,
1990), 96104.
28
ian g. barbour
in which a single molecular bond in a gene is formed or broken, and

the effects would be amplified in the phenotype of the growing organism, and might be perpetuated by natural selection. Such evolutionary
unpredictability would reflect indeterminacy in nature and not merely
the limitation of human knowledge.20
In chaos theory and nonlinear thermodynamic systems far from
equilibrium, an infinitesimally small uncertainty concerning initial
conditions can have enormous consequences. In chaotic systems, a very
small change may be amplified exponentially. This has been called the
butterfly effect because a butterfly in Brazil might alter the weather a
month later in New York. The effect of moving an electron on a distant
galaxy might be amplified over a long period of time to alter events
on Earth.21 Deterministic laws can be applied only to closed systems;
they are an approximation to reality because actual systems that are
extremely sensitive to initial conditions can never be totally isolated
from outside influences.
According to Stephen Kellert, the unpredictability of chaotic systems
is not merely a reflection of temporary human ignorance. Prediction
over a long time period would require more information than could
be stored on all the electrons of our galaxy, and the calculations would
take longer than the phenomena we were trying to predict. Moreover
chaotic systems would amplify the quantum indeterminacies that set
limits to the accurate specification of initial conditions in both theory
and practice. Kellert also notes that in classical physics the behavior
of a larger whole is deduced from predictive causal laws governing
interactions of its constituent parts. Chaos theory, by contrast, studies
the qualitative form of large-scale patterns that may be similar even
when the constituents are very different. Chaos theory examines holistic
geometrical relationships and systemic properties rather than seeking
microreduction to detailed causal mechanisms. Order is a broader
20
On the topic of quantum indeterminacy and its possible role in mutations, see
Ellis, Murphy, Tracy, and Russell in Chaos and Complexity: Scientific Perspectives on
Divine Action, Robert John Russell, Nancey Murphy, and Arthur R. Peacocke, eds.
(Rome: Vatican Observatory, and Berkeley, CA: Center for Theology and the Natural
Sciences, 1995).
21
James Gleick, Chaos: Making a New Science (New York: Penguin Books, 1987);
John Holte, ed., Chaos: The New Science (Lanham, MD: University Press of America,
1993).
29
concept than law because it includes formal, holistic, historical, and

probabilistic patterns.22
2.3. Top-down Causality
Living organisms exhibit a many-leveled hierarchy of systems and subsystems. A level identifies a unit which is relatively integrated, stable,
and self-regulating, even though it interacts with other units at the
same level and at higher and lower levels. One such hierarchy is identified structurally: particle, atom, molecule, macromolecule, organelle,
cell, organ, organism, and ecosystem. Other hierarchies are identified
functionally: the reproductive hierarchy (gene, genome, organism, and
population), or the neural hierarchy (molecule, synapse, neuron, neural
network, and the brain with its changing patterns of interconnections).
Human beings also participate in all the social and cultural interactions
studied by the social sciences and humanities. A particular discipline or
field of inquiry focuses attention on a particular level and its relation
to adjacent levels.
We can distinguish three kinds of reduction between levels.
a. Methodological reduction is a research strategy that studies lower
levels in order to better understand relationships at higher levels.
Analysis of molecular interactions has been a spectacularly successful strategy in biology, but it is not incompatible with multi-level
analysis and the study of larger systems.
b. Epistemological reduction claims that laws and theories at one level
of analysis can be derived from laws and theories at lower levels. I
have argued that biological concepts are distinctive and cannot be
defined in physical and chemical terms. Distinctive kinds of explanation are valid at differing levels. But inter-level theories may connect adjacent levels, even if they are not derivable from the theories
applicable to either level alone. A series of overlapping theories and
models unifies the sciences without implying that one level is more
fundamental or real than another.23
22
Stephen Kellert, In the Wake of Chaos: Unpredictable Order in Dynamical Systems
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993).
23
For analyses of reduction, see Ian G. Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1966), 32437 and Religion in an Age of Science,
16569; Francisco Ayala, Reduction in Biology in Evolution at the Crossroads, Depew
30
ian g. barbour
c. Ontological reduction is a claim about the kinds of reality or the kinds

of causality that exist in the world. It is sometimes asserted that an
organism is nothing but organized molecules, or that only physical
forces are causally effective. I have defended ontological pluralism,
a multi-leveled view of reality in which differing (epistemological)
levels of analysis are taken to refer to differing (ontological) levels
of events and processes in the world, as claimed by critical realism.
In evolutionary history, novel forms of order emerged which not
only could not have been predicted from laws and theories governing previously existing forms, but which also gave rise to genuinely
new kinds of behavior and activity in nature. We can acknowledge
the distinctive characteristics of living organisms without assuming
that life is a separate substance or a vital force added to matter,
as the vitalists postulated.
Bottom-up causation occurs when many sub-systems influence a system.
Top-down causation is the influence of a system on many sub-systems.
Higher-level events influence chemical and physical processes at lower
levels without violating lower-level laws.24 Microproperties are not
referred to in the specification of the macrostate of the system. Network properties may be realized through a great variety of particular
connections. Correlation of behaviors at one level does not require
detailed knowledge of all its components. The rules of chess limit the
possible moves but leave open an immense number of possibilities that
are consistent with but not determined by those rules. So, too, the laws
of chemistry limit the combinations of molecules which are found in
DNA, but do not determine them. The meaning of the message conveyed by DNA is not given by the laws of chemistry.The holistic and
anti-reductionistic character of chaos theory has been described by one
of its best-known exponents, James Gleick:
and Weber, eds.; Arthur Peacocke, God and the New Biology (London: J.M. Dent &
Sons, 1986), chaps. 1 and 2.
24
On top-down causation, see Donald Campbell, Downward Causation in Hierarchically Ordered Biological Systems in The Problems of Reduction, Francisco Ayala and
Theodosius Dobzhansky, eds. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974); Michael
Polanyi, Lifes Irreducible Structures, Science 160 (1968), 130812; Elizabeth Vrba,
Patterns in the Fossil Record and Evolutionary Processes in Beyond Neo-Darwinism,
Ho and Saunders, eds.
31
Chaos is anti-reductionist. This new science makes a strong claim about

the world, namely, that when it comes to the most interesting questions,
questions about order and disorder, decay and creativity, pattern formation, and life itself, the whole cannot be explained in terms of the parts.
There are fundamental laws about complex systems, but they are new
kinds of law. They are laws of structure and organization and scale, and
they simply vanish when you focus on the individual constituents of a
complex systemjust as the psychology of a lynch mob vanishes when
you interview individual participants.25
We know little about how memories are preserved in the brain, but
computer simulations of neural nets suggest that memory may be
stored in distributed patterns rather than at discrete locations. In some
computer networks with parallel distributed processing, the nodes in a
series of layers can be connected by links whose strength can be varied.
In one experiment, the inputs are groups of letters, and the outputs
are random sounds in a voice synthesizer. Every time the correlation
between an input and the correct output is improved, the strongest links
are strengthened, so the network gradually improves its performance.
The network can be taught to pronounce written words. The connective
patterns involve the whole network and they are learned by experience
rather than by being directly programed. Patterns develop in the whole
without prior specification of the parts; the readjustment of the parts
can be considered a form of top-down causation.26 We should also note
that the brain of a baby is not finished or hard-wired at birth. The
neural pathways are developed in interaction with the environment
and are altered by the babys experiences.
Of all the sciences, ecology is the most holistic in its outlook. No
part of an ecosystem can be considered in isolation because changes
in one component often have far-reaching ramifications elsewhere in
the system. The participants in an ecosystem are linked by multiple
connections and cycles. The oxygen inhaled by animals is exhaled as
carbon dioxide which is in turn taken in by plants and converted back
to oxygen. The food chain connects various life forms. Predator and
prey are dependent on each other in maintaining stable populations.
A holistic approach is also used in the field of systems analysis which
25
James Gleick, address at 1990 Nobel Conference, Gustavus Adolphus College,
quoted in Steven Weinberg, Dreams of a Final Theory (New York, N.Y.: Pantheon
Book, 1992), 60.
26
C. Rosenberg and T. Sejnowski, Parallel Networks That Learn to Pronounce
English Text, Complex Systems 1 (1987), 14568.
32
ian g. barbour
studies the dynamics of urban, industrial, and electronic systems. In all

these cases, there are of course lawful relations among the parts, but
their behavior is analyzed in relation to a larger whole.
Holism is both a rejection of ontological reductionism and a claim
that the whole influences the parts. Attention is directed to the parts of
a particular whole, even though it is in turn a part of a larger whole. The
whole/part distinction is usually structural and spatial (for example, a
larger whole). Top-down causality is a very similar concept, but it draws
attention to a hierarchy of many levels characterized by qualitative
differences in organization and activity (for example, a higher level).
Levels are defined by functional and dynamic relationships. Patterns
in time are emphasized, though of course they are inseparable from
patterns in space.
2.4. The Communication of Information
Information has been an important term in many fields of science. In the
thermodynamics of gases, systems of low entropy are highly improbable
molecular configurations, which tend to degrade into the more probable configurations of uniform equilibrium states. This entails a loss of
order and pattern that is also a loss of information. Information theory
was first developed in World War II in studies of the communication
of messages by radio. Communication is more reliable if the signalto-noise ratio is high and if a coded message contains regularities and
redundancies which allow the detection of errors. With the advent of
computers, instructions could be encoded in a binary representation
(0/1 or off/on) and quantified as bits of information. The computer
responds to the instructions in the program which specify the connections in its electrical circuits. It manipulates the electrical representations
of the symbols fed into it (information processing) and then activates
some form of output. The letters on a printed page are of course the
classical case of the communication of information to a reader.27
Information is an ordered pattern (of alphabetical letters, auditory
sounds, binary digits, DNA bases, or any other combinable elements)
which is one among many possible sequences or states of a system.
Information is communicated when another system (reader, listener,
27
Jeremy Campbell, Grammatical Man: Information, Entropy, Language, and Life
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1982).
33
computer, living cell, etc.) responds selectivelythat is, when information is coded, transmitted, and decoded. The meaning of the message
is dependent on a wider context of interpretation. It must be viewed
dynamically and relationally rather than in purely static terms as if the
message were contained in the pattern itself.
The information in DNA sequences in genes is significant precisely
because of its context in a larger organic system. In the growth of an
embryo, a system of time delays, spatial differentiation, and chemical
feed-back signals communicates the information needed so that the
right proteins, cells, and organs are assembled at the right location
and time. Complicated developmental pathways, with information
flowing in both directions, connect genes with molecular activities and
physiological structures. A genome contains an immense number of
possible developmental scenarios, of which only a few are realized. In
The Ontogeny of Information, Susan Oyama argues that the meaning
and informational significance of genetic instructions depend on what
cells and tissues are already present, and on the actual functioning of
the developmental system. In place of a one-way flow of information
we must imagine interactive construction in a particular context.28
An enzyme speeds the interaction of two molecules by recognizing
them (by shape and chemical affinity) and holding them at adjacent
sites where they can react with each other. Molecules of the immune
system recognize an invading virus, which is like a key that fits a lock,
and they are activated to release a specific antibody. The communication between molecules is dependent on properties of both the sender
and the receiver. A receptor is part of an embodied action system that
implements a response to signals.
Stored in the DNA is a wealth of historically acquired information
including programs for coping with the world. For example, a bird or
animal uses specific visual or auditory clues to recognize and respond
to a dangerous predator which it has not previously encountered. Individuals in some species are programed to communicate warning signals
to alert other members of the species. Higher primates are capable of
symbolic communication of information, and human beings can use
words to express abstract concepts. Human information can be transmitted between generations not only by genes and by parental example,
28
Susan Oyama, The Ontogeny of Information: Developmental Systems and Evolution
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985).
34
ian g. barbour
but also in speech, literature, art, music and other cultural forms. The
storage and communication of information is thus an important feature
of biological processes at many levels and it must always be understood
dynamically and relationally rather than in purely static and formal
terms. Even at low levels, reality consists not simply of matter and
energy, but of matter, energy, and information.
3. Models of Gods Action in Nature

What models of Gods relation to nature are compatible with the central
affirmations of the Christian tradition and also with a world which is
characterized by self-organization, indeterminacy, top-down causality,
and communication of information? I will examine theological proposals that draw from each of these four characteristics.
All four models reject the idea of divine intervention that violates
the laws of nature. In none of them is God invoked to fill particular
gaps in the scientific account (the God of the gaps who is vulnerable
to the advance of science). Gods role is different from that of natural
causes. In each case, a feature of current scientific theory is taken as
a model (that is, a systematically developed analogy) of Gods action
in nature.29 Some authors in the first group below do propose a new
version of natural theology in which evidence from science is used as
an argument in support of theism, even if it does not offer a proof of
Gods existence. The other authors are proposing ways in which a God
who is accepted on other grounds (such as religious experience in a
historical interpretive community) might be reconceived as acting in
nature. I have called such an approach a theology of nature rather than
a natural theology.30
29
Barbour, Myths, Models, and Paradigms (New York: Harper and Row, 1974).
Barbour, Religion and Science: Historical and Contemporary Issues (San Francisco:
Harper Collins, 1997), chap. 4.
30
35
3.1. God as Designer of a Self-organizing Process

Until the nineteenth century, the intricate organization and effective
functioning of living creatures were taken as evidence of an intelligent
designer. After Darwin, the argument was reformulated: God did not
create things in their present forms, but designed an evolutionary process through which all living forms came into being. Today we know
that life is possible only under a very narrow range of physical and
chemical conditions. We have seen also that in the self-organization of
molecules leading to life there seems to have been considerable builtin design in biochemical affinities, molecular structures, and potential
for complexity and hierarchical order. The world of molecules seems
to have an inherent tendency to move toward emergent complexity,
life, and consciousness.
If design is understood as a detailed pre-existing plan in the mind of
God, chance is the antithesis of design. But if design is identified with
the general direction of growth toward complexity, life, and consciousness, then both law and chance can be part of the design. Disorder is
sometimes a condition for the emergence of new forms of order, as
in thermodynamic systems far from equilibrium, or in the mutations
of evolutionary history. We can no longer accept the clockmaker God
who designed every detail of a determinate mechanism. But one option
today is a revised deism in which God designed the world as a manyleveled creative process of law and chance. Paul Davies is an exponent
of this position.31
A patient God could endow matter with diverse potentialities and
let the world create itself. We can say that God respects the integrity
of the world and allows it to be itself, without interfering with it, just
as God respects human freedom and allows us to be ourselves. Moral
responsibility requires that the world have some openness, which takes
the form of chance at lower levels and choice at the human level. But
responsible choice also requires enough lawfulness that we have some
idea of the probable consequences of our decisions.
An attractive feature of this option is that it provides at least partial
answers to the problems of suffering and death which were such a
31
Paul Davies, The Cosmic Blueprint: New Discoveries in Natures Creative Ability
to Order the Universe (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988); idem, The Mind of God:
The Scientific Basis for a Rational World (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992); idem,
Teleology without Teleology (CTNS/VO, v. III).
36
ian g. barbour
challenge to the classical argument from design. For competition and

death are intrinsic to an evolutionary process. Pain is an inescapable
concomitant of greater sensitivity and awareness, and it provides a valuable warning of external dangers. My main objection to a reformulated
deism is that we are left with a distant and inactive God, a far cry from
the active God of the Bible who continues to be intimately involved
with the world and human life.
One could still argue that God has an ongoing role in sustaining the
world and its laws. Some theologians maintain that the world does not
stand on its own but needs Gods continual concurrence to maintain
and uphold it in what is known today to be a dynamic rather than a
static process. According to neo-Thomists, God as primary cause works
through the matrix of secondary causes in the natural world. William
Stoeger argues that there are no gaps in the scientific account on its
own level; Gods action is on a totally different plane from all secondary causes.32 Many neo-Thomists maintain that divine sovereignty is
maintained if all events are foreseen and predetermined in Gods plan.
God does not have to intervene or interfere with the laws of nature;
divine action occurs indirectly and instrumentally through natural
processes. This view respects the integrity of science and the transcendence of God, whose action is not like causality within the world.
Some theologians hold that God sees all events in timeless eternity
without determining them, but I would argue that predestination is
not compatible with human freedom or the presence of chance, evil,
and suffering in the world.
3.2. God as Determiner of Indeterminacies
I suggested earlier that uncertainties in the predictions made by
quantum theory reflect indeterminacy in nature itself, rather than the
inadequacy of current theory. In that interpretation, a range of possibilities is present in the world. Quantum events have necessary but
not sufficient physical causes. If they are not completely determined
by the relationships described by the laws of physics, their final determination might be made directly by God. What appears to be chance,
32
Austin Farrer, Faith and Speculation (London: Adam & Charles Black, 1967),
chaps. 4 and 10; William R. Stoeger, Describing Gods Action in the World in the
Light of Scientific Knowledge of Reality, in Chaos and Complexity, Russell, Murphy,
and Peacocke, eds.
37
which atheists take as an argument against theism, may be the very

point at which God acts.
Divine sovereignty would be maintained if God providentially controls the events that appear to us as chance. No energy input would
be needed, since the alternative potentialities in a quantum state have
identical energy. God does not have to intervene as a physical force
pushing electrons around, but instead actualizes one of the many
potentialities already presentdetermining, for example, the instant
at which a particular radioactive atom decays.33
We have seen that under some conditions the effects of very small
differences at the microlevel are greatly amplified in large-scale phenomena. In nonlinear thermodynamics and chaos theory, an infinitesimal
initial change can produce dramatic changes in the larger system. Similar trigger effects occur in evolutionary mutations and in genetic and
neural systems today. Scientific research finds only law and chance, but
perhaps in Gods knowledge all events are foreseen and predetermined
through a combination of law and particular divine action. Since Gods
action would be scientifically undetectable, it could be neither proved
nor refuted by science. This would exclude any proof of Gods action
of the kind sought in natural theology, but it would not exclude the
possibility of Gods action affirmed on other grounds in a wider theology of nature.
If we assume that God controls all indeterminacies, we could preserve the traditional idea of predestination. This would be theological
determinism rather than physical determinism, since nothing happens
by chance. But then the problems of waste, suffering, and human
freedom would remain acute. Nancey Murphy has proposed that God
determines all quantum indeterminacies but arranges that law-like
regularities usually result, in order to make stable structures and scientific investigation possible, and to ensure that human actions have
dependable consequences so that moral choices are possible. Orderly
relationships do not constrain God, since they are included in Gods
purposes. God grants causal powers to created entities. Murphy holds
that in human life God acts both at the quantum level and at higher
33
William Pollard, Chance and Providence (New York: Charles Scribners Sons,
1958); Donald MacKay, Science, Chance, and Providence (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1978).
38
ian g. barbour
levels of mental activity, but does it in such a way that human freedom
is not violated.34
An alternative would be to say that most quantum events occur by
chance, but God influences some of them without violating the statistical laws of quantum physics. This view has been explained by Robert
Russell, George Ellis and Thomas Tracy, and it is consistent with the
scientific evidence.35 A possible objection to this model is that it assumes
bottom-up causality within nature once Gods action has occurred,
and thus seems to concede the reductionists claim that the behavior
of all entities is determined by their smallest parts (or lowest levels).
The action would be bottom-up even if one assumed that Gods intentions were directed to the larger wholes (or higher levels) affected by
these quantum events. However most of these authors also allow for
Gods action at higher levels which then results in a top-down influence
on lower levels, in addition to quantum effects from the bottom up.
The model can thus be combined with one of the models discussed
below.
3.3. God as Top-down Cause
The idea of levels of reality can be extended if God is viewed as acting
from an even higher level than nature. Arthur Peacocke holds that
God exerts a top-down causality on the world. Gods action would be
a constraint on relationships at lower levels that does not violate lowerlevel laws. Constraints may be introduced not just at spatial or temporal
boundaries, but also internally through any additional specification
allowed by lower-level laws. In human beings, God would influence their
highest evolutionary level, that of mental activity, which would affect
the neural networks and neurons in the brain.36 Within human beings,
divine action would be effected down the hierarchy of natural levels,
34
Nancey Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order: Buridans Ass and
Schrdingers Cat, in Chaos and Complexity, Russell, Murphy, and Peacocke, eds;
Nancey Murphy and George F.R. Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the Universe: Theology,
Cosmology and Ethics (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996).
35
Thomas F. Tracy, Particular Providence and the God of the Gaps, and George
F.R. Ellis, Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action: The Nexus of Interaction, in
Chaos and Complexity, Russell, Murphy, and Peacocke, eds.
36
Arthur Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age: Being and BecomingNatural,
Human, and Divine, enlarged edition (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), chap. 3, and
his Gods Interaction with the World in Chaos and Complexity, Russell, Murphy,
and Peacocke, eds.; idem, in CTNS/VO, v. III.
39
concerning which we have at least some understanding of relationships

between adjacent levels. (Peacocke gives a table showing the hierarchy
of academic disciplines, from the physical sciences to the humanities,
which study successively higher levels, with some disciplines addressing
inter-level questions.37) His use of top-down causality seems to me more
problematic in the case of divine action on inanimate matter; we would
have to assume direct influence between the highest level (God) and
the lowest level (matter) in the absence of intermediate levelswhich
has no analogy within the natural order.
Peacocke also extends to God the idea of whole-part relationships
found in nature. He proposes that God as the most inclusive whole
acts on the-world-as-a-whole. But this spatial analogy seems dubious because the world does not have spatial boundaries, and it has no
temporal ones if we accept Stephen Hawkings version of quantum
cosmology. Moreover the rejection of universal simultaneity in relativity
theory makes it impossible to speak of the-world-as-a-whole at any
one moment. The whole is a spatio-temporal continuum with temporal
as well as spatial dimensions. In such a framework Gods action would
presumably have to be more localized in space and time, interacting
more directly with a particular part rather than indirectly through
action on the spatio-temporal whole.
One version of top-down causality uses the relation of mind to body
in human beings as an analogy for Gods relation to the world. Some
authors urge us to look on the world as Gods body, and God as the
worlds mind or soul. In using the analogy, we can make allowance for
the human limitations that would not apply to God. We have direct
awareness of our thoughts and feelings, but only limited awareness
of many other events in our bodies, whereas God would be directly
aware of all events. We did not choose our bodies and we can affect
only a limited range of events in them, whereas Gods actions are said
to affect all events universally. From the pattern of behavior of other
people we infer their intentions which cannot be directly observed;
similarly, the cosmic drama can be interpreted as the expression of
Gods intentions.38
37
Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age, 217.

Grace Jentzen, Gods World, Gods Body (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1984);
Sallie McFague, The Body of God: An Ecological Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress Press,
1993).
38
40
ian g. barbour
But the analogy breaks down if it is pressed too far. The cosmos as a
whole lacks the intermediate levels of organization found in the body.
It does not have the biochemical or neurological channels of feedback
and communication through which the activities of organisms are
coordinated and integrated. To be sure, an omnipresent God would
not need the cosmic equivalent of a nervous system. God is presumably
not as dependent on particular bodily structures as we are. However,
we would be abandoning the analogy if we said that God is a disembodied mind acting directly on the separate physical components of
the world. It appears that we need a more pluralistic analogy allowing
for interaction among a community of beings, rather than a monistic
analogy that pictures us all as parts of one being. The world and God
seem more like a community with a dominant member than like a
single organism.
3.4. God as Communicator of Information
In radio transmissions, computers, and biological systems, the communication of information between two points requires a physical input
and an expenditure of energy (the Brillouin-Szilard relationship). But if
God is omnipresent (including presence everywhere at the microlevel),
no energy would be required for the communication of information.
Moreover, the realization of alternative potentialities already present
in the quantum world would convey differing information without any
physical input or expenditure of energy.
Arthur Peacocke has used a rich variety of analogies in addition to
top-down causality. Some of these involve the communication of information. God is like the choreographer of a dance in which much of the
action is left up to the dancers, or the composer of a still unfinished
symphony, experimenting, improvising, and expanding on a theme
and variations.39 Peacocke suggests that the purposes of God are communicated through the pattern of events in the world. We can look on
evolutionary history as the action of an agent who expresses intentions
but does not follow an exact predetermined plan. Moreover, an input
of information from God could influence the relationships among our
memories, images and concepts, just as our thoughts influence the
39
Peacocke, Creation and the World of Science (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979),
chap. 3, and Theology for a Scientific Age, chap. 9.
41
activity of neurons. Peacocke maintains that Christ was a powerfully

God-informed person who was a uniquely effective vehicle for Gods
self-expression, so that in Christ Gods purposes are more clearly
revealed than in nature or elsewhere in history.40
John Polkinghorne proposes that Gods action is an input of pure
information. We have seen that in chaos theory an infinitesimally small
energy input produces a very large change in the system. Polkinghorne
suggests that in imagining Gods action we might extrapolate chaos
theory to the limiting case of zero energy. (This differs from quantum
theory in which there actually is zero energy difference between alternative potentialities, so no extrapolation is needed). Polkinghorne holds
that Gods action is a nonenergetic input of information which expresses
holistic patterns. Gods selection among the envelope of possibilities
present in chaotic processes could bring about novel structures and types
of order exemplifying systemic higher-level organizing principles.41
The biblical idea of divine Word or Logos resembles the concept
of information. In Greek thought, the Logos was a universal rational
principle, but biblical usage also expressed the Hebrew understanding
of Word as creative power. The Word in both creation and redemption
can indeed be thought of as the communication of information from
God to the world. As in the case of genetic information and human
language, the meaning of the message must be discerned within a wider
context of interpretation. Gods Word to human beings preserves their
freedom because it evokes but does not compel their response.42 But
the divine Logos is not simply the communication of an impersonal
message since it is inseparable from an ongoing personal relationship.
The Logos is not a structure of abstract ideas like Platos eternal forms,
or like a computer program that exists independently of its embodiment
in a particular medium or hardware system. If we believe that one of
Gods purposes was to create loving and responsible persons, not simply
intelligent information processors, we will have to draw our analogies
40
Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age, chap. 9.

John Polkinghorne, Reason and Reality (Philadelphia: Trinity International Press,
1991), Chap. 3; idem, The Metaphysics of Divine Action in Chaos and Complexity,
Russell, Murphy, and Peacocke, eds; idem, The Faith of a Physicist (Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press, 1994), pp. 7778.
42
John Puddefoot, Information Theory, Biology, and Christology, in Religion and
Science: History, Method, Dialogue, W. Mark Richardson and Wesley J. Wildman, eds.
(New York: Routledge, 1996).
41
42
ian g. barbour
concerning the communication of information primarily from human

life, rather than from the genetic code or computer programs.
4. Gods Action in Process Theology

Process theology shows similarities with each of the four models above,
but also differs because it adds a fifth idea, that of interiority. Christian
process theology combines biblical thought with process philosophy,
the attempt of Alfred North Whitehead and his followers to develop a
coherent set of philosophical categories general enough to be applicable
to all entities in the world. Process theology is advocated by Charles
Birch and John Haught.43
4.1. Biology and Process Philosophy
Many features of contemporary science are strongly represented in
process philosophy. Whitehead was indebted to quantum physics for
his portrayal of the discrete, episodic, and indeterminate character of
all events. He was indebted to relativity for his view that all entities
are constituted by their relationships. Process thought is evolutionary
in stressing temporality and change. Becoming and activity are considered more fundamental than being and substance. The continuity
of evolutionary history implies the impossibility of drawing absolute
lines between successive life forms historically, or between levels of
reality today.44 Each of the four themes outlined earlier can be found
in process philosophy:
a. Self-organization is a characteristic of the basic units of reality, which
are momentarily unified events (Whitehead called them actual occasions, but I will refer to them simply as events, which reminds us
of their temporal character). No event is merely a passive product
of its past. All events are also products of present creative activity in
which organization is realizedthat is, pattern and structure which
are temporal as well as spatial. But self-organization is analyzed by
43
Charles Birch and John Haught, in CTNS/VO, v. III.

Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (New York: Macmillan,
1925); Process and Reality (New York: Macmillan,1929). See Barbour, Religion in an
Age of Science, chap. 8, or Religion and Science: Historical and Contemporary Issues,
chap. 11.
44
43
process thought in a distinctive way. Interiority is postulated in every

event, providing a unifying center for the organizing activity.
b. Indeterminacy is assumed by process thought not only in the quantum world but at all levels of integrated activity. Both order and
openness are present at all levels. At lower levels, order predominates,
while at higher levels there is more opportunity for spontaneity,
creativity, and novelty.
c. Top-down causality is defended in process writings. Process thought
is holistic in portraying a network of interconnected events. Every
event is a new synthesis of the influences on it; it occurs in a
context which affects it and which it in turn affects. This can be
called a relational or ecological view of reality. Not even God is
self-contained, for Gods experience is affected by the world. More
specifically, reality is taken to be multi-leveled. Events at high levels
of complexity are dependent on events at lower levels. But genuinely
new phenomena emerge at higher levels which cannot be explained
by the laws describing lower-level phenomena. Charles Hartshornes
version of process philosophy makes extensive use of the concept
of hierarchical levels with differing characteristics, and he gives a
careful critique of reductionism.45
d. The communication of information is not prominent in early process
writings, which is not surprising since its scientific importance
was not recognized prior to World War II. However the idea that
a concrescing event takes other events into account resembles the
contextual and relational character of information in action. James
Huchingson notes that information always involves selection from
among possible states; he proposes that Whiteheads actual occasions are information-processing entities that select from among
the possibilities provided by God and previous events. Moreover
information from the world feeds back to God; this feedback leads
to relevant readjustment, as in cybernetic systems. Huchingson finds
holism and top-down causality in the role of information in both
process thought and systems theory. A system works as a whole to
restrict the ability of its components to realize all possible states.
New forms of order are generated at higher levels of organization,
according to both process and systems thinking.46
45
Charles Hartshorne, Reality as Social Process (Glencoe, IL: Free Press, 1953).
James Huchingson, Organization and Process: Systems Philosophy and Whiteheadian Metaphysics, Zygon 11.4 (1981): 22641.
46
44
ian g. barbour
4.2. Interiority
Interiority is the most controversial theme in process thought. Reality is construed as a network of interconnected events which are also
moments of experience, each integrating in its own way the influences
from its past and from other entities. The evolution of interiority, like
the evolution of physical structures, is said to be characterized by both
continuity and change. The forms taken by interiority vary widely, from
rudimentary memory, sentience, responsiveness and anticipation in
simpler organisms, to consciousness and self-consciousness in more
complex ones. Human life is the only point at which we know reality
from within. If we start from the presence of both physical structures
and experience in human life, we can imagine simpler and simpler
structures in which experience is more and more rudimentary. But if
we start with simple physical structures totally devoid of interiority, it
is difficult to see how the complexification of external structures can
result in interiority.47
The approach and avoidance reactions of bacteria can be considered elementary forms of perception and response. An amoeba learns
to find sugar, indicating a rudimentary memory and intentionality.
Invertebrates seem to have some sentience and capacity for pain and
pleasure. Purposiveness and anticipation are clearly present among
lower vertebrates, and the presence of a nervous system greatly enhances
these capacities. The behavior of animals gives evidence that they suffer
intensely, and even invertebrates under stress release endorphins and
other pain-suppressant chemicals similar to those in human brains.
Some species exhibit considerable problem-solving and anticipatory
abilities and a range of awareness and feelings. Conceptualizing interiority requires that we try to look on an organisms activities from its
own point of view, even though its experience must be very different
from our own.48
We noted earlier that evolutionary change can be initiated by the
activity of organisms in selecting their own environments (the Baldwin effect). Their diverse responses and novel actions may create new
47
Charles Birch, A Purpose for Everything (Mystic, CT: Twenty-Third Publications,
1990); Birch and Cobb, The Liberation of Life: From the Cell to the Community (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981).
48
Donald Griffin, The Question of Animal Awareness: Evolutionary Continuity of
Mental Experience (Los Altos, CA: William Kaufmann, 1981); Charles Birch and John
B. Cobb, Jr., The Liberation of Life.
45
evolutionary possibilities. Among the creatures who were the common ancestors of bison and horses, some charged their enemies head
on, and their survival would have been enhanced by strength, weight,
strong skulls and other bison-like qualities. Others in the same population fled from their enemies, and their survival depended on speed,
agility, and other abilities we see in horses. The divergence of bison
and horse may have arisen initially from different responses to danger,
rather than from genetic mutations related to anatomy. Emotions and
mental responses are not uniquely determined by the genes, though
they occur in nervous systems which are the product of an inherited
set of genes. Organisms participate actively in evolutionary history
and are not simply passive products of genetic forces from within and
environmental forces from without.49
In the study of human beings, psychology was once dominated
by behaviorists who correlated observable stimuli and responses and
claimed that mental life is inaccessible to science. But the more recent
cognitive psychologists talk about perception, attention, memory, intention, mental representation and consciousness. These issues are highly
disputed today, but some authors have been trying to relate data from
three sources: phenomenological self-description, neurological research
on the brain, and computer simulations of neural nets.50 Others insist
that subjectivity, which always involves a particular perspective or
point of view, cannot be represented in the objective framework of
science.51
We are each aware of our experience despite the difficulty of studying it scientifically. It is this direct awareness that leads us to attribute
subjectivity to other humans, animals, and even to lower forms of life.
While the terms consciousness and mind should be restricted to organisms with a nervous system, it is reasonable to attribute rudimentary
forms of perception and experience to organisms as simple as the
amoeba. I would argue that in the light of evolutionary continuity and
in the interest of metaphysical generality we should take experience as
a category applicable to all integrated entities, even if consciousness
appears only in higher life forms.
49
C.H. Waddington in Mind in Nature, John B. Cobb, Jr. and David Griffin, eds.,
(Washington DC: University Press of America, 1977).
50
Owen Flanagan, Consciousness Reconsidered (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992).
51
Thomas Nagel, The View from Nowhere (New York: Oxford University Press,
1986); Colin McGinn, The Problem of Consciousness (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991).
46
ian g. barbour
4.3. Christianity and Process Theology

In process thought God is the source of order and also the source of
novelty. God presents new possibilities to the world but leaves alternatives open, eliciting the response of entities in the world. God is present
in the unfolding of every event but never exclusively determines the
outcome. This is a God of persuasion rather than coercion. For process theologians, God is not as an omnipotent ruler but the leader and
inspirer of an interdependent community of beings. John Cobb and
David Griffin speak of God as creative-responsive love which affects
the world but is also affected by it. Gods relation to human beings is
used as a model for Gods relation to all beings.52
Process theologians stress Gods immanence and participation in the
world, but they do not give up transcendence. God is said to be temporal in being affected by interaction with the world, but eternal and
unchanging in character and purpose. Classical ideas of omnipresence
and omniscience are retained, but not even God can know a future
which is still open. Compared to the traditional Western model, Gods
power over events in the world is severely limited, especially at lower
levels where events are almost exclusively determined by their past. The
long span of cosmic history suggests a patient and subtle God working
through the slow emergence of novel forms. Christian process theologians hold that the life and death of Christ are the supreme examples
of the power of Gods love and participation in the life of the world.
The cross is a revelation of suffering love, and the resurrection reveals
that even death does not end that love.
Process thought shares insights with each of the theological models
described earlier, but it differs at crucial points.
a. Like God the designer of a self-organizing process, the God of process
thought is the source of order in the world. But the process God
is also directly involved in the emergence of novelty through the
interiority of each unified event. Deism is avoided because God has
a direct and continuing role in the history of the world.
b. Like those who say that God determines quantum indeterminacies,
process thinkers hold that God influences systems that are not fully
determined by past events. It is never an absolute determination,
52
John B. Cobb, Jr. and David Ray Griffin, Process Theology: An Introduction (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1976).
47
for God always works along with other causes. In process thought
Gods activity occurs at higher levels of organization in addition to
the quantum level. This avoids a reliance on quantum events alone
which would perpetuate the reductionists assumption that only
bottom-up causality operates within natural systems.
c. Like those who postulate God as top-down cause, process thinkers
stress Gods immanence and participation in an interdependent
many-leveled world. But process thought has no difficulty conceptualizing the interaction between the highest level (God) and the
lowest (inanimate matter) in the absence of intermediate levels,
because God is present in the unfolding of integrated events at all
levels. Hartshorne has indeed used the analogy of the world as Gods
body, though we must remember that in the process scheme the body
is itself a community of integrated entities at various levels. Most
process theologians, however, insist on a greater divine transcendence
and greater human freedom than the analogy of a cosmic body suggests. Using a social rather than organic analogy they imagine us,
not as cells in Gods body, but as members of a cosmic community
of which God is the preeminent member.
d. The idea that God communicates information to the world is consistent with process thought. Gods ordering and valuation of potentialities is a form of information within a larger context of meaning.
God also receives information from the world, and God is changed
by such feedback. The communication of information occurs within
the momentary experience of integrated events at any level, rather
than by bottom-up causality through quantum phenomena alone, or
through the trigger points of chaos theory, or by top-down causality
acting on the whole cosmos. God, past events, and the events present response join in the formation of every event. Process thought
uses a single conceptual representation for divine action at all levels,
whereas some of the authors mentioned earlier assume very different
modes of divine action at various levels in the world. At the same
time, process thought tries to allow for differences in the character
of events that occur at diverse levels.
The idea of Gods self-limitation or kenosis in recent theology is in
many ways similar to the assertions of process theology. Some theologians have suggested that God voluntarily set omnipotence aside in
creating a world. They hold that the life and death of Christ reveal a
God of love who participates in the worlds suffering. They suggest
48
ian g. barbour
that, like a wise teacher or the parent of a growing child, God respects
the integrity of the created world and the freedom of human beings,
but does not abandon them. They balance the classical emphasis on
transcendence, eternity, and impassibility with a greater emphasis on
Gods immanence, temporality, and vulnerability.53 Feminist authors
have urged that patriarchal images of power as coercive control be
replaced by the images of empowerment, nurture, and cooperation
that are associated with women in our culture. They propose the image
of God as Mother to balance the traditional image of God as Father.54
Many feminists are sympathetic to the idea of kenosis, but with the
caveat that divine vulnerability and suffering love must not be cited
to support the submission and self-abnegation of women. Power as
control is a zero-sum game: the more one party has, the less the other
can have. Power as empowerment is a positive-sum situation and does
not imply weakness in either party. Empowerment and the nurturing
of growth and interdependence also seem to be appropriate features
of a model of God in an evolutionary world.
Proponents of self-limitation hold that God is in principle omnipotent but voluntarily accepts a limitation of power in order to create
a community of love and free response. The goal is relationship and
transformation, not kenosis in itself. Moreover, the use of personal
images of the relation between God and the world suggests that God
might influence events in the world without controlling them, so we do
not end up with a powerless or deistic God. Gods dialogic relation to
human beings serves as a model of divine activity throughout nature.
Process thought agrees with many of these assertions. However, it holds
that the limitations of Gods power are not voluntary and temporary
but metaphysical and necessarythough they are integral to Gods
essential nature and not antecedent or external to it.
The role of God in process thought has much in common with the
biblical understanding of the Holy Spirit. Like the process God, the
Spirit works from within. In various biblical passages, the Spirit is said
to indwell, renew, empower, inspire, guide, and reconcile. According to
53
W.H. Vanstone, Loves Endeavor, Loves Expense (London: Dartmon, Longman,
and Todd, 1977); Jrgen Moltmann, God in Creation (San Francisco: Harper & Row,
1985), 8693; Paul Fiddes, The Creative Suffering of God (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1988); Murphy and Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the Universe.
54
Sallie McFague, Models of God: Theology for an Ecological, Nuclear Age (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987); Elizabeth A. Johnson, She Who Is: The Mystery of God
in Feminist Theological Discourse (New York: Crossroads, 1992).
49
Psalm 104, the Spirit creates in the present: Thou dost cause the grass
to grow for the cattle and plants for man to cultivate. . . . When thou
sendest forth thy Spirit, they are created; and thou renewest the face of
the ground. The Spirit represents Gods presence and activity in the
world. This is an emphasis on immanence which, like that in process
theology, does not rule out transcendence. Moreover, the Spirit is God
at work in nature, in human experience, and in Christ, so creation and
redemption are aspects of a single activity.55 Process thought similarly
applies a single set of concepts to Gods role in human and nonhuman
life, and it is not incompatible with the idea of particular divine action
and human response in the life of Christ. The Holy Spirit comes to us
from without to evoke our response from within. It is symbolized by
the dove, the gentlest of birds. Other symbols of the Spirit are wind
and fire, which can be more overpowering, but they usually represent
inspiration rather than sheer power. I have elsewhere tried to show
that the process view of God is consistent with other aspects of the
biblical message.56
4.4. Some Objections
Let me finally note some possible objections to process thought.
a. Is panexperientialism credible? Process thinkers attribute rudimentary
experience, feeling, and responsiveness to simple entities. They hold
that mind and consciousness are present only at higher levels in more
complex organisms, so they are not panpsychists as the term is usually understood. Rocks and inanimate objects are mere aggregates
with no unified experience. There are no sharp lines between forms
of life in evolutionary history or among creatures today. It appears
that for matter to produce mind, in evolution or in embryological development, there must be intermediate stages or levels, and
mind and matter must have some characteristics in common. No
extrapolation of physical concepts can yield the concepts needed to
describe our subjective experience. Process thought interprets lowerlevel events as simpler cases of higher-level ones, rather than trying
55
G.W.H. Lampe, God as Spirit (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977); Alisdair Heron,
The Holy Spirit (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1983).
56
Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science, 23538.
50
ian g. barbour
to interpret higher-level events in terms of lower-level concepts or

resorting to dualism.
However, Whitehead himself was so intent on elaborating a set
of metaphysical categories applicable to all events that I believe he
gave insufficient attention to the radically different ways in which
those categories are exemplified at different levels. In that regard,
Hartshorne, Griffin, and other more recent process thinkers are more
helpful. I have also questioned whether Whiteheads understanding
of the episodic character of moments of experience provides an
adequate view of human selfhood. I would argue that we can accept
more continuity and a stronger route of inheritance of personal
identity, without reverting to traditional categories of substance.
b. Is this a God of the gaps? In earlier centuries, God was invoked as
an explanation for what was scientifically unexplained. It was held
that God intervened at discrete points in an otherwise law-abiding
sequence. This was a losing strategy when the gaps in the scientific
account were successively closed. According to process philosophy,
by contrast, God does not intervene unilaterally to fill particular gaps.
God is already present in the unfolding of every event, but no event
is attributable to God alone. God and the creatures are co-creators.
The role filled by God is not a gap of the kind that might be filled by
science, which studies the causal influence of the past. The contribution of God cannot be separated out as if it were another external
force, for it operates through the interiority of every entity, which
is not accessible to science. Gods influence on lower-level events
would be minimal, so it is not surprising that the evolution of new
forms has been such a long, slow process.
c. Can we worship a God of limited power? The God envisaged by
process thought is less powerful than the omnipotent ruler of classical theology. But different kinds of power are effective in different
ways. The power revealed in Christ is the power of love to evoke our
response, rather than the power to control us externally. Moreover,
the God of process thought is everlasting, omnipresent, unchanging
in purpose, knows all that can be known, and has a universal role
and priority in status reminiscent of many of the traditional divine
attributes. But I would grant that the numinous experience of the
holy and the Christian experience of worship seem to require a
greater emphasis on transcendence than we find in Whitehead himself. We can adapt Whiteheadian categories to the theological task
51
of interpreting the experience of the Christian community without

accepting all of his ideas.
d. Is process thought too philosophical? Metaphysical categories seem
abstract and theoretical, far removed from the existential issues of
personal life which are central in religion. Some process writers use
a technical vocabulary which is understandable only after considerable study, though process ideas can be expressed in a more familiar
vocabulary. No theologian can avoid the use of philosophical categories in the systematic elaboration of ideas. Augustine drew from
Plato, Aquinas from Aristotle, Barth from Kant, and so forth. However, we do always need to return to the starting point of theological
reflection in the formative events and characteristic experiences of
the Christian community. Imaginative models are more important
than abstract concepts in the daily life of the church. No model is a
literal or exhaustive representation, and we can use different models
to imagine different aspects of Gods relation to the world. In our
search for universality we must be in dialogue with people in other
social locations, since economic interests, cultural values, and gender
affect all our interpretive categories.
Perhaps, after all, we should return to the biblical concept of the Holy
Spirit. This will help us to avoid the separation of creation and redemption that occurred in much of classical Christianity. It is free of the
male imagery so prominent elsewhere in Christian history. It will help
us recover a sense of the sacred in nature that can motivate a strong
concern for the environment today. The Spirit is God working from
within, both in human life and the natural world, which is consistent
with process thought. The theme of the 1991 assembly of the World
Council of Churches in Canberra, Australia, was a prayer in which we
can join: Come, Holy Spirit, renew thy whole creation.
CHAPTER TWO
THE SOUND OF SHEER SILENCE:

HOW DOES GOD COMMUNICATE WITH HUMANITY?
Arthur Peacocke1
[Elijah] got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that
food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God. At that
place he came to a cave, and spent the night there.
Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, What are you doing
here, Elijah? He answered, I have been very zealous for the Lord, the
God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down
your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and
they are seeking my life, to take it away.
He said, Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the
Lord is about to pass by. Now there was a great wind, so strong that it
was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord,
but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but
the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but
the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence.
When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out
and stood at the entrance of the cave.
I Kings 19: 813 (NRSV)
1
This essay amplifies and extends a train of thought concerning the significance of
whole-part constraint in relation to divine action which has engaged me since 1987;
cf. fn. 1, p. 263, of my Gods Interaction with the World, in Chaos and Complexity:
Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, Robert J. Russell, Nancey Murphy and Arthur
Peacocke, eds. (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory; Berkeley, Calif.: Center for
Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1995), henceforth CAC. I have used the term wholepart constraint to avoid any possible Humean implications of downward/top-down
causation previously employed in this context. Perhaps this was unnecessarily cautious
(cf. my guarded language in fn. 22, p. 272, in CAC!), since I continued to envisage a
causative influence of the whole on the parts in complex systems (i.e., of the system
on its constituents), as my essay in CAC, 27276, 28287, shows. Here I take the
opportunity to emphasize this and to take account of other concepts that have been
used to describe the whole-part and the mind-brain-body relation so that the inclusive
notion of whole-part influence (as I here denote it) can be applied as an analogy for
divine action, especially in relation to Gods communication with humanity, that is,
with possible divine effects on human consciousness (an approach which I developed
earlier in my Theology for a Scientific Age, 2nd enlarged edition, [London: SCM Press;
Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993], esp. in chap. 11henceforth TSA).
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arthur peacocke
1. Introduction
When Elijah in extremis and in flight from the wrath of Jezebel sought
a message from God and stood expectantly on the mount of God,
Horeb, what brought him to the mouth of his sheltering cave was not
the great wind, the earthquake, or the fire, butwe are tolda sound
of sheer silence, from the depths of which Elijah is addressed by God.2
The story encapsulates the directness and immediacy of such experiences and at the same time exemplifies their baffling character. For it
is not only these archetypal figures and events in the tradition which
have this character, but also the widespread religious experiences of
humanityboth those inside and those outside of religious tradition.3
The content of such experiences will be the concern of the last section of this essay, but their very existence raises questions about the
general nature of Gods interaction with the world and with humanity,
especially when both are viewed in the contemporary perspectives of
the natural and human sciences. The track of inquiries into scientific
perspectives on divine action in the CTNS-Vatican Observatory series
of research conferences has inevitably led to the question of how God
possibly can communicate with a humanity that is part of the natural
world and evolved in and from it.
The natural and human sciences clearly provide a context entirely
different from the cultural milieu of the legends concerning Elijahand
indeed from that of even a hundred years ago. The dominance of the
essentially Greek, and unbiblical, notion in the Christian world that
human beings consist of two distinct kinds of entity (or substance)a
mortal, physical body and an immortal spirit (or soul)provided
a deceptively obvious basis for envisaging how God and humanity
might communicate. The divine Spirit was thought then to be in
some way closely related to, and capable of communication with, the
human spiritboth were capable of being, as it were, on the same
wavelength for inter-communication. This ontology of spirit was not
physicalist insofar as it was understood that spirit was not part of the
2
I Kings 19: 12 (NRSV). The implicit paradox is well illustrated by the alternative
translations: a low murmuring sound (NEB); a faint murmuring sound (REB);
a sound of gentle stillness (RV, footnote); and, of course, the familiar a still small
voice of AV and RV.
3
See also sec. 4.1 below, Revelation and Religious Experience, and fn. 80.
the sound of sheer silence
55
causal nexus of the physical and biological world which the natural
sciences continue to explicate.
The basis for such an ontology has been undermined by the general
pressure of the relevant sciences towards a monistic nondualist view
of humanity. In what follows we shall examine (2.1) the perspectives
of science on the world4 and advocate an emergentist monism as the
epistemology and ontology most appropriate to these perspectives. The
relation of wholes to parts in the systems of the world, which bears upon
how effects and influences are transmitted in the world, is discussed
(2.2) and the idea of whole-part influence is again utilized (2.2.1).
Other terms used in this context are also surveyed and related to this
notion (2.2.2). The idea of a flow of information between, and even
in, systems proves to be illuminating (2.3), especially when the world is
viewed (2.4) as a System-of-systems. The mind-brain-body relation is
considered (2.5) in the light of the foregoing and it transpires that the
details of the relation between cerebral neurological activity and consciousness (the concern of many of the essays in this volume [Ed: v. IV
of CTNS/VO Series, Neuroscience and the Person]) cannot in principle
detract from or particularly illuminate the causal efficacy of the content
of the latter on the former. In other words, folk psychology and the
holistic language of personhood are held to be justified and vindicated.
The nature of communication between persons is then analyzed (2.6)
and found to be mediated entirely through patterns within the physical constituents of the world, consistently with the monist feature of
this approach and without eliminating the place for consciousness and
intention in interpersonal communication.
With this as background, the inquiry can then move on to considering Gods interaction with the world (3) and to distinguishing between
various modes of this relation (3.1). In section 3.2, reasons for eschewing
any attribution of intervention by God will be given, while recognizing that the key problem of the ontological gap(s) at the causal
joint of divine interaction may, in principle, never be solublethough
its location can usefully be discussed and affirmed to be holistic and
everywhere. How God may be best conceived as bringing about events,
or patterns of events, in the world will be addressed in section 3.3, and
an earlier hypothesis of the authorof divine holistic action on the
4
Here, and elsewhere, the world = all-that-is, including humanitythat is,
everything other than God.
56
arthur peacocke
world-as-a-whole by whole-part influencewill be further developed.

This leads to a reinstatement of the traditional model of God as a personal agent in the world, albeit in a new perspective.
On this foundation it proves possible to move on to the question
of how God could affect the content of human thinking instantiated
in human-brains-in-human-bodiesthat is, of how God could communicate with a humanity embodied in the natural world. This will
entail consideration (4.1) of the status of what has traditionally been
called revelation in human experience and, more particularly, religious experience. Finally, we can then examine (4.2) how God might
be considered as communicating with humanity and whether such
communication can be regarded as personal.
As it happens, a perceptiveindeed magisterialtreatment earlier
this century by Oliver Quick, in relation to sacramental theology,
provides a useful conceptual framework for linking the steps in this
inquiry.5 His approach was based on a working distinction in human
experience which can be extended to Gods relation to the world. There
are two ways, he suggested, in which outward things or realitiesthose
which occupy space and time and are in principle, at least, perceptible
to human senses (basically, the physical)may be related to our
inward mental lives, which do not occupy space and time and are
not perceptible to the senses. The outward things or realities may take
their character either (1) from what is done with them in implementing inward mental states; or (2) from what is known by and through
them of inward mental states. The first is an instrumental relation
and the second a symbolic one.
This broad distinction in human experience has a parallel in Gods
relations to the world, to all-that-is, which, in the Jewish and Christian
monotheistic traditions, may be viewed (1) as the instrument whereby
God is effecting some purpose by acting on and doing something with
and through it; or (2) as the symbol in and through which God is
signifying and expressing Gods eternal nature to those who have the
ability to discern it. We need to postulate ways in which God can effect
instrumentally particular events and patterns of events in the world,
in order to render intelligible how God might be known symbolically
through particular events or patterns of events. These are what they
5
Oliver C. Quick, The Christian Sacraments (London: Nisbet, 1927; repr. 1955),
chap. 1.
57
are, and not something else, because of Gods intention and purposes
to communicate to humanity. Quicks analysis points to the need to
clarify the instrumental mode of Gods interaction with the world in
order to underpin the possibility of Gods symbolic, communicating
action on human-brains-in-human-bodies, that is, in our thinking. So
what are the features of the world unveiled by the sciences that are
relevant to such an inquiry?
2. The World
2.1. Scientific Perspectives on the WorldEmergentist Monism
The underlying unity of the natural world is testified to by its universal, embedded rationality which the sciences assume and continue
to verify successfully. In the realm of the very small (the subatomic)
and of the very large (the cosmic), the extraordinary applicability of
mathematicsthe free creation of human ratiocination in elucidating
the structures, entities, and processes of the worldcontinues to reinforce that it is indeed one world. Yet, the diversity of the same world is
apparent not only in the purely physicalmolecules, the Earths surface,
the immensely variegated denizens of the astronomical heavensbut
even more strikingly in the biological world. New species continue to
be discovered, in spite of the depredations caused by human action.
This diversity has been rendered more intelligible in recent years by
an increased awareness of the principles involved in the constitution of
complex systems. There is even a corresponding science of complexity
concerned with theories about such systems. It will be enough here to
recognize that the natural (and also human) sciences increasingly give
us a picture of the world as consisting of a complex hierarchyor more
accurately, hierarchiesa series of levels of organization of matter in
which each successive member of the series is a whole constituted of
parts preceding it in the series.6 The wholes are organized systems of
6
Conventionally, the series is said to run from the lower less complex systems
to the higher more complex systemsfrom parts to wholesso that these wholes
themselves constitute parts of more complex entities, rather like a series of Russian
dolls. In the complex systems I have in mind here, the parts retain their identity and
properties as isolated individual entities. So the systems referred to are those which,
loosely speaking, were the concern of the first phase of general systems theory. In those
systems the parts (elements) of the complex wholes are physical entities (e.g., atoms,
58
arthur peacocke
parts that are dynamically and spatially interrelateda feature (sometimes called a mereological relation) which will concern us further
below (section 2.2). This feature of the world is now widely recognized
to be of significance in relating our knowledge of its various levels of
complexitythat is, the sciences which correspond to these levels.7 It
also corresponds not only to the world in its present condition but
also to the way complex systems have evolved in time out of earlier
simpler ones.
What is significant about this process in time and about the relation of complex systems to their constituents now is that the concepts
needed to describe and understandas indeed also the methods needed
to investigateeach level in the hierarchy of complexity are specific to
and distinctive of those levels. It is very often the case (but not always)
that the properties, concepts, and explanations used to describe the
higher level wholes are not logically reducible to those used to describe
their constituent parts, themselves often also constituted of yet smaller
entities. This is an epistemological assertion of a nonreductionist kind,
and its precise implications have been much discussed. With reference
to a particular system whose constitutive parts (or elements) are
stable (see footnote 6), I think it is possible to affirm that there can
be theory autonomy in the sense indicated above (that is, the logical
and conceptual nonreducibility of predicates, concepts, laws, etc., of
the theories applied to the higher level) without there being processautonomy (defined to mean that the processes occurring at the higher
level are more than an interlocking, in new relations, of the processes
in which the constituent parts participate).8
molecules, cells) which are either individually stable or which undergo processes of
change (as, e.g., in chemical reactions), themselves analyzable as being the interchange
of stable parts (atoms in that case). The internal relations of such elements are not
regarded as affected by their incorporation into the system.
7
See, e.g., TSA, 3643, 21418, and figure 3, based on a scheme of W. Bechtel
and A. Abrahamson in their Connectionism and the Mind (Oxford: Blackwell, 1991),
figure 8.1; for a bold extension of the schema developed there, see Nancey Murphy
and George F.R. Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the Universe: Theology, Cosmology and
Ethics (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996), chaps. 2, 4.
8
See the Appendix to this essay and my God and the New Biology (London: Dent,
1986, repr. Gloucester, Mass: Peter Smith, 1994), chaps. 1, 2, henceforth GNB. Whether
or not this statement about theory- and process-autonomy applies to the relations
between distinctive systems is a matter which will be examined further in sec. 2.4 and
the Appendix. [Editors Note: the appendix to this essay is not included in the current
volume].
59
When the nonreducibility of properties, concepts, and explanations applicable to higher levels of complexity is well established, their
employment in scientific discourse can often, but not in all cases, lead to
a putative and then to an increasingly confident attribution of a causal
efficacy to the complex wholes which does not apply to the separated,
constituent parts, for to be real, new, and irreducible . . . must be to
have new, irreducible causal powers.9 If this continues to be the case
under a variety of independent procedures and in a variety of contexts,
then new and distinctive kinds of realities at the higher levels of complexity may properly be said to have emerged.10 This can occur with
respect either to moving synchronically up the ladder of complexity,
or diachronically through cosmic and biological evolutionary history.
This understanding accords with the pragmatic attribution, both in
ordinary life and scientific investigation, of the term reality to that
which we cannot avoid taking account of in our diagnosis of the course
of events, in experience or experiments. Real entities have effects and
play irreducible roles in adequate explanations of the world.
We have been assuming, with the physicalists, that all entities,
all concrete particulars in the world, including human beings, are
constituted of fundamental physical entitieswhatever it is that current physics postulates as the basic constituents of the world (which,
of course, includes energy as well as matter). This is a monistic view
(a constitutively-ontologically reductionist one)everything can be
broken down into fundamental physical entities and no extra entities
are to be inserted at higher levels of complexity to account for their
properties. I shall denote this position as that of emergentist monism,
rather than as nonreductive physicalism, for those who adopt this
latter label for their view, particularly in their talk of the physical
realization of the mental in the physical, often seem to me to hold a
much less realistic view of higher level properties than I wish to affirm
9
Samuel Alexander, as quoted by Jaegwon Kim, Non-reductivism and Mental
Causation, in Mental Causation, John Heil and Alfred Mele, eds. (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1993), 204.
10
William C. Wimsatt has elaborated criteria of robustness for such attributions
of reality for emergent properties at the higher levels. These involve noting what is
invariant under a variety of independent procedures; this is summarized in GNB, 2728,
from Wimsatts paper Robustness, Reliability and Multiple-Determination in Science,
in Knowing and Validating in the Social Sciences: A Tribute to Donald T. Campbell,
Marilynn Brewer and Barry Collins, eds. (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1981).
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hereand also not to attribute causal powers to that to which higherlevel concepts refer.11
If we do make such an ontological commitment about the reality of
the emergent whole of a given total system, the question then arises:
How is one to explicate the relation between the state of the whole
and the behavior of parts of that system at the micro-level? The simple
concept of chains of causally related events (ABC . . .) in constant
conjunction ( la Hume) is inadequate for this purpose. Extending and
enriching the notion of causality now becomes necessary because of
new insights into the way complex systems in general and biological
ones in particular behave. This subtler understanding of how higher
levels influence the lower levels, and vice versa, still allows application
in this context of the notion of a causal relation from whole to part
(of system to constituent)never ignoring, of course, the bottom-up
effects of parts on wholes, for the properties of wholes depend on the
properties of the parts being what they are.
2.2. The Relation of Wholes and Parts in Complex Systems
A number of related concepts have been developed in recent years to
describe these relations in both synchronic and diachronic systemsthat
is, respectively, both those in some kind of steady state with stable,
characteristic emergent features of the whole, and those which display
an emergence of new features in the course of time.
11
My view of emergent monism is in harmony with that of Philip Clayton, to
whom I am much indebted for his shrewd and useful comments on this essay. Note
that the term monism is emphatically not intended (as is apparent from the nonreductive approach adopted here) in the sense in which it is taken to mean that physics
will eventually explain everything. Note also that this position is distinct from that
of dual-aspect monism or two-aspect monism, which could appear to be purely
epistemological, being about how an entity is viewed from two different perspectives.
Even when the two and dual refer to distinct properties of a single entity, there
is not in these terms any implication of a causal relation between the aspects (any
more than between the wave and particle aspects of the single entity of the electron).
Talk of two aspects is not strong enough to include an affirmation that the higher
level is real and has causal efficacy.
61
2.2.1. Whole-Part Influence (or Constraint)

The term downward-causation or top-down causation was, as far
as I can ascertain, first employed by Donald Campbell12 to denote the
way in which the network of an organisms relationships to its environment and its behavior patterns together determine in the course of time
the actual DNA sequences at the molecular level present in an evolved
organismeven though, from a bottom-up viewpoint, a molecular
biologist would tend to describe the organisms form and behavior, once
in existence, as a consequence of those same DNA sequences. Campbell
cites as an example the evolutionary development of efficacious jaws
made of suitable proteins in a worker termite. There are imprecisions
and a lack of generalizability in Campbells example and I prefer to use
actual complex systems to clarify this suggestion. One could cite, for
example, the Bnard phenomenon13at a critical point a fluid heated
uniformly from below in a containing vessel ceases to manifest the
entirely random Brownian motion of its molecules, but displays up
and down convective currents in columns of hexagonal cross-section.
Moreover, certain auto-catalytic reaction systems (for example, the
famous Zhabotinsky reaction and glycolysis in yeast extracts) display
spontaneously, often after a time interval from the point when first
mixed, rhythmic temporal and spatial patterns the forms of which can
even depend on the size of the containing vessel. Many examples are
now known also of dissipative systems which, because they are open,
a long way from equilibrium, and nonlinear in certain essential relationships between fluxes and forces, can display large-scale patterns
12
Donald T. Campbell, Downward Causation in Hierarchically Organized Systems, in Studies in the Philosophy of Biology: Reduction and Related Problems, Francisco
J. Ayala and Theodosius Dobzhansky, eds. (London: Macmillan, 1974), 17986. A
valuable and perspicacious account (with which I entirely agree) of emergent order,
top-down causation (fully illustrated by its operation in the hierarchical organization
of the modern digital computer), and the physical mediation of top-down effects has
been given in Murphy and Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the Universe, 2232. For brevity here, I refer the reader to that recent excellent exposition. For earlier expositions of
the hierarchies of complexity, of the relation of scientific concepts applicable to wholes
to those applicable to the constituent parts, and of top-down/downward causation and
whole-part influence (as discussed below), see GNB, chaps. 1, 2; TSA, 3941, 5055,
21318 (esp. figure 3); and CAC, 27276.
13
For a survey with references, see Arthur Peacocke, The Physical Chemistry of
Biological Organization (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983, 1989), henceforth PCBO.
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arthur peacocke
in spite of random motions of the unitsorder out of chaos, as Ilya

Prigogine and Isabelle Stengers dubbed it.14
In these examples, the ordinary physico-chemical account of the
interactions at the micro-level of description simply cannot account
for these phenomena. It is clear that what the parts (molecules and
ions, in the Bnard and Zhabotinsky cases) are doing and the patterns
they form are what they are because of their incorporation into the
system-as-a-wholein fact these are patterns within the systems in
question. This is even clearer in the much more complex, and only
partly understood, systems of genes switching on and off and their
interplay with cell metabolism and specific protein production in the
processes of development of biological forms. The parts would not be
behaving as observed if they were not parts of that particular system
(the whole). The state of the system-as-a-whole is affecting (that is,
acting like a cause on) what the parts, the constituents, actually do.
Many other examples of this kind could be taken from the literature
on, for example, self-organizing and dissipative systems15 and also
economic and social ones.16
We do not have available for such systems any account of events in
terms of temporal, linear chains of causality as previously conceived
(ABC . . .). Hence, in my recent writings I adopted the term
whole-part constraint to describe the effects on the constituent parts
of their being incorporated into systems of this kind, because the term
causation often has tended to denote simply a regular chain of events
(sometimes, too, simply in terms of a Humean conjunction). A wider
use of causality and causation is now needed to include the kind of
whole-part, higher- to lower-level, relationships that the sciences have
themselves recently been discovering in complex systems, especially
the biological and neurological ones.
Here the term whole-part influence, will be used to represent the
net effect of all those ways in which the system-as-a-whole, operating
from its higher level, is a causal factor in what happens to its constituent parts, the lower level. Such a causal relation within a particular
system is one that relates entities which are, because of the mereological
14
Ilya Prigogine and Isabelle Stengers, Order Out of Chaos (London: Heinemann,
1984).
15
PCBO; Prigogine and Stengers, Order Out of Chaos; Niels H. Gregersen, The Idea
of Creation and the Theory of Autopoietic Processes, Zygon 33 (1998): 33367.
16
Prigogine and Stengers, Order Out of Chaos.
63
nature of the system, in some sense the same; so this causal relation
might, adding confusion, entice some to regard the higher level as possessing a somewhat metaphysical character.
2.2.2. Other Analyses
Various interpretations have been deployed by other authors to represent this whole-part relation in different kinds of systems (and notably
the mind-brain-body onesee section 2.5), though not usually with
causal implications.
a. Structuring causes. The notion of whole-part influence is germane
to one that Niels Gregersen has recently employed17 in his valuable
discussion of autopoietic (self-making) systemsnamely that of structuring causes, as developed by Fred Dretske18 for understanding mental
causation. Gregersen and Dretske refer to the event(s) that produced
the hardware conditions (actual electrical connections in the computer)
and the word-processing program (software) as the structuring causes
of the cursor movement on the screen connected with the computer;
whereas the triggering cause is usually pressure on a key on the
keyboard. The two kinds of causes exhibit a different relationship to
their effects. A triggering one falls into the familiar (Humean) pattern
of constant conjunction. However, a structuring cause is never sufficient to produce the particular effect (the key still has to be pressed);
there is no constant relationship between structuring cause and effect.
In the case of complex systems, such as those already mentioned, the
system-as-a-whole often has the role, I suggest, of a structuring cause
in Dretskes sense.
This idea helps in responding to two features that Thomas Tracy19
has found to be problematic in my own earlier use of top-down
explanations.20 Tracy was, firstly, concerned with the supposition that
17
Gregersen, The Idea of Creation.

Fred Dretske, Mental Events as Structuring Causes of Behavior, in Mental
Causation, 12136. Another example of his is as follows. A terrorist plants a bomb in
the generals car. The bomb stays there until the general gets into the car and turns
the ignition key and then is killed by the detonation of the bomb. The triggering
cause of his death is his turning on the engine, but the structuring cause is the
terrorists action.
19
Thomas F. Tracy, Particular Providence and the God of the Gaps, in CAC,
3067, fn. 39.
20
In the first 1990 edition of TSA and before my espousing the of whole-part constraint in the 1993 enlarged edition of TSA and, more especially, in CAC, 26387.
18
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top-down explanations cannot be analyzed in terms of structures of

bottom-up explanation.21 The particular examples of systems already
given and the considerations which lead to distinguishing structuring
from triggering causes serve to explain why such top-down explanations could not, by their very nature, be analyzed in bottom-up
terms. That is the whole point of identifying them as such. For example,
in the Bnard case, it is not the properties, as such, of the individual
molecules of the water in a heated beaker which explains why they suddenly abandon random collisions and move in serried ranks with the
same velocity in one direction at the critical pointor why suddenly,
in the Zhabotinsky reaction, in a particular spatially defined band at
certain (periodic) positions vertically in the reaction test tube, all the
cerous irons should become ceric. In both examples, it is a distinctive
structuring property of the whole, and of the new relations among the
constituents involved, that is the operative factor.
Tracy also finds problematic the move from whole-part explanation
to treating the whole (or the nature of the system) as a cause.22 I have
shared this concern, for that is why I moved away from Campbells
terminology of causation.23 However, provided causation is given a
wider than chain-sequence (Humean) sense consistent with the holistic
behavior of complexes, as already discussed, it can still be applied to
the whole-part relation.
b. Propensities. The category of structuring cause is closely related
to that of propensities developed by Karl Popper, who pointed out that
there exist weighted possibilities which are more than mere possibilities,
but tendencies or propensities to become real24 and that these propensities in physics are properties of the whole situation and sometimes
even of the particular way in which a situation changes. And the same
holds of the propensities in chemistry, biochemistry, and in biology.25
Hence Poppers propensities26 are the effects of Dretskes structuring
causes in the case that triggering causes are random in their operation
(that is, genuinely random, no loading of the dice).
21
Tracy, Particular Providence and the God of the Gaps.

Ibid.
23
In CAC, 272, fn. 22.
24
Karl Popper, A World of Propensities (Bristol: Thoemmes, 1990), 12.
25
Ibid., 17.
26
Cf. my urging in TSA that there are propensities in biological evolution, favored by
natural selection, to complexity, self-organization, information-processing andstorage,
and so to consciousness.
22
65
c. Boundary (limiting) conditions. In the discussion of the relations

between properties of a system-as-a-whole and the behavior of its
constituent parts, some authors refer to the boundary conditions that
are operating.27 It can be a somewhat misleading termlimiting condition would be better but I will continue to use it only in this wider,
Polanyian, sense.
A more recent, sophisticated development of these ideas has been
proffered by Bernd-Olaf Kppers:
[T]he [living] organism is subservient to the manner in which it is constructed . . . Its principle of construction represents a boundary condition
under which the laws of physics and chemistry become operational in
such a way that the organism is reproductively self-sustaining. . . . [T]he
phenomenon of emergence as well as that of downward causation can
be observed in the living organism and can be coupled to the existence
of specific boundary conditions posed in the living matter.28
Thus a richer notion of the concept of boundary conditions is operative

in systems as complex as living ones. The simpler forms of the idea of
boundary condition as applied, for example, by Polanyi to machines
are not adequate to express the causal features basic to biological
phenomena. Indeed the boundary conditions of a system will have
to include not only purely physical factors on a global scale, but also
complex inter-systemic interactions between type-different systems
(see section 2.4 below).
Willem Drees has also emphasized, with respect to the Bnard phenomenon, the role of the conditions at the actual, physical boundary
of the fluid in its physical environment in determining the behavior of
the billions of constituent molecules. He asserts that in this case one
could replace the term top-down causation by environment-system
interaction. The environment determining the temperature is simply a
physical system so, he argues,
. . . There is no sense in which the system-as-a-whole has a specific, emergent causal influence. All the causal influences can be traced locally
27
For example, Michael Polanyi, Life Transcending Physics and Chemistry, Chemistry and Engineering News (August 21, 1967): 5466; and idem, Lifes Irreducible
Structure, Science 160 (1968): 130812. In his discussion, and mine in this essay, the
term boundary condition is not being used, as it often is, to refer either to the initial
(and in that sense boundary) conditions of, say, a partial differential equation as
applied in theoretical physics, or to the physical, geometrical boundary of a system.
28
Bernd-Olaf Kppers, Understanding Complexity, in CAC, 100.
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as physical influences within the system or between the system and its
immediate environment. Boundaries are local phenomena, rather than
global states of the system-as-a-whole.29
But the system is what has a boundaryand only the system can have
it. It is because the system-as-a-whole is an entity, immersed in a conditioning environment with which it has a boundary, that it undergoes
holistic reorganization of its constituent units. Indeed the Bnard
phenomenon is independent of the shape of the container provided its
dimensions are large with respect to convection cell size (the very condition that makes physical boundary effects negligible). The theory that
has to give an intelligible account of all this has to deal with properties
of the system-as-a wholethe temperature dependence of the viscosity and density of aggregates of molecules, their thermal conductivity
and the mutual interplay of all these factors together in the behavior
of the whole assembly. It is not enough, therefore, to pinpoint only the
environment-system interaction as uniquely determinative. For it is
only because of the nature of the entire system-as-a-whole that under
such boundary conditions the constituent molecules manifest their
unexpected, bizarre behavior. It is a case of whole-part influence in
the sense defined above.
There is a sense in which the system-as-a-whole, because of its distinctive configuration, can constrain and influence the behavior of the parts
to be otherwise than if they were isolated from this particular system.
Yet the system-as-a-whole would not be describable by the concepts
and laws of that level and still have the properties it does have, if the
parts (in the Zhabotinsky case, the ceric and cerous ions) were not of
the particular kind they are. What is distinctive in the system-as-awhole is the new kind of interrelations and interactions, spatially and
temporally, of the parts.
d. Supervenience. Another, much debated term which has been used
in this connection, especially in describing the relation of mental events
to neurophysiological ones in the brain, is that of supervenience. The
term, which does not usually imply any whole-part causative relation,
goes back to Donald Davidsons employment of it in expounding his
view of the mind-brain-body relation as anomalous monism.30 The
29
Willem B. Drees, Religion, Science and Naturalism (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ.

Press, 1996), 102.
30
Donald Davidson, Mental Events, in Essays on Actions and Events (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1980).
67
various meanings and scope of the term in this context had been formulated and classified by Jaegwon Kim as involving: the covariance of
the supervenient properties with, the dependency of the supervenient
properties on, and the nonreducibility of the supervenient properties
to, their base properties.31 Another definition has been proposed elsewhere by Nancey Murphy.32 In the wider context of hierarchical systems
(prescinding from the mind-brain-body problem, for the momentsee
section 2.5 below) the term supervenience may be taken to refer to the
relation between properties of the same system that pertain to different
levels of analysis . . . higher-level properties supervene on lower-level
properties if they are partially constituted by the lower-level properties
but are not directly reducible to them.33
One can ask the question:
[H]ow are the properties characteristic of entities at a given level related
to those that characterize entities of adjacent levels? Given that entities
at distinct levels are ordered by the part-whole relation, is it the case
that properties associated with different levels are also ordered by some
distinctive and significant relationship?34
The attribution of supervenience asserts primarily that there is a necessary covariance between the properties of the higher level and those of
the lower level. When the term supervenience was first introduced its
attribution did not imply a causal influence of the supervenient level on
the subvenient one.35 Its appropriateness is questionable for analyzing
whole-part relations, which by their very nature relate, with respect to
complex systems, entities that are in some sense the same.
Yet, in the context of the physical and biological (and, it must also
be said, ecological and social) worlds, the mutual interrelations between
whole and parts in any internally hierarchically organized system often,
31
Jaegwon Kim, Epiphenomenal and Supervenient Causation, Midwest Studies in
Philosophy 9 (1984): 25770; repr. in Supervenience and Mind: Selected Philosophical
Essays (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993).
32
Nancey Murphy, Supervenience, and the Downward Efficacy of the Mental: A
Nonreductive Physicalist Account of Human Action, in CTNS/VO, v. IV.
33
Murphy and Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the Universe, 23.
34
Kim, Non-reductivism and Mental Causation, in Mental Causation, 191.
35
However, utilizing her definition of supervenience, Nancey Murphy has suggested (personal communication, July, 1998) that the supervenient level may involve
additional circumstances that cannot be described at the subvenient level, and these
additional circumstances can have a causal impact on the series of events. Thus, the
causal connections will show up (be intelligible) only at the supervenient level of
description.
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we have seen, appear to involve causal effects of the whole on the parts.
We shall continue, therefore, to use the term whole-part influence,36
rather than the terms 14 above, to refer to the subtle interlocking
influences of the whole of any particular hierarchically organized system
on its constituent parts.
2.3. Flow of Information
A general concept which has often been found to be applicable to
understanding the relation between higher and lower levels in a single,
hierarchically stratified complex system is that of there being a flow of
information from the higher to the lower level. The higher level is seen
as constraining and shaping the patterns of events occurring among
the constituent units of the lower one. Although information is a
concept distinct from those of matter and energy, in actual systems
no information flows without some exchange of energy and/or matter. Nevertheless, as an interpretative concept it is useful not only in
the more obvious context of the mind-brain-body relation but also in
considering the relation of environment to biological processes, including that of evolution.37 Thus, the case of the worker termite cited by
Donald Campbell could well be interpreted as manifesting a temporal
flow of information: information about the environment is, over a long
period of time, impressed indirectly (via the effect of the environment
on the viability of organisms possessing mutated DNA) on the DNA.
This DNA then shapes the functioning of the organism that is capable
of producing viable progeny. The concept of information is indeed apt
for situations in which a form at one level influences forms at lower
levels. This process can at least be conceived as a process of transfer
of information, as distinct from energy or matter. John Puddefoot has
usefully distinguished between:
a. Information in the physicists, communication engineers, and
brain scientists sense, that of C.E. Shannonthe sense in which
information is related to the probability of one outcome or case
36
It must be stressed that the whole-part relation is not regarded here necessarily, or
frequently, as a spatial one. Whole-part is synonymous with system-constituent.
37
Cf. Jeffrey S. Wicken, Evolution, Information and Thermodynamics: Extending the
Darwinian Paradigm (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987).
69
selected out of many, probable outcomes or cases. In this sense it

is, in certain circumstances, the negative of entropy.
b. Information in the sense of the Latin informare, meaning to give
shape or form to. Thus, information is the action of informing
with some active or essential quality, as the noun corresponding
to the transitive verb to inform, in the sense of To give form
or formative principle to; hence to stamp, impress, or imbue with
some specific quality or attribute (quotation from the Shorter Oxford
English Dictionary on Historical Principles, sense II).
c. Information in the ordinary sense of that of which one is appraised
or told (Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, sense I.3).38
Puddefoot points out that information 1 is necessary to shape or give
form, as information 2, to a receptor. If that receptor is the brain of a
human being, then inter alia information 3 is conveyed. In this essay
the term information (as well as its associates) is being broadly used
to represent this whole process of 1 becoming 3and only modulating to 3 when there is a specific reference to human brain processes in
which 1 acquires meaning for human beings. Briefly, the mathematical
(often digital) information 1 is the necessary basis of 2 (often syntax)
which can in human mental experience become 3, with semantic content. I am not intending here in any way to imply that 3 is reducible to
1that semantics is reducible to syntaxonly that 1 is the necessary
pre-condition for the manifestation and emergence of 3.39
Information 1 and 2 are often applicable to the higher- to lower-level
interactions in hierarchically stratified physical and biological systems.
The transition from information 1 and 2 to information 3 is, of course,
ambivalently related to the opaque mind-brain-body relation, though
it has been widely employed in that context. The concept of information 1, or its flow, has been used to attempt to define living entities40
but biologists have often been skeptical as to its general usefulness in,
38
John C. Puddefoot, Information and Creation, in The Science and Theology of
Information, C. Wassermann, R. Kirby, and B. Rordoff, eds. (Geneva: Labor et Fides,
1992), 15 (my numbering). For further discussion, especially in relation to biological
complexity, see PCBO, 25963, and in relation to evolution, 26368.
39
The transition from 1 to 3 is also closely akin to that from semiotics to semantics
and coheres well with the emergentist-monist position.
40
See PCBO, 25963; Frank J. Tipler, The Physics of Immortality (London: Macmillan, 1995), 12427.
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for example, understanding development,41 though it has an obvious

applicationone which was of historical significancein interpreting
the relation between nucleotide sequences in DNA and amino acid
sequences in proteins and so in relation to heredity, that is, to genetic
information. The notion of flow of information is therefore a conceptual tool ready to hand, as it were, to interpret the relation of higher
to lower levels in a particular hierarchically stratified complex, but it
must be used warily. But what of the relation between distinct systems?
To this latter issue we must now turn.
2.4. The World-as-a-Whole 42An Interconnected and Interdependent
System-of-Systems
The world consists of myriads of individual systems which are themselves very often hierarchically stratified complex systems of stable
parts. We have been exploring their internal (whole-part) relationships. But these individual systems themselves can interact in a highly
ramified manner across space and time. For distant events in space
(for example, flaring spots on the Sun shower cosmic rays on the Earth
which affect its climate and the evolution of its living organisms); and
in time (for example, the elliptical orbits of the planets about the Sun,
hence the seasons of terrestrial life; and the relation of the Earths axis
to the plane of its motion to the north-south seasonal patterns). The
individual systems of the world are increasingly demonstrated by the
sciences to be interconnected and interdependent in multiple ways with,
of course, great variations in the strengths of mutual coupling. Thus all
wave functions of all sub-atomic particles (indeed of all matter) only go
asymptotically to zero at an infinite distance from their maximal value,
so that there is a finite, if small, chance of finding that particular particle
anywhere.43 On the Earths surface, the ecological interconnectedness of
41
Michael J. Apter and L. Wolpert, Cybernetics and Development. I. Information
Theory, Journal of Theoretical Biology 8 (1965): 24457.
42
By the world-as-a-whole, I here mean all-that-is, or ever has been; all that is
created, i.e., all that is not God. (The outer dashed circle in figure 1 on p. 85 is meant
to denote this).
43
Recall also the notorious gravitational effect of the motion of an electron at the
edge of, say, our galaxy on the collisions of macroscopic billiard balls; Michael Berry,
Breaking the Paradigm of Classical Physics from Within, Cercy Symposium on
Logique et Thorie des Catastrophes, 1983.
71
all forms of life (including human), as well as their matter and energy
cycles, themselves related to atmospheric and geological ones, has in
recent years become increasingly apparent in all its baffling intricacies.
These interactions between individual systems over space and time are
as real in their mutual influencing as anything else described by the
natural sciences, and their existence cannot be ignored in our reflections
on the nature of the world and of Gods relation to it, simply because
we can never have one comprehensive theory of them.
This character of the world-as-a-whole suggests that it is metaphysically plausible to perceive it as a System-of-systems (using the word
system with the weight already attached to it in the light of complexity theory of individual systems). Such an epistemological assertion
would have, as always, a putative ontological significance. In that case,
the world-as-a-whole is not simply a concept44 nor an abstract
description,45 but could at least provisionally be regarded as an holistic
reality at its own leveleven if the coupling between systems is much
looser and more diffuse, and therefore less classifiable, than it is within
a particular individual hierarchically stratified system clearly demarcated
from its environment. The apprehension of all-that-is in its holistic
unity as a System-of-systems is, of course, scarcely vouchsafed to the
limited horizons and capacities of humanity, though every advance
in the sciences serves to reveal further cross-connections between its
component systems. Such interconnectedness would be transparent to
the omniscient Creator, who continuously gives its constituents and its
processes existence and in Whom all-that-is exists, from a sacramental,
panentheistic perspective.
The relation between higher and lower levels within an individual
hierarchically stratified system I have been designating by the pantechnicon term whole-part influence.46 This influence, I suggested,
can often be regarded as a flow of information. We now have to ask:
Can these notions be applied to the relations between systems in the
world-as-a-whole? In order to respond to this question, it turns out
44
Niels Henrik Gregersen, Providence in an Indeterministic World, CTNS Bulletin, 14.1 (Winter, 1994): 26.
45
Idem. Three Types of Indeterminacy, in The Concept of Nature in Science and
Theology, part I, vol. 3 of Studies in Science and Theology of the European Society for
the Study of Science and Theology (Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1995), 175.
46
See sec. 2.2 above.
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to be necessary to clarify the relation between theory- and processautonomy and this issue is discussed in the Appendix. There I conclude
that, although theory-autonomy can occur without process-autonomy
with respect to the internal relations of a particular system of stable
parts, in the relation between two mutually interacting type-different
systems both the theories applicable to and processes of each can be
autonomous with respect to the other.
From that discussion it transpires that we shall have to recognize that
the interactions and relations between distinctive systems are unlikely to
be describable in the same way as those within hierarchically stratified
systems of stable parts. We are regarding the world as a System-ofsystems, but not as a hierarchically stratified one, so that the principles
of weak nonreducibility do not have to apply to the relation between
the component systems of the world.47 Indeed, if we could have a cosmic-global science of the world-as-a-whole as a System-of-systems, the
theories (and predicates, concepts, laws, etc.) of that science would be
expected to manifest not only theory-autonomy but also ex hypothesi
process-autonomy since the processes going on in that whole System
consist of the changing relations among type-different component
systems (often containing type-different component parts).
Earlier we noted that when a particular hierarchical system was
considered, the idea that there can be envisaged a flow of information from the higher level to the lower one could sometimes be usefully employed. Is this notion of the flow of information any help
in thinking of the multiple interactions between individual systems in
the world System? Such interactions are obviously highly variegated,
multiple, and overlapping, as Gregersen says, for we face a criss-cross
interpenetration of different kinds of operational systems . . . a world of
naturally polycentric systems . . ., a nexus of realities,48 or a network
of influences.49
47
For weak nonreducibility, see the Appendix. If the systems in question are
themselves part of an actual hierarchy of organization and are themselves stable, then
the analysis may well revert to that applicable to the internal relationships within a
larger hierarchical system of stable parts, each of which is then itself a system. For the
world-as-a-whole, it is the interaction between systems not so described that is chiefly
under consideration . . . the reality of the world as a whole is itself a result of the
interpenetrations between the type- and code-different systems observed . . . (Gregersen,
The Idea of Creation and the Theory of Autopoietic Processes, 337).
48
Ibid.
49
Gregersen (personal communication, 12 November, 1996), describing my own
view.
73
The world may be conceived of as an interconnected web of type-different systems interacting in specific ways and mutually influencing each
other.50 A common factor then discernible in the multiple interactions
between such systems (in the whole cosmic System) is the transfer of
information whereby patterns of events in one system affect patterns
of events in anotherand the interchange between the myriad systems
of energy and/or matter are ex hypothesi variegated beyond the possibility of generalization. The use of the concept of information is thus
particularly apt for elucidating these interactions since it is, conceptually
at least, independent of those of matter and energythough in nature
it never occurs without their exchange.
2.5. The Mind-Brain-Body Relation and Personhood
Much of the discussion of the relation of higher levels to lower ones in
hierarchically stratified systems has centered on the mind-brain-body
relation, on how mental events are related to neurophysiological ones
in the human-brain-in-the-human-bodyin effect the whole question
of human agency and what we mean by it. A hierarchy of levels can
be delineated,51 each of which is the focus of a corresponding scientific
study, from neuroanatomy and neurophysiology to psychology. Those
involved in studying how the brain works have come to recognize
that properties not found in components of a lower level can emerge
from the organization and interaction of these components at a higher
level. For example, rhythmic pattern generation in some neural circuits is a property of the circuit, not of isolated pacemaker neurons.
Higher brain functions (e.g., perception, attention) may depend on
temporally coherent functional units distributed through different maps
50
Gregersen (personal communication, March, 1998) has expressed this point to
me thus: [P]erhaps the most curious feature about our universe is that it starts out as
a unity and ends up in a plurality of systems . . . . forever based on the same uniform
matter, always interacting with one another in ever-new constellations of mutual influences (thus certainly interlocked) but nonetheless appearing in type-different forms,
thus also operating by virtue of type-different causalities (emphasis original).
51
As indicated in the legend to fig. 1 on p. 85, where the schema of Patricia S.
Churchland and T.J Sejnowski is depicted (Perspectives in Cognitive Neuroscience
Science 242 [1988]: 74145). The physical scales of these levels are, according to these
authors, as follows: molecules, 1010m; synapses, 106m; neurons, 104m; networks, 103m;
maps, 102m; systems, 101m; central nervous system, 1m, in human beings.
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and nuclei.52 So that even an in-principle physicalist, such as Patricia

Churchland, can express (with T.J. Sejnowski) the aim of research in
cognitive neuroscience thus:
The ultimate goal of a unified account does not require that it be a single
model that spans all the levels of organization. Instead the integration will
probably consist of a chain of models linking adjacent levels. When one
level is explained in terms of a lower level this does not mean that the
higher level theory is useless or that the high-level phenomena no longer
exist. On the contrary, explanations will coexist at all levels, as they do
in chemistry and physics, genetics and embryology.53
The still intense philosophical discussion of the mind-brain-body

relation has been broadly concerned with attempting to elucidate the
relation between the top level of human mental experience and the
lowest, bodily physical levels. In recent decades it has often involved
considering the applicability and precise definition of some of the terms
used above in section 2.2 to relate higher levels to lower ones in hierarchically stratified systems. The question of what kind of causation,
if any, may be said to be operating from a top-down, as well as the
obvious and generally accepted bottom-up, direction is still much
debated in this context.54
Earlier (section 2.2), when discussing the general relation of wholes
to constituent parts in a hierarchically stratified complex system of
stable parts, I used whole-part influence and other terms and maintained that a nonreductionist view of the predicates, concepts, laws,
etc., applicable to the higher level could be coherent. Reality could, it
was argued, putatively be attributed to that to which these nonreducible, higher-level predicates, concepts, laws, etc., applied; and these
new realities, with their distinctive properties, could properly be called
emergent. When this emergentist monist approach is applied to the
mental activity of the human-brain-in-the-human-body then, we must
look to vernacular [folk] psychology and its characteristic intentional
idioms of belief, desire, and the rest, and their intentional analogues in
systematic psychology in order to elucidate its nature.55
52
Terrence J. Sejnowski, C. Koch, and P. Churchland, Computational Neuroscience, Science 241 (1988): 12991306, see p. 1300.
53
Churchland and Sejnowski, Perspectives in Cognitive Neuroscience, 744.
54
See, for example, the collection of papers in Mental Causation, Heil and Mele, eds.
55
Kim, Non-reductivism and Mental Causation, 193.
75
Mental properties are now widely regarded by philosophers as

epistemologically irreducible to physical ones, indeed as emergent
from them, but also dependent on them56similar terms have been
used to describe the relation of higher to lower levels as in the
context of nonconscious, complex systems (see section 2.2.2). In the
mind-brain-body case the idea that mental properties can be physically
realized has also been much deployed.57 Jaegwon Kim has argued that,
if this latter concept (which overlaps that of supervenience in many
treatments) is taken to mean that a microstructure physically realizes
a mental property by being a sufficient cause for that property, and if
for mental properties to be real is for them to have new, irreducible
causal powers, then the nonreductive physicalist is thereby committed to downward causation (in a strong nomological sense) from the
mental to the physical levels.58 Kim then argues that, because there is
complete causal closure at the physical level alone, mental properties
cannot, in fact, have real causal powers irreducible to physical ones.
Hence there is a conflict between the postulate of downward causation
(derived from the nonreducibility, and the need for causal efficacy, of
the mental) and the physicalists assumption that a complete physical
56
Broadly, this is the nonreductive physicalist view of the mental-physical relation,
which has been summarized (ibid., 198) as follows:
a. Physical Monism. All concrete particulars are physical.
b. Anti-reductionism. Mental properties are not reducible to physical properties.
c. The Physical Realization Thesis. All mental properties are physically realized; that
is, whenever an organism, or system, instantiates a mental property M, it has some
physical property P such that P realizes M in organisms of its kind.
d. Mental Realism. Mental properties are real properties of objects and events; they are
not merely useful aids in making predictions or fictitious manners of speech.
57
The idea of mental states being physically realized in neurons was expanded
as follows by John Searle, Minds, Brain and Science, (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 1984), 26 (emphasis added):
Consciousness . . . is a real property of the brain that can cause things to happen.
My conscious attempt to perform an action such as raising my arm causes the
movement of the arm. At the higher level of description, the intention to raise my
arm causes the movement of the arm. At the lower level of description, a series
of neuron firings starts a chain of events that results in the contraction of the
muscles . . . [T]he same sequence of events has two levels of description. Both of
them are causally real, and the higher-level causal features are both caused by and
realized in the structure of the lower level elements. What follows in the main text
here shows that I am not satisfied with Searles parallelism between the causality
of the mental and physical; it is not enough. I argue later on in this essay for a
joint causality whereby the mental influences the physical level in the brain.
58
Kim, Non-reductivism and Mental Causation, 2025.
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theory can in principle account for all phenomena (causal closure). Steven Cain has succinctly summarized these conclusions of Kim: . . . the
nonreductive physicalist cannot live without downward causation, and
the nonreductive physicalist cannot live with it.59
Crain argues (and I agree) that it is Kims assumption that a physical
microstructure in physically realizing a mental property is its sufficient
cause, which leads to the exclusion of any causative role for mental properties, for in the wider range of physical, biological, and other systems
discussed in section 2.2, the causative effects of the higher levels on the
lower ones were real but different in kind from the effects the parts had
on each other operating at the lower level. Thus, what happens in these
systems at the lower level is the result of the joint operation of both
higher- and lower-level influencesthe higher and lower levels could
be said to be jointly sufficient, type-different60 causes of the lower-level
events. When the higher-lower relation is that of mind/brain to body,
it seems to me that similar considerations should apply.
Up to this point, I have been taking the term mind, and its cognate mental, to refer to that which is the emergent reality distinctive
especially of human beings. But in many wider contexts, not least that
of philosophical theology, a more appropriate term for this emergent
reality would be person, and its cognate personal, to represent the
total psychosomatic, holistic experience of the human being in all its
modalitiesconscious and unconscious, rational and emotional, active
and passive, individual and social, etc. The concept of personhood
recognizes that, as Philip Clayton puts it,
We have thoughts, wishes and desires that together constitute our character. We express these mental states through our bodies, which are
simultaneously our organs of perception and our means of affecting other
things and persons in the world . . . [The massive literature on theories
59
Steven D. Crain, in an unpublished paper, kindly made this available to me.

See the illuminating discussion of type-different causalities by Gregersen in his
Three Types of Indeterminacy, 17374. He remarks: The Humean concept of causality that still prevails in the philosophical debate . . . . thinks of causality in terms of
general laws applicable on systems of events and processes . . . Non-Humean concepts of
causality normally think of causality in terms of influencing conditions and events that
in their totality make up the effect. . . . My suggestion is that there exist quite different
types of causality that can neither be subsumed under general laws nor be measured
through additions and subtractions (173). In line with this, he espouses an holistic
supervenience theory as against Kims physicalist one, as in his Divine Action in
a Universe of Minds, paper presented at the ESSSAT Conference, Durham, March
31April 4, 1998.
60
77
of personhood] clearly points to the indispensability of embodiedness

as the precondition for perception and action, moral agency, community and freedomall aspects that philosophers take as indispensable
to human personhood and that theologians have viewed as part of the
imago dei.61
There is, therefore, a strong case for designating the highest level, the
whole, in that unique system which is the human-brain-in-the-humanbody-in-social-relations as that of the person. Persons are inter alia
causal agents with respect to their own bodies and to the surrounding
world (including other persons). They can, moreover, report on aspects
of their internal states concomitant with their actions with varying
degrees of accuracy. Hence the exercise of personal agency by individuals
transpires to be a paradigm case and supreme exemplar of whole-part
influencein this case exerted on their own bodies and on the world
of their surroundings (including other persons). Thus, the details of
the relation between cerebral neurological activity and consciousness
cannot in principle detract from the causal efficacy of the content of
the latter on the former and thus on behavior. In other words, folk
psychology and the real reference of the language of personhood
are both justified and necessary.
2.6. Communication Between Persons
We are aiming at understanding better, in the light of what we now
know through the sciences about human nature, how God might be
conceived of as communicating with humanity. Let us remind ourselves first how human persons communicate with each other. How
do we get to know each other, not only by description, but also by
acquaintancethat is, get to know what is, as we say, in each others
mind?62
All communication at its most basic level is mediated through
the senseshearing, sight, touch, taste, and smell. The physical
61
Philip Clayton, The Case for Christian Panentheism, Dialog 37.3 (Summer 1998):
2018 (quotation on 205); see also his Rethinking the Relation of God to the World:
Panentheism and the Contribution of Philosophy, chap. 4 in God and Contemporary
Science (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1997), in which the nuances of panentheism are well developed. Broadly, they amount to a stronger form of immanence
in which God is seen as in, with, and under the very processes of the world almost in
a sacramental modality. See also TSA, passim.
62
See the articles in CTNS/VO, v. IV by Leslie Brothers and Marc Jeannerod.
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intermediaries are vibrations in pressure in the air, electromagnetic

waves, physical pressure, changes of temperature, molecules, etc. Our
genes, culture, nurture, and education have enabled human beings to
decode patterns of these physical intermediaries so as to convey information about the content of the consciousness of the one attempting
to communicate. These patterns can be immensely complex, associated
with long histories, for example, in language and in the objective carriers
of a cultural heritage such as books, tapes, paintings, sculptures, CDs,
etc. They can be woven in time, as in music, drama, and language; and
they can be more bodily based, as we now know from research into
body language and communication through eye-to-eye contact. In
all these ways individual persons communicate with each other and also
with the wider human communitypast, present, and future.
The receptor of this information63 in the individual person is the
individual human brain which stores this variegated information
that constitutes knowledge of an others state of consciousness (which
is, under a different description, of the state of an others brain). This
occurs at different levels and is integrated into a perception of the
other person. Such knowledge of the other person can be recalled,
with varying degrees of rapidity and accuracy, into consciousness. On
a nondualist view, this process can be regarded as a re-activation of the
brain to reproduce the original patterns that previously constituted this
conscious awareness of the other person64as long as it continues to
be recognized that these conscious mental events are a nonreducible
reality that is distinctive of the human-brain-in-the-human-body.
It seems that all the processes involved in inter-communication
between human persons can be investigated and described at different
levels by the methods and concepts appropriate to the level in question
without invoking any ontologically distinct, special, psychic medium,
unknown to the natural sciences, as the means of communication.
This is not to say that the meaning of what is communicated can be
reduced simply to physical patterns in the media in question, for the
interpretation of these necessitates a recognition of their distinctive kind
63
The scare quotes around information are meant to indicate that I in no way
wish to pretend that the mind-brain-body relation will be eventually subsumed entirely
into information theory, useful as that is in delineating key aspects of the relation; see
sec. 2.3 above.
64
Presumably it is therefore at some point in brain development and function that
autism, in which interpersonal communication is impaired, is to be located, as was
suggested to me by John Marshall in the conference discussions.
79
of reality. But it is to stress that all communication between human

beings, even at the most intimate and personal level, is mediated by
the entities, structures, and processesthat is, by the constituentsof
the world. The subtly integrated patterns of these means of communication do in fact allow mutual comprehension between two human
individuals of each others distinctive personhood. This knowledge of
two persons of each other, this knowledge by acquaintance, is notoriously not fully expressible in any of the frameworks of interpretation
appropriate to the various modalities of the interaction process. There
remains an inalienable uniqueness, and indeed mystery, concerning
the nature of the individual person and of the interaction between two
persons. Both the sense of personhood, of being a person, and also
awareness of interpersonal relations are unique, irreducible emergents
in humanity.
Recognition of the rootedness of the means of interpersonal communication in the constituents of the world does not diminish or derogate
from the special kind of reality that constitutes persons and their mutual
interactions. For in such communication between persons there occurs a
subtle and complex integration of the received sense-data with previous
memories of that person, under the shaping influence of a long-learned
cultural framework of interpretation that provides the language and
imagery with which to articulate the relation in consciousness. So recognition of the physical nature of the means of communication between
persons in no way diminishes the uniqueness and in depth character
that can pertain to personal relationships at their most profound level
for the individuals concerned, which are, indeed, often the most real
and significant experiences of peoples lives.
3. Gods Interaction with the World

3.1. Modes of Interaction
This interaction has been variously classified in the history of Christian
thought:65 (1) the creative activity of God; (2) the sustaining activity of
God; (3) Gods action as final cause; (4) general providence; (5) special
providence; (6) miracles. Since we human beings are individuals, the
65
For example, by Michael J. Langford, Providence (London: SCM Press, 1981), 6.
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question of how God can communicate with us is an instance of 5,

Gods special providencenamely, how God can affect our thinking
and so events, or patterns of events, in our brains. That God might be
able to do so at all is, of course, an aspect of 4 that results from the
character of 1 and 2, into which 4 is often subsumed.66 For the purposes
of the ensuing discussion, I shall be taking a broadly panentheistic
view of the relation of the being of God to that of the world.67 When
more distinctly Christian theological matters are under consideration,
I have a broadly modalist understanding of the Trinity insofar as
such a view is apophatic (that is, reticent) concerning the ontology of
God, but recognizes the threefold character of the Christian experience
of the personal God as transcendent, incarnate, and immanent (the
economic Trinity).68
3.2. Intervention?
The successes of the sciences in unraveling the intricate, often complex,
yet rationally beautifully articulated, web of relationships among structures, processes, and entities in the world have made it increasingly
problematic to regard God as intervening in the world to bring about
events that are not in accordance with these divinely created patterns
and regularities that the sciences increasingly unravel. Indeed for most
scientifically educated Christians, their very belief in the existence and
nature of the Creator God depends on this character of the world. The
66
As discussed in TSA, chap. 9, where references are given.

For my understanding of panentheism, see TSA, 15859, 37072. Briefly, it is the
belief that the Being of God includes and penetrates the whole universe, so that every
part of it exists in Him but (as against pantheism) that His Being is more than, and is
not exhausted by, the universe, Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, 2nd rev.
edit., Frank L. Cross and Elizabeth A. Livingstone, eds. (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1983), 1027. In contrast to classical philosophical theism with its reliance on the
concept of necessary substance, panentheism takes embodied personhood for its model
of Godcf. Clayton, The Case for Christian Panentheismand so has a much stronger
stress on the immanence of God in, with, and under the events of the world. This
was the thrust of my essay, Biological Evolutiona positive theological appraisal, in
Evolutionary and Molecular Biology (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory; Berkeley,
Calif.: Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1998), namely, that God is the
Immanent Creator creating in and through the processes of the natural order, and that
the very processes of biological evolution, as revealed by the biological sciences, are
God-acting-as-Creator, God qua Creator. . . . The processes are not themselves God,
but the action of God-as-Creator. This, of course, is why I also do not wish to resort
to any micro-interventionist action of God to steer evolution.
68
See TSA, 34749.
67
81
transcendence of God, Gods essential otherness and distinct ontology

from everything else, always allows in principle the theoretical possibility that God could act to overrule the very regularities to which God
has given existence. But, setting aside the immense moral issues about
why God does not intervene to prevent rampant evil, more fundamentally this gives rise to an incoherence in our understanding of Gods
nature, for intervention suggests an arbitrary and magic-making agent
far removed from the concept of One who created and is creating the
world science reveals. That world appears increasingly convincingly as
closed to causal interventions from outside of the kind that classical
philosophical theism postulated (for example, in the idea of a miracle
as a breaking of the laws of nature).
So the problem is: How can one conceive of the God who is the
Creator of this world affecting events in it without abrogating the very
laws and regularities to which God has given existence and all the time
sustaining it in existence? It has been intensified by the general skepticism among philosophers, theologians, and scientists (if not in the
general public) about the existence of a supernatural world which,
by postulating an ontological category of immaterial spirit, provided
a route or channel, as it were, along which divine influences could
operate to manipulate matter and human beings. Such dualism is not
intellectually defensible today, and has few supporters, not least with
respect to human nature. Theists find themselves asserting that the only
ontological dualism to which they are committed is that between God
and the worldthat is, to the absolute difference between an infinite
and necessary being and the contingency of the entire created order.
This is also a premise of this essay. But, as Austin Farrer, long since
noted,69 this inevitably leads, in all hypotheses concerning how God
might bring about particular events (5 in section 3.1) to the problem
of the ontological gap(s) at the causal joint, for if God in Gods own
Being is distinct from anything we can possibly know in the world,
then Gods nature is ineffable and will always be inaccessible to us so
that we have only the resources of analogy to depict how God might
influence events.70
From a panentheist point of view, the problem of Gods interaction
with the world is mitigatedthough the intractable problem of evil
69
70
Austin Farrer, Faith and Speculation (London: A. & C. Black, 1967).

For a fuller discussion see TSA, 14852.
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remainsbecause the total web of natural events, in this perspective,

is viewed as in itself the creative and sustaining action of God but,
of course, not identical with God.71 This points us in the direction of
postulating that the ontological gap(s) between the world and God
is (are) located simply everywhere72or, more precisely, because the
world is in God, God can influence the world in its totality, as a
System-of-systems.
3.3. Whole-Part Influence as a Model for Gods (Special, Providential)
Interaction with the World
I have elsewhere expounded this model (using the term constraint,
now replaced by influence) in an attempt to render intelligible how
God might be conceived of as influencing particular events, or patterns
of events, in the world without interrupting the regularities observed at
the levels the sciences study; the reader is referred to those texts for a
fuller account.73 Only with a plausible account of how God can affect
the world instrumentally can we proceed to address the question
71
For panentheism, see TSA, chap. 9 and fn. 67, above. The metaphor of natural
events as, in some sense, Gods actions should not, in my view, be stretched to include
a metaphor employed by some authors of the world as Gods body. The first has, like all
metaphors, an is/is-not aspectnamely, in this case, my emphasis on the ontological
distinction between God and the world. The second might tempt us unwarrantedly to
seek for a divine analogy for the human brains and nerves whereby human decisions
effect events in their bodies!
72
Cf. my remarks in CAC (p. 287, first para.) which apply here too: [T]he present
exercise could be regarded essentially as an attempt, as it were, to ascertain where
this ontological gap, across which God transmits information (i.e., communicates),
is most coherently located, consistently with Gods interaction with everything else
having particular effects and without abrogating those regular relationships to which
Gods own self continues to give an existence which the sciences increasingly discover.
This concurs with Gregersen in his article, Three Types of Indeterminacy (fn. 14,
p. 184), in which he says: We cannot expect to find the causal routes of divine action
and their subsequent joints with natural causes. The most we can do, is to suggest
meaningful localizations of possible divine actions.
73
TSA, passim, especially 15760; and CAC, 27276, 28287, where I proposed: If
God interacts with the world at a supervenient level of totality, then God, by affecting the state of the world-as-a-whole, could, on the model of whole-part constraint
relationships in complex systems, be envisaged as able to exercise constraints upon
events in the myriad sub-levels of existence that constitute that world without abrogating the laws and regularities that specifically pertain to themand this without
intervening within the unpredictabilities we have noted [I had in mind here the inprinciple, inherent kinds, i.e., quantum events, though the remarks would also apply
to the practical unpredictabilities of chaotic systems]. Particular events might occur
in the world and be what they are because God intends them to be so, without at any
83
of how God might communicate symbolically with humanity (see

section 1).
Initially, I will prescind from any analogy with the mind-brain-body
relation or with personal agency. The model is based on the recognition that the omniscient God uniquely knows, across all frameworks
of reference of time and space, everything that it is possible to know
about the state(s) of all-that-is, including the interconnectedness and
interdependence of the worlds entities, structures, and processes. By
analogy with the operation of whole-part influence in real systems (see
section 2.2), the suggestion is that, because the ontological gap(s)
between the world and God is/are located simply everywhere in space
and time, God could affect holistically the state of the world (the whole
in this context). Thence, mediated by the whole-part influences of the
world-as-a-whole (as a System-of-systems) on its constituents, God
could cause particular events and patterns of events to occur which
express Gods intentions. These latter would not otherwise have happened had God not so intended.
This unitive, holistic effect of God on the world could occur without
abrogating any of the laws (regularities) which apply to the levels of
the worlds constituents74by analogy with the exercise of whole-part
influence in the systems discussed in section 2.2. Moreover, this action
of God on the world may be distinguished from Gods universal creative
action in that particular intentions of God for particular patterns of
point any contravention of the laws of physics, biology, psychology, or whatever is the
pertinent science for the level of description in question (283).
Ernan McMullin has raised the question of how this proposal of mine relates to
quantum indeterminism in his, Cosmic Purpose and the Contingency of Human
Evolution, Theology Today 55 (1998): 407 and fn. 50. As he points out, in my view
God does not definitively know the future, but has a maximally conceivable capacity to
predict it based on total knowledge of present events and of the laws and regularities of
natural processes (TSA, 12833). In the case of quantum events, this would, to respond
to his query, have to refer to Gods prediction of the statistical outcome of multiple
quantum events and not individual onesif the standard Copenhagen interpretation
of quantum mechanics is assumed. In his article, McMullins other query about the
proposal concerns how the interaction between an ontologically distinct God and the
world might be conceived of without being the forbidden sort of intervention. This is
met by the suggestion of the interaction being analogous to a flow of information, as
described later in this section.
74
Note that the same may be said of human agency. Also, this proposal recognizes
explicitly that the laws and regularities which constitute the sciences usually apply only
to certain perceived, if ill-defined, levels within the complex hierarchies of nature.
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events to occur are effected therebyand the patterns could be intended

by God in response inter alia to human actions or prayers.
The ontological interface at which God must be deemed to be
influencing the world is, on this model, that which occurs between God
and the totality of the world (all-that-is), and this, from a panentheistic
perception, is within Gods own self. What passes across this interface, I have also suggested,75 may perhaps be conceived of as a flow
of information, but one has to admit that, because of the ontological
gap(s) between God and the world, which must always exist in any
theistic model, this is only an attempt at making intelligible that which
we can postulate as being the initial effect of God seen from our side
of the boundary, as it were.76 Whether or not this use of the notion of
information flow proves helpful in this context, we do need some way
of indicating that the effect of God at this, and so at all, levels is that
of pattern-shaping in its most general sense. I am encouraged in this
kind of exploration by the recognition that the concept of the Logos, the
Word, of God is usually taken to emphasize Gods creative patterning
of the world and so Gods self-expression in the world.
The panentheistic inter-relations of God and the world and the interaction of God with the world, including humanity, I have attempted to
represent in figure 1 (overleaf ).77 This is a kind of Venn diagram and
represents ontological relationships. It has the limitation of being in two
planes so that the God label appears dualistically to be (ontologically)
outside the world; although this conveys the truth that God is more
and other than the world, it cannot represent Gods omnipresence in
and to the world. This limitation may be surmounted by noting that
God, in the figure, is denoted by the (imagined) infinite planar surface of the page on which the circle representing the world is printed.
For, it is assumed, God is more than the world, which is nevertheless
in God. The page underlies and supports the circle and its contents,
just as God sustains everything in existence and is present to all.
75
TSA, 161,164; CAC, 27475, 285. John Polkinghorne has made a similar proposal
in terms of the divine input of active information in his Scientists as Theologians
(London: SPCK, 1996), 3637.
76
Morever, I would not wish to tie the proposed model too tightly to a flow of
information interpretation of the mind-brain-body problem (see also fn. 63 above).
77
This is an elaboration of fig. 1 of TSA to include a depiction of the multi-leveled
nature of human beings. While it hardly needs to be said, the infinity sign represents
not infinite space or time, but the infinitely more that Gods being encompasses in
comparison with that of everything else.
85
GOD
G
O
D
G
O
D
GOD
GOD
is represented by the whole surface of the page,

imagined to extend to infinity () in all
directions
the WORLD, all-that-is: created and other than
God, and including both humanity and systems
of non-human entities, structures, and processes
the human WORLD: excluding systems of
non-human entities, structures, and processes
Gods interaction with and influence on the
world and its events
tip and shaft of a similar double-shafted arrow
perpendicular to the page; Gods influence and
activity within the world
effects of the non-human world on humanity
human agency in the non-human world
personal interactions, both individual and social,
between human beings, including cultural and
historical influences
Mental experiences
[conscious and unconscious]
Brain and CNS
Systems
Maps
Networks
Multi-leveled
HUMANITY
Neurons
Synapses
Apart from the top one, these are the levels of
organization of the human nervous system
depicted in fig. 1 of Patricia S. Churchland and T.J.
Sejnowski, Perspectives on Cognitive
Neuroscience, Science 242 (1988): 741745.
Figure 1. Diagram representing spatially the ontological relation of, and the
interactions between, God and the world (including humanity).
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So the larger dashed circle, representing the ontological location of

Gods interaction with all-that-is, really needs a many-dimensional
convoluted surface78 not available on a two-dimensional surface. The
point and tail of a double-shafted arrow have been placed at the centre
of this circle to signal Gods immanent influence and activity within
the world. The present form of this figure is meant to stress particularly the many-leveled nature of the human recipients of divine communication.
3.4. God as Personal Agent in the World
I hope the model as described so far has a degree of plausibility in
depending on an analogy only with complex natural systems in general
and on the way whole-part influence operates in them. It is, however,
clearly too impersonal to do justice to the personal character of many
(but not all) of the most profound human experiences of God. So
there is little doubt that it needs to be rendered more cogent by the
recognition that, among natural systems, the instance par excellence of
whole-part influence in a complex system is that of personal agency.
Indeed in the previous section, I could not avoid referring to Gods
intentions and implying that, like human persons, God had purposes
to be implemented in the world. For if God is going to affect events and
patterns of events in the world, then one cannot avoid attributing the
personal predicates of intentions and purposes to Godinadequate and
easily misunderstood as they are. So we have to say that though God
is ineffable and ultimately unknowable in essence, yet God is at least
personal and personal language attributed to God is less misleading
than saying nothing!
That being so, we can now legitimately turn to the exemplification
of whole-part influence in the mind-brain-body relation (section 2.5)
as a resource for modeling Gods interaction with the world. When we
do so the ascendancy of the personal as a category for explicating the
wholeness of human agency asserts itself and the traditional, indeed
biblical, model of God as in some sense a personal agent in the world
is rehabilitatedbut now in a quite different metaphysical, nondualist
78
Recall Augustines representation of the whole creation as if it were some
sponge, huge , but bounded floating in the boundless sea of God, environing and
penetrating it . . . everywhere and on every side (Confessions, VII.7).
87
framework and coherently with the worldview (cf. section 3.2, above)
which the sciences engender.79
When I was using nonhuman systems in their whole-part relationships as a model for Gods relation to the world in special providence, I
resorted to the idea of a flow of information as being a helpful pointer
to what might be conceived as crossing the ontological gap(s) between
God and the world-as-a-whole. But now as I turn to more personal
categories to explicate this relation and interchange, it is natural to
interpret a flow of information between God and the world, including
humanity, in terms of the communication that occurs between personsnot unlike the way in which a flow of Shannon-type information
metamorphoses in the human context into information in the ordinary
sense of the word.80 Thus whatever else may be involved in Gods personal interaction with the world, communication must be involved,
and this raises the question: To whom might God be communicating?
We would not be deliberating here on scientific perspectives on divine
action if it had not been the case that humanity distinctively and, it
appears, uniquely has regarded itself as the recipient of communication
from an Ultimate Reality, named in English as God. But in what ways
has the reception of communication from God been understood and
thought to have been experienced?
4. God and Humanity 81

My account so far of how God interacts with the world has been chiefly
concerned with devising a model for (1) the instrumental kind of relation. Now we have to think through the implications of this model for
explicating (2) Gods symbolic relation, that is, Gods communicating
relation to the world.
It is clear that all mutual interactions between human beings and
the world (the solid and dashed single-shafted, double-headed arrows
of fig. 1) are through the mediation of the constituents in the physical
79
See TSA, 16066, and, more recently, CAC, 28487, for an elaboration of this
move and a discussion of the extent to which it is appropriate, if at all, to think of
the world as the body of the ultimately transcendent God, who has a panentheistic
relation to that same world.
80
That is, Puddefoots 1 2 3; see sec. 2.3 above.
81
The sequence of thought in this section is more fully amplified in TSA, chap. 11.
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world of which human beings are part and in which human actions
occur. Furthermore, all interactions between human beings (the pairs
of solid single-headed arrows in fig. 1) also occur through the mediation of the constituents of the physical world, including the cultural
heritage coded on to material substrates.82 Such interactions include, of
course, communication between human beings, that is, between their
states of consciousness, which are also, under one description, patterns of activity within human brains. This raises the question: How,
within such a framework of understanding, can one conceive of Gods
self-communication with humanity? This in turn raises the traditional
question: How might God reveal Godself to humanity? How (in what
way) can we conceive of God communicating with and to humanity
in the light of the foregoing?
4.1. Revelation and Human Experience
In communication between human beings some of our actions, gestures,
and responses are more characteristic and revelatory of our distinctive
selves, of our intentions, purposes and meanings, than are others. Its
not what you say but the way youre saying it. This prompts us to
seek in the world those events and entities, or patterns of them, which
unveil Gods meaning(s) most overtly, effectively, and distinctively
constituting what is usually called revelation, for in revelation God
is presupposed to be active.
The ways in which such a revealing activity of God have been thought
to occur in the different ranges and contexts of human experience can
be graded according to the increasing extent to which God is said to
be experienced as taking the initiative in making Godself explicitly
known.
a. General Revelation. If the world is created by God then it cannot
but reflect Gods creative intentions and thus, however ambiguously,
Gods character and purposes;83 and it must go on doing so if God
continuously interacts with the world in the way we have proposed.
Hence there can be a knowledge of God (and by inference, of Gods
purposes), however diffuse, which is available to all humanity through
82
83
Cf. sec. 2.6 above.

The locus classicus is, of course, Romans 1:1920.
89
reflection on the character of the created world, its entities, structures,

and processes, and in personal and social experience.
b. Revelation to members of a religious tradition. Belonging to a religious tradition provides one with the language and symbols to articulate
ones awareness of God at any instant and as a continuing experience.
The tradition provides the resources that help the individual both to
enrich and to have the means of identifying his or her own experience
of God. Thus there is a general experience of the ordinary members of
a continuing religious community which may properly be regarded as
a mode of revelation that is an enhancement of, and is more explicit
than, the general revelation to humanity.
This kind of what one might call religiously general revelation arises
when there is a confluence between, on the one hand, the streams of
general human experience and general revelation and, on the other
hand, those of the recollected and re-lived particular and special revelations of God that a tradition keeps alive by its intellectual, aesthetic,
liturgical, symbolic, and devotional resources. These all nurture the
unconscious of the adherents to that tradition and so shape their conscious awareness of God.
c. Special revelationrevelation regarded as authoritative, and so as
special in a particular tradition. Some experiences of God by individuals, or groups of individuals, are so intense and subsequently so
influential that they constitute initiating, dubbing experiences which
serve in the community to anchor later references to God and Gods
relation to humanity, even through changes in the metaphorical language used to depict that ultimately ineffable Reality. The community
then regards them as special, even if not basically different from those
referred to in 2 above. So it is not improper to seek in history those
events and entities, or patterns of them, which appear to have revealed
Gods meaning(s) most overtly, effectively, and distinctively.
That there should be such a knowledge is entirely coherent with
the understanding of Gods interaction with the world as represented
in figure 1. The double arrows denote an input into the world from
God that is influential in the whole-part constraining manner already
discussed and thereby conceivable as an input of information in the
sense of altering patterns of events in the world. The states of human
brains can properly be considered to be such patterns so, in the model
I am deploying, there can be a general revelation to humanity of Gods
character and purposes in and through human knowledge and experience of the world.
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The Jewish and Christian traditions have, more than most others,
placed a particular emphasis on Gods revelation in the experienced
events of a history. Such special revelation, initiated (it is assumed)
by God, has been regarded by Christians as recorded particularly in the
Bible. How we are to receive this record today in the light of critical
and historical study is a major issue in contemporary Christianity since
it involves a subtle dialogue of each generation with its own past.
d. Revelation and religious experience. My attempt to discriminate
between modes of revelation according to the degree to which God is
experienced as taking the initiative in making Godself explicitly known
is helpful only up to a point, for there must be avoided the not uncommon tendency to press the distinctions too sharply and to ignore the
smooth gradations between the different categories of revelation already
distinguished. It is notable from a wide range of investigations how
widespread such religious experience is, even in the secularized West,
and that it is continuous in its distribution over those who are members of a religious community and those who are not.84 The evidence
suggests that the boundary between general revelation and revelation
to members of a religious tradition is very blurred. But so also is the
boundary between the latter and special revelation, for there are welldocumented non-Scriptural accounts over the centuries of devotional
and mystical experiences, regarded as revelations of God, among those
who do belong to a religious tradition.
It is also widely recognized that the classical distinction between
natural and revealed theology has proved difficult to maintain in
modern times, for it can be held that the only significant difference
between supposedly natural and supposedly revealed insights is
that the former are derived from considering a broader (though still
selected) range of situations than the latter. The same could also be said
of the subsequently more widely favored distinction between general
and special revelation, for the range of, and overlap between, the
84
See, for example, David Hay, Religious Experience Today: Studying the Facts
(London: Mowbray, 1990). Typical questions concerning religious experience to
which positive responses from between one third and one half of people in Western
countries were obtained were: Have you ever been aware of or influenced by a presence or power, whether you call it God or not, which is different from your everyday
self? or, Have you ever felt as though you were very close to a powerful spiritual
force that seemed to lift you out of yourself?
91
means whereby insights are gained into the divine reality has had to
be recognized.85
There is therefore a gradation, but there are also differences in intensity
and the degree of explicitness with which these religious experiences
are received as revelations of God as their initiatorrather as a variegated and rough terrain may be accentuated to give rise to distinctive
hills and even sharp peaks without loss of continuity. The questions now
that follow are: How does our understanding of Gods interaction with
the world, including humanity, relate to human revelatory experiences
of God? How can the notion of religious experience be accommodated
by, be rendered intelligible in, and be coherent with, the understanding
of Gods interaction with the world that we have been developing?86
4.2. How Does God Communicate with Humanity?
If God interacts with the world in the way already proposed, through
a whole-part constraining influence on the whole world system, how
could God communicate with humanity in the various kinds of religious experience? It has been noted that the interpersonal relationships
which we know of occur through the mediation of the constituents
of the world. This suggests that religious experience that is mediated
through sensory experience is intelligible in the same terms as that of
the inter-personal experience of human beings. It is therefore plausible to think of God as communicating with human persons through
the constituents of the world, through all that lies inside the dashed
circle representing the world in figure 1that is, via the nonhuman
constituents represented by the inner dotted circle in the figure. God is
seen as communicating symbolically through such mediated religious
experiences by imparting meaning and significance to constituents of
85
As David Pailin (Revelation, in A New Dictionary of Christian Theology, Alan

Richardson and John Bowden, eds. [London: SCM Press, 1983], 5046) puts it, the
ultimate justification of a supposed revelation is by showing that the resulting
understanding is a coherent, comprehensive, fruitful and convincing view of the fundamental character of reality.
86
These questions are rendered more pertinent by the recognition of the important
role played in recent years by religious experience as part of inductive and cumulative
arguments which claim to warrant belief in God.
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the world or, rather, to patterns of events among them.87 Insights into
Gods character and purposes for individuals and communities can
thereby be generated in a range of contexts from the most general to
the special. The concepts, language, and means of investigating and
appraising these experienced signals from God would operate at their
own level and not be reducible to those of the natural and human sciences. The interpretation of mediated religious experience would have
its own autonomy in human inquirymystical theology cannot be
reduced without remainder to sociology or psychology, or a fortiori to
the biological or physical sciences.
What about those forms of religious experience which are unmediated
through sense experience? Brown subdivides them into the mystical,
where the primary import of the experience is a feeling of intimacy
with the divine, and the numinous, those experiences where awe of
the divine is the central feature.88 Swinburne divides them, on the
one hand, into the case where the subject has a religious experience
in having certain sensations . . . not of a kind describable by normal
vocabulary, and on the other hand, religious experiences in which
the subject . . . is aware of God or of a timeless reality. . . . [I]t just so
seems to him, but not through his having sensations.89 The experience
of Elijah at the mouth of the cave on Mount Horeb was of all kinds:
God communicated to him, not only through the natural phenomena
of wind, earthquake, and fire, but eventually, apparently, and paradoxically, in an unmediated waythrough a sound of sheer silence, an
image of absolute nonmediation.
In such instances, is it necessary to postulate some action of God
whereby there is a direct communication from God to the human consciousness that is not mediated by any known natural means, that is,
by any known constituents of the world? Is there, as it were, a distinctive layer or level within the totality of human personhood that has a
unique way of coming into direct contact with God? This was, as we
saw in section 1, certainly the assumption when the human person was
divided into ontologically distinct parts, one of which (often called the
spirit or the soul) had this particular capacity.
87
This may properly be thought of as a flow of information from God to humanity, so long as the reductive associations of such terms are not deemed to excludeas
they need and should notinterpersonal communication.
88
David Brown, The Divine Trinity (London: Duckworth, 1985), 37, 4251.
89
Richard Swinburne, The Existence of God (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979), 251.
93
Now, we cannot but allow the possibility that God, being the Creator
of the world, might be free to set aside any limitations by which God has
allowed his interaction with that created order to be restricted. However,
we also have to recognize that those very self-limitations which God is
conceived of as having self-imposed are postulated precisely because
they render coherent the whole notion of God as Creator with purposes
that are being implemented in the natural and human world we actually
have and which the sciences increasingly unveil. Such considerations
also make one very reluctant to postulate God as communicating to
humanity through what would have to be seen as arbitrary means,
totally different in kind from any other means of communication to
human consciousness. The latter would include the most intensely
personal inter-communications, yet even these, as we saw above, are
comprehensible as mediated subtly and entirely through the biological
senses and the constituents of the world (section 2.6).
So, to be consistent, even this capacity for unmediated experience
of God cannot but be regarded as a mode of functioning of the total
integrated unity of whole personspersons who communicate in the
world through the worlds own constituents. For human beings this
communicating nexus of natural events within the world includes not
only human sense data (qualia) and knowledge stored in artefacts, but
also all the states of the human brain that are concomitant (or whatever
word best suits the relation of mind-brain-body) with the contents of
consciousness and of the unconscious. The process of storage and accumulating both conscious and unconscious resources is mediated by the
various ways in which communication to humanity can occurand all
these have been seen to be effected through the natural constituents of
the world and the patterns of events which occur in them.
When human beings have an experience of God apparently unmediated by something obviously sensoryas when they are simply waiting
upon God in silencethey can do so through God communicating
via their recollected memories, the workings of their unconscious and
everything that has gone into their Bildung, everything that has made
them the persons they are. All of this can be mediated through patterns
in the constituents of the world, including brain patterns. Experiences
of God indeed often seem to be ineffable, incapable of description in
terms of any other known experiences or by means of any accessible
metaphors or analogies. This characteristic they share with other types
of experience, such as aesthetic and interpersonal experience, which
are unquestionably mediated through patterns in the events of this
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world. Experiences of God could take the variety of forms that we have
already described and could all be mediated by the constituents of the
world and through patterns of natural events, yet could nonetheless be
definitive and normative as revelations to those experiencing them, for
if God can influence patterns of events in the world to be other than
they otherwise would have been but for the divine initiativeand still
be consistent with scientific descriptions at the appropriate levelthen
it must be possible for God to influence those patterns of events in
human brains which constitute human thoughts, including thoughts
of God and a sense of personal interaction with God.
The involvement of the constituents of the world in the so-called
unmediated experiences of God is less overt and obvious because in
them God is communicating through subtle and less obvious patterns in
the constituents of the world and the events in which they participate.
The latter include the patterns of memory storage and the activities of
the human brain, especially all those operative in communication at all
levels between human persons (including inter alia sounds, symbols,
and possibly Jungian archetypes), and the artefacts that facilitate this
communication.
On the present model of special providential actionas the effects of
divine whole-part influenceit is intelligible how God could also affect
patterns of neuronal events in a particular brain, so that the subject
could be aware of Gods presence with and without the mediation of
memory in the way just suggested. Such address from God, whether
or not via stored (remembered) patterns of neuronal events, could
come unexpectedly and uncontrivedly by the use of any apparently
external means. Thus, either way, it would seem to the one having
the experience as if it were unmediated. The revelation to Elijah at the
mouth of the cave had both this immediacy and a basis in a long prior
experience of God.
On examination, therefore, it transpires that the distinction between
mediated and unmediated religious experiences refers not so much to
the means of communication by God as to the nature of the content
of the experiencejust as the sense of harmony and communion with
a person far transcends any description that can be given of it in terms
of sense data, even though they are indeed the media of communication. We simply know we are at one with the other person. Similarly, in
contemplation the mystic can simply be aware of God . . . it just seems
so to him (as Swinburne puts it), and both experiences can be entirely
95
mediated through the constituents of the world. So it is not surprising

that those experiencing such communications from God experience
them as intensely personal, for this is the kind of experience closest to
them in ordinary life. What the treatment in this essay has therefore
been pointing to is that an intelligible account can be given of how
God can communicate personally to human beings within a world that
is coherent and consistent with the descriptions of that world given at
other levels by the natural and human sciences.
Certainly, for Elijah, the sound of sheer silence left no doubt about
the personal nature of the command he had received and its meaning
for him personally.90
90
Editors note: the original chapter included an appendix on the distinction between
theory-autonomy and process autonomy, which has been omitted for this edition.
CHAPTER THREE
THE METAPHYSICS OF DIVINE ACTION

John Polkinghorne
1. Introduction
Metaphysics is not a popular word in contemporary culture but, in fact,
no one can live a reflective life without adopting some broad view of
the nature of reality, however tentative and subject to possible revision
it might need to be. Even militant scientific reductionists, for whom
physics is all, are metaphysicians. They claim to be able to extend the
insights and laws of physics into regimes, such as human behavior, in
which their total adequacy is an untested hypothesis. They are certainly
going beyond (meta) physics.
Anyone who wishes to speak of agency, whether human or divine,
will have to adopt a metaphysical point of view within which to conduct the discourse. The conceptual edifice thus constructed must be
consonant with its physical base, but it will no more be determined by
it than the foundations of a house completely determine the character
of the building. In each case, there is constraint but not entailment.
Metaphysical endeavor in general, and talk of agency in particular,
will inevitably require a certain boldness of conjecture as part of the
heuristic exploration of possibility. In our present state of ignorance,
no one has access to a final and definitive proposal. The test of the
enterprise will be the degree to which it can attain comprehensiveness
of explanation and overall coherence, including an adequate degree of
consonance with human experience. The principal strategy of nearly all
writers on divine agency has been to appeal in some way to an analogy
with human agency, though our ignorance about the latter makes this
a precarious undertaking.
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john polkinghorne
2. Epistemology and Ontology
Metaphysical theories are ontologically serious. They seek to describe

what is the case. It is a central philosophical question how what is the
case is related to our knowledge of the world. There is clearly no certain
and simple way in which to make the connection. There has been a
strong tradition since Immanuel Kant which emphasizes the unknowability of things in themselves. The spectacles we wear behind the eyes
(the presuppositions we bring to our interpretation of the world) and
the epistemic blinkers imposed by our having to view reality from the
limitations of a human perspective are held so to refract and limit our
perceptions of the way things are that reality is inaccessible to us.
It is not necessary to give way to such metaphysical despair. Of course
there is no deductive way of going from epistemology to ontology. In
fact, an important aspect of the connection is precisely the problem of
induction: what degree of knowledge could lead to an ontological conclusion? Yet almost all scientists believe that they are learning about the
actual nature of the physical world that they investigate. Consciously or
unconsciously, they are critical realists. One could define the program
of critical realism as the strategy of seeking the maximum correlation
between epistemology and ontology, subject to careful acknowledgment
that we view reality from a perspective and subject to pushing the
search for knowledge to any natural limits it may possess. Its motto is
epistemology models ontology; the totality of what we can know is a
reliable guide to what is the case. It has to be a critical realism because
in some regimes (such as the quantum world) what is the case is so
counterintuitive in terms of common sense expectation that it cannot be reduced to a simple-minded objectivity. We have to respect its
idiosyncrasy, but that does not prejudice its reality. One can see how
natural this strategy is for a scientist by considering the interpretation
of the uncertainty principle in quantum theory. Heisenbergs original
discovery was epistemological; he showed there were intrinsic limitations on what could be measured. Very shortly, he and almost all other
physicists were giving the principle an ontological interpretation. It was
treated as a principle of actual indeterminacy, not mere ignorance.
There was no logical necessity to make this transition. It could not
be deduced. This is clearly established by the existence of alternative
interpretations in which there is complete determinacy, but in ways that
are hidden from human knowledge. One such interpretation is Bohms
the metaphysics of divine action
99
version of quantum theory,1 where a hidden wave guides the perfectly

determined motion of purely classical particles. Another is many-worlds
quantum theory,2 in which the perfectly deterministic Schrdinger
equation controls all that is, but its consequences are spread between
parallel universes, not simultaneously open to human observation.
Neither of these interpretations has commended itself to the majority
of physicists. They have freely (and in my view rightly) made the metaphysical decision to interpret quantum theory as indicating an intrinsic
indeterminacy in physical reality. I have been arguing3 that it is a rational
and attractive option to pursue the same strategy in relation to other
intrinsic unpredictabilities which we discover in nature. We should
treat these epistemic limitations as being ontological opportunities for
fruitful metaphysical conjecture.
3. Some Questionable Metaphysical Strategies

3.1. Primarily Science-Based: Physicalism
Our growing recognition of the remarkable powers of self-organization
displayed by complex physical systems far from equilibrium has encouraged some to adopt a refined form of physicalism. They suppose that
this will enable the completion of an adequate descriptive program of
human experience on the basis of natural science alone.4 I have already
stressed that such a claim is metaphysical in character, however much
it may seek to hide that fact behind the language of physics.
1
David Bohm, Wholeness and the Implicate Order (London: Routledge & Kegan
Paul, 1980); Bohm and B.J. Hiley, The Undivided Universe: An Ontological Interpretation of Quantum Theory (London: Routledge, 1993).
2
H. Everett, Reviews of Modern Physics 29 (1957): 454. See also, Alastair Rae,
Quantum Physics: Illusion or Reality? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986),
chap. 6.
3
John Polkinghorne, Science and Creation: The Search for Understanding (London:
SPCK Press, 1988) chaps. 3 and 5; idem, Science and Providence: Gods Interaction
with the World (London: SPCK Press, 1989), chap. 2; idem, Reason and Reality: The
Relationship Between Science and Theology (London: SPCK Press, 1991), chap. 3; and
idem, The Laws of Nature and the Laws of Physics in Quantum Cosmology and the
Laws of Nature: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, ed. Robert John Russell, Nancey
Murphy, and C.J. Isham (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1993; Berkeley, CA:
Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1993), 437448.
4
See Bernd-Olaf Kppers, Understanding Complexity in CTNS/VO, v. III.
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john polkinghorne
Such a strategy may be defended on the grounds that science has

already explained much which was not understood by previous generations and why should we set limits to its eventual successes? Indeed it
can be argued that the lessons of history encourage this point of view.
The boundaries between organic and inorganic matter, between living
entities and inanimate objects, are no longer perceived as total barriers
to the advance of scientific explanation. Why should consciousness or
human agency be thought to be different?
I would respond by pointing out that the lessons of history are more
ambiguous than this argument acknowledges. Even within physical
science itself there are many phenomena (the stability of atoms, superconductivity, the energy sources of stars) which only proved intelligible
in terms of an extremely radical revision of then currently accepted
physical principles, represented by the advent of quantum theory
and relativity. When one considers the big ugly ditch which seems to
intervene between physical talk (however complex and sophisticated
in terms of neural networking or whatever) and mental talk (even at
the most elementary level of perceiving a patch of pink), there seems
no reason to suppose that its bridging will not require the most drastic
revision, in unforeseeable ways, of our understanding of the nature
of reality. In the words of the sharp-tongued theoretical physicist,
Wolfgang Pauli, it is no use simply claiming credits for the future,
waving ones hands and hoping that one day present understanding
will turn out this way.
Physical science seems light-years distant from the unaided understanding of the mental or the intentional, an indispensable requirement
for an adequate metaphysical strategy. Moreover, the reductionist
program that underlies physicalism is threatened by developments in
physical science itself. The non-locality found in quantum theory shows
that the subatomic world is one which cannot be treated atomistically.5
The vulnerability of chaotic systems to the smallest influences from their
environment, consequent upon the exquisite sensitivity of such systems
to fine details of their circumstance,6 shows that they are never truly
isolable. Physics is taking a holistic turn. The possibility of the existence of holistic laws of nature is one which should not be discounted.
5
See, e.g., Polkinghorne, The Quantum World (London: Longman, 1984), chap. 7.
See, e.g., James Gleick, Chaos: Making a New Science (London: Heinemann, 1988),
chap. 1.
6
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Certainly such laws would be more difficult to discover than the familiar
laws governing the behavior of parts, and their form would surely be
different from that of the differential equations which are the staple of
current localized mathematical physics. Yet it would be a Procrustean
imposition on science to deny that it could have access to such laws. It
is clearly worthwhile to pursue the program of reductionist explanation
as far as it can legitimately be pursued, but that is a methodological
strategy for investigation, not a metaphysical strategy determining the
total nature of reality. The dawning holism of physics points in a more
hopeful direction if science is eventually to find a satisfactory integration
into a comprehensive and adequate metaphysical scheme.
One final criticism of too great a reliance on the principle of selforganization needs to be made. The insights of non-equilibrium thermodynamics seem helpful in relation to the generation of structure
and long-range order. Agency, however, seems to correspond to an
altogether more flexible and open kind of time-development than that
corresponding to typical self-organizing patterns, such as convection
columns or chemical clocks.
3.2. Primarily Theology-Based: Primary Causality
At least since Thomas Aquinas, there has been a tradition of theological
thinking which seeks to explain divine agency by appeal to the distinction between primary and secondary causality. A notable modern
exponent of this point of view has been Austin Farrer with his idea of
double agency.7 The secondary web of created causality is treated as
being complete and unriven. Yet the primary causality of God is supposed nevertheless to be ineffably at work in and through these created
causalities. How this is so is not explained. Indeed Farrer would regard
it as risking monstrosity and confusion if one were to attempt to discern
the causal joint by which divine providence acts.
It is not clear to me what is gained by so apophatic an account of
Gods action. In the end, the answer seems to be God only knows. I
agree with Arthur Peacockes judgment on the paradox of double agency
that it comes perilously close to that mere assertion of its truth . . . since
7
Austin Farrer, Faith and Speculation: An Essay in Philosophical Theology (London:
A&C Black, 1967).
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john polkinghorne
Farrer on his own admission can give no account of the causal joint
between the agency of the Creator and even human action.8 This seems
to me to be a strategy of absolutely last resort, only to be undertaken
if it proves impossible to make any satisfactory conjecture about the
causal joint of Gods agency. I do not believe we are in so desperate a
case, and I make my own suggestion in the course of what follows.
3.3. Top-Down Causality
The causality which physics most readily describes is a bottom-up causality, generated by the energetic interaction of the constituent parts of
a system. The experience of human agency seems totally different. It is
the action of the whole person and so it would seem most appropriately to be described as top-down causality, the influence of the whole
bringing about coherent activity of the parts. May not similar forms of
top-down causality be found elsewhere, including Gods causal influence on the whole of creation?
It is an attractive proposal, but it is important to recognize that
without further explanation top-down causality is a far from unproblematic concept. Its uncritical use would amount to no more than
sloganizing. It seems to me that two important difficulties have to be
faced and discussed.
The first is one I have already referred to in discussing the limitations on the insights provided by the principles of self-organization. If
one is to give an account of intentional agency, it will require something much more open and dynamic than simply the generation of
long-range order or the propagation of boundary effects. Striking as
instances of this kind can be (involving the coherent motion of billions
of molecules), they are often fully explicable in terms of a bottom-up
approach, generating long-range correlations between localized constituents (phase transitions in physics are good examples of this kind
of phenomenon). True top-down causality will have to be more open
and more non-local than that. I believe that chaotic dynamics, with
its picture of the open exploration of proliferating possibilities within
the confines of a strange attractor, may offer an important clue to
8
Arthur Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age: Being and BecomingNatural and
Divine (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990), 149.
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how this might come about. Self-organization offers the prospect of

the generation of different patterns of spatial order; chaotic dynamics
offers the prospect of the generation of different temporal patterns of
dynamical history. The latter seems much closer to notions of agency
than the former.
The second point, closely related to the first, is that if there is to be
room for the operation of true top-down causality, then there will have
to be intrinsic gaps, a degree of underdetermination in the account of
the bottom-up description alone, in order to make this possible.9 It is
to the possible identification of the source of this intrinsic openness
that I now turn.
4. Ontological Gaps
It seems to me that our experience of human agency is basic and by
itself sufficient to indicate that a metaphysical scheme affording no
scope for top-down causality would be seriously defective. Yet metaphysics must be consonant with its physical basis and so it is necessary
to consider whether there are appropriate intrinsic gaps already known
to us in the bottom-up description of the physical world. There seem to
be two broad possibilities:
4.1. Quantum Theory
May not agents, human or divine, act in the physical world by a power
to determine the outcomes of individual indeterminate quantum events,
even if the overall statistical pattern of many such events may still be
expected to lie within the limits of probabilistic quantum laws?10
This form of causality would actually be effected in the basement of
subatomic processes. The proposal requires, of course, the adoption of
the metaphysical strategy of interpreting quantum theory as involving
9
See Thomas Tracy, Particular Providence and the God of the Gaps (CTNS/VO,
v. III).
10
William Pollard, Chance and Providence: Gods Action in a World Governed by
Scientific Law (London: Faber, 1958); see also Nancey Murphy, Divine Action in the
Natural Order: Buridans Ass and Schrdingers Cat (in this volume); and Tracy,
Particular Providence (CTNS/VO, v. III.).
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intrinsic indeterminacies, but that is a strategy consciously or unconsciously endorsed by the great majority of physicists. For agency thus
exercised, these microscopic determinations would have to have their
consequences amplified up to the macroscopic level.
There are a number of difficulties about this proposal in relation
to human and divine agency. One relates to the amplification effect.
Exactly how the quantum world interlocks with the everyday world is
still a question of unresolved dispute. In essence, this is the measurement problem in quantum theory.11 Until this question is settled, the
micro-macro boundary is a difficult barrier to cross with confidence.
One might hope that a way around this might result from the sensitivity of chaotic systems to small triggers. Very quickly, there seems
to be established a dependence of the behavior of such systems on
details of what is going on at the level of quantum indeterminacy. Yet
the grave and unresolved difficulties of relating quantum theory to
chaos theory,12 or of what is often called quantum chaos, makes this
a perilous strategy to pursue.
There is a particular difficulty in using quantum indeterminacy to
describe divine action. Conventional quantum theory contains much
continuity and determinism in addition to its well-known discontinuities and indeterminacies. The latter refer, not to all quantum behavior,
but only to those particular events which qualify, by the irreversible
registration of their effects in the macro-world, to be described as
measurements. In between measurements, the continuous determinism of the Schrdinger equation applies. Occasions of measurement
only occur from time to time and a God who acted through being
their determinator would also only be acting from time to time. Such
an episodic account of providential agency does not seem altogether
satisfactory theologically.
4.2. Chaos Theory
The exquisite sensitivity of chaotic systems certainly means that they are
intrinsically unpredictable and unisolable in character. In accordance
11
See, e.g., Polkinghorne, Quantum World, chap. 6.

Joseph Ford, What is Chaos, that we should be mindful of it? in The New Physics, ed. Paul Davies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).
12
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with the realist strategy already discussed, I propose13 that this should
lead us to the metaphysical conjecture that these epistemological properties signal that ontologically much of the physical world is open and
integrated in character. By open is meant that the causal principles
that determine the exchange of energy among the constituent parts
(bottom-up causality) are not by themselves exhaustively determinative of future behavior. There is scope for the activity of further causal
principles. By integrated is meant that these additional principles will
have a holistic character (top-down causality).
The deterministic equations from which classical chaos theory developed are then to be interpreted as downward emergent approximations
to a more subtle and supple physical reality. They are valid only in the
limiting and special cases where bits and pieces are effectively insulated
from the effects of their environment. In the general case, the effect of
total context on the behavior of parts cannot be neglected.
Of course, with present ignorance, it is no more possible for me to
spell out the details of the subtle and supple physical reality I propose
than it is for the physical reductionist to spell out how neural networks
generate consciousness, or for those who rely on quantum indeterminacy to spell out how it generates macroscopic agency, or for those who
rely on an unanalyzed notion of top-down causality through boundary
conditions to spell out how it actually operates. We are all necessarily whistling in the dark. I prefer the tune I have chosen because it
has a natural anchorage in what we know about macroscopic physical
process and because it exhibits certain promising features which I will
now discuss.
For a chaotic system, its strange attractor represents the envelope
of possibility within which its future motion will be contained. The
infinitely variable paths of exploration of this strange attractor are not
discriminated from each other by differences of energy. They represent
different patterns of behavior, different unfoldings of temporal development. In a conventional interpretation of classical chaos theory, these
different patterns of possibility are brought about by sensitive responses
to infinitesimal disturbances of the system. Our metaphysical proposal
13
See n. 3 above. See also Polkinghorne, Science and Christian Belief: Theological
Reflections of a Bottom-up Thinker (London: SPCK Press, 1994; printed in the United
States as The Faith of a Physicist: Reflections of a Bottom-up Thinker [Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press, 1994]), chap. 1.
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john polkinghorne
replaces these physical nudges by a causal agency operating in the openness represented by the range of possible behaviors contained within
the monoenergetic strange attractor. What was previously seen as the
limit of predictability now represents a gap within which other forms
of causality can be at work.
Because of the unisolability of chaotic systems, this new agency
will have a holistic top-down character. It will be concerned with the
formation of dynamic pattern, rather than with transactions of energy.
In a vague but suggestive phrase I have proposed that it might best
be thought of as active information. There seems a hope that here
we might discern a glimmer of how it comes about that intentional
agency is exercised, either by our minds upon our bodies or by God
upon creation.
It is important to recognize that, in this scheme, the significance of
the sensitivity of chaotic systems to the effect of small triggers is diagnostic of their requiring to be treated in holistic terms and of their being
open to top-down causality through the input of active information. It
is not proposed that this is the localized mechanism by which agency
is exercised. I do not suppose that either we or God interact with the
world by the carefully calculated adjustment of the infinitesimal details
of initial conditions so as to bring about a desired result. The whole
thrust of the proposal is expressed in terms of the complete holistic
situation, not in terms of clever manipulation of bits and pieces.14 It is,
therefore, a proposal for realizing a true kind of top-down causality.
It may fittingly be called contextualism, for it supposes the behavior of
parts to be influenced by their overall context. This implies a strong
form of anti-reductionism in which processes are capable of being
modified by the context in which they take place. This will be so for
cloudy chaotic systems, but there will also be some clockwork
systems, insensitive to details of circumstance, in which the behavior
of the parts will be unmodified. Thus, one can understand the successes of molecular genetics in describing the (mechanical) behavior of
DNA, without having to suppose that this justifies a claim that all
14
The discussion of Peacocke in Theology for a Scientific Age, p. 154, does not
correctly represent my view. I have never supposed agency to be exercised through
(calculated!) manipulations of individual atoms and molecules. See n. 3 above.
107
aspects of living systems are adequately described in this reductionist

fashion.
5. A Metaphysical Proposal
The classical metaphysical options were materialism, idealism, and
dualism. None seems satisfactory. Materialism implausibly devalues the
mental. Idealism implausibly devalues the physical. Dualism has never
succeeded in satisfactorily integrating the disjoint realms of matter
and mind and it faces the problem of how to account for the apparent
continuity of evolutionary history, in which a world which was once a
hot quark soup (apparently purely material) has turned into the home
of human beings.
In consequence, in the twentieth century some have felt encouraged
to explore the possibility of a dual-aspect monism, in which the mental
and material are conceived of as being opposite poles (or phases, as a
physicist might say) of a single (created) reality. A key idea may well be
that of complementarity. Quantum theory discovered that the apparently qualitatively different characters of wave and particle were present
in the nature of a single entity, light. This proved possible to understand
when quantum field theory identified the feasibility of reconciling these
complementary descriptions as due to the presence of an intrinsic
indefiniteness. (A wavelike state is associated with the presence of an
indefinite number of photons.) The essence of complementarity is its
ability to hold together apparently irreconcilable characteristics (spread
out wave and point-like particle) in a simple reconciling account. We
experience the apparently qualitatively different realms of the material
and the mental. May not the understanding of this duality be found
in the intrinsic indefiniteness associated by our hypothesis with the
behavior of chaotic systems, influenced by both energetic transactions
and by active information? Of course consciousness is a much more
profound and mysterious property than history formation by active
information, but at least the latter seems to point in a mildly hopeful
direction.
In common with all the other metaphysical proposals here discussed, a dual-aspect monism based on a complementary mind/matter
metaphysic, is largely conjectural and heuristic. We do not have the
knowledge to produce definitive proposals of a fully articulate kind.
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john polkinghorne
Nevertheless, I believe this is a sensible and hopeful direction in which

to look for an understanding consistent with our knowledge of physical process and with our experience of human agency. It would afford
a picture of reality which would also be hospitable to the theological
concept of divine providential interaction with creation. Motivation
for belief in divine providence is found in the religious experiences of
prayer and of trust in a God who guides.
6. Some Comments
There are well-known relationships, due to Leon Brillouin and Leo
Szilard, which connect the transfer of units of information (in a communications-theory sense) with minimal transfers of energy. This might
seem to imply that for a physical system there could not be a totally pure
distinction between energetic action and active information. Careful
analysis would be required before such a conclusion was firmly established. It is not clear that active information is subject to exactly the
same constraints as communications theory imposes on the storage of
elements of passive information.15 Even if that were so, it would simply
reflect the embodied character of human beings. We are mind/matter
amphibians and are never in the state of being pure spirits.
God, in any case, is not embodied in the universe and there does not
seem to be any reason why Gods interaction with creation should not
be purely in the form of active information. This would correspond to
the divine nature being pure spirit and it would give a unique character
to divine agency in a way that theologians have often asserted to be
necessary. (God is not just an invisible cause among other causes.)
A world open to both bottom-up and top-down causality is a world
released from the dead hand of physical determinism. It is a world of
true becoming, in which the future has novel aspects not predictable
from the past. It is a world of true temporality.16 God knows things
as they really are and this surely implies that God knows the temporal in its temporality. Divine knowledge of temporal events must be
knowledge of them in their succession, not just that they are successive.
15
See the discussion in Bohm and Hiley, Undivided Universe, 3538.

Cf. C.J. Isham and J.C. Polkinghorne, The Debate over the Block Universe in
Quantum Cosmology, 135144.
16
109
This implies, I believe, that the God who is the creator of a world of
becoming must be a God who possesses a temporal pole as well as an
eternal pole.17 Because the future of such a world is not yet formed,
even God does not yet know it. This is no imperfection in the divine
nature. God knows all that can be known, but the future is still inherently unknowable.
17
Polkinghorne, Science and Providence, chap. 7.
CHAPTER FOUR
DESCRIBING GODS ACTION IN THE WORLD IN LIGHT

OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE OF REALITY
William R. Stoeger
1. Introduction
I intend this brief essay as a trial balloon. I shall sketch how we can
describe Gods action in the world, accepting with critical seriousness
both our present and projected knowledge of reality as we have it from
the sciences, philosophy and other non-theological disciplines, and our
present knowledge of God, his/her relationship with us and our world,
and his/her activity within it.
By saying that we shall accept the knowledge we have from both
ranges of experience with critical seriousness, I mean accepting it
as indicating something about the realities it claims to talk about,
after carefully applying the critical evaluations of such claims which
are available within the disciplines themselves, and within philosophy
and the other human sciences. This obviously involves beginning with
a number of definite presuppositions, some of which favor neither the
sciences nor religion and spirituality, and some of which do. But it also
involves the presupposition that the claims of each have been carefully
examined in the light of the different ranges of experience and certain
principles of interpretation and validation. I shall not spend time here
going through that process step by step, but instead shall simply assert
some general results in each area which derive from such a distillation. It will be somewhat obvious to those in the respective fields what
critiques I have applied to reach the results I shall assert. Then I shall
attempt to marshall these results into a roughly-sketched, integrated
theory of Gods action in the world.
The input into this integrated, coherent theory of Gods action
will not consist of highly technical assertionseither from science or
from philosophy and theologybut rather assertions which more or
less describe the general character of the world as we know it from
the contemporary sciences and the limits of our knowledge of it, and
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william r. stoeger
the general character of Gods action in the world as we know it from

contemporary Christian belief and theology. The latter has already
developed a great deal in response to the input and challenges mediated to our culture by the sciences. In other terms, we wish to attempt
to describe more adequately Gods action in the world, given that we
know that the world, its structures, and processes, are presently best
described in such and such a way (from the sciences and philosophy)
and that God and his/her relationships to the world are presently best
described in such and such a way (from theology and philosophy).
What we know from each set of disciplines must critically interact
with what we know from the other set according to certain principles
(which we shall later outline). This interaction should modify each set
of disciplinesparticularly in our interpretation of the conclusions each
one reaches at a philosophical leveland allow us to describe Gods
action in the world in an integrated way.
Implicit here, as Stephen Happel has pointed out to me,1 is the
methodological problem of how these two languages are to be integrated. This is an issue which is important, but one which is best treated
after allowing the interaction to occur via the critical apparatuses which
are already available and functioning. The two languages of science
and religion/theology, though different, are not isolated from or out of
contact with one another. They continue to be in dynamic interaction
in our common cultural and academic fields.
In describing what we know about the world and about God, and
his/her relationship to us and to physical reality, I need to employ a
language, a set of categories, and certain philosophical presuppositions. In particular, I assume a weakly critical-realist stance and use
some of the language, categories, and metaphysical presuppositions of
Aristotelianism and Thomism, most notably the notions of primary
and secondary causality. Other categories might have been chosen and
other assumptions might have been made instead. I have chosen these
because, in my opinion, they are more adequate to both the scientific
and the theological data, and lead to fewer difficulties in explicating the
essential differences between God and his/her creation, the relationships
between them, and the ideas of divine immanence and transcendence.
It is important to note also that I use the term law in the context
1
Personal communication. Here and elsewhere in this paper I am indebted to
Happels very helpful comments.
describing gods action
113
of both physical processes involving inanimate entitiesthe laws of

natureand free human actions. Law is any pattern, regularity, process, or relationship, and by extension that which describes or explains a
pattern, regularity, process, or relationship. Thus it applies, in the range
of the ways I use the word, not only to the inanimate and non-human,
but also to the human and the divine. Law is a word used to specify,
describe, or explain order. It does not necessarily imply determinism.
As I use it throughout the paper, modified by various adjectives and
adjectival phrases, its meaning should be clear.
1.1. Presuppositions
An obvious presupposition we make in pursuing this discussion is that
the sciences give us some knowledge of reality. We are not able to specify
that correspondence precisely, because we do not have an independent
handle on reality as it is in itself. Furthermore, our knowledge of it is
always only provisional and corrigible, and its certainty is only relative,
not absolute.2 But we are still reasonably persuaded to maintain that
there is correspondence, however precarious and uncertain it may be.
The care we exercise in validating and confirming scientific knowledge
indicates that this is what we as scientists are intending to do. And unless
reality is extraordinarily malevolent and contrary, the intersubjectively
applied criteria used in scientific observation, theory, and experiment
assure us that the sciences give us some purchase on the structures and
the dynamics of the physical, chemical, and biological world of which
we are a part. We presuppose in doing this that in its interaction with
us, reality reveals something of what it is. It could be very devious, it is
true, but we presume it is not so devious as to reveal nothing of itself
in the phenomena we observe.
The other key presuppositions we make here may not be so obvious
or common. They relate to God and to divine action, and to our knowledge of it through Christian belief and theology, according to the critical
principles of discernment, validation, confirmation, and interpretation
2
See Frederick Suppe, The Semantic Conception of Theories and Scientific Realism
(Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1989), 475; and William Stoeger, Contemporary
Physics and the Ontological Status of the Laws of Nature, in Quantum Cosmology
and the Laws of Nature: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, ed. Robert John Russell, Nancey Murphy, and C.J. Isham (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1993;
Berkeley, CA: Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1993), 20934.
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william r. stoeger
which are applied in these areas. First of all, we presuppose that God
exists and is and has been actively present and involved in our lives
and in our world. How this action, presence, and involvement are
to be described and understood will be modifiedeven significantly
modifiedin the conversation with the natural sciences. We are not
attempting to prove Christian doctrines by appealing to scientific evidence, but rather attempting to re-articulate and understand theological
truths in a more satisfactory way by looking at the relevant knowledge
available to us in the sciences and other disciplines. As Happel has said,
religion and theology are put in conversation with the data, concepts
and language of scientific performance and theory.3
Secondly, we presuppose that the sources of revelation, the scriptures,
tradition, and our living experience as believers who are individually and
communally openmore or lessto God and to Gods action, do give
us some reliable knowledge about God and about his/her action in our
world. As in the sciences, this is very limited and corrigible knowledge,
subject to error and modification, particularly with regard to interpretation and understanding of that revelation, and of our overall response to
it. And, as in the sciences, it too is dependent on the careful application
of critical principles of interpretation, discernment, and confirmation
suitable to the experiences being examined. We might also mention
that the limits and uncertainties of this knowledge derive both from the
extraordinary but limited character of the revelation we have available,
and perhaps most of all from our own limitations and lack of openness
to receiving, interpreting, and living out that revelation.
1.2. The Aim of Our Discussion
The aim of our discussion is simply to describe Gods action in the
world in terms which are faithful to Christian sources of revelation
and consistent with what we know from the sciences about reality, its structure, evolution, and processes, especially in view of the
self-organizing capabilities of matter, from the chaotic and dissipative
structures evident even in inanimate systems to the complex systems
of living organisms themselves. One of the key issues here is causality.
How can we speak of divine causality within the world as we know it,
Private communication.
115
without compromising scientific and philosophical principleswithout

using an interventionist model, for instance?
But how can this aim be pursued? Where is the common mode of
inquiry to be found? How do we distill relevant information concerning Gods action in the world from the sciences and from the sources
of revelation? Those questions are very difficult foundational ones. But
I do not think they can be answered from an a priori perspective. As
I have mentioned already, I am assuming that we have used and are
using the relevant tools of philosophy, philosophy of science, the critical
methods proper to scripture studies, historical and systematic theology,
and hermeneutics to do this. I am also assuming that we can begin to
integrate these results through the common ground of understanding
and language which our various specialized languages share with one
another. They are not, as I have stressed above, completely isolated from
one another, nor are the experiences to which they appeal.
2. What the Sciences Tell Us about Ourselves and Our Universe

If we generalize from the vast knowledge of the universe and all that
makes it up, including living and conscious beings like ourselves, we
can say that at every level there are self-ordering and self-organizing
principles and processes within nature itself, which can adequately
describe and account for (at the level of science) its detailed evolution
and behavior, the emergence of novelty, possibly even of consciousness, the inter-relationships between systems and levels, and even the
various laws of nature themselvesand the unfolding of all this, its
diversification and complexification, from an epoch very close to the
initial singularity or Big Bang. Some of these principles and processes
are well known and understood, and others are at present only conjectured or suspected. No outside intervention is necessary to interrupt
or complement these regularities and principles at this level. Nor is
an lan vital called for to explain living thingsnor an lan spirituel
at the next level of development. At the level of the sciences there are
no gaps, except the ontological gap between absolutely nothing and
something.4
4
Somefor instance Ellis, Murphy, and Tracyconsider the indeterminacy at the
quantum level to be an essential gap which requires filling (see their papers in this
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william r. stoeger
This general conclusion is strongly supported by detailed conclusions

from physics, chemistry, biology, molecular biologyparticularly from
those emanating from the studies of complex systems, information theory, molecular biophysics, and by the promised or envisioned advances
in these fields. The gaps in scientific knowledge have not all been filled,
but they are gradually being filled by new discoveries. And it has become
clear that appealing to divine intervention is not an acceptable means
for doing so. Nature itself is open and capable of realizing new possibilities in a whole variety of ways. Even in the surprising transitions
from inanimate beings to living ones, from living ones to conscious
ones, from conscious ones to human ones, it seems very unlikely that
any intervention from outside natural processes was involved. Material, physical reality is much richer in its possibilities, particularly when
it is in a highly organized form, than we usually think. At the same
time, an analysis of the sciences, the theories and the laws of nature
which derive from them, makes us very aware of their limitations. The
knowledge given us by the scienceslike all human knowledgeis
imperfect, provisional, corrigible. In particular, it only very imperfectly
describes the regularities and underlying inter-relationships, necessities
and possibilities, and structures which constitute reality.5 Through the
sciences we do not know reality as it is itself; we do not know it directly,
interiorly, comprehensively, exhaustively, as we would like to know
itas God must know it. So, although we have through tremendous
sustained effort and genius come to unravel a great deal about reality,
we are far from comprehending it at its ultimate depths.
In particular, from the sciences we still are unable to answer the
questions, why there is something rather than nothing, why there is
order rather than disorder, and why there is openness to noveltyto
new and more complex entitiesrather than just sterile uniformity.
volume). Though this view needs much more careful discussion than is possible here,
my assessment is that indeterminacy is not a gap in this sense, but rather an expression
of the fundamentally different physical character of reality at the quantum level. It does
not need to be filled! To do so, particularly with divine intervention, would lead in
my view to unresolvable scientific and theological problems. The demand for a cause
to determine the exact position and time of an event misconstrues the nature of the
reality being revealed. Quantum events need a cause and have a cause, but not a cause
determining their exact time and position of occurrence, beyond what is specified by
quantum probability (the wave function).
5
See Stoeger, Contemporary Physics.
117
That is, why are there laws of nature in the first place? And why these
laws of nature and not some others? In fact, not even philosophy can
adequately answer these questions.
A third conclusion stemming from the sciences is one which is not
usually mentioned but one which I believe is quite importantbut
not for the first reason that will probably occur to us: The laws of
nature and nature itself constrain but underdetermine what develops
or occurs. Great possibilities are left open in nature. It is very pliable.
This does not mean that nothing happens, obviously, but it does mean
that uncorrelated coincidences often end up filling in what is needed
to complete determination. It is this pervasive feature of realityalong
with others, such as its knowability and its localizabilitywhich enables
human beings and other animals to manipulate and harness reality, and
even to know it. We can fly in airplanes, build bridges, and heal the
sick, precisely because the laws of nature as we know them, and perhaps
even as they are in themselves, underdetermine events. In fact we are
who we are as human beings because of this important featurewe
can decide to do things which otherwise would not happen within the
constraints imposed by physics, chemistry, and biology. Some of this
underdetermination is due to the indeterminism and unpredictability
of physical systems at the quantum level and to the unpredictability
of both simple and complex systems on the macroscopic level. As we
have seen in studying the behavior of chaotic, nonlinear, or nonequilibrium systems, very slight changes in the initial conditions or the
boundary conditions can severely alter how they will behave, and what
sort of self-organizing behavior they will manifest. However, the underdetermination of phenomena by the laws of nature is due to much more
than these important sources of indeterminism and unpredictability. It
is due primarily to the freedom that exists in establishing initial conditions and boundary conditions throughout nature. An agent can, with
some expenditure of energy, change initial conditions and/or boundary conditions of a system or, even more importantly, construct new
systems, thus determining outcomes much different from those which
would otherwise occur.
Aha! You have pointed this out in order to leave room for divine
intervention! someone might say. In fact I have not, because, as we
shall see, this underdetermination of reality by the laws of nature does
not easily allow for divine interventionat least not direct divine
interventionbecause that would involve an immaterial agent acting
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on or within a material context as a cause or a relationship like other

material causes and relationships. This is not possible; if it were, either
energy and information would be added to a system spontaneously
and mysteriously, contravening the conservation of energy (and we
just do not have substantiated cases of that happening) or God would
somehow be acting deterministically within quantum indeterminacy,
which presents a number of serious scientific and theological difficulties.6 No, I have pointed out this feature of reality in order to emphasize
the potentiality, flexibility, and scope for newness that is within nature,
as well as the many different levels of agency which operate within it,
including the types of agency we exert as human beings.
Before going on to summarize what revelation tells us about God
and divine action, we should point out that the sciences themselves
are limited in dealing with personal agency and personal relationships.
In some ways psychology and sociology deal with the phenomena
related to these, but I think we are all aware of the limitations under
which they labor in their quest for knowledge in these profound and
mysterious areas.7
3. What We Know from Revelation and Our Reflection upon It

From revelation, and partially from reason, we know that God exists,
created the universe and all that is in it, reveals him/herself to people,
loves and cares for us, continually acts within material creation, particularly now through Jesus and the presence of his spirit among us,
and calls us to share his life and mission forevera promise which will
be fulfilled only after our deaths.8
Here a couple of conclusions stand out in reference to the issue we
are probing. Though it is not the primary revelation of God, the first
is that he/she is somehow the answer to the question, Why is there
something rather than nothing?and to the other similar fundamental questions we posed above. He/she created what is not God from
6
See n. 1 above.
Arthur Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age: Being and BecomingNatural and
Divine (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990).
8
As Happel points out (private communication), this creedal summary is deceptive.
The meaning of the language used is neither static nor agreed on by all who accept it.
It will change, even radically so, as we live out of and reflect upon our individual and
common experience of Gods presence and action among us.
7
119
nothing. But how that was done is still very much a mystery, as well as
whether or not creation is eternaldoes God create from all eternity?
How that was done is understandable only to God, at the very depths
of the divine being. We know in a very limited way how it was done
by looking at nature as revealed to us by the sciencesor let us say,
we know how it was not done!
A second conclusion from revelation is Gods motivation for creation
and for his/her interaction with the worldit is Gods goodness, Gods
innate drive as God to share that goodness, and Gods love both for
him/herself and for all that he/she creates and holds in existence. So,
interpersonal relationships are of paramount importance to Godas
are the values of goodness and truth. This is true of God in him/
herselfGod as Trinity. But it is also true of Gods relationships ad
extra. This divine priority is most fully expressed in the Incarnation
of the Son of God in Jesus, and in the sending of the Spirit. But it is
manifest throughout creation at every level.
A third conclusion is that creation itself is good, and an expression
of Gods goodness and love. Therefore, it makes perfect sense that it
should reflect to some extent who God is and what his/her characteristics are. Also, the more complex and capable beings are, the more
they reflect who God isincluding humanity, which is made in the
image and likeness of God. This perspectivethe priority of the values
of goodness and truth, along with reverence and respect for all that
isis consistent with the importance and value God gives to personal
relationships.
A fourth conclusion is that, although God reveals him/herself through
everything in creation, Gods most particular revelation is in terms of
persons and personal relationships involving generous, self-sacrificing
love and forgiveness. And our principal way of responding to Gods
revelation is in those same terms. So we experience revelation as personal and social, God among usas creator and source of life, yes,
but also as a personal presence and force who loves, invites love, gives
and invites giving, forgives and reconciles, and invites forgiveness
and reconciliation. The created, inanimate, and non-personal levels of
reality, though they exist in their own right and reveal God and Gods
goodness, power, and love in their own way, and give glory to God
in their own way (they cannot do otherwise!), exist also to enable the
development and maintenance of persons to whom God can reveal
him/herself and with whom God can maintain a personal relationship
leading to the full and harmonious union of the divine with created
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reality. The degree to which this is desired by God is expressed in creation itself, in the Incarnation and all that follows from it, and in the
sending of the Spirit.9
These are the principal conclusions flowing from Christian revelation
which I wish to highlight. Our endeavor now will be to bring these
conclusions into critical interaction with what we know about reality from the sciences, as outlined in the preceding section. As I have
already emphasized, these conclusions will have to be re-articulated and
modified as a result of this interaction. For instance, the strong anthropocentrism of this particular articulation would have to be significantly
mitigated. And the radical non-objectifiability of God would have to be
factored in, on other, more theological and religious grounds.10
4. Gods Creative Action and SciencePrimary Causality

I have already emphasized that the sciencesphysics in particulardo
not explain or account for existence or for the general order of the
universe. They presuppose it. They do not answer the question, Why
is there something rather than nothing? They can deal very well with
questions of origin in whichas is usually the casethe origin of a
structure or an entity derives from something else which already exists,
for example, the origin of children from their parents. But the sciences
do not deal with ultimate origins. They cannot bridge the gap between
nothing (which includes no potentialities and no physical lawsabsolutely nothing) and somethingor even between God and nothing else
and God and something else not God; and it is not clear that any branch
of human knowledge can adequately address this fundamental issue.
The God of Christian revelation, belief, and spirituality, however, is
an adequate answer to this questionthough this answer, adequate as
it may be, is somewhat impervious to adequate understanding on our
part. It does not adequately tell us how God bridged that gap. God is
the one who in some way has brought something out of nothing; God
9
My emphasis here on the priority of persons does not deny the wider role the Spirit
has throughout the created order, and the impact of the Incarnation on the cosmos.
Nor does my formulation properly describe the relationship of non-conscious entities
to the divine presence and their essential mystery.
10
Jos Porfirio Miranda, Marx and the Bible (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1974),
40ff.
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is the agent of creatio ex nihilo. In one way this is not accurate, for, as
I have already implied above, God has always existed as a necessary
being. He/she is, as the uncaused cause, or primary cause, as Christian
theology has traditionally described him/her. So something (i.e., God)
has always existed. There was never absolutely nothing, if something
exists. What we really want to say is that the only explanation for
something created to emerge from the absence of anything created is
God. This affirmation, as I have just said, does not particularly deepen
our understandinghow this happened, the detailsbut it is, strictly
speaking, an adequate answer to the fundamental question we are
considering.
It should be clear, furthermore, that this is not basically a temporally
weighted answer to the question of existence. It does not necessarily
imply that there was a state or situation when there was nothing besides
God, and then at some juncture God created entities other than him/
herself, and with them time, space, etc. As Thomas Aquinas11 realized,
it could be that God has created from all eternitythat created reality is
eternal in the sense that it has no temporal beginning (there was never
a state in which God existed and created reality did not), but it is still
radically contingent on God.12 There may have been a beginning of
time, but that is by no means essential. Ultimate origins are essentially
ontological, not temporal. In fact, I believe a good argument can be
made for eternal creation on the basis of who God must be as God. If
God is of his/her very nature bonum diffusivum sui, infinite love, and
therefore creator, then he/she was always and eternally such. Therefore,
in order to fully realize who he/she is, creation must in some sense,
at least in intention, be an eternal process. This may at first seem to
infringe on Gods freedom to create. But it really does not do that at
all. His/her creating is perfectly free, but is also a natural consequence
of Gods very nature. Nor does this mean that God or Gods love is
dependent on creation for self-origination. God and Gods love must
be sovereign. But Gods love must also be fruitful, and that one principal manifestation of its fruitfulness be an eternal created order is not
surprising.
11
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, 1.44.

See Ernan McMullin, How Should Cosmology Relate to Theology? in The Sciences
and Theology in the Twentieth Century, ed. A.R. Peacocke (Notre Dame, IN: University
of Notre Dame Press, 1981), 39ff.; and Stoeger, Contemporary Physics.
12
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william r. stoeger
This primary divine, existence-endowing causality is always operative,

holding things in existence, charging them with realization. It is essential
to conceive primary causality very differently from the causessecondary causeswe discuss and deal with each day. The primary cause is not
just another one of theseit completely transcends them and provides
their ultimate basis in reality. There are no gaps is the secondary causal
chain, but the whole chain demands a primary cause to support and
sustain it. Without the primary cause there is no explanation for its
existence or for its efficacy.13
But it is not just a question of existence. It is also a question of order.
What accounts for the order which exists in naturein the universe?
Why is there order rather than complete disorder? Again this is not
a question which can be answered by the sciences. In the same bald
and impoverished way as before,14 however, the existence of God does
provide an adequate answer: God is the ultimate source of order in
nature and in the universe, and of both necessity and contingencyand
therefore of any possibilities which might emerge from their interaction.
A consequence of this, of course, is that God is ultimately the source
of the underlying regularities, constraints, and behavioral relationships
and patterns which are imperfectly described by laws of nature we
formulate.15 The question why the world behaves this way rather than
some other logically possible way can only have an ultimate answer in
God as creator. He/she is the well-spring of both necessity and possibility in nature.
5. Gods Creative ActionCreatio Continua and Secondary Causality

There is an important corollary to the foregoing discussion, which takes
us into a brief consideration of Gods continuing creative action in the
universe, conceived now more richly than simply as just divine existential conservancy. It is that a principal mode of Gods activity in the world
13
Stoeger, The Origin of the Universe in Science and Religion, in Cosmos, Bios,
Theos, ed. Henry Margenau and Roy A. Varghese (LaSalle, IL: Open Court, 1992),
25469.
14
Ibid.
15
See ibid.; and idem, Contemporary Cosmology and Its Implications for the Science-Religion Dialogue, in Physics, Philosophy, and Theology: A Common Quest for
Understanding, ed. Robert John Russell, William R. Stoeger, and George V. Coyne
(Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1988), 21944.
123
at the level of inanimate and non-personal beings is precisely through

the underlying regularities, constraints, and relationships he/she has
established in nature, and which we sometimes refer to as the laws of
nature.16 This is a very rich way of looking at natureas the expression
of God him/herself and as one of the fundamental ways in which God
acts within the world. The regularities, constraints, and relationships
are as they are by Gods allowance or choicehe/she works through
the secondary causes of our world. They give Gods presence and action
concrete form. As new possibilities are realized God becomes present
and active in new ways.17 They express how God desires the world to
bethe necessities that are imposed along with the contingencies, the
possibilities and the openness to development and to novelty.
If we put this into an evolutionary context, then, and consider what
we know of the complexification of structure and the diversification of
physical, chemical, and biological processes from a time shortly after
the Big Bang, we see that we can conceive of Gods continuing creative
action as being realized through the natural unfolding of natures potentialities and the continuing emergence of novelty, of self-organization,
of life, of mind, and spirit, as the universe expanded and cooled. Within
this perspective, Gods direct interventionin the sense of operating
outside of the regularities, constraints, and relationships he/she has
established, or abrogating or mitigating them in any way, either ad hoc
or regular, to fulfil some higher purposefails to make much sense if
God is really God, though it cannot be ruled out. Even if intervention
in the underlying principles, relationships, and regularities as they are
in themselves sometimes occurs, it is still clear, from critical reflection
upon both scientific knowledge and the knowledge we have from faith,
16
I prefer to reserve this term for our imperfect formulation of the underlying regularities, constraints, and relationships we discover, or our models for those. However,
we must distinguish between the laws of nature as God knows them, and the laws
of nature as we have imperfectly and provisionally formulated them.
17
Though the general primary-cause-secondary-cause approach to the problem
of Gods action in the world is very traditional, I believe that it is the only one that
holds much promise. Owen Thomas (Recent Thoughts on Divine Agency, in Divine
Action, ed. Brian Hebblethwaite and Edward Henderson [Edinburgh: T & T Clark,
1991], 3550.) arrives at a similar conclusion, that in the current state of discussion
only the theories involving either primary and secondary causality or process theology even approach adequacy. I am thankful to Russell (Introduction, in Quantum
Cosmology; and in CTNS/VO, v. III) for this reference. In my view, the approach of
process theology, though attractive in some ways, has unresolved philosophical and
theological problems, particularly with regard to the doctrines of God, creation, and
Christology.
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william r. stoeger
that the operation of the laws of nature, from the divine perspective,
is a principal channel of Gods active presence in our world, and as
such is an expressioninadequate and imperfect though it may beof
who he/she is. Thus, our investigation of these regularities, constraints,
and relationships, and our imperfect formulation of them in scientific
theories and in our laws of nature, articulates an important mode of
divine activity in created reality.
I shall have more to say about this later when we discuss Gods action
within personal and social contexts. Looking forward briefly to the
issues which will emerge there, we see that it is crucial to distinguish
carefully between the laws of nature, the regularities, constraints,
and relationships realized in nature, as we have conceptualized and
formulated them, and the laws of nature as they in fact function
in created realityfrom Gods full and complete point of view, so to
speakwhich somehow includes the internal or interior relationship
he/she has with nature, with us, and with other created entities.18
We immediately see the importance of this distinctionsince our
very limited account and formulation of these laws may leave out
crucial relationships (even constitutive relationships) which organize
the inanimate and unconscious world at a very profound level, which
function to subtlety link the personal and the non-personal, or which
subordinate the non-personal to the personal. We are not fully able to
see how this might happen, but we begin to see something of it in the
underdetermination of physical reality and its vulnerability to human
agency, which can mold it within its constraints to our intended use,
for better or for worse.19
From our point of view, manifestations of this may be interpreted
by us as contravening the laws of nature simply because we have not
fully understood them, whereas in fact they are in perfect accord with
the laws of nature as they are in reality. In other words, God may
act in a purely natural way within the relationships and regularities
he/she has established and maintained, but in a way which we see as
supernatural intervention simply because we have not yet come to
comprehend fully the relationships and regularities (the higher laws)
which obtain.20
18
Stoeger, Contemporary Physics.

Cf. Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age.
20
Will all events be lawful in his extended sense? Referring to how I characterized
law in the introduction and in this section, that may very well be the case. However, it
19
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In light of this, it is clear that the distinction we often make between

the natural and the supernatural really derives from our limited perspective on reality, and our imperfect knowledge of it. We simply do
not know enough to put everything together. Where there are gaps in
our knowledge we always seem to insert Gods direct intervention, with
the implication that there is a concomitant abrogation, mitigation, or
suspension of the laws of nature. Again, the distinction between the
two rather different meanings the laws of nature may have is some
help to avoiding this confusion.
6. Problems of Conceiving Direct Divine Action and the Need for It

Gods action in the world through the regularities, constraints, and
relationships he/she enforces, as we have sketched it in the previous
sectionthrough the laws of nature as they are in themselvesis
indirect.21 God establishes an order within which processes occur
and constraints are imposed. These processes and constraints lead to
the evolution of structures and even of other, higher-level processes
which govern their behavior, and to the emergence of new and more
complex entities which are able to reproduce and evolve further. The
whole process culminates in entities which are conscious, able to know,
free and capable of making decisions, and able to harness and control
reality within certain limits. All this has been orchestrated by Godso
to speakthrough the divine establishment and maintenance of the
laws of nature.
We can easily understand Gods indirect action, because we are
familiar with analogous instances of indirect action in our human
experienceusing an instrument, making a machine, or constructing
a program which will perform some function for us, setting an organization or a group into action to carry out some series of commands
directed toward fulfilling some desired end we have conceived. God
does something analogous in establishing and maintaining the laws
of nature.
needs more careful consideration than I can give it here. Certainly, relative to a more
restricted notion of lawas what is generalizablesome events will fall outside its
comprehension, e.g., what is important and significant in its radical particularity.
21
By direct I mean unmediated; by indirect I mean mediated.
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But conceiving or modeling Gods direct action is a very different

kettle of fish. We have the experience of what direct action means
within human experience. It means active involvement without an
intermediarythe agent does what he or she intends personally, without
asking someone else or triggering something else to do it. Any action will
always have a direct component and indirect components. No action by
an agent can be completely indirect. When I contract a firm to repair
my roof, I indirectly repair the roof by doing so, and the supervisor
indirectly repairs the roof by directing his subordinates to do so and
telling them how to go about it, but I directly act to initiate the contract
with the roofing firm (picking up the phone to call them, showing them
what needs to be done, making and communicating the decision to
accept the estimate on the proposed work, signing the contract, etc.)
and the supervisor directly acts to put his roofers into motion. It will
be the same in Gods indirect action in the world. We see the results of
the indirect components, and even have access to the agents through
whom God is acting indirectly. But we know or conclude that there
must be a component of Gods perceived indirect action which is direct.
At some stagesome initial stagehe/she acts without intermediary to initiate the intended action or create a range of necessities and
possibilities, for instance, by directly establishing fundamental laws of
nature and the fundamental constants or their primordial antecedents.
At some level we know that Gods direct action was and is necessary
to ground and maintain existence of everything that is not God, and
to enforce the regularities, constraints, and interrelationships which
we refer to as the laws of nature and which endow reality with its
interlocking levels of order, necessity, and possibility.
But our ability to model Gods direct action seems to encounter an
insuperable barrier at this point. Our experiences of acting directly no
longer provide a helpful analogy or model for what divine direct action
must be. Essentially, even though we know that at some fundamental
level God is and must be acting directly, we never have direct experience of his/her doing so! We always experience divine action as indirecteven though the action may sometimes seem to operate outside
of the laws of nature as we understand them. And we never have
experience of God acting directlyeven though we have assurances
from revelation that he has and does, in creation, in the Incarnation,
within the realm of the personal. We would apparently not be able to
determine if a particular consequence were the result of Gods direct
action, instead of Gods indirect action through a channel or instrument
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we are not aware of or do not understand. Thus, an apparent divine

intervention on our behalfa miraclein answer to our prayers, for
instance, a healing of a disease of paralysis which cannot be explained
by contemporary medical science, does not of itself manifest the direct
action of God, though it does manifest Gods personal loving and
life-giving action towards us. We always experience it through some
intermediary datum or agentthrough some sacrament. Even when
there is no obvious causewe just find ourselves well whereas before
we were ill and dyingour experience of this is mediated by what has
occurred unexplainably in our bodies. Our experience is not of any
direct encounter with God, however mystical (in the extraordinary
sense) that may have been. Furthermore, there is no assurance that the
proximate cause of the healing, miraculous as it is, was not effected by
God operating through a regularity or law of nature which is beyond
our present knowledge or understanding or through an intermediary
agent, that is, a prophet or an angel.
My point is that, though the extraordinary character of the event,
which is outside what we normally expect in similar situations, leads us
to believe that God is personally responding to our needs and prayers,
this does not of itself indicate that the divine action is direct. It may
indicate, however, that it is special, particular, and personal; I shall have
more to say about this later. Even in terms of the Incarnation, no one,
not even Mary, had an unambiguous experience of direct divine action,
however personal and gratuitous it was.
Another possibility for divine action, however, is what St. Ignatius
of Loyola refers to as consolation without previous cause, as being an
unequivocal sign of Gods active graced presence in a religious experience.22 This may be, but it still is not at all clear that it is an experience
of direct divine action! It may be an unequivocal sign of Gods presence
and action, but it is very difficult to assess critically as an experience of
God as a direct, unmediated cause. Perhaps the only place where we
shall experience that is in the beatific vision.23
22
St. Ignatius of Loyola, Rule for the Discernment of Spirits, The Spiritual Exercises. See Karl Rahner, The Dynamic Element in the Church, trans. W.J. OHara, vol. 12,
Quaestiones Disputatae (New York: Herder & Herder, 1964), for a theological account
of this.
23
Cf. F. Suppe, The Scientific Vision and the Beatific Vision, paper presented at
the Notre Dame Symposium on Knowing God, Christ, and Nature in the Post-Positivisitic Era, University of Notre Dame, April 1417, 1993.
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The key point to this discussion is simply that we have no experiential

basis upon which to model Gods direct action with regard to created
reality.24 Thus, although we know it occurs, it is apparently inaccessible
to our experience and therefore to our detailed understanding. The case
of Gods action in creating from nothing and maintaining in existence
is essentially direct divine actionperhaps the clearest case of it. But
here again, that extraordinary and pervasive relationship of creatures
with the divine, in which we ourselves participate, occurs at the very
core of our beings and is hidden from our eyes.
7. The Problems of the Primary-Secondary Causal Nexus, of Double

Causality, and of Top-Down Causality
There are a series of unsolved problems related to divine action, which
flow from this discussion of the impossibility of adequately articulating
or modeling Gods direct action towards a creature. From what I have
said above, it is clear that Gods direct creative action ex nihilo is not
susceptible to experiential detection or probing. In a sense, in order
to answer how it happens, we would have to be God! We have some
access to the why because of revelationin terms of Gods goodness
and love. When we turn to other categories of direct divine action, the
same obstruction is found.25
7.1. The Primary-Secondary Causal Nexus
A key issue is the direct action of God with regard to secondary causes,
through which he/she acts indirectly. How does God operate on a secondary cause, other than by bringing it into existence and conserving
24
Russell (private communication) insists that we distinguish three different ideas

which I have tended to conflate here: (1) knowing where God acts directly (such as
at the quantum level or in the free moral agent); (2) having an immediate experience
of such a direct act; and (3) being able to model the act itself. My point here is that,
though we may know or suspect that God acts directly in a given place or situation,
we are never in the position to model it, simply because we do not have access to it
in its immediacy. We have mediated experience of it, but no experience of the direct
action itself, which is precisely what is in question.
25
Arthur Peacocke discusses this problem at lengththe problem of the how,
or what he refers to as the causal joint (Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age). He
suggests that the resolution of it can be approached by locating creation in God and
applying top-down causality, God acting on created reality.
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it in existence, so that it is the instrument for carrying out his/her

intentions? In some cases this is just by maintaining it in existence and
continuing to endow it with the nature or properties it has, and we do
not know how that is done. But in some other examples, there is more
going onthat is, in the sacraments, in the prophets, who are inspired
to speak for God, in individuals who are in personal relationship with
him/her. In other words, the causal nexus between God and any other
cause or entityincontrovertible as it is as a necessary condition for
what we experienceis shielded from and inaccessible to our probing.
Does God simply inject information or intention into secondary causes,
inducing them to act on his/her behalf? Does this happen within the
framework of the physical and other laws of nature, as we imperfectly
know them? Or does it instead at least sometimes involve an abrogation or a fulfillment of those laws in terms of higher laws operating in
the realm of the conscious and the personal and transcending those
of physics, chemistry, and biology? We do not know for sure. I would
strongly suspect that the last is often, though not exclusively, at work,
simply on the basis of the priority the personal seems to have for God,
as is clear to us from revelation.26 But it seems extraordinarily difficult
to substantiate that suspicion independently and to model such a causal
nexus in concrete terms.
One of the difficulties here is simply that, in speaking of Gods causal
activity, we are trying to speak about a cause which is radically different
from any other cause we experienceGod is the primary cause. And
we have no direct experience of this sort of causality. He/she is never
one cause among many others, and cannot be conceived in his/her
activity on the pattern of the created causes which we are and which
we experience.27 Gods causal activity completely transcends secondary causality, and at the same time is perfectly immanent in secondary
causality, supporting it and giving it efficacy. To use metaphors, God as
primary cause is much more interior and present to creatures than they
are to one another as secondary causes. But at the same time, on the
basis of our lack of direct experience of it, Gods causality is extremely
subtle and hidden, and does not interfere with necessities, regularities,
26
At the same time, however, we must find a way of avoiding an overly anthropocentric theology.
27
Stoeger, Origin of the Universe.
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and freedoms with which secondary causes are endowed, except in

response to a higher or more personal law.
7.2. Double Causality
Another problem with Gods direct action in the world which is connected with this issue of the causal nexus is what we might call double
causality. This is not so difficult in light of the conclusions we have
already reached, but it bears mentioning. It is essentially: How can we
have two adequate agents causing the same effectGod as primary
cause and the secondary causes through which God is working?
There are several rather different issues which must be distinguished
here: (1) God as primary cause acting to maintain secondary causes in
existence, with their own particular capabilities, tendencies, and limitations, without further determining how they act to produce their effects
(the underdetermination we were speaking of earlier); (2) God not only
acting as primary cause to maintain secondary causes in existence, but
possibly working through secondary causes to produce an effect God
desires, a special or particular effect, outside of the ordinary pattern
of what we would expect; (3) God inviting secondary causes to act
in a certain way, but not determining or forcing them to do so; and
(4) God apparently being a sufficient cause for an effectdirectly or
indirectlyand some created cause apparently being a sufficient cause
for the same effect.
Regarding this last issue, I believe that the only problem here may
be our confusion concerning what constitutes a sufficient causeor
reasonin a concrete case, along with whether the sufficient cause is
acting directly or indirectly. For example, if one cuts the stem of an
apple hanging on the tree and the apple falls to the ground, we might
at first think that the person cutting the stem is the sufficient cause for
the apple to fall, but that sufficiency presupposes a context in which
other causes are acting, namely gravity. Without the action of gravity the apple would not fall. Nor is gravity a sufficient cause for the
apple to fall; nor is God, who at some level instantiated the laws of
nature,they are necessary conditions, but not sufficient ones. The
apple must be free to fall before gravity can cause it to fall. Applying
this example to divine action, we see that God is never the sufficient
condition for an effect occurringthough he/she is always a necessary
condition for what occurs and sometimes contributes (in situations
involving free moral agents) to the further conditions needed to consti-
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tute sufficiency. Correlatively, a secondary cause is never an absolutely

sufficient condition for an effect, only what might be called a relatively
sufficient conditiongiven that other normal conditions are fulfilled,
that is, that gravity is acting.
Again God as a necessary condition for the existence of something,
or of anything, is not in doubt, but God as sufficient condition is
always in question. This is undoubtedly an aspect of divine kenosis (or
self-emptying) and hiddenness in created realitythat God withholds
his/her capability of being the sufficient condition of particular effects.
For instance, God is not the sufficient condition of my existenceby
relying on secondary causes (my parents and the processes of reproductive biology) divine causal sufficiency is surrendered. This is true even
with respect to an event like the Incarnation. God invites it, but does
not force it. The fiat of Mary was essential to the concrete realization
of the Incarnation.
Now that they have been distinguished, the other issues, (1) through
(3), lead to fairly straightforward resolutions. I shall not discuss (1)
and (3) further, as the only one which may cause a problem is (2),
that of God possibly determining a special or particular effect through
secondary causes. The situations where this occurs are in Gods personal action towards a person open to his/her presence and activity,
in Gods activity through impersonal, animate, or inanimate beings or
causal chains, and more clearly in the cases where God apparently has
directly or indirectly rigidly fixed general patterns of physical behavior,
relationships, and structures in the laws of nature.
In the first situation, God somehow communicates love and mercy
Gods life-giving presencein a particular experience or concrete
event to a person or group. This rarely involves even the appearance of
abrogation of the laws of nature, but instead a certain coming together
of events which seem purely coincidental but which speak strongly of
Gods care and love to the person concerned. Does God really marshall
such natural occurrences in these ways? Or is it rather that God sensitizes or inspires the person to whom he/she wishes to communicate
the divine active presence in whatever naturally occurs, by means of
the laws of nature we normally experience, and those higher laws of
which we have no adequate understanding? In either case we are dealing
with Gods intended action toward a particular individual or group as
a perceived response to faithfulness, openness, prayer, petition. And in
either case, we must deal at some juncture with Gods direct action on
secondary causes and how that direct action is effected.
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william r. stoeger
In these personal secondary causal situations, there is always some

form of personal relationship between God and the created personan
openness and free initiative of God towards the person, and of the
person towards God. And this mutual relationship is expressed in a
whole network of manifestations. Furthermore, the persons cooperation is not forced, but free. How does this personal communication
take place? Something analogous occurs in human relationships and in
human agency involving other personsacting to have someone else
do something, either by command, by suggestion, by request, usually
based on a previously established relationship of some sort between the
persons. The key problem, as always, in this relationship between God
and the created personal agent is that of the causal nexushow does
God influence or inspire someone? Oftentimes it is indirectthrough
an event, another person, reading and reflecting upon scripture, an idea
or an emotion. But at some point there must beat least according
to our analysis so farsome direct connection, communication, or
component of divine action with respect to the created agent. There
must always be, it seems, some direct divine communication involved
at some stage in the designation of a prophet, in the issuance of a call
or vocation, and certainly in very special events like the Incarnation
and the Resurrection. How is this direct link realized?
And then there is the second situation, Gods action through impersonal secondary causes, in which the agents or instruments are not free
to act or not act. Despite this difference from the previous case, the
same issue arisesthe way in which God directly causes or constrains
some created beings to act as secondary causes.
In either case how does God do this? What is the nexus between God
and the secondary causal instruments? We do not know. But perhaps
we can begin to understand in terms of human agency and action.
We do something very similar, do we not? We act through secondary
causes. We decide to do somethingto build a bookcase, to type a letter,
to make a pot of coffee. And working through our bodiesdirecting
our eyes, our hands and our fingers to perform very complex, goaldirected series of operations using tools and instruments, we bring all
sorts of secondary causes together to aid in finishing our bookcase,
completing the letter, and brewing the coffee. Undoubtedly, God is
able to do the same thing, but with great reverence for both his/her
creation and for the freedom and independence of the persons with
whom God is communicating, for the character and the individuality
of the beings, whether they be personal, animate, or inanimate, and
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their interrelationships, through which he/she is working. Although this

is a description of top-down causality, which will be briefly discussed
later, my point here is not its character but rather whether and how we
can describe or model the causal nexus between God and secondary
causal instruments. We understand something about our interaction
with the material world around us, because we are material (but we
certainly do not yet understand the relationship between our minds and
our bodies!). It is considerably more difficult to understand the direct
causal nexus between God, who is immaterial and uncreated, and the
material secondary causes.
And yet a profound nexus there must bewhether it is more interior to the created causes, or more top-down and exterior. I shall
very shortly suggest how the immanence and transcendence of God may
provide the key to understanding this problem of the causal joint.28
Before doing so, it is worth pointing out that, as we come to understand
that the material and the immaterial are not essentially different, but
intimately united at every level, and how this sameness in difference
functions, we will perhaps come to some better appreciation of Gods
direct interaction with secondary causes. This will be paralleled, I hope,
by progress in understanding how mind-body issues can be resolved.
Both advances will help our analogy between human agency and divine
agency to yield more fruit.
Answering this question how? concerning the direct causal connection between God and secondary causes requires a detailed knowledge
and understanding of God and of Gods causal and personal relationships with persons and with other creatures. Our inability to answer
that question reflects the profound inadequacy of our knowledge of the
divine. Still, to the extent that we know something about Godthanks
to revelation and our reflection upon itwe can move in a promising
direction.
As I have mentioned, this is in the direction of Gods immanence and
transcendence, particularly as they are realized in Gods transcendent
primary causality as a cause unlike any other. The key point is that God
acts immanently in naturein every nook and cranny of nature, at the
core of every being and at the heart of every relationshipto constitute
and maintain it just as it is and just as it evolves. God constitutes things
as they are and as they actwith freedom or without freedom, personal
28
Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age.
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william r. stoeger
or impersonaland maintains this constitutive relationship with them,

with great efficacy, but also with great reverence and respect for the
individuality and character of each and of the network of relationships
they have with one another. This constitutive presence of God at the
heart of things is so pervasive that from a strictly scientific perspective we do not notice it. There is nothing we experience or encounter,
either exterior or interior, that is without it. God is fully and actively
immanent precisely because God is fully transcendent.
Transcendence implies complete availability, accessibility, and active
presence at every levelthat is, immanence. What is transcendent is not
trapped or constrained by a given level of being, a given relationship,
or a given perspective, and so is available to all. There are no principles
or regularities or relationships needed other than the secondary causes,
regularities, and relationships which are vulnerable to scientific and
philosophical investigation. But Gods transcendent/immanent primary
causality is always immediately and immanently endowing them with
existence and with the intricate and dynamic order and interrelationships they enjoy.
Creation is a limited expression of the divine being. The direct causal
nexus is the active, richly differentiated, profoundly immanent presence of God in created beings and in their interrelationships. It is at
the same time their limited and specific participationinclusionin
Gods own existence and interrelationships as Trinity, which is utterly
transcendent and immaterial but also radically open to and available
for the realization of finite possibilities. The presence of God in each
entity constitutes the direct, the immediate, relationship of that entity
with God, and therefore is the channel of divine influence in secondary
causes. This approach by no means resolves the mystery or answers the
question, but it serves to locate it where the answer almost certainly
lies. I shall discuss some of these issues again when I deal with Gods
personal action. Here I have briefly looked at the causal problems associated with this approach. There I shall focus more on the experience
and intention involved in such modes of divine action.
The final situation in which God has determined an effect through
secondary causes is where either directly or indirectly he/she has rigidly
fixed (determined) general patterns of behavior, structures, relationships, constraintsthe structure of atoms, for instance, and the periodic
table with all the chemical laws embodied in it, the operation of the
laws of physics. Among all the possible and apparently internally
consistent ways in which physical reality could behave, only this one
135
is realized. And, if God exists and is the primary cause, he/she must
have either chosen this realization, or allowed it to develop from some
other more primordial laws.
In either case, God at some point or in some way acts directly to
effect them, and continues to act directly and immanently to conserve
them. Again, we have the nexus problem, for which we have no
real solutionother than the observations made above concerning
the immanently and transcendently interior active presence of God in
all that is. God chose to make the world the way it is, however much
he/she allowed it to develop on its own. God implements that choice
by initiating and maintaining an existence-endowing (constitutive)
relationship with the possibilities he/she wishes to realize. The choice
of a particular instantiation and its direct implementationwhatever
the number of allowed outcomeswas necessary at some level. From
revelation, we appreciate some of the motivations directing that choice,
in terms of freedom and the primacy of love, dictating a world in which
God remains involved and caring, but in which we remain free and able
to freely give or refuse love and service to God and to one another.29
Top-Down Causality
In this discussion we are already aware of the final problem we shall
briefly discuss, that of top-down causality. The brief discussion of human
agency above provided examples of top-down causalitya human being
building a bookcase, typing a letter, brewing a pot of coffeein which
an entity of higher complexity or possessing greater versatility determines or causes entities at lower, more fundamental levels to behave in
a certain wayin a more organized and coherent way than they would
do otherwise. In the hierarchical layers of organization and complexity which characterize our universe, top-down causality is pervasive.
Although some causal influences operate from lower levels of organization to higher levels, constraining and also enabling what more complex
entities do, other causal influences act from the top down to marshall
and coordinate less organized constituents into coherent, cooperative
action in service of the more complex organism or system. A precondition for this being possible is the radical underdetermination of effects
29
Cf. George F.R. Ellis, The Theology of the Anthropic Principle, in Quantum
Cosmology, 367405.
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by the laws of nature at lower levels (the freedom and the need to
establish initial conditions, or boundary conditions)rendering nature
very pliable within certain limits. There is really no problem herejust
a characteristic of reality which requires proper recognition and careful
analysis. Obviously in the case of divine action, we have the ultimate
case of top-down causality, in which the essential issues challenging our
understanding are those which we have already discussed.
8. Divine Action within the Context of the Personal

The realm of divine action which is especially important for the meaning, orientation, and direction of our lives is that of the personal. In
fact, within the context of Christian revelation at least, the focus of
divine action is on the personal and the communalGods continual
active presence with and on behalf of his/her people, drawing them
closer to God, and sharing the divine life ever more fully with them as
individuals and as groups. God takes the initiative in our regard, invites
us and enables us to establish a relationship with him/her, gives life,
reveals Godself, heals, punishes, reconciles, forgives, transforms, renews,
savesout of love and care for persons. The ultimate manifestation of
this is in the Incarnation, and in the life, death, resurrection of Jesus, and
sending of the Spirit of the Incarnate One, who is Wisdom, Word, Child
of God. It is only as an afterthought, so to speak, but a very important
afterthought, that revelation and our response to it in faith speaks of
Gods creative action with regard to the whole context within which
God personally directed saving and transforming activity takes place.
It is obviously important from many points of view, but falls outside
the primary focus of attention in much of revelation.30
30
See Richard J. Clifford, Creation in the Hebrew Bible, in Physics, Philosophy,
and Theology, 15170. In saying this, however, we must not separate what is personal
and self-conscious from Gods action in its deepest form in inanimate creation. The
focus of much of revelation on the personal should not insulate us from attending
to and celebrating Gods active presence in all creation. In fact, in light of both what
we know from revelation and from contemporary sciences, part of our commitment
must be to emphasize our profound unity with the rest of creation, to learn from it
by contemplating it, and to take a more enlightened responsibility in caring for it
and fostering reverence for it. Though we must be faithful to revelation in terms of
the priority of the personal, we must be faithful to all that it offers us, and we cannot
continue to indulge in an overweening anthropocentrism.
137
Within the context of our present interest in articulating more

adequately divine action in light of the self-organizing capabilities of
material systems, we may think that Gods personal action falls outside
our primary focus. There is a sense in which this is true. But there is
also a sense in which it is completely false. If our understanding of God
is primarily as a Trinity of personswith all that that implies within
the Christian traditionthen all divine action, however impersonal it
may seem, in its consequences or manifestations, must be seen in terms
of the personal, of personal relationships, and of the preconditions for
the emergence of the personal within the universe. This is certainly
true from the standpoint of our faith and the knowledge which we
have based on divine revelation. However, it is far from clear simply
from the standpoint of the physical and the other natural sciences,
even though there are indications that point in that direction (e.g., the
coincidences which point towards an anthropic principle, however
vacuous the actual logic of those arguments may be without the presupposition of Gods existence). Our procedure is really to take both
areas of knowledge seriously and let them critically interact with one
another, as we have already done in dealing with other issues. What
are the consequences of doing so on this subject of the priority of the
personal in divine action and on manifestations of divine action at the
level of the impersonal and inanimate through the underlying physical
constraints and regularities and the self-organizing capabilities we see
in reality?
The clearest answer would be that all of what we see manifested in
the natural world has been established for the purpose of securing the
priority and dominance of the personal and of personal relationships
within creation, and to enable created persons to relate freely and lovingly with one another, with the rest of creation, and with God. Profound as this is, there is nothing new here which we would not have
known before delving into the self-organizing behavior of matter. But
is there anything else?
Yes, I believe that in George Elliss Christian Anthropic Principle,31 we see a deep compatibility among the autonomous ways in
which physical, chemical, and biological laws operate at every level of
natureparticularly in the self-organizing capabilities of matter and
systems composed of matter at every level. The core of this compatibility
31
Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle.
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william r. stoeger
is the relative independence and freedom of created reality to evolve

and organize at every level without direct divine intervention or interference (except at the most radical ontological level) with a richness
of inherent potentiality and possibility. Correlative with this, as I have
already mentioned, is Gods relative hiddenness in creation; God has
created and is creating it, but at the same time is radically setting it
free to become itself, to discover itself, to become conscious of itself,
to become free and to become independently personal and social, to
discover its roots and its ultimate origins, to respond freely to the
invitation to enter into relationship with the community and society
of persons which is God, its source and origin.
In a sense the fact that we are made in the image and likeness of
God necessitates an infrastructure like we have. One which needed the
constant intervention of Goddivine direct action to fill gaps and to
negotiate the difficult transitions between nonliving and living, living
and conscious, conscious and knowingwould be a creation which
would be very unfree and incapable of becoming itself, discovering
God as a person (and not just as a demiurge and problem-solver), and
entering into a loving relationship with that God. Nor would such a
creation be very compatible with Gods self-communication to it. In
short it would be a creation unworthy of God, and one which did not
adequately reflect who God is.
If we take this point of view, then there is one other point that falls
into place. If the personal has priority, then relationships are of the
utmost importance. And what we see throughout creation is a reflection of thisthe central role that constitutive relationships play at
every level. Entities are as they are at every level not just because of the
parts that constitute them but because of the relationships which exist
among the components. The whole is always greater than the sum of
the parts because of these relationships. And the different interactions
which obtainfor instance those of gravitation, electromagnetism, the
weak and strong nuclear forces in physicsand the behaviors they allow
and forbid help to determine these interrelationships. We are able to
some extent to describe these regularities, patterns, constraints, and
relationships through the laws of nature we formulate.
But, as I have insisted before, these are only imperfect descriptions
of the intricate network of regularities, constraints, and relationships
which actually operate, linking everything with everything else, but
also constituting each entitys individuality and relative independence.
139
If there are phenomena which seem to fall outside of the regularities

we are able to describe securely, or situations in which they do not
seem to hold, then undoubtedly there are higher laws at work. These
laws somehow reflect more fully the dominance of the personal, or
the essential role of relationships. These in turn are more intricate,
complex, or subtle, than we are yet capable of understanding and
modeling, but they would be thoroughly compatible with the nature
of all the entities involved and of their relationships with one another,
with the personal, and with God, if we were to completely understand
those relationships.
9. Conclusions
This has been a sketch of my synthesis of a model of Gods action in
the world, taking seriously both revelation and the knowledge of reality
we have from the sciences. There are aspects of divine action which we
are able to understand somewhat better by letting these two areas of
our knowledge critically interact and dialogue with each other. There
are other aspects which seem to be thoroughly resistant to our understanding, particularly that of the nexus between God and the secondary
causes through which God acts or between God and the direct effects of
divine action, as in creatio ex nihilo. The analogue of human agency is
of some limited help here. However, the principal barrier seems to be
that we can only know that critical nexusan adequate answer to how
divine causality operates in this circumstancesif we are divine, or if
God reveals such knowledge to us. Otherwise we do not have enough
knowledge of the key term in the nexusGod.32
32
My special thanks to all those who have given me comments on a previous draft of
this paper or who have discussed aspects of it with me, especially Stephen Happel, Ian
Barbour, Tom Tracy, Nancey Murphy, George Ellis, Arthur Peacocke, Denis Edwards,
Bob Russell, Wim Drees, and John Polkinghorne.
CHAPTER FIVE
EVALUATING THE TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT

FOR DIVINE ACTION
Wesley J. Wildman
1. Introduction
1.1. Divine Action and Evolutionary Biology
There are many ways to conceptualize divine action in nature and
history, ranging from attribution to God of natural-law suspending
miracles or natural-law conforming activity, to virtual identification of
the laws and processes of nature with the initiating creative act of God
or with the divine nature itself. It must be recognized from the outset
that some of these conceptions cannot possibly profit from insights
drawn from the natural sciences, including evolutionary biology. One
example is Rudolf Bultmanns assertion that divine action occurs only
in the realm of human existence and leaves no traces in history and
nature; this depends upon a dualism of being or language. Another is
John Lockes reliance on the miraculous as a mode of special divine
action. To the extent that miraculous and various forms of dualistic
theories of divine action are defensibleand I think they are if the
right approach is takena theory of divine action that is independent
of considerations from the natural sciences, including evolutionary
biology, is still feasible. Theories of divine action that take the natural
sciences to have something crucial to offer, however, have much better
chances of achieving the virtues of specificity and plausibility.
If we accept this, then we will be inclined to try to establish substantive connections between theories of divine action and all kinds
of scientific theories, including evolutionary biology. One type of connection begins with the appearance of purposes or ends in nature and
attempts to construe this as evidence of the reality of divine action
by means of the argument that such apparent ends indicate genuine
teleology in natural objects and processes, and that this teleology (in
any of a number of possible forms) is the mode of Gods action. I shall
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call this argument the teleological argument for divine action. The
English divine William Paley appealed to the teleological argument for
divine action when he drew his famous analogy between a watch and the
wondrous structures and processes of nature: both demand a designer.1
Likewise, Alfred Russel Wallace, co-discoverer with Charles Darwin of
the principle of natural selection, found the complexity of some features
of biology so amazing that he invoked an active designer God to explain
it.2 This peculiarly aggressive form of the teleological argument for
divine action (the so-called design argument) is comparatively rare in
our day because evolutionary biology has made impressive advances in
explaining how complex organs and biological systems developed from
simpler forms. That has made it exceedingly difficult to attempt to move
from the products of biological evolution to divine action by means of
the argument that the beauty and functionality of those products is so
wonderful as to demand a divine mind whose intention they are; or
from the process of biological evolution to divine action by means of
the argument that the evolutionary process requires occasional divine
moderation, adjustment, acceleration, or specific directing to account
for the forms of life that exist. The theory of evolution is increasingly
well justified in asserting that wonderful forms of life result from the
evolutionary process regardless of what any mind intends, and that this
process is automatic, in need of no occasional, special adjustments.3 The
argument from design has been thoroughly undermined as a result.
The teleological argument for divine action, however, has more modest, more viable forms. One is driven by the question of the significance
and possible ultimate purpose of the evolutionary trajectory that has
produced human life.4 Another finds a congenial starting point in one
of the intuitions guiding neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory, namely,
that increases in biological complexity probably occur at different speeds
William Paley, Natural Theologyof Evidences of the Existence and Attributes of

the Deity Collected from the Appearances of Nature (Oxford: J. Vincent, 1802; 2nd
ed., 1828).
2
This is so according to Michael Shermer, Why People Believe Weird Things (New
York: W.H. Freeman, 1997), who cites an article of Wallace in Quarterly Review
(April, 1869).
3
For marvelous descriptions of many particular case studies, see Richard Dawkins,
The Blind Watchmaker (New York, London: W.W. Norton, 1986), and even more
impressively, Climbing Mount Improbable (New York, London: W.W. Norton, 1996).
4
See, for example, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man (London:
Collins, New York: Harper, 1959; tr. from 1955 French ed.), and Mans Place in Nature
(London: Collins, New York: Harper, 1966; tr. from 1956 French ed.).
the teleological argument for divine action
143
(albeit virtually always gradually) within the evolutionary process5 suggesting the possibility of higher-level laws of complexity,6 and leading
to the question about whether teleological categories are needed for the
adequate description of the conditions for the possibility of punctuation
in evolutionary equilibrium. Yet another seeks to move from the laws
and capacities of naturethe conditions of the possibility of biological
evolutionto the reality of divine action by means of an argument that
nature is purposefully designed by God to have the laws and capacities
it has, in which case divine design of nature is the primordial divine
act. There are other motivations for exploring the teleological argument
for divine action, but what has been said is enough to show that this
form of the connection between evolutionary biology and divine action
might be well worth examining closely. The special virtue of the teleological argument for divine action is its promise of relevant, detailed
support for the reality of divine action. Other advantages of centralizing
the category of teleology when examining the relation between divine
action and evolutionary biology will become evident later.
1.2. The Argument of this Paper and its Significance
The argument of this paper leads to my provisional conclusion that
no relevant, detailed, supportive relation between evolutionary biology and the reality of divine action is possible using this approach.
This is a negative result as far as the teleological argument for divine
action is concerned, but it does not imply that evolutionary biology
bluntly rebuts the claim that God acts in nature and history. Rather,
evolutionary biology is one of many considerations that can influence
theories of divine action without having much evidentiary effect one
way or the other.
This argument will merely confirm what many theorists of divine
action seem already to hold, but it may challenge the assumptions
5
See, for example, Stephen Jay Gould, Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the
Nature of History (New York: W.W. Norton, 1989), and Niles Eldredge, Macroevolutionary Dynamics: Species, Niches, and Adaptive Peaks (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1989),
and Time Frames: The Rethinking of Darwinian Evolution and the Theory of Punctuated
Equilibria (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985).
6
This topic is explored perhaps most vigorously by Stuart Kauffman. See The
Origins of Order: Self-organization and Selection in Evolution (Oxford and New York:
Oxford University, 1993), and At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of
Self-Organization and Complexity (New York and Oxford: Oxford University, 1995).
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wesley j. wildman
of some. For example, those who think that an argument can be

constructed leading from apparent purposes in nature to the activity
of God will need to refute the conclusion of the present argument.
Similarly, those who think that evolutionparticularly its portrayal
of ends in nature as epiphenomenal side-effects of the evolutionary
processdestroys affirmations of divine action will need to grapple
with the argument of this paper.
It might seem, therefore, that I am preaching to the converted, and
that the argument of this paper is only problematic for those whose
views can be depreciated in many other ways besides that taken here.
Making the argument has other benefits, however. Most importantly,
it exhibits in detail a small part of the diversity of possible connections
between evolutionary biology and theories of divine action, and drives
home the scope of the metaphysical ambiguity that attends every step
of the movement from one to the other. This means that the argument
may be of value even to those who would be inclined at the outset to
agree with its conclusion.
The argument from apparent ends in nature to the affirmation of the
reality of divine actionthe teleological argument for divine actionhas
three logically distinguishable stages. The first stage (section 3) must
conclude that apparent ends in nature are indications of genuinely
teleological capacities of natural objects and processes. This necessarily involves grappling with the problem of reductionism, and with
the evolutionary critique of teleological terminology. The second stage
(section 4) must situate the affirmation of the genuinely teleological
capacities of natural objects and processes in a wider metaphysical context that is rich enough to refer to fundamental teleological principles,
because it is only through metaphysical generalization that particular
teleological capacities can be connected with God, who is assumed to
be the ontological ground of such capacities, or at least metaphysically
connected with them.7 The third stage (section 5) must show that these
fundamental teleological principles support particular theories of divine
7
This is not the place to defend the possibility of such metaphysical reflection. Suffice to say that I do not suppose that Kants strictures on metaphysics can be set aside
lightly. On the contrary, the pragmatism of C.S. Peirce offers a way around them while
taking them with proper seriousness. My interpretation of the task of inquiry, and my
general indebtedness to pragmatism (not, however, to Richard Rortys neo-pragmatism), is laid out briefly in Similarities and Differences in the Practice of Science and
Theology, CTNS Bulletin 14.4 (Fall, 1994).
145
action. Any argument from apparent ends in nature to the reality of

divine action includes these three stages.
Some preliminaries are also needed. To that end, I address some
basic philosophical concerns about the definition and application of
having an end, and propose a schema that draws attention to key
features of a number of views of teleology in the evolutionary process
(section 2).
Each stage of the evolutionary argument for divine action is negotiable only with complex and subtle argument. I will try to show that
the argumentative link in each stage is relatively weak in the sense that
each of the intermediate conclusions required for the overall argument
to work cannot be secured without recourse to metaphysical presuppositions that have far more influence on the conclusions than do
considerations from evolutionary biology. That is, there is no chain of
sound implications from appearances of ends in nature, to the reality
of the teleological capacities of natural objects and processes, to the
identification of fundamental teleological principles in a wider metaphysical theory, to particular theories of divine action; each proposition
is crucially underdetermined by the previous one, and other premises
are required to make the implications valid. This paper will examine
what some of those additional premises might be. It will turn out that,
for every such premise that facilitates the movement of the teleological
argument for divine action to its next stage, there are many equally
plausible premises that lead not in the direction of divine action but
in other directions altogether.
In concluding this introduction, I want to make two further remarks.
First, with regard to limitations, because the examination of teleology
in what follows will concentrate on the place of teleology in biological
evolution, I forgo the chance to state or criticize cumulative arguments
for a fundamentally teleological universeand this is unquestionably
where many of the debates in the theological literature focus their
attention. The narrowing of focus is needed, however, and it does not
interfere with my more limited goal of assessing the teleological argument for divine action.8
Second, with regard to my motivation, this essay seeks to do partial
justice to the many criticisms of the very idea of divine action in history
8
For an example of such an ambitious undertaking, see William R. Stoegers paper
in CTNS/VO, v. IV.
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wesley j. wildman
and nature. These depreciations range from the denial of the reality of
God and the God-affirming denial that divine action is a meaningful
phrase, to the rejection of nature and history as metaphysically significant categories, as a result of the contention (typical of much Indian
and Buddhist philosophy) that ultimate reality lies deeply beneath its
misleading natural, historical appearance. Centralizing the category of
teleology helps here, because it is possible within limits to specify its
meaning for a wide variety of metaphysical and religious traditions;
the idea of divine action cannot be generalized to the same degree.
After conclusions about the conceptual relations between teleology and
biological evolution are drawn, the possibility will then exist of relating
these conclusions to other concepts, such as divine actionor, for that
matter, the Indian philosophical concepts of samsara and maya, though
I will not be pursuing this.9 The teleological argument for divine action
follows this procedure precisely.
2. Speaking of Teleology
Teleological categories have been generally out of favor in the West for
some time, so it is necessary to clear some terminological ground.
2.1. The Meaning of Having an End
The ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle (384322 BCE)10 contended
that the essence (and so the behavior) of a thing is understood when
four questions about it can be answered: What is it made of? What are
its essential attributes? What brought it into being? What is its purpose? (Physics II.3, 194b.16195a.2; Metaphysics V.2, 1013a.241013b.2.11
These questions correspond to what scholastic philosophers aptly called
9
This two staged approach to the problem of teleology and divine action has been
adopted before to good effect, notably and influentially as the distinguishing principle
for the two books constituting Paul Janet, Final Causes, tr. From the 2nd French ed.
by William Affleck (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1892; 1st French ed., 1876).
10
The following translations of Aristotles works are referred to or quoted in what
follows: Physics (Physica), tr. R.P. Hardie and R.K. Gaye; Metaphysics (Metaphysica),
tr. by W.D. Ross; On the Parts of Animals (De partibus animalium), tr. William Ogle;
On the Gait of Animals (De incessu animalium), tr. A.S.L. Farquharson; and On the
Generation of Animals (De generatione animalium), tr. Arthur Platt.
11
References are in the form book.chapter, pagecolumn.line of the Berlin Greek text.
147
the material, formal, efficient and final causes.12 The fourth of Aristotles
questions is answered by identifying the end of a thing. But how was
this conceived?
Aristotle implicitly defined an end when he spoke of the cause of
a thing in the sense of end or that for the sake of which a thing is
done, e.g. health is the cause of walking about (Physics II.3, 194b.33).
Thus, an end causes its means by virtue of the fact that the means
(as cause) are capable of securing that end (as effect). Now, the end,
since it lies in the future relative to the means, cannot obviously be
their cause, though the idea of the end can certainly be the cause of
the means. Thus, we arrive at a definition: An end, E, is the cause of
means, M, insofar as E is the foreseen effect of M. This is a common
definition of having an end, and fits Aristotles view rather well. It
captures the meaning of end through being explicit about how it is
that ends cause.
The usual way of allowing for literal application of teleological categories is through the concept of intending: since human beings and
some other animals intend, their behavior is genuinely purposeful and
causal. In the context of intentional agents, therefore, since foreseeing effects can be spoken of literally, the definition of end just given
is uncontroversial. Extending this definition to cover some cases of
habitual, preconscious, unconscious, goal-directed, and even some
acquired and instinctive behavior poses comparatively few problems.
Outside the realm of intending and its physiological derivatives, however, making sense of having an end is far more difficult. Aristotle
accepted human beings as free agents and allowed human intending
to be the metaphysical ground of many kinds of events that are for the
sake of something, such as habitual and what we would call unconscious
behaviors. Contemporary philosophy will go that far with Aristotle,
but rarely much further. In particular, Aristotles attribution of ends
to inanimate natural processes is genuinely difficult to justify.
Aristotle was fully aware of the problems with this more ambitious
usage of end. In the context of a discussion of the various kinds of
processes that have ends.13 Aristotle dealt with the problem of assigning
12
Aristotle himself used only nouns or nominal phrases to designate the four causes
(e.g. to telos); the adjectival forms are later Latin creations.
13
For details of the classification, see Physics II.5, and especially the discussion of
spontaneous and chance processes in Physics II.6, 197b.1821.
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wesley j. wildman
ends to spontaneous natural processesan important consideration in

the context of evolutionary biologyby distinguishing between intelligent and natural ends. When an end is consciously entertained or
habitually assumed by a moral agent, it can be spoken of as an intelligent
end; other ends are natural. What intelligence does for the one by way
of foreseeing, nature does for the other in a kind of natural, teleological analogue of foreseeing (Physics II.6, 198a.112). The definition of
end given above will work for every sphere of nature if this natural,
teleological foreseeing is legitimate.
Philosophers who have affirmed ends in this more ambitious way
have also tried to offer compelling arguments for their interpretations.
Alfred North Whiteheads argument turned on a sophisticated theory
of causation that had the attractive virtue of solving the freedom-determinism problem. Aristotles argument flowed from a grand teleological
vision of reality in which nature itself is a vast teleological organism
and each object and process has natural ends fitted to the actualization
of its natural potentiala view notable for its explanatory and ethical
power. In these two cases and all others of which I am aware, the reality
of natural ends is affirmed as a consequence of a wider metaphysical
theory that commends itself based on numerous considerations apart
from the question of the reality of natural ends.
2.2. A Criterion for Having an End
If we are to maintain the distinction between apparent and real ends
and the teleological argument for divine action demands that we make
the attemptthere needs to be a criterion for endedness in natural
objects and processes that does not beg the question about the reality
of ends in nature. Forcing the definition of having an end to serve as
criterion for detecting apparently-ended natural objects and processes
does not meet this condition. A widely held criterion for endedness
that does meet this condition is as follows: a natural process or object
can be said to be ended (to have an end) if it exhibits a tendency toward
some endpoint that persists through changing circumstances.14
14
Something akin to this is defended in R.B. Braithwaite, Scientific Explanation
(Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1953), and in many other writers. Dawkins, whose
uses the term designoid for apparently designed, introduces statistical measures
that reflect human intuitions about what is designed and what is not designed. This
approach seems useful also for furnishing an approach to apparent endedness. See
Climbing Mount Improbable, chapter 1.
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This criterion is especially apt for designating processes that might be

called closed-endedin which the process really does have a particular
endpoint. It is less useful for the situations of most interest in biology,
the open-ended processes, because an open-ended process potentially
yields very different outcomes, and so there can be no definitely known
endpoint.15 Open-ended processes, however, do have the predictable
appearance of closed-ended processes in their stable regimes (typically
when they are close to thermodynamic equilibrium). In practice, therefore, it is possible to apply the criterion for endedness even when we
are dealing with open-ended processes of some kinds. We just need
to remember to allow for the possibility that the final outcome of an
apparently ended process may not be known in advance, even when
a proximate endpoint is known, because of: (1) the complexity of the
process; (2) the ability of the environment to alter available end states
of the process; or (3) the role that chance factors play in the transition
of a system between relatively stable regimes of behavior. Our criterion might not capture all open-ended processes, therefore, but it does
include all of the processes with a relatively stable appearance, whether
part of a larger open-ended process or not. In view of what we need
it for, this is sufficient.
With this criterion in place, we have selected out a class of nominally
ended natural objects and processes that is even richer than Aristotles
class of events and processes that are for the sake of something. It is
important to note that this class is stratified, as in Table 1.16
The items at the top of the table are better placed to win assent from
contemporary thinkers to the thesis that teleological categories are
15
This appears to be the reason for Francisco J. Ayalas approach to the problem.
He begins with a vague and general criterion: An object or a behavior is said to be
teleological or telic when it gives evidence of design or appears to be directed toward
certain ends. He then partially overcomes the vagueness of this definition by distinguishing between artificial (external) teleology, due to deliberate purposefulness,
and natural (internal) teleology, when no deliberate purposefulness is involved; and
then again by further distinguishing within the category of natural teleology between
determinate teleology (what I am calling closed-endedness) and indeterminate teleology (open-endedness). The vagueness of the initial definition is understandable in
view of what it must cover. See Theodosius Dobzhansky, et. al., eds., Evolution (W.H.
Freeman, 1977), p. 497; reprinted as Teleological Explanations in Michael Ruse, ed.,
Philosophy of Biology (New York: Macmillan, London: Collier Macmillan, 1989). Also
see Ayalas contribution to CTNS/VO, v. IV.
16
Edwin Levy presents a hierarchy that is a subset of this one in Networks and
Teleology, pp. 159186, in Mohan Matthen and Bernard Linsky, eds., Philosophy
and Biology, Canadian Journal of Philosophy, Supplementary Volume 14 (Calgary:
University of Calgary, 1988).
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wesley j. wildman
Table 1. Hierarchical class of events, objects, and processes with nominal ends
Realm of Nature
Characteristics
Self-conscious animals
(human beings)
Conscious, deliberate (e.g. strategizing)

Habitual (e.g. walking, talking)
Preconscious (e.g. subliminal perception)
Unconscious (e.g. projecting desires)
Goal-directed (e.g. seeking food)
Acquired (e.g. learning skills)
Instinctive (e.g. self-protection, mating)
Feedback-guided, goal-seeking (e.g. thermostat,
metal detector)
Appropriately systemic (e.g. operation of organs,
body parts)
Functional (e.g. anything in its functional aspect)
Other higher animals

All animals
Human-made objects
Biological organisms
Everything
necessary for adequate explanations, while those lower in the table are
less well placed. Unsurprisingly, it is Aristotles intelligent ends that are
at the top of the table (especially conscious and habitual behavior).
For each of the objects and processes falling under one of the categories in this table, it is possibleand this is the point of the criterion for
endednessto ask: Is the appearance of endedness in this instance due
to real ends in nature, or is it merely a misleading epiphenomenon of
complex natural processes without ends? If the epiphenomenal explanation is to be preferred in every case, then this constitutes a strong
argument for eliminating the more metaphysically loaded usages of
teleological language from all descriptions and explanations of nature,
though of course speaking of ends and purposes may still serve a useful heuristic function. If in some cases the explanation for apparent
ends is that they are real, then teleological categories will be needed for
adequate explanations of the processes in question, and some mediating
metaphysical theory of causality and teleology will be needed also.
2.3. Dangers and Virtues of Teleology
If the teleological argument for divine action is to move even a step
forward, then it is necessary first to deflect a fundamental objection to
teleology. To that end, let us venture a brief evaluation of Aristotles
teleological vision so as to illumine the modern suspicion of teleological categories.
According to Aristotle, everything has a natural, in-built purpose, a
purpose fitted to its nature (the ambiguity of the English word nature
151
reflects Aristotles viewpoint). This purpose is expressed in the form

nature gives to each thing, which makes the purposes of things immanent within the things themselves. For example, the oak tree has a life
principle that explains both its development from an acorn, and its
shape, color, and acorn-producing capacity. This life principle cannot be abstracted from the oak, as if the purpose of the acorn-to-oak
growth process were in the mind of some other being, or the trees
death were the result of the withdrawal of the life principle from the
trees essence. By extension, therefore, nature can be likened to a vast,
integrated, purposive organism, with ends fitted to each thing for the
optimal fulfillment of that things potential: nature is a cause, a cause
that operates for a purpose (Physics II.8, 199b.32). The final teleological
principle of this great organism resides with a perfectly unified, fully
actualized prime mover that transcends the world, and toward which
the world is drawn.17
This magnificent vision of reality was the basis for much of Aristotles
philosophical achievement, from his ethics to his studies of plants and
animals. In practice, however, his own answers to the four questions that
were intended to guide the investigation of nature (the four causes)
were of limited use because he failed to maintain a balance among them,
emphasizing final causes and muting efficient causes.
Aristotles studies of plants and animals18 for example, while taxonomically brilliant, were occasionally contaminated with implausible
explanations of behavior in terms of supposed natural purposes. Now,
it must be admitted that Aristotle had generally excellent success in
interpreting the parts and motion of animals with the aid of such telic
assumptions as: Nature makes the organs for the function, and not
the function for the organs (On the Parts of Animals, IV.12, 694b.13);
17
This makes the prime mover something like the life principle of the entire cosmos,
which might seem inconsistent with Aristotles rejection of life principles in living
beings. It is his view nonetheless. This tension is closely related to a complex corner
of Aristotle interpretation having to do with his distinction between active and passive
reason. Aristotles need to find in human beings something akin to Platos indestructible
soul is the basis for attributing a mixture of active and passive reason to them. Active
reason suggests a life principle that requires no body and it is active reason that is
generalized and perfected in Aristotles concept of God. Nonetheless, Aristotle insists
in relation to all beings apart from God that their soul is their principle of unity and
not a mystical life principle separable from their constitution as formed matter.
18
The works on zoology include, in addition to those mentioned above, On the
Motion of Animals (De motu animalium), tr. A.S.L. Farquharson; History of Animals
(Historia animalium), tr. DArcy Wentworth; and the so-called Short Physical Treatises
(Parva naturalia).
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Nature never fails nor does anything in vain so far as is possible in

each case (On the Generation of Animals, V.8, 788b.22); Nature creates nothing without a purpose, but always the best possible in each
kind of living creature by reference to its essential constitution (On
the Gait of Animals, 2, 704b.15), and Nature never makes anything
that is superfluous (On the Parts of Animals, IV.11, 691b.4). The very
fact that this kind of interpretation is ever successful is testimony to
the ubiquity of apparent purpose in nature. However, Aristotle was so
enamored with his guiding presuppositions about natures purposes
that he described mollusks as a mutilated class owing to their odd
means of locomotion; he called the seal and bat quadrupeds but misshapen (On the Gait of Animals, 19, 714b.1015); and he explained the
small amount of blood in the chameleon by means of its timid nature
(inferred from frequent color changes), and the principle that fear is a
refrigeration, and results from deficiency of natural heat and scantiness
of blood (On the Parts of Animals, IV.11, 692a.25).
Likewise, in his ethics19 Aristotle was insufficiently suspicious of his
readings of the natural purposes of certain types of people. For example,
Aristotle held that women should be treated with honor fitting to their
place as the helpers of men; this was (we might say) the Golden Mean
between Platos admission of them to the ruling class and the common
treatment of women as virtual slaves. This view of the place of women
was determined by Aristotles view of their natural purpose, which
flowed from his interpretation of their essential nature. He assumed,
on the basis of experience, and admitting a few contrary-to-nature
exceptions, that women have a partially ineffective reasoning faculty.
Slaves have no reason at all, and so need to be ruled outright, according
to Aristotle, but the kind of partially irrational soul possessed by women
determines that their natural purpose and thus their social place is to
be the helpers of, and ruled by, men, who have fully functional faculties of reason, and can regulate the irrational tendencies of women20
Though Aristotles view, in his context, was relatively generous toward
womenthough not to slaves, whom he regarded as living tools and
living possessions (Politics I.4, 1253b.231254a.17)it is evident that
19
See especially Nicomachean Ethics (Ethica Nicomachea), tr. W.D. Ross; and Politics
(Politica), tr. Benjamin Jowett.
20
See Politics I, esp. I.1213, 1259a.371260b.25; and Nicomachean Ethics V.11,
1138b.59, VIII.11, 1161a.101161b.10.
153
his analyses of purposes are too often indistinguishable from conservative rationalizations of social practices he found desirable.
The more dubious aspects of Aristotles use of final causes were amplified in much subsequent philosophy, some of which was not characterized by a steadying critical instinct to the extent that Aristotles was.
Thus, it is unsurprising that modern Western thinkers have frequently
been quite aggressive in banishing consideration of purposes from most
natural, and even many ethical, inquiries. This anti-teleological posture
has secured many desirable results, including protection of scientific
research and social policy from the negative effects of unchecked speculation, and increased efficiency of the powerful process of scientific
discovery and theorizing. The main reason for the decline of interest in
teleology, however, is that analyses based on efficient causation proved
to be far more specific and fruitful than teleological analyses. Instead
of resting content with the statement that the final, internal purpose of
an acorn is to grow into an oak, for example, the dynamism of natural
change is now explained primarily through efficient causes: the acorns
genetic capacities decisively constrain the chemical processes of growth
made possible by the causal interactions between acorn and environment. That is an explanation that fosters further detailed development,
and leads out into testable consequences, so it is far better suited to
scientific theorizing.
This abandonment of the explanatory contribution of final causes in
favor of the greener pastures of efficient causes also has a significant
disadvantage. It obscures some important perspectives that the teleological approach keeps in the forefront, such as the question of the ultimate
basis for the amazing capacities of acorns. For this reason, final causes
have never vanished into the realm of philosophical curiosities. There
have always been thinkers willing to argue forcefully that ultimately
satisfying explanations of nature cannot be achieved in isolation from
the category of purpose, that ethics is untenable without final causes,
or that Gods action in the world is impossible to discern if teleological categories are not admittedinto metaphysical explanations, if not
physical ones. Moreoverand for my purposes this is crucialends in
nature seem to be everywhere, and denying their reality on the basis of
an efficient-causal reduction carried out only part-way in theoretical
detail and the rest of the way in the imagination is probably hasty, and is
certainly difficult to justify. Thus, there is no way preemptively to block
the teleological argument for divine action by invoking the achievements
of modernity against Aristotelian natural science and ethics.
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2.4. A Schema for Views of Teleology in the Evolutionary Process

There have been many systematic interpretations of teleology, especially from West Asian philosophical traditions, but also from South
and East Asia. Most influential in the West, without question, has
been Aristotles vision of nature as a vast teleological organism. Most
notable during the last two centuries is Hegels theory of the ever
more profoundly reflexive, and logically determined, self-realization
of Geist in history. Important in the last half of the twentieth century
has been Whiteheads cosmology, which offers an elaborately worked
out and fundamentally teleological doctrine of causality in which the
basic entities (occasions) of reality become actual through resolving
prehended, antecedent influences under the sway of an initial aim fitted to the character of each occasion. As to South Asian philosophy,
the basic concepts shared by many Indian philosophical schools, both
Hindu and Buddhist, also yield the possibility of the literal application
of teleological categories, though in a quite different way. In this case,
generally speaking, nature is for, and only for, the sake of the liberation of souls; indeed, liberation consists in attaining the discrimination required fully to grasp (to put it in Hindu terms) that human
consciousness is fundamentally different from, and actually more real
than, nature. Another instance of understanding reality in teleological
categories is the East Asian conception of the natural and social world
as fundamentally a flowing together of events in harmonyoriginally
and always at least potentiallywith some larger cosmic pattern that
is usually described as heaven or principle.
There are other teleological visions of the world that, like these, have
been developed in great detail over many centuries by philosophical
traditions whose achievements are comparable in grandeur. All of these
theories remain useful for rendering teleological categories literally
applicable to natural objects and processes. Recent years have seen newer
theories that are typically less philosophically developed but peculiarly
well placed to deal with current understandings of nature from biology,
chaos and complexity, and self-organization. In fact, the creation of
these contemporary views of teleology in the evolutionary process has
been inspired as much by evolutionary biology and the natural sciences
generally as by the need to extend long-standing philosophical traditions, and so they are of special interest for my purposes. This is not
the place to offer a survey of such views, however, because the book
within which this article stands already contains a number of them.
It is enough to note that they have been marked in recent years by a
155
number of controversies that are relevant (positively or negatively) to

the question of divine action. A review of four of those controversies
permits a schematization of part of the range of theoretically possible
positions on the issue of teleology, evolution, and divine action.
2.4.1. First Dispute: Teleology or No Teleology?
To take a position on this issue is to answer the question posed in
the first stage of the teleological argument for divine action about the
possibility of finding a place for teleological categories in furnishing
an ultimately satisfying account of apparent ends in nature. Obviously
enough, apparent ends can be taken to be only apparent, leading to
the denial that there is a fundamental, teleological principle at work in
nature. This is the view of Richard Dawkins, who expounds Darwins
theory precisely to show that ends in nature are only apparent. Picking
up (as it were) William Paleys analogy of the watch, mentioned above,
Dawkins thesis is as follows:
The analogy between the telescope and the eye, between watch and living
organism, is false. All appearances to the contrary, the only watchmaker
in nature is the blind forces of physics, albeit deployed in a very special
way. A true watchmaker has foresight: he designs his cogs and springs,
and plans their interconnections, with a future purpose in his minds
eye. Natural selection, the blind, unconscious, automatic process which
Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the
existence and apparently purposeful form of all life, has no purpose in
mind. It has no mind and no minds eye. It does not plan for the future.
It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all. (5)
Dawkins freely admits that nature appears to be full of ends.21 It

is this apparent design he intends to explain, and to explain away
as apparent, without impugning its beauty and complexity. But the
entire argument is directed toward the conclusion that the explanatory
reduction achieved by Darwin and later theorists can be extended to an
ontological reduction.22 A more strident or colorful statement of this
case can scarcely be imagined.
21
The Blind Watchmaker, chapter 2 is an extended appreciation of the apparently

designed character of so much in nature, and this is also a prominent theme throughout
Climbing Mount Improbable.
22
Dawkins approach begins from an idiosyncratic definition of biological complexity, which functions as a criterion for the class of objects and processes equivalent
with apparent ends. After dismissing a few problematic alternatives, Dawkins defines
a complex object as statistically improbable in a direction that is not specified with
hindsight (15). He is quite prepared to work with an alternative definition for the
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wesley j. wildman
The opposite position is that at least some objects and process in

nature appear to have ends because they really do have them in some
metaphysically profound sense. This view has been affirmed in a variety
of ways, corresponding to various strategies for locating the teleological grounding for apparent ends in natural objects and processes, as
we shall see.
Between these two opposed views lie intermediate possibilities that
take a yes-and-no position in relation to the first dispute. An intriguing instance of this is based onperhaps it is an imaginative extension
ofJacques Monods account of molecular and evolutionary biology
in Chance and Necessity.23 Monod analyzes the appearance of ends
in nature specifically in the realm of living beings. Living beings, he
argues, have two distinguishing primary characteristics: teleonomy
(being endowed with apparent purposes or projects), and reproductive
invariance (the ability invariantly to pass information expressed in the
structure of a living being through reproduction to other living beings).
The interlocking of these two characteristics is what makes possible the
increase of complexity through invariant reproduction in spite of the
second law of thermodynamics:
[I]nvariance is bought at not one penny above its thermodynamic price,
thanks to the perfection of the teleonomic apparatus which, grudging of
calories, in its infinitely complex task attains a level of efficiency rarely
approached by man-made machines. This apparatus is entirely logical,
wonderfully rational, and perfectly adapted to its purpose: to preserve
and reproduce the structural norm. And it achieves this, not by departing
from physical laws, but by exploiting them to the exclusive advantage of
its personal idiosyncrasy. (2021)
This interlocking of teleonomy and invariance is not only wonderful,

Monod argues, but also in flagrant contradiction with what he calls the
cornerstone of the scientific method: natures objectivity. While objec-
sake of argument, however, as the crux of his argument lies elsewhere. Note that he
includes human-made objects as honorary living things (12,10). He considers that
this class of objects and processes will be explained when an account of it is provided
that is consistent with, and relies on nothing other than, the basic laws of physics.
Chapter three is devoted to spelling out the special way that the laws of physics are
deployed in evolutionary theory.
23
Jacques Monod, Chance and Necessity: An Essay on the Natural Philosophy of
Modern Biology, tr. from the French by Austryn Wainhouse (New York, Alfred A.
Knopf, 1971). Monod advances a form of existentialist polemic against all manner of
vitalisms and animisms, superstitions, and self-deceptive metaphysics, in the name of
a materialist ethic of knowledge.
157
tivity, on Monods reading, requires the systematic denial that true

knowledge can be got at by interpreting phenomena in terms of final
causes (21), it also calls for the frank recognition that living organisms
realize and pursue purposes in their structure and activity (22).
This is the epistemological contradiction that biology sets out to
resolve. And resolve it biology does, with its answer that invariance
is logically and physically prior to teleonomy. In a beautiful sentence,
Monod describes this solution as:
the Darwinian idea that the initial appearance, evolution, and steady
refinement of ever more intensely teleonomic structures are due to perturbations occurring in a structure which already possesses the property
of invariancehence is capable of preserving the effects of chance and
thereby submitting them to the play of natural selection. (2324)
This is the key to Monods argument that the explanatory reduction of

apparent ends in nature can bemust beextended to an ontological reduction. Invariance only is ontologically primary; teleonomy is
entirely derivative. In the logic of the case, this is the only conclusion
possible if biology is to be epistemologically coherent (24).
Monod does not fail to draw out the philosophical significance of
this viewpoint. As he insists, it is spectacularly opposed to all other
answers to the question about the strangeness of living beings. These
answers Monod classifies into two groups: the vitalist identification of
a teleological principle that operates in the sphere of living beings, and
the animist affirmation of a universal teleological principle. Both the
vitalist and animist views are well represented in religious, philosophical, political, and even scientific ideologies. Moreover, both assume the
opposite answer to the one defended by biology, namely, that invariance
is a manifestation of a metaphysically fundamental teleological principle
(24). Why do so many powerful ideologies find themselves at odds with
biology? According to Monod, All religions, nearly all philosophies,
and even a part of science testify to the unwearying, heroic effort of
mankind desperately denying its own contingency (44).
This, then, is the entry point to Monods urging that the choice be
takenit cannot be scientifically or politically compelledto embrace
an ethic of knowledge. The ethic of knowledge, contrary to the ethic
of vitalism or animism, distinguishes rigidly between value judgments
and statements of knowledge. But it needs to be adopted, and this
requires a subjective commitment to the fundamental value affirming
the objectivity of knowledge.
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wesley j. wildman
This is a crucial decision, because modern societies owe their material wherewithal to this fundamental ethic upon which knowledge is
based, and their moral weakness to those value systems, devastated by
knowledge, to which they still try to refer. The contradiction is deadly.
It is what is digging the pit we see opening under our feet. The ethic of
knowledge that created the modern world is the only ethic compatible
with it, the only one capable, once understood and accepted, of guiding
its evolution. (177)
More importantly, for my purposes, the existential commitment to the

ethic of knowledge requires the rejection of metaphysically fundamental
teleological principles. This takes courage, in Monods view, because
we are culturally and (he thinks) probably genetically predisposed to
desire security. The vision of ourselves as the products of teleonomic
structures, grounded on reproductive invariance, and functioning
essentially as amplifiers of random noise, brings us face to face with
our contingency. Of course, it is the structure of natural laws and
not chance that accounts for the emergence of complexity and the
generally upward driving character of evolution. Nevertheless, natural
selection operates upon the products of chance and can feed nowhere
else (118119). And just as chance bespeaks the contingency of our
origins and development, so in the encounter with it, man knows at
last that he is alone in the universes unfeeling immensity, out of which
he emerged only by chance. His destiny is nowhere spelled out, nor is
his duty. The kingdom above or the darkness below: it is for him to
choose (180).
While Monod clearly states and argues for the ontological reduction
of teleonomy to reproductive invariability, therefore, he also speaks
of chance as the feeding ground of natural selection, and as the great
revealer of the contingency of all life, including especially of human
beings. This indicates that, in Monods view, what might perhaps be
called an anti-teleological principle is at work in nature. This principle of anarchy is necessary for all complex systems, and so potentially
fruitful; yet it is also infinitely threatening, driving entropic dispersal
of energy, promising the ultimate destruction of all order, and kept in
check only by the capacity of natural selection to make creative use of
it. In fact, to put the point so as to make its irony more evident, nature
is utterly dependent on chance for its ability to stimulate adaptations in
nature capable of deflecting the threat of chance. While Monod clearly
denies fundamental teleological principles, therefore, his viewpoint is
pregnant with suggestions that nature is something like a battle between
teleonomic and chaotic tendencies; more precisely, it is ultimately an
159
inexplicable, symbiotic dualism between a disruptive, anti-teleological

principle (chance) and a constructive, ordering principle (natural laws).
This is what makes his view an intriguing middle position in relation
to the first dispute.
2.4.2. Second Dispute: Teleology Permits Achievement of Specific
Goals?
Another dispute bears on whether the fundamental teleological principle affirmed in any case is so constituted as to be amenable to the
realization of specific purposes. To convey what is meant here requires
first saying what is not meant: To use language introduced earlier,
teleological processes can be open-ended, in which case they have a
trajectory without a specific goal; or closed-ended, in which case they
do have a specific goal. Though the question of whether there are any
closed-ended complex systems is debated by some, and there are others
who argue that evolution itself is closed-ended, these are peripheral
views. All thinkers in the mainstream in this respect hold that complex
systems are open-ended. The dispute is not about open-endedness
versus closed-endedness.
So, what is meant by this second dispute? It is possible to ask whether
a fundamental teleological principle allows for the possibility that one
specific goal out of the possible ends of an open-ended teleological
process could somehow be achieved. This is easiest to conceive when
an intentional agent (such as some tricky supernatural entity, perhaps)
is thought to be the ultimate ground of, or to know how to manipulate,
the fundamental teleological principle. In that case, would the supposed
fundamental teleological principle permit this agent to bring about an
intended goal? The point would need to be generalized from the case
of an intentional agent to make sense of the views of the historicalevolutionary process expressed in Hegels logic, Rahners Christology,
or Teilhards Omega Point, but this can be done.
We must note that a fundamental teleological principle could be
confined to the laws of nature, in deistic fashion, with the result that
there is in this case no possibility of the principle or its divine wielder
selecting out a particular end for realization in a teleological process.24
24
Paul Davies interprets what I am calling the fundamental teleological principle

in this way. See The Cosmic Blueprint: New Discoveries in Natures Creative Ability to
Order the Universe (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1988), and The Mind of God: The
Scientific Basis for a Rational World (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1992). Also see
Davies essay in CTNS/VO, v. III.
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Alternatively, a fundamental teleological principle could embrace both

law and chance, thus making conceivable a process of top-down causation or whole-part constraint whereby God might elect to manipulate
complex systems so as to select out for realization one particular end
out of all those permitted by natural laws.25 This would be a form of
teleological realization that is consistent with natural laws in the sense
that it does not involve breaking or suspending them.
2.4.3. Third Dispute: Internal Relations or Complexity?
Most thinkers involved in evolutionary biology hold that high-level
characteristics of living systems are due to the complexity of arrangement of component parts. On this view, for example, the biological
feature of the human brain called consciousness is only the highest
level property of a hierarchy of large scale characteristics of the brain,
including in the middle reaches its structure and function, and at the
lower levels its texture, color, weight, and size. On the other hand,
some thinkers hold that emergence due to complexity of arrangement
is inadequate as an explanation of the products of biological evolution.
Rather, complex organisms must be interpreted as communities of
fundamental elements, each of which has the character it does only in
relation to the other constituents of the organism. This is the doctrine
of internal relations, and it promotes the contention that properties of
25
This approach is taken by many theologians. Arthur Peacocke in Theology for a
Scientific Age: Being and BecomingNatural, Divine and Human, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia:
Fortress, London: SCM, 1993) tends not to use explicitly teleological categories, but
he does take this approach to divine action. Also see Peacockes essay in this volume.
Process philosophers and theologians are interesting on this point. Some would allow
that the fundamental teleological principle could select out a particular end for realization in an open-ended teleological process, as appears to be the case in Marjorie Hewitt
Suchockis Christology, for example, though not everywhere in her writing. See God,
Christ, Church (New York: Crossroad, 1989), especially Part III, God as Presence.
Other phases of that book appear to be in sharp tension with the tendency to require
specific outcomes of open-ended process that appears at times in connection with the
Christology, especially as regards the perfection of Jesus response to the (divine) initial
aim. Others (such as Alfred North Whitehead, Charles Hartshorne, and Charles Birch)
would reject this possibility. John Cobb usually tilts decisively in the latter direction,
but on rare occasions, perhaps anxious to find continuities with traditional Christian
teaching, he seems to lean in the former direction. See, for example, the view of Jesus
Christ espoused in John Cobb, Christ in a Pluralistic Age (Philadelphia: Westminster,
1975), which I would say requires certain specific outcomes to be effected in openended teleological processes. This is a complex case, however, and cannot be argued
here. Process philosophy does, however, allow that nature is open to persuasion toward
specific, possible outcomes at every point.
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a living organism do not emerge inexplicably from thin air, but from
incipient possibilities already present in its constituent elements.26 On
one view, the doctrine of internal relations is superfluous, a metaphysical enthusiasm; while on the other it is necessary to make sense
of self-organization, and is even an unacknowledged implication of the
emergence-due-to-complexity-of-arrangement view.27
2.4.4. Fourth Dispute: Ground of TeleologyLaws, Chance, or Basic
Constituents?
When a fundamental teleological principle is affirmed, it is natural to
inquire as to how it shows up in nature. Perhaps it is expressed only
in the laws of nature. Perhaps it is expressed also in anarchic chance
orwhich probably amounts to the same thing in view of the sensitivity
of complex systems close to bifurcationsin boundary conditions. Or
perhaps the fundamental teleological principle is also expressed in the
basic constituents of nature, which we might expect to be the case for
some forms of panpsychism or dipolar metaphysics. It is certainly the
case for those views affirming the doctrine of internal relations.
There is an important correlation between positions taken on the
first three disputes and positions taken on the fourth. This correlation
appears in the similarity between the pairs of columns marked A, B,
and C in the following table, where Y and N denote Yes and No
respectively, N/A denotes not applicable, and Disputes refers to
the disputes described in this section. Four hypothetical positions are
assigned Roman numerals in the first column; I have already mentioned
examples of each.
The great virtue of this schema is that it highlights some of the
metaphysical decisions that need to be settled in the three stages of
the teleological argument for divine action. In so doing, it illumines
the complexity of that argument and the difficulty of prosecuting it
especially its second stagewithout heavy reliance on highly contentious
26
Here again, process philosophers make an interesting contribution. See, for
example, the affirmation of the doctrine of internal relations in Charles Birch and John
B. Cobb, Jr., The Liberation of Life: From the Cell to the Community (Cambridge and
New York: Cambridge University, 1981), and Birch, A Purpose for Everything: Religion
in a Postmodern Worldview (Kensington: New South Wales University Press; Mystic:
Twenty-Third Publications, 1990).
27
This contrast is most evident when Davies view is compared to that of Birch
and Cobb.
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wesley j. wildman
Table 2. Four types of views on teleology in biological evolution
Views
Type I
Type II
Type III
Type IV
Key disputes about teleology
How teleology is expressed in nature
Dispute 1:
Teleological
categories
are nonreducible?
[A]
Dispute 2:
Teleology
permits
specific
goals?
[B]
Dispute 3:
Internal
relations
are
needed?
[C]
Dispute 4:
In the
laws of
nature?
Dispute 4:
In chance or
boundary
conditions?
Dispute 4:
In the basic
constituents
of nature?
[A]
[B]
[C]
N
Y
Y
Y
N/A
N
Y
Y
N
N
N
Y
N
Y
Y
Y
N
N
Y
Y
N
N
N
Y
metaphysical premises. The column for Dispute 1 corresponds to

one aspect of the first stage of the teleological argument for divine
action, from apparent ends in nature to affirmation of the teleological
capacities of natural objects and processes. The column for Dispute
2 corresponds to one of the factors influencing the third stage, which
moves from a metaphysical theory affirming a fundamental teleological
principle to an interpretation of divine action. The columns for Dispute
3 and Dispute 4 correspond to some of the aspects of the second
stagethough the correlation between the pairs of columns marks A,
B, and C means that the whole diagram is needed for understanding
the character of the second stage.
It must be pointed out immediately that, although these four types of
views cover some interesting metaphysical waters, the range of options
is much wider when the metaphysical net is cast deeper into the richness
of Western metaphysics or wider to East and South Asian philosophy.
Even so, this schematization offers one way to conceptualize part of the
range of views that may be taken (with varying degrees of justification)
on the question of teleology in the evolutionary process.
3. The First Stage: Teleology and Nature

From physical cosmologys cosmic anthropic principle to zoological
morphology, from the status of natural laws to the analysis of toolwielding animals, from the interpretation of literature to the ascribing
of responsibility in legal traditions, the appearance of ends is ubiquitous.
The first stage of the teleological argument for divine action begins with
this observation and attempts to establish that real purposes give rise
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to at least some of these appearances. But this raises the question: How
can we tell whether ends are merely apparent or real? More generally:
Do teleological categories have some advantages in spite of the objections to them in contemporary science.28
3.1. The Evolutionary Objection to Real Ends in Nature
The debate over the reducibility of natural ends has classic status in
Western philosophy. It is evident, for example, in Aristotles critiques
of his predecessors, especially Democritus:
Democritus, however, neglecting the final cause, reduces to necessity all
the operations of Nature. Now they are necessary, it is true, but yet they
are for a final cause and for the sake of what is best in each case. . . . [T]o
say that necessity is the only cause is much as if we should think that
the water has been drawn off from a dropsical patient on account of the
lancet, not on account of health, for the sake of which the lancet made
the incision. (On the Generation of Animals V.8, 789b.36,1115).
Leaving aside Aristotles questionable agreement with Democritus on

the necessity of natures processes, but following his main point, this
debate can be expressed briefly in the form of a single question: Does
the usefulness of efficient-causal explanations of apparent ends in nature
justify the conclusion that apparent ends are only apparent?
Evolutionary biology has produced the strongest possible reason
for answering this question affirmatively, thereby threatening to bring
the teleological argument for divine action to a grinding halt before it
has completed its first step. The evolutionary objection to real ends in
nature in its philosophical form is actually ancient in origins. Aristotle
himself, drawing on the thought of Democritus, stated and attempted
to refute it:
[W]hy should not nature work, not for the sake of anything, nor because
it is better so, but just as the sky rains, not in order to make the corn
grow, but of necessity? . . . if a mans crop is spoiled on the threshingfloor, the rain did not fall for the sake of thisin order that the crop
might be spoiledbut that result just followed. Why then should it not
be the same with the parts in nature, e.g. that our teeth should come up
of necessitythe front teeth sharp, fitted for tearing, the molars broad
28
It is because of this bias that Richard Feynmans demonstration that classical
mechanics can be based entirely on least action principles (which are teleological in a
certain sense) is so striking.
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and useful for grinding down the foodsince they did not arise for this
end, but it was merely a coincident result; and so with all other parts in
which we suppose that there is a purpose? Wherever then all the parts
came about just what they would have been if they had come to be for
an end, such things survived, being organized spontaneously in a fitting
way; whereas those which grew otherwise perished and continue to perish, as Empedocles says his man-faced ox progeny did. (Physics II.8,
198b.1732)
This is a remarkable passage, partly because it mentions ideas such as

fitness for survival and spontaneous organization, which eerily anticipate
contemporary discussions, and partly because of its sensitivity to the
logical possibility that the appearance of natural ends may not be due
to the existence of ends in nature. But Aristotles multi-pronged attack
on this beautiful statement of the evolutionary objection is ineffective
(Physics II.8, 198b.34199b.32), so I will not take space to criticize his
replies.
What is the logical force of this ancient objection after more than
a century of development of the theory of biological evolution? It is
clear that evolutionary theory imparts tremendous momentum to the
evolutionary objection: whereas Democritus was simply speculating,
Darwin and others adduced powerful evidence that those speculations
were right on target. But I do not think the evolutionary objection is
any more logically forceful because of evolutionary biology. To see
this, consider the two-fold logical point of the evolutionary objection,
in either its ancient or modern form.
The most forceful argument flowing from the evolutionary objection is not that evolutionary biology furnishes proof that Aristotles
teleology is mistakenafter all, metaphysical speculation can render
almost any hypothesis secure from threatbut only that it is arbitrary,
a charge fierce enough to worry a metaphysician. If the evolutionary
theory of Darwin (or Darwins successors or Democritus; it makes no
difference) is correct, real ends in nature are superfluous: explanations
in terms of ordinary efficient causes can account for all apparently
ended natural objects and processes. In this way, evolutionary biology
supposedly removes all of the good reasons in support of grand teleological visions, leaving their assertion in any formfrom Aristotle to
Whiteheadmerely an imposition of philosophical taste.
Thus, the evolutionary objection undermines arguments for real ends
in nature without directly attacking the teleological hypothesis itself.
To develop a direct attackagain, in Democritus time or our ownit
165
is necessary to invoke an Ockhamistic minimalism that seeks to keep

the metaphysical shelves as free as possible of amusing but pointless
metaphysical trinkets such as real ends that do not explain anything.
This brings to the evolutionary objection a more metaphysical cast, as
follows: theoretical explanations based on efficient causation account
fully for apparent ends in nature, and human (and perhaps other animal)
intending lies at the basis of everything with real purpose in nature and
history. Therefore, there is no need to clutter the shelves with a second
level of pseudo-explanations in the form of ends in natural objects
and processes. Keep things simple, and the apparent ends in most of
nature are justifiably concluded to be epiphenomenal appearances of a
complex and wonderful biological process. The ground of that process
as a whole is a separate question that may call for a teleonomic answer
with regard to the fundamental laws of naturethat is, one that ascribes
inherently telic characteristics to those lawsbut it does not change
anything about the conclusion just reached concerning the ends of most
objects and processes of nature being epiphenomenal.
It is common to see rhetorical flourishes in which this argument
overextends itselfperhaps by hiding its reliance on Ockhams razor,
by ignoring the final caveat about the need for an explanation of the
laws of nature themselves, or by trying to treat even conscious human
purposes as epiphenomenal.29 When its conceptual forcefulness is not
squandered in these ways, however, the evolutionary objection is genuinely impressive. It forces the first stage of the teleological argument
for divine actionand indeed any assertion of real ends in natureto
overcome the reasonable principle of metaphysical minimalism and the
blunt charge of metaphysical arbitrariness. Is this possible?
3.2. Evaluating the Evolutionary Objection
The two points at which the evolutionary objection is vulnerable are
its heavy reliance on a principle of metaphysical minimalism, and its
sweeping claim that all ends in nature outside of purposes associated
with the act of intending can be exhaustively explained by means of
efficient causes and without reference to final causes.
First, there are plenty of good ethical and theoretical arguments for
metaphysical minimalism, but both ethics and the theory of inquiry
29
For a similar critique, see George Ellis in CTNS/VO, v. III.
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wesley j. wildman
demand that a balance be achieved among all relevant considerations.

It is conceivable, then, that real ends could sneak back in through
being necessary for theoretical consistency, even though efficient causes
exhaustively explain the appearance of ends. That is the essence of the
reply to the evolutionary objection that teleological metaphysicians from
Aristotle to Whitehead offer. For example, Aristotles failure to rebut
the evolutionary objection in detail makes little difference, because he
relies most heavily on his constructive metaphysical theory to establish
that ends in nature are more than merely apparent.
This heavy reliance on a more general metaphysical theory is typical
in this area. As I said before, though in absence of a definite argument
to support my claim, affirmations of real ends in nature can be made
only indirectly by means of arguments for a large-scale metaphysical
theory that imply real ends in nature. We simply cannot read through
apparent ends to real ends, as Paley famously contended we could. So,
then, we are able to state a necessary condition for the success of the
first stage of the teleological argument for divine action: it requires
that a metaphysical scheme postulating real natural ends can be shown
to be superior to its competitors. And in this battle, the principle of
metaphysical minimalism is but one of many criteria for superiority that
must be collectively evaluated. Of course, such a metaphysical scheme
must also be consistent with some interpretation of divine action, but
that is a mere detail at this stage.
Second, and more pointedly, how we are to decide that evolutionary
explanations based on efficient causes do indeed exhaustively account
for the appearance of ends in the biological sphere, so that we may
justifiably conclude that explanations based on final causes are superfluous? This is a much more perplexing question than it may seem at
first glance, and the perplexity has both scientific and philosophical
wings. On the scientific side, recent attempts within some branches of
neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory to theorize about and perhaps to
identify higher-level laws of self-organization and complexity suggest
that the biological data itself may not admit of exhaustive accounts in
terms of efficient causes. But this enterprise is still in its infancy, and
thus too difficult to evaluate. On the philosophical side, where debate
on this question has been extensive, the considerations are too many
to evaluate in passing. I will therefore mention just two issues; both
are representative of the wider discussion.
On the one hand, at the most basic level, the theory of efficient causation faces many famous problems, some of vagueness and others of
167
consistency. With regard to vagueness, if the theory of causation is to

be spelled out in any detail, the door is opened to inherently teleological
accounts such as Whiteheads, and then real ends in nature come flooding back in with enough conceptual integrity to overcome the objections
of Ockhamistic minimalism. With regard to consistency, quantum
mechanics and quantum cosmology seem to demand an atemporal
theory of causation, which throws the common sense account of efficient causationwith its fundamentally temporal castinto profound
doubt. The need for reconstruction invites many visions of causation,
including possibly some for which teleological categories are basic.30
On the other hand, the very task of showing that evolutionary theory
exhaustively accounts for apparent ends by means of efficient causation
is challenging. The efficient-causal story in any instance is more complex than we can now, or possibly ever, manage in detail. Some process
metaphysicians and other thinkers leap into this gap and predict that
the efficient-causal account will always remain incomplete on its own
terms because teleological categories are essential even for an adequate
empirical analysis of nature (this is the third dispute, above). Other
thinkers, including some other process metaphysicians, see no gap
at all but simply assume that achieving completeness of the efficientcausal account on its own terms is a task limited only by time, energy,
money, and other practical considerations. I have little confidence in
the intuition of the former group and, based on the ever-increasing
detail of efficient-causal accounts of episodes in evolutionary biology,
I am inclined to throw my lot in with the latter group.
The weaknesses of the evolutionary objection, it seems, are thoroughly
metaphysical in character. If so, then empirical tests will be unable
ever to demonstrate that teleological categories are indispensable for
adequate efficient-causal accounts within evolutionary biology. Does
this, then, constitute victory for the evolutionary objection to the first
stage of the teleological argument for divine action? Has this objection
demonstrated that the use of teleological categories is metaphysically
arbitrary, allowing the clean use of Ockhams razor to cut away all
teleological speculations?
No. The evolutionary objection is much more ambitious than merely
establishing the efficient-causal accounts can do the explaining without
help from teleological categories, as I have shown. It seeks to justify
30
See, for example, the contribution of Robert John Russell to CNTS/VO, v. III.
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wesley j. wildman
the use of the metaphysical criterion of Ockhamistic minimalism to

block the use of teleological categories, and showing metaphysical
arbitrariness in the use of those categories is the means for achieving
that end. The first stage of the teleological argument for divine action
has a strike against it because teleological categories are superfluous in
empirical explanations, but it has not yet struck out. To avoid striking
out, it is necessary to engage the metaphysical questions associated with
judgments of arbitrarinessand that is precisely what the second stage
of the argument seeks to do. The burden of proof has shifted, though:
the evolutionary objection has seized the initiative and the teleological
argument now must show good cause why anyone ought to think that
teleological categories might have some virtue.
To that end, consider a simple example. A genetically-based capacity
more effectively to regulate blood composition conferred on animals
possessing it a survival advantage that could be transferred to at least
some offspring. Random variations, sometimes in competitive environments, then led both to the development of extremely efficient wasteprocessing organs, such as kidneys, and to the misleading appearance
that kidneys are for the sake of waste processing, that waste processing
is their natural end. Good point, of course, butdare Aristotles reply
to Democritus be invoked here?kidneys are for the sake of waste
processing. What precisely is wrong with the teleological language here:
for the sake of? How is it ruled out by the furnishing of a detailed
story of the origin and development of the kidney?
This problem can be cast into a helpful light by noticing another
misleading appearance of kidneys, namely, that they look designed for
the sake of waste processing, in the sense of being the result in their current form of a specific intention. This really is a misleading appearance,
because it suggests some other story at the level of efficient causation
than actually applies. The history of the design argument (in William
Paleys form, for example) bears this out: to the extent that it made any
suggestions about efficient causation, it has collapsed, and has only been
able to reestablish itself at the level of the laws of nature, removed from
the realm of efficient causation to the realm of the condition for the
possibility of the operation of efficient causes, in which context design
is a thoroughly abstract notion. Saying that the kidney is for the sake
of waste processing, however, says nothing about efficient causes. It is
much easier to push the appearance of design off the playing field of
efficient causation, therefore, than it is to provide an exhaustive explanatory reduction of apparent ends in terms of efficient causes.
169
If nothing else, this shows that Aristotle thought a lot harder and
more clearly about causation than is sometimes assumed. This is
essentially his reply, after all. But more needs to be said, and to take
the discussion further, it is necessary to ask about the nature of those
ends on account of which we say kidneys are for the sake of waste
processing. Two levels of answer present themselves, and the distinction between these two is of the utmost importance for the teleological
argument for divine action.
On the first level, being for the sake of may be a functional way
of speaking about the properties of the thing in question in some
larger context. For example, waste processing is a property that is only
functional in the context of a living body, and being for the sake of
expresses that context silently. To see this, imagine a change of context,
which for me brings up memories of having to eat steak and kidney pie
as a child. In that case, kidneys are for the sake of eating. The examples
can be multiplied. The signification of for the sake of shifts with the
context in which the kidney is considered. Now, if this was all there
was to be said about the ends, then ends in nature could be admitted
without interfering with efficient-causal explanations, and the richer
structure of a teleological metaphysics really would be superfluous.
On the second level, however, one context may have priority over
the others in the sense that it is the natural context for thinking about
the natural end of kidneys. This is, of course, a way to say that the
functional analysis just given may not exhaust what of significance
can be said about the end of kidneys. Indeed, it is the story furnished
at the level of efficient causation about the development and function of kidneys that determines the natural context for assessing the
natural end of kidneys. In that context, asserting that kidneys are for
the sake of waste processing has a more fundamental status than the
statement kidneys are for the sake of eating has in any context. It is
the fundamental status of the natural end that so impressed Aristotle;
it has always driven, and will continue to drive, teleologically minded
thinkers to try to speak of natural ends as a way of capturing what
is important in nature, even if such ends have no part in functionalempirical accounts of evolutionary biology.
This is a subtle point, so let me be as clear as I can. We know roughly
how kidneys developed the capacities and functions that they have. We
can tell this story of origins and development in some detail without
recourse to categories of purpose. We can show how this process gives
kidneys the appearance of having been designed, even though no self-
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wesley j. wildman
conscious, intentional designer needs to be invoked for the empirical

story to workand this exclusion of an intentional designer in no way
inhibits our sense of wonder about kidneys. We can also show how this
process gives kidneys a purpose relative to their function in the animal
bodies that have them. But we cant treat the appearance of purpose in
the same way as we do the appearance of design. A better analogy is
this: we can speak of qualia without affecting neurobiological accounts
of brain function one way or another, so the decision about whether
to speak of qualia must turn on other issues. Likewise, our speaking
of purposes (or not) has no effect on the causal story of biological
evolution, so other reasons must decide whether to use teleological
categories. Just as there is a reason to speak of qualia (they just seem
so indispensable for saying what is important about a person even
though we know they are biologically produced), so there is a reason
to speak of purposes (they just seem so indispensable for saying what
is important about nature even though we know they are biologically
produced). The question is, therefore, whether the reasons for speaking of real natural ends are good enough to outweigh the contention
of the evolutionary objection that their use is philosophically arbitrary.
3.3. A Place for Teleology
With this, then, we come to the crux of the debate about natural ends
(other than purposes associated with acts of intending). The first stage of
the teleological argument for divine action cannot be resolved without a
metaphysical judgment about the value of using teleological categories.
They are arbitrary in respect of not helping empirical accounts of nature
(thats bad) but they are useful for expressing what is important and
natural about natural processes (thats good). Weighing all such considerations together is the only alternative. Naturalness is an aesthetic
category like beauty, however, so accounting for naturalness is not
a task to which efficient-causal explanations are well-suited. The same
goes for accounting for value, importance, and the like. If teleological
categories help us deal with such matters, then it is genuinely difficult to
remove the need for a metaphysical articulation of teleological categories
in any complete explanation of biological evolution (notwithstanding
the completeness of the efficient-causal account on its own terms).
At this stage, with teleology reappearing, it is vital to remember that
the evolutionary objection has had an effect on this debate. For example,
171
due to its influence, any claim that teleological categories are necessary for efficient-causal explanations of apparent ends is desperately
weak. But teleological categories can no more be kept from the task of
accounting for naturalness than can metaphysics in general be kept
from the human imagination. Kant thought of these as understandable
but misleading impulses, but I see no sound reason decisively to ban
either, Kant to the contrary notwithstanding. Teleology may only appear
as teleonomy, at the level of the laws of nature, but appear it ought.
So, while admitting that this is a complex judgment involving balancing competing considerations, I conclude that there is a place for
teleological categories in accounting for apparent ends in nature. But
exactly what place is this? This question brings us to the first metaphysical crossroads of the teleological argument for divine action, with
two more to come later. The way teleological categories are actually
wielded varies. Some philosophers, theologians and scientists would
be inclined to find real ends underlying apparent ends by virtue of
the laws of nature (for example, Davies). Some would make use of a
philosophical strategy hinging on supervenience, whereby multiple
independent descriptions of the same process can each be true on its
own level (for example Murphy).31 Some (such as myself ) are inclined
to resort to teleology to engage the topics of value and importance in
nature. And, as I have mentioned, there are even a few (including some
extremists in the process philosophy camp) who contend that teleological categories are needed even to produce adequate efficient-causal
accounts of apparent ends in nature. I have argued only that teleological
categories cannot be entirely ruled out of comprehensive explanations
for apparent ends in nature, and I have suggested that I find the causalgap prediction of the last option breathtaking but implausible. To that
I will add only that the other options seem compatible, and that every
option, even the supervenience strategy, requires contextualization in
a wider metaphysical theory to achieve intelligibility.32
31
See Nancey Murphys essay in CTNS/VO, v. III for a definition and discussion
of supervenience (primarily with regard to ethics). See also William Stoegers use of
this concept in CTNS/VO, v. III.
32
Nancey Murphy denies this; see her essay CTNS/VO, v. III. Murphy adopts the
supervenience strategy in order to argue for the feasibility of higher-order language
about ethics and theology, yet feels no need to explain how those higher order languages
relate in detail to other levels of discourse about the world, for which metaphysics is
indispensable. This freedom from the worries of metaphysics is held to be a desirable state of affairs to which we are propelled by Wittgensteins later philosophy. By
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4. The Second Stage: Teleology and Metaphysics
The second stage of the teleological argument for divine action attempts
to situate the affirmation of the reality of natural ends in a broader
metaphysical theory that is capable of presenting real natural ends as
instances of a more general fundamental teleological principle. This
metaphysical context is the bridge between real ends in nature and a
theory of divine action, and must be compatible with both. It is clear
that real ends in nature can be metaphysically contextualized in a
variety of ways. The question for evaluation here is whether the second
stage of the teleological argument for divine action can successfully
move from real ends in nature to only those metaphysical theories that
are amenable to divine action (in some sense), avoiding all otherwise
adequate metaphysical theories that are antagonistic to divine action.
The answer to this question is negative, I shall argue, notwithstanding
the fact that the science-religion literature at the present time exhibits
views with a strong correlation between being friendly to teleology and
being friendly to divine action. This, therefore, is the second crossroads
at which a wealth of metaphysical choices obstructs the clear lines of
inference needed by the teleological argument for divine action.
4.1. Counterexamples: Teleology without Divine Action
The obvious place to begin is with arguments that the second stage of
the teleological argument for divine action cannot succeed. For this, it
is necessary to find examples clearly illustrating that real ends in nature
can be contextualized in metaphysical systems that are both antagonistic to divine action and otherwise adequate, or at least comparable
in adequacy to metaphysical systems within which divine action can
be imagined. There are a number of such counterexamples, and I shall
mention several from a variety of philosophical traditions here.
contrast, I take this attempt at maintaining higher-order worlds of discourse while

bypassing questions of metaphysical and all manner of intellectual connections to
other language games to be strategically futile (it fails to secure the long-term stability
of ethical and theological discourse) and philosophically wrong-headed (it is mistaken
in its assumption of substantial independence between such language games and
presupposes an inadequate theory of inquiry). A partial argument for the operating
theory of inquiry from which these critiques may be inferred is in my Similarities and
Differences in the Practice of Science and Theology.
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First, and most obviously, Aristotles teleological metaphysics posits

real natural ends but is antagonistic toward divine action in all of the
usual senses. On the one hand, by holding that the universe is everlasting, Aristotle tried to block the specter of creation, which he seems to
have thought robbed the God-world relation of its aesthetically pleasing
necessary character. On the other hand, Gods role as the ground of
the giant teleological organism that is the universe was understood by
Aristotle as thoroughly automatic, which is to say, precisely the opposite
of deliberate. To be the prime mover in Aristotles understanding does
not imply that God undertakes any specific actions. On the contrary,
just as motion has to be understood as change in accordance with the
fulfillment of the nature of a thing, so a things nature or purpose cannot
be understood unless there is a principle of order in which all natures
participate. God is this principle, for Aristotle. God neither begins a
chain of efficient causes as an efficient cause, nor interferes with it, nor
creates the universe in which this dynamism of change occurs.
Perhaps it might be argued that Aristotles God does act in the sense
of being creative; after all, God does at times seem to be thought of by
Aristotle along the lines of the creative part of human rationality. Furthermore, this is how God acts in Whiteheads teleology. But Aristotles
God neither persuades nor reconciles the actuality of the world in the
consequent nature, as Whiteheads God does. And the analogy for
God of the active human intellect goes nowhere when such creative
characteristics are not affirmed. Whiteheads God does act, even though
not through creation as such, nor through the expression of particular,
specific intentions (which has not stopped process theologians from
affirming the divine expression of such intentions necessary to speak
of special events within salvation history). But Aristotles God does
not act, because it is fully actualized with no potential. It is not creative,
but rather the serenely all-present principle of nature.
This view of Aristotles was arguably also present in Plato, in a related
way. By the middle Platonists, however, it had already weakened because
the forms came to be identified with the ideas of God, thus making
God more closely analogized by the active intellect of human creativity.
Slowly and unsurprisingly after the middle Platonists, the concept of
creation became firmly established in Western and especially Christian
philosophycreatio ex nihilo, no lessand then, no matter what else is
said about God, God at least acts in creating determinate reality. After
the time of Aristotle, therefore, his view is hard to find in the West,
even though conceiving nature as a vast teleological organism cannot
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wesley j. wildman
easily be argued to be less metaphysically persuasive than thinking of

it as the result of an act of divine creation. Indeed, the former view
has the advantage of a less stringent form of the problem of theodicy.
Outside of the West, views similar to Aristotles are found in Chinese
philosophy, both ancient and modern. In this case, the concept of li, in
the sense of principle, is central. It is what is expressed in the nature of
individual objects and processes, and in their coming together to make
an orderly world. Yet it is usually not considered as an active principle,
but rather as changeless. Divine action makes little sense on this view,
too, yet it is one of the greatest and stablest metaphysical systems the
world has known.
A second type of teleology-without-divine-action viewpoint is widespread in South Asian philosophy, but requires a shift in the focus of
teleology. Madhyamaka Buddhist philosophysay, in the thought of
Bhavavivekaoffers an example. Here we have a metaphysics without
God, and so without divine action. Yet nature has a definite purpose,
albeit one that dissipates into nothing as properly discriminating human
beings see the world for what it really is. What is that purpose? Nature
is dependently co-arising with human consciousness; the suffering,
frustration, and weary repetition of nature reflect our own delusion.
We achieve liberation when we attain the discrimination needed to
end all attachment to conventional reality, including our own being.
Western philosophers are quick to ask why our attachment results in
so interesting and public a delusion. Buddhist philosophy, and South
Asian philosophy in general, has been relatively weak in answering this
question, but for a good reason. To appeal to a famous image from the
Buddhist fire sermon, when a house is burning down around you, the
only important thing to do is to escape; studying the intricate patterns
on the wallpaper on the way out is absurdly, dangerously beside the
point. Somehow, our deluded state creates impressions of things with
apparent reality, including ourselves, and it is neither possible nor
ultimately interesting or important to know why it is so. However, the
suffering ubiquitous in this dependently co-arising world is the great
clue to its ultimate unreality, and so to its ultimate purpose: to help us
wake up, and flee the flames.
Here, then, we have a teleological principle for nature as a whole and
for individual instances of suffering (including most ordinary events
and processes in one respect), but it has little explicit to say about real
ends in natural objects and processes. However, this teleological principle is embedded in a truly powerful metaphysical perspective with
175
an enormously sophisticated history of development. Conceivably the

development of this view could lead to the answering of wallpaper-type
questions about evolutionary biology, in which case it could be rendered
a more fully fleshed-out counterexample to the second stage of the
teleological argument for divine action. Though Buddhist philosophy
typically has not been interested in such explanatory possibilities, it
may have to become more engaged in them if it is effectively to engage
the natural science of the modern world. Indeed, signs of growing
interest are already evident as Buddhism becomes better established
in the West.
A third type of counterexample derives from certain mystical theologies in theistic traditions. These theologies have two characteristics:
the affirmation of nature as a telic process within the life of God (in
a sense) and the denial that talk of divine action makes religious or
philosophical sense. God on this view is infinitely hard to describe:
every symbolic characterization of God is needed in the path by which
the soul ascends to unity with the divine and yet each fails decisively
and must be contradicted and refused on that same path. This embrace
of contradictions and frank acknowledgement of the failure of human
cognition are neither needed nor desirable for the comprehension of
much in nature and human life, but they are essential in approaching
divine realities. Thus, this view is not irrational but rather supremely
rational through clearly recognizing the limits of human wisdom at
precisely the point where reasons self-deception can have the most
harmful effects. This view can adopt a highly teleological analysis of
nature along any number of lines and yet typically will speak of divine
action and divine intentions only as a first-order approximation to a
deeper mystery; better approximations leave intentional and personal
categories for God behind. Here again, then, we have a viewpoint
that can be highly sympathetic to fundamental teleological principles
in various forms and yet is finally profoundly uninterested in talk of
divine action. This view has made its presence known more recently
in the radical theologies of the twentieth century. The blending of
atheism and religious sensibility in these theologies is profound, in my
judgment, and truly expressive of the richness of Western theological
insight. Moreover, in all such cases, the category of divine action is
ultimately inapplicable.
It is interesting to me that there are so few examples in the West of
metaphysical systems that are teleological in character and yet unsympathetic to all three classes of divine action: creation, creativity, and
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the expression of specific divine intentions. The perspective of mystical

theology has usually been marginalized in the history of Western theology, and Aristotle is ancient. We might be inclined to suppose, by sheer
weight of Western habit since the invention of the concept of creation,
that the second stage of the teleological argument for divine action is
successful in moving from real ends in nature to metaphysical theories
of fundamental teleological principles that are only ever amenable, and
never antagonistic, to divine action in some form. Even a rudimentary
knowledge of South and East Asian philosophy will save us from this
mistake. But just one counterexample is sufficient to block the second
stage of the teleological argument for divine action, and the ancient
Western example of Aristotle fills the bill, providing it is a basically
viable metaphysical view. To assess this crucial caveat, some evaluation
of these teleological metaphysical views is in order.
4.2. Evaluating the Counterexamples
To give the teleological argument for divine action its due, let us
continue by noting how constrained are the options for providing a
metaphysical framework for real ends in nature without introducing
a conception of a God who acts: there are just two. On the one hand,
we may decline to furnish a fundamental teleological principle as an
explanation for real natural ends. That is, we could try to affirm real
ends in nature while denying that any fundamental teleological principle is expressed therein, which prevents real natural ends from ever
receiving a metaphysical contextualization that might be relevant to
divine action. This amounts to denying that real natural ends are coordinated with each other, much as human intentional ends are frequently
uncoordinated with each other (as human societies demonstrate). The
key philosophical move here parallels the pluralistic rejection of metaphysical monisms. This view threatens to be philosophically unstable,
however, because it is probably simpler to drop real ends and dispense
with teleology in nature at large altogether. That is, this view is likely
to trip over the criterion of metaphysical adequacy I have been calling
Ockhamistic minimalism.
On the other hand, we might admit a fundamental teleological principlecalled God by some, li by others, and strategically unnamed by
yet othersand conceive this principle so as to block any further move
toward divine action. This fundamental teleological principle would be
impersonal, without specific intentions, neither creative nor a creator,
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so it could not meaningfully be said to act. All of the candidates for

counterexamples in the last section are of this kind. Yet in all of these
cases the second stage of the teleological argument for divine action
retains a fighting chance. Even a small philosophical nudgeby the
questions about there being something rather than nothing, or about
the public character of naturethreatens to push such a fundamental teleological principle into a conception of God that creates or is
creative. While this threat can be effectively rebuffed, I think the history of Western philosophy shows how difficult it is (at least for that
philosophical tradition) to resist the impulse of such questions toward
positing a God that acts as a creator or as creative.
This accounts for the fundamental attractiveness of the teleological
argument for divine action: if only we can show that there are real ends
in nature (supposedly the hard part), then it is only a short hop to the
reality of divine action (supposedly the easy leg of the journey). Well,
the second stage of the argument does not live up to this promise, but
it is interesting to see how close it gets. It gets close enough, in fact, that
another question presents itself: What more, if anything, can be done
to make the second stage of the teleological argument for divine action
successful? It would be necessary to solve the problem of the conflict
induced by a plurality of (at least superficially) adequate metaphysical
contextualizations of real ends in nature.
It may be that some would assert that these alternative teleological-metaphysical visions are fundamentally inadequate, perhaps just
because they are not amenable to divine action, or for other reasons.
That certainly takes courage, at least at this early stage of the process
of systematic comparative metaphysics. This is not the place to establish the relative adequacy of a rainbow of metaphysical views. But it is
appropriate to insist here that such well-attested, long-standing views
of reality cannot be dismissed cavalierly. Indeed, at least with regard to
such majestic worldviews as those I have mentioned, the presumption
of adequacy must be granted until a preponderance of evidence to the
contrary is established. Nor will it do to satisfy oneself with identifying a
weakness merely in one respect, for all metaphysical systems have weaknesses, and evaluating overall superiority must comprehend questions of
balance and emphasis. The task of comparative metaphysics is genuinely
difficult. Reality seems susceptible of description by multiple, conflicting,
adequate metaphysical schemes, and a non-arbitrary approach finds
soundly-argued decisions among such theories infuriatingly difficult to
construct. This is the famous problem of metaphysical ambiguity.
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4.3. Metaphysical Ambiguity

This problem of metaphysical ambiguity has been the chief source of
despair over metaphysics in the West from ancient times. The Sophists
cited it as evidence of the intellectual corruption of Socrates, Kant of
his Leibnizian heritage, Kierkegaard of Hegel, Ayer and Wittgenstein
of the entire metaphysical tradition. Every philosophical tradition
worldwide shows signs of skepticism induced by the specter of metaphysical ambiguity. Now, we ought to recall that the second stage of
the teleological argument for divine action does not need to justify the
one true metaphysics (though the third stage needs more) but only the
more modest result of merely excluding teleological views antagonistic
toward divine action. Perhaps, after all, the problem of metaphysical
ambiguity can be overcome to the extent needed through an ongoing
process of diligent comparison and analysis in relation to carefully
examined and constantly revised criteria for theoretical adequacy.
Unfortunately, it is obvious that the problem of metaphysical ambiguity
is very far from being overcome, even to this modest extent. Moreover,
we appear to lack even some crucial tools for accomplishing it, such as
a tradition of systematic inquiry into categories used in cross-cultural,
metaphysical comparisons.33
We must ask, then, exactly how bad is the problem? The dimensions
of the problem of metaphysical ambiguity can be estimated from the
side of metaphysics in the following way. Systematic metaphysical
contextualization of real ends in nature by means of a fundamental
teleological principle does not require the idea of a God that acts, nor
even the idea of God, as I have pointed out already. However, it is usually Western traditions that have been explicitly interested in teleology,
so the idea of God has appeared frequently in teleologically concerned
metaphysics. If the idea of God does show up, it may not be (and often
has not been) a deistic or theistic idea of God. And if deism or theism
is implied in the teleological metaphysics, it may or may not be one
of the traditional ideas of God familiar to the major Western theistic
religions: Judaism, Christianity, or Islam.
33
An attempt to develop such a tradition of inquiry out of fragmentary, extant efforts
has been funded for 19956 and subsequent years by the National Endowment for the
Humanities in conjunction with some private foundations. The Principle Investigator for the three year project is Robert C. Neville, and the Co-Investigators are Peter
Berger and John Berthrong.
179
To be a little more specific at the level of this sprawling metaphysical wildness that is closest to the sphere in which divine action can be
conceived, there is important variation even in traditionally recognized
forms of theism, both within and among the three major Abrahamic
traditions. One debate that appears within all three is that over whether
or not God is ontologically fundamental. In Christianity, it is usually debate over omnipotence and creation that signals the presence
of this question, with process and classical theism taking opposed
views on both doctrines. In Judaism it appears in legal debates over
the ontological primacy of the law, and in metaphysical and ethical
debates surrounding Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism) over whether God
needs salvation through human cooperation. In Islam it shows up
in some of the ethical and legal debates between the competing medieval Mu`tazilite and Ash`arite schools, as when they argued that God
forbade killing because it is bad, and that killing is bad because God
forbade it, respectively. All three traditions, therefore, have ways to
think of God either as subject to fundamental teleological principles, or
as their absolute groundand kenotic theories of creation try to have
both at once. Thus, it appears that, even when systematic metaphysical accounts of fundamental teleological principles include some form
of theism, multiple ways of envisaging the relation between God and
teleology are still possible.
4.4. Metaphysical Ambiguity and Evolutionary Biology
In spite of this staggering diversity, these metaphysical views of teleology in the evolutionary process do have common features. Three of
these common characteristics become evident from the point of view
of evolutionary biology. In fact, these shared characteristics apply even
to metaphysical contextualizations of teleology that reject teleological
categories. There are metaphysical ways of understanding teleology
that do not have all of these characteristics, and so stand outside of
the diverse mainstream I seek to characterize here, but they seem to
be relatively rare and theoretically fragile. These common features suggest a somewhat skeptical conclusion about the usefulness of biological
evolution for resolving debates about teleology in the short term.
The first common characteristic is that: Current knowledge of biological evolution is consistent with all of these views of the place of
teleology in the evolutionary process. The obvious upshot is that none
of these views can be rejected on the grounds of simple inconsistency
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with the contemporary account of biological evolution. Of course,

process philosophers sometimes argue that the doctrine of internal
relations is indispensable for any satisfactory account of the emergence
of life and consciousness. This subtle debate seems to be unresolvable
on the basis of biological considerations alone; certainly the doctrine
of internal relations is not a popular position, in view of the fact that
virtually all biologists appear to believe that emergent properties such
as life and consciousness can be explained on the basis of complex,
stratified organization. Granted, on this view, the mystery of life as
such persists. However, it is not demystified in the doctrine of internal
relations, but only shifted to another level of discussionthe level of the
ultimate constituents of nature and the theory of causation. This may
well be the right level on which to conduct the debate. However, the
debate at any level is sufficiently complex that there is scant justification
for the expulsion of views that hold to a doctrine of emergence based
simply on complex organization.
The second common characteristic of the diverse mainstream views
is that: All of these views of the place of teleology in the evolutionary
process are neutral toward all short-term controversies in biological
evolution. These short-term controversies include, with regard to biological evolution, whether or not gaps in the biochemical story about
the origin of life can be filled; whether or not apparent variations in the
rate of variation and selection can be explained; and whether higher
level laws or tendencies of complex systems can be identified. Further
debates likely to be short-term in nature pertain to evolutionary psychology: whether or not law-like relations can be identified between
gene-perpetuation interests and social practices; and whether or not
it is possible to specify the senses in which human freedom mediates
between gene-perpetuation and other, possibly competing, interests.
Mainstream views are indifferent to the outcome of such inquiries. At
worst, there might be a failure of the new paradigm to turn up solutions to some of these problems, and that may threaten the progressive
status of the research program it defines. That, however, would not be
a short-term crisis. It must be admitted, of course, that this is a rather
curtailed list of short-term puzzles, because there are hundreds of major
research problems that can reasonably be expected to find solutions in
the relative near term in the ordinary course of scientific advance. But I
am aware of no short-term controversies whose resolution could justify
the exclusion of any of the large class of mainstream views.
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The third common characteristic is that: Each of these views of the

place of teleology in the evolutionary process is vulnerable (if at all)
only to long-term metaphysical controversies that are unlikely to be
affected by biological evolution. The class of long-term disputes includes
many debates that may not be resolvable in principle, and others that
may not be resolvable in practice. Long-term controversies include,
with regard to biological evolution, whether or not compelling evidence
can be adduced for the irreducibility of teleological categories to the
description of what is essential in complex biological systems; whether
or not God acts undetectably to influence evolutionary development;
and whether or not any given form of life can be demonstrably, exhaustively accounted for in detail in terms of specific chemical processes
and evolutionary principles. Another long-term debate, pertaining to
evolutionary psychology, is whether or not culture, ethics and religion
can be exhaustively explained in terms of gene-perpetuation interests,
or other principles connected to genetic heritage.
It is important not to be too presumptuous about what might or
might not eventually fall under the auspices of the scientific method.
While the long-term problems just mentioned are presently at least
as much metaphysical as biological in character, it is possible that
some of them might one day be considered more completely a part
of evolutionary biology and biochemistry than they are now. In any
event, the point is that all of the debates in which views of teleology
in biological evolution have something at stake lie in the class of longterm-disputes. Mainstream views that reject fundamental teleological
principles (for example, Dawkins and Monod) have the most to lose,
since they could potentially stumble on an unfavorable result in every
one of the long-term disputes mentioned. I take such vulnerability to
be a sign of profound intelligibility, for the intelligibility of a hypothesis
partly involves being able to indicate clearly what counts as evidence
against it. However, such vulnerability by itself is not necessarily a
reliable indicator of truth.
5. The Third Stage: Teleology and Divine Action

It remains now to consider the third stage of the teleological argument
for divine actionand after what has been said, this is relatively simple.
Here again, for the third time, the specter of metaphysical options
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interferes with the easy inferences that would make the teleological
argument for divine action simpler than it is.
5.1. The Connection between Teleology and Divine Action
Some dimensions of the question of divine action are not highlighted
when teleology is the source of illumination, but there are compensating
advantages. Among these is the fact that, because apparent endedness
is a highly effective category for expressing what is interesting about
nature, it is useful as a principle for organizing conceptions of divine
action. So, then, what possibilities for divine action are suggested by
this discussion of the place of teleology in biological evolution.34
Let us begin by noting that, if the apparent ends of objects and processes are only apparent, then the rough and ready conclusioncertainly
the one that we are entitled to assume Dawkins would drawis that
there is no possibility of divine action. Strictly speaking, I suppose it is
conceivable that God might act without leaving apparently teleological
traces, but the metaphysical and theological viability of such a view is
low, as it would shut creation, all patterns in nature, and all stories in
history out of the domain of divine interest, leaving miscellaneous,
unintelligible (to us) interference as the sole mode of divine action.
Similarly, if Monods view is correct, then traditional deism and theism
are highly misleading accounts of ultimate reality. The more natural
metaphysical contextualization of his view (Monod does not propose
this himself) is the dualist one of a primal battle between principles of
order and anarchy, such as was and is still found in Zoroastrianism,
except that these two principles must be symbiotically related. If this
symbiosis itself is named God (rather than the more obvious Nature),
then we are speaking of a kind of pantheism in which divine action is
synonymous with event, which renders this God profoundly morally
ambivalent and evacuates divine action of specific meaning. Against
34
Owen Thomas distinguishes six ways to parse the question How does God act?
in Gods Activity in the World: The Contemporary Problem (Chico: Scholars Press,
1983): By what means? In what way or manner? To what effect? With what meaning
or purpose? To what extent? On analogy with what? (234236). While these six questions considerably enlarge the ordinary sense of the original query, they also helpfully
draw attention to the fact that divine action probably cannot be discussed thoroughly
without suggesting answers to all or most parts of this six-fold battery of questions.
The following discussion focuses chiefly only on the first two questions, and so stops
short of complete thoroughness.
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these anti-teleological views is ranged an array of metaphysical contextualizations of fundamental teleological principles, many of which
are not amenable to divine action. I will not revisit these views here. It
is enough to see that the teleological argument can break down when
trying to speak of divine action even in the context of emphatically
teleological metaphysics.
Now, moving by these open metaphysical options, let us suppose for
the sake of argument that the second stage of the teleological argument
for divine action has been successful and that we begin the third stage
from within the ambit of the traditional deistic, theistic, or panentheistic
worldviews that allow us to speak in recognizable ways about divine
action. In this case, the locus in nature of the fundamental teleological
principlethe fourth dispute discussed earlierwill be the key insight
into the possible modes of divine action. So let us reflect on the relations
between the locus of teleology in nature and divine action.
When the locus in nature of this fundamental teleological principle
is natural laws only, then divine action cannot include the expression
of specific divine intentions in the context of an ongoing providential
relationship with that creation because this requires the fundamental
teleological principle also to be expressed in chance (or boundary conditions), as discussed earlier. Nor can divine action presuppose teleological
characteristics within the constituents of nature. That leaves two modes
of divine action, both bearing on creation, and both expressed in the
laws of nature: the universal determination of natural possibilities and
the ontological grounding of nature.
The locus in nature of this fundamental teleological principle might
include chance, understood as a general category including the influence
on complex systems of their boundary conditions. If so, then divine
intentions (or analogues thereof ) can conceivably be expressed either
directlythere are a number of proposals for such mechanismsor less
specifically in the striving for general ideals of harmony, complexity,
and intensification of value in history and nature (as in Whiteheads
version of process philosophy).
Finally, when the locus in nature of this fundamental teleological
principle also includes the constituents of nature, two other ideas of
divine action come into play. On the one hand, process philosophy
stipulates a rich theory of causality that posits specifically teleological
characteristics in the fundamental constituents of nature. In this case,
divine action consists in the performance of the necessary regulative
tasks associated with that theory of causation: offering initial aims
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wesley j. wildman
to concrescent actual occasions from out of a primordial envisagement of possibilities, and reconciling the actuality of the world in the
maximally harmonized consequent nature. On the other hand, it is
possible to conceive of God as furnishing the material conditions for
the possibility of the emergence of complex, self-organizing systems
through creation. These conditions would be realized in the constituents of matter itself, but the mode of divine action would be creation
rather than creativity, the latter being the category to which process
metaphysics appeals in explaining the emergence of complex and
novel forms of self-organization. This view of divine action is implied
whenever complexity and self-organization require the constituents of
nature to have particular capacities in addition to the constraints on
their interaction stipulated by the laws of nature. An example of such
a view is the philosophy of Robert Neville whose theory of causality is
similar to Whiteheads process philosophy, but affirms the metaphysical theory of creation ex nihilo, and denies that God furnishes initial
aims to actual occasions.35
5.2. A Schema for Further Discussion
These six modes of divine action and their relationships to the loci in
nature of fundamental teleological principles are represented in the following diagram. Note that all three classes of divine action appear here.
Creation appears in modes 1, 2, and 5; creativity shows up in modes
3 and 6; and the expression of specific divine intentions is covered in
mode 4, which can be specified in a number of different ways.
It is clear from this table that there are a lot of possibilities for
envisaging modes of divine action, even after the philosophical contextualization of real ends in nature is specified to be compatible with
one or more types of divine action. If the locus in nature of teleology is
limited to the laws of nature, then there are fewer options. If it extends
into the processes and constituents of nature, however, the possibilities
multiply rapidly. Deciding among them depends not upon teleological
considerations but upon other metaphysical issues including such tough
problems as causality and time.
Note, too, how the contrast between essentially deistic proposals
(Davies) and more traditional theistic proposals (Peacocke, Russell)
35
See Robert Cummings Neville, Creativity and God: A Challenge to Process Theology (New York: Seabury, 1980).
185
Table 3. Correlation between fundamental teleological loci in nature and

modes of divine action
Locus in nature of
teleological principle
Mode of divine action
Laws of nature
1. Creation as universal determination of natural

possibilities (e.g. creatio ex nihilo)
2. Creation as ongoing ontological grounding of
nature (e.g. divine faithfulness)
3. Creativity as striving for harmony, complexity,
intensification of value (e.g. creatio continua)34
4. Expression of specific divine intentions via:
top-down causation or whole-part constraint
(e.g. Arthur Peacocke)
manipulating boundary conditions of chaotic
systems (e.g. John Polkinghorne)
chaotic amplification of quantum field
actualizations (e.g. Robert Russell)
lawfully widening the canalizing of complex
processes (given feedback mechanism from
environment to operation of natural laws)
means associated with atemporal theories of
causation35
and perhaps other means as well . . .
Fundamental
constituents of nature
5. Creation as furnishing the material conditions

for the possibility of the emergence of complex,
self-organizing systems (e.g. Robert Neville, but
not process philosophy, which denies creation)
6. Creativity as expressed in a theory of causation
that assigns a necessary regulative role to God
(e.g. Whitehead, Birch and Cobb)
34
This use of creatio continua is problematic on some views of causality. It is, of
course, quite natural in the context of process metaphysics. On some other views,
however, the teleological capacities of natural laws as currently understood are by
themselves sufficient for fostering trajectories toward complexity, which implies that
divine action would not be needed for the maintenance of processes of complexification, except in the most basic sense that God, on this view, is the ultimate ground of
all natural processes (this is mode 2). This narrows the meaning of creatio continua as
it applies in these cases, accordingly. It also illustrates the intimate connection between
the meaning of creatio continua and metaphysical theories about causality and the
fundamental constituents of nature.
35
For example, it has been proposed by Troy Catterson in conversation with me
that superspace versions of quantum cosmology, in conjunction with an interpretation of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle that applies to the relation of space and
time, allow for the possibility of understanding natural-law-conforming action of a
non-temporal deity in temporal nature.
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wesley j. wildman
appears here. Their difference, while genuine, is not so conceptually

large as is often thought. In fact, both affirm a fundamental teleological
principle expressed at least in the laws of nature, which is an agreement
of considerable proportions in view of the fact it involves assent to the
irreducibility of teleology, and dramatic, almost identical narrowings
of the breadth of metaphysical possibilities. The move from deism to
theism is then accomplished by a relatively minor enlargement of the
locus of teleology so as to include chance (or boundary conditions).
This suggests that the move to theism from deism is hard to block from
the deistic side without arbitrariness.
6. Conclusions
The main conclusion to be stated here is that the teleological argument
for divine action is not very teleological. That is, there is no sound chain
of implications from analysis of apparent ends in nature to judgments
about the ontological irreducibility of those apparent ends, to estimations of the locus in nature of fundamental teleological principles, and
then to specification of the modes of divine action. In fact, the implications run more smoothly in the reverse direction. In the order stated,
the chain breaks down at each link, at least when biological evolution
remains the sphere of discussion. Additional premises are needed to
move from apparent ends in nature to the affirmation of real ends,
from there to metaphysical theories affirming a fundamental teleological
principle consistently with divine action, and from any such teleological
metaphysics to the reality of divine action in particular modes. None of
these missing premises is furnished by biological evolution, and I have
tried to spell out what some of them might be at each stage. Because
the additional premises needed to make the teleological argument for
divine action valid characteristically have little specifically to do with
teleology, we need to conclude that the argument does not depend as
much on its starting point of the ubiquity of apparent ends in nature
as the way it is stated promises.
Discussions about divine action in connection with biological evolution must not casually assume that these missing premises are unproblematic. In particular, it would be easy to fall into a kind of blinkered
or perhaps ideological ignorance of alternative, profound teleological
visions that are antagonistic toward divine action and that are as well
supported by biological evolution as any that permit us to speak of
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divine action. I have adverted to a number in this essay. In discussions

of divine action in the context of teleology in nature, and especially in
evolutionary biology, therefore, let us hesitate to conflate articulation
of theories about divine action with justification of those theories. The
gap between what is possible by way of divine action and what can be
justified is rather large.38
The failure of the teleological argument for divine action, especially
the second stage, has been traced to the problem of metaphysical
ambiguity, and I argued that the specter of metaphysical ambiguity is
largely immune from considerations drawn from contemporary biology. Therefore, just as it is unwise to expect to be able to decide among
competing views of teleology in biological evolution based on any shortterm considerations from biology, so it is over-hasty to expect to narrow
the range of possibilities for metaphysical construals of divine action
on the basis of considerations drawn from contemporary biology.
A second, subsidiary conclusion is, I hope, a sound conjecture. It is
related more to teleology than to the teleological argument for divine
action itself, but is strongly suggested by the various pieces of argumentation presented here. It is this: the case for affirming a fundamental
teleological principle is far stronger than that for rejecting it, given the
premise that the cosmos (note: not ultimate reality) is meaningful rather
than absurd. This premise seems not infrequently denied by biologists
and philosophers of biology who dare to treat such questions. And
philosophically it is notorious for being impossible to justify except in
obviously self-referential ways. But, if it is granted, then it is genuinely
difficult to maintain, as many popular writers in evolutionary biology
do, that the universe has no overarching teleological sweep. How do
they do this, then?
It seems to me that all attempts to avoid postulating a fundamental
teleological principle require either an arbitrary arresting of inquiry,
or the assumption of an absurd cosmos. Dawkins and Monod, who
have been mentioned a number of times by now, make interesting case
studies at this point. In Dawkins case, in both The Blind Watchmaker
36
The scope of this essay prevents me from arguing to the more adventurous conclusion that the gap between what is possible by way of divine action and what can
be justified is large, no matter what the context of discussion. That is, this fundamental
kind of metaphysical ambiguity can be found not only in relation to evolutionary biology, but also in relation to everything from cosmology to religious experience, from
history to mysticism, from sociology to hermeneutics. This is perhaps equivalent to a
thesis as to the limitations of human rationality.
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wesley j. wildman
and Climbing Mount Improbable, curiosity is inexplicably terminated,

at least by my standards. His assumption of a self-explanatory and
ontologically self-sufficient universe ought to be examined, if only to
understand why his other apparent assumption that the universe is a
meaningful and wonderful place is to be believed. That is, Dawkins
denies both cosmic absurdity and a teleological sweep to the cosmos,
and the conceptual strain that results forces the contrived truncation
of his inquiry. Future books may correct this, perhaps by extending his
intriguing images of the biosphere as a distributed supercomputer, of
the cosmos as dancing, or of evolution as an enchanted loom, weaving a massive database of ancestral wisdom.39 These are images whose
precise articulation and evaluation demands metaphysical categories
and argument that Dawkins so far seems unwilling to engage.
By contrast, it is possible to construe Monod as abandoning inquiry
not arbitrarily, but in recognition of cosmic absurdity, in the context
of which humans are simply confronted with the choice to create
proximate meanings or not. That is, Monod denies a teleological sweep
to the cosmos, but courageously and consistently pays the intellectual
price by explicitly surrendering the hypothesis of cosmic intelligibility.
This marks out a genuine intellectual possibility, albeit a paradoxical
one, for it admits the possibility of inquiry (it does not affirm ultimate
absurdity, which is extreme skepticism, but only cosmic absurdity)
while characterizing it as an anomalous activity that peters out into
deferential silenceexistentially in our experience through ubiquitous
limitations and contradictions, and in history and nature through the
eventual vanishing of all life.
The cosmic absurdity view is affirmed systematically in Vedanta
philosophy (notably and with important differences in Sankara and
Ramanuja). It is also expounded in Madhyamika Buddhism, especially
in the thought of Nagarjuna and Bhavaviveka, who denied that any
fundamental metaphysical principle (teleological or not) can be identified without distorting more than illumining. Many other thinkers and
sub-traditions of Buddhism affirm more or less the same position, as do
various strands of apophatic mysticism in the West. These views tend
to use the conjunction of apparently contradictory statements as a form
of reference to states of affairs essentially beyond categorial experience, and so beyond discussion. This form of reference (the so-called
39
Dawkins, Climbing Mount Improbable, p. 326.
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Middle Way, which is the meaning of Madhyamaka) is similar to

that used in the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, and
corresponds functionally to Monods deferential arresting of inquiry.
The choice to move beyond the cosmic absurdity thesis in any
direction, including by means of affirming a fundamental teleological
principle, cannot be coerced, for neither the circumstances of life nor
argument can force the abandonment of the vision of cosmic absurdity.
However, it is a choice that can still be entertained. My conjectural
conclusion amounts to the contention that every move beyond the
cosmic absurdity thesis involves positing a fundamental teleological
principle. Put differently, this conclusion fails only if there is a way
simultaneously to affirm the overall meaningfulness of the cosmos
(against cosmic absurdity) and yet to deny a fundamental teleological
sweep to that cosmosand, based on the absence of actual examples
in addition to the other reasons I have given, I think there is no such
possibility.
Of course, this is not to say that a meaningful cosmos necessitates
a God; that is a separate case, and (as I have already said) there are
many ways of speaking of fundamental teleological principles that do
not advert to divine action, or even to divinity. Nor is it to say that
the cosmos must be meaningful; in fact the case for cosmic absurdity
in the idiosyncratic sense in which I have used the term is, I would
say, every bit as strong as the case for its rejection. But that, too, is a
separate case. The final conclusion does, however, significantly narrow
the metaphysical choices available to those who affirm that biological
evolution suggests a meaningful (as against an absurd) cosmos: to say
this is implicitly to be committed to a fundamental teleological principle of some kind. And that is an awkward conclusion for a number
of writers on the philosophical significance of evolutionary biology.
CHAPTER SIX
CONSTRAINT AND FREEDOM IN THE MOVEMENT FROM

QUANTUM PHYSICS TO THEOLOGY
Philip Clayton1
1. IntroductionShould One Apologize for Trying to Do Theology?

Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. Many of the essays in this
collectionessays by theologians as well as by professional scientists
describe the difficulties of our shared project. In fact, this book is replete
with warnings about how hard it is to determine the viable options for
interpreting the quantum mechanical results, then to interpret quantum
theory, and finally to specify which theories of action (human or divine)
are or are not consistent with the physics of the very small. Perhaps
more wisely than I, the majority of the authors have remained at the
descriptive level with regard not only to the physics but also to the
theology (if any) about which they write.
I am about to dive into the morass of constructive metaphysics, and
perhaps even constructive theology, in a rather less cautious manner.
Preparing to do so causes one to worry about what flaws of mind (or
character?) might be responsible for this lack of reticence. Do I not realizeas James Cushing has shown in many fine publicationsthat the
empirical data underdetermine the interpretive position that one takes?
Even if this underdetermination should be contingent on the current
state of science rather than expressing some necessary limitation, am I
not aware that experts are deeply divided on interpretive (ontological)
1
Acknowledgment. I am grateful to the entire workshop group for criticisms that
have improved the argument of this essay. Once again, the CTNS/Vatican Observatory project has demonstrated the virtue of detailed and sustained critical interaction.
Indeed, importing the ethos of scientific critique into theology may be the greatest
long-term contribution of this fifteen-year project. I thank in particular John Polkinghorne, Owen Thomas, and Kirk Wegter-McNelly for their criticisms during the
final writing phase.
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questions regarding quantum physics, making forays into this field by

non-experts all the more precarious? Finally, do I not realize that theology as a discipline is itself highly suspect, if not downright unsavory,
to many scientists; that profoundly difficult questions are raised by any
attempt to draw connections between technical science and theology;
and thateven if scientists did agree on the interpretation of quantum
mechanicsadditional premises and arguments would be required to
reach even the most rudimentary and tenuous of theological conclusions? And if I am aware of these things, why would I still wish to do
constructive theology in dialogue with quantum physics?
Two reasons come to mind. First, if there is to be any contemporary
theology, it cannot be carried out in ignorance of natural scientific
results, even the most difficult ones. The one thing worse than a theology that attempts to draw connections between physics and God is a
theology that believes it has no need of any such connections, a theology that believes it can concoct the divine out of metaphysical whole
cloth. An intellectually responsible theology has no choice, I suggest:
theologians either wrestle with the best physical knowledge available
or condemn themselves to the subjectivity that sola fides has come to
represent in the modern world.
The second reason for proceeding is that I am willing to countenance
a type of theology (and metaphysics, for that matter) that is much more
hypothetical, fallible, open to revision, and provisional than was traditionally allowed. Call it eine Theologie von unten: theology from below,
theology in the trenches. In various publications over the last decade2 I
have defended a view of theology that allows for multiple models, openended discussion, and the underdetermination of theological theory by
data. Now admittedly it is significantly harder to specify exactly which
parts of such a pluralistic theology are true, since one acknowledges
both the viability of competing truth claims and the malleability of ones
own claims. But to acknowledge that one does not yet know which of
the competing claims will finally turn out to be true does not mean that
one must then become a relativist about all arguments. Sometimes a
stronger case can be made for one theological option than another, so
thatgiven the state of the data and the discussion at some particular
2
Philip Clayton, Explanation from Physics to Theology: An Essay in Rationality and

Religion (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1989); idem, God and Contemporary
Science (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997); idem,
The Problem of God in Modern Thought (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000).
from quantum physics to theology
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timeone is more justified in assenting to one position than to its

competitors. We wont know until we try.
One way to ensure that theological discussions do not amount to
tennis without a net is to tie them where possible to existing fields
of empirical study. In order to do this, one first considers the array of
interpretive models in a specific scientific field, looking for areas of
compatibility (or incompatibility!) with existing theological models and
reevaluating ones theology, or perhaps even ones science, as a result.
One then repeats this activity across a variety of scientific (and, if the
questions are theological, also nonscientific) disciplines, attempting to
discern which theological options become more and which become less
credible in light of the overlap between the various fields. A theology
subjected to these sorts of rigors becomes a sort of third-order discipline: reflections on the data set of theories from multiple disciplines,
which are in turn responses to the data within those disciplines. Like a
complicated Venn diagram that contains many more than three circles,
this synthetic task entails looking for common points and exclusion relationships between rather diverse fields of data and theoretical options.
In the present essay I will be satisfied if I have been able to illustrate
how this process might work when the starting point is the difficulties
associated with the interpretation of quantum physics.
2. Why Physics Might Provide Constraints on How God Might Act

Physicists regularly comment on the ways that quantum mechanics has
transformed our view of the nature of reality. Authors often use classical or Newtonian physics as the background in order to dramatize the
transformation brought about by the twentieth-century understanding
of quantum processes. The technique is effective: even the lay reader
is struck by what a radically different world it is that she encounters
in the realm of the very small.3 It is as if one were confronting a new
level of reality, a new metaphysical space. (This fact alone demands
theological response!)
See e.g., James Cushing, Philosophical Concepts in Physics: The Historical Relation
between Philosophy and Scientific Theories (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1998); John Polkinghorne, The Quantum World (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, 1985).
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The conceptual space defined by the quantum mathematical formalism and the associated empirical observations neither proves
nor disproves the existence of any divine being. Nor will it, by itself,
establishor rule outany claims about divine action. But it may tell
us something about how a being (human or divine) must act if it acts
in the physical world and in conformity with physical law. That is, the
conceptual space of quantum physics may constrain the ways such a
being could be manifested and the sorts of actions a human observer
could in principle detect.
All this assumes, of course, that any inklings we might have of a divine
being would have to be drawn from its creative actions (as reflected,
say, in the structure of the physical world or the evolutionary development of the cosmos) or from its interactions with us (as reflected
in human experience, including claims regarding religious experience
and revelation in the various world religions).4 Let me use the word
God to designate whatever might be the actual nature of the divine
and divine action to designate the manifestations of God (if any) in
the cosmos and its history. If God exists and has not acted at all, or
if these actions fail to indicate anything about the divine natureand
especially if the actions lead us to infer things about the divine nature
that are falsethen we are completely sunk, epistemically speaking
(and perhaps in other ways as well!). In such cases our best reflection
will yield only false conclusions about the divine.
On the other hand, it is possible that the constraints of physics do
represent the context within which God chooses to act; thus it is possible that the constraints imposed by the physical order themselves tell
us something interesting about the nature of that orders Creator. Of
course, when one reads possible rather than probable or necessary, one realizes that this is theology in a hypothetical moderather
unlike the old certainties of the faith. If theologians must proceed
with this sort of tenuousness, one is always justified in choosing not
to play. The same holds, by the way, for any theology of divine action
in light of contemporary science. Whether one plays will depend on
how expensive one judges the wager to be (do I lose credibility by
even considering the God-hypothesis seriously?) and how valuable one
4
This is a more philosophical formulation of what theologians call Rahners Rule.
See Wolfhart Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, vol. 1, Geoffrey Bromiley, trans. (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991).
195
thinks the possible outcome is. Clearly ones decision on these questions
depends on subjective factors that go far beyond the context of this
(or any) academic essay. The most I can show here is that the wager is
not irrational. There is no point in wagering on an impossible option,
making bets one can only lose. But it is not irrational to wager on a
possible outcome.
What, precisely, is the wager? Formulated negatively, the wager is
that none of the three if s in the sentence two paragraphs above is
true. It is a wager because no empirical result can determine the answer,
at least at present. Nonetheless, it is the positive side of the wager that
sets the agenda for the present essay. Put positively, one can wager
that the structure of the physical world sets parameters onand thus
gives us some knowledge ofthe manner in which God could act. The
physical world would thus provide us some epistemic access to divine
action (if God acts); it would be conducive to knowledge of the source
of these actions and of the nature of that hypothetical source. Indeed,
if there is a God who creates, the bets not a bad one, for wouldnt one
expect the nature of the Creator to be represented in some way in the
structures of what has been created?5 As Owen Thomas has pointed
out in conversation, my approach also amounts to the wager that there
is some analogy between human and divine action, for our actions
are certainly constrained by the physical world. Hypothesizing some
similarity between the human and divine agent gives us some basis
for understanding divine action (if it exists), whereas hypothesizing
5
James Cushing refers to the problem of evil at this point. My approach, rather
than dodging this difficult set of issues, puts them right at the center. The history of
evolution in general, and human history in particular, includes incredible waste and
suffering, and the wager suggests that the biological and psychological structures that
cause this suffering are somehow indicative of the nature of the underlying divine cause
(if any). One pursuing this method must therefore introduce the categories of evil and
good, ask whether God can consistently be called good, and examine the reasons that
a divine being might have had for allowing biological and psychological structures of
this sort. Such debates belong to the field of theodicy; see e.g., John Hick, Evil and the
God of Love (New York: Harper & Row, 1966); John Feinberg, The Many Faces of Evil:
Theological Systems and the Problem of Evil (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan, 1994);
Thomas F. Tracy, ed., The God Who Acts: Philosophical and Theological Explorations
(University Park, Penn.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1994); David Ray Griffin, Evil Revisited: Responses and Reconsiderations (Albany, N.Y.: SUNY Press, 1991);
Jane Mary Trau, The Co-existence of God and Evil (New York: P. Lang, 1991); Richard
Worsley, Human Freedom and the Logic of Evil: Prolegomenon to a Christian Theology of Evil (Houndmills, Basingstoke: Macmillan Press; New York: St. Martins Press,
1996). Needless to say, I cannot resolve the debate in this essay, though the successful
outcome of my argument requires that I eventually address it.
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philip clayton
that divine action is utterly sui generis would rule out any general
knowledge of it.6
But why treat quantum physics separately? If we had a unified
science in which the interrelationships between the various special
sciences were fully understood, as in the third-order form of theology
proposed above, we could use the shared structures common to all
scientific fields as the starting point for asking about the nature and
action of the divine. The task would be difficult, of course, even with
an agreed upon empirical and theoretical basis on which to draw. At
present, however, we are far from unified science; and major areas of
physics, such as quantum physics and gravitational theory, remain
theoretically distinct. There is no other option, then, but to consider
the various scientific fields seriatim, asking what divine action would
mean in that context, how it might occur (if it occurs) and, given the
laws and structures in question, what the nature of the divine source
might be. Whether or not the conclusions that one reaches within the
various fieldsfor example physics, evolutionary biology or genetics,
the neurosciences, and the social sciencesfit together into a single
picture is a separate question.7
I recognize that these proposals are controversial; there are opponents on all sides (Cannon to the left of them, cannon to the right of
them/Volleyed and thundered . . .) and the debates are often heated. If
one uses not only the present book but also other recent publications
as data, one finds at least five alternative positions:8
a. No reasons can be given, other than purely subjective ones, for any
theological position (Cushing);
b. Serious theological positions can be defended in light of science
in some cases, but quantum physics is too unclear, and subject to
too much difficulty, to give rise to helpful theological conjectures
(Polkinghorne);
c. Some constructive theology can be written on the topic of divine
action and quantum physics, even if our conjectures remain highly
6
This is the opposition of faith and reason first formulated by Tertullian and associated in the twentieth century with the No! of Karl Barth in his debate with Emil
Brunner.
7
In The Emergence of Spirit (forthcoming) I argue for the affirmative, but obviously
that case cannot be made here.
8
Predictably, each of these schools view those to their left as unnecessarily empiricist and positivist and those to their right as insufficiently aware of the power and
rigor of scientific thought.
197
speculative (the present essay, but also, inter alia, those by Chiao,
Russell, Stoeger and Tracy);
d. Rather strong theological conclusions can be reached on the basis
of modern physics, presumably including quantum physics. Thus,
for example, the physicist Cyril Domb finds clear evidence of the
Creator in the world, and the intelligent design theorists (William
Dembski, Michael Behe, et al.) argue that evolution requires a prior
intention and in-built design on Gods part.
e. The convergence between scientific conclusions and the teachings
of the religious traditions is so great that they should no longer
be viewed as separate realms that need to be connected but rather
as one integrated whole. The Mystics and Scientists conferences
have produced a variety of calls for their unification;9 Fritjof Capra
has long been famous for touting the role of intuition and holism
in quantum physics; and much popular and New Age thinking
presupposes that the science-religion separation is now defunct.
For many of these individuals quantum physics actually serves as
the central argument for their position.
Those of us who write in the neighborhood of (c) make the plea to
advocates of (a) and (b) that they would at least consider our proposals
with an open mind, recognizing that they are not excluded by sound
empirical science and that they are different from many of the dogmatic
and unquestioning theologies of the past. Likewise, we caution advocates
of (d) and (e ) to be aware of the hypothetical and contingent nature
of all such theological reflection, as well as to observe the continuing
distinctions between theology and the sciences.
3. Some Quantum-Mechanical Constraints on the

Possibility of Divine Action
In the following paragraphs I explore three examples of issues that have
arisen in debates concerning the interpretation of quantum mechanics: the role of subjectivity, the many-worlds interpretations, and
the debate over indeterminacy and free will. Note that these classic
debates have arisen independently of theological concerns and need
See David Lorimer, ed., The Spirit of Science: From Experiment to Experience (New
York: Continuum, 1999).
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not presuppose belief in God or divine action. Nevertheless, it is my

hypothesis that debates such as these are deeply relevant to the question of divine action. These are the sorts of level-two discussions
that naturally emerge out of the field of quantum physics and that the
theologian of type (c) must master before she proceeds to any constructive theological work.
3.1. The Role of the Observer
One fundamental issue in the interpretation of quantum physics is
the role of subjectivity. Since the early days of quantum theory, many
leading physicists have heldto put it brieflythat the observers
choice regarding what to measure determines which quantum propensity becomes actual. In opposition to the subjectivity theories, other
interpretations dispense with any real reduction of the wavepacket,
or argue that the reduction occurs automatically as quantum systems
interact with macrosystems, or appeal instead to consistent histories
or many worlds in the effort to avoid giving any indispensable place
to conscious intentions in explaining quantum phenomena.
Those who do posit an irreducible role for the observer may do
so either as minimalists or as maximalists. Minimalists introduce the
smallest amount of metaphysics necessary to explain the reduction of
the wavepacket through the act of observation. They dispute the need
for a theory of the conscious observer, arguing that it is enough for
there to be some macrophysical act of measurement or recording by
an observer. No lofty metaphysic is at work here, they assert, since it
is trivially true that it takes human agents for there to be science in the
first place. All we need to note is that the observer is never within the
quantum mechanical system being studied. For there to be an observation there must be an observer; hence, according to minimalists, the
notion of observation is irreducible in quantum mechanics.
For maximalists, by contrast, these answers stop half-way; there is
no way around a metaphysics of the observer. Concepts such as the
subject, subjectivity, consciousness, free will, and spirit must be introduced in order to explain what happens when a scientist constructs an
experiment and makes an intentional measurement. Now it is true that
many leading quantum physicists have taken maximalist views, and we
will return to these below. Still, it is important to ask why many others
are committed to finding an interpretation that avoids the need for any
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theory of subjectivity. What are the intuitions that underlie their effort?
At the deepest level, as Jeremy Butterfield has argued in the context of
the CTNS/Vatican conference, physics has an inherent resistance to
invoking subjectivity. Subjectivity is certainly not part of that family of
physical properties (such as mass, charge, location, time, and entropy)
that makes up standard physical explanations.
It does seem true that one does not immediately need to invoke a
full metaphysics in order to interpret the transition from quantum
propensities to actual measurements. Some level of analysis lies between
the straight physical report and the robust metaphysics of subjectivity
or holism that some interpreters favor. In this middle level of analysis
one can formulate a more minimalist account of the transition. What
occasions the move from quantum coherence to decoherence? Is it a
sheer result of size, of the number of particles in a system, or does the
act of measurement, or even the intent to measure, play a crucial role
in this occurrence? The minimalist wants to know only what is entailed
by the physicsor, to put it differently, whether anything is presupposed in doing physics and formulating physical theories that (presently, or perhaps necessarily) lies outside the scope of physics. Some
minimalists thus argue that an observer is presupposed by quantum
theory, and that there is no place for the observer within that theory
as currently formulated.
It is important to ask how strong a role is played in this debate by
another assumption that has been a part of the history of physics in the
modern era. We might call it the ladder of disciplines or ladder of
the sciences assumption. That is, the success of science is based on the
explanatory reduction of one discipline to another. If chemistry were a
unique domain of its own, not connected via physical chemistry to the
fundamental laws of physics, then (it is argued) we would have a situation very similar to the age of alchemy: chemistry would be a completely
separate discipline, governed by its own rules, laws, and principles. But
(they argue) such isolation of explanatory fields would cast questions
on the unity of science and thus on the prospect of the completion of
science, or even of genuine scientific advancement. Likewise, if some
unique principle of life characterized all the biological sciences, such
as the striving for perfection or self-development (entelechy), then
biochemistry would not be sufficient to explain the functioning of living beings, and again the ladder of the sciences would fail. Isnt some
such concern, at any rate, at the root of the resistance to allowing the
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interpretation of quantum mechanics to rest on a higher-order principle such as conscious observation rather than on a principle proper
to physical theory itself?
Now consider an alternative metaphysical frameworkif only as a
Gedanken experiment.10 On this imagined view one expects interconnections between scientific disciplines but not relationships of reduction
between all of them. More complicated natural systems are sometimes
genuinely or strongly emergent from underlying physical systems.
New emergent levels presuppose the law-like relations that we find at
the lower levels, but they are not fully explainable in terms of those
laws. Indeed, phenomena occurring at the higher levels are sometimes
actually constitutive of the lower-level processes. Systemic patterns
describable only at higher levels of analysis affect what occurs at the
lower levelswhether it be epigenesis affecting the way a cells genetic
code is actually expressed, or qualities of an ecosystem influencing the
behavior of particular organisms in the ecosystem, or the observations
of a subject affecting which of the quantum mechanical probabilities
are in fact observed and become a part of the macrophysical world.
The choice between these two models, which we might call the
reductionist and the emergentist models respectively, is a difficult
one, and there is much to be said for both and against both. At the
most cautious level, it may suffice to note that the interpretation of the
quantum mechanical formalism is deeply affected by ones metaphysical
inclinations on this matter. But there is also a less cautious response to
the questionone that a number of well-known quantum physicists
have pursued. An additional set of conclusions can be drawn about
the measurement problem by those who are inclined to postulate that
observers are a basic part of the furniture of the universe. In its strong
form (cf. the strong anthropic principle) this view holds that subjectivity in certain important respects makes the physical world to be what
it is. Perhaps as a result of being more strongly dualist in its theory
of the human person than the emergentist view sketched above, the
subjectivity is basic view opens the door more readily to a theory of
God and Gods actions. If subjectivity has this sort of foundational role
in the becoming of the physical world, and if a divine being exists, then
10
I have developed these ideas in more detail in the above-cited works; I list them
here only to illustrate some of the effects of alternative metaphysical or theological
frameworks.
201
it would not be unreasonable to imagine that the divine subject plays a

role in influencing the outcome of all (or at least a significant number)
of the quantum mechanical events in the world.
Like many physicists, I shy away from an overtly robust metaphysics
of subjectivity as a tool for interpreting quantum phenomena; and the
stronger claims about divine action at the quantum level raise some
perplexing problems.11 But I must at least grant the inherent interest
of a metaphysic that, were it successful, would solve the measurement
problem and offer a synthesizing perspective on both quantum physics
and theology.
3.2. Everett and DeWitts Many-Worlds Interpretation Versus
Subject-Based Interpretations
A particularly interesting set of methodological issues is raised by the
famous many-worlds interpretations of quantum mechanics. Manyworlds theories hold that there is no need for a shift from an indeterminate to a determinate state of affairs, no need for a transition from
quantum superposition to definite states by means of the so-called
collapse of the wavepacket. Instead, the set of possible measurements of
a quantum mechanical event constitutes a (large) number of branches,
each of which represents a different actual universe. The observer,
when she makes the measurement, finds herself to inhabit one of these
worlds rather than the others. The other universes continue to exist,
even though we can have no further causal contact with them.
Note that there are some philosophically important differences
among many-worlds theories. Hugh Everetts original formulation
emphasized memory: the different memory traces in one or another
observer separate the universe as remembered one way or another.12
In the original 1957 article in Modern Physics Everett does not appeal
explicitly to multiple (actual) universes. By contrast, Bryce DeWitt
appealed to multiple actual universes from the start. When the observer
observes the precise location (or momentum or spin) of a subatomic
particle, she causes a branching among the various universes, which
were identical up to that point; after the observation she inhabits one
11
See Nicholas Saunders, Divine Acnun and Modern Science (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2002), which explores some of the difficulties associated with this view.
12
See David Bohm and Basil J. Hiley, The Undivided Universe: An Ontological
Interpretation of Quantum Theory (New York: Routledge, 1993), 296ff.
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philip clayton
of these actual universes and not the others. In either case, no actual
reduction of the wavepacket occurs. Its not that the physical world
changes from indeterminate to determinate; its rather that a branching of universes occurs and the observer subsequently finds herself in
only one of them.
Everett was explicit that his interpretation was designed to avoid the
consequence that some mysterious subject should cause an ontological
change in the physical world, namely the collapse of the wavepacket.
He was thus reacting against the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, which held this sort of view. Consider, for example,
the position of Werner Heisenberg, who explained the Copenhagen
interpretation by taking a fundamentally Aristotelian view of quantum
mechanics. Heisenberg believed that quantum indeterminacy was like
the world of Aristotles metaphysics, in which (actual existing) potentials
strive to become actual. In this theory the subject acts as a sort of final
cause, pulling a certain (real) potential into actual existence. Note that
this view reverses the stance of classical (Newtonian) physics, which
requires that the subject ultimately be explained in terms of physical
laws. For the Copenhagen theorists, by contrast, when a definite measurement is made at the subatomic level, the resulting macrophysical
state is a combination of a quantum-physical probability distribution
and the scientists decision of what, when, and how to measure. Indeed,
on this view the subjects role is in one sense the primary one: the
world is merely potential until the moment of observation, when the
conscious observer resolves it into an actual state. In its most extreme
form, the form propounded for instance by John Wheeler, the entire
universe may have existed in a state of quantum potentiality until the
first observer emerged, at which point it was retroactively resolved into
macrophysical structures such as stars, planets, and the like. Wheeler
even applied this view backwards to the creation of the universe:
Is the very mechanism for the universe to come into being meaningless
or unworkable or both unless the universe is guaranteed to produce life,
consciousness and observership somewhere and for some little time in its
history-to-be? The quantum principle shows that there is a sense in which
what the observer will do in the future defines what happens in the past
even in a past so remote that life did not then exist, and shows even more
that observership is a prerequisite for any useful version of reality.13
13
John Wheeler, quoted in Paul C.W. Davies, Other Worlds: A Portrait of Nature
in Rebellion, Space, Superspace, and the Quantum Universe (New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1980), 126.
203
The debate between the many-worlds and the subject-centered interpretation cannot yet be physically resolved. (It may be resolved in the
future if many worlds is an entailment of string theory or hyperspace
or a cosmology of universes birthing universes, as some claimand if
these theories are in fact empirically checkable. Of course, it would also
be resolved if one could produce a physical theory that explained the
collapse of the wavepacket.) It is therefore at present a philosophical
debate, and one that, as I hope to show, is deeply influenced by metaphysical intuitions or assumptions. At the risk of oversimplification, we
might state the basic opposition in this way: if you take it to be crucial
that the explanation of the world be given ultimately in physical terms,
then you will be justified in rejecting explanations that are essentially
subject-basedeven at the cost of an incredible loss of parsimony.
For it certainly seems like ontological exuberance (or over-kill) of the
worst sort to assert, with DeWitt, that our universe must be viewed
as constantly splitting into a stupendous number of branches and that
every quantum transition taking place on every star, in every galaxy,
in every remote corner of the universe is splitting our local world into
myriads of copies of itself. Here is schizophrenia with a vengeance!14
But if one holds, as many many-worlds theorists have, that this is the
only viable scientific interpretation that interprets quantum mechanics
in a purely physical fashion, and if one has a strong enough commitment to avoiding any reference to conscious observers, then it may be
a cost one is willing to pay.15
But what if you believe that subjects are irreducible parts (inhabitants) of the one universe? In this case your metaphysical belief will
incline you to see quantum mechanics as evidence for a metaphysics
of the subjectas a number of its leading theorists have in fact maintained (Eugene Wigner, John von Neumann, Henry Stapp). Instead of
multiplying worlds unnecessarily, youll argue, one should see quantum mechanics as a (the?) point at which the physical and the mental
connect. Thus the quantum physicist Carl Friedrich von Weizscker
argued in the 1950s that quantum physics was the vindication of Kants
dualism, his sharp separation between the kingdom of causes and the
14
Ibid., 136.
Put more strongly, it sometimes seems that the major motivation for many-worlds
theorists is that Copenhagen or subjectivity-based views would stand in the way of a
strong, unambiguous reduction of all sciences, including the sciences of human subjectivity, to physical objects, forces, and laws.
15
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philip clayton
kingdom of means and ends.16 This was also the view taken by Eugene
Wigner and his followers. Wigner used the quantum revolution to argue
that the minds of sentient beings occupy a central role in the laws of
nature and in the organization of the universe, for it is precisely when
the information about an observation enters the consciousness of an
observer that the superposition of waves actually collapses into reality.17
Interestingly, one of Roger Penroses arguments against many-worlds
theories also appeals to subject-based considerations. He calls them
zombie theories of the world because the continual branching of the
world and the threading of my own consciousness through it would
seem to result in my becoming separated from the tracks of consciousness of all my friends.18 Penrose insists that one needs an adequate
theory of consciousness before one can make sense of the many-worlds
view as an interpretation of quantum mechanics.
Now there are also serious objections to the subjective interpretation,
objections that emphasize its counterintuitive features. Every text on
the philosophy of quantum physics includes diagrams of the counterexamples of Schrdingers Cat and Wigners Friend. Another form of
the objection imagines that a meter is set up to permanently register
whether the radioactive particle has decayed at the end of a minute
(assuming an experimental set-up in which there is a 50% probability
of this occurring). Two photographs are then automatically taken of
the meter reading, first photo A and then photo B. The photographs
are developed but no one looks at them. Imagine that ten years are
allowed to pass during which no subject observes either the meter or
the photos. At the end of that time a subject looks at photo B, and
suppose that she observes the meter to register a radioactive decay.
On Wigners viewaccording to the criticat that moment, but not
before, the superposition of states will be collapsed, the particle will
(retroactively) have decayed, the meter will (retroactively) register its
decay, and photo A (which no one has yet looked at) will suddenly
show a picture of the meter in its on position. Before that moment
16
Carl Friedrich von Weizscker, Zum Weltbild der Physik, 4th ed., revised (Stuttgart: S. Hirzel, 1949).
17
Eugene Wigner quoted in Davies, Other Worlds, 132f.
18
Roger Penrose, Singularities and Time-Asymmetry, in General RelativityAn
Einstein Centenary Survey, S.W. Hawking and W. Israel, eds. (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1979).
205
photo A was still indeterminate; the observation of photo B makes A

determinatedespite the fact that A was taken before B.
At this point you may be inclined to dismiss both options, if not
the entire field of subatomic physics, as hopelessly counterintuitive.
Yet counterintuitiveness seems to go with the quantum territory; after
all, our intuitions have been nurtured on millennia of macrophysical
experiences. The formalism is extremely well supported; its the interpretation that is raising the difficulties. Can theological intuitions (or,
for the critic, the intuition that theological intuitions are mistaken)
help us at all here?
3.3. Indeterminacy and Free Will
On the subject of quantum physics and free will, at least, it is not
only the philosophers who tend toward speculative exuberance; the
early founders of quantum mechanics and the initial architects of the
Copenhagen interpretation were already quick to draw connections.19
According to defenders, the free choice of an observer to decide where,
when, and how to measure plays an irreducible role in the outcome of
quantum physical experiments. The observer thus helps to determine
whether the world will be this way or that way, and he does so in a
manner that (thanks to Heisenbergs uncertainty principle) is completely
consistent with the laws of physics. Since quantum indeterminacy is
an inherent feature of the physical world and not a hole that further
advances could plug, these physicists argued, physics and genuine
human freedom are fully compatible. Indeed, quantum physics opens
the door again to free will for the first time since Newton.
Of course, the quantum argument for free will has been widely
criticized as well. Indeterminacy at the quantum level may well be
cancelled out by the time one reaches the macrophysical level. Thus it
might be that the microphysical world is indeterminate but that this
indeterminacy disappears when one reaches systems as large as the
ones encountered in biology and psychology. If so, quantum physics
cannot support the doctrine of freedom at the level of human actions.
Also, physical indeterminacythe claim that our epistemic limitations
19
Werner Heisenberg, Physics and Philosophy: The Revolution in Modern Science
(New York: Harper and Row, 1958); Carl Friedrich von Weizscker, Zum Weltbild der
Physik (Stuttgart: S. Hirzel, 1949).
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philip clayton
in knowing the quantum physical world reflect genuine indeterminacy

in the way things actually are at that levelmay not be sufficient for
human freedom. After all, human freedom is normally parsed in
terms of choice, conscious decision, rational selection among multiple
alternatives, and similar notions. None of these factors are, as far as
we know, operative at the quantum physical level. And, of course, the
Copenhagen defense of strong ontological indeterminacy, especially if
it is to be transformed by the choice of a particular subjective agent,
is only one of multiple viable interpretations allowed for by the empirical data.20 Even if it is the majority view in the field, this fact cannot be
taken as decisive support for this interpretation.
Nonetheless, there are various respects in which quantum indeterminacy (assuming it exists) is significant for metaphysical discussions
of human and divine action. First of all, indeterminacy seems to be
a necessary condition for free will. This debate, which philosophers
know as the debate about compatibilism, has been a subject of attention for most major modern philosophers and an absolutely central
question in twentieth-century philosophy. Compatibilists hold that a
fully deterministic universe is compatible with one type of freedom (the
freedom necessary for moral responsibility), even if it rules out another
traditional type of freedom (counterfactual freedom: the freedom that
one might have done otherwise, even in precisely the same situation).
Thus if a causal chain of events results in some action A, such that,
given the first event in the chain, A would necessarily result, compatibilists would still call A a free action as long as the penultimate link in
the causal chain (A1) happens to be the will of the agent in question.
On this compatibilist definition an act is free as long as it is the result
of the agents will, whether or not the agent could have willed differently (counterfactual freedom). Conversely, incompatibilists reject this
argument. An agents action is only free if the agent could have done
otherwise, all previous moments of her life (and of the universes history, for that matter) remaining the same. This notion of counterfactual
freedom continues to have strong intuitive appeal, even though it has
been subjected to some pretty vigorous criticism and, at least until
recently, was clearly the minority view among philosophers.21
20
James Cushing, Quantum Mechanics: Historical Contingency and the Copenhagen

Hegemony (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994).
21
See, e.g., the numerous publications by Donald Davidson; cf. also Richard Double,
The Non-Reality of Free Will (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991). Neuroscientists
207
There is no danger that we will resolve this debate here, though some
progress has been made in recent years.22 In this context we can ask
only about the effects of the debate on the interpretation of quantum
mechanics and theology, and vice versa. If one accepts compatibilism, then the whole issue of physical determinacy or indeterminacy is
clearly irrelevant to the question of freedom and deserves no further
mention here. By contrast, what happens if one shares the incompatibilist intuition and holds that humans are, at least on some occasions,
genuinely free (as I do)? One answer is to side with a strongly dualist
view of the physical and mental realms. For the dualist (of the Cartesian as well as the Kantian variety), it doesnt matter if the physical
order is deterministic, since the action of the mental agent23 is by itself
sufficient to guarantee that the action is free, whatever the state of the
physical world.
But many of us do not find such dualistic views credible as a theory
of human nature and action. For nondualists who are incompatibilists, there must be some place or places in the physical order where an
outcome in the natural world is not determined by the set of antecedent conditions and states. Call it the Nondeterminism Postulate. As
Robert Russell has written, an ontological indeterminacy of this type
seems necessary if human beings are to enact their own choices in the
world.
We might look, for example, to see whether brain functioning allows
for an openness of outcome that is sufficient for counterfactual freedom.
Could the same complex brain state result in more than one subsequent
outcome (assuming that we had the knowledge to establish that it was
the same brain state that was correlated with two different outcomes
in two different cases)? Those of us who accept the Nondeterminism
have also weighed in on this side, e.g., Richard M. Restak, The Modular Brain: How
New Discoveries in Neuroscience are Answering Age-old Questions about Memory,
Free Will, Consciousness, and Personal Identity (New York: Scribners, 1994). But the
incompatibilist side has, if anything, become stronger in recent years. Among many
examples see especially Peter Van Inwagen, An Essay on Free Will (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1983); Timothy OConnor, ed., Agents, Causes, and Events: Essays
on Indeterminism and Free Will (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995); John Martin
Fischer, The Metaphysics of Free Will: An Essay on Control (Oxford: Blackwell, 1994);
Derk Pereboom, ed., Free Will (Indianapolis, Ind.: Hackett Pub. Co., 1997); Robert
Kane, The Significance of Free Will (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996).
22
Van Inwagen, An Essay on Free Will represents a particularly strong example.
23
By agent I mean here Descartess res cogitans, or a member of the kingdom of
means and ends, as in Kants Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals.
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philip clayton
Postulate argue that there must be this sort of openness at least somewhere in the hierarchy of natural phenomena. And, given what we
know of the microphysical world, its at least plausible that the required
openness of outcome has its first (and perhaps only) source at the
quantum level. As long as the openness could be amplified up through
the causal chain so that it remained relevant to the description of some
of your actionse.g., to the complex physical state underlying your
choice to commit a crime or notthen you could be said to be free and
thus responsible for your actions. Only in this sense could quantum
indeterminacy (if it exists) be said to be the necessary condition for
human free will. Incidentally, note that nothing in this account makes
indeterminacy sufficient to establish robust free will in humans; it is
only a prerequisite, a first step in showing how genuine freedom might
arise at the level of complex organisms like ourselves.
In this third example there is again room for one to engage in
some serious metaphysical reflection, though not all will wish to do
so. Imagine that you accept incompatibilism as defined above, as well
as some version of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics: you hold that the quantum world is genuinely indeterministic.
Suppose also that you do not think that indeterminacy arises at any
other or higher physical level than quantum mechanics. The minimal
formulation of your view is that quantum indeterminacy is a necessary
condition for human freedom. But you might also postulate and look
for other kinds of openness as well. You might hold, for instance, that
the hierarchical structure of the physical world, rather than eliminating the indeterminacy, actually augments or amplifies it. You might
look for expressions of indeterminacy at multiple levels of the physical
hierarchy, from the macrophysical level of measuring devices through
genetic variation to indeterminacy in neuronal firing within the brain
and the resulting behavioral plasticity. In your more philosophical
moments you might argue that the existence of mentality in general,
and free will in particular, are among the results of this openness of
the world at whatever levels it occurs.24
Your view would then commit you to giving some account of how
quantum indeterminacy could find macrophysical expression. Could
you suggest a physical mechanism for making this indeterminacy
24
Having said this, I must add that I am not currently aware of any concrete results
that suggest such openness at any other level than the quantum level.
209
matter at the level of human decision makers? There are a variety of

physical processes that augment quantum mechanical effects (see the
essay by George Ellis in CTNS/VO, v. V). Or perhaps you would look
(more speculatively) for the augmentation of quantum indeterminacy
via chaotic systems to the point where they might have discernable
macrophysical impacts. Or perhaps you would attempt to specify the
mechanisms within the brain whereby quantum mechanical indeterminacy might directly contribute to the brain processes that underlie
and give rise to conscious experience.25 If you were convinced of the
strength of these empirical accounts and were also interested in integrating the results with a theological position in the fashion suggested
above, it would be natural to take an additional step. You might then
postulate that God created a world with indeterminacy at the most
fundamental level in order to allow the freedom required of human
agents. In this case, the existence of these mechanisms would reveal
something of the nature and intentions of the Creator of this physical
order. For example, God would have to be such that God could intend
to create conscious agents such as ourselves.
Clearly I have stopped short of a complete defense of quantum indeterminacy as the touchstone for human freedom. But I have tried to
show the significance of the sorts of connections that might be drawn
and to defend the type of reflection that is required for developing
and assessing these various possibilities. It may not be the case that
the different metaphysical alternatives would entail physically distinct
observations. Yet from the perspective of a theory of human nature,26
at any rate, they do represent significantly different options.
4. Taking Stock
In examining these three classic areas in the interpretation of quantum
mechanics it has been my goal not so much to decisively establish
one set of systematic conclusions as to defend the importance of this
25
Henry P. Stapp, Mind, Matter, and Quantum Mechanics (Berlin: Springer,
1993).
26
See e.g., Robert J. Russell, Nancey C. Murphy, Theo C. Meyering, and Michael
A. Arbib, eds., Neuroscience and the Person: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action
(Vatican City State/Berkeley, Calif.: Vatican Observatory/Center for Theology and the
Natural Sciences, 2000), hereafter NAP.
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philip clayton
type of discussion. This task is necessary, since many scientists are

constitutionally opposed to speaking of science and divine action in
the same sentence, such as occurs in this books title. Such scientists
pride themselves, in fact, on the distance of their own work from any
theological subject whatsoever (whatever their own private religious
stance might be).
4.1. The Continuum of Abstraction
Such outbreaks of animosity are not without precedent: for much of the
twentieth century, and perhaps since Kant, a bipartite opposition was
set up between physics and metaphysics. This contentious dichotomy
unfortunately managed to obscure a third realm, wedged in between
the two, in which interesting and productive philosophical interactions
regularly take place. In its professional form this realm is known as
the philosophy of physics and includes (among many other topics) the
questions of the status of objects and entities in physics, the nature of
physical law, the nature of inference and justification in physics, and
the relations of physics to chemistry, biology, and mental events.27 But
this in-between realm has in fact a rather broader scope than the formal discipline of the philosophy of physics. Bench scientists engage in
it on a regular basissometimes during the work day, and sometimes
over a glass of wine afterwards. It is inevitable that both theorists and
experimentalists spend time thinking about the specific conceptual
problems raised by their field: quantum indeterminacy, observation,
nonlocality, entanglement, and so forth. The preceding section provides
a good example of questions raised by physics even though they are no
longer physical questions in the direct sense.
27
Recent introductory texts to the philosophy of physics include James Cushing,
Philosophical Concepts in Physics: The Historical Relation between Philosophy and Scientific Theories (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Peter Kosso, Appearance
and Reality: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Physics (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1998); Roger G. Newton, Thinking about Physics (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 2000). Significant works (among many others) in the field include Jarrett Leplin,
ed., The Creation of Ideas in Physics: Studies for a Methodology of Theory Construction (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1995); Bernard dEspagnat, Veiled Reality: An Analysis of
Present-Day Quantum Mechanical Concepts (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1995);
Jeremy Butterfield and Constantine Pagonis, eds., From Physics to Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999); Elena Castellani, ed., Interpreting Bodies:
Classical and Quantum Objects in Modern Physics (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1998).
211
I would like to call this type of reflection meta-physical, using the

hyphen to indicate its borderline status. In one sense these questions
come after (hence the Greek meta-) the physical work. Yet in another
sense they are close cousins to physical questions, insofar as they arise
directly out of experimental and theoretical work in mathematical physics. To grant their close kinship with physics is to acknowledge that
physics and philosophy lie on a continuum. At the one endpointe.g.,
solving problem sets in your physics textbookfew, if any, philosophical questions are raised. At the other extreme, as one moves into the
more lofty realms of metaphysical speculation, empirical questions and
the controls of physics play a decreasingly significant role. But many of
the most interesting questions (the ones I have called meta-physical)
fall in the middle regions of this continuum.
Many factors influence how far along the continuum from problem
sets an individual thinker is willing to go. These include taste, scientific training and field, intellectual influences, cognitive style (e.g.,
philosophical or anti-philosophical mind-set), and level of intellectual
curiosity. When the topic is divine action, ones religious commitments
become crucial. If one is a theistand if one believes that her theism
should be responsive to the results of the natural sciencesthen she
has a strong motivation, and perhaps obligation, to travel further along
the continuum toward metaphysics and theology.
4.2. Taking the Next Step
One is often told that the problem is metaphysics: statements about
divine action are metaphysical statements, and some physicists deny that
there is anything interesting at all to say about any metaphysical topic.
Indeed, there were some in this working group who took this position,
maintaining that issues about the mathematical formalism and concrete
experimental results represent the sum total of decidable questions; all
else is subjective preference and hence beyond the scope of argument.
But most who work on questions of quantum physics think that some
interesting things can be said about at least some meta-physical issues
raised by physics.28
28
Indeed, many have actually published on meta-physical questions raised by quantum physics, and some even have books in which the word metaphysics appears in the
title! So the problem cannot be that all metaphysical statements are strictly speaking
meaningless and to be eschewed, as Professor Ayer famously held; A.J. Ayer, Language,
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philip clayton
We found that what might at first appear as a dichotomy (physics

or philosophy) is in fact a continuum. There are interpretive statements one can make about quantum theory that, although they are not
themselves part of physical theory, stand quite close to it; what I have
called meta-physical debates are determined even less fully by the body
of physical theory; and classic metaphysical debates are speculative in
yet a stronger sense. Clearly statements about theology and the quantum world will fall in the latter category. Thus dEspagnats comments
about quantum fields are only mildly interpretive; his postulation of a
deeper reality begins to be speculative; and his advocacy of a strong
Spinozistic monism, one phenomenal manifestation of which is the
physical world, is a fully metaphysical position. Still, at no particular
point does one encounter a definite point on the continuum, such that
assertions made prior to that point reflect purely empirical knowledge
and assertions made after it are purely speculative. I have attempted
to show that there is value in reflecting ones way across the entire
spectrum of this continuum.
It may be that there is no point of contact between those physicists
whose various publications span the whole continuum (in this group,
Heller, Polkinghorne, Russell, Stoeger, and Shimony) and those who
have not engaged in theological or metaphysical reflection of this sort.
But the idea of a continuum suggests that constructive contact is at
least possibleespecially if we avoid labeling the side closest to actual
physical theory good and the side closest to classical metaphysical
reflection or theology bad. (The opposite value judgment must be
avoided as well.) It is not intrinsically questionable to explore the
more speculative reaches of the continuum, for example by engaging
questions at the interface of theology and physics. Of course, claims
about physics and theology can be poorly or dogmatically argued, and
participants in the discussion (especially in more popular publications)
sometimes substitute lofty global claims for serious argument. But there
is no intrinsic reason why good argumentation cannot take place at any
point along the continuum.
Truth, and Logic, 2nd ed. (New York: Dover, 1946). For positivists in Ayers tradition, metaphysical questions are unacceptable whenever they introduce any entities
or categories that cannot be directly justified by the mathematical formalism and the
empirical data. On this view, debates about the foundations or interpretation of quantum
mechanics might or might not be acceptable, depending on how they are pursued.
213
One protection against sloppy or dogmatic treatments of theology

and physics is to take a pluralistic approach to the discussion, tracing
the multiple interpretive possibilities of quantum mechanics rather
than siding immediately with one or another. The reasonableness of
a given position in speculative debates is not immediately obvious,
as if one interpretation could be proven to have exclusive rights as
the best interpretation of the data. Rather, like the owl of Minerva,
judgments of reasonableness must come at the end of the day. Reasonableness in metaphysical debates lies in ones ability to tie multiple
discussions together within a single interpretive framework. The more
comprehensive the claim, the more domains will have to be part of
the explanatory story.
Clearly, explanations that include the term God lie at a rather high
point on the scale of comprehensiveness; they certainly cannot be less
comprehensive than the field of physics as a whole. Now the more comprehensive ones explanation becomes, the more difficult it becomes to
decide on its truth, whereas, famously, claims about more limited data
sets are easier to resolve. Strict and rapid decidability will not be the
hallmark of debates about physics and theology. Thus a certain shyness
about advancing any position at all is in order. But the shyness need
not be stultifying. Science has often been advanced by this or that risky
hypothesis; why shouldnt the same be true of the metaphysics of science as well? Hence, if we are to make any progress at all on research
questions that involve moving further along the physics-philosophy
continuum, it will be necessary to develop an even greater willingness
to entertain speculative hypotheses and to look rigorously for reasons
to select one and to abandon others.
5. Three Metaphysical/Theological Options

An entire genre of writings on the interpretation of quantum mechanics
moves in this more speculative direction. These authors take the sorts
of interpretive debates described in section 3 and attempt to provide
a more systematic framework within which to address them. Here the
goal is not only (for example) to solve the measurement problem, but
also to construct an adequate systematic philosophical position. As test
cases for this sort of discussion we might take the topics of philosophical monism, treatments of quantum physics in the context of Eastern
philosophy, and theistic accounts of divine action.
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philip clayton
5.1. Bernard dEspagnats Spinozistic Monism

Bernard dEspagnat has developed an ontology based on quantum
theory that represents a particularly interesting way of drawing lines
between physics and metaphysicsand refusing to draw others. As he
writes, in quantum field theory particles are viewed as quantized states
of a field that extends over the whole of space. But quantum fields are
not appropriately interpreted as things. The mathematics associates them
with operators like the operators associated with observable properties in elementary quantum mechanics, properties such as position or
momentum. To dEspagnat a French example comes to mind: quantum
fields are less like the Eiffel Tower than like some qualities that are in
(or: that we observe in) the Eiffel Tower, such as its height, size, or
shape. So we must ask: what is it that these qualities are qualities of ?
According to dEspagnat, the only possible answer is that the state
vector expresses properties of some deeper underlying reality. Since
we know its manifestations to uswe know what its like when
measuredand since quantum physics forbids us to speak about what
its really like when not measured, dEspagnat speaks of it as a veiled
reality.29 His is a sort of realism at a distance: we cant say that reality
is just this way or that, since our observations and what we observe
are intertwined; and yet we can say that the-world-as-observed is a
manifestation of the real; reality really takes this or that form in our
observations. DEspagnat develops these insights into a strong form
of philosophical monism.30 There is just the one reality, since quantum physics requires us to think of the world as interconnected and
nonseparable. And yet this reality can take quite diverse forms. Take
consciousness: it is not a separate kind of force, as in the dualistic or
subject-based interpretations of quantum mechanics; rather, it is one
property of that one realitynot a property of the particles in the
brain. The brain particles and consciousness both represent properties
29
See Bernard dEspagnat, In Search of Reality (Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1983). More
recently, see his Veiled Reality. See also idem, Realism and the Physicist: Knowledge,
Duration, and the Quantum World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989),
and his article in W. Schommers, ed., Quantum Theory and Pictures of Reality: Foundations, Interpretations, and New Aspects (Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1989).
30
Several critics are right to point out that dEspagnats monism is not a strict
entailment of his interpretation of quantum theory. The point of the continuum and
the pluralistic model I am advocating is that broader metaphysical discussions are
underdetermined by formalism + empirical data, and even by the basic interpretive
options, without thereby becoming purely arbitrary, bad metaphysics.
215
of the veiled underlying reality. Thus, dEspagnat writes, the whole

set of consciousness and the whole set of objects are in fact two
complementary aspects of independent reality; neither exists in itself,
but each one comes into existence through the other, somewhat in the
same way in which the images of two mirrors facing one another give
rise to one another.31 With this parallelism (or dual-aspect monism)
dEspagnats allegiance to Spinoza comes to light. For Spinoza there
was just one reality, which he called both God and nature: deus siva
natura. Likewise for dEspagnat, God means Being, and above all the
unity of Being common to the indications of physics and to the most
essential of Spinozas intuitions.32
DEspagnat is an ally to the divine-action theorist in several respects.
He clearly makes the empirical world depend on a deeper order, and he
allows that empirical science can at least hint at some of its qualities.
Science cannot however provide definitive knowledge of this realm,
since the very nature of science is that its domain is limited to empirical
reality.33 Thus he does not try to derive subjectivity from (or reduce
it to) the realm of the purely physical. On the other hand, dEspagnat
has also formulated the greatest competitor to divine action theories:
Spinozistic monism. He reminds us that there are ultimately three
major options for interpreting the physical world: there is no God, and
physics ultimately defines reality; there is a God (and presumably also
subjects), in which case Spirit is the more ultimate explanation of the
physical universe; or there is the One that has both mental and physical
qualities. Following the third option, dEspagnat maintains that there
is no God apart from the world; we dont need one, since the existing world admits both mental and physical properties as qualities or
attributes or operators.
5.2. Eastern Mysticism
The best known exponent of the Eastern approach has been Fritjof
Capra, whose book The Tao of Physics spawned a school of similar
books, essays and disciples. Capra finds close parallels between modern physics and certain key tenets of Eastern religious thought. Kevin
31
32
33
dEspagnat, In Search of Reality, 96f.

Ibid., 101.
Ibid., 167.
216
philip clayton
Sharpe provides a concise summary of the nine central parallels that

Capra advocates:
Eastern mysticism and modern physics perceive the cosmos as a unity,
holding together opposites in a complementary yin and yang manner
rather than in a conflicting dualism; they comprehend spacetime as [a]
relative construct of the mind and not objective; the universe as dynamic
and not static; that elements of matter cannot be understood as being
isolated, but only in relation to the physical vacuum in which they are;
that matter is performing a dance and not just quietly inert; he further
sees a similarity between the paradoxical nature of quark symmetries and
Zen koans; and between their both seeing no basic elements of matter, but
only patterns of change and interpretation within the mutual interrelation
and self-consistency of all phenomena (the bootstrap hypothesis).34
A host of authors have followed a similar tack. Dennis Postle, for

example, finds a similar stress on the interconnectedness, interpenetration, and interdependence of all things in both Eastern philosophy
and modern particle physics.35 Both approaches, he believes, preserve
a role for consciousness in affecting what the world becomes. In physics, Postle holds, an experimenters attitude towards the experiment
changes what is then looked at. But Eastern teaching goes further:
what we can know depends on our consciousness, and knowledge
is structured in consciousness. Physics (allegedly) points toward the
Eastern unity of all things, though in the end it doesnt go quite far
enough for these authors.
Bohm in his more mystical writings also seems to advocate a similar
position:
One is led to a new notion of unbroken wholeness which denies the classical idea of analyzability of the world into separately and independently
existing parts. . . . We have reversed the usual classical notion that the
independent elementary parts of the world are the fundamental reality,
and that the various systems are merely particular contingent forms and
arrangements of these parts. Rather, we say that inseparable quantum
inter-connectedness of the whole universe is the fundamental reality,
34
See Kevin J. Sharpe, Mysticism in Physics, in Religion and Nature, K.J. Sharpe and
J.M. Ker, eds. (New Zealand: The University of Auckland Chaplaincy, 1984), 43f.
35
Dennis Postle, Fabric of the Universe (London: Macmillan, 1976), 8f.
217
and that relatively independently behaving parts are merely particular

and contingent forms within this whole.36
Bohm turned this interconnectedness into an ethical or religious view:

Indeed, the attempt to live according to the notion that the fragments
are really separate is, in essence, what has led to the growing series
of extremely urgent crises that is confronting us today.37 Atomism
leads to confused questions, which indicates the need for new forms
of insight.38 Based on the quantum inter-connectedness of the whole
universe, Bohm concludes, one can no longer maintain the division
between the observer and observed (which is implicit in the atomistic view that regards each of these as separate aggregates of atoms).
Rather, both observer and observed are merging and interpenetrating
aspects of one whole reality, which is indivisible and unanalyzable.39
This leads to his main thesis: So approaching the question in different
ways, relativity and quantum theory agree, in that they both imply the
need to look on the world as an undivided whole, in which all parts of
the universe, including the observer and his instruments, merge and
unite in one totality.40
Entanglement phenomena in quantum physics have often been cited
as evidence for holistic conclusions. One finds mainline physicists who
appeal to entanglement to defend an overarching interconnection of all
things. Thus Henry Stapp defines the concept of local causality: The
principle of local causes asserts that what happens in one spacetime
region is approximately independent of variables subject to the control
of an experimenter in a far-away spacelike-separated region. Stapp
shows how Bells theorem conflicts with the principle of local causes:
The statistical predictions from which this result follows . . . have been
experimentally tested and confirmed. . . . Bells theorem shows that no
theory of reality compatible with quantum theory can allow the spatially
separated parts of reality to be independent.41
Ken Wilber then uses Stapps comments and the empirical tests of
Bells theorem to defend the holism of the Eastern traditions:
36
Bohm and Hiley, The Undivided Universe, 96, 102.

See David Bohm, Fragmentation and Wholeness (Jerusalem: The Van Leer Jerusalem Foundation, 1976), 1f.
38
Ibid., 8.
39
Ibid.
40
Ibid., 10.
41
Henry P. Stapp, Theory of Reality, Foundations of Physics 7 (1977): 31323.
37
218
philip clayton
It is common among the new-paradigm thinkers to claim that the basic
problem with science is that, under the Newtonian-Cartesian worldview,
the universe is viewed as atomistic, mechanistic, divided, and fragmented,
whereas the new sciences (quantum/relativistic and systems/complexity
theory) have shown that the world is not a collection of atomistic fragments but an inseparable web of relations. This web-of-life view, they
claim, is compatible with traditional spiritual worldviews, and thus this
new paradigm will usher in the new quantum self and quantum society,
a holistic and healing worldview disclosed by science itself.42
The problem, in other words, was not that the scientific worldview was
atomistic instead of holistic, since it was basically holistic from the start.
No, the problem was that it was a thoroughly flatland holism. It was
not a holism that actually included all of the interior realms of the I
and the We (including the eye of contemplation).43
When concepts such as these are fleshed out in full form by the more
radical Eastern mystics, the results can be startling:
. . . in quantum physics the elements are not physical themselves; they
do not exist as objects. Their very existence depends on the idea of their
existence beforehand. They are treated as tendencies to exist rather
than as already existing possibilities like the sides of a flipped coin.
In the quantum world the quantum coins sides do not appear unless
someone calls for them to appear. . . . Thus we conclude that the new
physics introduces the element of consciousness into the material world.
This consciousness will not arise from the molecule itself, as seen as a
material unit, but will arise as a risk-taking psychethat is, one that
chooses. These choices cannot be made willy-nilly. Reason must begin
to make its appearance, which surpasses the simple mechanism of cause
and effect. We know that atoms do not follow the laws of cause and effect
except statistically or on the average. To explain the evolution of learning, associative memory, and possibly even the more primitive forms of
memory called habituation and sensitization, we must face the quantum.
States of consciousness, feelings, emotional states, and psychology as a
science may depend on the recognition that mind, the consciousness of
the universe, arises through quantum physics.44
Now there may be inherent interest in the Eastern metaphysics that

these thinkers are seeking to express. The problem arises when the
42
Ken Wilber, The Marriage of Sense and Soul: Integrating Science and Religion
(New York: Random House, 1998), 38.
43
Ibid., 57.
44
Fred Alan Wolf, Star Wave: Mind, Consciousness, and Quantum Physics (New
York: Macmillan, 1994), 179.
219
authors couch their conclusions as if they were implications of the

quantum physics. Physics needs metaphysical interpretation, and some
quantum mechanical results do support a form of interconnectedness
not unlike the metaphysics of holism. But physics does not directly support a particular metaphysic on the speculative end of the continuum.
Of course, the founders of quantum mechanics were the first to stress
that the resulting ontology, whatever it turns out to be, will be radically different from the everyday ontologies that we encounter in the
macrophysical world and in traditional philosophical theories. Clearly
the physics requires some radical rethinking, though it is not clear that
this particular direction is the best way to go, and it is certainly not
the only one.
5.3. Theistic Metaphysics
In this final example I compare and contrast the previous two
approaches with the tradition of theistic metaphysics, briefly considering
both classical theism and panentheism. No pretense can be made that
physics will determine the choice between them, any more than it can
decide between theism and its competitors. Thus our only goal can be
to show the coherence of one particular account of divine action with
the physical constraints as we know them.
5.3.1. Classical Theism
Theism has generally been characterized by a two-fold assertion. On
the one hand, the way the world appears to us is not an illusion: there
are indeed multiple physical objects, law-like regularities, and so forth.
On the other hand, this world has its origin in an ultimate principle
characterized primarily as spirit. This means, at least, that the divine
is an active principle and that the actions of this principle are more like
that of a person than like the operation of impersonal natural law.
There are certain advantages to theisms double assertion in comparison to some of the views encountered above. Surely it is some
advantage to be able to incorporate the real existence of the world into
ones philosophy rather than having to label it all illusion. But it is also
an advantage to be able to grant the real physicality of the worldthe
existence of distinct physical objects that obey natural laws, change and
develop, and have a beginning and an end in time. At the same time,
postulating the existence of a God allows one to make sense of the
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philip clayton
existence of mental objects, or at least mental properties, in the world.45

For theists, mental properties are not utterly different in kind from the
deeper reality that underlies our everyday experience as creatures, since
God, the creative source of all things, also manifests consciousness and
agency. Indeed, from an explanatory perspective it would be a clear
advantage if ultimate reality has (quasi-)personal features, since it would
then have the resources to explain the higher-order features of human
persons. By contrast, an impersonal ultimate principle (karma, say, or
traditional materialism) must reduce mental or personal phenomena
to the terms of its own ultimate principle(s).
On the other hand, classical philosophical theism (CPT) faces a few
difficulties of its own.46 Since God is understood purely as disembodied
spirit, it is more difficult to specify in detail how God is to be presently related to the physical world. (I will assume for now that CPT
can adequately answer questions about the initial creation of the world
through the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo, though certain difficulties
arise here as well.) Further, Gods nature becomes perhaps too different
from our own. Human agents exist only as embodied,47 whereas CPT
understands the divine agent to be essentially disembodied. At worst,
one worries that no analogy will remain between human and divine
agency, which would mean that one could no longer speak without
equivocation of both humans and God as agents.
But what CPT cannot provide in terms of a model, it can protect
by means of a sharp separation between God and world. God dwells
ultimately in mystery, and as the tradition noted, his ways are not our
ways. The theist may not be able to say how God is an agent, if he is
utterly unlike us, nor how he makes a difference in the world. She may
therefore be unable to supply a theory of how God can act in a purely
physical world governed by natural laws. But she can always claim that
45
Classically, Christian theology claimed that there were mental objects or souls
that constituted the essence of (at least) each person. Recent dialogue with the neurosciences has led many theologians to think instead of mental properties rather than
essentially mental things. See, e.g., the essays in NAP.
46
I cannot do justice to the complicated criticisms in five sentences. In addition
to other works cited here, see Philip Clayton, The Case for Christian Panentheism,
Dialog 37 (1998): 2018; idem, Panentheist Internalism: Living within the Presence
of the Trinitarian God, Dialog 40 (2001), in press.
47
Even Christian theologians are now arguing that the notion of a (dualistically
understood) soul does not make sense. See, e.g., Warren S. Brown, Nancey C. Murphy, and Newton Malony, Whatever Happened to the Soul? Scientific and Theological
Portraits of Human Nature (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 1998).
221
God acts miraculously in the world, that God is not constrained by

natural law, that God acts in time from outside of time, or that God
is a co-cause of every event alongside inner-worldly causes. Surely the
inaccessibility of such divine causes to explanation by human agents is
disturbing. But it cannot be argued that it is incoherent.
5.3.2. Panentheism
As I have argued elsewhere,48 a panentheistic form of theism avoids
some of these difficulties. Panentheism is usually defined as the view
that the world is within God, although God is also more than the
world. If God includes the world with Godselfperhaps somewhat
on analogy with the relationship between your mental properties and
your bodythen the question of divine action within the world is made
less intractable than when God and the world are understood as fully
ontologically distinct.
Specifically, we can imagine the regularities of the natural world as
analogous to our bodies autonomic functioning. Of course, a being that
is omni-aware will know all the regular functions that are occurring in
the universe and can be said to be in control of them to an extent far
beyond a humans control over her autonomic bodily functions. This
means that each physical event, no matter how law-like, can be understood as an expression of divine agency. In addition to such regular
functions, panentheism also allows us to speak of focal divine actions,
similar to the way that a human can carry out focal conscious actions
through an act of attention and will. It is a matter of dispute among
theists how many such focal actions God accomplishes in the world.
But if they occur in a top-down manner, acting as a lure or partial
motivation for individual human agents, then no natural laws need to
be broken and hence no contradiction with the results of science needs
to be introduced.
It is particularly fascinating to note the parallels between this sort
of panentheism and some of the interpretations of quantum mechanics given above. One theme that has already been introduced in the
reflections of several quantum physicists is the distinction between
empirical appearances and an underlying reality. DEspagnat distinguished between the manifest and the veiled or hidden reality,
Bohm between the implicate and explicate (or implicit and explicit)
48
Clayton, God and Contemporary Science; idem, The Problem of God.
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philip clayton
order: That is, there is a universal flux that cannot be defined explicitly,
but which can be known only implicitly, as indicated by the explicitly
definable forms and shapes, some stable and some unstable, that can be
abstracted from the universal flux.49 Some label this the fundamental
metaphysical move: to distinguish between the world of appearances
and something deeper. Think of Platos distinction between the phenomena and the realm of the formsor, for that matter, any of the
other Greek attempts to specify the archor ultimate principle. Note
also that what the world ultimately turns out to be will depend on the
nature of this deeper principle.
Consider some candidates for the nature of this underlying reality.
In the Spinozistic tradition with which dEspagnat aligns himself, the
One is not an active principle; it is neither mind nor matter (though it
manifests itself as both); it is unchanging, eternal, and in itself unitary
and undivided. Contrast this position with the view of Bohm and the
physicists who draw on the process philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead,50 for whom the deeper reality is process or movement: What
is is a whole movement, in which each aspect flows into and merges
with all other aspects. Atoms, electrons, protons, tables, chairs, human
beings, planets, galaxies, etc. are then to be regarded as abstractions
from the whole movement and are to be described in terms of order,
structure, and form in movement.51 One must then ask whether or not
this reality-in-motion is conscious. The Hindu traditions, for example,
have often understood it as a universal ground of consciousness. Thus
the Hindu quantum physicist Amit Goswami solves the measurement
problem by imagining all conscious observers to be manifestations of
a universal, omnipresent ground of consciousness.52 For Spinozists, by
contrast, although mentality appears among the infinite attributes of the
One, mind is no more basic to reality than matter. Panentheism can
be seen to split the difference. It does not draw the sharp separation
between this material world and its purely spiritual source that we found
in CPT. On the other hand, it does not equate world and God, physical
49
Bohm, Fragmentation and Wholeness, 10.

See the two special issues of Process Studiesvols. 26.34 (1997)edited by the
physicist Tim Eastman and containing articles by (among others) the physicists David
Finkelstein, Lawrence Fagg, and Eastman.
51
Bohm, Fragmentation and Wholeness, 39.
52
Amit Goswami, The Self-Aware Universe: How Consciousness Creates the Material World, with Richard E. Reed and Maggie Goswami (New York: Putnams Sons,
1993).
50
223
and mental, as Spinoza does. Rather, the relationship between them is

analogous to our own relationship between our mental properties and
our physical properties, which a number of thinkers have understood
as a relationship of supervenience.53
Panentheistic theology tends to unify the world, understanding all
its behaviors as expressions of the one unified divine will, whereas CPT
conceives God as present to all parts of a world that is radically plural.
Of the two, CPT is somewhat more dualistic in its understanding of
the God-world relationship54 and more pluralistic in its conception of
the physical world. By contrast, panentheism shares with the Eastern
traditions, with dEspagnat, and with the later Bohm, a certain tug
toward monism over atomism. This fact links it with those developments
in contemporary physics that reveal a deeper level of interconnection
within nature. Entanglement phenomena, for example, reveal this sort
of interconnection in the quantum world, if indeed they show that
several apparently discrete parts of the world are in fact best viewed as
a single system or particle. The theory of quantum fields offers another
framework in which apparently discrete objects (subatomic particles)
are reconceived as manifestations of a unified field. The extent of such
interconnections is of course contested. But if the best interpretation
of quantum mechanics should turn out to be the one that emphasizes
some degree of holism, interconnection, and interdependence, then
panentheism becomes a level-three metaphysic that evidences a natural
fit or coherence with quantum physics so understood.
6. Conclusion
In this essay I have attempted to trace some of the lines that connect
quantum physics and theology. Admittedly, we have not found the
sort of tight conceptual connections that sometimes arise within the
philosophy of physics; in this sense there is certainly more freedom
than constraint. At least five tentative conclusions have emerged out
of the discussion:
53
On the supervenience relation see several of the essays in NAP, e.g., Murphy and
Clayton, and the literature cited therein.
54
See Bede Griffiths, The Vision of Non-Duality in World Religions, in The Spirit
of Science, Lorimer, ed.
224
philip clayton
a. Strong connections or constraints would suggest a tight model of

the science-theology relationship as involving strict entailments from
one to the other. The much more tentative and inconclusive nature
of the constraints defended here suggests a rather different model.
Instead of working with a physics versus metaphysics dichotomy,
we explored a three-level division of labor (physics, philosophy of
physics interpretations, metaphysical interpretations) that, I believe,
more accurately reflects the actual order in which the questions
are raised. Interpreting the quantum results naturally gives rise to
second-order philosophical debates; and these second-order options
are in turn amenable to various theological interpretations, some of
which may evidence a slightly better fit than others.
b. Such theological interpretations are admittedly speculative in nature.
Whether this speculation is acceptable or unacceptable depends in
part on what ones goals are. If your goal is to interpret, say, quantum physical entanglement with the absolute minimum metaphysical
commitment, then something like Abner Shimonys seven features
of potentiality will suffice. If you want a philosophically rich interpretation of quantum physics but nothing more, then one or more
of the standard interpretations of quantum mechanics presented in
this volume will do. By contrast, if you want an interpretation broad
enough to also include (say) biological structures and the existence
of creatures with psychological experience, then you will need a
metaphysics at least as extensive as those developed in this volume
by Chris Clarke and George Ellis. Finally, if you wish to reach a
metaphysical dimension broad enough to include human religious
experience, then you will have to go as far as the sorts of hypotheses
covered in section 5 above. To characterize such a project in advance
as bad or unacceptable is to use ones own disinterest as a criterion
of epistemic adequacynot a particularly powerful argument.
c. Imagine that one is looking for a level of theorizing that encompasses
both quantum physics and theology. Of course, this project is not
mandatory, yet neither have we found anything to suggest that it
is incoherent. What we have discovered is that one cannot engage
in such a projectone cannot do constructive work in science and
theologyunless one includes the relevant intervening fields. Again,
the essays by Clarke and Ellis in CTNS/VO, v. V55 reveal that the
55
Cf. Nancey C. Murphy and George F.R. Ellis. On the Moral Nature of the Universe:
Theology, Cosmology, and Ethics (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996); Arthur Peacocke,
225
best way of including these fields is by considering the pattern of

emergence that characterizes the relation between them. In the case of
quantum physics and theology, the relevant intervening data are (at
least) biological structures and mental properties or experiences.
d. Even if conclusions (a)(c) are granted, there remain multiple
theological or metaphysical options. It would have been nicer for
orthodoxy, perhaps, if a decision mechanism existed for making a
clear rational decision between the theological options, but we have
not found this to be the case. In a situation in which the metaphysical
options are radically underdetermined by the theories and data of
science, one must content oneself with affinities and compatibilities,
with (at best) a fit or coherence between groups of concepts in radically disparate disciplines. Panentheism may represent an attractive
middle ground between the complete holism of the Eastern mystical approaches and the stronger ontological separation of God and
world that has often characterized CPT (section 5.3 above). But the
looseness of the connection with physicsnot to mention the deep
ambiguities in the interpretation of quantum physics itselfproscribe
any lofty claims on its part.
e. For those who begin to study the possible interrelationships between
quantum physics and theism, and who are interested in the problem
of divine action, panentheism offers a certain attraction. It provides a
way of speaking of the law-like regularities of dynamics and mechanics as expressions of regularities within the being and character of
the divine (autonomic divine action). At the same time, it allows (in
principle) for focal divine actions that are consistent with physical
lawas long as divine action is construed as a top-down (or wholepart) influence that lures the wills and mental dispositions of conscious agents. Now there may be some reason to wonder whether
divine action actually occurs that is focused and specific in this sense.
Certainly if the divine mental influence were understood as able to
determine human thoughts and actions, it might begin to constrain
human freedom and, by implication, to make God responsible for
non-interventions that leave suffering and evil unrequited (the socalled problem of evil). For this reason, again, theologians are better
advised to limit their claims to how God could act than to commit
Theology for a Scientific Age: Being and BecomingNatural, Divine, and Human (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993); Harold J. Morowitz, Emergences: Twenty-Eight Steps
from Matter to Spirit, forthcoming.
226
philip clayton
themselves to strong knowledge claims about how God must act in

the physical world.
Quite a come-down from the old-style theology as queen of the sciences? Perhaps. The type of hypothetical theology that I have here
advocated is keenly aware of its limitations and the difficulties of the
task. These may not be awe-inspiring results. But they are accurate
expressions of the difficulty of the taskbut also of the opportunities
that face theists who wish to listen closely and respond to the scientific
results. Our exploration does not, at any rate, represent a null result.
And if I am right, it does provide at least the outlines for a continuing
research program in the field of quantum physics and theology.
CHAPTER SEVEN
CREATION, PROVIDENCE AND QUANTUM CHANCE

Thomas F. Tracy
1. The God Who Acts in History

One of the central challenges of modern theology has been to explain
what it means to speak of the acts of God. The biblical texts at the
foundation of Judaism and Christianity include a rich deposit of stories
that depict God acting in history to advance the purposes for which
the world was called into being. The extraordinary main character
to whom we are introduced in these narratives is not a distant and
impassive observer of the course of history. On the contrary, this God
engages individuals and communities in a relationship that unfolds as
a compelling drama full of tensions and surprises, reversals and renewals. The narratives present a vivid and often poignant account of a long
history of divine initiative and human response, stretching from the
covenant with Abraham to the liberation from bondage in Egypt and
the giving of the law at Sinai to the establishment of an independent
kingdom and the building of the temple and to the eventual bitter loss
of both. Christians later take up this story, reading it in their own way
and carrying it forward in the Gospels toward a surprise ending of
stunning boldness.
These stories do not simply remain artifacts of ancient faiths. Rather,
they continue to play a central role in shaping life within the religious
traditions that preserved them as scripture. The liturgical practices of
worshiping communities, for example, typically involve a movement
back and forth between the biblical texts, in which Gods mighty
acts are depicted, and the contemporary context, in which the ongoing presence of God is affirmed. In telling and retelling these stories,
communities of faith renew their understanding of who God is and of
what God is up to in the world. We might say that the narratives serve
to delineate the character of God by showing the divine agent in action,
228
thomas f. tracy
not unlike the depiction of human character in a well-told story.1 In light

of this narrative understanding of the nature and purposes of God, the
faithful seek to make sense of their own lives and of the world around
them. This meaning-making process, as H. Richard Niebuhr has pointed
out, involves not so much an incorporation of the story into ones life,
as an incorporation of ones life into the story.2 The biblical narratives
provide patterns for discerning how God is at work in the world, for
glimpsing this deepest of plot-lines in history. In understanding the
world this way, the faithful come to see themselves as living out, even
now in their own stories, a moment in the larger biblical drama.
1.1. Modern Challenges
Despite the central role that narratives of Gods acts play in the biblical
traditions, theologians in the modern era have persistently found themselves stumbling over the language of divine action, uncertain about
what to make of it. To be sure, circumspect theologians throughout
history have recognized that there is no direct and simple route from
the biblical stories to a theology of divine action, and they have grappled
with questions of interpretation. Some degree of hermeneutical selfconsciousness is virtually forced upon thoughtful readers by the biblical
texts themselves, which do not all speak with a single voice but rather
reflect an internally diverse tradition; in order to construe these texts
as a relatively unified story of Gods acts, a whole series of important
theological decisions must be made. This interpretive enterprise has
become particularly problematic for modern theologians, however.
There are several interrelated reasons for this, two of which are especially worth noting here.
First, the development of critical historical and literary techniques
has deepened our understanding of the contingency and complexity
of the biblical text. In particular, the application of historical criticism to biblical narratives has progressively loosened the connections
between story and history. It now requires great determination to
persist in taking biblical stories of Gods acts at face value as descriptions of historical events. But if God does not, after all, perform just
1
Hans W. Frei, The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative (Haven: Yale University Press, 1974),
and The Identity of Jesus Christ (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1975).
2
The Meaning of Revelation (New York: Macmillan, 1941), especially Ch. 3.
creation, providence and quantum chance
229
the actions described in the biblical stories, then what if anything does
God do? If, for example, we are not prepared to say that God sent a
series of plagues to Egypt, parted the waters of the Red Sea to let the
Hebrew people pass, guided them with pillars of cloud by day and fire
by night, and fed them heavenly mana in the desert, then in what way
is God the agent of their liberation?3 Having granted that the biblical
narratives should not be read as direct reports of God mighty deeds,
modern theologians confront a host of difficult questions about how
to interpret these stories and about what claims they warrant regarding
divine action in the world.
Second, the rise of the natural sciences has profoundly changed
the intellectual context within which this theological enterprise of
interpretation is carried out. Since the sixteenth century, the various
sciences have progressively disentangled themselves from the explicitly
religious conceptions of the universe to which they initially were tied.
For example, the periodic divine interventions that Newton introduced
to correct the planetary orbits were replaced by the deterministic causal
closure of Laplace; traditional flood geology gave way to the uniformitarianism of Hutton and Lyell; the exquisite divine design of each
creature for its place in nature (that Paley illustrated in his anatomical
studies) was succeeded by Darwins theory of natural selection. At
every point the sciences have proven their ability to provide powerful
explanations of events in the world without appeal to a transcendent
cause. Laplace spoke for the modern sciences generally in his famous
remark, when asked about the role of God in his astronomical theories,
that he had no need for that hypothesis. The sciences, for their own
explanatory purposes, not only get along perfectly well without God,
they systemically exclude appeals to such an agent from their battery
of explanatory strategies.
Langdon Gilkey famously pressed this question with great effect against the biblical theology movement (Cosmology, Ontology, and the Travail of Biblical Language,
The Journal of Religion 41 (1961), pp. 194205). The biblical theologians, e.g. G. Ernest
Wright in The God Who Acts: Biblical Theology as Recital (London: SCM, 1952), argued
that nineteenth century liberal theology made a fatal error in identifying revelation
with certain modifications of human religious consciousness. By contrast, Wright
and others contended that we come to know God in response to Gods self-revealing
mighty acts in salvation history, as narrated in the biblical texts. Gilkey pointed out
that the biblical theologians were unwilling to take these stories at face value and yet
offered no alternative account of what they meant by an act of God. As a result, they
were left in the embarrassing position of proclaiming Gods self-revelation in action
without being able to say what God has done.
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thomas f. tracy
1.2. A Dilemma for Divine Action

Modern theologians have been acutely aware of these features of contemporary natural science and many have drawn the conclusion that
we must give up, or at least profoundly qualify, talk of God acting in
the world. This is often held to be a consequence of recognizing either
that 1) scientific methods in principle rule out divine action or 2) scientific findings in fact are inconsistent with the affirmation that God
acts in the world. Neither of these claims will bear critical scrutiny.
From the observation that God cannot appear as a term in explanations offered by the sciences, it does not follow that theologians, for
their own distinctive purposes, cannot develop an account of divine
action in the world. And while it is evident that scientific explanations
sometimes refute particular religious claims about divine action (e.g.
that God brought the universe into being in 4004 BCE), it is at least
not obvious that anything the sciences have so far taught us about the
world rules out the possibility of divine action within it. It is a mistake
to conclude that modern human beings have adopted, in general, a
scientific way of knowing and/or a scientific world-view that rules
out talk of divine agency developed within a theological interpretation
of the world.
The theologians who have made these claims, and used them as the
basis for far-reaching theological revision, have almost always uncritically presupposed a deterministic picture of the natural world. We can
see this in a long line of religious thinkers, from deists in the eighteenth
century to Schleiermacher at the founding of liberal Protestant theology in the early nineteenth century to contemporary theologians like
Rudolph Bultmann and Gordon Kaufman.4 For these thinkers, a general
metaphysical picture of the world as a closed causal continuum came
to be invested with the authority of science by being treated either as
a methodological given of scientific inquiry or as a well-established
empirical result. This is one of the most important points at which
theological appropriation of the sciences during the twentieth century
lagged well behind the emerging openness and deep uncertainty of sci-
4
See Friedrich Schleiermacher, The Christian Faith, ed. H.R. Macintosh and J.S.
Stewart (New York: Harper & Row, 1963), Para. 46; Rudolph Bultmann, Kerygma and
Myth, ed. H.W. Bartsch (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1961), and Gordon Kaufman,
God the Problem, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972). Also see Langdon
Gilkey, op. cit.
231
entists themselves as they explored multiple ontological interpretations

of their own results. Once universal causal determinism is assumed to
be an essential feature of modern science, however, it is not difficult to
see why one might think that scientific explanations are incompatible
with theological claims about divine action in such a world. It appears
that God will be able to affect the course of events in a deterministic
world only by 1) setting the initial conditions and laws of nature which
jointly determine each event in the worlds history, and/or 2) interrupting this deterministic causal series to turn events in a new direction.
This presents the theologian with a dilemma. The first option accepts
the deliverances of science but does not give us divine action within
nature and human history, only divine action at their foundation. The
second alternative provides for divine action within the world, but does
so by countenancing violations of the laws of nature, and so requires
that we abandon a strictly deterministic world view.
It is now seems clear that the natural sciences do not require (on
methodological grounds) or establish (on evidential grounds) an
exceptionless causal determinism, though neither do they rule out a
metaphysical interpretation of this sort. This point alone is sufficient
to disarm the dilemma that would force a mutually exclusive choice
between modern science and the religious traditions that speak of a
God who acts in history. But this by no means solves the problems
that theologians face in interpreting this language in the contemporary
world. A host of difficult questions remain concerning the relation
between theological talk about Gods activity in the world and scientific
descriptions of events as integrated within a lawful (even if not closed)
causal structure. The scientific commitment to seeking explanations
formulated strictly in terms an intelligible network of efficient, rather
than final, causes has been enormously successful.
This explanatory paradigm has come to carry tremendous authority,
and it has had a deep impact on our expectations about how to make
sense of particular events in the world around us. We look at the world
very differently than did, say, the Irish monk who wrote the story of St.
Brigid miraculously producing a vast quantity of good Easter ale from a
small bag of malt.5 Our initial skepticism about this story is based not so
much on an assessment of the available evidence as on a general picture
5
Anonymous, Bethu Brigte, ed. Donncha O hAodha (Dublin: Dublin Institute for
Advanced Studies, 1978), Sect. 21.
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thomas f. tracy
of the world and on habits of explanation that have been shaped by the
natural sciences. Accordingly, miracles are very much out of favor, if
by miracles we mean events that a) are brought about by God and
b) depart from the laws of nature. Although nothing in the sciences
entitles us to say that such events cannot occur, we know that there are
important evidential hurdles facing any particular claim that one has
occurred; on this point, critical approaches in historical analysis and
our scientifically shaped understanding of nature reenforce each other.
We have grown instinctively resistant to picturing the world as a place
where God persistently breaks in with astonishing displays of divine
power. So while the modern theologians predicament is not as severely
constrained as our initial dilemma suggested (viz. to a choice between
the scientific enterprise as a whole or the God who acts in history), the
options appear quite limited. We can speak of God as the creator who
sets the terms of cosmic history, which then unfolds according to the
natural laws God has established. But if we want to go on to affirm that
God acts within that history, then it appears that we must take up the
epistemic burdens associated with miracles.
There are, I think, at least two ways to respond to this theological
predicament. The first argues that Gods relation to the world as creator, properly understood, provides the basis for an account of Gods
particular actions in history that is sufficiently robust for theological
purposes. This is to challenge the claim that constitutes the first horn of
the dilemma we constructed; the strategy here is to show that traditional
claims about Gods special providence in history can be explicated by
reference to Gods activity as the creator of history. The second response
addresses the other horn of the dilemma; it challenges the claim that if
God acts to redirect the course of events in the world, then this must
constitute an intervention that departs from the lawful structures of
nature. If a) the structures of nature include events that are not fully
determined by the past, and b) these events have effects that sometimes
are amplified in the causal sequences that flow from them, then God
could shape the course of history by acting in these open interstices of
creation without disrupting its immanent structures. It is at this point
that quantum mechanical indeterminism may be relevant.
I want to explore some of the strengths and weaknesses of each of
these approaches. Much of the discussion of the relevance of contemporary natural science to the theology of divine action has focused on
variants of the second approach. In this paper, I would like to counterbalance this tendency by including extended consideration of the
233
prospects for a position of the first type. There are two reasons for this.
First, it is important not to underestimate the resources available in the
classical theological tradition for giving an account of special divine
action in history that does not appeal to causal openness in the structures of nature. Note that if a position of this type could be sustained,
there would no longer be as clear and pressing a theological need to
need to develop a position of the second type; the theological stake in
scientific debates about (for example) deterministic interpretations of
quantum mechanics would be considerably reduced. Second, if we do
go on to claim that God acts through indeterministic structures in the
natural world, it is important to root this claim firmly in an account
of the basic creative relation of God to nature.
2. God as Creator
Gods fundamental action is the act of creating the world, i.e., the
totality of non-divine things. As this idea developed in the theological
traditions in the West, it came to include three elements. First, creation
is a free intentional action, rather than a necessity of the divine nature.
Because Gods being is complete quite without the world of created
things, creation is an act of gracious generosity. The effect of affirming
the freedom of Gods creative action is to emphasize the utter contingency of the existence of created things. This stands in contrast, for
example, to Neo-Platonic conceptions of creation as a necessary and
involuntary emanation of the super-abundant plentitude of the divine
being. This classical understanding of creation also contrasts with the
views of most process theologians. Whiteheads metaphysical scheme,
for example, specifies that every individual entity must be a creative
integration of relations to other entities. God is no exception to this
scheme; God makes a uniquely pervasive contribution to the creative
becoming of the world, but God and world are co-eternal.
Second, Gods creative act cannot be understood on the familiar
human model of refashioning materials already at hand. There is no
prime matter, no chaotic primordial stuff, that is presupposed by and
constrains Gods creative work. Rather, God creates ex nihilo; apart
from Gods creation action, nothing but God would exist. Creation
accounts for the very being of the creature, and not just for the way it
is or for its properties over time. It follows that the divine creative act
cannot be regarded as a species of change; in creating, God does not
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thomas f. tracy
transform or modify the state of things, but rather brings it about that
there are finite things at all.
Third, Gods creative action includes the continuous giving of being
to the created world in its entirety. Creation is not a particular event,
completed at some time in the distant past, which leaves behind (as
it were) a world that gets along perfectly well on its own. This understanding of creation was characteristic of eighteenth century Deism.
But the mainstream of the theological tradition has held that created
things do not possess a power of continuing in existence on their own;
rather, the existence of the created world depends absolutely at every
moment upon Gods creative action. This has typically been expressed
by saying that the act of creation includes the activity of sustaining, or
conserving, the existence of each creature.6 If God were to cease this
continuous creative action, finite things would cease to be.
2.1. Direct and Indirect Divine Action
This understanding of Gods relation to the world provides a rich context within which to interpret talk of divine action in history. God is
universally and intimately present to every creature at every moment,
and nothing takes place without Gods agency. Thus we can speak
not only of creatio ex nihilo but also of creatio continua, a continuous
creative activity expressed in the unfolding history of the world. There
is a sense in which everything that happens can properly be described
as Gods act, but we must be careful about just what sense this is. The
theistic traditions have wanted to affirm that God gives to created things
active and passive causal powers of their own, that is, the capacity to
affect other things and to be affected by them. Aquinas held that this is
part of Gods providential governance of creation. Divine Providence
works through intermediaries. For God governs the lower through the
6
The idea of divine conservation of the existence of created things should not be
confused with the scientific idea of conservation of mass and energy. The latter is
concerned with physical interactions between entities, and it specifies that these interactions and the transitions they bring about cannot involve the creation or destruction
of matter/energy. This does not conflict with the theological idea of continuous divine
conservation of the being of finite things; on the contrary, the two ideas compliment
each other, since both assert that interactions between created things involve changes
of state but not the giving of being. For an extended discussion of this point, see J.L.
Kvanvig and H.J. McCann, Divine Conservation and the Persistence of the World,
in Divine and Human Action, ed. Thomas Morris (Ithaca: Cornell University Press,
1988), pp. 1349.
235
higher, not from any impotence on his part, but from the abundance
of his goodness imparting to creatures also the dignity of causing.7
God could simply cause, say, a kettle of water to become increasingly
warm until it begins to boil. But God instead grants to created things
the dignity of causing, so that the water is heated by the fire. This
contrasts with the view of those who have taken Gods working in
everything that acts to mean that no created power effects anything
in the world, but that God alone does everything without intermediaries.8 The position that Aquinas rejects here has come to be called
occasionalism, because it holds that the created entities (or events)
identified as causes are merely occasions for Gods own direct action.
If we are to avoid occasionalism we must make a distinction between
direct and indirect divine action. In causing the being of creatures ex
nihilo God acts directly, without employing any subordinate agency as
a means, since there are no such agents until God creates them. But
in bringing about particular events in the world, God ordinarily acts
through secondary causes, producing the result through the operation
of created things.9
7
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, ed. Thomas Gilby, O.P. (Garden City, NY:
Image Books, 1969), Ia, 22, 3.
8
Ibid., Ia, 105, 5.
9
We can borrow a distinction from the philosophy of action to help explain the
ideas of direct and indirect divine action. Philosophers of action have recognized that
any instrumental intentional actioni.e. an action in which an agent does one thing
as the means of doing anothermust, on pain of infinite regress, have at its base an
action that the agent intentionally undertakes without having to perform any prior
intentional action as the means to it. This basic action is direct, in contrast to its
intended result which is indirect. There has been controversy about which element
in an indirect human action should count as the basic action, and we could, in a
perverse mood, carry over this question into theology and speculate about whether
there is some divine action that is intentionally prior to the act of creation. For my
purposes it is enough to note that Gods act of creating and conserving creatures ex
nihilo obviously cannot have creaturely intermediaries, and so it is basic for all the
indirect divine acts that flow from it.
It is also worth observing in this connection that there are two crucially different
senses in which we may speak of bringing about the existence of something. On
the one hand, there is the act of creating/sustaining ex nihilo, which is unique to God
alone. On the other hand, there is the bringing to be of a particular arrangement of
matter/energy in the world. Finite agents create in this sense; we are able to bring about
changes in things, and thereby cause complex individuals to come into existence or
to pass out of existence, as in birth and death. God can also be said to create in this
second sense, by acting indirectly through secondary causes. Bearing this distinction
in mind, we can say that all complex individuals (like ourselves), which are produced
by the operation of secondary causes, are created by God both directly (in sustaining
our being ex nihilo) and indirectly (by working through the order of nature).
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thomas f. tracy
2.2. Indirect Divine Action through Created Causes

On this view, the changes of state from moment to moment that
make up the history of the universe have as their proximate causes
the interactions of creatures within the order of nature. These events
can be regarded as acts of God, however, insofar as they result from a
series of causal intermediaries that God has established. This pattern
of attributing actions to an agent is familiar from human activity; we
use a great variety of means to accomplish our ends indirectly, and we
often describe such acts in terms of the outcome that the agent intends.
If I make a mark on paper under the right circumstances, my action
can be described not just as drawing an X but also as casting a vote.
But not every description of an agents intention is appropriate as a
description of her action; the links between the act and the intended
outcome may be circuitous or uncertain. We will hesitate to describe
my vote for mayor as ensuring adequate funding for public education,
even if that is what I intend. Further, not every true description of the
outcome of action (e.g., causing distress to the ex-mayors family) can
be taken as a description of the agents intention. Human agents are
aware only of a narrow range of the vast number of true descriptions
that can be given of our actions and their consequences.
These limitations do not apply to the indirect acts of the divine agent.
God knows everything that it is possible to know about the causal history
of the world, and God does not simply make use of causal structures that
happen to be available in the world but rather establishes and sustains
them. This vastly expands the range of events that may be attributed to
God as indirect divine actions. It is easiest to see how this story might
go if we work initially with a simple, deterministic picture of the natural
world. In such a world, God will fix the entire history of created things
by setting the laws of nature and the initial conditions under which
those laws operate. It will be possible, therefore, to attribute every event
to God as a divine act.10 The number of causal intermediaries and the
complexity of their interactions will be irrelevant; these causal chains
may extend across the entire history of the created world, all of which
will serve as the means to the ends now realized. When a strong east
wind pushes back the water in the shallows of the Sea of Reeds and
allows the fleeing Jews to escape from their pursuers, we can say quite
10
Also see William P. Alston, Gods Action in the World, in Divine Nature and
Human Language, (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989), pp. 200203.
237
straightforwardly that this wind was sent by God. The wind, and the
deliverance it makes possible, is no less Gods act if it is a result of the
lawful operations of the natural order than if it is the product of a divine
intervention within that order. In either case, it is something that God
intentionally brings about in accordance with Gods overarching purposes for history. On this view, Gods providential action in the world
is principally a function of Gods creative action at the foundation of
the world.11 The strong east wind is written into the course of history
when God establishes the laws of nature and the initial conditions of
the created world, and the billions of years of cosmic history that follow are the means by which God carries out this action, along with an
unimaginably vast range of other actions.
It is important to note that while every event in such a world will be
Gods act, our ability to describe these divine actions will depend upon
our understanding of Gods purposes. Jews, Christians, and Muslims
might agree with the general principle that God as creator acts throughout the history of the created world, but the traditions disagree about
some important aspects of the overarching plot-line that is being
enacted and therefore about which intention-descriptions should be
given of these actions. The differing stories they tell about Gods acts
have as their corollary diverging understandings of who God is, i.e.
of the identity of the divine agent.
2.3. Special Divine Action in a Deterministic World
If every event, taken under the right description, is an act of God, is
there any sense in which we can single out some events as special, or
particular, divine acts? Gods action, on this account, is universal and
uniform; God acts in the same way in every event, i.e. as the source of
its being. So there is no basis for picking out some events as bearing
a distinctive relation to Gods agency or as being attributable to God
in a way that other events are not. Nonetheless, there are at least two
senses in which events may be singled out as special divine actions. First,
events may play a special epistemic role if they become the occasion for
our recognition of Gods purposes, and thereby provide guidance in
11
I add the qualifier, principally, because it is possible to hold that God ordinarily
acts through secondary causes, but sometimes intervenes directly to bring about effects
outside the expected course of nature or beyond the natural powers of creatures. This
was Aquinass view.
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thomas f. tracy
understanding other events as belonging to a wider pattern of divine

action in the world. H. Richard Niebuhr remarks that sometimes when
we read a difficult book, seeking to follow a complicated argument, we
come across a luminous sentence from which we can go forward and
backward and so attain some understanding of the whole. Revelation
is like that.12 What makes the revelatory event special is that it enables
us to see the world in a new way, namely, as caught up in a drama of
divine action and therefore charged with a significance that we had
not recognized before.
Second, events may play a special causal role in the developing course
of the worlds history. Even if every event is an indirect act of God
brought about through created causes, some may play a particularly
important role in advancing Gods purposes, and this will be a fact about
their function within the causal series and not just about our perception
of them.13 History may have turning points, and the special significance
of these events is in no way diminished if they arise smoothly within
the causal structures of the world. As a result, there can be objectively
special divine acts even though they cannot be distinguished from other
events with regard to the way in which God acts in them.14
12
The Meaning of Revelation, p. 68.

Compare William Alston, op. cit., p. 216. What we take to be special about them
is simply that God has acted in such a way as to effect this result, that this is something
that God intended to bring about. How God chose to do this is not the heart of the
matter. This is right, as far as it goes, but it does not yet give us a basis for marking out
particular events as special acts of God, since every event (taken under an appropriate
description) in a deterministic world will be a specific result that God intends.
14
It is useful to map this idea onto the typology of divine action developed at
earlier conferences and presented in Russells introduction to Chaos and Complexity:
Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, ed. by Robert John Russell, Nancey Murphy,
and Arthur R. Peacocke (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1995), pp. 1012.
Both of the senses of special divine action that I have discussed are forms of uniform
divine action, within the terms of the typology. What I have called epistemically
special action corresponds to what the typology calls subjectively special action. The
second form of special divine action that I describe, however, cannot be located in the
typology as it is currently formulated. I have suggested that an event may both be an
expression of Gods uniform action throughout creation and be objectively special by
virtue of the role this event plays in realizing Gods purposes in the world. What marks
out the event is not that God plays a special causal role in producing it, but rather that
the event plays a special causal role in the unfolding course of events. The escape of
the Jews from Egypt may arise entirely through the ordinary interactions of natural
causes and human agents, and yet it may also turn human history in a new direction
and so be an objectively special, but indirect, divine act.
13
239
2.4. Indirect Divine Action in an Indeterministic World

So far we have been considering a simple model of a thoroughly
deterministic world; in such a world every event could in principle be
deduced by applying the laws of nature to a complete description of
the total state of things at any moment.15 But how would this account
of divine action be affected if the structure of the world were to include
some events that have necessary but not sufficient conditions in the
events that precede them? This might take either or both of two forms.
First, there may be indeterministic chance, in which the most complete
account of the transition from one state to another is probabilistic;
in this case antecedent states of the system determine no more than
a distribution of likely results for the next state. This is distinct from
what we might call epistemic chance, in which converging causal
chains catch us by surprise and/or the causal series is too complex
for us to unravel. Second, there may be indeterministically free intentional action, in which a rational agents choices are informed but not
determined by her physical and psychological history. The question of
whether either of these forms of indeterminism occurs in our world
is, of course, a matter of controversy. I will consider at length below
(in Section 3) the question of whether quantum mechanics can be
understood to present a theologically relevant form of indeterministic
chance. At this point we need only consider the hypothetical question
of what impact such indeterminisms would have on our account of
Gods action in the world.
2.4.1. Chance
If the structures of nature in fact include a role for indeterministic
chance, then one option for the theologian is to think of God as
determining these events. In this case, chance events would be causally undetermined only in their horizontal relations to other finite
events, but they would be fully determined by their vertical relationship to God. Note that a) in determining these finitely undetermined
events, God would be acting directly in the worlds history, rather than
15
Given the chaotic dynamics of some deterministic systems, however, no finite
intelligence could specify the initial conditions with sufficient precision to make these
calculations. Determinism asserts that the laws of nature and the initial conditions
jointly entail every future state of the system, but determinism does not entail predictability for any knower other than God.
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thomas f. tracy
indirectly through secondary causes, but that b) this direct action need
not disrupt the causal structures of nature, since chance events, ex
hypothesi, do not have sufficient secondary causes. This is the second
way of responding to the original dilemma we considered, and I will
consider this possibility at greater length in section 3 below.
An alternative would be to say that God leaves some or all chance
events undetermined, so that God really does play dice with the universe. To be sure, an extensive web of secondary causal conditions will
be necessary for the occurrence of the chance event. But this causal
nexus is not sufficient to produce the event, and if God does not
determine it, then nothing does. This situation generates a conceptual
puzzle. Is it coherent to say that God brings about a state of affairs in
which an entity or system undergoes a change that has no sufficient
cause, whether in creatures or in God? It is helpful here to recall the
distinction between Gods act of causing existence ex nihilo and the
act of causing creatures to undergo various changes; the divine action
of giving being to the entity does not cause the change of state that is
the chance event; creation/conservation is not, we have said, a matter
of working a change in the creature but rather of positing the creature
in existence. But in the special case of chance events, the creature that
God creates/conserves undergoes a change that not even God determines. Perhaps Gods creative act in such instances amounts to willing
that one from among a set of possible states for the system shall be the
one to which God gives being, without specifying which and without,
of course, providing any means by which a selection is made.16 This is
a puzzling idea, but this or something like it appears to be required if
we say that a) God is the creator of the world ex nihilo, b) the world
includes indeterministic chance, and c) God does not determine chance
events.
If it is a coherent possibility that God might build this kind of randomness into the structure of the world, how would this affect our
account of divine action? The answer will depend on the role that chance
16
Peter van Inwagen discusses this possibility with regard to Gods creative choice
between equally good alternative initial states of the world. God might, van Inwagen
suggests, will that one from among a set of alternatives be actualized, without determining which it shall be. It does not seem to me to be logically or metaphysically
impossible that God should decree that either X or Y should be without decreeing
that X should be and without decreeing that Y should be. The Place of Chance in a
World Sustained by God, in Thomas Morris, ed. Divine and Human Action, (Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press, 1988), p. 227.
241
plays within the worlds unfolding history. If chance events at one level
in the structures of nature are entirely subsumed within higher order
deterministic regularities, then the account of Gods indirect action
through these structures will be unaffected. On the other hand, if indeterministic chance plays a significant role in shaping the direction of
the worlds unfolding history,17 then the attribution of events to God as
divine acts must be correspondingly qualified. In establishing the laws
of nature, God determines how chance figures in the course of events,
and sets the range of outcomes that are possible. But if God chooses
not to determine these chance events, then at least some features of
the worlds future will be open, bounded but left unspecified in Gods
creative intention. The structures of nature will include within them a
means for trying out novel possibilities not rigidly prescribed by the
past; God would, in effect, make a world that must in some respects fill
in the details of its own creation. If, for example, some of the genetic
changes amplified by natural selection result from processes that involve
not just epistemic chance but also indeterministic chance, then which
living creatures appear over the course of cosmic history will not be
written into the design of the world.18 The natural order God establishes may assure the emergence of diverse forms of life with a wide
range of capacities, including eventually the ability to gain theoretical
knowledge of the world and to wonder about its creator.19 But on this
view, God may not have provided specifically that personhood should
be realized in a bipedal mammal; the particular species identity of the
rational agents that arise within the evolutionary process could be one
of the accidents of biological history. Gods agency would, of course, be
at work throughout this history as the creator who sustains all of the
secondary causes at work in it. And because God sets the boundaries
17
This is the question of amplification, which I take up in section 3.3 below.

See section 3.3 below.
19
Paul Davies, for example, suggests that God selects very special laws that guarantee a trend towards greater richness, diversity, and complexity through spontaneous
self-organization, but the final outcome in all its details is open and left to chance.
See Davies, Teleology Without Teleology, in Evolutionary and Molecular Biology:
Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, eds. Robert John Russell, William R. Stoeger,
S.J., and Francisco J. Ayala (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1988). It is, of
course, a matter of controversy as to whether the laws of nature and the conditions
under which they operate make the emergence of intelligence to some degree probable
in our universe. See, for example, Paul Davies, The Accidental Universe (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1982), and John Barrow and Frank Tipler, The Anthropic
Cosmological Principle (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986).
18
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thomas f. tracy
within which chance operates, thereby designing the dice that are set
rolling in cosmic history, the general result can certainly be attributed
to Gods action. But if, returning to our earlier example, the strong east
wind at the Sea of Reeds happened to be the meteorological amplification of a chance event somewhere else in the structures of nature, then
it seems more appropriate to view the wind as a stroke of good luck,
rather than as a particular divine action in history.20
2.4.2. Human Freedom
The second form of indeterministic transition that we noted above is
a particular, and particularly controversial, form of free human action.
One family of positions in the longstanding (and probably intractable)
philosophical debate about freedom of the will holds that an action is
free only if it is not determined by antecedent circumstances. On this
view the past history of universe and the laws of nature do not uniquely
determine the agents choice; under precisely these causal conditions
the agent could do otherwise than she does. This is commonly referred
as incompatibilist freedom because it holds that free action is incompatible with causal determinism.21 Note that causal indeterminism is a
necessary but not sufficient condition for incompatibilist free action; in
order for a free act to be distinguished from a chance event, an account
is needed of the agents capacity for self-determination, and this account
must not reduce to an explanation by appeal to the causal efficacy of
antecedent events. This is the metaphysical burden carried by defenders of incompatibilist freedom, and it is important to remember, as we
consider quantum mechanics, that searching out causal indeterminisms in nature (even if they are located in the brain) is not going to be
sufficient to provide us with a theory of free action. My interest here,
however, is simply to consider the impact that creaturely freedom of
20
The story here could be made more complex, however. If omniscience includes
knowledge of how every random transition would in fact turn out if God were to permit
it, then God could choose which total set of chance and determined events to permit
(i.e. which world to create) with particular effects in mind. In this case, it seems to me,
the east wind would be Gods act by a different route but in just a strong a sense as if
it were the deterministic outcome of a closed series of secondary causes.
21
For some arguments that human freedom is incompatible with certain types of
determinism see Peter van Inwagen, An Essay on Free Will (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1983). For some representative compatibilist arguments see Daniel C. Dennett,
Elbow Room: The Varieties of Free-Will Worth Wanting (Cambridge: MIT Press,
1984).
243
this sort would have, if the world were to include it, on the attribution
of events in the world to God as divine acts.
Just as we saw in considering chance events, there are two ways of
relating the divine agency to this second type of indeterministic transition. First, God might directly bring it about that the agent acts as she
does. There are at least two ways to argue that this divine causal role in
human action is compatible with the claim that the action is free. First,
one might insist that because God acts directly as creator to constitute
the finite agent and her act, God cannot be regarded as a determining cause that compromises the agents freedom. Second, one might
qualify the conditions for freedom of action so that indeterminism is
required only on the horizontal level of relations within the world; created agents would possess indeterministic freedom in relation to other
creatures, but not in relation to God. This second view combines a
creaturely incompatibilism with divine determination, and so generates
a distinctive theological compatibilism. This seems to have been John
Calvins position, and it has also been attributed to Aquinas, though
some interpreters read him as taking a position of the first type, and
the construal of Aquinass view continues to be a matter of dispute.22
The alternative is to say that God empowers and permits human
agents to make choices that are not determined by other creatures or
by God. Gods creative agency, of course, intimately and pervasively
shapes the exercise of free human agency by establishing our powers of action, their limitations, and the circumstances under which
they are exercised. In this respect, it is appropriate to say both that 1)
God always acts with the created agent, and that 2) when free human
actions conform to Gods will, the human agent is the means by which
22
For the first way of reading Aquinas see, e.g., David Burrell, C.S.C., Aquinas: God
and Action (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1979) and Freedom
and Creation in Three Traditions (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press,
1993); and Kathryn Tanner, God and Creation in Christian Theology (Oxford: Basil
Blackwell, 1988). For the second reading see, e.g., Thomas Flint, Divine Providence:
The Molinist Account (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998), and Thomas J.
Loughran, Aquinas: Compatibilist, in Human and Divine Agency, ed. F. Michael
McLain and W. Mark Richardson, (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1999).
The first approach faces important conceptual objections. See the discussion of these
issues in my Divine Action, Created Causes, and Human Freedom, and Kathryn
Tanner, Human Freedom, Human Sin, and God the Creator, in The God Who Acts:
Philosophical and Theological Explorations, ed. Thomas F. Tracy (University Park, PA:
The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1994). Also see David Burrells reply to me,
and William Haskers reply to Tanner.
244
thomas f. tracy
God acts. But it is important not to miss the fundamental distinction

between divine action by means of free human acts and divine action
by means of secondary efficient causes. If God chooses to create finite
agents who are free in this strong sense, then in establishing the laws
of nature and the initial conditions of the world, God does not fix the
whole course of history. Wherever a created agent faces a free choice,
there will be branching alternatives for the worlds future, and it will be
up to the creature to determined which of these alternative possibilities
becomes actual. The agents action will turn the course of events in a
genuinely new direction, setting in motion a novel causal series. The
consequences of the action will spread outward in space and time like
ripples in a pond. Both the free human act and its causal consequences
are intentionally permitted by God, but it may be that they do not enact
Gods particular purposes.
It is apparent here that human freedom considerably complicates
the account of divine action we have been considering. If we suppose
that God acts in history exclusively by means of secondary causes, and
if we also hold that God permits incompatibilist free action, then at
least two interrelated theological concerns arise. First, as we have just
seen, the attribution of particular events in the world to God as divine
acts becomes more problematic. We no longer can say simply that the
activity of creatures is the indirect action of God, since many events
will have free human acts somewhere in their causal ancestry. For some
theological purposes, this is a welcome conclusion. One of the most
pressing problems with any form of theological determinism is that it
makes God the cause of human moral wrongdoing, and this deepens
the difficulty of offering a morally plausible response to the problem
of evil.23 Given the open future of a causally under-determined world,
however, there will be many events that cannot be regarded as Gods
intentional actions, even though the divine agent acts in every event as
its ontological ground. God gives creation some scope of freedom to go
its own way, and while this freedom, along with all it makes possible,
is embraced within Gods purposes, some of its expressions can be at
odds with the good that God intends for creatures.24
23
Although there are various traditional strategies for blunting the force of this
conclusion, they face important conceptual and moral objections. See, for example,
Kathryn Tanners careful discussion of this problem and William Haskers reply in
The God Who Acts, ed. Tracy.
24
This idea lies at the heart of most modern responses to the problem of evil. Gods
good purposes in creation may require (as a logically necessary condition) that God
245
This leads to a second set of theological issues. The Christian tradition affirms that although history can and does go wrong through the
misuse of human freedom, Gods good purposes lie at its foundation
and ultimately will be fulfilled. The freedom that God grants to creatures
is a gift that expresses, rather than compromises, Gods providential
care for the created world. But how is this divine superintendence of
history to be exercised if creatures have the capacity to stray from Gods
purposes? God is not only creator but also redeemer, and redemptive
divine action would appear to require that God act in response to the
actions of free creatures. If we insist, however, that Gods action in
history always takes the form of indirect action through the order of
nature, then it is not clear that such responsive action is possible. The
fundamental structures of the natural world are fixed and in place long
before human agents appear on the scene and make the choices to
which God responds. If human choices were determined by antecedent
conditions, then both the human action and the divine response could
be built into the causal program of the world. But indeterministic free
human actions present problems for divine providence that cannot be
addressed in this way. This provides a compelling theological reason to
affirm that God not only acts indirectly through secondary causes but
also acts directly among them. And this, in turn, motivates theological
interest in points of under-determination in nature at which God could
act directly and yet without a miraculous intervention.
permit various evils to occur. This can be argued with respect both to so-called natural
evils (i.e., the harm that befalls creatures simply by virtue of the natural conditions
of their lives) and moral evils (i.e., the misuse of moral freedom by rational agents).
A full defense of Gods goodness must 1) identify the good for the sake of which evil
is permitted, 2) explain the relation between evils and this good, and 3) argue that
this good is worth having even at this price. I have argued elsewhere that there are
important limits in principal on our ability to do this; we can make some helpful points
about why, in general, a God of perfect goodness, power, and knowledge would create
a world that includes the sorts of evils we see around us, but we cannot expect to give
a full explanation of the magnitude and distribution of evils in the world. Rather than
offering an explanation of evil, however, the central focus of Christian theology is on
Gods redemptive actions in response to it. See my Evolution, Divine Action, and
the Problem of Evil, in Evolutionary and Molecular Biology: Scientific Perspectives on
Divine Action, ed. Robert John Russell, William R. Stoeger, S.J., and Francisco J. Ayala
(Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1998), pp. 51130, and Why Do the Innocent
Suffer? in Why Are We Here: Everyday Questions and the Christian Life, ed. Ronald
F. Thiemann and William C. Placher (Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International,
1988). Also see Russells comments on the problem of evil, in the context of evolution,
in Special Providence and Genetic Mutation: A New Defense of Theistic Evolution,
in Evolutionary and Molecular Biology, pp. 220223.
246
thomas f. tracy
2.5. Divine Response Without Direct Action in the World?

Before turning to the idea of direct divine action at points of causal
openness in the world, however, it is important to note that the argument for moving in this direction is not as strong as it may at first
appear. There are resources in the theological tradition for a fascinating
and subtle reply to the problem we just noted, a reply that avoids relying
on direct divine action in the world. The key to this view is found in a
particular understanding of divine foreknowledge. In the midst of late
sixteenth century disputes about divine sovereignty and human freedom,
Luis de Molina argued that divine omniscience includes not only 1)
knowledge of all necessary truths, and 2) knowledge of all matters of
fact, but also 3) knowledge of what every possible free creature would
freely choose to do in every circumstance in which it might exist.25
This is not simply a matter of foreknowledge of the free actions of
actual human beings. In addition to this it includes knowledge of what
these created agents would freely choose to do in any conceivable set
of circumstances, even though these circumstances never in fact arise.
Further, it involves having this knowledge with regard to every possible
free creature, including of course an infinite number who never actually exist. Molina called this third aspect of omniscience Gods middle
knowledge, because it is neither logically necessary (as is the first aspect
of omniscience) nor entirely dependent upon Gods determining will
(as is the second aspect), but rather is a knowledge of contingent matters of fact that are nonetheless independent of Gods will, since their
truth is fixed by the free choices of finite agents (i.e., the free choices
these creatures would make if they were to exist in these circumstances).
This idea has been controversial ever since Molina proposed it, and
there is a lively contemporary discussion about whether there are any
true propositions of the form Molina proposes (i.e. true propositions
about what an actual or possible free agent would freely choose to do
in circumstances that never actually exist).26
25
Luis de Molina, On Divine Foreknowledge: Part IV of the Concordia, ed. Alfred
J. Freddoso (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988). For helpful discussions of
Molina and his dispute with Dominic Banez see Freddosos introduction, and Kathryn
Tanner, God and Creation in Christian Theology, ch. 4.
26
These propositions have come to be called counterfactuals of freedom, and a
great deal has been written about them. For a small sampling of the contemporary
controversy see, for example, Robert Adams, Middle Knowledge and the Problem of
Evil, American Philosophical Quarterly 14 (1977), pp. 109117, and An Anti-Molinist
Argument, in Philosophical Perspectives 5 (1991), pp. 343353; Thomas Flint, Divine
247
If there are such truths to be known, then omniscience will include

them. This will put God in a position to respond to free human actions
by acting indirectly through secondary causal chains built into the
order of nature at the outset. It is, of course, extraordinarily difficult
to imagine designing the causal laws and boundary conditions of the
world in such a way that a particular set of free agents and a particular
set of divine responses to the actions of those agents emerge entirely
through the ordinary operation of secondary causes. But there is no
reason to think that this is logically impossible; the fact that the design
problem boggles our minds does not have much force as a refutation
of the idea that Gods providential intention works in this way.
It might be objected that an indirect divine action programmed into
the structure of nature from time immemorial is not what the faithful
have in mind when they understand their lives to be lived as a responsive, interpersonal relationship with God. We need not, however, adopt
a temporal picture of divine action that locates Gods creative initiative
at a moment in the distant past and imposes a temporal gap between
our acts and Gods response. As the creator of all things, including
time, God has classically been understood to transcend time. One way
to try to grasp this inevitably ungraspable idea is to imagine that the
whole created world in its temporal extension is immediately present
to God, so that God is simultaneous with every event in time even
though these events are not simultaneous with each other. When God
takes a free human action into account in the overall design of the
created world, this taking into account does not occur either before
or after the human action. The human action is explanatorily, but not
temporally, prior to the divine act of taking it into account, and the
events that constitute Gods response take place at the time proper to
them in the causal history of the world.27
There are, of course, important conceptual puzzles raised both by the
idea of middle knowledge and by the notion of timeless eternity. These
puzzles have kept theologians busy for centuries, and show promise of
continuing to do so. Every theological position, however, brings with
Providence: The Molinist Account (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998); William
Hasker, A Refutation of Middle Knowledge, Nous 20 (1986), pp. 545557.
27
See, for example, William Hasker, God, Time, and Knowledge (Ithaca, NY: Cornell
University Press, 1989); Brian Leftow, Time and Eternity (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University
Press, 1991); Eleonore Stump and Norman Kretsmann, Eternity, Journal of Philosophy
79 (1981), pp. 429458, and Richard Swinburne, God and Time, in Reasoned Faith,
ed. Eleonore Stump (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993), pp. 204222.
248
thomas f. tracy
it various conceptual difficulties, and decisions between competing

theological proposals inevitably involve judgments of art about which
problems we want to cope with. So we do not need to settle these disputed questions about foreknowledge and eternity in order to see that
we have here a powerful strategy for understanding particular divine
action in history in terms of indirect action through the natural order.
This considerably dampens the force of the theological argument I
gave for supplementing indirect divine action with the claim that God
also acts directly in the world. On the account I have been considering, events can be 1) objectively special divine acts and 2) particular
divine responses to human acts, and yet be indirect acts brought about
entirely through the working of created agencies without any direct
divine action other than creation/conservation. If most of what theology
needs to say about Gods action in history can be provided in this way,
then the theological motive for searching out openings in the causal
structure of the world is undercut. This point applies, of course, not
only to theological interest in quantum mechanics, but also to appeals
to chaos theory or any other area of contemporary scientific work.
I argued in an earlier paper that if theologians want to say that God
acts to alter the course of events once the worlds history is underway,
then there must be gaps (of the right sort) in the causal structures of
nature.28 That conclusion still seems to me to be correct. But in light of
the theological options explored in this paper, it is less clear that there
is a need to make claims of this sort about direct divine action in the
world, except in a limited (but theologically crucial) set of instances
(e.g., in explicating classical theological claims about Christ). In these
special cases, however, traditional views seem to involve a mode of
divine action more akin to miraculous intervention than merely to
a redirection of events by means of a probabilistic flexibility built into
the laws of nature.29
28
Particular Providence and the God of the Gaps, in Chaos and Complexity:
Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, ed. Robert John Russell, Nancey Murphy, and
Arthur Peacocke (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1995), pp. 289324.
29
It has often been noted that it is not possible to spell out very fully the action that
is ascribed to God when Christianity affirms that God raised Jesus from the dead. If
we interpret this language as pointing to an eschatological transformation of the human
creature, then the familiar notion of miraculous divine intervention in nature is not
so much wrong as insufficiently radical. Certainly the new creation is not merely the
disruption or violation of the old order, but rather its fulfillment.
249
3. Direct Divine Action Through Open Structures in Nature

That being said, it is important nonetheless to consider whether we
might think of God as acting directly at points of causal openness in
the structures of nature. There are a number of reasons to explore
this possibility. So far, we have been considering how rich a theology
of divine action can be generated if we limit our account to 1) direct
action in creation and conservation and 2) indirect action through
secondary causes. If the idea of non-miraculous direct divine action
can be worked out satisfactorily, it could be conjoined with these
modes of divine action in a combined approach that can more readily
interpret traditional claims about Gods active engagement with nature
and history. Furthermore, if our best theories about the structures of
nature support an indeterministic interpretation, then this is something
that a theology of divine action will need to take into account. The
Creator of such a universe will be not only the Lord of natural law
but also, and in a perfectly acceptable sense, the God of the gaps. We
have already seen that the indirect action position, as I have sketched
it, is able to accommodate indeterministic transitions of chance and
of freedom. It is important to acknowledge the possibility that one of
the ways Gods providential care engages the world is through these
open structures in nature. Finally, the theological approach I have so
far been considering faces a variety of important objections, and so it
is wise to consider alternatives. Of course, the idea of non-miraculous
direct divine action also faces a number of difficult challenges. Given
the inevitably problematic nature of all theological constructions, there
is good reason to explore a variety of possibilities. In developing the
idea of divine action, we need not claim to know which of the possibilities comes closest to capturing Gods ways with the world, but we
do need to show that some coherent combination of these possibilities
provides a means by which God could accomplish the purposes that
we attribute to the divine agent.
We turn, then, to the suggestion that God might act directly at points
of under-determination to shape the course of events without disrupting the structures of nature. Any position of this type will require not
only that the natural order be causally open rather than closed, but also
that under-determined transitions at least sometimes make a significant
difference in the development of the events that follow from them. If
these conditions are met, then we can conceive of God acting to bring
about particular effects in the world without displacing secondary
250
thomas f. tracy
causes. Note that this is not to say that God acts entirely without created
causes. The effects God brings about will have an extensive network
of causal antecedents in the world, but these will be necessary, rather
than sufficient, conditions.30 There are a number of different ways in
which this general theological strategy can be deployed, and the details
will vary from case to case. I will focus here on the possibility of direct
divine action through indeterministic events at the lowest levels in the
structures of nature.31 It is worth noting at the outset, however, that
there may be causal incompleteness at other levels of the natural order;
if the case can be made for the existence such open structures, then
it may be possible to conceive of God acting directly through these
structures as well.32
3.1. Multiple Interpretations of Quantum Mechanics
There are a number challenges facing any attempt to make use of
quantum physics in developing a proposal of this kind about divine
action. Perhaps the first and most obvious is that quantum theory can
be interpreted in a bewildering variety of different ways, not all of which
are congenial to this theological project. The formalism of quantum
mechanics is well-established, but there has been a remarkable prolifera-
30
Russell makes a distinction between mediated and immediate divine action in
Divine Action and Quantum Mechanics: A Fresh Assessment (note #30) in this
volume. The former refers to divine action that presupposes secondary causal conditions and works together with them. The latter would be unilateral divine action. If an
immediate divine action truly had no necessary causal conditions in the prior history
of the world, however, it is not clear that it could be an action in the world at all. So
all divine actions within nature and history will be mediated, whether those actions
are performed indirectly by means of secondary causes or directly in the way we are
now considering. Gods direct act of creating/conserving the world, of course, will be
unmediated.
31
William Pollard is an early proponent of one version of this theological strategy. See
Chance and Providence: Gods Action in a World Governed by Scientific Law (London:
Faber and Faber, 1958). For contemporary varieties of this approach see Robert Russell,
Special Providence and Genetic Mutation: A New Defense of Theistic Evolution, in
Evolutionary and Molecular Biology, and the articles by George Ellis, Nancey Murphy,
and Thomas Tracy in Chaos and Complexity.
32
John Polkinghorne, for example, argues that the unpredictability in principle of
macroscopic chaotic systems suggests an underlying ontological openness. Although
the non-linear equations describing chaotic systems are deterministic, Polkinghorne
suggests that this formalism is an abstract and approximate description of natural systems that are more flexible than the mathematics suggests. See Science and Providence:
Gods Interaction with the World (London: SPCK Press, 1989), and The Metaphysics
of Divine Action, in Chaos and Complexity.
251
tion of different explanations of what that formalism might tell us about

the world.33 The behavior of quantum systems defies ready ontological
interpretation, and this leaves physicists grappling with the limits of
our conceptual resources, with what is speakable and unspeakable in
quantum mechanics.34 This predicament bears a striking resemblance to
the classical struggles of theologians in attempting to speak of a reality
that inevitably exceeds our grasp.
If quantum theory is going to be helpful for the theological purposes
I have described, it obviously must be interpreted indeterministically.
It is fair to say that some of the currently dominant interpretations
of quantum mechanics meet this condition, but the question is by no
means settled.35 According to the Copenhagen view, the wave function
of a quantum entity (e.g., an electron) describes a state that in certain
respects is objectively indeterminate. Some of the properties of the
entity have specific values, e.g., the mass, charge, and magnitude of
spin of an electron. But other properties must be expressed as a sum
of probabilities (on measurement) for every possible particular state
of the entity; this is the case, for example, with the electrons position, momentum, and spin orientation. The wave function describes
the development of the entity in space and time, and is strictly deterministic; the quantum entity undergoes a mathematically necessary
and precise evolution of indeterminate (probabilistically described)
properties. When a measurement is made, however, a determinate
value is obtained for the measured property, e.g., orientation of spin.
This collapse of the wave equation to a single value for the measured
33
A brief overview of competing interpretations of quantum mechanics can be found
in John Polkinghorne, The Quantum World, and Robert John Russell, Quantum
Physics in Philosophical and Theological Perspective, both in Physics, Philosophy and
Theology: The Common Quest for Understanding, ed. Robert John Russell, William R.
Stoeger, S.J., George V. Coyne, S.J. (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1988).
Also see Butterfield and Polkinghorne in CTNS/VO, v. V. There are a number of good
introductions to quantum mechanics written for the general reader. For example, see
Nick Herbert, Quantum Reality: Beyond the New Physics (Garden City, NJ: Anchor/
Doubleday, 1985); Peter Kosso, Appearance and Reality: an Introduction to the Philosophy of Physics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998); John Polkinghorne, The
Quantum World (London: Longman, 1984); Alastair Rae, Quantum Physics: Illusion
or Reality? (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986).
34
This is the title of John Bells book (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1987).
35
Werner Heisenberg is well-known for this indeterministic interpretation of quantum theory. See his Physics and Philosophy: the Revolution in Modern Science (New
York: Harper & Row, 1958).
252
thomas f. tracy
property cannot be further explained beyond noting the probability of

that particular outcome, which can be derived from an analysis of the
wave equation. On the Copenhagen interpretation, quantum theory is
complete; there are no hidden variables that, if we knew them, would
allow us to assign fully determinate properties to the entity at every
moment and therefore explain the measured result as having been
causally determined by antecedent conditions. It is at this point that
we encounter the indeterministic character of quantum systems; the
transition from the indeterminate superposition of possibilities to a
particular determinate state represents a point of ontological chance
and causal openness in the structure of the world.
This interpretation of quantum theory has not gone uncontested.
Einstein was famously troubled by the idea that God would play dice
with the universe, and the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen thought experiment of the 1930s was designed to display the counter-intuitive consequences of supposing that there is actual superposition in quantum
systems involving two correlated particles. EPR sought to show that if
quantum theory is complete, i.e. if there are no local hidden variables
determining the particle states that quantum theory leaves indeterminate, then we seem to be left with instantaneous action at a distance
when measurement takes place. Einstein found this consequence of the
completeness thesis too bizarre to be credible, and so concluded that
quantum theory must be incomplete. Niels Bohr, on the other hand,
held that the theory is complete, and so affirmed non-locality (illustrating once again that one thinkers modus ponens is another thinkers
modus tollens).36 In the 1960s, John Bell broke through this impasse
by showing that the theoretical predictions of quantum mechanics
are incompatible with local hidden variable theories.37 This was not
the end of hidden variable theories, however; even before Bell, David
Bohm had put forward a non-local hidden variable interpretation of
quantum mechanics.38 Bohms version of the theory supposes that there
36
Niels Bohr, Atomic Physics and Human Knowledge (New York: Wiley, 1958).
John Bell, Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1987). Also see James T. Cushing and Ernan McMullin,
eds. Philosophical Consequences of Quantum Theory: Reflections on Bells Theorem
(Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1989); Michael L.G. Redhead,
Incompleteness, Nonlocality, and Realism: a Prolegomenon to the Philosophy of Quantum
Mechanics (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987).
38
David Bohm, A Suggested Interpretation of Quantum Theory in Terms of Hidden
Variables, I & II, Physical Review 85 (1952), and Wholeness and the Implicate Order
(London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980).
37
253
are determinate values for the properties (like position, which he treats
as basic and from which other properties, such as spin, are derived)
of entities in quantum systems, and he accounts for the probabilistic
character of our knowledge by postulating that these classical-like
particles interact with a pilot wave, which is mathematically related to
the wave function of the quantum formalism. In order to explain the
correlation of properties when measurement occurs on linked two-particle systems, these pilot waves must themselves be correlated in a way
that instantaneously incorporates information about the measurement
situation. In this way Bohm constructs an interpretation of quantum
theory according to which its probabilistic character is strictly an artifact
of the limits of our knowledge, and does not reflect any indeterminateness in the properties of the quantum entities nor any indeterminism
in their causal histories.
Bohms version of quantum theory has not been widely embraced.
There are a variety of reasons for this: e.g. worries about how it handles
special relativity, uneasiness with its postulation of additional entities
for which there can in principle be no experimental evidence, its failure
so far to suggest novel lines of empirical research.39 But Bohms account
does save determinism and the principle of sufficient reason, and these
are powerful considerations in its favor. James Cushing has argued that
the current consensus in favor of the Copenhagen interpretation reflects
various historical contingencies in the development of modern physics.40 At this point in the development of quantum theory, the decision
for or against a Bohm-like approach remains perhaps a matter more
of metaphysics than of physics.
The alternative views I just sketched are by no means the only interpretative options that the theologian faces, nor is Bohms account the
only deterministic interpretation of quantum theory. In a rather different way, many worlds interpretations are deterministic, insofar as
they insist that when measurement takes place all the possibilities (of
non-zero amplitude) prescribed by the wave equation are actualized.
There is no indeterministic transition from superposed possibilities to
a single actuality; the wave equation does not collapse, rather the world
branches, and it does so in accordance with the deterministic evolution
39
See the essays by Polkinghorne and Redhead in CTNS/VO, v. V.

James T. Cushing, Quantum Mechanics: Historical Contingency and the Copenhagen
Hegemony (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994).
40
254
thomas f. tracy
of the wave function.41 The only uncertainty in this transition is epistemic; we know what outcomes are possible (i.e. what worlds will be
spawned by our act of measurement ) and we can precisely state the
relative probability of each outcome (i.e. the likelihood of our world
actualizing any one of these possibilities), but we cannot know which
outcome will occur (which world we will find that we inhabit).
This interpretive pluralism creates both an opportunity and a hazard
for the theologian. On the one hand, it is perfectly legitimate under
these circumstances for a thinker grappling with the theology of nature
to prefer one interpretation to another on theological grounds. Indeed,
there can be no theological appropriation of quantum mechanics that
does not make use of one or another of the currently viable interpretations. On the other hand, in casting our theological lot with a particular
interpretation, we take the risk that new developments in physics or
in the philosophy of physics will significantly undercut our theological
constructions. It is important to acknowledge this possibility in framing
our discussion of these matters, and this suggests two caveats. First,
the particular interpretive approach we favor should not be presented
as the conclusion to be drawn from quantum mechanics. Second,
proposals about the theological relevance of quantum theory should be
regarded as tentative and provisional hypotheses reflecting the current
uncertainty of the relevant science and the extraordinary difficulty of
interpreting it.
3.2. The Measurement Problem
One of the considerations driving the proliferation of interpretations of
quantum theory is the nest of puzzles generated by the role of measurement in the standard interpretation. As we have seen, when a
measurement takes place, the superposed possibilities described by the
wave equation collapse to a single determinate value for the measured
property. The outcome of this transition is not determined by the prior
state of the system; rather, one state is actualized from among a probabilistically structured ensemble of possible states. Unless a measurement
is made, the quantum system continues to evolve deterministically in
accordance with the wave equation. Here we encounter one of the
41
Bryce S. DeWitt and Neill Graham, eds. The Many-Worlds Interpretation of
Quantum Mechanics (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973).
255
central puzzles of quantum theory. What is it about the act of measurement that induces the collapse of the wave function? Bohr was inclined
to point out that the macroscopic apparatus in the laboratory registers
determinate states that are distributed in conformity with the wave
function, and leave it at that. But if we move beyond this instrumentalism and interpret the quantum formalism as representing an actual
indeterminacy in the system studied, then a host of difficult questions
arise about how and where the indeterminateness of quantum entities
gives way to the definiteness of macroscopic objects.
The puzzles surrounding measurement, as it is understood by the
standard account of quantum theory, have at least two kinds of consequences for theological uses of this interpretation. First, they provide
a motive for adopting an interpretation that avoids the idea of wave
function collapse, and this may well result in a view that is less congenial to theological use. In the perplexing enterprise of interpreting
quantum mechanics, however, each approach engenders its own set of
problems. We just noted, for example, that although Davids Bohms
deterministic interpretation generates no measurement problem, it faces
difficulties about the privileged role it gives to position over momentum, the postulation of pilot waves, and the way it handles special
relativity. Second, if we say that God acts through chance events at the
quantum level, then it appears that this form of divine action is limited
to occasions of measurement. John Polkinghorne has argued that this
restricts Gods action in a way that severely undercuts the usefulness
of quantum indeterminism for a theology of divine action. If (at the
quantum level) causal openness is found only in the collapse of the
wave function, and if the wave function collapses only when there is
an irreversible macroscopic registration of the state of the quantum
system, then Gods action appears to be discontinuous and episodic.
Occasions of measurement only occur from time to time and a God
who acted through being their determinator would also only be acting
from time to time. Such an episodic account of providential agency
does not seem altogether satisfactory theologically.42
42
John Polkinghorne, The Metaphysics of Divine Action, in Chaos and Complexity,
pp. 152153. Also see Polkinghornes remarks on this problem in this volume. The
idea that measurement should be understood as the irreversible macroscopic registration of a quantum effect can be found both in Polkinghorne, CTNS/VO, v. V and
in Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, in Evolutionary and Molecular
Biology, p. 212.
256
thomas f. tracy
The measurement problem certainly raises an important knot of

issues for theological appeals to quantum indeterminism. But questions about measurement are so basic and unsettled a part of quantum
theory that it is unclear as yet how far-reaching a problem is posed by
the apparently episodic character of measurement events. Two cautious
observations may be pertinent here. First, it is important to note, as
Robert Russell points out, that state reduction takes place throughout
the natural world, and not only in the laboratory. Such events occur
constantly in the universe whenever elementary particles interact irreversibly with molecules, gases, solids, and plasmas.43 Russell mentions
a number of particular examples: e.g., Brownian motion, blackbody
radiation, the photoelectric effect, fission and fusion. In radioactive
decay an indeterministic quantum transition occurs that, at least on the
customary interpretation, takes place whether or not a Geiger counter
is present to record it. But these examples only point us back to the
underlying puzzles about measurement. The radioactive material and
our Geiger counters (and Schrdingers infamous and unfortunate cat
in the box) can all be described quantum mechanically, and yet we do
not find macroscopic objects displaying superpositions of incompatible properties (e.g. we do not encounter cats that are both dead and
alive). We are bought back to the question of when and under what
circumstances the wave equation collapses, and this in turn prompts
the second of my two points; it is not clear what constitutes measurement. The indeterminate quantum world gives rise to the determinate
world of observable objects; the two constitute one world, but as yet we
cannot explain just how they do so. The conundrum about the collapse
of the wave equation lies at the heart of this broader difficulty in the
interpretation of quantum mechanics, and until some greater clarity
is gained on these basic matters it will be difficult to assess the impact
of this problem on theological efforts to enlist quantum mechanics in
an account of divine action.
3.3. Dampening and Amplification
Even if indeterministic transitions of the sort associated with measurement are a pervasive feature of the world, this alone would not
provide a useable toehold for a theological proposal of the sort we
43
Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, p. 204.
257
are considering. As we have seen, a further condition must be met,

namely, that quantum chance at least sometimes make a difference in
the course of macroscopic events. There is a relatively straightforward
sense, of course, in which the histories of quantum systems do make
a macroscopic difference, namely, they jointly constitute macroscopic
objects and are the underlying base upon which higher level properties
supervene. But if indeterministic transitions are entirely dampened out
by their accumulation in statistical patterns, so that they disappear into
deterministic regularities at the level of classical objects, then they will
be largely irrelevant to the theologians interest in special divine action
in the world. It could contended that the probabilistic laws of quantum
mechanics reflect the pattern of divine action in determining the outcome of all chance events in quantum systems.44 But this is just to say
that God establishes and sustains the structure of natural law; we get
the same result if we say that God establishes the stochastic laws and
leaves the particular transitions to chance. Nothing is gained (at least
with regard to the question of special divine action) by the claim that
God determines some or all of the otherwise undetermined events at the
quantum level, unless those events sometimes set in motion particular
causal chains with macroscopic consequences.
It is clear that indeterministic transitions in quantum systems can
have macroscopic effects. On the standard interpretation, precisely this
is that what happens when physicists make measurements on quantum
systems in the lab. The more controversial question is whether nature
is arranged in such a way that this amplification of quantum effects can
occur apart from human contrivance. This of course is a question of
empirical fact, and it is an unsettled one. Theological proposals about
special divine action through quantum transitions must be correspondingly cautious and tentative. There do appear to be structures in nature,
however, that register and then amplify the results of chance events at
the quantum level. Robert Russell and George Ellis have both noted,
for example, that vision involves a dramatic biochemical augmentation
of the interaction between photons and molecular structures in the
retina.45 The nervous system appears to rely extensively on amplification
44
See Nancey Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order: Buridans Ass and
Schrodingers Cat, in Chaos and Complexity especially section 4.4.
45
George Ellis, Reflections on Quantum Theory and the Macroscopic World,
and Robert Russell, Divine Action and Quantum Mechanics: A Fresh Assessment,
in CTNS/VO, v. V. Also see Carl S. Helrich, Measurement and Indeterminacy in the
258
thomas f. tracy
processes of this sort. Further, a number of authors have pointed out

that genetic mutation can be induced by a variety of quantum mechanical transitions. In discussing the measurement problem, Alastair Rae
offers the following example.
. . . mutations can be caused by the passage of high-energy cosmic ray
particles. But these cosmic rays are clearly subject to the laws of quantum physics and each cosmic ray particle has a range of possible paths
to follow, only some of which give rise to the mutation. The mutation
therefore fulfils the role of a measuring event, similar to the photon being
detected by the polarizer.46
Mutation may in effect record the interaction with a quantum

mechanical entity, and then the phenotypic expression amplifies this
change, exposing it to the selective pressures of evolutionary processes
which may in turn further amplify (or extinguish) it. Robert Russell
has offered a careful development of the idea that God might act in
evolutionary processes by affecting quantum transitions that result in
mutations in the germ-line of an organism.47 Mutation, of course, is just
one among a number of sources of variation in a species, but it clearly
plays an important role and can occur at a wide variety of points in
the processes by which gametes are produced.
We should also note, though even more hesitantly, the possibility
that quantum transitions might serve as triggers for chaotic processes.
Familiar deterministic but non-linear macroscopic systems can be
extraordinarily sensitive to their initial conditions, generating dramatically divergent results from infinitesimally different starting points.48
This suggests the possibility that an interaction with, say, a single
electron might be amplified by a chaotic system into significant macroscopic effects. The indeterministic quantum transition would provide
the trigger for a deterministic development of wide scope. This is an
elegant and intuitively appealing hypothesis, but it is accompanied by
a number of fundamental scientific uncertainties.
Quantum Mechanics of Dirac, Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 35, 4 (December
2000), pp. 489503.
46
Quantum Physics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), p. 61.
47
Special Providence and Genetic Mutation: A New Defense of Theistic Evolution,
in Evolutionary and Molecular Biology.
48
James P. Crutchfield, J. Doyne Farmer, Norman H. Packard, and Robert S. Shaw,
Chaos, and Wesley J. Wildman and Robert John Russell, Chaos: A Mathematical
Introduction with Philosophical Reflections, both in Chaos and Complexity.
259
It is not clear, for example, whether chaotic processes really are pervasive within the structures of nature, how chaotic systems are related
to non-chaotic systems, and how much the latter tend to dampen out
the effect of the former.49 An even more basic set of issues concerns the
relation of quantum mechanics and chaotic systems.50 As has often been
noted, the Schrdinger equation for the evolution of quantum systems
is linear, and the prospects are not promising at present for a non-linear
reformulation of the quantum formalism. So it is not clear how deep
chaos goes in the structures of nature or how chaotic behavior emerges
at the macroscopic level out of its quantum mechanical substrate. The
idea of chaotic amplification of indeterministic quantum effects is an
enticing possibility, but it remains to be seen whether it will become
more than that.
4. Conclusion
A theological proposal tied to currently disputed scientific questions
must, of course, be hedged about with qualifications and put forward
with a significant degree of diffidence. But given the current state of
knowledge, it remains a viable possibility to hold that God might act at
points of indeterministic transition in quantum systems, and thereby
1) bring about particular effects in the world which were not built into
history from the beginning, and 2) do so without intervening, if by
this we mean that God interrupts the ordinary lawful operations of the
natural order. Clearly, this conception of divine action depends upon
a whole series of interpretive judgments and on unsettled questions of
fact, and so it has more the character of a program for further research
than of a thesis that can be confidently asserted.
How seriously we take this possibility will depend in part on how
much we think a proposal of this kind is needed in contemporary
theology. The key consideration is whether the idea of divine action
in response to human actions requires that God act in ways that affect
49
See Jeffrey Koperski, God, Chaos, and the Quantum Dice, Zygon: Journal of
Religion and Science, 35, 4 (December 2000), pp. 54559.
50
This is the question of quantum chaos. For helpful discussion of these issues, see
the essays by Michael Berry and John Polkinghorne in CTNS/VO, v. V. Also see Abner
Shimony Conceptual Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, in The New Physics, ed.
Paul Davies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 391392.
260
thomas f. tracy
the course of events in the world once the worlds history is underway.
I have argued that responsive divine action does not require that God
act directly to alter the course of events in the world, though some of
the specific things Christians have traditionally said about how God
responds to us (especially in Jesus Christ) do appear to require this. If
this is right, then theologians have less at stake than it might first appear
in the question of whether the science of quantum mechanics (or of
chaos theory or of emergent systems at higher levels of organization)
provide openings in the causal structures of nature through which God
can act without intervening. Even if the natural order is deterministic,
we can understand God to act responsively in history with particular
intentions, bringing about events that reflect Gods special providence
and doing so in most instances without miraculous interventions.
We may find, however, that our best physical theories support (even
if they do not require) an ontological interpretation that recognizes
a significant role for chance within the structures of nature, so that
chance and law are dynamically woven together in a way that makes
possible creative new developments not rigidly prescribed by the past.
This picture of the world would be consonant with theological understandings of Gods good purposes in creation, and it invites theological
interpretation. If what we think we know about the world suggests that
the structures of nature are open in this way, then there is good reason
for the theologian to consider the possibility that Gods providential care
for creation might be exercised in part by acting directly through these
flexible structures without forcing or deforming them. It is important to
bear in mind that this mode of divine action is limited and theologically
secondary.51 It clearly would not be sufficient by itself to provide a full
account of all that the theistic traditions have wanted to say about Gods
activity in the world. On the account I have given, Gods foundational
action is that of directly establishing and sustaining the existence of
all finite things. Because this creative action gives creatures genuine
causal powers of their own, God also acts indirectly by means of created causes in an endless variety of particular ways. Now we tentatively
add to this account the idea that God may also act directly at points of
51
This has been overlooked by some of the critics of the idea of divine action
through quantum indeterminisms. For example see Nicholas Saunders, Does God
Cheat at Dice? Divine Action and Quantum Possibilities, Zygon: Journal of Religion
and Science, 35, 4 (September 2000), pp. 51744, and my response Divine Action and
Quantum Theory, Zygon, 35, 5 (December 2000), pp. 88998.
261
under-determination in these causal structures and thereby turn events

in new directions that serve Gods purposes in creation.
This last mode of divine action invites some familiar objections. We
might worry, for example, that it returns to the God of the gaps. The
gaps in which God acts, however, are not merely points of incompleteness in our knowledge of the world; an appeal to divine agency to fill
merely epistemic gaps is a clumsy and inevitably temporary expedient.
Rather than preying upon what we do not yet understand about the
natural world, this theological proposal would make use of what we
claim to know, namely that there are (ex hypothesi) ontological gaps in
the causal structures of nature.52 It might be replied that this nonetheless
treats God as one cause among others, on a par with secondary causes,
busily pushing particles around the universe. This is a rhetorically vivid
objection, but it does not carry much force unless we think of direct
action at points of causal incompleteness as the only or the primary
mode of divine action. God is never merely one agent among others.
Rather, God is always the absolute source of the being of all finite things,
acting continuously and universally as the primary cause. It would be
an arbitrary limitation upon Gods power if we denied that God could
act among secondary causes should God choose to do so. But this is a
claim that Christians, in particular, should hesitate to make, given the
radical affirmation in this tradition of Gods freedom to enter fully into
relationship with creatures without ceasing to be God.
52
For a more detailed discussion of this objection, see my Particular Providence
and the God of the Gaps, sect. 1, in Russell, Murphy, and Peacocke, eds., Chaos and
Complexity.
CHAPTER EIGHT
DIVINE ACTION IN THE NATURAL ORDER:

BURIDANS ASS AND SCHRDINGERS CAT
Nancey Murphy
1. Introduction
In the Medieval period, especially after the integration of the lost works
of Aristotle into Western thought, Gods action in the world could be
explained in a way perfectly consistent with the scientific knowledge
of the time. Heaven was a part of the physical cosmos. Gods agents,
the angels, controlled the movements of the seven planets, which, in
turn, gave nature its rhythms. But modern science has changed all that,
primarily by its dependence on the notion of laws of nature. For Isaac
Newton and other architects of the modern scientific worldview, the
laws of nature were a direct expression of Gods willGods control
of all physical processes. However, today they are generally granted
a status independent of God, not only by those who deny the very
existence of God, but also by many Christians, who seem to suppose
that God, like a U.S. senator, must obey the laws once they are on the
books. Consequently, for modern thinkers, deism has been the most
natural view of divine action: God creates in the beginningand lays
down the laws governing all changes after thatthen takes a rest for
the duration.
Not all modern theologians have opted for this deistic account, but
in many cases the only difference has been in their additional claim that
God sustains the universe in its existence. Those who have wanted (or
who have believed Christianity needed) a more robust view of Gods
continued participation in the created order have been forced to think
in terms of intervention: God occasionally acts to bring about a state
of affairs different from that which would have occurred naturally.1
1
Authors represented in this volume are some of a small number of more recent
thinkers who have sought non-interventionist accounts of special divine acts.
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nancey murphy
It is an ironic bit of history: the laws that once served as an account of

Gods universal governance of nature have become a competing force,
constraining the action of their very creator.
The series of conferences for which this essay was written involve a
re-evaluation of the modern understanding of divine action in light of
more recent science. Chaos theory has been proposed as an important
avenue for a new view of divine action.2 However, this essay grows out
of a recognition that the turn to chaos and complexity has not solved the
problem in the way it was intended. Furthermore, while the recognition
of top-down causation is an important advance in our understanding of
natural processes, as well as an important ingredient that must go into
any new theory, it is not in itself an adequate account of divine action.3
So the main goal of this paper is to provide an alternative account of
causation and divine action that is both theologically adequate (consistent with Christian doctrine and adequate to Christian experience),
and consistent with contemporary science.
1.1. Preview of the Argument
Following a brief critique of the most promising account of divine
action based on chaos theory, I shall attempt to set out in advance the
criteria a theory of divine action needs to meet. It is my contention that
the problem of divine action is, at base, a metaphysical problemone
that cannot be solved by anything less radical than a revision of our
understanding of natural causation. One way to understand the nature
of metaphysics is as a set of interrelated theories about reality that are
of the broadest possible scope, and thus descriptive or explanatory
of the phenomena described by all other branches of knowledge. My
goal, then, is to provide a theory of causation that takes account of
2
John Polkinghorne is the most important proponent of this view. See, e.g., his
Science and Providence: Gods Interaction with the World (Boston: Shambhala, 1989);
and idem, Laws of Nature and Laws of Physics, in Quantum Cosmology and the Laws
of Nature: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, ed. Robert John Russell, Nancey
Murphy, and C.J. Isham (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory, 1993; Berkeley, CA:
Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1993).
3
Arthur Peacocke is to be credited with the most compelling accounts to date of
the role of top-down causation in accounting for Gods continuing action. See his
Theology for a Scientific Age: Being and BecomingNatural, Divine and Human, 2d
ed., enlarged, (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1993). I owe a great debt to Peacockes
thought throughout this paper.
divine action in the natural order
265
phenomena germane to both science and theology. Thus, in section 2, I

propose criteria of adequacy drawn from both theology and science.
Section 3 surveys relevant changes in metaphysical views of matter
and causation, in particular contrasting the Aristotelian hylomorphic
conception with the early modern corpuscular theory. This background
is intended to put in question current metaphysical assumptions about
the nature of matter and of natural causes. This section also considers
consequences of recent developments in science for rethinking these
metaphysical issues.
Section 4 advances a proposal. I shall argue that any adequate account
of divine action must include a bottom-up approach: if God is to be
active in all events, then God must be involved in the most basic of
natural events. Current science suggests that this most basic level is
that of quantum phenomena. Consequences of this proposal need to
be spelled out regarding the character of natural laws and regarding
Gods action at the macroscopic level in general and the human level
in particular.
In section 5, I attempt to answer some of the objections that have
been raised against theories of divine action based on quantum indeterminacy, and also to show that this proposal meets the criteria of
adequacy set out in section 2.
1.2. Chaos Theory: The Road Not Taken
One proposed solution of the problem of divine action in the natural
world is John Polkinghornes suggestion that God works within the
indeterminacy of chaotic systems. Complex systems, being highly sensitive to initial conditions, are inherently unpredictable, since significant
variations in initial conditions fall beneath the threshold of measurement. Polkinghorne argues from this fact to the claim that the futures
of such systems are truly open, and hence that God can operate within
them without contravening the laws of nature.
I claim (a) that the argument from unpredictability to indeterminacy
is fallacious; (b) that the attempt to find indeterminacy between the
quantum and human levels is unnecessary if we have already made
allowance for Gods action at the most basic levels of organization; but
(c) that the unpredictability recognized by chaos theorists is nonetheless
extremely important for an account of divine action. If we begin with
the hypothesis that God works at the quantum level, it is not necessaryin fact it is counterproductiveto argue for causal indeterminism
266
nancey murphy
at higher levels of organization (excluding the human level) since

Gods will is assumed to be exercised by means of the macro-effects of
subatomic manipulations.
Polkinghorne, in speaking of chaotic systems, says:
We are necessarily ignorant of how such systems will behave. If you are
a realist and believe, as I believe, that what we know (epistemology) and
what is the case (ontology) are closely linked to each other, it is natural
to go on to interpret this state of affairs as reflecting an intrinsic openness
in the behavior of these systems.4
Now, let us grant the realist thesis that what we know is (unproblematically) linked to what is the case. Let P stand for any proposition, then
X knows that P entails P. So far so good.
But Polkinghornes argument is not from the content of some known
proposition P to the character of the world; it is rather an argument
from the character of our knowledge of P to the character of the world.
Take any P that is a statement about the future (chaotic) state of a
chaotic system: what the unpredictability amounts to is that for any
person, X, and for any P, it is not the case that X knows that P. This
implies nothing at all about the worlds likeness to P.
To make such an argument is comparable to confusing a modal
qualifier, which qualifies a proposition as a whole, with a property of
an object described by that proposition. Possibly there are unicorns
does not entail that there are possible unicornsthat is, entities that
are both unicorns and possible. Neither does The outcome of chaotic
processes are inherently unpredictable imply that there are outcomes
that are indeterminate.
Is this move in Polkinghornes thought simply an instance of using
a bad argument for a position that may well be defensible on other
grounds? I think not. The grounds upon which chaos theorists argue
for the unpredictability of future states depend upon the assumption
that the future states are determined by initial conditions in so sensitive
a manner that we cannot measure them. So the systems are presumed
to be determined at a very precise levelsmall changes produce large
effects.
So what chaos shows is not that there is genuine indeterminacy in
the universe, but rather that we have to make a more careful distinction
between predictability (an epistemological concept) and causal deter4
Polkinghorne, Science and Providence, 29.
267
minism (an ontological concept). In a similar way, the phenomenon of

quantum indeterminacy forced earlier physicists to distinguish between
ontological and epistemological indeterminacy. That the consensus
now is in favor of an ontological interpretation does not obliterate the
distinction; a fortiori it does not provide warrant for obliterating the
distinction between ontological indeterminism and epistemological
unpredictability in this case.
Furthermore, it is not clear to me that Polkinghornes position would
solve the problem even if the argument for indeterminacy were valid. Let
us take a specific case. Suppose Father Murphy is playing billiards in a
high-stakes game in the hope of winning enough to get his school out
of debt. Let us also suppose that God intends him to win, and in order
to do so must bring about his getting a particular ball in the pocket.
Murphy takes aim, hits the cue ball and the cue ball hits the #2
ball, which undergoes several more collisions. Polkinghorne rightly
points out that we are unable to predict whether the ball will fall into
the appropriate pocket. But what, exactly, could it mean to say that
the outcome is open? Does it mean undetermined, tout court? Does it
mean not uniquely determined by the laws of motion? I take this latter
to be Polkinghornes meaning, since I find it hard to imagine what it
would mean to say that it is totally undetermined, and also because he
sees such things as slight environmental influences as important to the
outcome in such cases. So what we might better say is that there are a
range of outcomes that are consistent with the laws of motion.
Now, how does God effect one of these possible outcomes? Polkinghorne suggests that in some cases Gods input might be a non-energetic
contribution of information. But to whom or what is the information
contributed? How is it conveyed without any energy at all. And in what
sense does this proposal avoid turning God into a demiurge, acting as
an agent among other agents?5 Polkinghorne quotes John V. Taylor
with approval, when he writes:
[I]f we think of a Creator at all, we are to find him always on the inside
of creation. And if God is really on the inside, we must find him in the
process, not in the gaps.6
Ibid., 33.
John V. Taylor, The Go-Between God (London: SCM Press, 1972), 28, quoted in
Polkinghorne, Science and Providence, 31.
6
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nancey murphy
I suggest that Polkinghorne has not provided a clear account of how

God works on the inside, in the process.
This raises the question of how God could work on the inside. I
take it that if God is to do so, then it is necessary that God work on
the inside of all created entitieswhich must mean in turn that God
works within the smallest constituents of macroscopic entities, since
these smallest constituents are entities in their own right.7 If we begin
with this hypothesis, it is not necessaryin fact it is counterproductiveto argue for causal indeterminism at higher levels of organization
(excluding the human level) since Gods will is assumed to be exercised
by means of the macro-effects of subatomic manipulations.
2. Criteria of Adequacy for a Theory of Divine Action

The theory of causation and divine action to be presented here might be
construed as metaphysicalthat is, metascientific and metatheological.
As such, its primary confirmation should come from its consistency with
both science and theology, and especially from the fact that it solves
problems that have arisen at the interface between these two sorts of
disciplines. To solve such problems is no small accomplishment, and
insofar as this proposal could be shown to solve problems that its competitors cannot solve, it would have a high degree of acceptability.8
7
It is interesting to speculate about the meaning of the distinction between God
working on the inside versus from the outside. We can give a clear sense to from
the inside when we are speaking of macroscopic entities and God working within
them by manipulating constituent quantum entities, since the quantum entities are
inside of the macroscopic entity. But can we make sense of a distinction between
the inside and outside of the quantum entities themselves? If God has no physical
location, literally speaking, yet we say that God is omnipresent and immanent in all
of creation, perhaps we are assuming that a disembodied agents presence is to be
defined in terms of the agents causal efficacywherever God acts, there God is. Thus,
to say that God works within quantum entities would be equivalent to saying that God
affects quantum entities.
8
Ideally, one would like to be able to show that such a proposal is progressive in
the sense defined by Imre Lakatos. He proposed that a scientific research program is
progressive if it can be developed in such a way that its theoretical content anticipates
the discovery of novel facts. A similar criterion could be devised for metaphysical
theories: that they anticipate and solve problems in other disciplines. That is, a metaphysical theory should be counted progressive if it turns out to contain resources for
solving conceptual or empirical problems in or between other disciplines that it was not
originally designed to solve. Lakatoss scientific methodology is found in Falsification
269
2.1. Theological Requirements

To do justice to the Christian tradition, a theory of divine action ought
to be consistent with widely accepted formulations of key Christian
doctrines, andthis is at least as importantit must constitute suitable
presuppositions for Christian practice.
2.1.1. Doctrine
I take it that one desideratum for theological construction is always
to see what sense can be given in each age to traditional formulations.
Only if the formulations of the past turn out to be hopelessly unintelligible should they be rejected or radically changed. Gods continuing
action in the created world has been spoken of in a number of different
waysas sustenance, providence, continuing creation. One traditional
set of terms will turn out to be particularly useful: Gods continuing
work understood as sustenance, governance, and cooperation.9 The sense
that can be given to these terms by means of the proposal in this paper
will become clear as we go along.
An additional doctrinal requirement, I suggest, is that an account
of divine action throughout the hierarchy of levels of complexity must
show forth Gods consistency. Thus, if the paradigm of divine action for
Christians is found in the story of Jesus, we should expect that same
divine moral character to be manifested, analogously, in Gods action
within sub-human orders. I shall claim that the relevant feature of
Gods action in Christ, displayed analogously throughout the whole,
is its non-coercive character.
2.1.2. Presuppositions for Christian Practice
The following seem to be required of any account of divine action that
would be supportive of Christian belief and practice:
and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes, in Criticism and the Growth
of Knowledge, ed. I. Lakatos and Alan Musgrave (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1970), 91196. See my adaptation of his work in Evidence of Design in the
Fine-Tuning of the Universe, in Quantum Cosmology.
9
These terms go back at least to Augustine, who formulated the discussion of
grace and free will using the concepts of providence, sustaining activity, governance
and cooperation. The terms have been used frequently in subsequent discussions of
divine action.
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nancey murphy
Special Divine Acts10

The first requirement is that we be able to distinguish in a meaningful
way between events that are in some way special acts of God, and others that are not. This requirement is not met easily, since both doctrine
and logic suggest that if God acts at all, God is acting in everything
that happens.
Here are at least three reasons for needing to distinguish special
divine acts. First, our knowledge of a person comes primarily from the
persons actions, including speech acts. Knowledge of God, therefore,
must come primarily from seeing what God has done. However, it is
well-recognized that the sum total of the events known to us so far
(both natural and historical) provide at best an ambiguous testimony
to the character of God.11 So we need at least to be able to distinguish
between Gods acts and the actions of sinful creatures; ideally we ought
to be able to make sense of recognizing certain historical events as
actions of God that are especially revelatory of Gods character, intentions, and providence.
A second reason for needing to distinguish between divine actions
and natural events is to support the practice of petitionary prayer. If
there is no sense in which God may be expected to bring about a state
of affairs that would not otherwise have occurred, then the practice of
petitionary prayer is groundless.12
An even more pressing reason for needing to distinguish a special class of divine actions is that to fail to do so makes God entirely
responsible for every event, and thus exacerbates the problem of evil.
As Polkinghorne argues, theodicy requires a free-process defense, as
well as a free-will defense.13
Notice, though, that a concept of the autonomy and regularity of
natural processes is not merely a parallel to the theodicists doctrine of
free will; it is a prerequisite for it as well. In order to make intelligent,
free decisions and take responsibility for our action we must live in a
10
My use of special here corresponds to that of objectively special divine acts as
defined in Russells Introduction to Chaos and Complexity.
11
See, e.g., David Humes critiques of the argument from design in Dialogues
Concerning Natural Religion, and John Wisdoms parable, Gods, Proceedings of the
Aristotelian Society, 19445.
12
See my Does Prayer Make a Difference? in Cosmos as Creation: Theology
and Science in Consonance, ed. Ted Peters (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1989),
23545.
13
See Polkinghorne, Science and Providence, 6667.
271
world where outcomes of our actions are often predictable, and this in
turn requires that the universe exhibit law-like regularity.
Extraordinary Divine Acts
Many modern and contemporary Christians would be satisfied with
an account of causation and divine action that met all of the above
requirements. However, earlier Christians would have insisted as well
that there be room in such an account for something on the order of
miracles. I prefer not to use the term miracle because it is now so
closely associated with the idea of a violation of the laws of nature. I
believe it could be shown that the primary reason for current rejection
of miracles, in fact, has been this very definition.
So one reason for going against the Enlightened consensus and
including as a second requirement for a theory of divine action that
it leave room for what I shall call extraordinary acts of God is that the
modern rejection of such acts was based on a mistaken view of the
nature of miracles. A second is that elimination of all such events from
Christian history leaves too little: the resurrection is an extraordinary
act of God if ever there was one. Yet, as Paul asserts, if Christ is not
raised, then Christian faith comes to nothing (cf. 1 Cor. 15:14,17,19).
But if the resurrection is credible, then lesser signs cannot be ruled
out a priori.
2.1.3. Summary
We can sum up the discussion of theological requirements by saying
that an adequate account of divine action will have to avoid the opposite
poles of deism and occasionalism. Occasionalism, as applied to theories
of divine action, denies the causal interaction of created things: created
entities only provide an occasion for the action of God, who is the
sole cause of all effects. This position has been rejected on the grounds
that it ultimately denies the reality of finite beings.
Schematic representations make clear the difference between these
two extreme positions. Occasionalism can be represented as follows,
where G stands for an act of God and E stands for an observable
event:
G1 G2 Gn
E1
E2
En
time
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nancey murphy
Here, God is the sole actor, and any causal efficacy on the part of
observable events is mere illusion.
The following sketch represents the deist option, where L represents
a law of nature:
{
{
G E1 E2 En
L1
Ln
time
Here, Gods action is restricted to an initial act of creation, which

includes ordaining the laws that govern all successive changes.
Some modern accounts of divine action have sought to hold divine
action and natural causation together: God acts in and through the
entire created order. Thus, we get a combined picture:
G1
G2
Gn
E1 E2 En
time
This approach suffers from two defects. First, it leaves no room for
any sort of special divine acts and, second, it seems impossible to do
justice to both accounts of causation (the problem of double agency);
one inevitably slides back into occasionalism or else assigns God the
role of a mere rubber stamp approval of natural processes.
In short, we need a new picture of the relation of Gods action to the
world of natural causes that allows us to represent Gods sustenance,
governance, and cooperation in such a way that we can make sense of
revelation, petitionary prayer, human responsibility, and of extraordinary acts such as the resurrection, without at the same time blowing
the problem of evil up to unmanageable proportions.
2.2. Scientific Requirements
An adequate account of divine action must also be consistent with the
sciences. Here, again, we can distinguish several types of consistency.
2.2.1. The Results of Scientific Research
An adequate account of causation in general and divine action in particular needs to save the phenomena. That is, we are setting out to
273
explain how God and natural causes conspire to bring about the world
as we know it. The salient features seem to be, first, the general law-like
behavior of macroscopic objects and events, qualified, however, by two
major exceptions: the apparent randomness of individual events at the
quantum level and human free actions.14 The fact that the rule of law
needs to be so qualified, however, suggests the value of recognizing as
a second, equally important, feature of the world known by science its
organization into a hierarchy of levels of complexity.15 More on this
below. It also suggests that in an account of divine action, attention
needs to be given to three very different regions or regimes within
the hierarchy: the quantum level, the realm of human freedom, and
an intermediate regime wherein the behavior of entities is describable
by means of deterministic laws.
2.2.2. Presuppositions of the Practice of Science
The law-like character of the natural world is not only a finding of
science; it is a presupposition for engaging in scientific research in the
first place. It has often been argued that the Christian (and Jewish)
doctrines of God, stressing both Gods freedom and Gods rationality
and reliability were crucial assumptions for the development of empirical science.16 No revised account of divine action that undercuts the
practice of science will be acceptable.
2.2.3. Metascientific Factors
I have been careful in the two preceding subsections to speak of the
law-like character of the natural world, not of the existence of laws of
nature. While many scientists assume that there must in some sense
be such lawsthat they must have some sort of existence17I do not
believe such a view is either a necessary prerequisite for doing science
or necessarily supported by the findings of science.18 Thus, I shall argue
14
Perhaps the higher animals are also capable of free actions, but if philosophers
are not agreed what it means to say that human actions are free, a fortiori we do not
know what to say about the animals.
15
See Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age, inter alia.
16
See Ian Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion (New York: Harper & Row, 1966), 46.
17
See, e.g., Paul Davies, The Mind of God: Science and the Search for Ultimate
Meaning (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992).
18
For a discussion of this issue, see William Stoeger, Contemporary Physics and
the Ontological Status of the Laws of Nature, in Quantum Cosmology. See also Bas C.
van Fraassen, Laws and Symmetries (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989).
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nancey murphy
that the de-ontologizing of the laws of nature is a helpful move in

understanding divine agency.
3. Metaphysical Considerations
I claimed above that nothing short of a revision of current metaphysical notions regarding the nature of matter and causation is likely to
solve the problem of divine action. In this section we survey some
important changes in the history of metaphysics as background, and
then attempt to see where we are now and where we must go in our
thinking about causes.
3.1. From Aristotle to Newton
One of the most striking changes from medieval (Aristotelian) hylomorphism to modern corpuscularism ( l Descartes and Newton) regards
the powers of material things to move themselves or to change in other
ways. Of course Aristotle and Newton would both agree that horses,
for example, are material bodies, and horses, obviously, can move. So
the question is a deeper one about the nature of matter itself.
For Aristotelians, all individual substances were constituted by two
principles: matter and form. Individual substances could be arranged
hierarchically with the more complex at the top. For the higher beings,
the matter of which they were composed was already en-formed by
the forms of lower realities. The lowest entities in the hierarchy of
existents were the four elements: earth, water, air, and fire. But these
elements were themselves constituted by forms (of earth, water, air, or
fire) and prime matter. Prime matter, however, was assumed to exist
only as ingredient in the four elements (and hence as a basic ingredient
in all higher substances), so it was only a theoretical construct within
the system.
However, in Aristotles system, prime matter, were it to exist independently of all forms, would be entirely passive since it is form that
gives individual characteristics to existent beings, including whatever
powers and actions are natural to that species of existent. Conversely,
since all existent material beings are enformed matter, all material
beings have certain inherent powers and certain motions that are
natural to them. Even stones, simple objects composed primarily of
275
the element earth, have the intrinsic power to seek their natural position, which is at the center of the cosmos. That is why rocks fall when
dropped, and sink when placed in water. So in this worldview, while
prime matter is passive, it does not exist as such. All material beings
(primary substances), in contrast, have inherent powers to act in
their own characteristic ways. The self-moving capacities of animals
and humans need no special explanation.
In contrast, Ren Descartes, Thomas Hobbes, Newton, and other early
modern thinkers developed a worldview in which material bodies were
inherently passive or inert. All macroscopic phenomena, including the
movements of animals and human bodies, were manifestations of matter in motion. According to Hobbes, all that exist are bodies. Bodies
move. In doing so they move other bodies; that is all that happens.19
We can describe this change by making use of terms coined by
Baruch Spinoza. He distinguished between immanent causes, which
produce changes within themselves, and transeunt causes, which produce changes in something else. The change from the Aristotelian to
the Newtonian worldview included a change from a world filled with
immanent causes to one in which all causes, when properly understood,
are transeunt causes. According to Newton, all motion in the universe
was introduced from the outside by God. The laws of nature were,
in the first instance, laws of motion that determined the patterns of
motion after that initial impetus.
It has been argued that Newton had theological motives for developing the inertial view of matter.20 One motive was what might be called
Calvinist theological maximalismto give as much credit to God as
possible for whatever happens. So Newton ascribed all motive power to
God. Second, this view of the physical universe made an obvious argument for the existence of God: someone had to have set it in motion
in the beginning.
So a second change in the understanding of causes, from Aristotle
to Newton, regards the question of what it is that causes cause. For
Aristotle causal analysis was given of substances and their modification
19
This summary of Hobbess materialism is Wallace Matsons, A New History of
Philosophy, vol. 2 (San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1987), 288.
20
See Eugene Klaaren, Religious Origins of Modern Science: Belief in Creation in
Seventeenth-century Thought (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1977).
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nancey murphy
(including locomotion). For Newton causal analyses are given of

changes, and changes are ultimately changes in motion.
3.2. Current Assumptions
I submit that since the demise of the Newtonian worldview, philosophical accounts of causation have not kept pace with science. The
question of the innate powers of matter is little addressed these days
by either scientists or philosophers,21 and it seems a crucial preliminary
question for locating Gods action in the physical universe. Yet, if scientists after Newton are willing to do without Newtons version of the
Prime Mover, they must be assuming, contra Descartes and Newton,
that matter is inherently active.22 So what is the ultimate source of the
worlds processes? Do we look to the beginning, in the Big Bang; or do
we look instead to the basis of all processes in the smallest constituent
events? Are quantum events brought about by transeunt causes or by
immanent causes?
Nor is it clear what answer is to be given today to the question of
what it is that causes cause. It is more common now to speak of events
or states of affairs, rather than objects, as the effects of causes. Suppose
we describe an event as a change from one state of affairs S1 to another
S2. Then, is it S2 or the change from S1 to S2 that requires causal explanation? And is S1 the cause, or merely a necessary condition? Scientific
language is not consistent here. When there is a regular connection
between states of type 1 and states of type 2 we are inclined to speak
of S1 as the cause of S2. However, if there is no such regularity we have
two options. The first is always to look for an additional factor to label
as the cause. If none can be found we speak of S2 as randomand in
such cases some would say that the event is uncaused.
Furthermore, it is necessary to distinguish between entropy-increasing
changes and entropy-decreasing changes. Entropy-increasing changes
require no additional explanation; here S1 is an adequate explanation
21
However, Richard Taylor claims that there remain two important philosophical
questions regarding causation that have not been satisfactorily resolved. One is whether
the concept of power or causal efficacy is after all essential, and whether there is after
all any kind of necessary connection between a cause and its effect. The Encyclopedia
of Philosophy, 1967 ed., s.v. Causation, by R. Taylor.
22
See Wolfhart Pannenberg, Toward a Theology of Nature: Essays on Science and
Faith, ed. Ted Peters (Louisville, KY: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1993), esp. chap. 1,
Theological Questions to Scientists.
277
of S2 (or of the change to S2). Entropy-decreasing changes require an

exchange with the environment, which is sometimes designated the
cause, and the status of S1 is reduced to that of a necessary condition.
Another complication: it is also possible to treat the laws of nature
as the most significant ingredient in a causal explanations, in which
case S1 is designated as the set of initial conditions. This tendency
has been furthered by Carl Hempels influential nomological account
of explanation, wherein a causal explanation takes the form of a law
and a set of initial conditions from which the explanandum can be
deduced.23
So with current physics and cosmology having displaced the simple
clockwork model of the universe, we are left without a clear scientific answer to the question of the causal nature of matter. Neither
do we seem to have an agreed-upon philosophical analysis of causal
concepts.
3.3. The Ontological Status of the Laws of Nature
Another area of disagreement concerns the ontological status of the laws
of nature. When Newton and his contemporaries spoke of the laws of
nature they no doubt understood the term as a metaphorical extension of the notion of divine law from the realm of theological ethics.24
The ontological status of the laws of nature was unproblematic: they
were ideas in the mind of God (a move for which the way had already
been paved by Christian Platonists, who located Platos realm of the
forms in the mind of God).
What status have the laws of nature in contemporary thought? Paul
Davies notes that:
As long as the laws of nature were rooted in God, their existence was no
more remarkable than that of matter, which God also created. But if the
divine underpinning of the laws is removed, their existence becomes a
profound mystery. Where do they come from? Who sent the message?
Who devised the code? Are the laws simply therefree floating, so to
23
See Carl Hempel, Aspects of Scientific Explanation: and Other Essays in the Philosophy of Science (New York: Free Press, 1965).
24
See Mary Hesse, Lawlessness in Natural and Social Science, draft paper for
conference on quantum cosmology and the laws of nature, Vatican Observatory,
September, 1991, typescript, p. 1.
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nancey murphy
speakor should we abandon the very notion of laws of nature as an
unnecessary hangover from a religious past?25
Davies, along with a number of other scientists, opts for what I shall
call a Platonistic account of the laws of nature, meaning that like Platos
eternal forms, the laws have an existence independent of the entities
they govern.
However, no one, to my knowledge, has provided a suitable account
of how (or where) the laws might exist and how they affect physical
realitythe same problems that have led most philosophers to abandon Platonic metaphysics. Furthermore, William Stoeger has argued
persuasively that no such account of the laws of nature is necessary.
All one needs to recognize is that there are objective regularities and
relationships in nature, which scientists describe in human language
and with the aid of mathematics.26
Stoegers view appears the most credible account of the status of
the laws of nature, but even if his arguments were not persuasive, this
would still be the most viable option, since there seems to be no intelligible answer to the question of how the laws of nature could exist
independently of either the mind of God or of the reality that instantiates them. Still, Stoegers account leaves unanswered the question of
what accounts for the objective regularities and relations in nature if
not pre-existent laws. To this question we return in section 4.
3.4. Pointers Toward a New Metaphysic
An absolutely crucial development in contemporary understandings of
the nature of reality regards its non-reducible hierarchical ordering in
terms of increasingly complex systems. In some ways this recognition
represents a return to the Aristotelian view that the form (organization,
functional capacities) of an entity is equally constitutive of reality as is
the stuff of which a thing is made.
The recognition of top-down causation is integral to this view. The
hierarchical conception of reality suggests that an investigation of
causation and the role of divine action begin at either the top or the
bottom of the hierarchy, or both. The present state of our knowledge
25
26
Davies, Mind of God, 81.

Stoeger, Contemporary Physics and the Laws of Nature.
279
gives primacy to bottom-up causation; it is not clear whether this is an

accident resulting from the long dominance of reductionist thinking, or
whether bottom-up influences do in fact play a more decisive role in
events than do top-down influences. In any case, no account of what
makes things happen can neglect what we now take to be the lowest
level of the hierarchythe quantum level.
This level is odd from the point of view of a causal analysis: quantum events do not obey deterministic laws. Individual events violate
the principle of sufficient reason, which expresses our expectation that
things happen when and as they happen due to some specific cause; that
we should be able to give a reason why this happened now, rather than
later or not at all. So here is a radical incompleteness in our knowledge
at this most basic level. There is a metaphysical gap that we hunger to
fillby means of hidden variables, or layers of the implicate order, or
some other means.
4. A Proposal
Let me summarize the requirements and hints so far assembled for
an account of divine action. We are looking for a way to make sense
of the traditional claim that God not only sustains all things, but also
cooperates with and governs all created entities. This account needs to
be consistent with other church teaching; it needs to leave room for
special divine acts for both doctrinal and practical reasons; and it must
not exacerbate the problem of evil.
It also needs to be consistent with science in the sense of saving the
phenomena, and must not undercut the practice of science. However,
I claim that it need not be consistent with metaphysical assumptions
about matter and causation, which seem at present to be in great
disarray.
Finally, a revised metaphysical account of causation that includes
divine action as an integral part needs to take into account the recent
recognition of the non-reducible hierarchy of complexity; this suggests
two likely starting points, based on either top-down or bottom-up
causation.
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4.1. Top-Down Causation: Another Road Not Taken

Peacocke has very helpfully explored the topic of top-down causation and its possibilities for a theory of divine action. The concept of
top-down causation itself is crucially important for a number of reasons.
It explains how human free agency is possible within a highly deterministic universe. Hence, it is an important element in any account of
divine action, since Gods influence on human consciousness would
otherwise have no possible influence on the rest of the cosmos. It is
also necessary simply to understand the relations among the various
levels of complexity in the natural world.
However, I have serious reservations about the adequacy of an
account of divine action in terms of top-down causation alone. I shall
discuss top-down effects in the human realm below, so here my focus
will be on purported top-down effects on the non-human world. The
clearest account given so far of how God operates is by analogy to
human (top-down) agency in the inanimate world. However, this analogy does not solve the problem because human agency is brought to bear
on the natural world via bodily action. Since God has no body, we get
no help with the question of how God brings it about that events obey
his will. This pushes us to consider whether Gods causal relation to the
world is like the causal relation between a human mind and the body.
But Peacocke rightly rejects any dualistic account; and if we understand
mental events as a function of the operation of the organism at a high
level of organization, we again have trouble applying the account to
GodGod would then be the world-mind or the world-soul.
Ordinarily we invoke the concept of top-down causation when we
find processes that cannot be described or understood in abstraction
from the whole system, comprised of the affected entity in its environment. However, in such cases, it appears that the effect of the environment is always mediated by specific changes in the entity itself. For
example, team spirit only affects an individual insofar as sights and
sounds emanating from the other people affect the individuals sensory
organs. Environmental factors affect individual organisms by means of,
say, food surpluses or shortages, which in turn affect an animal only
insofar as it does or does not eat.
So top-down causation by God should also be expected to be mediated by specific changes in the affected entities, and this returns us to the
original question of how and at what level of organization God provides
281
causal input into the system. I suggest we turn to a bottom-up account

as the most plausible supplement to Peacockes top-down approach.
4.2. Overview of Modes of Divine Action
In brief, the following is my position. In addition to creation and sustenance, God has two modes of action within the created order: one
at the quantum level (or whatever turns out to be the most basic level
of reality) and the other through human intelligence and action. The
apparently random events at the quantum level all involve (but are not
exhausted by) specific, intentional acts of God. Gods action at this level
is limited by two factors. First, God respects the integrity of the entities
with which he cooperatesthere are some things that God can do with
an electron, for instance, and many other things that he cannot (e.g.,
make it have the rest-mass of a proton, or a positive charge).27
Second, within the wider range of effects allowed by Gods action
in and through sub-atomic entities, God restricts his action in order
to produce a world that for all we can tell is orderly and law-like in its
operation. The exact possibilities for Gods action within higher reaches
of the natural order by means of cooperation with and governance of
sub-atomic entities are highly debatable and will be considered below.
But I hope to show that by taking quantum events as the primary locus
for divine action it will be possible to meet many of the theological
needs placed upon such a theory without running into insuperable
theological or scientific objections.
In the following sections I address each of three regimes mentioned
above: the quantum level, the regime of law-like behavior, and the
human realm, asking in each case what are the possibilities for divine
governance and cooperation. Since the levels are interrelated, the position outlined for each regime will have consequences throughout.
Divine action in the regime of law needs to be understood in terms
of both bottom-up and top-down components. For example, I shall
suggest that there is an analogy between Gods respecting the natural rights of humans and a similar respect for the inherent rights of
lower entities to be what they are. So calculating the possibilities for
27
The sense in which God cannot do all things with an electron is explained in
section 4.3.
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nancey murphy
divine interaction with macroscopic objects involves the interaction of

top-down and bottom-up influences with the God-given characteristics
and potentialities of those beings.
Most of what I shall have to say about Gods mode of action at
the human level will be non-controversial. Insofar as it presents anything new, it will be by applying the results of my proposal regarding
bottom-up causation at this level.
4.3. Gods Action at the Quantum Level
The first question to raise with regard to the quantum level is this:
Does God produce solely and directly all the events (phenomena) at
this level, or are the entities endowed with powers of their own? In
other words, I am raising here the question introduced in section 3the
activity or passivity of matterbut relating it specifically to the most
basic entities in the physical universe and their relation to God. There
are two possible answers: either God is the sole actor at this level or
the entities (also) have their own (God-given) powers to act.
I believe we can rather quickly dismiss the first option on theological grounds. To say that each sub-atomic event is solely an act of God
would be a version of occasionalism, with all the attendant theological difficulties mentioned above: it exacerbates the problem of evil; it
also comes close to pantheism, and conflicts with what I take to be an
important aspect of the doctrine of creationthat what God creates
has a measure of independent existence relative to God, notwithstanding the fact that God keeps all things in existence. To put the point
another way, if God were completely in control of each event, there
would be no-thing for God to keep in existence. To create something,
even so lowly a thing as an electron, is to grant it some measure of
independence and a nature of its own, including inherent powers to
do some things rather than others.
These considerations lead to the conclusion that it is necessary for
theological reasons to grant that every created entity, however small
and ephemeral, has an existence independent of God. To be is to be
determinate, and to be determinate is to have certain innate properties,
including actual or potential behaviors.
Now, the peculiarity of entities at the quantum level is that while
specific particles have their distinguishing characteristics and specific
possibilities for acting, it is not possible to predict exactly when they
will do whatever they do. This allows us to raise another question: Is
283
the when: (1) completely random and undetermined; is it (2) internally

determined by the entity itself;28 is it (3) externally determined by the
entitys relations to something else in the physical system;29 or, finally
(4) is it determined by God?
To make sure that these four options are distinguished clearly,
allow me to present an analogy. A medieval philosopher by the name
of Buridan is supposed to have hypothesized that if a starving donkey
were placed midway between two equal piles of hay it would starve to
death for want of sufficient reason to choose one pile rather than the
other. I am supposing that entities at the quantum level are miniature
Buridian asses. The asses have the power to do one thing rather
than another (walk to one of the piles of hay). The question is what
induces them to take one course of action rather than the other (or to
take a course of action at a particular time rather than another or not at
all). By hypothesis, there is nothing external to determine the donkeys
choice (no difference in the piles of hay). Also, by hypothesis, there is
nothing internal (no sufficient reason) to determine the choice.
Insofar as epistemological interpretations of quantum theory and the
quest for hidden variables are rejected, we are left with the conclusion
that there is no sufficient reason either internal or external to the
entities at this level to determine their behavior. While these issues are
still open, many physicists have rejected both epistemological interpretations and at least local hidden variables.
By process of elimination, this leaves options 1 and 4: complete
randomness or divine determination. The fact that the inventor of
Buridans ass believed the donkey would starve illustrates the philosophical assumption that all events must have a sufficient reason.
This same intuition is what has made the apparent randomness of
quantum events so difficult for the scientific community to accept. I
shall argue that the better option is divine determination. While most
of my argument will be for the advantages of this thesis for theology,
it is important to bear in mind that it has the further advantage of
consistency with the principle of sufficient reason.30 To put it crudely,
God is the hidden variable.
28
In Spinozas terms, is the entity itself an immanent cause?

That is, moved by a transeunt cause.
30
However, this is probably a minor point, since it not clear what the principle
itself is based upon.
29
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4.3.1. Gods Governance, Cooperation, and Sustenance

It is neither theologically nor scientifically problematic to maintain that
Gods creative activity involves the sustaining in existence of that which
has been created. However, it poses an interesting question to see if we
can find work for the terms cooperation and governance. These terms
turn out to be quite valuable here. My proposal is that Gods governance
at the quantum level consists in activating or actualizing one or another
of the quantum entitys innate powers at particular instants, and that
these events are not possible without Gods action. This is the manner
and extent of Gods governance at this level of reality.
I have already claimed that we need to maintain that all created
entities, despite being sustained by God, are entities in their own right
vis--vis God. Only in this way can we say that there is a created entity
with which God can cooperate. Gods action is thus limited by or
constrained by the characteristic limitations of the entities with which
he cooperates. This limitation is, in one sense, voluntaryGod could
cause an electron to attract another electron, but so far as we know
has chosen not to do so. In another sense, though, this limitation is a
logical necessityan electron that attracts electrons is no longer (really)
an electron.
This principle of Gods respecting the integrity of the entities he has
created is an important one. Proposing it is in line with Polkinghornes
speaking of free processes in nature. I further suggest, on the strength
of a similar analogy with the human realm, that we speak of all created entities as having natural rights, which God respects in his
governance. This is the sense in which his governance is cooperation,
not domination.
4.3.2. Gods Bottom-Up Causation
The rationale for proposing this bottom-up account of divine governance is based upon what remains true about reductionism and determinism, even after recent criticisms of these positions are taken into
account. The theological goal is to find a modus operandi for God at
the macro-levelthe level that most concerns us in our Christian lives.
The ontological reductionist thesis seems undeniablemacroscopic
objects are composed of the entities of atomic and subatomic physics.31
31
This point stands even for those who want to add a mind or soul to the human
body in order to get a living person: the body is still nothing but a complex organization of its most basic physical parts.
285
This being the case, much (but not all) of the behavior of macro-level
objects is determined by the behavior of their smallest constituents.
Therefore, Gods capacity to act at the macro-level must include the
ability to act upon the most basic constituents. This is a conceptual
claim, not theological or scientific.
However, the theological question that arises immediately is whether
God acts upon these parts-making-up-wholes only in rare instances, or
whether God is constantly acting on or in everything. Over the long
history of the tradition, I believe, the majority view has been that God
acts in all things at all times, not just on rare occasions.
We can approach this question from the following angle: we object to
interventionist accounts of divine action because it seems unreasonable
that God should violate the laws he has established. We object to God
of the gaps accounts of divine action for epistemological reasonsscience will progress and close the gaps. But I think there is a more basic
intuition behind the rejection of both of these views: God must not be
made a competitor with processes that on other occasions are sufficient
in and of themselves to bring about a given effect. In addition, if Gods
presence is identified with Gods efficacy32 then a God who acts only
occasionally is a God who is usually absent.
So our theological intuitions urge upon us the view that, in some
way, God must be a participant in every (macro-level) event. God is not
one possible cause among the variety of natural causes; Gods action
is a necessary but not sufficient condition for every (post-creation)
event. In addition, I claim that Gods participation in each event is by
means of his governance of the quantum events that constitute each
macro-level event. There is no competition between God and natural
determinants because, ex hypothesi, the efficient natural causes at this
level are insufficient to determine all outcomes.33
4.3.3. Conclusions
In this section I have proposed a bottom-up account of divine action.
God governs each event at the quantum level in a way that respects the
natural rights of the entities involved. Gods action is (and from the
point of view of science, must be) such that, in general, these events
32
See n. 6 above.
My suspicion is that arguments based on quantum non-locality could also be
used to reinforce the claim that if God works in any quantum event, God must work
in all of them.
33
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accumulate in regular ways. However, within the limits provided by

the natures of the quantum entities involved and by our need for an
orderly and predictable world, God is free to bring about occasional
extraordinary events at the macro-levelexceptions that suit Gods own
purposes. This account provides a modus operandi for Gods constant
and all-pervasive governance of the physical cosmos, but does not rule
out special acts upon rare occasions.
Each event at the quantum level, then, needs to be represented as
follows:
G
S1 S2
Here S1 represents the prior state of the entity or system, and G represents an intentional act of God to actualize one of the possibilities
inherent in S1. Notice that this is a radical revision of the meaning
of cause as it is used in science and everyday life, since on the view
presented here no set of natural events or states of affairs is ever a sufficient condition for an event. One necessary condition will always be
an element of divine direction; nothing ever happens without Gods
direct participation.
Notice, also, that this view splits the difference between Newtons
view of the utter passivity of matter and Aristotles view of substances
possessing their own inherent powers to act. On this view, created
entities have inherent powers, yet they are radically incomplete: they
require Gods cooperation in order to be actualized.
4.4. Gods Action in the Regime of Law
By the regime of law I mean to refer to the events occurring at all
levels of complexity above the quantum level but below the level of
free action. In this section I shall first mention the constraints placed
upon our conclusions by the requirements of both science and theology.
Second, I shall attempt to state the consequences that the proposal of
the previous section has for a conception of the relationship of divine
action to the laws of nature.
4.4.1. Reconciling the Needs of Science and Religion
We come to the crux of the problem of divine action when we address
the regime of law. Science both presupposes for its very existence the
strictly law-like behavior of all entities and processes, and constantly
287
progresses in its quest to account for observable phenomena in terms of

elegant sets of interrelated laws. As stated above, no account of divine
action that undermines the practice of science or denies its major findings can be considered adequate.
However, the law-like regularity of nature has regularly been equated
with causal determinism, with the result that Gods action can be understood in one of three ways: God is not causally involved in the ongoing
processes of the universe; God is involved, but only by intervention; or
Gods action amounts to supporting the ongoing regular processes.
Since none of these options seems an adequate account of divine
action,34 much of the previous work in this area has concentrated on
finding respects in which the processes in this regime are not causally
determined by prior conditions and natural laws. However, if we adopt a
bottom-up view of divine causation, the problem of Gods action at the
macro-level reverses itself. The problem is not that of beginning with the
law-governed character of macro-level phenomena, and then trying to
find room for divine action. Rather, one begins with a strong measure
of divine determinism at the most basic level of natural processes and
then has to account for the observed regularity and the applicability
of laws of nature.
At this level we have to consider a similar set of questions as we
did in considering Gods relation to entities at the quantum level. But
these questions are complicated by relations to answers given at the
quantum level.
Let us take a very simple example of a macro-level entity: a billiard
ball. The ball is composed of cellulose structures; cellulose in turn is
composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. The stability of the elements and their ability to form this compound are effects of overall
patterns in the behavior of the constituent sub-atomic entities. The
characteristics of the wood itself (e.g., the grain and density) are the
result of past biological processes, similarly grounded in (but not
uniquely determined by) the behavior of the quantum-level entities.
The characteristics of the wood give rise to some of the characteristics
of the ball itself, such as its elasticity. Others, such as its shape and size
are effects of the manufacturing process, and perhaps other accidents
since then. So past environmental influences have interacted with
34
For reasons described in section 2.
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influences determined in a bottom-up manner by characteristic behaviors of its constituents.

To be a billiard ball is to have a set of inherent properties that allow
for a characteristic range of behaviors and interactions with other entities in the environment.
How does God act with respect to billiard balls? Is the rolling of a
billiard ball always, sometimes, or never the result of divine action? To
be consistent with the above analysis we must say that divine action is
always a necessary condition, but never a sufficient condition for such
an event. The continued existence of the ball is dependent upon God
acting in regular ways at the quantum level (e.g., governing the movements of the electrons in its atoms). But such patterns of action give
rise to an entity capable of interacting in some ways (but not others)
with the environment. One of the capacities with which the ball is
endowed by virtue of its constitution is to lie still until struck; another
is to roll when struck by the cue stick. So the rolling of the ball (ordinarily) will be a joint effect of an impact and of Gods sustaining the
balls characteristics from below.
One might now ask how this account differs from a standard modern account of God sustaining entities in existence whose behavior is
determined by the laws of nature, in particular the laws of motion. The
differences are subtle.35 First, God is not merely keeping the ball in existence; God is maintaining its typical characteristics through intentional
manipulation of its smallest constituents. This fulfills the theological
requirement that God be understood as acting within all macro-level
events. Second, the behavior of the ball and its characteristic interactions with the environment are not determined externally by laws out
there, but are inherent characteristics, emergent from the behavior
of its constituent parts.36 And, third, within the limits provided by the
natural rights of those constituents, God could effect extraordinary
behaviors or interactions by governing the constituents in atypical ways.
A philosopher once wrote that it is not impossible for all the atoms in
a billiard ball to go on a spree so that the ball would suddenly move
without any outside force. The account of divine action given here
entails that such things are possible, but if they happen they are not
35
And of course they are intended to be subtle. The goal here is to produce an
account of divine action that does not conflict with observations.
36
There may be exceptions here, such as the law of gravity.
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the result of chance synchronization of random vibrations, but rather

of intentional orchestration of the vastly many micro-events.37
4.4.2. God and the Laws of Nature
I have already suggested that we view the statistical laws of quantum
mechanics as summaries of patterns in Gods action upon quantum
entities and processes. In light of this claim, what are we to say about the
laws of nature above the quantum level but below the human level?
To say that these laws are nothing but summaries of individual acts
of God is to ignore the fact that Gods actions at the quantum level
constitute macro-level entities that have their own distinct manners of
operation. Mathematical description of the typical behaviors of these
entities yields our laws of nature.
Notice that at this point I am not saying anything new or unorthodox scientifically. I am simply assuming what has turned out to be true
about reductionism. Macro-level objects are complex organizations
of their most basic constituents (this is analytic). To a great extent,38
the behavior of the whole is determined by the behavior of its parts.
So the laws that describe the behavior of the macro-level entities are
consequences of the regularities at the lowest level,39 and are indirect
though intended consequences of Gods direct acts at the quantum level.
What is unorthodox (scientifically) is the grounding I have given to the
statistical regularities in the behavior at the quantum level.
Now, if the behavior of macro-level entities is dependent upon Gods
sustaining their specific characteristics by means of countless free and
intentional acts, why do natural processes look so much like the effect
of blind and wholly determinate forces? Since we have undermined
the standard modern answerdetermination by the laws of naturea
different account must be provided. The account to be given here is
theological: one of Gods chief purposes is (must have been) to produce
a true cosmosan orderly system. If we ask why God purposed an
orderly universe we might speculate that it is for the intrinsic beauty
and interest of such a cosmos; we could ground this speculation in our
37
The contentious point here has to do with the question whether or not quantum
effects necessarily wash out at the macro-level. I am assuming that they need not.
See section 5.4.
38
That is, within the limits circumscribed by top-down causation.
39
This is true even if the laws at higher levels cannot be derived mathematically
from the laws of quantum mechanics.
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own aesthetic appreciation and in the supposition that our appreciation

is an aspect of the imago Dei.
An equally significant explanation is the necessity for such order and
regularity so that intelligent and responsible beings such as ourselves
might exist to know, love, and serve him. The law-like character of the
universe is a necessary prerequisite for the physical existence of systems
as complex as our bodies; it is also necessary for intelligence. There could
not, of course, be brains capable of investigating the cosmos without
the cosmos being orderly; but if, per contra, suitably complex beings
did exist in a chaotic environment they would be unable to develop
intelligence. A fortiori they would not be able to make responsible free
choices. Free agency requires a background of law-like processes so that
the effects of ones action can be predicted.
But how law-like does the cosmos have to be? There is a vast continuum between total chaos (which is actually unimaginablethink of
the difficulty in producing a truly random series of numbers) and the
absolute regularity (determinism) that has often been assumed since
the rise of modern science. The assumptions upon which this paper
is based require that at some level a principle of the uniformity of
nature must prevail. Otherwise Gods governance would not include
intelligent use of cause-effect relations (any more than ours could),
and we would be back to occasionalism. But this does not entail that
our scientific laws could suffer no exceptionsin fact, I have just been
arguing that by tampering with initial conditions at the quantum level,
God can bring about extraordinary events; events out of keeping with
the general regularities we observe.
So the question is: To what extent can God bring about such extraordinary events without defeating his own purposes? It is obvious that the
whole cosmos does not fall into chaos if there are occasional exceptions.
The more interesting question is how much disorder is possible without
destroying our ability (or motivation) for intelligent appreciation of the
cosmos or our ability to take responsibility for our actions.
John Hick has written that God withholds obvious signs of his
existence in order to create epistemic distance, and hence to leave us
free to believe or not in his existence.40 This argument seems to have
something right about itit is certainly the case that God could act
in such a way as to make it much more difficult to deny his existence.
40
See John Hick, Evil and the God of Love (London: Macmillan, 1966).
291
Yet the argument seems faulty, too. It seems to overlook the traditional
account of disbelief as sin, and the fact that even in the face of the
most astounding evidence given by and on behalf of Jesus, the crowds
largely failed to believe. I suggest that Gods action does remain largely
hidden and is always ambiguouswhen manifest it is always subject
to other interpretations. But this is not because we would otherwise be
forced to believe in God (as Hick claims) and then to obey him. Rather
it is because we would lose our sense of the reliable behavior of the
environment. When the environment is taken to behave in a set (and
therefore predictable) manner, we can make responsible choices about
how to act within it. If instead we saw the environment as a complex
manifestation of divine action, we would lose our sense of being able
to predict the consequences of our actions, and would also lose our
sense of responsibility for them. So, for instance, if I carelessly allow
my child to fall off a balcony, I would not see myself as responsible
for his injuries since God was there with all sorts of opportunities for
preventing them.
These psychological requirements for responsible action seem to
require in turn that extraordinary acts of God be exceedingly rare (that
we not have any adequate justification for expecting God to undo the
consequences of our wrong choices) and that they normally be open
to interpretation as (somehow) in accord with the laws of nature. So
Gods relation with us requires a fine line between complete obviousness and complete hiddennessthe latter since we could not come to
know God without special divine acts.41 The difficulty in describing
Gods action is that we want to have it both ways: both that there be
evidence for divine actionsomething that science cannot explainand
that there be no conflict with science. So a suitable theory of how
God acts leaves everything as it was scientifically. But then there is no
evidence upon which to argue that such a view ought to be accepted
over a purely naturalistic account. Perhaps the ambivalence we find
41
History, both in scripture and elsewhere, reports frequent miracles in ancient times;
relatively few are reported today, and contemporary reports come more often from
less-educated populations. Most commentators assume that we are seeing a decrease
in gullibility. It is possible, though, that there are in fact fewer extraordinary events
because, with our sharpened sense of the order of nature, with increased abilities to
make measurements, our sense of the order of nature has become more fragile. As
technological and scientific capabilities to test miracle claims have increased, so have
our abilities to cast doubt upon causal regularity.
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in attempting to provide a description of divine action is rooted in an

intentional ambiguity in Gods acts themselves.
In summary: I am proposing that the uniformity of nature is a divine
artifact. God could produce a macroscopic world that behaved in much
less regular ways by manipulating quantum events. However, there are
two kinds of limits by which God abides. The first is respecting the
inherent characteristics of created entities at both the quantum and
higher levelsrespecting their natural rights. However, within the
degrees of freedom still remaining many more strange things could
happen than what we observebilliard balls going on a spree. So we
must assume that God restricts extraordinary actions even further in
order to maintain our ability to believe in an orderly and dependable
natural environment.
Chaos Theory: A Subsidiary Role
The real value of chaos theory for an account of divine action is that it
gives God a great deal of room in which to effect specific outcomes
without destroying our ability to believe in the natural causal order.
The room God needs is not space to work within a causally determined
orderontological roombut rather room to work within our perceptions of natural orderepistemological room.
It may be significant that two of Christians most common subjects
for prayer are health and weather. Weather patterns are clearly chaotic,
so it is never possible to claim definitively that a prayer regarding the
weather has or has not been answered. I suspect that because most
bodily states are so finely tuned they too involve chaotic systems. Thus,
the recovery from an illness and especially the timing of recovery cannot
always be predicted. So do we pray for these things rather than others
because we lack faith that God could break a law of nature or is it
rather because of our long experience with a God who prefers to work
on our behalf under the cover of chaos?
4.4.3. Top-Down Causation: A Subsidiary Role
The recognition of top-down considerations plays two vital roles in
this proposal. In addition to the factor to be pursued belowGods
top-down influence on the created order through human top-down
agencya second is as follows: I have argued that Gods action at the
sub-atomic level governs the behavior of natures most basic constituents, but without violating their natural rights. So in order to understand the limits of divine agency at that level and in all higher levels,
we need to know what are the intrinsic capabilities of those entities.
293
However, it appears that the behaviors that are natural to an entity

(from any level of the hierarchy) are not simply givenentities can do
more, have more degrees of freedom, when placed in a more complex
environment. Studying the inherent powers of an entity in isolation will
not tell us what it can do when incorporated into a higher regime. For
example, humans can eat, move about, make noise, in total isolation
from community, but our truly human capacities such as language only
emerge in society. A solitary individual, or even an individual who is
part of a herd rather than a society, cannot teach philosophy.
There are limits, of course, to the increased freedom that any particular regime can promote. For example, cats can be taught to play
games and eat onions when incorporated into a household; pet rocks
cannot, no matter how stimulating the company. However, this limitation applies to known regimes. As Polkinghorne has pointed out, we
are not well-acquainted with the possibilities for either human life or
natural events within a regime in which Gods will is the dominant
factor. Medieval Christians believed that the great chain of being was
also a chain of command, broken by human (and angelic) disobedience. Saintly beings repaired the chain, and hence holy people such as
St. Francis could command the animals. While this account does no
more than Peacockes to explain how divine influences are transmitted to sub-human beings, it does suggest that a phenomenon has been
recognized throughout Christian history: natural beings and processes
operate somewhat differently in the presence of people imbued with
the presence of God.
4.5. Divine Action in the Human Realm
God has a number of ways to affect human beings by means of the
spoken and written word. But this kind of communication is the
transmission of effects via normal human processes, and we have to
ask where these effects originated. How does original communication
between the divine and human take place?
A theory consistent with the proposal of this paper is that God
affects human consciousness by stimulation of neuronsmuch as a
neurologist can affect conscious states by careful electrical stimulation
of parts of the brain. Gods action on the nervous system would not
be from the outside, of course, but by means of bottom-up causation
from within. Such stimulation would cause thoughts to be recalled to
mind; presumably it could cause the occurrence of new thoughts by
coordinated stimulation of several ideas, concepts, or images stored in
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memory. Such thoughts could occur in conjunction with emotions that

suited the occasion. I suggest that concatenations of such phenomena
that convey a message or attitude from God to the individual is what
constitutes revelation.42 I believe that this account fits with the phenomena of religious experience. It is interesting to note that medieval mystics
placed a great deal of emphasis on the faculty of memorytaking it
as an important means by which God made himself known to them.43
It is also consistent with the extent to which revelation is formed of
materials available in the persons culture.
The following account illustrates my suggestion: A student reported
that the thought suddenly occurred to him that he should speak to a
recent acquaintance about his drinking problemeven though he did
not know that the person had such a problem. In conjunction with the
thought, he had a sudden memory of his troubled relationship with his
father due to alcohol, and felt an associated emotional impact from that
memory. The conjunction of all of these experiences convinced him that
he was receiving a message from God to approach the acquaintance
and urge him to attend to the alcohol problem before it affected his
relations with his children.
In short, religious experience is made up of the same materials of
which ordinary experience is made. This is consistent with the view that
God acts upon consciousness by stimulating and coordinating materials that are already stored in the subjects brain. So this is a top-down
account of God acting upon our actions, since its explanation requires
reference to God as the environment within which the person functions. However, it depends for its means of operation on a bottom-up
account of Gods affecting the brain. As stated above, I believe all
top-down causes have to involve some point of contact between the
larger whole and the affected part.
4.6. Overview
I have claimed that we need to distinguish among three different regimes
for the purpose of devising a theory of divine action: the human, the
quantum and, in between, the regime of law. However, these three
42
See George F.R. Ellis, The Theology of the Anthropic Principle, in Quantum
Cosmology, section 8.1.
43
This notion originated with Augustines Platonic epistemology, but there must
have been some experiential correlate to keep the emphasis alive.
295
regimes cannot be considered in isolation. God acts within the regime

of law by actualizing, at chosen times, one or another of the built-in
potentialities of each sub-atomic entity. Coordination of all such events
generally produces the law-like behavior we observeboth statistical
regularities of aggregates of quantum events and the law-like behavior
of macro-entities and processes.
So when we consider the behavior of entities in the regime of law,
Gods ability to engineer desired outcomes is on the one hand limited
by his decision to respect the natural rights of the entities with which
he cooperates, and in this sense Gods consequent freedom of action
decreases as we go up the scale of complexitymore and more complex constraints are placed on divine outcomes by the more and more
complex sets of entities with their natural rights to be allowed their
characteristic limitations. Why this is so can be seen by considering
an analogythe increasing complexity of engineering an outcome in
increasingly complex societies. Among a group of friends, exerting
ones will is constrained only by ones own natural limitations and by
the wills (rights) of the other individuals. However, if these individuals
together constitute a social entity or institution with its own proper
rights and responsibilities, further constraints are imposed (e.g., club
rules require attendance at group activities, forbid certain activities). If
this social entity is a part of a larger social entity (a national organization of local clubs) it will be further constrained by the character of
that larger entity, and so forth.
On the other hand, as I have emphasized above, placing entities
in more complex environments increases the scope of their inherent
powers. To return to our analogy, there are things God can do with
a national organization that could not be done with a collection of
individuals. So, in some ways, this gives God more room to maneuver
without violating their natural rights. And finally, we have to reckon
with the possibilities for interaction between Gods top-down and
bottom-up causation.
5. Evaluation
In this final section I shall attempt an evaluation of the position presented herein. First, I shall indicate the ways in which this proposal
meets the theological and scientific criteria proposed in section 2.
Second, I shall mention some of the objections that I expect will be
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raised and reply to them. Third, I shall mention advantages of this

proposal over some others. Finally, I shall describe the issues that need
further development.
5.1. Theological Criteria
This proposal meets the criteria set out in section 2 as follows:
5.1.1. Doctrine
The above account of divine action allows for Gods cooperation with
and governance of all events in a way that leaves (some) room for
special (extraordinary) divine acts. It also emphasizes the non-coercive,
freedom-respecting character of Gods action in the human realm and
extends these features to an account of divine action in the non-human
realm as well.
5.1.2. Knowledge of Gods Actions
I have proposed an account that for all practical purposes is observationally indistinguishable from a naturalistic or deistic account. The built-in
ambiguity in distinguishing intentional action of God from natural
eventsthe general hiddenness of Gods action in random processes
and chaotic systemsraises the question of how we could ever know of
Gods action. The answer is that we only see Gods action by observing
larger patterns of events. Consider this analogy: Rocks are arranged on
a hillside to spell out Jesus saves. It is obvious when looking at the
whole that this has been done intentionally. However, investigation of
the location of any single rock in the collection would not reveal that
it had been intentionally placed. Similarly, in the students account of
his revelatory experience, the occurrence of the thought that he should
speak to his acquaintance about a drinking problem, by itself, would
merely be odd. It is only because of its occurrence in conjunction with
the other experiences that he took it as possibly revelatory. Its revelatory
status was confirmed when he acted on it: the acquaintance confessed
to the problem and set out immediately to get help. So Gods acts are
recognized by the way particular events fit into a longer narrative, and
ultimately into the great narrative from creation to the eschaton, from
Genesis to Revelation.
In order to maintain a place for special acts of God, it is important
to distinguish between two classes of events: those that would not have
happened without causal input from God (and we are here assuming
297
that all events fall into this category), and events that count as Gods
actions. In discussing human action we distinguish, from among all of
the events that humans cause, the smaller class of those that express
their intentions. Only the latter are described as actions. So all events
are the result of Gods causal influence; only some events express (to
us) Gods intentions. It is the latter that ought, strictly speaking, to be
called Gods actions.
5.1.3. Prayer
Petitionary prayer makes sense on this account, but more so for some
kinds of events than others. Events that are recognized as possible yet
unpredictable (i.e., the results of chaotic processes, unpredictable coincidences) are more to be expected than events that defy the law-like
behavior of natural processes. However, prayers for the latter are not
out of the question. One condition under which we might expect such
prayers to be answered is when the divine act would serve a revelatory
purpose, since, by hypothesis, God must occasionally act in extraordinary ways to make himself known.
It is clear that in cases where outcomes are not predictable (e.g.,
weather, healing), one of the most valuable conditions for recognizing
the action of God is that it constitutes a meaningful complex of prayer
and response. The prayer beforehand makes it possible for an unpredictable eventan event that might have happened in any caseto
reveal the purposes of God. So while prayer might not be necessary to
persuade God to act, it will be necessary for us to recognize the fact
that God is acting.44
5.1.4. Deism and Occasionalism
The central goal of this paper was to present an account of divine action
that steers a course between deism and occasionalism. I believe that this
proposal does so. Gods action in every event is guaranteed, and so is
some measure of control over the course of events such that special,
even extraordinary, acts are possible. At the same time, Gods decision
to cooperate with created entities rather than to override their natural
characteristics means that entities above the quantum level, with their
44
There are surely other reasons for prayer, as well, such as building a relationship
with God, and perhaps the praying itself in some way contributes to bringing about
the desired effect.
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built-in capacities for action, are allowed by God to use themnatural

causal relations are not denied. It is this letting be that provides an
explanation for the fact that the universe does not appear to manifest
the purposes of an all-wise and all-powerful God in all of its details.
5.2. Scientific Criteria
This proposal saves the appearance (within limits) of law-governed
processes and justifies scientific research. However, the justification is
theological: the universe can be expected to be intelligible since it is
one of Gods high purposes that it be so. In addition, it saves quantum
physics from violation of the principle of sufficient reason.
5.3. Objections and Answers
The following are some of the objections that might be raised against
this proposal. Others will be addressed in conjunction with the evaluation of competitors in section 5.4.
5.3.1. Ad Hoc-ness
One criticism of this position is that it appears ad hoc: God can make all
sorts of wonderful things happen, but almost never does so. In defense, I
claim that the apparent absence of divine action is ethically necessary.45
First, unless and until we know more about how Gods acts at the quantum level affect the macro-level, we really do not know what actions
are possible for God without violating Gods ethical principles.
Second, the intentional but metaphysically unnecessary decision on
Gods part to act openly only on rare occasions is necessary if God is
to interact with humans without destroying their sense of the dependability of the natural order and of their own responsibility. This not
only answers the charge in question, but has the further advantage of
answering the very troubling question raised for Christians who believe
in providence: Why would God answer prayers for small things (cure
of a cold), while apparently refusing to take actions that would prevent
much suffering (an early death for Hitler)?
45
See Ellis, Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action (in this volume).
299
5.3.2. Uncertainty of Science

It may be said that this proposal is faulty because the science upon
which it is based is controversial or likely to change. My reply is that
the proposal is not based on the particularities of current quantum
theory. Its real basis is ontological reductionism (a view that is not
likely to be overturned so long as there is science as we know it) and
on the theological claim that God works constantly in all creatures. I
conclude that God therefore works constantly in the smallest or most
basic of all creatures. This claim will stand, however those most basic
constituents are described.
However, current theories in quantum physics do provide a valuable
ingredient for this theory of divine action: the currently accepted supposition of indeterminacy at the quantum level provides a handy analogue
for human freedom, and thus grounds for the claim that Gods action
is analogously non-coercive at the quantum level. I would be sorry to
have to give up this element, but it is not essential to the proposal.
5.3.3. Two Languages
How shall we now speak of causes? For any event there will be at
least two, usually three, necessary conditions: the prior state of the
system, Gods influence, and often influences from the environment.
Our standard practice in answering questions about causes is to select
from a set of necessary and jointly sufficient conditions the one that
is most relevant to our purposes. On this account, every event can be
considered from the point of view of science, and the natural conditions
(previous state and environment) will then be cited as causes. Every
event can likewise be considered from a religious point of view, where
Gods action is the relevant factor.
It might be said that this position is a version of a two-language
solution, similar to some strategies for answering the problem of free
will and determinism. However, the difference is that divine action and
natural causation, on the view proposed here, are no longer opposing
accounts (as are freedom and determinism), since neither the natural
nor the divine condition for an event is assumed to be a sufficient
condition.
I claim that this way of speaking about causes is not only consistent
with our normal linguistic practice, but also reflects a common way
of speaking of divine action in scripture. For example, Joseph says to
his brothers: And now do not be distressed, or angry with yourselves,
because you sold me here; for God sent me here to preserve life
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nancey murphy
(Gen. 45:5). The full account of the event involves both human and
divine agency. Joseph emphasizes Gods providence while recognizing
at the same time that his brothers can indeed be held accountable.
5.3.4. Gods Lack of Knowledge
Peacocke claims that Gods action at the quantum level is forestalled
by the fact that particular events are as unpredictable to God as they
are to us. My proposal evades this difficulty since by hypothesis these
events are not random; they are manifestations of divine will.
5.4. Advantages Over Previous Proposals
The theorist in this area whose work comes closest to mine is W.G.
Pollard, who suggested that God works through manipulation of
all sub-atomic events.46 Pollard has been criticized by both David
J. Bartholomew and Barbour for providing an account whereby all
events are determined by divine action. Such an account, they say, in
incompatible with human freedom. My account avoids this problem,
first, by qualifying bottom-up divine influences by means of top-down
causation.47 Second, and more importantly, my account of Gods respect
for the natural rights of all creatures leaves room for genuine human
freedom.
Another criticism of Pollard is that he takes Gods action at this level
to be constrained within fixed statistical laws. However, I concur with
Bartholomew, who claims that Pollards work involves a misunderstanding of the very nature of statistical laws.48
The constraints upon Gods action that I propose come instead from
Gods commitment to respect the innate characteristics with which he
has endowed his creatures. This seems to leave some room for God to
maneuver at the macro-level, but, as I mention below, the exact amount
of room is difficult to ascertain. This same factor (constraint) allows
me to answer a charge Bartholomew makes against Donald MacKay.
MacKay claims that God is in detailed control of the behavior of all
46
William Pollard, Chance and Providence: Gods Action in a World Governed by
Scientific Law (New York: Scribner, 1958).
47
Barbour has already noted the need for this qualification in his discussion of
Pollards position in Issues in Science and Religion, 430.
48
See David J. Bartholomew, God of Chance (London: SCM Press, 1984), 12728.
301
elementary particles.49 But if this is the case, Bartholomew asks, why

does God appear to act in such a capricious manner?50 My answer:
Gods control is limited by his choice to cooperate with rather than
over-ride created entities.
So we have returned to the issue of finding an account of how God
acts that produces a result between two extremes: On the one hand, the
account must not lead us to expect God to have total control of every
outcome. If so, it would deny human freedom, clash with the apparent
randomness and purposelessness manifested in some aspects of nature,
and leave God entirely responsible for all of the evil in the world. On
the other hand, such an account must not lead to the conclusion that
God has no room within created processes intentionally to influence the
course of events. I believe that my account successfully steers between
these two extremes.51
5.5. Unanswered Questions
The most serious weakness of this paper is in describing the consequences of the theory of divine action at the quantum level for events
at the macro-level. What, exactly, are the possibilities for Gods determining the outcomes of events at the macro-level by governing the
behavior of sub-atomic entities? What exactly are the limits placed upon
Gods determination of macro-events by his decision not to violate the
natures of these entities? Is this a broad opening for divine action, or
a very narrow window? The answer depends on sorting out issues in
the relation of quantum physics to the rest of science. Polkinghorne
states that:
There is a particular difficulty in using quantum indeterminacy to describe
divine action. Conventional quantum theory contains much continuity
and determinism in addition to its well-known discontinuities and indeterminacies. The latter refer, not to all quantum events, but only to those
particular events which qualify, by the irreversible registration of their
effects in the macro-world, to be described as measurements. Occasions
of measurement only occur from time to time and a God who acted
49
See Donald MacKay, The Clockwork Image: A Christian Perspective on Science
(Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1974).
50
Bartholomew, God of Chance, 25.
51
It also avoids the interventionist overtones of Bartholomews suggestion that it
might be better to assume that God leaves most quantum events to chance and only
acts upon occasion to determine some specific outcome. See ibid., 130.
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nancey murphy
through being their determinator would also only be acting from time
to time. Such an episodic account of providential agency does not seem
altogether theologically satisfactory.52
Polkinghorne would include among these possible instances of meaningful divine action, I believe, cases where sensitivity of chaotic systems to
initial conditions involves changes so slight as to fall within the domain
of quantum mechanics. The classic example of a macroscopic system
that measures quantum events is Schrdingers poor cat, whose life
or death is made to depend on the status of one quantum event.
Against Polkinghornes view, Robert Russell would argue that the
important fact that has been overlooked here is the extent to which
the general character of the entire macroscopic world is a function of
the character of quantum events. Putting it playfully, he points out that
the whole cat is constituted by quantum events!
We can imagine in a straightforward way Gods effect on the quantum event that the experimental apparatus is designed to isolate; we
cannot so easily imagine the cumulative effect of Gods action on the
innumerable quantum events that constitute the cats existence. Yet
this latter is equally the realm of divine action.53 I have been assuming
Russells position throughout this paper. Yet even if Russell is correct,
there still remains a question. Does the fact that God is affecting the
whole of reality (the whole cat) in a general way by means of operation
in the quantum range allow for the sort of special or extraordinary
divine acts that I claim Christians need to account for? Or would such
special acts be limited to the few sorts of instances that Polkinghorne
envisions?54
A second open question comes from our lack of knowledge regarding the possibilities for top-down causation, and the role of holist
laws. In particular, we lack knowledge of the possibilities of divine
top-down causation and of the possible behavior of natural entities
within a regime constituted by the full presence and action of God.
We have a glimpse of this regime in the resurrection of Jesus, and a
hint from Paul that the whole cosmos awaits such a transformation.
52
Polkinghorne, Metaphysics of Divine Action.

See Russell, Quantum Physics in Philosophical and Theological Perspective, in
Physics, Philosophy, and Theology: A Common Quest for Understanding, ed. Russell,
William R. Stoeger., and George V. Coyne (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory,
1988), 34368.
54
My hope is that this question can be addressed at a future conference.
53
303
Are there states in between this final state, in which God will be all in
all, and the present state of Gods hiddenness in natural processes? Do
the extraordinary events surrounding the lives of Jesus and the saints
represent such an intermediate regime?
Finally, it has been the consistent teaching of the church that God
respects the freedom and integrity of his human creatures. I have proposed as an axiom of my theory of divine action that God respects the
natural rights of entities at the quantum level as well. Is it, then, the
case that all created entities have intrinsic characters that God respects in
his interaction with the world? And what does God do when the rights
of creatures at different levels of the hierarchy come into conflict? The
claim that God acts consistently throughout the hierarchy of complexity
has consequences regarding what sort of thing God should and should
not be expected to do with creatures within the intermediate realm
between humans and quarks. For instance, it would be consistent with
my proposal for God to cause Buridans ass to eat, but not to cause
Balaams ass to speak. Does our experience of Gods action in our lives
bear out such a distinction, and does this distinction help explain why
some prayers are answered and others not?
My hope is that despite these unanswered questions, the foregoing
proposal provides insights that are worthy of further pursuit.55
55
I thank all conference participants for their responses to this paper. Steve Happel
and Bob Russell were especially diligent critics.
CHAPTER NINE
ORDINARY AND EXTRAORDINARY DIVINE ACTION:

THE NEXUS OF INTERACTION
George F.R. Ellis
Prologue
This paper touches controversial issues, and some of the possibilities
discussed will undoubtedly make some readers uncomfortable. This is
because it takes seriously in a particular way both the historic Christian
message and a modern scientific perspective, emphasizing their cognitive claims as I understand them from a Quaker perspective. The reader
may not share this double commitment. Nevertheless the argument is
logically and epistemologically sound; the unease is at a theological
and/or metaphysical level. This issue will be discussed briefly in the last
main section. However, a full treatment cannot be given here; an indepth justification for the view taken has been given in other works.1
For the moment I make the initial claims that: (1) there are other
types of knowledge besides that given by the hard sciences, for
example, that given by philosophy, theology, humanistic, and artistic
disciplinesthe task is to find a viewpoint that does justice to these
issues as well as to hard science, in a compatible way; (2) the hypothetico-deductive method used to support the viewpoint presented here
is essentially the same as that underlying our acceptance of modern
science; and (3) the main themes proposed, controversial as they are,
are supported by as much or indeed more evidence (admittedly of a
more general form than that used by physics alone) than many of the
themes of modern theoretical physics.
The requirement in order to approach the material fairly is an open
mind in looking at the various logically possible options, rather than
Nancey Murphy and George F.R. Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the Universe:
Theology, Cosmology, and Ethics (Mineapolis: Fortress, 1996)developing themes
outlined in Ellis, Before The Beginning: Cosmology Explained (New York: Bowerdean/
Boyars, 1993).
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george f.r. ellis
simply selecting one particular metaphysical stance on an a priori basis.

The important point is that we have to adopt some metaphysical position; we should do so here in a considered way.
1. Introduction
This paper is largely a response to Nancey Murphys contribution to
this volume, Divine Action in the Natural Order: Buridans Ass and
Schrdingers Cat. That paper is revolutionary because it represents a
conservative interpretation of the Christian faith2 which, unlike most
other such interpretations, takes the content of modern science seriously as part of the task of constructive theology. The viewpoint here
will be to basically agree with Murphys paper, and comment on some
specific issues raised by its thesis.
Accepting the main thesis of that paper, the themes I would like to
discuss further are: (a) the issue of capricious action; (b) the issue of
top-down causation through intention, and the particular causal nexus
of the action; and (c) the issue of evidence for the position stated.
As regards (a), one of the main problems for the proposal is the
charge of capriciousness in Gods action, in terms of God deciding
now and then to act contrary to the regular patterns of events but often
deciding not to do so. One would like to have articulated some kind
of criterion of choice underlying such decisions, and then an analysis
given of how that criterion might work out in practice. This has to take
very seriously indeed the issue of evil, pain, and suffering as experienced in the present-day world, of Gods acceptance and allowance of
horrors of all kinds, which one might a priori presume he/she could
and would prevent if he/she so desired. If the usual Christian view is
to make sense, there has to be a cast-iron reason why a merciful and
loving God does not alleviate a lot more of the suffering in the world,
if he/she has indeed the power to do so. This leads to the question of
when divine action may be expected to take place, in either an ordi2
That is, it is in agreement with centuries-old aspects of the Christian tradition. See,
e.g., Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, ed. Gordon Wakefield (London: SCM Press,
1989); and Denis Edwards, Human Experience of God (Ramsey, NJ: Paulist Press, 1983).
However it is certainly not fundamentalist in its attitude; rather it is in agreement with
the kind of modernizing approach advocated by Peter Berger in his superb book, A
Rumor of Angels: Modern Society and the Rediscovery of the Supernatural (New York:
Doubleday, 1969; reprint, New York: Anchor Books, 1990).
ordinary and extraordinary divine action
307
nary or an extraordinary manner. Thus, one needs to characterize

those concepts, and have some kind of criterion as to when each may
be expected.
One possible approach to this range of issues is to emphasize the
possibility of another domain of response of matter to life than usually
encountered, as suggested by John Polkinghorne:3 that matter might
respond directly to God-centered minds through laws of causal behavior that are seldom tested (see section 4.4 below). Then the distinction
between ordinary and extraordinary action becomes the question of
whether we have entered this domain or not. This may provide a
partial answer.
As regards (b), a central theme in Peacockes writing,4 the issue is
what type of top-down causation might occur, and where the causal
nexus could be whereby this top-down action could be initiated in the
physical world. I will particularly contrast general top-down influences
which alter conditions over a wide range of events (as in many of the
examples given by Bernd-Olaf Kppers)5 with specific top-down actions,
which are very focused in their aim and influence. I will argue that the
latter is what is required for the Christian tradition to make sense, and
that it requires something like the special action mentioned in Murphys
paper. This is probably related to the issue of free-will.6
Regarding the specific causal nexus, my view is in agreement with that
of Robert Russell, William Pollard, and others, and recently supported
and well-discussed in Thomas Tracys paper Particular Providence
and the God of the Gaps.7 The relevant points are: (b1) the need for
some kind of gap in the strictly causal chain from physical cause
to effect if specific divine action in the world is to be possible in a
meaningful sense (I believe it may well be that one can make the same
claim in respect to individual actions with a connotation of personal
responsibility); (b2) the inability of deterministic chaos to provide a
3
See John Polkinghorne, Gods Action in the World, CTNS Bulletin 10, no.
2 (Spring 1990), 7; idem, Science and Providence: Gods Interaction with the World
(London: SPCK Press, 1989); and William Stoeger Describing Gods Action in the
World in the Light of Scientific Knowledge of Reality (in CTNS/VO, v. II).
4
See Arthur Peacocke, Gods Interaction with the World (in CTNS/VO, v. II).
5
Bernd-Olaf Kppers, Understanding Complexity (in CTNS/VO, v. II).
6
See, e.g., Roger Penrose, The Emperors New Mind: Concerning Computers, Minds,
and the Laws of Physics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989); and Euan Squires,
Conscious Mind in the Physical World (Bristol: Adam Hilger, 1990).
7
CTNS/VO, v. II.
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george f.r. ellis
solution to this problem of causal gaps; and (b3) the fact that quantum
uncertainty does indeed have this potential. Overall these contentions
are supportive of the argument in Murphys paper.
As regards (c), while proof will not be available, one would like
some broad brush-stroke defense of the position presented in terms of
general lines of evidence.8 The main point here is that, as emphasized
in Murphys present paper, one of the needs is to satisfy the Christian
tradition in terms of doctrine and practice; but then the issue is, Whose
doctrine? Whose practice? What is the foundation for choosing and
supporting one particular brand of tradition?
Either one goes here for a rather inclusive, broad-stream interpretation which aims to be widely acceptable across the many varieties of
Christian tradition, and therefore will inevitably be regarded as weak
by many of them; or one aims to be more particular and detailed in
terms of developing the view of some particular branch of that tradition
in depth. But then the product becomes rather exclusive in its nature,
and may be regarded as irrelevant by others. In either case the issue
becomes that of validating what is claimed to be true by the chosen
traditions or doctrines, in the light of manifest errors, in many cases,
in what has been claimed in the past.
To cope with the issue of inclusivity, one can suggest that this defense
should, first, have a broad base aimed at validating a religious worldview
in general, strongly supported by widely acceptable evidence; second,
support a more specifically Christian view developed as a second stage
of the argument, refining its methods, detail, and evidence; and with
support for a particular tradition developed in the third stage. I shall
make some comments along these lines at the end. The proposal made
here is that the idea of top-down causation, with different layers of
description, effective laws, meaning, and evidence, is the best framework
for understanding and testing the overall scheme suggested.
Cf. Murphy, Evidence of Design in the Fine-Tuning of the Universe, in Quantum

Cosmology and the Laws of Nature: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, ed. Robert
John Russell, Nancey Murphy, and C.J. Isham (Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory,
1993; Berkeley, CA: Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1993).
309
2. Emergent Order and Top-Down Action

As explained clearly by Kppers and Peacocke, in hierarchically structured complex systems we find both top-down action and emergent
order.
First, the hierarchical structure introduces levels of emergent order,
as described so ably by Arthur Peacocke:9 irreducible concepts used
to describe the higher levels of the hierarchical order are simply inapplicable at the lower levels of order. Thus, different levels of order and
description are required, allowing new meanings to emerge at the higher
levels of description. (Note that these are different-level descriptions of
the same physical system, applicable at the same time.)
Second, this structure enables top-down action to take place whereby
interactions at the lower levels cannot be predicted by looking at the
structure at that level alone, for it depends on, and can only be understood in terms of, the structures at the higher levels.
In the specific case of biology, we find, beautifully described by Neil
Campbell, a hierarchical structure as depicted in Figure 1 (on following
page). As expressed by Campbell:
With each upward step in the hierarchy of biological order, novel properties emerge that were not present at the simpler levels of organization.
These emergent properties arise from interactions between the components. . . . Unique properties of organized matter arise from how the parts
are arranged and interact . . . [consequently] we cannot fully explain a
higher level of organization by breaking it down to its parts.10
Indeed not only are such different levels of description permitted, they
are required in order to make sense of what is going on. This is true
not only of biological systems: Kppers shows convincingly that such
emergent properties are important even in a physical system such as a
gas, being mediated by the systems structural conditions and boundary
conditions (as discussed further below).11 Ian Barbour12 and Peacocke13
develop the theme of emergence in depth.
Peacocke, Gods Interaction.

Neil A. Campbell, Biology (Redwood City, CA: Benjamin Cummings, 1991), 23.
11
Kppers, Understanding Complexity.
12
Ian Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science, The Gifford Lectures, 19891991, vol. 1
(San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1990).
13
Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age: Being and BecomingNatural and Divine
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1987).
10
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george f.r. ellis

Ecosystem
Biological Community
Species
Population
I
community
structure
Organism
Organ Systems
Organs
Tissues
II
organism structure
Cells
Organelles
Molecules
Atoms
Ions and electrons
III
cell
structure
Figure 1. Biological Levels of Emergent Order.
In a biological system, the two crucial levels of order are that of the cell
and the individual organism; at each of these levels there is a higher
level of autonomy of coherent action than at any of the other levels. A
biologist regards individuals as the elementary components of a population, and cells as elementary components of the individual, while
(broadly speaking) a microbiologist regards molecules and a biochemist,
ions and electrons, as the elementary components. A physicist would
continue down the hierarchical scale, reducing these to quarks, gluons,
and electrons.
2.1. Hierarchies of Software: Digital Computers
A particularly clear example is given by modern digital computers,
which operate through hierarchies of software: from the bottom up
there are machine language (expressed in binary digits), assembly
language (expressed in hexadecimal), operating system and programming language (expressed in ASCII), and application package (e.g.,
word processor) levels of software. At every level there is a completely
deterministic type of behavior described by algorithms applicable at
that level. All of this is realized in terms of the motion of electrons
flowing in the integrated circuits as determined by the laws of physics.
This is where the actual action takes place, but it does so according to
311
plans implemented at the higher levels of structure, and thereby effects

actions that are meaningful at the higher levels.14
Level n
Virtual Machine Mn with machine

Language Ln
Level 4
Virtual Machine M4 with machine

Language L4
Level 3

Language L3
Level 2

Language L2
Level 1

Language L1
Figure 2. Generic Hierarchical Structure of a Computer.
Logically, a digital computer consists of a hierarchy of n different virtual

machines Mn each with a different machine language Ln.15 Its generic
structure is expressed in Figure 2 (above).
The physical computer M1 does the actual calculation in machine
language L1; each virtual computer runs programs either by interpreting them in terms of the lower machine languages, or translating
them into these lower languages (e.g., programs in L2 are either interpreted by an interpreter running on L1, or are translated to L1). Each
computers machine language (at each level in the hierarchy) consists
of all the instructions the computer can execute at that level. However,
only programs written in language L1 can be directly carried out by
the electronic circuits, without the need for intervening translation or
14
For a very clear exposition of the hierarchical structuring in modern digital
computer systems, see Andrew S. Tannenbaum, Structured Computer Organization
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1990).
15
Ibid., 23.
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george f.r. ellis
Level 6
Application package
(e.g., word-processor)
Translation (compiler)
Level 5
Problem-oriented language
level (e.g., C or Basic)
Translation (compiler)
Level 4
Assembly language level

Translation (assembler)
Level 3
Operating system machine

level
Partial interpretation
(operating system)
Level 2
Conventional machine
level
Interpretation
(microprogram)
Level 1
Microprogramming level
Directly executed by
hardware
Level 0
Digital logic level
Figure 3. Typical Hierarchical Structure of a Digital Computer.
interpretation. In contemporary multilevel machines, the actual levels

realized are shown in Figure 3 (above).16
The logical connections between the different levels in the computer,
and the resulting machine languages at each level, are tightly controlled
by the machine hardware and software. In particular, given the machine,
the program loaded into particular memory locations, and the data
resident in memory, each high-level instruction will result in a unique
series of actions at the digital (hardware) level, which in turn will
result in a unique series of consequences at each of the higher levels.
16
Ibid., 47.
313
Consequently the machine language at each level also has a tight logical
structure with a very precise set of operations resulting from each
statement in that language. The detailed relation of operations from
high to low levels, and at each level, will depend on the actual memory
locations used for the program and data; but the logical operation is
independent of these details.17
In biological systems, with hierarchical levels as indicated above,
the same kind of logical structure holds; however the languages
at the higher levels are much less tightly structured than in the case
of the computer,18 and the links between different levels correspondingly less rigid.
2.2. The Physical Mediation of Top-Down Action
Consider now how the hierarchically structured action is designed
to occur, in physical terms. We can represent this as follows: for a
structured hierarchical physical system S, made up of physical particles
interacting only through physical forces, top-down and bottom-up
action are related as shown in Figure 4 (on following page).
The boundary B separates the system S from its environment E.
Interaction with the outside world (the environment) takes place by
information/energy/matter flow in or out through the boundary, and is
determined by the boundary conditions at B. The structure of the system
is determined by its structural conditions, which can be expressed as
constitutive relations between the parts. I distinguish here structural
conditions, fixed by the initial state of the physical system but then
remaining constant in a stable physical system (e.g., the structure of
a computer as determined by its manufacture), and initial conditions
and boundary conditions as usually understood in physics (e.g., the
initial state of motion of a fluid in a cell and temperature conditions
imposed at the cell boundaries over a period of time).19
17
These structures and their interconnections are described in considerable detail
in Tannenbaums book.
18
The major aim of the AI (artificial intelligence) movement is to arrive at a correspondingly loose structure in the computers higher-level languages.
19 Kpperss concept of boundary condition conflates these three rather different
concepts. See Understanding Complexity.
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george f.r. ellis
2.2.1. Classical Physical Systems

Examples: (1) the atmosphere; (2) an aircraft; (3) a digital computer.
In these systems, the action is strictly deterministic, though not
necessarily predictable.20 (This is ensured in designed systems such as
(2) and (3), in order to obtain reliability; any quantum uncertainties
are damped out, by design.)
* Level of Meaning N
* Level of Law N
TopDown
I*
Lowest level
Constituents
* Level of Meaning N1
* Level of Law N1
F*
Microscopic laws
Environment
E
Boundary B
BottomUp
Figure 4. Top-Down and Bottom-Up Causal Interactions in a Generic

Hierarchical System. I is the initial state of the constituents and F the final
state; the microscopic laws of the system determine the movement from I to
F. (For brevity only two of the levels of meaning and law have been shown;
ordinarily there will be many.)
A: Top-down action happens by means of states at the higher-level

initiating coordinated action at the bottom level, which is governed
by the basic causal relations underlying the system. The bottom-level
components act on each other by regular physical laws, the resulting
final state at the bottom level then determining conditions at the higher
levels, because they define conditions at the higher levels through their
aggregation (or coarse-graining) properties. The last two steps are
what is meant by bottom-up causation in these contexts.
The coordination of action occurs through the structural arrangement
and interconnection of lower-level entities (e.g., transistors, capacitors,
etc.) to form higher-level entities (e.g., computers, television sets, etc.).
20
If the computer output were predictable in any simpler way we would not need
to run the computer program.
315
Because the semantics of the higher level are intrinsic to its nature, the
language (vocabulary and syntax) at each level cannot be reduced to
that at a lower level, even though what happens at each higher level is
uniquely determined by the coordinated action taking place at the lowerlevels, where it is fully described in terms of the lower-level languages.
Thus, the whole structure shows emergence of new properties (at the
higher levels) not reducible to those of the constituent parts.
Examples: (1) lowering the undercarriage in an aircraft (realized by
gas particles exerting forces on a piston in a cylinder); and (2) a computer reading out a text file and printing it on the screen (realized by
electrons impinging on the screen).
What happens to a given system is controlled by the initial state
along with the boundary conditions. The system boundary is either:
(i) closed (no information enters); or (ii) open (information enters;
possibly also mass, energy, momentum). In the latter case we have to
know what information enters in order to determine the future state
of the system.
B: The final state attained at the bottom level is uniquely determined
by the prior state at that level (the initial conditions) and the incoming
information at that levelthat is, by the boundary conditions (assuming a given system structure and given microlaws). This determines
uniquely what happens at the higher levels. We assume that a unique
lower-level state determines uniquely the higher-level states through
appropriate coarse-graining. When this is not true, the system is either
ill-defined (for example, because our description has omitted some
hidden variables), or incoherent (because it does not really constitute
a system). We exclude these cases. Note that the loss of information
implied in the definition of entropy results because a particular higherlevel state can correspond to a number of different lower-level states
(each of which leads to that single higher-level state).
Note 1: This statement does not contradict the idea of top-down
causation. Any given macro-state at the top level will correspond to a
restricted (perhaps even unique) set of conditions at the basic level. It
is through determining a set of micro-states as initial conditions at the
bottom level, corresponding to the initial macro-state, that the top-level
situation controls the evolution of the system as a whole in the future.
How uniquely it does so depends on how uniquely the top-level state
determines a state at the bottom.21
21
Or, equivalently, it does so depending on how much information of the microstates is lost by giving only a top-level descriptionthis information loss defining the
entropy of the macroscopic state.
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george f.r. ellis
Note 2: At the higher levels, the statement analogous to B may or may

not be true (i.e., the system may or may not be causally determinate
when regarded as a machine at a higher level); this depends on what
micro-information is lost in forming the macro-variables at the higher
levels, from the micro-variables.
Note 3: Although the bottom-level system is determinate, prediction
of what will happen is in general not possible even at the bottom level,
because of the possibility of chaotic behavior (sensitive dependence on
initial conditions).
2.2.2. Quantum Physical Systems
In a system where quantum effects are significant,22 we have a new
element:
C: The bottom-level evolution is indeterminate in a quantum system,
although the statistical properties of its evolution are determined. This
lower-level indeterminacy may or may not result in significant higherlevel indeterminacy, depending on the system structure.
In many cases the properties at some higher level may be effectively
determinate (the quantum uncertainties being washed out). However,
this is not true when there is a sufficiently powerful amplifier in operation (e.g., photo-multipliers in a telescope which allow detection of
individual photons), or sufficiently sensitive dependence on initial
conditions.23 This theme has been developed by Russell.24 He points out
that quantum physics both produces the macroscopic world in all its
properties and affects the macroscopic world (occasionally) through a
single quantum event. Schrdingers cat represents both aspects: it has
bulk properties, such as volume, because of quantum statisticsbased
on the Pauli exclusion principleand it lives or dies because of a
single radioactive event. The latter (macroscopic effects due to a single
quantum event) may well only happen during a measurement; the
22
In this paper the prime quantum effect considered is that of indeterminacy (which
is closely related to the problem of measurement). There are other equally important
aspects of quantum theoryFermi vs. Bose statistics, nonlocality, etc.; but they do not
seem to bear directly on the argument at hand, except perhaps that of non-locality.
23
These are really two ways of saying the same thing.
24
See Robert John Russell, Quantum Physics in Philosophical and Theological
Perspective, in Physics, Philosophy, and Theology: A Common Quest for Understanding,
Robert John Russell, William R. Stoeger, and George V. Coyne, eds. (Vatican City State:
Vatican Observatory, 1988).
317
problem in deciding whether or not this is the case is that measurement in quantum theory proper is not yet a well defined concept.
However, this effect is quite sufficient to allow the effects we have in
mind in this paper.
2.2.3. Simple Biological Systems
By this we mean systems in the biological hierarchy at the level of an
individual organism or lower.
Examples: (4) a mosquito; (5) a dog; and (6) a person.25
In these examples complex neural systems convey, route, and filter
information in a hierarchically structured way so as to allow maximal
local autonomy and yet coordinate overall action,26 the whole being
coordinated by the extraordinarily complex structure of the brain.27
The fundamental point is that, despite this complexity, if in these
systems what happens macroscopically is determined at the micro-level
simply by the action of known physical laws, then the analysis is the
same as in the case of the classical or quantum machines considered
above. One can consider, for example, a moving human hand (realized
by the motion of electrons and ions in muscles).
The analysis and examples given above lead to the following propositions about hierarchically-structured, physically-based systems, even
given the high complexity of a living system:
Proposition 1: Top-down action underlies meaningful activity, for it
enables lower levels to respond coherently to higher-level states, but
does not by itself imply openness.
Proposition 2: Chaos generates unpredictability, but does not by itself
underlie meaningful action.
Proposition 3: Quantum uncertainty allows openness (as it only makes
probabilistic statements), which can be amplified to macro-levels.
25
In principle, the same kind of description applies to complex biological systems,
e.g.: (7) people in a room; and (8) an ecosystem. But so many extra issues arise because
of social, economic, and political interaction that it is better first to consider and
understand the simpler examples.
26
See Stafford Beer, Brain of the Firm: The Managerial Cybernetics of Organization,
2d. ed. (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1981), for an illuminating discussion.
27
See, e.g., John C. Eccles, The Human Mystery (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul,
1984); or idem, The Wonder of Being Human: Our Brain and Our Mind (New York:
Free Press, 1984); and Gerald M. Edelman, Bright Air, Brilliant Fire: On the Matter of
Mind (New York: Basic Books, 1992), for contrasting views.
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george f.r. ellis
In the latter case, the issue is the nature of this openness: is it truly
indeterminaterepresenting a random process whose final state is not
determined by the initial stateor is it in fact determinate, through
some hidden variable presently inaccessible to us? We will return to this
later. In any case the above analysis suggests the following speculation:
Meaningful physical top-down action with openness in a hierarchical
structure can occur only either (i) via injection of information from
outside, that is, by manipulation of the boundary conditions (probably
in a very directed manner, conveying specific information to specific
sub-components); or (ii) through a process that resolves quantum
uncertainty at the microscopic level by a choice of a particular outcome from all those that are possible according to quantum laws, thus
resolving the uncertainties in a quantum mechanical prediction. This
effect can then be amplified,28 or it could be effective at the larger scale
because it takes place in a coordinated way at the micro-level (as in
superconductivity).
Note to (i): Bill Stoeger29 has pointed out that it is essential to be clear
about what is inside and what is outside the system considered
particularly when non-local effects occur. A more adequate characterization of a system to better account for the observed phenomena may
result in some of what was outside being brought inside the system.
Our comment applies after such adjustments have been made.
Note to (ii): The basic point made here is that our present description of the quantum world is essentially causally incomplete,30 as is
clear from every discussion of the measurement process in standard
quantum mechanics. Quantum theory determines the statistical properties of measurements, but does not determine the result of individual
measurements where the initial state is not an eigenstatea condition
which includes almost all measurements. However, a specific final
state does in fact result in each case. There is no known rule that leads
uniquely from the initial state to the final state. Thus, the final state in
28
See, e.g., I. Percival, Schrdingers Quantum Cat, Nature 351 (1991): 357ff. DNA
responds to quantum events, as when mutations are produced by single photons, with
consequences that may be macroscopicleukemia, for example.
29
Private communication.
30
This issue is separate from the further thorny problem of defining what a measurement is, in a fully quantum system, and when it will take place. See, e.g., M.A. Morrison,
Altered States: The Great Measurement Mystery, in Understanding Quantum Physics:
A Users Manual (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1990).
319
almost every specific case is determined by some feature not described

by present quantum theory, or is uncaused. The present view utilizes
the first option.
Clearly this speculation contrasts with aspects of the views of Polkinghorne and Peacocke, but basically agrees with those of Russell, Murphy,
and Tracy. I suggest that it is the logical outcome of any hierarchical
structuring in which the bottom, low-level actions are governed by
regular physical laws (i.e., we exclude a vitalist or mentalist interaction not mediated by physics).
3. Ordinary Divine Action

To set the scene, it is convenient to recapitulate some issues covered in
many other essays in this volume. We need somehow to divide Gods
action in the world into ordinary and extraordinary action. This section concerns that which may be regarded as ordinary, that is, those
actions that are the result of the action of physical laws alone (Gods
effective action is secondary, through these laws, which are themselves
established by his primary action). A theme at the conclusion of this
section will be that it is reasonable and indeed in line with the religious
worldview to characterize most ordinary action as revelatory and
sacramental.
3.1. Cosmological
The first domain of action is the cosmological creative act:
Action 1: Creation of the universe, which has two aspects:
Action 1a: Initiation of the laws of physics and of the universe:
creation of basic structure (setting up the regularities that underlie
existence).
Action 1b: Setting the boundary conditions for the universe: contingent choice from the possibilities compatible with the basic structure31
followed by:32
31
This may or may not imply a specific event at t=0. Cf. the discussions in Physics,
Philosophy and Theology; and Quantum Cosmology.
32
As seen from within the universe. Seen from outside, this may well be no different from Action 1.
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george f.r. ellis
Action 2: Sustaining the universe, through maintaining the sheer

existence as well as the regularity of the universe (as described partially
through the laws of nature we discover); thus underpinning existence
in a reliable way.
The initial act of creation, if there was one (i.e., if there was a t=0), may
properly be regarded as an extraordinary divine act, but in the past
rather than the present; it has taken place, rather than being ongoing.
The second (sustaining all events) is what underlies the predictable
nature of the laws of physics, as is required for meaningful moral
activity.33
Together these are the prerequisites and basis for ordinary divine
action; that is, divine action carried out through the means of regular
laws of behavior of the physical universe. The true creativity involved
in these acts is in the selection of the laws of physics, and in choosing
specific boundary conditions for them (whether in a single universe,
or in an ensemble of universes) that enable the desired results to be
attained (cf. CTNS/VO, v. I).
3.2. Functional
The laws of physics in the existent universe provide the basis for the
evolution and functioning of complex systems. They therefore allow
ordinary divine action, which is second-order or indirect action.
Its nature is fashioned by the laws of physics and the boundary conditions; it is understood specifically that divine input in such ordinary
actiononce the system is runningis to maintain the regular functioning of nature in such a way that it is describable by means of scientific
laws, and therefore its results are largely determinate.34
In the relation of theoretical biology to fundamental physics, there
are three main kinds of issue: the functioning of general living systems,
evolution, and the issue of consciousness and free will. We will look
at these in turn.35
33
Ellis, The Theology of the Anthropic Principle, in Quantum Cosmology; and

Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order: Buridans Ass and Schrdingers Cat
(in this volume).
34
Quantum uncertainty and sensitive dependence on initial conditions to some
extent limit predictability and allow for indeterminacy.
35
The concerns of this section relate to the Anthropic Principle discussed in
Quantum Cosmology; the point is that not every set of laws of physics will allow life
to function.
321
Action 3: sustaining functioning of general living systems: this can

be split into three parts:36
Action 3a: sustaining development: growth from a single cell to a
complete organism; Action 3b: enabling physiological functioning of
organisms; Action 3c: enabling community functionalism/ecology.
The basic mechanisms in all three cases are feedback controls operating
in hierarchically-structured complex systems, made of matter functioning according to the fundamental laws of physics, and in the first two
cases, organized according to digitally-coded information contained
in DNA.
The first and second are highly controlled processes; it is very unlikely
that chaotic mechanisms of any kind can play a significant role here.
Indeed the whole purpose of feedback organization is to damp out any
deviations from the desired developmental or physiological path; thus,
these processes are usually of an anti-chaotic nature when properly
functioning (they efficiently guide the system to a desired final state,
despite errors in initial data or disturbances that may occur). What
does occur here is self-organization, but based on very specific and
highly controlled mechanisms (e.g., a reaction-diffusion equation with
restricted boundary conditions, or cells moving over an extra-cellular
matrix). Given the laws of physics, these mechanisms for the operation
of life not only function but in some sense seem to be preferred solutions of the physical equations: experience seems to show that physics
prefers life (e.g., simple organic molecules assemble themselves from
an appropriate primeval soup, providing the basis for more complex
molecules to form). However, it seems a reasonable view that no special
intervention is required to make all this happen; it is just the wonder
of ordinary divine action (cf. the next subsection).
The third case, ecology, is less well-controlled (as is well known),
and here chaotic effects may well happen. The most significant question
(apart from learning how to cope with them) is whether this played any
significant role in evolutionary processes, for example, by enhancing the
range of the environments to which living beings were subjected. That
will be a difficult question to answer; it may just as well have placed
evolution in jeopardy as assisted it in creating more complex beings.
36
Cf. Ellis in The Anthropic Principle: Proceedings of the Second Venice Conference
on Cosmology and Philosophy, ed. F. Bertola and U. Curi (Cambridge: Cambridge
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george f.r. ellis
Action 4: evolution, shaping the nature of things as they are at present.

Here is where the issue of design arises, answered in conventional
evolutionary theory by the statement that there is no design, only
evolutionary selection, with evolutionan open-ended feedback process with the goal simply of survivalbeing adequate to describe the
design of all living beings, including humans.37 The shift to cultural
evolution implies a change in the nature of evolution, but still based
on the same general process.38
One can, if somewhat diffidently, question whether the current
orthodoxy is really adequate to explain all that we seewhether there
is some degree of direction in the variations that take place (via genetic
variation of DNA), or whether the variations are indeed totally random.
Probabilistic calculations suggest that there may be a time problem if
variations are indeed purely random (cf. the controversial claims by
Fred Hoyle). The real issue that concerns me here is the question of
evolutionary development of hardwired behavioral patterns of great
complexity, despite the essential comment39 that nothing experienced or
learned can have any effect on the DNA passed on to offspring (these
factors can effect whether DNA is passed on to offspring, but not the
coding of that DNA). It may be claimed that the plasticity of the brain
along with the Baldwin effect40 are sufficient to explain development of
all complex behavioral patterns.
However, I would like to see clear evidence that this is the case in
such examples as bird migration, or the signals used for communication
by the honey bee, let alone more complex examples in higher animals,
where procreation is relatively rare and very complex interactions determine whether the animal survives long enough to procreate, so that any
37
See, e.g., Richard Dawkins, The Blind Watchmaker (New York: Norton, 1986).
See, e.g., Daniel C. Dennett, Consciousness Explained (London: Penguin Books,
1991).
39
Cf. L. Wolpert, The Triumph of the Embryo (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1990).
40
Dennett, Consciousness Explained, 18487. The basic point here is that if there
is a high peak of suitability associated with some specific brain wiring state but not
any nearby states, nevertheless nearby states will be more likely to survive because of
brain plasticity. Their initial wirings will alter during their lifetime, because of plasticity of the brain connections, and will explore the region near where they start; all
those ending up at (or passing through?) the highly preferred state will be more likely
to survive than those that do not. But they will be more likely to end up there if they
start nearby.
38
323
tendency to a specific behavioral pattern, determined by hard-wiring

of the brain, is only one of many other features determining survival
and procreation rates. Without being dogmatic about it, I would leave
open a small question as to whether chance or fortuitous happenings
alone in the evolutionary process are adequate in order that evolution
succeed in the time scales available.41
Finally we come to the most difficult of the areas of ordinary
action:
Action 5: enabling the functioning of the brain and mind: foundations of consciousness and free will; the foundation, in turn, of moral
response.
Given some explanation of what happens in the mind, one can then
envisage downward causation from intentions formed in the brain
acting to enable specific events to happen in the body: bodily conditions alter, cells function in altered environments, different currents
flow and adjust electric potentials. Consequently muscles move, allowing limbs to fulfill the intent in the mind and alter conditions in the
physical world. This clearly is a case of downward causation from the
brain to events in the body.42 The issue is how the mind relates to
the brain,43 a core question in terms of personal existence and meaning.
An open-minded investigation must consider four features that might
contribute (singly or together):
a.
b.
c.
d.
organized complexity,
chaotic motion (openness),
quantum uncertainty,
mental fields.
Explanation via some combination of a, b, and c sees physics based on

known fundamental (microscopic) laws as the basic answer, through
41
See R.E. Lenski and J.E. Mittler, The Directed Mutation Controversy and
Neo-Darwinism, Science 259 (1993): 188ff., for a discussion refuting directed mutation.
42
Cf. Kppers, Understanding Complexity; and Stoeger, Describing Gods
Action.
43
See, e.g., Squires, Conscious Mind; Dennett, Consciousness Explained; Edelman,
Bright Air, Brilliant Fire; Eccles, The Human Mystery; and Penrose, The Emperors
New Mind.
324
george f.r. ellis
allowing hierarchically structured organization and so emergence of

higher levels of organization based on lower levels.
View I is that this complexity itself is sufficient; no invoking of chaos
or quantum theory is necessary to attain consciousness and possibly not
for free will, even though everything is fully deterministic. This includes
the modern mind is a computer suggestion (supported by work on
neural networks, and theoretical analyses such as that of Dennett,44 but
challenged by others such as Penrose.45
View II is the same as view I except that one needs the openness or
unpredictability allowed by chaos theory, or the indeterminacy inherent in quantum theory (viewed as a purely random process), in order
that consciousness can emerge. However, insofar as this is equivalent
in the quantum case to adding a truly random variable to the equations, which is then amplified, this does not appear to help with the
deeper issues.46 Thus, views I and II perceive standard physics alone to
be the total answer to the basis of consciousness. Mind is an emergent
phenomenon, as are the other levels of organization in biology.47 Mind
is, in a sense, reducible to physics (the emergent order of biological
systems, allowed by physics, is completely ruled by micro-level physics
even though it entails and encodes higher levels of order). It is hard to
see how free will and morality can be anything but an illusion on this
notion (cf. the discussion of top-down causation above), particularly
when we remember the development of the physical brain through
the process of evolution governed by random mutation and selection
through survival of the fittest.48
View III is that quantum theory allows the uncertainty needed for the
independent existence of mind, as it is an essentially incomplete theory
of physical behavior. The conventional view49 is that the specifics of what
happens at the quantum level are uncaused: statistical behavior must
be regular, but in each specific case what happens is purely random.
Chance is treated as a causal explanation in itself, not relying on any
other cause. Despite much propaganda for this viewpoint, it is essentially
unsatisfactory; for chance does not cause anything, rather it is the name
44
45
46
47
48
49
See, Dennett, Consciousness Explained.

See, Penrose, The Emperors New Mind.
Cf. Tracy, Particular Providence and the God of the Gaps (in CTNS/VO, v. II).
See Campbell, Biology.
See Ellis, Before the Beginning, for further discussion.
See, e.g., Morrison, Understanding Quantum Physics, 7073, 8587, and 22628.
325
for a lack of cause. For example, Morrison states, after discussing the
unsatisfactory state of the problem of measurement, that:
Underlying the problem of measurement there is a deeper question. As
a consequence of an ensemble measurement of an observable Q, the
original state collapses into one of the eigenstates of Q. The question
is, what mechanism determines which eigenstate a particular member
collapses into? According to the conventional epistemology of quantum
mechanics, the answer is that random chance governs what happens to
each member of an ensemble. Many (your author included) consider
this no answer at all.50
View III suggests rather that there is some cause: something not
contained in our current physical descriptions of quantum theory
determines the details of what happens in each specific case. This
something may be related to mind in two ways. First, indeterminism
is needed at the quantum level of nature if mind/consciousness is to
be effective in animals as in humankind,51 and it extends the possibility of a non-algorithmic kind of activity that is essential in a full view
of consciousness.52 Second, mind/consciousness could be necessary to
collapse the wave function and give a complete account of natural
events, which quantum physics by itself cannot supply.
The suggestion is that the apparent randomness of quantum theory
is not truly random but rather is a reflection of the operation of mind,
intricately linked to the unsolved problems of the observer in quantum
mechanics and the collapse of the wave function.53 Imbedded in a complexly structured system, this provides the freedom for consciousness to
function, mind being allowed to determine some of the uncertainty
that quantum physics leaves open (thus being completely compatible
with quantum physics, but allowing some other level of order to act
in the physical world with openness). On this view one can maintain
that information entry from mental to physical levels of nature is,
for example, through the choice of when a quantum state will decay,
which, because of quantum uncertainty, is not determined by known
physical laws. This allows a transfer of information between levels of
the world without an expenditure of energy or a violation of the known
physical laws.
50
51
52
53
Ibid., 61718.
See, e.g., Squires, Conscious Mind; and Eccles, The Human Mystery.
See Penrose, The Emperors New Mind.
Squires, Conscious Mind.
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george f.r. ellis
The basic physical question relating to quantum uncertainty is what,

if anything, determines such apparently uncaused information selection
(e.g., when an energetic state will decay)? It may be truly uncaused
(nothing determines what occurs, it just happens capriciouslythe
standard dogma of quantum theory) or it may in fact be controlled
(something determines what happens, we simply do not know what it
isin effect the hidden variable theory of quantum mechanics.) View
III supports the latter, linking it to the reality of free will and morality
(taken as solid experiential data about the real world),54 and accepting
as inevitable and even natural the consequent non-locality of causationan important aspect of quantum theory.
View IV, based on d, entails something like vitalism: known physics,
by itself, is not the answer. Some as yet undiscovered feature (thus, not
quantum uncertainty, which is already known) links mind to brain and
matter. Perhaps there is some as yet undiscovered force or field (the
mental field) underlying consciousness, which may eventually be discovered and studied as any other physical field. However, it is difficult
to see how this will resolve the issues at stake unless its equations of
motion are quite unlike any we have seen before.
In both latter views, something outside presently known physics acts
and has material effects in the physical world (e.g., by fixing the time
when a quantum decay takes place, which currently known quantum
theory is unable to do). These views are probably consistent with
proposals such as the radical dualist-interactionist theory of the brain
and the self-conscious mind proposed by Eccles.55 This kind of view is
of course highly controversial. The challenge to those who disagree is
to produce an alternative in which free will in a solely physics-based
hierarchical system (the human brain) is not an epiphenomenon.
This discussion is relevant to the theme of this paper in two ways. First,
when viewed from within the world, essentially the same issues arise
in terms of special divine intervention (discussed below); we may well
expect that an analysis of the two issues will be very much in parallel.56
54
Ellis, Before the Beginning.

See Eccles, The Human Mystery.
56
Although complex problems of dualism then arise: if our minds and Gods can
both influence what happens, how do they compete for such influence? This would
have to be modeled on the basis of our understanding of the chosen mode of Gods
action. Cf. Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle.
55
327
Indeed view III is basically consonant with the view of special divine
action in Murphys paper.57
Second, and related to the first point, what is at stake here is the
closedness or openness of the physical world to other influencesnot
the rattle of a dice (as in view II) but the intervention of some purposeful consciousness that is not wholly bound into physical systems.58
On the latter views, physics is not all that controls the functioning of
the physical universe: at higher levels of organization, information is
introduced that affects lower levels by top-down action. This theme
will be picked up again in the discussion of special divine action in
the next section, and later sections will consider how that higher-level
information could be inserted.
3.3. The Divine in the Ordinary
What is miraculous? The birth of a baby; the design and function of a
flower or a tree; the everyday and the ordinary:
I like to walk alone on country paths, rice plants and wild grasses on both
sides, putting each foot down on the earth in mindfulness, knowing that I
walk on the wondrous earth. In such moments, existence is a miraculous
and mysterious reality. People usually consider walking on water or in
thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk on water or
in thin air, but on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which
we dont even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black,
curious eyes of a childour own two eyes. All is miracle.59
While these features are ordinary given our laws of physics and the
nature of our universe, which allows or even prefers these events to take
place, they are not ordinary if one considers the range of all possible
universes. This is where the anthropic arguments are relevant: most of
these possibilities will probably not be actualized in most universes.60
57
Murphy, Divine Action.

Tracy, Particular Providence.
59
Thich Nhat-Hanh, The Miracle of Mindfulness: A Manual of Meditation (New
York: Random House, 1991), 12. This is also the standard viewpoint of nineteenthcentury liberal Protestantism (cf. Friedrich Schleiermacher, On Religion: Speeches to
Its Cultured Despisers [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988]), and continues
in much of contemporary theology, in particular being part of the views of Peacocke
and Barbour.
60
I have to admit that it is almost impossible to make this statement precise and
give it a watertight justification. It is, however, highly plausible.
58
328
george f.r. ellis
Thus, we can be justified in regarding these everyday occurrences as

extraordinary if we include in our range of concepts an ensemble of
universesreal or imaginedin most of which life is not possible.61 It
is appropriate for the ordinary scientist to forget this while studying
what happens within the given, taken-for-granted order of things in
the universe-as-is. However, this issue cannot be forgotten in studying
Cosmology in its broad sense;62 remembering this frailty of life within
the broader framework of possible universes gives a justificationeven
within a scientific frameworkfor a sense of awe and wonder at what
we see around us, which is an essential part of many religious world
views (the sense of the numinous). Indeed on many such views these
ordinary miracles are evidence of design, albeit of design of the universe itself rather than direct design (through specific action) of the
objects or beings involved.63
The point is that our attitude to ordinary divine action, mediated
through the laws of physics and their boundary conditions, can take
into account both of these views: the ordinariness of this action, and
also its miraculous nature, where this word reflects both on the probability of what has happened and on what is achieved by it.64 The awe
and wonder that attracts many people to a scientific career need not be
totally lost as one immerses oneself in the details of scientific study.
4. Extraordinary Divine Action

We may define extraordinary divine action in the already existent
universe, as that action which: (a) can reasonably be interpreted as
expressing the intention of God, that is, it has a revelatory character;
and (b) is not predictable through regular laws of behavior of matter;
that is, the events concerned will not inevitably happen as a result of
the laws of logic and physics.65
61
Cf. the anthropic discussion in Quantum Cosmology.

By Cosmology I intend to refer to a more complete account of reality than that
provided by scientific cosmology. See Ellis, Before the Beginning.
63
Murphy, Evidence of Design.
64
Thus, all these events are subjectively special, in terms of the typology of modes
of divine action presented in Russells Introduction to CTNS/VO, v. II.
65
In terms of the typology of modes of divine action in the Introduction, CTNS/
VO, v. II they are objectively special.
62
329
I identify two main themes here: revelatory insight and the possibility
of miracles proper, and consider them in turn.
4.1. Revelatory Insight
The first aspect is:
Action 6: revelation as to the nature and meaning of reality. This
may be taken as having two parts:
Action 6a: providing spiritual insight; Action 6b: providing moral
insight.
4.1.1. Spiritual Insight
Whatever ones view may be of consciousness and free will in general,
to make sense of the standpoint of Murphys paper66 and the broad
Christian tradition, there must be a possibility of specifically revelatory processes being made accessible to the mind of the believer (and
the unbeliever).67
The first point is that the existence of such a causal joint or communication channel is required as the foundation of Christian (and
other) spirituality,68 which we are taking to be a reality. This requirement underlies any theory of revelation whatever, for without some
such causal nexus, an immanent God, despite his/her immanence, is
powerless to affect the course of events in the world, but is simply a
spectator watching the inevitable unfolding of these events. Such a God
has no handle with which to alter in any way, in the minds of the faithful, the conclusion of that physical unfolding governed by the physical
regularities (the laws of nature) that he/she has called into being and
is faithfully maintaining. Here I am rejecting the somewhat paradoxical notion of revelation without special divine acts.69 While one can
certainly envisage people who are unusually receptive or perceptive of
Gods action through natural processes, they cannot reach that stage of
understanding without somehow knowing of the existence and nature
of God. But this in turn requires some kind of specific revelatory act
66

Cf. Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle.
68
Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, ed. Wakefield.
69
See, e.g., Maurice Wiles, Religious Authority and Divine Action, in Gods Activity
in the World, ed. Owen Thomas (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1983).
67
330
george f.r. ellis
to convey those concepts, so that faith can be based in personal experience and knowledge rather than unsupported imagination, which could
arrive at any conclusion whatever.
The second point is the use made of this capability by the creator.
This is where various traditions diverge, and the position one obtains
depends on ones view of revelation. It could in principle be used to
convey information, images, emotions, instructions, or pre-conceptual
intimations of the nature of reality to humanity. Which of these actually
occurs depends on the nature of the revelatory process implemented
by the creator, which must be compatible with his/her nature and the
character of his/her action in the world. As a specific example, consider
the theory of revelation proposed by Denis Edwards. He states:
Only an adequate theology of experience can do justice to the Old and
New Testament understandings that God breaks in on our individual lives,
that the Spirit moves within us, that Gods word is communicated to us,
and that we live in Gods presence. . . . It is possible to show that while we
do not have access to Gods inner being, and while God transcends our
intellectual comprehension, yet we can and do experience the presence
and activity of this Holy One in a pre-conceptual way.70
This experience is the reason why the kind of causal joint mentioned
above is necessary; it could not plausibly be the result of the blind action
of physical forces alone. How does this happen?
When I speak of the experience of God I will always mean pre-conceptual
experience . . . [this] allows us to speak of a real human awareness of
God who yet remains always incomprehensible to our intellects. It is, I
will argue, precisely as mystery that we experience Gods presence and
action.
. . . experience of grace is experience of something that transcends us,
which breaks in on our lives in a mysterious way, and which we experience as a gift given to us.71
This particular view is broadly in agreement, for example, with the

Quaker view of the experience of the light of God within.72 Thus, we
may take it that the envisaged channel of communication is used at
least to convey pre-conceptual intimations of the nature of reality to
humankind. It finds its expression in the profound insights of the
70
Denis Edwards, Human Experience of God (New York: Paulist Press, 1983), 5.
Ibid., 13; 28.
72
See Christian Faith and Practice in the Experience of the Society of Friends
(London: Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, 1972).
71
331
mystics and saints, as well as the religious experiences in the lives of

the countless faithful, those ordinary people who do their best to follow
their understanding of a life of enlightenment.
The traditions diverge on the issue of whether more specific forms
of spiritual revelations and insights are communicated to humanity
(e.g., St. Paul on the road to Damascus; Jesus throughout his life,
but specifically in the temptations in the desert and in the garden of
Gethsemane). In the context of the present investigation, we can afford
to be open-minded about this; once the existence of the causal link is
established, it could be used for such purposesif that was spiritually
desirable.
Note 1: In either case, a process of discernment is required on the
part of the receiver to test whether what appears to be some intimation or revelation is indeed so, or if it is a false (perhaps psychologically induced) manifestation. This is an area that has been considered
by the spiritually aware for many centuries, and will not be discussed
further here.73
Note 2: It must be emphasized that the idea of conveying such
information, where this word is used in the broadest possible sense as
indicated above, does not in any way imply a coercive or monarchical
use of that capability by the creator. Indeed it is fully compatible with a
view of the universe based on self-sacrifice and kenosis.74 Indeed without such a possibility for the flow of information, we cannot have any
reliable idea of the nature of transcendent reality. Thus, it is precisely
the availability of the intimations of reality through the envisaged link
that enables us to conclude that this reality is better described by the
theme of kenosis than by any other.
The supposition here is that these events proceed through the normal
functioning of the brain but have an extra, non-inevitable character in
the sense that they mustif they mean what they appear to mean on
the Christian interpretationconvey information to the receiver that
was not explicitly there initially (in an evolutionary perspective). This
necessity supports view III above as to the functioning of the brain,
73
See, e.g., Edwards, Human Experience of God; and Murphy, Theology in The Age
of Scientific Reasoning (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990), where this topic
is discussed in depth.
74
Cf. Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age; idem, Gods Interaction with the
World; Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle; and Murphy and Ellis, Cosmology,
Theology, and Ethics.
332
george f.r. ellis
as is discussed in the following section. This is then the foundation of

Christian spirituality.
4.1.2. Moral Insight
However, the further need for meaningful human existence is for a more
generally based understanding of the nature of ethics and morality, as
a foundation for moral decisions and the search for meaning. It can be
argued75 that the deeper levels of ethics and morality also should come
through this revelatory channel as intimations of reality and ethical
rightness, rather than through some process based on evolution of the
brain and culture, as envisaged in sociobiology. While the mechanism
would be closely related to that by which consciousness and free will
arise (cf. the previous section), this ethical understanding cannotby its
very nature, in order that it can have ethical meaningbe mandatory;
that is, it cannot be supposed to follow inevitably from the operation
of the laws of physics in the brain. In that case there would be a lack
of the ability for free response, which is essential for ethical behavior to
have meaning.76 Thus, this should also be classifiedaccording to the
above definitionas extraordinary rather than ordinary divine action
(but non-disruptive).
4.2. Miracles Proper
Finally, we come to the most controversial area of allthe possibility
of:
Action 7: miracles: special actions of an exceptional kind, so that the
physical outcome is altered from what it would otherwise have been.
This could be either:
Action 7a: actions not based on ordinary laws of physics, indeed
involving a suspension of those laws; or
Action 7b: actions affecting physical conditions directly,77 based on
a steering of what happens consistent with known laws; for example,
through direction of quantum events, amplified by sensitive dependence
on initial conditions to macroscopic effects.
75
76
77
See Ellis, Before the Beginning.

See Murphy, Divine Action; and Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle.
Apart from giving humans insight that leads to purposeful action, as in Action 6.
333
This is where the traditions differ most, the modern liberal view denying
their existence at all, in contrast to many more traditional views. They
may or may not occur (or have occurred in the past); we will return to
that issue in the next subsection. For the moment we simply consider
this as a possibility in a non-committed, open-minded way. In doing so,
we note that action 7a is the only possibility considered in this paper
that does not respect the laws of physics;78 all the rest do (they are all
strictly compatible with the regularities of those laws).
Considering the first type of exception (7a), these certainly are possible, although there may be a problem of interface with the rest of the
universe: If some exceptional interaction takes place in a space-time
domain U, then in general these illegitimate effects will causally
interact with events outside U, eventually spreading the consequences
to a large part of the universe. Problems could arise at the interface of
the region where the laws of physics hold and the region where they
are violated; for example, how are energy, momentum, and entropy
balances maintained there?
Leaving this technical issue aside, examples of what might conceivably
occur range from the Resurrection to altering the weather or making
someone well if they are ill. It is here that one needs to distinguish
different strands of the Christian tradition, and the various ways they
view the question of miracles. Some will take literally all the miracle
stories in the Old and the New Testaments; others will explain away
some, many, or even all of them. Supposing that they do occur, or have
occurred, one has then to face the thorny questions: What is the criterion that justifies such special intervention? When would they indeed
occur? These issues will be picked up in the next sub-section.
The second type (7b) is quite possible in principle too, the classic
case being God affecting the weather through the butterfly effect but
within the known laws of physics. In its effect this is similar to the
previous possibility, but of course in practical terms this has to be seen
through the eyes of faith: no physical investigation could ever detect
the difference between such action and chance effect, even if it was
clear that the desired rain had fallen just after a major prayer meeting
called to petition God for an end to the drought. Thus, one has here the
possibility of an uncertainty effect deliberately maintained in order
78
In terms of the types of modes of divine action, these are objectively special
interventionist events.
334
george f.r. ellis
that true faith be possible. Such intervention would never be scientifically provable. Whether we believe it takes place or not depends on
our overall worldview and experience.79
4.3. Capricious Action or Regular Criteria
The problem of allowing miraculous intervention80 to turn water into
wine, to heal the sick, to raise the dead, or to alter the weather is that
this involves either a suspension or alteration of the natural order.81
Thus, the question arises as to why this happens so seldom. If this is
allowed at all to achieve some good, why is it not allowed all the time,
to assuage my toothache as well as the evils of Auschwitz?
Indeed when we look at the world around, seeing the anguish of
Bosnia, Somalia, Mozambique, and so on, and seeing children dying
of drought and famine in many parts of the world, we pray God
have mercy on us and wonder what would induce him/her to do so:
to relinquish for a minute the iron grip of physical law held there by
his/her apparently pitiless will. After all, these laws hold in being the
material in its inexorable course while it is used to destroy and torture
humanity. Here one recalls the unspeakable horrors of necklacing in
the townships of South Africa, or the materials used in previous times
by clerics of many theological persuasions who pitilessly tortured and
burnt to death those of differing views. We even arrive at the extraordinary concept of God holding to their natural behavior and nature the
nails and wood used in the cross at Calvary to crucify Jesus.
Thus, if the usual Christian view is to make sense, there has to be a
cast-iron reason why a merciful and loving God does not alleviate a lot
more of the suffering in the world, if he/she has indeed the power to
do so, as envisaged in Murphys paper. This reason has to be sufficient
to outlaw any pity in all these cases, and to prevent the taking of that
decision that would end the suffering. This is of course just the age-old
79
Perhaps this corresponds to the non-basic objectively special events identified in
the typology of divine action.
80
It is not possible in the space available here to do justice to the debates on the
enormous hermeneutical and historical problems concerning the miracles reportedly
performed by Jesus, and their relation not only to enlightenment science but also to
the problems of interpreting ancient, often contradictory, texts.
81
Such an occurance is allowed and possible because the laws are the expression
of the will of God, who could therefore suspend them if he/she wished. See Murphy,
Divine Action.
335
problem of evil, brought to special focus by the claim that the laws that
enable it to take place are the optional choice of God.
In broadest terms,82 the solution has to be that greater good comes
out of the arrangement we see, based on the unwavering imposition
of regularities all or almost all the time, even though that conclusion
may not be obvious from our immediate point of view. For example,
death is not so important when life is considered in a full perspective
that takes into account the promise of resurrection. More particularly
the regularity and predictability gained by the laws of physics must be
seen as the necessary path to create beings with independent existence
incorporating freedom of will and the possibility of freely making a
moral and loving response.83 Pain and evil are the price to be paid both
for the existence of the miracle of the ordinary (cf. the previous section)
and for allowing the magnificent possibility of free, sacrificial response.
But thenif miracles do occurthe issue is why on some occasions
this apparently unchanging law should be broached; this would strongly
suggest a capriciousness in Gods action, in terms of sometimes deciding to intervene but mostly deciding not to do so.
What one would like hereif one is to make sense of the idea of
miraclesis some kind of rock-solid criterion of choice underlying such
decisions to act in a miraculous manner,84 for if there is the necessity
to hold to these laws during the times of the persecutions and Hitlers
Final Solution, during famines and floods, in order that true morality
be possible, then how can it be that sometimes this iron necessity can
fade away and allow turning water to wine, or the raising of Lazarus?
Here as before I am not going to deal directly with the enormous
hermeneutical problems of interpreting texts on miracles. Instead I
am asking a different kind of question. If we are to be able to make
any sense whatsoever of these miracles, what one would like to have
is some kind of almost inviolable rule that such exceptions shall not
82
Cf. Stoeger, Describing Gods Action.

See John Hick, Evil and the God of Love (New York: Macmillan, 1977); Murphy,
Divine Action; Stoeger, Describing Gods Action; and Ellis, Theology of the
Anthropic Principle.
84
These are criteria from our limited viewpoint, being applied to Gods activity.
Stoeger points out we must realize that in considering this, what appears to us to
be intervention may not be so from Gods viewpoint; and that while in some sense
through revelation, God has given us access to his/her point of view, this is only a
limited access.
83
336
george f.r. ellis
take place unless the most unusual circumstances arisesomething

like the following:
Assertion 1: Exceptional divine action (7) can take place only in the case
of events that make a unique and vital difference to the future evolution
of humanity as a whole, and/or its understanding of the action of God,
significantly influencing the entire future of humankind.
This does not include making rain in a drought-stricken area, stopping slaughters, or saving children from starvation, but could include
the Resurrection of Christ as one of the most important ways of God
communicating with humanity about the nature of life here and after.
It could just conceivably include some steering of biological evolution
at vital junctures (cf. 4) in a way compatible with the laws of physics
(cf. 7b), although in that case it would be impossible to prove that this
steering had ever happened; believing this to be so would be an act of
faith. The alternative, suggested in my previous paper,85 is:
Assertion 1a: Exceptional divine action (7) never takes place, but action
(6) does. Then extraordinary divine action must always be in the form
of provision of pre-images of right action or of ultimate reality, as
freely attested in the spiritual tradition, thereby guiding and assisting
free agents as they struggle to understand the world; the miraculous
option, although possible, would not be used. This view somewhat
assuages the problem of evil in that the charge of capriciousness is
removed: the same laws always holdimplemented in order that freedom and morality can exist. Regularity is always there, and the rights
of matter are always respected.
I suggest that what is needed here is a testing and examination of
such possible views, looking again, systematically, at the different kinds
of claims about miraculous intervention and whether they would or
would not be permitted by the criterion being considered, and what
the moral and religious implications are (a centuries-old debate). As
emphasized previously, this would be tantamount to choosing between
various viewpoints on the nature of Christianity. My own present
preference has been made clear above: I would exclude interventions
7a and 7b, because otherwise the charge of capriciousness becomes
85
Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle.
337
almost overwhelming.86 Should one hold the opposite view, adopting a

criterion something like that suggested, it is imperative to clarify what
essential means in this context.
Stoeger raises the issue of a category of events which we call miracle,
which of itself does not necessarily have a determinative influence on
the course of history, but seemingly involves abrogation or at least a
transcending of the laws of nature, and functions as a sign of something
deeper or more life-giving in a situation or in reality than is otherwise
apparent. Most of Christs miracles were in this categoryas are other
claimed healings. Their main purpose was not, or is not, the healing
or transforming act itself, but rather the manifestation of the deeper
level of reality which otherwise would be hidden (e.g., Jesus cure of the
paralytic as a sign of his power to forgive sins). My suggestion would
be that insofar as these events actually happenobviously an issue for
debatethey belong to category 6 rather than 7.
The above criterion relates to miraculous events (7). Similar questions arise in regard to the provision for moral and spiritual visions to
people (cf. 6): What determines when this is done and when not? It
may perhaps be suggested here that these are always available to those
willing to hear, who patiently wait on God. This is a partial answer, as
one can suggest that sometimes compelling visions are indeed made
available (cf. St. Paul or George Fox) that are not given at other times,
and that a recurring feature of spiritual life are the desert times when
such sustenance is not forthcoming. There may well be good spiritual
reasons for this, but this too needs clarification. Thus, to complete the
picture one would require some kind of criterion applicable in these
cases too. This may be already implicit in the literature on Christian
spirituality, but it needs to be drawn out and explicated in the present
context.
4.4. An Alternative Domain of Action
There is one alternative way to avoid the charge of capriciousness.
This is to consider the possibility that within the laws governing the
behavior of matter, there is hidden another domain of response of
matter to life than usually encountered: matter might respond directly
86
Apart from a point made by Willem Drees about respecting the integrity of science, relevant to 7a. See Willem Drees, Gaps for God? (CTNS/VO, v. II).
338
george f.r. ellis
to God-centered minds through laws of causal behavior, or there may

be domains of response of matter encompassed in physical laws, but
they are seldom tested because such God-centered minds are so seldom
encountered.87 Then the distinction between ordinary and extraordinary action becomes a question of whether or not we have entered this
domain. What has been classified as extraordinary action above would
be ordinary action but in a different set of circumstances leading to
a different kind of response and behavior where God-centered thought
dominates and matter responds. Thus, we have the possibility:
Action 7c: existence of a new order, a new regime of behavior of matter (cf. a phase transition), where apparently different rules apply (e.g.,
true top-down action of mind on matter), when the right spiritual
conditions are fulfilled.88
Thus, the extraordinary would be incorporated within the regular behavior of matter, and neither the violation of the rights of matter89 nor the
overriding of the chosen laws of nature would occur. Thus, the laws
and the nature of physics are respected. The charge of capriciousness
would then fall away, in a way consistent with the views of Murphys
paper. This is related to collapsing the distinction between the natural
and the supernatural, from Gods point of view. An example could be
Jesus resurrection. Wolfhart Pannenberg suggests that this could be
the first instance of the kind of transformation that awaits the entire
cosmos.
Three new issues would arise. First, similar to criterion 1 above for
exceptional divine action, one would want to have stated carefully
something like:
Assertion 2: the condition requisite for such a change-of-phase in the
operation of physical laws in a given situation is the presence of one
or more people in that situation who haveas a consequence of Gods
initiativehanded over their lives to God so fully that they are able
to act freely as channels of the divine will. This enabling feature then
transforms the local functioning of physical law to a new domain.
87
See Polkinghorne, Science and Providence; and Stoeger, Describing Gods

Action.
88
In Russells terms, this is a time-dependent miracle.
89
339
This attempt at a criterion for what determines where such a phase

transition takes place should not be taken too seriously in its details;
it is intended rather to suggest the type of thing one might take into
account in understanding this possibility. If it is indeed true that such a
kind of transition can take place,90 then characterizing its nature through
a criterion of some kind, as suggested by the example above, would
clearly be a description of one of the most fundamental features of the
nature of the universe. Its clear characterizationeven weakly would
be a major achievement.
Second, one would want to characterize the nature of what would be
possible and impossible in this altered regime: what then are the laws
of behavior of matter?
A third issue would be to give some kind of evidence that this intriguing but highly controversial possibility is realized. One could claim
that there is existent evidence supporting this proposal, for example,
in the historical record contained in the Bible. But apart from querying
the status of the evidence itself (e.g., did miracles really take place?),
it is not clear how uniquely those data can be taken as supporting this
particular proposal (7c).
Could we give some other evidence that this kind of behavior does
indeed take place? This seems very difficult but not entirely beyond the
bounds of possibility; for example, careful scientific investigation into
the claimed instances of faith-healing might be relevant. One would
encounter here all the same kinds of problems that occur in scientific
testing of para-normal phenomena. Perhaps the biggest problem would
be the conceivably legitimate claim that the kind of skeptical watching
involved in a scientific investigation is precisely one of the conditions
preventing such an altered domain of behavior. Supporting such a
claim would require some modification of criterion 2, so that it takes
into account negative factors that might hinder the proposed change
of state.
5. Mind and Top-Down Causation

As mentioned before, given the understanding attained so far, the
further issues are what type of causation might occur whereby these
90
Polkinghorne, Science and Providence; Stoeger, Describing Gods Action.
340
george f.r. ellis
intentions are made a reality, and where the causal nexus could be
whereby this top-down action could be initiated in the world (whatever
interpretation one may give to the concept of special divine action).
It is essential here to distinguish two rather different kinds of downward causation. Firstly, there is generic downward causation: this
influences a whole range of events through alteration of operational
conditions in a region (e.g., variation in temperature or pressure or
magnetic fields affects the way matter responds). Most of the examples
mentioned by Kppers are of this kind.91 This kind of general top-down
influence alters conditions over a wide range of events in a region, and
affects them all.
By contrast, there is specific or directed downward causation, which
influences very specific events as occurs, for example, in the human body
or complex machinery and is essential to their functioning. Instances
include brain action to move a specific muscle in the body, a command
to a computer that activates a particular relay or sensor, or hitting a
specific typewriter or organ key that effects the desired result. In each
of these cases a very specific local change in environment (current flow,
pH levels, etc.) is effected, which causes proximate events to proceed
in a specific way that is very localized and directed. This is possible
through specific communication channels (nerves in a human body,
bus lines in a computer, wires in a telephone exchange, or fiber optics
in an aircraft) conveying messages from the command center to the
desired point of activity.92
The point here is that setting boundary conditions at the beginning
of the universe can achieve generic downward action but not specific
action. An event such as influencing a mental state requires specific
acts, changing circumstances in a locally highly specific way, rather
than an overall change in the boundary conditions (a change in temperature, for example). I reject the possibility of setting special initial
conditions at the beginning of the universe (t=0) to make this happen.
While this is theoretically possible, it would amount to solving the
problems involved in a reversal of the arrow of time. It would require
setting precisely coordinated initial conditions over a wide area of the
universe so as to come together at the right time and place in such a
way as to achieve the desired effect, despite all the interactions and
91
92
Kppers, Understanding Complexity.

Cf. Beer, Brain of the Firm.
341
interfering effects that will have taken place from the hot early universe, where the mean free path even for neutrinos is extremely small,
up to the present day, where the possibility of agents acting with free
will implies an essential unpredictability in the environment within
which this distant effect will be propagating. This tuning would in fact
be impossible to accomplishwith the usual arrow of timefor one
highly specific event, let alone a whole series of such events, each to be
accomplished independently. According to Oliver Penrose,93 this feature
is the essential foundation of the second law of thermodynamics, based
on a lack of correlations in initial conditions in the past (in contrast to
the existence of such correlations in the corresponding final conditions
in the future). This law can in principle be confounded; for example,
one could reverse the motion of molecules from a fallen and broken
glass to reassemble it. In practice, however, this is not possible94or
at least not without special directed intervention.
Thus, the specific top-down action needed requires either specifically
directed lines of access to particular nerve cells (as in the physiology
of the human body), or a universal presence with detailed and specific
knowledge of and access to each atom (as conveyed by the idea of
the immanent presence of God). The latter is what is required for the
Christian tradition to make sense as envisaged in Murphys essay in
this volume. Thus, in order for any of the special action discussed
in the previous section to be possible (and specifically the provision of
pre-images of ultimate reality or notions of spirituality to a persons
mind), the interaction must be such as to provide highly directed
information and influence, rather than some broad, overall top-down
influence.
5.1. The Nexus of Interaction
The point then is that the action envisaged will be top-down in the
sense that it originates in some higher level of organization (the mind
of a person, the mind of God) but is highly specific in the time and
place of action (as discussed here in terms of the specificity of action).
93
Oliver Penrose, Foundations of Statistical Mechanics, Reports on Progress in
Physics 42 (1979): 19372006.
94
See Penrose, Emperors New Mind.
342
george f.r. ellis
Unless we envisage a totally new form of interaction95 it cannot be

effected in terms of some broad overall interaction with the universe
as a whole, or indeed at any higher level of organization. Rather it
must be implemented in detailed local interactions at the atomic or
particle level, where quantum uncertainty and non-locality are factors
that cannot be neglected and can in fact conceivably provide a modus
operandi without violation of any physical laws.96 This must then be
done in whatever coordinated way is required to effect the required
results at the macroscopic scale.
Thus, the quantum mechanism identified in Murphys and Tracys
essays will suffice, in principle, as the vehicle of intentional interaction
by a transcendent being. This view requires the essential action of God
who is ensuring that the laws of physics are obeyed and who acts in
a hidden way in every classical realization of such action to determine
its actual outcome. At the meso-scale this interaction would not be
recognizable through any violation of physical laws; everything would
proceed causally according to those laws. The supposition is that this
quantum effect would be amplifiable through brain processessimilar
perhaps to photon multipliersto macroscopic levels where they could
influence feelings or thoughts. This is a wide enough channel to convey
to us all that is needed for revelation, and to be recognizable as such
by those with eyes to see.
Note that this would not mean that God in some sense calculates the
effect of what would happen via specific neural stimulations and then
delicately one by one acts in just the right way in each neuron; rather
we must see how we act downwards on our own neurons. We think
things, plan, imagine, and the delicate causal channels set up for that
purpose convey these intentions in such a way that the appropriate neurons fire as required. On this analogy we would envisage God through
the mode of transcendence planning certain pre-images, emotions, or
whatever to be made available to us. The appropriate communication
channels which are in place by means of divine immanence allow this
intention to be communicated to the appropriate neurons, quantum
uncertainty being the feature that allows this to happen at any desired
place and time without violating known physical laws. Thus, we would
95
This seems to be implied by Peacockes proposals, but it raises problematic aspects

in terms of its interaction with normal physics.
96
See Murphy, Divine Action; Tracy, Particular Providence; and Squires,
Conscious Mind.
343
envisage the conscious part of his/her intentional action being similar

to ours: the intention is formed consciously, the details take care of
themselves.
Now, this sounds very strange from the viewpoint of physics alone.
However, that is not our starting point. Following Murphy, I am assuming one stream of thought within the variety of traditional Christian
positions, and developing its logical implications. Thus, the underlying
assumption is: 1) The immanent God is present everywhere and yet,
as transcendent God, maintains the nature of physical entities, ensuring their regular, law-like behavior according to the description of
local physical laws. In particular he/she causes quantum action to take
place in a law-like way, according to the known nature of quantum
physics.
Then the possibilities are: 2a) God determines the actual realization
of quantum outcomes from the possible ones, choosing a specific result
in each quantum measurement (which is undetermined by the imposed
physical laws). There is an openness in the system, and God uses it
to input the desired information. Or: 2b) These outcomes really are
uncaused, in that God chooses not to determine which of the possible outcomes eventuates. God rattles dice each time to determine the
actual outcome from those that quantum theory allows, refraining from
making a choice. There is an openness in the system, and God uses it
to input random noise, or possibly a combination of these positions.
In any of these cases, the issue is not whether there is divine action at
the quantum level, (for effective immanence ensures that there is),97 but
rather, what use is made of this divine action at the quantum level?
Alternative 2a envisages coherent information input through this
action, actualizing top-down action in a purposeful manner. Alternative
2b rejects this as a useful channel of action. The action still takes place,
but is specifically structured so as not to be purposeful. In that case,
it seems that the only channel for meaningful top-down action of the
required kind98 is through altering the boundary conditions of the
system S. But this in turn has to happen through some physical means
in the larger system S = S + E, where the previous environment E is
now included in the system to be explained. The whole problem recurs
now for this larger system, with its new boundary E.
97
98

Peacocke, Gods Interaction with the World.
344
george f.r. ellis
The analysis supports the proposal of Murphy and Tracy that quantum uncertainty is a, perhaps even the only, vehicle through which special divine action (particularly as experienced in revelatory acts affecting
human minds) can take place as required by many religious traditions.
This provides an important part of the foundation of Christian spirituality. It also supports view III above as to the functioning of the brain,99
which seems to be a closely related issue.
6. Evidence
The final topic I wish to discuss briefly is the issue of supporting evidence for these views.100 It is clear from the nature of the argument that
some aspects are compatible both with chance and with divine action;
they will only be seen in the latter context through the eye of faith.
But what then is the starting point for our discussion of the nature of
faith? Furthermore, in view of conflicting standpoints, whose doctrine
of faith and whose practice will one accept and why?
This is the whole issue of apologetics, which cannot be dealt with
properly here.101 However, some key points can be made. The suggestion
will be that the Christian Anthropic Principle102 selects a particular
viewpoint based on the theme of self-sacrifice or kenosis,103 which
structures the argument and opts for specific Christian traditions from
among the competitors. We can present the analysis in summary form
by referring to the implied scheme of top-down action, with emergent
layers of description and meaning,104 that arises from that discussion.
The structure envisaged is one of layers of meaning and morality as
shown in Figure 5 (on following page).
Top-down causation is active in this hierarchy in terms of action and
meaning. The fundamental intention of the creator shapes the structure
and brings into being the physical foundations. The interactions at the
physical level are the basis for all the higher levels of order (through
99
Cf. Squires, Conscious Mind; and Penrose, Emperors New Mind.

Cf. section 2 of Murphys paper.
101
A systematic presentation is given in Murphy and Ellis, Cosmology, Theology,
and Ethics.
102
Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle, section 6.
103
The different levels of kenosis are discussed in K.M. Cronin, Kenosis: Emptying
Self and the Path of Christian Service (Rockport, MA: Element, 1992).
104
Cf. section 2 above.
100
345
bottom-up action), enabling the existence of life through the fine-tuned

nature of physical reality and allowing life to come into being through
the processes of self-organization and evolution. Once conscious beings
have come into existence, they create moral orders through psychological and sociological interactions. These orders then come into confrontation with the moral and spiritual order of ultimate reality, which exerts
its influence on humans in a persuasive rather than coercive manner.
Thus, while the upward and downward causal action is fairly rigid at
the lower levels, it is not so at the higher ones. At the lower levels the
interconnecting laws of action are those of physics, which are inviolate
as long as special divine actions 7a are not taking place (and we have
assumed they do not occur), while at the moral levels they are of the
nature of persuasion and invitation, allowing choice and free response.
This is their essential character.
Level 1: Spiritual/religious
Spiritual values:
kenosis in relation to transcendence
Data 1
Level 2: Moral/ethical
Ethical values:
kenosis in relation to others: serving
Data 2
Level 3: Social and ecological

Political, economic interactions:
community and ecosystem kenosis
Data 3
Level 4: Personal/individual (psychological)

Consciousness, choice: free will
responsibility, kenosis/self
Data 4
Level 5: Biological
Levels of biological organization: life
self-organization, evolution
Data 5
Level 6: Physical
Level of physical entities and action
regularities of physical law
Data 6
Figure 5. Hierarchinal structuring of meaning and morality in the Universe.

Top-down and bottom-up action occur as in the other hierarchically structured
systems, leading to emergent meaning at the higher levels as indicated. The
data at each level must be in terms of the kinds of concepts and meanings
appropriate at that level.
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george f.r. ellis
In assessing this proposal relative to its competitors, there are separate

data of different types appropriate to each level in the hierarchy. At
each level the scheme suggested is indeed supported by a considerable
volume of data, and provides an overall coherent scheme in agreement
with those data (but not uniquely indicated by those at the physical
level alone). However, choice of the whole structure is a metaphysical
choice based on recognition of the appropriateness and rightness of
what is presented, justified ultimately by the good fruits associated
with this worldview. The further key element is dealing with apparent
counter-evidence, for otherwise the proposal is vulnerable to the charge
of being based on selected evidence only, ignoring awkward evidence
pointing in other directions.105
A defense can be built on the lines indicated in Murphys paper and
my paper:106 essentially, the overall scheme proposed is only possible, in
terms of truly allowing free will and full moral choice, if the possibility
of evil is allowed as well, with full acceptance of its consequences. This
is both the free-process defense of Polkinghorne and the traditional
free-will defense.
Ones assessment of what has been suggested here will depend on
ones prior assumptions. If one accepts that the traditional religious
view (summarized above) is correct and, additionally, that the modern
scientific view is correct, then one arrives fairly uniquely at the scheme
suggested here (the essential element of choice is identifying the theme
of kenosis as fundamental,107 as against, for example, monarchical
themes). This leads to a holistic view, as sketched above, which accords
with the data at all levels, once the apparent counter-evidence has been
evaluated in the light of overall constraints on what is possible in view
of Gods ultimate aim in creating a universe where free moral response
is possible. Two further points are of interest.
First, from this foundation I suggest that we arrive at the necessity
for an upwards openness, in correspondence with the downwards
openness fundamental to the proposal. The possibility of free moral
choice requires gaps in the system, as discussed by Tracy. Indeed the
105
See Anthony N. Flew, Thinking about Social Thinking: Escaping Deception, Resisting
Self-Deception (London: Harper Collins, 1991), for a discussion of the dangers of such
selective choices.
106
See Murphy, Divine Action; and Ellis, Theology of the Anthropic Principle.
107
Cf. Ellis, Before the Beginning; and idem, Theology of the Anthropic Principle.
347
downward causation is not rigid but involves persuasion rather than

coercion, as mentioned above. Correspondingly, the upward causation
must be open; this is required for the system to be consistent.108
Thus, on this view, rather than searching for the gap allowed by
quantum uncertainty as a place where divine action can take place, we
invert the argument: we demand that there must be such an openness
in physical laws, in order that morality can be possible and that special
divine action (as described above) can take place. That is, just as one
demands certainty in physical processes at the macroscopic level, as
discussed by Murphy, so that moral response is possible, additionally
one demands causal gaps (as described by Tracy) at the microscopic
level, so that top-down causation can lead to an openness in upward
emergent properties and allow the kind of revelatory possibilities envisaged in this article. Thus, in a sense one predicts the necessity for an
openness. While it may be that this openness could occur otherwise
than through the uncertainty inherent in quantum processes, my own
analysis (in accord with Tracy and Murphy) is that it is indeed this
openness which we should identify with that required for true morality to exist.
It follows then that there is no question of this proposal not respecting the randomness built into quantum physics, as if this has an independent ontological status. Rather this apparent randomness is just the
openness required in physical reality in order that Gods action can be
effective without destroying the possibility of higher levels of order.
Second, because of the nature of any system of top-down causation
and emergent order, it is clear that when considered in terms of the
lower-level descriptions only, the meanings and concepts of the higher
levels do not exist: they literally have no meaning. This is what worries
those who view the proposal on the basis of the requirements of science
alone: the scheme simply does not make sense when viewed from that
perspective. The issue is what level of description is being used in ones
analysis of reality; the proposal here only makes sense if one includes
the highest levels of meaning.
108
This is really an aspect of W. Ross-Ashbys law of requisite variety. See his
Introduction to Cybernetics (London: Chapman & Hall, 1956); and Beer, Brain of the
Firm.
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george f.r. ellis

7. Conclusion
The view of divine action presented in Murphys paper109 seems coherent and reasonable. It emphasizes first ordinary action in terms of
the creation and preservation of the universe, providing the ground for
the existence of the dependable physical systems that allow objects and
people their independent existence and rights, through the upwards
emergence of physical properties based on physical laws. It also allows
special divine action, particularly in terms of intimations of right action
provided to those willing to see. Gods action is then able to lead to
action in the world through directed downwards causation in the body,
and so to effective changes in the world.
Problems arise in terms of the possible choice to act specially in a
miraculous manner as is certainly possible in this scheme of things.
The issue then is how to avoid the charge of capriciousness and, in
some sense, conniving with evil in those cases where such action is
not taken. A clear-cut criterion controlling such interventions provides
some kind of safeguard against such charges. This could be a partial
answer, when taken in conjunction with a strong argument to the effect
that the conditions leading to apparent evil are those required to create
free will and independence.110
However, a different possibility is the existence of an alternative
domain of action in the physical world, coming into effect in those cases
where wills are in concert with God.111 This preserves a fixed order of
behavior in the universe without miraculous intervention, but allows
special action to become commonplace where the conditions for this
alternative order exist. This possibility needs further exploration to
make clear the criteria that could govern such a phase change and
to characterize some of the features of the new domain of action that
could then arise. Experimental data relevant to this situation would
appear to be rather few; the motivation for its acceptance on other
grounds would then have to be compelling.
109
I see Murphys paper as being complementary to my own (Theology of the
Anthropic Principle). I regard the two as being (in broad terms) in agreement with
each other and with others in CTNS/VO, v. II, for example, that of Tracy.
110
I am here avoiding an explicit reference to free evil spirits, e.g., a Devil operating
independently of God, or to the Jungian alternative of a dark side of God. This could
be one of the areas where various Christian traditions differ strongly from each other,
possibly leading to significant variations of the theme proposed in Murphys paper.
111
Polkinghorne, Science and Providence; Stoeger, Describing Gods Action.
349
Clearly, the proposal that quantum uncertainty provides the necessary

causal gap is highly controversial. However, if one takes into account the
data as a whole and seriously attempts a holistic combination of both the
religious and scientific views, this suggestion becomes less scandalous
and, indeed, the necessity of microscopic uncertainty in physical laws
virtually becomes a prediction of the understanding attained.112
112
I thank all the members of the second Vatican Observatory/CTNS conference

for the stimulating interaction with them that has led to the thoughts presented in this
paper. I am particularly grateful to Bill Stoeger, Bob Russell, and Nancey Murphy for
detailed comments on the manuscript, which have led to major improvements.
CHAPTER TEN
DIVINE ACTION AND QUANTUM MECHANICS:

A FRESH ASSESSMENT
Robert John Russell
1. Introduction
In this essay, I will explore further a thesis about divine action and
quantum mechanics whose roots trace back four decades in the field
of theology and science.1 It has been extensively developed recently
by scholars in the decade-long CTNS/Vatican Observatory series of
research conferences. The thesis is the following: if quantum mechanics is interpreted philosophically in terms of ontological indeterminism (as found in one form of the Copenhagen interpretation), one
can construct a bottom-up, noninterventionist, objective approach2
to mediated direct divine action in which Gods indirect acts of general and special providence at the macroscopic level arise in part, at
least, from Gods objective direct action at the quantum level both in
sustaining the time-development of elementary processes as governed
1
For historical background, see Robert J. Russell, Special Providence and Genetic
Mutation: A New Defense of Theistic Evolution, in Evolutionary and Molecular Biology:
Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, R.J. Russell, W.R. Stoeger, and F.J. Ayala, eds.
(Vatican City State/Berkeley, Calif.: Vatican Observatory/Center for Theology and the
Natural Sciences, 1998), secs. 2.3.12, the volume hereafter EMB.
2
For a discussion of such terms as objective and noninterventionist, see Robert
J. Russell, Introduction, in Chaos and Complexity: Scientific Perspectives on Divine
Action, R.J. Russell, N.C. Murphy, and A. Peacocke, eds. (Vatican City State/Berkeley,
Calif.: Vatican Observatory/Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1995),
secs. 3.3 and 3.4, esp. figure 1, the volume hereafter CAC. For an anthology and
careful analysis of the contemporary theological literature on divine action see Owen
Thomas, ed., Gods Activity in the World: The Contemporary Problem (Chico, Calif.:
Scholars Press, 1983), hereafter GAW, and idem, Recent Thought on Divine Agency,
in Divine Action, B. Hebblethwaite and E. Henderson, eds. (Edinburgh: T&T Clark,
1990). For a detailed analysis of the philosophical problems involved, see Keith Ward,
Divine Action (London: Collins, 1990), and Thomas F. Tracy, ed., The God Who Acts:
Philosophical and Theological Explorations (University Park, Penn.: Pennsylvania State
University, 1994).
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robert john russell
by the Schrdinger equation and in acting with nature to bring about

irreversible interactions referred to as quantum events.
I begin with a few clarifying comments (section 2) before turning to
the heart of the essay (sections 3, 4, and 5). Here I first discuss methodological issues, including the warrant for a bottom-up approach
to divine action and the problems of the multiple interpretability
of quantum mechanics and historical relativism. Next I turn to two
philosophical issues: the phenomenological domain of the measurement
problem and its relation to the indeterministic form of the Copenhagen
interpretation of quantum physics. Then I explore a variety of theological
issues. Background topics include divine action at the quantum level
and general providence, the pervasiveness of divine action, local and
global aspects of divine action, and the challenge of special relativity.
Central topics include Gods action in some or all quantum events and
its relation to the problem of human freedom and the challenge of
theodicy. I propose that a trinitarian doctrine of God is the most suitable context for locating the divine action and quantum mechanics
thesis. A final section (6) lays out directions for future research on the
philosophical implications of quantum mechanics and their relevance
for divine action, including a proposed architecture of philosophical
issues, an exploration of implications of Bells theorem, and a comparison of nonlocality and (in)determinism in Bohms formulation and the
Copenhagen interpretation.
2. Clarifications
The general position of noninterventionist, objective, special divine
action actually includes several distinct approaches: (i) agential models
of Gods interaction with the world; (ii) agential models in combination with embodiment models of the God/world relation; (iii) agential
models deployed through complex metaphysical systems, such as
process philosophy and neo-Thomism. This essay will focus on the
first approach, which, in turn, includes three versions distinguished
primarily by their focus on inter- or intra-level causality: top-down
causality, whole-part constraints, and bottom-up causality.3 Though this
3
For a discussion of how a bottom-up approach relates to possible top-down
approaches, as well as why a bottom-up approach is essential in the context of the
early evolution of life, see Russell, Introduction, in CAC, sec. 4.3.
divine action and quantum mechanics
353
essay will focus on bottom-up causality, like most scholars I believe that
a combination of all three will eventually be needed for an adequate
account of objective, noninterventionist divine action.
In the bottom-up approach, God is thought of as acting at a lower
level of complexity in nature to influence the processes and properties
at a higher level. To qualify as a noninterventionist approach, the lower
level must be interpretable philosophically as ontologically indeterministic. A number of scholars4 have focused on quantum mechanics
because it deals with the lowest levels in nature (i.e., fundamental particles and physical interactions) and because it can be given such an
interpretation. Their work will serve as sources for the current essay.
First, however, I need to stress what the approach adopted in this essay
does not claim.
1. This approach does not explain how God acts or even constitute an argument that God acts.5 Instead it assumes that warrants for
the belief in divine action come from extended theological arguments
4
Karl Heim, The Transformation of the Scientific World (London: SCM Press,
1953); Eric L. Mascall, Christian Theology and Natural Science: Some Questions in Their
Relations (New York: Longmans, Green & Co., 1956); William G. Pollard, Chance and
Providence: Gods Action in a World Governed by Scientific Law (London: Faber and
Faber, 1958); Mary Hesse, On the Alleged Incompatibility Between Christianity and
Science, in Man and Nature, Hugh Montefiore, ed. (London: Collins, 1975); Donald
M. MacKay, Chance and Providence (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978); Nancey
Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order: Buridans Ass and Schrdingers
Cat, 32558, Thomas F. Tracy, Particular Providence and the God of the Gaps,
289324, and George F. Ellis, Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action: The Nexus
of Interaction, 35996, all three in CAC; Ian G. Barbour, Five Models of God and
Evolution, EMB, 41942; see as far back as idem, Issues in Science and Religion (New
York: Harper & Row, 1971); Mark W. Worthing, God, Creation, and Contemporary
Physics (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996), esp. 13046; Christopher F. Mooney,
Theology and Scientific Knowledge: Changing Models of Gods Presence in the World
(Notre Dame: Notre Dame Press, 1996), esp. chap. 3, 10810; Philip Clayton, God and
Contemporary Science (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1997), esp. chap. 7,
8. Some scholars have raised objections to the approach taken by these scholars. See,
for example, Arthur Peacocke, Gods Interaction with the World: The Implications
of Deterministic Chaos and of Interconnected and Interdependent Reality, in CAC,
27981. For an interesting recent response to Peacocke in terms of quantum indeterminacy, see John J. Davis, Quantum Indeterminacy and the Omniscience of God,
Science and Christian Belief 9.2 (October 1997): 12944. and Peacockes reply in the
same volume. See also John C. Polkinghorne, The Metaphysics of Divine Action, in
CAC, esp. 1523, articles in Niels H. Gregersen et al., eds., Studies in Science & Theology
1996: Yearbook of the European Society for the Study of Science and Theology, vols. 3
and 4, The Concept of Nature in Science & Theology, Parts I and II (Geneva: Labor et
Fides, 1997), articles in Science and Christian Belief 7.2 (October 1995), and George
Murphy, Does the Trinity Play Dice? Zygon 51.1 (March 1999).
5
See Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, sec. 4.1.
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whose sources lie elsewhere (including scripture, tradition, experience,

and reason).
2. It does not constitute either an epistemic or an ontological god of
the gaps argument.6 An epistemic gaps argument is based on what we
dont know. It invokes God to explain things that we dont yet understand but that science will eventually explain. Our approach, instead,
is based on what we do know about nature, assuming that quantum
physics is the correct theory and that it can be interpreted philosophically as telling us that nature is ontologically indeterministic. In this
approach, what we know is that nature provides the necessary but not
the sufficient causes for quantum events to occur.
An ontological gaps argument assumes that natural processes are
ontologically deterministic. Nature lacks what are called causal gaps7
or breaks in the order of event causation. If nature itself lacks such
causal gaps, God must act in special events to create these gaps. Such
an account of particular divine action is clearly interventionist: in order
to act in nature, God must intervene in these processes by suspending them and violating the laws that describe them. But this approach
is theologically problematic because it pits Gods special acts against
Gods regular action, the latter of which is seen to be the underlying
cause of natures regularities.
Instead, our approach is noninterventionist: God has created the
universe ex nihilo such that some natural processes at the quantum
level are insufficiently determined by prior natural events. One could
say that nature is naturally indeterministic. Thus God does not suspend natural causality but creates and maintains it as ontologically
indeterministic. God does not violate the laws of quantum physics but
acts in accordance with them. In essence, God creates the universe
such that quantum events occur without sufficient natural causes and
6
Michael Ruse, Can a Darwinian Be a Christian? The Relationship Between Science
and Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 868, 912, provides a
thoughtful and often conciliatory approach to the relations between Darwinism and
theism. Unfortunately, though, he reiterates the charge that the appeal to quantum
mechanics is an epistemic form of the gaps argument without discussing previous
responses by Tracy, Ellis, Murphy, and myself. He adds to it the claim that it raises
the problem of theodicy. I think the latter is a valid point, but again, it is one that I
have discussed in Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, sec. 5.2, and that I treat
in some detail below.
7
Here I am again following Tracys usage in his Particular Providence, sec. 1.1.
355
acts within these natural processes and together with natural causes to
bring them about.
The theological warrants for a noninterventionist account of divine
action include the following: objective special providence is achieved
without contradicting general providence (since Gods particular acts,
being noninterventionist, do not violate or suspend Gods routine
acts as represented in the laws of nature); God as the transcendent
creator ex nihilo of the universe as a whole is the immanent on-going
creator of each part (creatio continua); Gods intentions are disclosed
in what we know, not in what we dont know, as Dietrich Bonhoeffer
urged;8 noninterventionist objective special divine action offers a robust
response to atheistic challenges to the intelligibility and credibility of
Christian faith, since the presence of chance in nature does not imply
an absent God and a pointless world but an ever-present God acting
with purpose in the world.
3. It does not reduce God to a natural cause, nor does Gods direct9
action at the quantum level give rise to phenomena that cannot be
explained by science. It affirms that science is characterized by methodological naturalism, and thus it abstains from viewing God as an
explanation within science.10 Instead, Gods direct action at the quantum
level is hidden in principle from science, supporting the integrity of
science and yet allowing science to be integrated fruitfully into constructive theology where God as an explanation of natural events is
appropriately and fully developed.
8
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison, enlarged ed. (London: SCM
Press, 1972/1979), 311. See Tracy, Particular Providence, 289.
9
God may be thought of as acting directly at the quantum level (more precisely, the
effects of Gods direct action may occur at the quantum level). The events we attribute
to God at the macroscopic level are their indirect result. A direct, or basic, act is one
for which there is no prior act (such as willing my arm to move), and one which may
initiate a sequence of acts resulting in an indirect act (such as my arm moving). Thus
divine acts of general and special providence at the ordinary, classical level are mediated and indirect divine acts that arise from Gods direct acts mediated in, through,
and by quantum processes. Such providential acts can equally be seen as a form of
Gods ongoing, continuous creative action. See Tracy, Particular Providence and the
God of the Gaps, in CAC, 2956.
10
This approach thus differs from that of Intelligent Design since it does not
introduce concepts such as agency or designer into scientific theory. Instead it argues
that when quantum physics is introduced into theology through the lens of philosophy,
it offers a new theological approach to noninterventionist divine action.
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robert john russell
4. It does not propose that God alters the wavefunction between

measurements, makes measurements on a given system, or alters the
probabilities of obtaining a particular result.11 Instead, God together
with nature (i.e., as mediated divine action)12 determines what happens
during a quantum event. This claim represents a particular philosophical interpretation of quantum mechanics usually referred to as the
Copenhagen interpretation.13 A variety of scientists have supported
ontological indeterminism, including such contemporaries as Chris
Isham, Paul Davies, and Ian Barbour.14 This alone, of course, is not a
warrant for adopting indeterminism, only a recommendation.
Clearly this interpretation involves a number of complex issues,
including such external problems as historical relativity and multiple
interpretability, and such internal problems as the meaning of measurement, quantum event, quantum indeterminism, and more generally
11
Nicholas T. Saunders, Does God Cheat at Dice? Divine Action and Quantum
Possibilities, Zygon 35.4 (September 2000): 51744, offers a helpful overview of the
kinds of interpretations of quantum physics and of the theological notions of providence and divine action. He then delineates four ways of relating divine action and
quantum mechanics. The first three are the ones I have mentioned here: that God alters
the wavefunction between measurements, makes measurements on a given system, or
alters the probabilities of obtaining a particular result. They do not seem to describe
the actual positions of any of the principal scholars in theology and science, nor does
Saunders claim that they do.
I agree with Saunders that I and several others probably fit into his fourth approach:
as Sanders puts it, God ignores the probabilities predicted by orthodox quantum
mechanics and simply controls the outcomes of particular measurements. (I would
rather say that God acts with nature to bring about the outcomes of particular measurements consistent with the probabilities given before the event occurs.) Saunders
acknowledges that he does not find any specific problems with this approach, except
that it requires us to work within a particular philosophical position. I agree with
him, but I think that this is unavoidable. I have discussed this problem extensively in
previous publications and return to it below.
12
One can think of God as acting either in, through, and together with the processes of nature (mediated) or as acting unilaterally (unmediated). In the latter case,
often called occasionalism, all events in the world occur solely through Gods action.
Occasionalism denies that there are natural causes in the world and undercuts the
importance of science in discovering and in representing them mathematically. As
Murphy stresses, any adequate account of divine action must avoid both occasionalism
and deism (in which Gods action is restricted to a single event, the beginning of the
world); Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order, 332.
13
Again, what is crucial here is that the inclusion of a philosophical interpretation
is not an option; the only option is which interpretation is to be chosen.
14
Chris J. Isham, Lectures on Quantum Theory: Mathematical and Structural
Foundations (London: Imperial College Press, 1995), 1312; Paul Davies, Quantum
Mechanics (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984), 4; Ian G. Barbour, Religion in
an Age of Science (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1990), 123.
357
the problem of a realist interpretation of quantum mechanics, including

the referential status of the wavefunction, etc. I will seek to respond to
these issues in detail below, but I should say from the outset that one
generic problem is unavoidable: we must adopt one or another philosophical interpretation whenever we incorporate the results of science
(or any other field of knowledge) into a wider intellectual context,
particularly into constructive theology. The key is to hold ones philosophical interpretation explicitly, tentatively, and hypothetically as a lens
through which to ask questions about the relation between science and
theology, not foundationally as the basis of ones theological position
(as for example in natural theology or physico-theology).
5. It does not limit the relation between quantum mechanics and
divine action to special providence. Instead it views the domain of
quantum mechanics as giving rise to the general features of the ordinary
macroscopic world (i.e., general providence/continuous creation) and
to particular events within it (i.e., special providence).
Quantum processes underlie and give rise to the general features
of the world of ordinary experience and Newtonian physics.15 These
processes fall into two classes. First are the processes that produce
macroscopic properties such as the impenetrability of matter (and
thus the extension of matter in space), the chemical properties of the
elements (including color and valency), and the electrical and thermodynamic properties of solids (such as conductivity and specific heat).
Fermi-Dirac (FD) statistics describe these processes and explain why
they lead to the associated macroscopic properties. Particles that obey
FD statistics, such as electrons and protons, are called fermions. Second
are the processes that glue the everyday world together, i.e., that produce the electroweak, strong, and gravitational interactions, and that
create such macroscopic quantum phenomena as superfluidity and
15
For earlier detailed discussion see Robert John Russell, Quantum Physics in
Philosophical and Theological Perspective, in Physics, Philosophy, and Theology: A
Common Quest for Understanding, R.J. Russell, W.R. Stoeger, and G.V. Coyne, eds.
(Vatican City State: Vatican Observatory Publications, 1988), hereafter Quantum
Physics; idem, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation. How macroscopic phenomena first arose out of the quantum processes of the very early universe remains
a profound problem. Here I simply take it for granted that we can describe both our
ordinary experience using classical science and our subatomic data using quantum
physics, and look to their relation.
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robert john russell
superconductivity. Here the statistics are Bose-Einstein (BE), and the

particles, such as photons or gravitons, are bosons.16
The mathematical equations that represent FD and BE statistics
are radically different in the quantum realm of low energies and temperatures, but as we move to room temperature, both approach the
Boltzmannian equation that characterizes classical statistics (i.e., a
Gaussian bell curve).17 This fact leads to another striking aspect of the
relation between quantum and classical physics. If we look at statistics
from an epistemological perspective, classical chance is grounded
mathematically in and arises smoothly in the appropriate limit from
quantum statistics. But if we look at statistics from an ontological
perspective, the result is far more complex. Recall that Boltzmannian
statistics originated in classical physics and the context of ontological
determinism.18 On the other hand, FD and BE statistics arise within a
quantum mechanical framework suggestive of ontological indeterminism. So if we are interested in ontology and start with Boltzmannian
statistics, we are led in opposite directions: to determinism if we stay
within the framework of the classical world in which it originated,
and to indeterminism if we move to the quantum world and derive
Boltzmannian statistics from FD and BE statistics. How strange it is
that the classical, everyday world, where Boltzmannian statistics point to
16
Technically, superfluidity and superconductivity involve both FD and BE statistics,
as Carl York pointed out (private communications). FD and BE statistics are intimately
connected to the indistinguishability of fundamental particles (all electrons are identical) and their spin: y is anti-symmetrized for fermions (which carry odd spin) and
symmetrized for bosons (which carry even spin). Indistinguishability and spin, in turn,
are strictly quantum features, and yet they too can be seen as giving rise to the ordinary
features of the classical world. The space-like correlations in these statistics are also
intimately related to the problem of nonlocality in quantum physics, as Bells theorem
reveals (discussed below). A full discussion of spin-statistics requires a relativistic treatment of quantum physics, such as given by Dirac. Thus, in a strict sense, it lies outside
the confines of nonrelativistic quantum physics, although quantum statistics can be
warranted at least in part on the basis of indistinguishability.
17
FD statistics, 1/(eE/kT + 1), and BE statistics, 1/(eE/kT 1), both approach Boltzmann
statistics, namely 1/eE/kT, at energies E >> kT. Here E is the energy of the system, k is
Boltzmanns constant and T is the equilibrium temperature of the system. At low
energies, BE statistics still resemble the classical form, but FD statistics are strikingly
different. See for example figures 11:13 and table 11:1 in Robert Eisberg and Robert
Resnick, Quantum Physics of Atoms, Molecules, Solids, Nuclei, and Particles (New York:
John Wiley & Sons, 1974), chap. 11.
18
Here, bulk properties of solids, liquids, and gases were derived mathematically
from a statistical treatment of the deterministic interactions between their component
parts (e.g., the kinetic theory of gases).
359
causal determinism, is actually the product of a quantum world whose

FD and BE statistics point instead to ontological indeterminism!
From a theological perspective, Gods noninterventionist action at
the quantum level19 gives rise to the creation of the general features of
the classical world described above, as well as to their sustenance and
physical development in time, or what we would routinely call general
providence (or continuous creation).20
Quantum processes also underlie and give rise to specific effects in
the macroscopic world in several ways.21 One way is through those
phenomena, such as superfluidity and superconductivity, which,
though found in the ordinary classical world, are really bulk quantum
stateswhat George Ellis in this volume calls essentially quantum
effects at the macro level. Another, and quite different, way is through
specific quantum processes, which, when amplified correctly, result in
particular classical effects in the classical world. It is the latter that will
be the focus of this essay and will be thought of in terms of special
providence. Obvious examples range from such jury-rigged situations
as Schrdingers cat to such routine measurement devices as a Geiger
counter. But the production of specific effects in the macroscopic level
from quantum processes includes a whole range of phenomena such
as the animal eye responding to a single photon, mental states resulting from quantum events at neural junctions,22 or the phenotypic
19
God may act at other levels in nature should they, too, be open to an indeterminis-tic interpretation. This would apply most clearly in the domain of neurophysiology and thus involve an analysis of the neuro- and cognitive sciences. See Robert
J. Russell, Nancey Murphy, Theo Meyering, and Michael A. Arbib, eds., Neuroscience
and the Person: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action (Vatican City State/Berkeley,
Calif.: Vatican Observatory/Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, 1999),
hereafter NAP.
20
George Ellis makes this same point nicely in CTNS/VO, v. V sec. 2.1; note his
references as well. See also Russell, Quantum Physics, 3446; Murphy, Divine Action
in the Natural Order, sec. 4.3; Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation,
sec. 2.3.2.
21
See Russell, Quantum Physics. It is widely asserted that individual quantum
events always average out at the macroscopic level, thus making quantum mechanics
irrelevant to special providence and human free will. Instead, the Schrdinger cat
argument provides an elegant way to combine both general and special providence on
the same quantum template.
22
Ellis actually discusses two possibilities: (i) coherent firings in large arrays of neurons leading to a holistic response in a region of the brain (here amplification is an
almost inappropriate term), and (ii) localized firings in microtubules that are amplified
to macroscopic effect, following the suggestions of Roger Penrose; see George F.R. Ellis,
Intimations of Transcendence: Relations of the Mind and God, in NAP, 472; idem,
Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action, in CAC, 36971.
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expression of a single genetic mutation in an organism (resulting, for

example, in sickle-cell anemia or cancer). Indeed one may argue that
the evolution of life on earth over the past 3.8 billion years depends
in part on such biological amplifiers as the genotype-phenotype
relation, which expresses the effects of quantum mechanics within
genetic mutations at the macroscopic level of individual organisms and
populations.23 Moreover, the amplification of microscopic to macroscopic states in most of these processes does not rely on chaos theory.
Therefore, contrary to the claim by some scholars, we need not deal
with the unresolved problem of quantum chaology in this approach to
divine action.24
Thus Gods action at the quantum level can be seen as bringing about,
in a non-interventionist mode, both the general features of the world
we describe in terms of general providence (or continuous creation) and
those specific events in the world to which special providence refers.
3. Methodological Issues
3.1. Is a bottom-up approach to divine action warranted, and does
it exclude other approaches?
We should not see the present focus as a general limitation or restriction of divine action to bottom-up causality alone.25 Instead, I see the
present argument as located within a much broader context, namely the
theology of divine action in personal experience and human history,
because that is primarily where we, as persons of faith, encounter the
23
See Ellis, in this volume, sec. 2; Barbour, Five Models of God and Evolution, in
EMB, 426. For an extended discussion of quantum mechanics, evolutionary biology,
and divine action see Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation.
24
Polkinghorne, Metaphysics of Divine Action, section 4.1. Also see Polkinghornes
contribution to this volume, secs. 4 and 5. See also Fred Sanders, The Image of the
Immanent Trinity: Implications of Rahners Rule for a Theological Interpretation of
Scripture (Berkeley: GTU dissertation, unpublished, 2000), 540. Although quantum
chaos is not a problem for the present approach relating divine action and quantum
physics, it is a serious problem when one tries to relate chaos theory, at least in its
present state, to divine action, particularly when an appeal is made to quantum physics
to provide those variations in initial conditions of specifically chaotic systems that give
rise to the appearance of openness in deterministic, closed systems.
25
As Barbour notes, most authors who explore this approach also insist on eventually
combining these approaches; Barbour, Five Models of God and Evolution, 4323.
361
living God. For this, we clearly need to consider a variety of models,

including both top-down, whole-part, and bottom-up causes and
constraints, and their roles within both embodiment and non-embodiment models of agency, with particular emphasis on the mind-body
problem and human agency.26 Moreover, I believe we will eventually
need to work out the detailed relations between these models by integrating them into a consistent and coherent, adequate and applicable
metaphysical framework.
The question here, though, is why and how God might be thought
of as acting within nature via a form of bottom-up causality. Granting
that God is the creator of the universe per se, maintaining the efficacy
of nature, whose regularities, which we call the laws of nature, manifest
Gods faithfulness and rational intelligibility as creator, and granting
also that these laws have just the right statistical ingredients to allow
for the production of order out of chaos as part of Gods creative
actions, and granting that in some situations, such as our personal
encounter through faith with God, it is highly appropriate to introduce
top-down language about Gods action, can we nonetheless adequately
understand Gods action within the physical, astrophysical, molecular,
and evolutionary processes out of which we arose as expressing Gods
intention in ways that go beyond that of maintaining the existence
of these processes and allowing their built-in potentialities to work
themselves out over time? And can such an understanding of Gods
action be rendered in an intelligible way if we restrict ourselves to topdown causality or to whole-part constraint alone?
I believe it cannot. Top-down causality is helpful when considering
the action of conscious and self-conscious creatures that are genuinely
open to Gods action and that have at least some capacity to respond
to it. But it is hard to see what constitutes the top through which
God acts in a top-down way when no conscious, let alone self-conscious, creatures capable of mind/brain interactions have yet evolved.
Remember, we are trying to understand Gods action in the universe over its full twelve to fifteen billion year history, including the
26
I agree with Murphys 1995 assessment that Arthur Peacocke has given the most
compelling account to date of the role of top-down causation in accounting for Gods
continuing action. Her reference was to Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age, to
which could now be added a variety of his articles, including Biological Evolution
A Positive Theological Appraisal, in EMB, 35776, and The Sound of Sheer Silence:
How Does God Communicate with Humanity? in NAP, 21548. See Murphy, Divine
Action in the Natural Order, 326, fn. 3.
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production of first- and second-generation stars, planetary systems, and

eventually the evolution of organisms at least on Earth over a period
of nearly four billion years, ranging from the simplest primitive forms
to the present vastly rich profusion of life. Moreover, if God acts at
the top level of complexity at a given stage in evolutionary history,
that level of complexity must be ontologically open, that is, it must
be described by laws that can be interpreted in terms of ontological
indeterminism. Yet, until the evolution of organisms capable of even
primitive mentality, the top levels would presumably have been within
the domain of the classical sciences and the ontological determinism
of Newtonian physics. On the top-down approach special divine action
would thus be unintelligible without intervention from the epochs of
early galactic, stellar, and planetary formation on up through those
early stages of evolutionary biology prior and leading to the development of a central nervous system. But if we omit this early period from
our discussion of special providence, then we once again risk a radical
limitation on special divine action: Gods special action can only occur
after a sufficient degree of biological complexity has been achieved,
but it cannot be effective within the processes by which that degree
of complexity is achieved. For both these reasons, then, the top-down
strategy seems stymied.27
Perhaps we should try whole-part constraint arguments instead. The
challenge here is to find phenomena in nature that display holistic characteristics and that point to ontological indeterminism. The ecological
web is often cited as a candidate, due to its inherent complexity and
seemingly endless openness to external factors, but in my opinion it
fails to be a candidate for noninterventionist divine action because of
the underlying determinism of the processes involved, no matter how
complex or inter-related they might be.
Thus on critical reflection, and contrary to the hopes of most previous
attempts at theistic evolution, it seems unlikely that top-down or wholepart approaches are of much value for interpreting physical processes
and biological evolution at the pre-cognitive and even pre-animate era
in terms of special divine action. Unless one returns to the quantum
level, where holism and indeterminism are displayed everywhere and
at all times since t = 0, I see little hope that Gods action within the
27
Murphy outlines similar problems with a strictly top-down approach to divine
action in Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order, 4.1.
363
early stages of physical, astrophysical, and biological phenomena can be

described in noninterventionist ways using either whole-part constraint
or top-down causal arguments.
3.2. The historical relativism and multiple interpretability of quantum
mechanics
The next two problems are also methodological. First, why should we
take quantum physics seriously if it will one day be replaced by a new
physical theory? Second, how can we take quantum physics seriously
in discussing a theology of divine action given the fact that quantum
mechanics is subject to a variety of equally valid, and radically distinct,
philosophical interpretations?28
In response to the first problem, one option would be to disregard all
theories that are at the frontier of science, including quantum physics,
sticking instead with proven theories such as classical physics. If we
did so, we would be on surer grounds for drawing conclusions about
the world, since we know precisely where the limits of applicability lie
for such theories. For example, we know precisely in which domains
classical physics applies for all practical purposes, namely in the limits
of Plancks constant h 0 and the speed of light c infinity.29
I dont agree with this overly cautious approach for two reasons. First,
classical physics is in principle false. As a useful theory for practical
needs, like engineering or planetary exploration, it is excellent. But as a
fundamental theory of nature, its explanation of the world is wrong. As
Charles Misner has remarked, the theories that we know are proven
are the ones that have been the most clearly falsified! Second, it is within
this classical view of nature as a closed causal system that the theology
of previous centuries has operatedand much of contemporary theology still does! Many of the atheistic challenges to divine action have
ignored the quantum mechanical aspects of nature and presupposed
classical science and a mechanistic, deterministic metaphysics, as Ellis
28
Actually this is a concrete example of the multiple interpretability and historical
relativity that inevitably surround any scientific theory. How these factors affect the
philosophical and theological discussions of a scientific theory is a crucial methodological issue lying at the heart of any conversation about theology and science. A decision
regarding it is required of every scholar in the field. I will try to describe mine here,
though all too briefly. See also Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation,
sec. 4.2; idem, Quantum Physics.
29
But note Berrys careful discussion of this issue in CTNS/VO, v. V.
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has pointed out.30 Thus their arguments, too, are fundamentally flawed.
So sticking only with proven theories is out.
As is well known, quantum mechanics can be given a variety of philosophical interpretations.31 The Copenhagen interpretation is, arguably,
the most widely held view by physicists and philosophers of science.
According to Jim Cushing, it essentially involves complementarity (e.g.,
wave-particle duality), inherent indeterminism at the most fundamental
level of quantum phenomena, and the impossibility of an event-byevent causal representation in a continuous spacetime background.32
Although rooted in the work of Niels Bohr, the term Copenhagen interpretation includes several distinct versions. Bohr himself stressed the
epistemic limitations on what we can know about quantum processes.
Compared with their effortless union in classical physics, spacetime
description and causal explanation become complementary (necessary
but mutually exclusive) aspects of a quantum account of microscopic
processes.33 Bohr also believed that quantum formalism applies to
individual systems, compared with Einsteins statistical view in which
the formalism applies to ensembles only.34 Heisenberg both supported
the completeness of quantum mechanics and developed his own realist,
30
George F.R. Ellis, The Thinking Underlying the New Scientific World-Views,
in EMB, 25180.
31
In 1966, Ian Barbour provided what is still one of the most helpful surveys of
these interpretations. Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion, chap. 10, sec. III. See also
Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science, 1014. For a more recent and accessible account
see Nicholas Herbert, Quantum Reality: Beyond the New Physics (Garden City, N.Y.:
Anchor Press; Doubleday, 1985). For a technical survey of the philosophical problems in
quantum physics see Jammer, The Philosophy of Quantum Mechanics; Michael Redhead,
Incompleteness, Nonlocality, and Realism: A Prolegomenon to the Philosophy of Quantum
Mechanics (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1987); James T. Cushing and Ernan McMullin,
eds., Philosophical Consequences of Quantum Theory: Reflections on Bells Theorem
(Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1989); Abner Shimony, Conceptual
Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, in The New Physics, Paul Davies, ed. (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1989); James T. Cushing, Quantum Mechanics: Historical
Contingency and the Copenhagen Hegemony (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1994); Isham, Lectures on Quantum Theory.
32
Cushing, Quantum Mechanics, 24.
33
In his famous 1927 Como lecture Bohr argued that the spacetime coordination
and the claim of causality, the union of which characterizes the classical theories, [are]
complementary but exclusive features of the description, symbolizing the idealization
of observation and definition respectively. For a convenient source and translation,
see Jammer, The Philosophy of Quantum Mechanics, 8694. See also Cushing, Quantum
Mechanics, 28.
34
See Cushing, Quantum Mechanics, for a discussion of Leslie Ballentines arguments about Bohr versus Einstein. Cushing views Stapps interpretation as close to
Ballentines statistical approach.
365
indeterministic version of the Copenhagen interpretation in which the

measurement process actualizes potential characteristics of the quantum
system. His interpretation suggests that the unpredictability that arises
during measurement has an ontological basis and is not simply epistemological.35 Ian Barbour cites Henry Margenau who writes, the uncertainty does not reside in the imperfection in our measurements, nor in
mans ability to know; it has its cause in nature herself. As Barbour
puts it, if this interpretation is correct, indeterminacy is an ontological
reality.36 In sum, Cushing concludes that, On the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, physical processes are arguably, at the
most fundamental level, both inherently indeterministic and nonlocal.
The ontology of classical physics is dead.37
Other interpretations of quantum mechanics include: ontological
determinism (the neo-realism of Einstein/incompleteness and Bohm/
hidden variables); many worlds (Everett); quantum logic (Gribb;
Finkelstein); consistent histories (Clarke, Griffiths, Omns, Gell-Mann,
Hartle); and consciousness creates reality (von Neumann, Wigner,
Stapp). With this in mind, some have argued that we modify the basic
equations of quantum mechanics (e.g., Shimonys philosophically
motivated exploration of stochastic modifications of the Schrdinger
equation).38 Since their discovery in the 1960s, Bells theorems have
35
Werner Heisenberg, Physics and Philosophy: The Revolution in Modern Science
(New York: Harper, 1958); idem, Physics and Beyond (New York: Harper & Row,
1971). Heisenberg apparently had a two truths view of the relation between science
and religion, with religion as a set of ethical principles. See for example idem, Across
the Frontiers, Peter Heath, trans. (New York: Harper & Row, 1974/1971), chap. XVI.
He also argued that the extension of scientific methods of thought far beyond their
legitimate limits of application led to the much deplored division between science and
religion; idem, Philosophic Problems of Nuclear Science (Greenwich, Conn.: Fawcett
Publications, 1952), chap. 1.
36
Henry Margenau, Advantages and Disadvantages of Various Interpretations of
the Quantum Theory, Physics Today 7 (1954), quoted in Barbour, Issues in Science
and Religion, 3034.
37
Cushing, Quantum Mechanics, 32.
38
What is particularly interesting here is that Shimony not only argues for one
philosophical interpretation against its competitors, but that he allows his philosophical
commitments (i.e., to realism) to drive his scientific research program in new directions that seek to revise current physics; Shimony, Search for a Worldview which
can Accommodate Our Knowledge of Microphysics, in Philosophical Consequences
of Quantum Theory, Cushing and McMullin, eds., 2537, esp. 34. His interest in a
modified version of quantum mechanics provides an excellent example of how ones
philosophical and theological commitments can play a positive influence in the construction of new and empirically successful scientific theories. In essence, the creative
mutual interaction between theology, philosophy, and science can include not only
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underscored the nonlocal and particularly the nonseparable character

of quantum phenomena, making each of the earlier interpretations
more problematic.39 How then are we to decide which interpretation or
modification is right and reliable for a discussion of divine action, and
if we cannot decide, what might be a reasonable way to proceed?
My response is fourfold. First, why single out quantum mechanics?
Every scientific theory is open to competing metaphysical interpretations; indeed, metaphysics is always underdetermined by science,
although some theories, like classical physics, seem strongly to favor
one interpretation (e.g., determinism) over others. So this concern
about quantum mechanics applies, in principle, to any metaphysical
interpretation of any scientific theory. Indeed, the warrant for choosing
a specific metaphysical interpretation of any scientific theory is an issue
not only for theists but equally for naturalists or atheists.
Second, none of these interpretations returns us to an entirely classical view of the world; to one extent or another, all of them require a
reconstruction of our philosophy of nature. This might seem obvious,
but it actually addresses what is a subtle problem in the literature.
Bohms interpretation, being deterministic and describing nature in
such classical terms as particles, forces, and trajectories, can seem like a
less problematic option than Bohrs epistemology, with its wave-particle
complementarity, or Everetts many-worlds ontology. But in fact Bohms
advantages are bought at a heavy price: the determinism suggested by
Bohm is not strictly classical, but highly nonlocal. Bohms view is also
nonmechanical, involving the quantum potential and instantaneous
action-at-a-distance. (We shall return to the metaphysical problems
raised by Bohms approach in some detail below.) Thus even if we
adopted Bohms approach we would not simply fall back into the safe
haven of classical metaphysics (if indeed it ever were so, or we ever
wanted to!); instead we would inherit yet another set of thorny issues
that I will label Bohmian determinism. Indeed, this fact can actu-
the critical analysis and incorporation of scientific results in constructive theology,

but also the positive role played by theological and philosophical commitments in the
construction of new theories in science (i.e., the context of discovery). Obviously,
for such theories to count as scientific, they must be delimited by the assumptions of
methodological naturalism and prove their worth empirically. See Robert J. Russell,
Theology and Science: Current Issues and Future Directions, 2000, Part 3E, available
on the Internet at www.ctns.org.
39
See for example Redhead, Incompleteness, Nonlocality, and Realism; Cushing and
McMullin, eds., Philosophical Consequences of Quantum Theory.
367
ally be used to our advantage: a careful comparison of Bohmian and

Copenhagen views, as suggested below, might help us understand just
what is meant on both sides by (in)determinism.
Third, my approach is best seen as a form of constructive theology
with a focus on nature (what Barbour calls a theology of nature),
not a form of natural theology, let alone physico-theology. Hence a
change in science or its philosophical interpretation would challenge the
constructive proposal at hand, but not the overall viability of a theology of divine action in nature, whose primary warrant and sources lie
elsewhere in scripture, tradition, reason and experience.
Finally, I think we should welcome the specificity of this approach and
follow it as far as it can take us. By illuminating the concrete implications of a noninterventionist approach to objective special divine action
in light of a particular interpretation of quantum physics, the strengths
as well as the limitations of the approach are revealed, which in turn
should lead to further insight and new areas of research.
3.3. The approach taken here
With these responses in mind, my approach will be an explicitly
what if strategy: I will engage in the theological conversation with
quantum mechanics by choosing one particular philosophical interpretation (ontological indeterminism within the general Copenhagen
interpretation), stating clearly that this choice is being made, stressing
that it may one day prove no longer tenable (presumably for scientific
reasonsbut philosophical or even theological reasons could also play
a role in either initially choosing or later changing interpretations),40
and proceeding to explore the philosophical and theological implications of this interpretation in full awareness of the tentativeness of the
projectbut engaged in it nevertheless.
My choice of the Copenhagen interpretation means that I will need to
respond to a number of key issues that arise within this interpretation.
The most important issues will be the measurement problem and the
associated collapse of the wave equation, as well as the meaning of a
quantum event. All of these are involved in the claim of ontological
indeterminism with its presupposition that quantum mechanics can
be given a (critical) realist interpretation. I will then need to work out
40
See again Shimony, Conceptual Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, 34.
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the implications of these issues for our understanding of divine action

and embed it in a broader theological context. This process will occupy
most of the remaining portions of this essay.
4. Philosophical IssuesThe Measurement Problem within the

Copenhagen Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics
We turn now to a key issue in the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, the measurement problem. There are, of course, various
formulations of this problem, each raising complex issues for a realist
understanding of quantum mechanics. According to Chris Isham, the
way we understand the measurement problem depends on our interpretation of the formalism and, in particular, on what one means by
the reduction of the state vector. The measurement problem, in turn, is
part of a quaternity of problems all posed to the realist (but avoided
by instrumentalists and pragmatists): (i) the meaning of probability;
(ii) the role of measurement; (iii) the reduction of the state vector; and
(iv) quantum entanglement. Although their classical analogues allow
for a clear resolution from a realist perspective, Isham shows that the
quantum versions do not.41 For Jeremy Butterfield, the measurement
problem is important because it illuminates and underscores the problem of quantum indefiniteness from a realist perspective. If, as realists
claim, quantum physics applies to everything physical, the indefiniteness
of the microrealm should be endemic in the macrorealmit should be
transmitted to the macrorealm, but apparently is not. Indeed, indefiniteness should manifest itself in macrostates that blatantly contradict
our ordinary experience of definite states.42
For the limited purposes of this essay, I want to distinguish between
two issues regarding the measurement problem from a critical realist
perspective: (i) its phenomenological domain, i.e., what sorts of physical processes should be called measurements? and (ii) its relation to
ontological indeterminism. When discussing the mathematical structure
41
Isham, Lectures on Quantum Theory, chap. 8.

Butterfield, in CTNS/VO, v. V describes four strategies to solve the measurement problem: modify the Schrdinger equation or ascribe additional (though not
hidden) variables, and pursue each assuming that the macrorealm is either definite
or not definite.
42
369
of the wavefunction and its implications for divine action below, I will
stress again the challenge posed to a realist interpretation.43
4.1. The phenomenological domain of the measurement problem
We begin with a well-known distinction that arises in the Copenhagen
interpretation between (i) the time development of the wavefunction
of a quantum system, as governed by the deterministic Schrdinger
equation, and (ii) the irreversible interaction between the quantum
system and other systems. Ex hypothesi, these systems must be of such
size and complexity that their interaction with the quantum system is,
at least in practice, irreversible, i.e., the Schrdinger equation does not
apply. Irreversible interactions are routinely called measurements, but
they are not limited to interactions with the ordinary world around
us; instead, they include phenomena ranging from what we can call,
for want of better terms, micro-macro, micro-meso, and micromicro interactions.44
Micro-macro involves interactions between elementary particles and
classical measuring devices, such as the response of a Geiger counter
to an alpha particle, but it also includes any irreversible interaction
between an elementary particle and an ordinary object, such as the
absorption of a photon by an animal retina or an electron by a TV
43
An excellent example of the challenge that quantum mechanics poses to realism is
given by the wavefunction y. On the one hand, y can be thought of as a mathematical
function defined on a multidimensional configuration space; for n particles, configuration space is 3n-dimensional. Thus to represent the quantum state of two particles in
three dimensional physical space requires a six-dimensional configuration space. From
this perspective, a realist (versus, say, a Platonic) interpretation of y is problematic at
best. (Abstraction increases as one moves from configuration space to Hilbert space).
On the other hand, elementary texts on quantum mechanics routinely treat y as a physical wave in ordinary three-dimensional space, and not without precedent: de Broglie
favored a physicalist interpretation of quantum waves, while Schrdinger (and later
Bohm) recognized their imbedding in configuration space. For an excellent discussion and references, see Cushing, Quantum Mechanics. For the difference between de
Broglie and Schrdinger, see Cushings comments, 105 (and fn. 72) and 120. Cushing
tells us (124) that Schrdinger began with a realist interpretation of the wavefunction,
but quickly ran into the problems posed by its configuration space context. For the
gloss on Bohm, see 149.
44
Since we are working within the Copenhagen interpretation, we have not invoked
consciousness in accounting for the measurement process. Thus references to macro
might involve laboratory instruments, but not conscious observers per se. However,
see Butterfield, in CTNS/VO, v. V for complex ways of including consciousness in the
analysis of measurement.
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screen. Clearly micro-macro interactions entail a vast range of natural

phenomena from the physical and biological sciences, as well as those
involving human artifacts (e.g., Geiger counters). As stated above, the
evolution of life depends on such biological amplifiers as genotypephenotype-population arrangements. But, contrary to the views of some
scholars,45 I claim that the domain of the measurement problem is far
more extensive than this, for it also involves irreversible micro-meso
and micro-micro phenomena.46
Micro-meso includes all those interactions between elementary particles and (sub-)microscopic objects with enough degrees of freedom to
make the interaction irreversible (at least in practice). Examples include
the capture of an electron by a dust particle in interstellar space, the
decay of atoms in solids (such as radioactivity), the interaction between
bound and free particles (such as the absorption or emission of a photon
by an atomic electron in a crystal solid), and the making or breaking of
atomic and molecular bonds (such as hydrogen bonding during genetic
mutations of DNA). All of these, too, constitute a measurement since
they are irreversible, even though their scale is micro-meso.
Micro-micro interactions would normally be considered reversible
and governed by the Schrdinger equation, and thus would not constitute measurements. Examples include proton-proton scattering in free
space and pair-production and annihilation in the vacuum. However,
if such interactions occur within a complex environment they could
well be irreversible and thus constitute measurements. Proton-proton
scattering in the presence of heavy nuclei would be an example.47
In summary, the term measurement should not be restricted to
micro-macro interactions, let alone to those macro interactions
45
Measurement involves an intervention by our everyday world into the quantum
world (Polkinghorne, The Quantum World, 60). Also, see him in CTNS/VO, v. V,
secs. 1 and 4.
46
Although phenomena such as superfluidity and superconductivity are not specifically what I mean by micro-macro interactions, they do, as Ellis in CTNS/VO, v. V
points out, represent essentially quantum effects at the macro level.
47
Note here the crucial role of irreversibility in defining measurement. In order to
distinguish a measurement from the ordinary time-development of a quantum system
as governed by the Schrdinger equation, we must refer to irreversibility. But this term
is usually borrowed from thermodynamics, which reflects yet another profound problem at the heart of quantum physics: thermodynamics is, arguably, not a fundamental
theory, whereas quantum physics is. Why, therefore, would irreversibility play such a
fundamental role in quantum physics? For the sake of this essay, I will use irreversible as though its meaning were self-evident, although this is overtly not the case. For
a complex discussion, see Michael Berrys essay in CTNS/VO, v. V.
371
that involve laboratory experiments. Instead, the term measurement

should include all irreversible interactions in nature from micro-micro
to micro-macro. What is crucial, then, to making an interaction a
measurement is not that it involve something macro but that it is
irreversible.
4.2. The measurement problem as the basis for the indeterministic
interpretation of quantum physics
The measurement problem can now be stated (but, alas, not solved!) easily: How are we to understand measurements by using quantum physics if measurements cannot be described by applying the Schrdinger
equation to them and if we are not to alter quantum physics?48 Within
the Copenhagen interpretation, the response is stark: the measurement problem is not really a problem to be solved, but a synonym
for those processes not governed by the Schrdinger equation. Since
causes are represented by the Schrdinger equation (as formal cause)
and the potential V contained in that equation (as the efficient cause),
the inapplicability of the Schrdinger equation to a measurement is
the basis for the philosophical claim of ontological indeterminism.
Since the outcome of a measurement is not describable in terms of
the Schrdinger equation, we can infer that there are necessary (e.g.,
material) causes but not sufficient (in particular, efficient) causes to
bring about the measurement.
We can also see why the phrase the collapse of the wavefunction
is used to describe what happens during a measurement. The wavefunction , which had evolved deterministically in time under the
influence of the classical potential V and according to the Schrdinger
equation, changes discontinuously from a superposition of states to a
specific state. This is also a convenient place to offer a more precise
definition of the term quantum event than one customarily finds in
the literature. I propose that we restrict our usage of the term to what
we are calling measurements, that is, those interactions that are
48
As is well known, one attempt to address this problem was to assume two separate
ontologies: classical and quantum. The Schrdinger equation governed the latter, but
not the former. Thus when classical objects were seen as interacting with quantum
processes, a measurementin both restricted (laboratory) and general (micro-macro)
sensesoccurred. The problem is that if we insist that classical objects are made of
quantum processes, the basis for the ontological distinction breaks down and the
measurement problem remains.
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irreversible regardless of whether they are micro-macro, micro-meso,

or micro-micro interactions. Conversely, the time-development of the
wavefunction between measurements is not to be thought of as a series
of quantum events.49
In this approach, then, the measurement problem and ontological indeterminism are two sides of the same coin: the measurement
problem is that aspect of quantum physics to which ontological indeterminism is specifically addressed. For the purposes of this essay, we
will stay within the Copenhagen interpretation. This allows us to say
that for quantum events or measurements to occur, nature provides
the necessary but not the sufficient causal conditions, or what Barbour
calls a weak form of causality.50 I emphasize the deeply unresolved
status of the measurement problem, but I hope that by using it in this
specific way we can proceed to explore the case for divine action and
quantum physics.51
To summarize, within (at least one variety of ) the Copenhagen
interpretation, ontological indeterminism, the measurement problem,
the collapse of the wavefunction, and the meaning of quantum event
all merge into one conceptuality: a quantum event is an irreversible
interaction (at all scales in physics from micro-micro to micro-macro),
in which the Schrdinger equation ceases to govern the time-evolution
of the wavefunction y describing both the system and that with which it
irreversibly interacts. Instantaneously y collapses from a superposition
of states to one state. The fact that the resulting state is unpredictable
in advance, i.e., that it cannot be explained by a deterministic law,
is the basis for the philosophical interpretation that such an event is
ontologically indeterministic. In short, we find both the determinism
described by the Schrdinger equation between quantum events and
the indeterminism characterizing quantum events. In the following I
shall refer to ontological indeterminism in the strict sense as referring to quantum events.
49
I will return to this point in my critique of process philosophy /theology below.

Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion, 304; note his reference to Northrop.
51
In a similar way Ellis acknowledges the unsettled issues surrounding measurement
but proceeds to discuss quantum physics and divine causality; see Ellis, Ordinary and
Extraordinary Divine Action, 369.
50
373
5. Theological Issues
A variety of theological issues now emerge in the general relation
between divine action and the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum
physics as we look more closely at the thesis we are exploring here. I
will separate them into background issues and crucial issues.
5.1. Background Issues
5.1.1. Divine action at the quantum level and general providence
God creates ex nihilo and sustains the existence of quantum systems
as they undergo time-evolution (governed by the Schrdinger equation) and as they undergo irreversible interactions (quantum events,
measurements) with other micro- and macro-systems whose existence
God also sustains. The time evolution of quantum systems applies to
isolated systems, such as elementary particles traveling through relatively
empty intergalactic space, or to the very early universe. It also applies to
elementary particles bound together, as atoms and molecules undergo
time evolution in conformity with the Schrdinger equation. Quantum
events arise when micro-systems interact irreversibly with each other
or with more complex, molecular or macroscopic systems. (Here I am
not considering those irreversible interactions that lead indirectly to
significant changes in the world, and are thus interpreted in terms of
special providence.)
The point here is that during both time evolution and irreversible
interactions, particles and systems retain their FD or BE properties,52
and these properties account for the classical properties of bulk matter that we experience as the ordinary world of nature and describe in
terms of the classical laws of nature and classical statistics (i.e., epistemic
chance). It is to this world of ordinary experience that we attribute
Gods general providence (or continuous creation), namely the ongoing
creation and sustenance of the general features of the classical world
together with the emergence and evolution of physical, chemical, and
52
A fuller warrant for including the discussion of FD and BE statistics would require
relativistic quantum mechanics, and this lies beyond the scope of this essay; here we simply have introduced it in relation to the symmetry properties of the wavefunction.
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biological53 novelty in nature. Thus what we routinely take as general

providence arises indirectly from Gods direct action of sustaining in
existence quantum systems and their properties during both their timeevolution and their irreversible interactions. In short, God (indirectly)
creates macroscopic structures and interactions, as well as classical
chance, as a result of quantum processes and statistics.
In previous writings, I pointed to a watershed accomplishment in
theology and science when, in the 1970s, Arthur Peacocke54 shifted the
discussion of chance from a conflict model, law versus chance, as
urged by atheists such as Jacques Monod (unfortunately, a formulation
all too often accepted by Christians who reject evolution) to an integrative framework, law and chance. As a result of this shift, Christians
could claim that God acts through both law and chance to create
physical, chemical, and biological novelty in nature. Still, the meaning
of chance in this context may not be adequate for a genuine sense of
Gods noninterventionist action. Instead, I suggest that we now face
a second and even more fundamentaland promisingshift in our
discussion of law and chance in light of quantum physics: a shift from
the meaning of chance in classical physics and biology (i.e., chance in
the Boltzmannian sense of our epistemic ignorance of underlying causal
processes, which is not helpful for the agenda of noninterventionist
divine action) to the meaning of chance in quantum physics (i.e., chance
in the Copenhagen version of ontological indeterminism, which is open
to noninterventionist divine action, as well as chance represented by
FD and BE statistics and their relation to order at the classical level).
Rather than saying that God directly creates by turning chaos into new
and novel forms of order,55 we could say from a quantum perspective
that God indirectly creates order and novelty in the classical realm by
directly creating a quantum mechanical universe with its combination
of quantum events and FD/BE statistics and by acting as continuous
53
When applied to the realm of molecular and evolutionary biology, the relations
are further complicated, since the micro-macro processes are involved in all genotypic-phenotypic relations, including those that have little effect on a species, as well
as those that, accumulated over time, lead to species differentiation and in turn to
what might be called general and special providence. See Russell, Special Providence
and Genetic Mutation.
54
See in particular Arthur Peacocke, Creation and the World of Science (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1979) and his many subsequent publications.
55
Ilya Prigogines order out of chaos program, adapted so creatively by Peacocke.
375
creator in time within the indeterminism of quantum events. God is

thus truly the God of both order and novelty.
5.1.2. Divine action and special providence within the domain
of measurement
Is pervasive a more helpful term than ubiquitous or episodic?
We have argued that Gods direct act of sustaining quantum systems
in existenceboth during their time-evolution and during the occurrence of quantum eventsresults indirectly in those features of the
world that we attribute theologically to Gods general providence. But
the more important claim of this essay is that quantum events, i.e., all
irreversible interactions in nature from micro-micro to micro-macro,
constitute the domain in which Gods direct, noninterventionist action
can lead indirectly to special events at the macroscopic level, events
that we can interpret theologically in terms of special divine action or
special providence.
John Polkinghorne and others56 have been concerned that this
approach would lead to an episodic account of divine action for at least
three reasons: (i) the concept of measurement is limited to processes that
involve the quantum and classical levels (or what I have called irreversible micro-macro interactions); (ii) such interactions only occur from
time to time, and (iii) they relate quantum mechanics to chaos theory
and thus raise the technical problems associated with quantum chaos.
I would share their caution about this approach, too, if these concerns
were persuasive. However, as I hope I have shown here, the concept of
measurement is not defined by the levels involved (i.e., micro-macro,
micro-micro) but by irreversibility. Quantum chaos is not necessarily
(or even typically) involved in such irreversible interactions.
What then about the episodic nature of such interactions? In
fact, such interactions can occur at any time and place in the universe
where the deterministic time-development of the quantum phenomena
governed by the Schrdinger equation is disrupted by an irreversible
interaction (measurement), as is evident from the examples given in
56
See Polkinghorne, Metaphysics of Divine Action, 1523, and secs. 4, 5 of
Polkinghornes contribution to CTNS/VO, v. V where he uses the term episodic to
describe the limitations of this approach. Sanders apparently agrees with Polkinghornes
claim that measurements are relatively infrequent events, and thus any theory of divine
action linked to them is likely to be highly episodic in nature. Sanders, The Image of
the Immanent Trinity, 541, 5323. I have previously responded to this claim in some
detail. See Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, particularly sec. 3.2.
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robert john russell
the previous discussion. Previously I have used the term ubiquitous57

to suggest this comprehensive characteristic, since the term episodic
sounds far too occasional. But I am persuaded that both terms unduly
emphasize distinct aspects of what is in reality a single complex situation. A term is needed that suggests that noninterventionist divine action
can be related to the sudden disruptive aspect of quantum processes
that can occur anywhere, but not to the continuous time development
of the system governed by the Schrdinger equation. An appropriate
term for such divine action might be pervasive, and I shall use this
term in future writings. With this understanding in place, I hope that
concerns about this approach being episodic can be put to rest.
5.1.3. Is divine action local or global?
Before proceeding, we should inspect an implicit assumption, namely
that Gods action in relation to should be thought of as an unambiguously local action. Instead I will propose two claims.58
First, the mathematical features of the wavefunction used in
elementary quantum mechanics, and the parametric role of both space
and time variables in defining , suggest that Gods action in relation
to occurs globally in space and time.59 To see this we start with the
general60 wavefunction such that = (x, t). In principle, is defined61
57
See my previous response in Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, 2112.
There I did not mean ubiquitous in the sense that both (i) the time-evolution of a
quantum system and (ii) its irreversible interaction with other systems are the domain of
noninterventionist direct divine action and, in turn, of indirect special providence in the
macroscopic world. But surely this was evident since it was the indeterminism implied
by quantum physics that allowed us to think of noninterventionist direct divine action
in the first place, and indeterminism obviously does not apply to the time-evolution of
quantum systems governed by the deterministic Schrdinger equation.
58
However, these claims presuppose a realist interpretation of quantum mechanics in general, and of as referring, even if only partially, to the physical world. But
a variety of profound problems are associated with any such realist interpretation of
, not the least of which is that is typically formulated in an abstract space called
configuration space, mentioned above in fn. 43. Such challenges to realism should
be borne clearly in mind in the following discussion.
59
Again, this tends to presuppose a physical space approach instead of configuration space and this would be highly problematic when considering a quantum state
composed of more than one system. However, see Cushing, Quantum Mechanics, fn.
33, 2512.
60
For simplicity, we will work strictly in configuration space, although a momentum-space formulation is certainly an option, too. Again, for simplicity, we restrict the
discussion to one spatial dimension, x.
61
Of course, to be physically admissible, must be normalized properly and thus
be square integrable.
377
for - x + and for - t +, with x and t both serving formally

as parameters of . We can view this in at least three ways: (i) we can
stipulate the spatial shape of the wavefunction everywhere along the
x-axis at a given moment of time; (ii) we can describe the spatial shape
everywhere along the x-axis as it changes in time; (iii) we can specify its
amplitude (height) at a particular point in space as it changes in time.
Now (ii) is probably the closest we come, in very rough terms, to the
classical conception of a particle with a well-defined location in space
at a moment in time, such that we can write x = x(t).62 Thus, right from
the outset, an important aspect of the nonlocality of the quantum conception of matter is built in. Our conception of divine action in relation
to must reflect this view. We must take care not to presuppose an
unambiguous locality to Gods action when it is conceived in relation
to . We may think about divine action as localized by thinking of it
in relation to the region in space where is relatively large, somewhat
in the way we refer to the location of the particle represented by ,
as long as we keep in mind the fact that this is a rough way of speaking and do not fall tacitly into the classical conception of matteror
divine action.63
Second, the concept of God as acting to bring about a quantum event
(i.e., the collapse of the wavefunction) is as much a global as a local
event, regardless of whether this event leads indirectly to an instance
of special providence. Consider a simple physical process: a particle
is emitted at time t0 and propagates freely through space until it is
detected at time t1, lets say one hour later. The motion of the particle between t0 and t1 is governed by the Schrdinger equation, and
its wavefunction is a uniformly expanding sphere centered on the
source. (To be more precise, the particle is described by a wavepacket
whose maximum value, max, describes a uniformly expanding sphere,
but one that is everywhere nonzero.) Now, at t1 the particle is detected
62
In essence, the classical ontology is of a fully localized material object whose
properties include its place in space, and this place can change in time, allowing an
x = x(t) conceptuality. In the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics,
however, we picture y as defined everywhere in space and in time.
63
Of course there are qualifications here. Consider, for example, a wavefunction
bounded by an infinite square well of length L (such that = 0 when 0 x L).
Although wavefunctions of this type are useful for various practical purposes, infinite
square wells do not exist in nature. In principle, the ubiquity of always holds, and
thus the caution about presupposing a classical assumption of locality in conceptualizing special divine action.
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robert john russell
and its wavefunction collapses instantaneously and unpredictably to a

state representing the particle at the detector. We may make the additional assumption that its detection has significant consequences in the
world, which we interpret theologically in terms of special providence,
but this is irrelevant to the present issue.64 What then can this suggest
about the relation between Gods action at the quantum level and the
collapse of the wavefunction?
First we should keep in mind the previous point: God is active everywhere in space and time in relation to as it extends throughout space
and evolves in time. Indeed, one might say that the general action of
God is Gods action in maintaining the regular time development of
as described by the Schrdinger equation, much as we understand Gods
general providence as maintaining the world in its bulk, macroscopic
configurations. Still for convenience let us think in terms of the peak
in (max) as it expands spherically, since for all practical purposes this
represents a spherical wavepacket about to collapse.
Now, at the moment of collapse, changes discontinuously from
a light-hour sphere, s, to a fully localized wavepacket x. Thus the
irreversible interaction or quantum event involving the particle and the
detector is represented here by the juxtaposition of, and discontinuous
transition between, the global s and the local x that co-characterize
and co-constitute what we mean by the collapse of the wavefunction.
If we are to think of Gods action in relation to this event, then it, too,
must have both a global and a local character: God acts globally on
s to bring about the collapse by causing a local transition from a
nonzero to a zero amplitude everywhere on a sphere one light-hour in
radius except at the location of the detector. Finally, if we then assume
that the detection of the particle leads to a macroscopic event that we
interpret as an act of special providence, then the concept of special
providence, which refers to significant local macroscopic events in
history and nature, comes about by Gods action at the quantum level
globally and locally.65
64
Bear in mind, though, that it is an example of mediated and indirect divine

action.
65
At the same time, Gods action in regard to both s and x is fully global in the
general sense that both wavefunctions, in principle at least, extend infinitely in both
space and time.
379
5.1.4. Divine action, quantum physics, and the challenge of special

relativity
So far we have discussed several general issues related to divine action
and quantum physics. Before turning to more detailed issues, we
should note that this discussion has tacitly assumed the classical view of
space and time found in Newtonian-Galilean physics. Special relativity
(c. 1905) poses important issues for quantum physics and thus for our
discussion of divine action.66 It would be good to mention these briefly
before turning to more detailed issues. Indeed, we shall see that some of
the reasons given for not pursuing divine action in terms of quantum
physics stem from the problems with special relativity and not from
the issues that we will later consider. I will discuss scientific issues first,
and then theological issues raised by them.
From a scientific perspective, the Copenhagen interpretation in
particular is challenged by special relativity in several ways. First,
special relativity undercuts the classical assumptions of a global present and a universally unique rate of times flow. Both the Schrdinger
equation and the measurement problem presuppose these assumptions. Thus, in light of special relativity, it becomes crucial to ask
how we are to pick out the physically correct surface of simultaneity on which the Schrdinger equation governs and on which
collapses, as Jeremy Butterfield and Raymond Chiao stress in
Quantum Mechanics 380. Second, special relativity can be given
alternative ontological interpretationsmuch as alternative interpretations pervade quantum physicsnamely, the block universe
and flowing time views.67 Which of these ontologies are we to adopt
in a relativistic reformulation of the Copenhagen interpretation? These
are serious problems for quantum physics. On the other hand, however, it is crucial to note that quantum mechanics is consistent with
special relativity in a crucial way: violations of Bells inequalities need
66
I will not extend this essay to include relativistic quantum mechanics, the union
of quantum physics and special relativity, and its heir, quantum field theory.
67
See for example Chris J. Isham and John C. Polkinghorne, The Debate Over the
Block Universe, in Quantum Cosmology and the Laws of Nature: Scientific Perspectives
on Divine Action, R.J. Russell, N.C. Murphy and, C.J. Isham (Vatican City State/
Berkeley, Calif.: Vatican Observatory/Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences,
1993), 13444.; Robert J. Russell, Time in Eternity, Dialog 39.1 (Spring 2000): 4655.
Thus even if special relativity is given a world-line flowing time interpretation, one
should be careful about referring to Gods action in terms of the world-as-a-whole
and the future, as well as divine action in a specific event. A closely related problem
exists for all theologiestrinitarian, dipolar, panentheist, and processclaiming that
God experiences the world as a whole in a moment of time.
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robert john russell
not violate relativitys first signal principle (i.e., instantaneous causal

action-at-a-distance). This is a subtle point, since space-like correlations
do exist and their presence undercuts local realism, as we shall discuss
briefly below.68 Additional insight is also shed on the relation between
present and future by the temporal nonlocality that Raymond Chiao
describes in this volume. Here once-related events in the present and
the future display a Bell-like correlation, which undercuts the classical
relation between present and future.
Theologically, special relativity challenges the problem of time and
eternity that lies behind what I have proposed about divine action and
quantum physics. How, for example, does God know what action to
take in the present to bring about events of special providence in the
future in light of special relativity? There are actually a variety of nested
problems and issues here. Two will suffice for the present discussion.
The first is the block universe versus flowing-time interpretation
mentioned above. Chris Isham represents one widely held view: the
block universe perspective in which the future (and the past) are as
real as the present. We may not know what the future holds, but from
the perspective of eternity, Gods knowledge of the future is perfect.
But can Godor can weact to change things in the present, and thus
the future, in this scenario, and does quantum indeterminism make a
difference to our answer here? John Polkinghorne, like many others,
rejects the block universe, with its apparent contradiction of our
experience of time and free will, and opts instead for a flowing-time
perspective in which the future has no ontological status and thus
cannot be known by us or God. Here Gods providential involvement
in a genuinely open world is more like the master chess player who
may not know the outcome of a specific game in advance but who is
certain to win. But again, how do we make physical sense out of the
present or uniformly flowing time in light of special relativity?
68
These issues are extraordinarily subtle. Cushing claims that Bohm gives us a preferred frame for instantaneous action, and thus allows for true becomingwhich may
sound strange, since it is also a completely deterministic theory in which what becomes
is fully predetermined. He has also argued that Bohms approach allows for actionat-a-distance but without remote signaling either, and that it offers a unique solution
to the problem of simultaneity in special relativity. Michael Redhead, however, claims
that Bohms approach is inconsistent with a stronger requirement, the philosophically
grounded invariance principle. See their essays in CTNS/VO, v. V.
381
I think both of these options are valuable but problematic. Hence,

as I have indicated previously,69 I am attempting to construct a third
alternative that draws on the strengths of the previous scenarios. I call
it an event/world-line flowing time interpretation of special relativity.70
The project includes a relationally-based ontology of events in which
the status of present, future and past is attributed to relations
between events rather than to the events themselves. It then uses this
ontology to explore the conception of time and eternity as developed
in trinitarian doctrines of God. I believe this move will alleviate some
of the problems raised by the block universe versus flowing-time
debate. In any case, though, one can always argue that God does not
foresee the future in the sense of seeing the future from the present,
but rather by seeing the future in its own state as present.71
Second, Arthur Peacocke has argued that, given ontological indeterminism, even God can have only limited, probabilistic knowledge of the
future outcome of quantum processes. Thus, if God knows the future
by predicting it from present knowledge, even God can only have a
probabilistic knowledge of the future.72 My response is that the ontological indeterminism of quantum processes does not stop God from
bringing about a particular outcome because, as I have just indicated,
God sees, not foresees, the future. God brings about the future not by
predicting it from the present, as we do, but by knowing the future in
its own future present.73
5.2. Crucial Issues
We are now ready to move directly to the key questions in the debate
on divine action and (nonrelativistic) quantum physics. My central
thesis is that God acts in quantum events to bring about, or actualize,
one of several potential outcomes; the collapse of the wavefunction
occurs because of divine and natural causality. But does God act in
69
Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, 221.

The challenge to divine purpose is more complex still in the context of biological
chance, i.e., the uncorrelated inter-relation between mutations at the level of molecular
biology and change at the level of environment and population ( la Monod).
71
Thus I would not agree with Sanders claim; see Sanders, The Image of the
Immanent Trinity, 535.
72
Peacocke, Gods Interaction with the World, 27981.
73
I hope eventually to formulate my response in a way that is consistent with special
relativity and the irreducibility of flowing time and free will.
70
382
robert john russell
every quantum event or only in some? And what are the theological
implications for human freedom and the problem of evil in nature?
To respond to these questions, it will be helpful to focus carefully on
the responses given by Murphy, Ellis, and Tracy as they have explored
these and other crucial issues.
5.2.1. Does God act providentially (general and/or special) in all, or
only in some, quantum events?
Nancey Murphy74 has given what I consider one of the most important
accounts we have of divine action in relation to quantum physics. Her
arguments have been pursued in helpful ways by George Ellis,75 as we
shall see below. Murphy starts with the claim that God acts intentionally
in all quantum events. She begins by providing two theological criteria
for an acceptable theory of divine action: it should enable us to distinguish between events that are special acts of God and those that are not,
and it should leave room for extraordinary acts of God.76 These criteria are needed if we are to allow for divine revelation through natural
and historical events, to account for the practice of petitionary prayer,
and to respond to the problem of evil (theodicy), with their associated
entailments about human agency, natural goodness, and the regularity and autonomy of natural processes. Moreover, because Murphys
approach depicts Gods action as mediated (God acting together with
nature), it avoids making God the sole determiner of the processes of
nature (occasionalism). Because it is a bottom-up approach to divine
causation, God can effect the behavior of macroscopic objects without
intervening in the everyday world. By viewing God as an indirect
participant in every macro-level event, God is kept from becoming a
competitor with processes that on other occasions are sufficient in and
of themselves to bring about a given effect.77
Murphy points to the close relation between her work and that of
William G. Pollard. Unlike Pollard, though, Murphy claims that her
approach does not portray God as unilaterally determining, and thus
dominating, all events in the world, nor does it undercut human free74
Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order.

Ellis, Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action; idem, in this volume.
76
Murphy prefers this term instead of miracle. See Murphy, Divine Action in the
Natural Order, 331. In private correspondence, Murphy indicates that she now thinks
that Jesus resurrection should be placed in an entirely separate category from other
miracles, since it cant be the result merely of Gods guiding quantum events.
77
Ibid., 343.
75
383
dom. Instead it limits bottom-up divine action by allowing for top-down

causation and it stresses Gods respect for the integrity and rights of
creatures. In doing so, Murphy sees her approach as steering a path
between two extremes: making God responsible for all the randomness,
purposelessness, and evil in the world, or undercutting any possibility
for divine action within the course of nature and history.78
Tom Tracy79 has also developed an elegant account of divine action
in light of quantum physics. According to Tracy, a theory of noninterventionist divine action requires a world that is both open and ordered,
smoothly integrating chance and law. Quantum physics provides this:
the probabilistic distribution of quantum events gives rise to ordered,
deterministic structures at the macro-level, yet ontological openness
remains because quantum events are not uniquely specified by antecedent conditions. Gods action remains hidden in nature. Tracy then
asks, is it more helpful to think of God as acting in all quantum events,
as Murphy does, or in only some of them? In order for Murphys argument to work, he contends that she must provide a developed account
of top-down causation. But because the effects of wholes on parts are
mediated by the bottom-up interactions of the parts, it remains unclear
how freedom can appear as a top-down effect within a system of deterministic bottom-up causal relationships. Accordingly, Tracy explores
the alternative idea that God both creates a world with ontological
indeterminism and chooses whether or not to act in a given event in
light of its impact on the course of nature and history.80
Let me first say that I find Murphys approach helpful for several
reasons. The idea of God acting in all quantum events supports the
theological claim that God does more than sustain the existence of all
events and processes; in fact, God sustains, governs, and cooperates
with all that nature does. This idea offers us a subtle but compelling
way to interpret Gods action as leading to both general and special
providence. I think this point is so crucial that I will repeat my previous
argument here: Schrdingers cat makes it clear that Gods action at
the quantum level results in two quite different kinds of macroscopic
effects. It produces the ordinary world of the cat and Geiger counter
78
Ibid., 3556.
Tracy, Particular Providence. Tracy clearly indicates that his thought on this
issue is not settled. He is instead exploring a particular option to test its strengths and
weaknessesa research approach that I find highly congenial.
80
Ibid., 3212.
79
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robert john russell
(the ordinary physics of solid matter and Ohms law, the routine biology
of metabolism, etc.), which we describe as general providence. But it
also results in specific differences in the ordinary worldthe cat living
instead of dyingwhen God acts in one way instead of another in a
specific quantum event. For example, God acts with nature so that the
particle is emitted now and not later, or it is emitted in the +x direction rather than -x, etc. Which way God acts determines (indirectly)
a specific result in the ordinary world. Thus we may attribute special
providence to the cat being spared from death and granted life in the
crucial moment. In fact, it is precisely the nature of the measurement
problem, namely the collapse of the wavefunction from a superposition
of states to a single state, that might allow us to combine Murphys pervasiveness of divine causality with Tracys concern for the event to be
objectively special: God acts in this event as in all events (Gods action
is never more or less but the same, equally causative). Still in this
occasion, with two states superposed before the event, God will chose
one state in particular and not the other, the one destined to promote
life, thus conveying Gods intentionality in this particular event. We
can thus interpret this particular event, in which the cat lives instead
of dying, in terms of objective special providence without restricting
Gods action to that event, and yet still maintain the objectively revelatory character of that particular event.
The chief virtue of Tracys option is that it provides a more intuitive
connection between the idea of Gods occasional action at the quantum
level and Gods special providence in the everyday world. Still, it seems
less clear how Gods general providence could be based on Gods occasional action at the quantum level. Murphys approach, unlike Tracys,
conforms with the principle of sufficient reason, which I find a highly
attractive philosophical advantagealthough I agree with Tracy that, at
least in principle, God need not create a world in which the principle
of sufficient reason holds.
In sum, Murphys approach (and possibly Tracys too) delivers just
what is needed for noninterventionist objective, special providence. It
involves objective special providence, for the actual fact is that the cat
lives when it might have died; it is objective special providence since it
truly conveys Gods intentions through the event of the cat living; and
it is special providence because it is that event that we use to refer to
Gods providence against the assumed backdrop of the general situation itself: the cat purring, the sun shining, the apparatus functioning
routinely, and so on. Most importantly, it is noninterventionist objective
385
special providence because it is an act of objective special providence

that God achieves without violating or suspending the ongoing processes
of nature and the laws that describe them. So in short, God causes all
the processes of the ordinary world (general providence), but a few of
them genuinely convey special meaning because the choices God makes
in causing them, and not the other options available to God, bring them
about. I am not persuaded, however, that either Murphys or Tracys
approach deals adequately with the problems of human freedom and
theodicy. In the following two sections, I will sketch an approach I
have been developing as a third option that attempts to combine the
advantages of their views.
5.2.2. Quantum physics, divine action, and the problem of human
freedom
The problem of free will, as formulated in the modern period, is the
following: how are we able to act freely in the world if, as in the classical science picture, deterministic laws govern us somatically? Actually
the problem only arises on an incompatibilist/libertarian account of
free will (which I adopt here). Many scholars have seen quantum
indeterminism as a way out of the impasse: perhaps the human mind,
through some form of top-down causality (e.g., mind/brain causality), can objectively influence the movements of the body, making the
enactment of free choices possible. Ian Barbour notes that as early as
the 1920s physicists Arthur Eddington and Arthur Compton sought
to relate quantum indeterminism to volition.81 This idea is pursued in
this volume by George Ellis, who argues that the mind is necessary to
collapse the wavefunction and to give a complete account of natural
events, which quantum physics by itself cannot supply. This, however,
raises a concern I have pointed out previously: how do we allow Gods
action to determine the quantum events that occur in my body and
still allow for my own mind/brain to determine them? I will call this
the problem of somatic overdetermination.82
Before turning to it, though, I want to focus on the sub-problem of
free will and quantum indeterminism. It is important to note here that
Murphy does not see quantum indeterminism as essential to human
81
Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion, 133, 30514, particularly 308; Arthur
Eddington, The Nature of the Physical World (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1928);
Arthur Compton, The Freedom of Man (New Haven, Conn.: Yale Univ. Press, 1935).
82
Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, 215, point 2.
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robert john russell
freedom. She does appeal to the self-limitation of God in respecting the

natural rights of creatures and of thus creating a dependable environment necessary to human agency. However, she argues that top-down
causation does not depend on quantum indeterminacy at the bottom
level. She cites Don Campbells example to show how top-down causation could work even if all biological processes were deterministic.83 I
am not convinced by her response; in my view, the somatic enactment
of incompatibilist human freedom requires lower-level indeterminism,
and thus when we add the possibility of divine action we return to the
problem of somatic overdetermination.
Tracy, too, is concerned with the issue of free will, asking how freedom can appear as a top-down effect within a system of deterministic
bottom-up causal relationships.84 It was precisely this concern that
led him to explore the alternative option regarding divine action.
Unfortunately, Tracy does not provide a detailed response there, either.
Ellis, too, has stressed the problem of free will and quantum indeterminism to the extent of inverting it in a beautiful way: starting from
his assumption of divine kenosis and the intention of God to create a
universe where moral action is possible, Ellis argues that there must be
openness in physical laws, so that morality and special divine action are
possible. Thus, just as Murphy and others insist that the macroscopic
world must be regular for moral agency to function, Ellis demands
there be causal gaps, using Tracys term, at the microscopic level for
it to be enacted.85
But this takes us back to the larger problem: somatic overdetermination. My suggestion is to start with the scenario that God acts in all
quantum events in the universe until the rise of life and consciousness
anywhere.86 God then increasingly refrains from determining outcomes,
leaving room for top-down causality in conscious, and preeminently
in self-conscious, creatures. This would be a version of the standard
solution to the problem of free will, namely Gods voluntary or
83
See Nancey Murphys careful discussion in her Supervenience and the Downward
Efficacy of the Mental: A Nonreductive Physicalist Account of Human Action, in
NAP, esp. 1547. If Murphy adopts a compatibilist view then it would be clearer why
she doesnt need quantum indeterminism.
84
Tracy, Particular Providence, 3169.
85
Ellis, Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action, 393.
86
See Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, secs. 3.3, 4. This approach
might also shed light on the profoundly hard problem of the origins of sin in an evolutionary perspective.
387
metaphysically necessary self-limitation,87 but seen now as a temporal

development of the limitations, from minimum to maximum.
5.2.3. Quantum physics, divine action, and the challenge of theodicy
The problem of theodicy is a perennial issue for theism: if God is purely
good and if God can really act in history, why doesnt God minimize
the evil done by humanity (i.e., moral evil)? When we expand the
scope of divine action to include the evolutionary history of life on
earth, the question becomes: Why doesnt God act to minimize suffering, disease, death of individual organisms, and extinction of species
(i.e., natural evil)?88
Of course, theodicy has been discussed extensively in the theology
and science literature,89 where its subtle connection to the problem
87
In this sense, my approach is compatible with either a neo-orthodox or a process
view of divine self-limitation. I wish to note, however, that Ted Peters rejects the use of
divine limitation in general as a zero-sum view of freedom. Instead he argues for a
both-and view theologically. In future work I wish to consider the issue of quantum
physics, divine action, and human freedom from the perspective that Peters offers.
88
It is one of the most powerful arguments used by atheists in their rejection of
attempts to accommodate Christianity and Darwinian evolution. See for example
Richard Dawkins, A River Out of Eden (New York: Basic Books, 1995). In fact, the
argument goes back to Darwins own writings. For the pertinent reference to Darwins
letter to Asa Gray, May 22, 1860, see Ruse, Can a Darwinian Be a Christian?, 130. It
is noteworthy that, even while suggesting some creative ways in which Christianity
and Darwinism might find a bit of common ground (or at least some appreciation for
their respective positions), Ruse underscores the fundamental problem for that common ground raised by pain and suffering in the natural world; ibid., 912. Ruse refers
specifically to the thesis being explored here, but he does not discuss the response to
the problem of theodicy in this reference, although he, too, suggests that a theology
that stresses the suffering of God might be relevant to Darwinian evolution; ibid., 134,
and Russell, Special Providence and Genetic Mutation, sec. 5.2.
89
Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science, chap. 8, pt. 4; Denis Edwards, Original
Sin and Saving Grace in Evolutionary Context, in EMB, 37792; David Ray Griffin,
God, Power, and Evil: A Process Theodicy (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1976);
Gary Emberger, Theological and Scientific Explanations for the Origin and Purpose
of Natural Evil, Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith 46.3 (September 1994):
1508; John F. Haught, Evolution, Tragedy, and Hope, in Science & Theology: The
New Consonance, Ted Peters, ed. (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1998); Philip
J. Hefner, The Human Factor: Evolution, Culture, and Religion (Minneapolis: Fortress
Press, 1993), 271; Nancey Murphy and George F. Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the
Universe: Theology, Cosmology, and Ethics (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 1996),
sec. 4.1; Ruth Page, God and the Web of Creation (London: SCM Press, 1996), esp.
91105; Peacocke, Theology for a Scientific Age, chap. 8, sec. 2e; Polkinghorne, The
Faith of a Physicist, esp. 817, 169; Robert J. Russell, Entropy and Evil, Zygon 19.4
(December 1984): 44968; Worthing, God, Creation, and Contemporary Physics, 14656.
A frequent source for these ideas is John Hick, Evil and the God of Love, rev. ed. (San
Francisco: Harper & Row, 1966).
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robert john russell
of human freedom has frequently been stressed. Arthur Peacocke

provided an elegant example of this connection as far back as 1979,
when he wrote: [I]t seems hard to avoid the paradox that natural evil
is a necessary prerequisite for the emergence of free, self-conscious
beings.90 But theodicy becomes a particularly intense issue in light of
the present thesis regarding a noninterventionist approach to objective,
special divine action. In 1995, for example, George Ellis put the problem eloquently: [T]here has to be a cast-iron reason why a merciful
and loving God does not alleviate a lot more of the suffering in the
world, if he/she has indeed the power to do so.91 Does the approach of
either Murphy or Tracy in relating divine action and quantum physics
provide such a reason?
In response to the challenge of theodicy, Murphy calls on her notion
of Gods respect for the integrity or natural rights of all creatures.
Being noncoercive, Gods action is consistent with human freedom
and thus addresses, in part, the issue of theodicy as moral evil. But
what of theodicy as natural evil? I am not entirely clear how Murphy
would respond here. She makes a passing reference to the free-process defense proposed by Polkinghorne in analogy with the traditional
free-will response.92 Nevertheless, it raises several concerns. One is
that it may be irreducibly tied to other concepts, such as top-down
causality, which cannot fit, even analogously, at the much less complex
domain of physics and early biology. Another is that, while it accounts
for why God does not interfere in cases of natural evil where Gods
interference would undermine the conditions for the possibility of
human freedom (i.e., regularity/predictability), it may not be able to
account for why God does not interfere in those cases where human
freedom is unaffected, including the vast sweep of pre-human (and
pre-sentient?) evolution.93
90
Peacocke, Creation and the World of Science, 166.

Ellis, Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action, 360.
92
Note that her reference does not occur specifically in the context of theodicy.
Murphy, Divine Action in the Natural Order, 342. See Polkinghorne, Science and
Providence. I have worked along similar lines in developing Polkinghornes approach
in term of thermodynamics. Robert J. Russell, The Thermodynamics of Natural Evil,
CTNS Bulletin 10.2 (Spring 1990): 205.
93
For a helpful discussion, see Daniel Howard-Snyder, God, Evil, and Suffering, in
Reason for the Hope Within, M.J. Murray, ed. (Grand Rapids, Mich: Eerdmans, 1999),
esp. 968. and his references to Peter van Inwagen, William Rowe, and, interestingly,
Quentin Smith. His conclusion should give us pause: My sense is that we have no
idea how God would be justified in permitting the isolated suffering of nonhuman
91
389
Since her 1995 essay on quantum physics, Murphy has worked

with Ellis to develop a detailed theodicy in their work on the moral
universe.94 There they explicitly reject the Augustinian response to
theodicy, arguing instead for an Anabaptist approach grounded in a
kenotic view of Gods action that takes natural evil seriously, utilizes
Murphys work on quantum physics and divine action, and moves to
the suffering of Christ on the cross. Clearly, Murphy and Ellis offer a
promising approach to the challenge of theodicy.
Tracy, as we saw, explored the alternative view of divine action, citing
the problem of theodicy encountered by Murphys approach as a reason
for his choice. But does Tracys option help us here? It is not clear to me
how restricting Gods action really helps matters: why does God not act
in those events, or refrain from acting in others, if this would alleviate
suffering, etc.? Tracy has also discussed the impossibility of assessing
the extent of suffering compared to the goals met by these processes.95
I find this helpful in showing the difficulty of such an assessment, and
the navet with which such difficulty is normally overlooked, but the
search for an acceptable response to theodicy must move beyond the
philosophical framework of this approach to a fully-developed theology of redemption. I believe it is here that we will find something like
the cast-iron reasons that Ellis so rightly demandsreasons that will
have the form of the cross.
5.2.4. Embedding divine action and quantum physics in a broader
theological framework
In essence, the question now is how to locate our work on divine action
and quantum physics in the context of a fully developed and robust
systematic theology. At this point, a number of promising options are
available. With Murphy and Ellis, Barbour, Peacocke, Polkinghorne,
animals at Natures hand. For a classic version of the challenge of theodicy involving animal pain, see John Stuart Mill, Three Essays on Religion (London: Longmans,
Green, Reader & Dyer, 1875).
94
Murphy and Ellis, On the Moral Nature of the Universe, chap. 10, sec. 4. See my
response in Robert J. Russell, The Theological Consequences of the Thermodynamics
of a Moral Universe: An Appreciative Critique and Extension of the Murphy/Ellis
Project, CTNS Bulletin 19.4 (Fall 1998): 1924.
95
Tom Tracy, Evolution, Divine Action, and the Problem of Evil, in EMB, sec. 3.
Also see the extensive discussion in Howard-Snyder, God, Evil, and Suffering, sec.
6, of what he calls the argument from amount.
390
robert john russell
Edwards, Peters and many others in the theology and science conversation, I believe we must look to a kenotic theology that respects human
freedom and focuses on the passibility and suffering of God: through
the cross and the atonement of Christ, God redeems the world, suffering with and taking on the pain and death of all creatures. We could
explore the route Murphy and Ellis have taken, or pursue the theologies
of nature articulated by Peacocke and Polkinghorne, or explore the
directions taken by other scholars in theology and science. However,
I am still persuaded by Barbours argument some thirty years ago that
an elaborated metaphysics is needed if we want to relate rather than
simply juxtapose divine causation, natural causation, and free human
causation.96 Owen Thomas has recently underscored the lasting centrality of this problem, asserting that the most promising options are
the metaphysical systems of neo-Thomism and Whitehead;97 I would
add to these the metaphysical framework of Wolfhart Pannenberg and
other theologians exploring the doctrine of the Trinity.
It would be natural to explore divine action and quantum physics
from the perspective of process theology. Ground breaking research in
theology and science has already come from a variety of scholars who
work in differing ways within the broad outlines of process theology,
including Ian Barbour, Charles Birch, John Cobb, Jr., David Griffin, and
John Haught. These scholars draw on a crucial aspect of Whiteheadian
metaphysics: namely, that reality consists of actual occasions that
perish as they come to be, an idea highly reminiscent of quantum
events. Such actual occasions experience the causal efficacy of the past
by prehension, are characterized by inherent novelty, and respond freely
to Gods inviting, subjective lure. Process theology views God as active
in all levels of nature, stressing Gods respect of human free will and
Gods kenotic and redemptive suffering with all creatures.98
96
Barbour, Issues in Science and Religion, 430.

Thomas, Recent Thought on Divine Agency, 3550.
98
Process scholars argue that the inclusion of Gods subjective lure to evoke a
response from creatures offers a creative new approach to noninterventionist divine
action at various levels of organization and complexity in nature. See Barbour, Religion
in an Age of Science, 2324; John F. Haught, Darwins Gift to Theology, 4025,
Charles Birch, Neo-Darwinism, Self-Organization, and Divine Action in Evolution,
secs. 4, 8, both in EMB. The problem here is that one has to explain how divine
agency is effective in the domains of chemistry, biology, and early evolutionary life, if
the result of a succession of actual occasions is described classically by deterministic
laws and epistemic (not ontological) chance. Even with the metaphysical richness of
the subjective lure, I believe we need quantum mechanics to offer the indeterministic
97
391
The similarity between actual occasions and quantum events may

not be entirely surprising. One of the advantages attributed by process
scholars to Whiteheads philosophical system is its compatibility with
science.99 Whitehead himself claimed to offer a conceptual framework
suited to science in general and quantum mechanics in particular.100 But,
as Abner Shimony has pointed out, Whitehead may have been reflecting
on very early stages in the development of quantum mechanics when
he constructed his philosophy of organism in the mid-1920s, and
not on quantum mechanics as we now know and use it.101 Moreover,
important differences appear to exist between Whiteheads philosophy
and quantum mechanics. After a detailed comparison, Shimony has
concluded that the discrepancies . . . between Whiteheadian physics and
current microphysics constitute strong disconfirmation of Whiteheads
philosophy as a whole.102 One discrepancy is particularly relevant here:
from a Whiteheadian perspective, the temporal atomicity of actual occasions underlies and gives rise to what we take to be enduring objects,
but from a quantum perspective, such atomicities are quantum events
between which quantum systems undergo a continuous and deterministic time-development governed by the Schrdinger equation.
The story, though, is far from over. In his attempt to reformulate
quantum physics, Shimony has introduced a stochastic term that
addresses precisely this discrepancy, making his proposal closer to
Whiteheads view of indeterminism (where chance pervades each actual
occasion and hence the trajectory of an isolated particle) than it is to the
framework in which actual occasions can make a differenceand then we have to

face the apparent discrepancies between process philosophy and quantum mechanics
discussed immediately below. For the related problem of sentience, top-down causation,
and consistency with science, see Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science, 2247. I also
have theological reservations about the way process theologians treat such crucial issues
as the bodily resurrection of Jesus and the eschatological perspective of a new heaven
and earth, and in turn creation ex nihilo. These reservations would remain even if the
issues to be discussed between Whitehead and quantum physics were settled.
99
For a careful and balanced assessment of this compatibility, see Barbour, Religion
in an Age of Science, chap. 8, esp. pt. 3.
100
Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (New York: The Free
Press, 1925), chap. 8; idem, Process and Reality, corrected ed., David Ray Griffin and
Donald W. Sherburne, eds. (New York: The Free Press, 1978), 945, 2389, 254.
101
According to Shimony, Quantum Physics and the Philosophy of Whitehead,
in Search for a Naturalistic World View: Volume II, Natural Science and Metaphysics
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993/1965), chap. 19, esp. 2912, Whitehead
never refers to the new quantum theory in the exposition of his system.
102
Ibid., parts II and III, and 303.
392
robert john russell
indeterminism of current quantum physics (where it is focused strictly

on quantum events). Shimony also suggests that Whiteheads concept
of the concrescence of an actual occasion may contribute to a clearer
understanding of the collapse of the wavefunction.103 Other scholars
too, including Henry Folse, Jr., Charles Hartshorne, William Jones,
and Henry Stapp, have provided careful responses to the problematic
relation between quantum physics and Whiteheadian philosophy.104
Whether these suggestions and concerns will prove fruitful is an open
and intriguing question, particularly as it suggests once again, the
creative role philosophy can play in the construction of new scientific
theories (see footnotes 38 and 58).
Rather than look to process theology, I propose we locate the problem of divine action and quantum physics in an explicitly trinitarian
doctrine of God. In The Crucified God, which I take to be a landmark
in twentieth-century Protestant theology, Jrgen Moltmann pointedly
argues that only a move from a weakly Christianized monotheism to
a fully articulated trinitarianism can respond to the theological problem
of the cross.105
The challenge for this approach, however, is that this understanding
of the cross is linked theologically to Christian eschatology, including
the bodily resurrection of Jesus, the general resurrection in the parousia,
and the transformation of this universe into the new creation to come.
Although Moltmann sees this, it is given a central place in the proleptic
103
Ibid., 309. Shimony proposes a hybrid between the most radical elements in
quantum theory and the philosophy of organism, but in my view the input is almost
entirely from quantum physics after the fact and not a priori from process metaphysics
(chap. 19, esp. 3034). Shimony also points to Whiteheads treatment of an n-particle
system as being at odds with a quantum treatment and leading to revolutionary
philosophical implications (3002).
104
Henry P. Stapp, Quantum Mechanics, Local Causality, and Process Philosophy,
Process Studies 7.4 (Winter 1977): 17382; Charles Hartshorne, Bells Theorem and
Stapps Revised View of Space-Time, Process Studies 7.4 (Winter 1977): 18391;
William B. Jones, Bells Theorem, H.P. Stapp, and Process Theism, Process Studies
8.1 (Spring 1978): 25061; Henry J. Folse, Jr., Complementarity, Bells Theorem, and
the Framework of Process Metaphysics, Process Studies 11.4 (Winter 1981): 25973.
See also the two recent issues of Process Studies, vols. 26.34 (1997), guest edited by
Timothy Eastman and devoted to the question of the relation between process thought
and physics.
105
Jrgen Moltmann, The Crucified God: The Cross of Christ as the Foundation and
Criticism of Christian Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1993), 236. At the same
time, he claims that only a theology of the cross can extricate us from the perpetual
warfare over the problem of evil between theism, which is tantamount to idolatry,
and its brother atheism. Ibid., 250, 221.
393
trinitarian theology of Wolfhart Pannenberg. It is only through the

theology of reconciliation that the challenge of theodicy can be met,
and reconciliation means both the end and the transfiguration of the
world. Only in the light of the eschatological consummation may [the
verdict very good] be said of our world as it is in all its confusion
and pain.106
But we now find ourselves at ground zero of what is arguably the
most powerful challenge to Christian theology in its encounter with
science: how are we to understand eschatology in light of physics, biology, and Big Bang cosmology? I do not think that noninterventionist
divine action will be of significant help with these issues. The resurrection of Jesus involves more than a miracle, namely, the eschatological
transformation of the fundamental conditions of nature, and not an
extraordinary event within an unchanged natural backdrop, as described
by this essay on special providence through noninterventionist divine
action. I am currently beginning a major research project aimed at these
issues. I do, however, expect quantum physics to play some role in the
overall approach to this vast problem, particularly through the way
Pannenberg reformulates the concept of divine action in both creation
(and thus providence) and redemption in terms of the Spirit of God. He
has suggested that we use the concept of field in modern physics in order
to talk about the Spirit and divine action.107 Pannenbergs promising
suggestion invites a number of responses, the principal one here being
that his understanding of field comes from the context of classical field
theory, as seen in both Faradays and Einsteins work. When we move
to the context of quantum physics and then to quantum field theory,
a number of dramatic new features occur, as we have seen already.
John Polkinghorne has underscored several of these in his critique of
Pannenbergs use of the concept of field: superposition, nonlocality, and
106
Wolfhart Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, 3 vols., G.W. Bromiley, trans. (Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1998), 3:chap. 15, sec. 5, 645. See also Pannenbergs comments on Barths response to eighteenth-century theodicies.
107
Ibid., 1:382ff; idem, The Doctrine of Creation and Modern Science, in Cosmos
as Creation: Theology and Science in Consonance, Ted Peters, ed. (Nashville: Abingdon
Press, 1989), esp. 1627; idem, Toward a Theology of Nature: Essays on Science and
Faith, Ted Peters, ed. (Louisville, Ky.: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1993), esp. chaps.
5, 6, 7.
394
robert john russell
entanglement,108 to which I would add the relation between determinism

in Bohms work and ontological indeterminism within the Copenhagen
interpretation, the unification of such classically separate concepts as
matter and interaction through the nonclassical nature of quantum
statistics, and the concept of the filled quantum vacuum and its suggestion of a meonic view of spontaneous creation and annihilation.109
Hopefully these discussions, in turn, will contribute at least indirectly
to the central issue of eschatology and scientific cosmology, towards
which our focus on divine action and quantum physics has slowly but
inexorably led.110
6. Directions for future research on quantum physics, its philosophical

implications, and their relevance for divine action
We have probed deeply into theological issues raised by the Copenhagen
interpretation of quantum physics. The final one exploredtheodicy
has taken us far beyond the scope of divine action and quantum physics into the journey towards a complete reformulation of theology in
light of science.
Now it is time to conclude this paper by returning to quantum physics and the philosophical issues surrounding it. Are there ways to move
out of the Copenhagen interpretation and get an overall perspective on
the problemmatic facing any philosophical interpretation of quantum
physics, a perspective worth pursuing for its theological relevance? Here
I will tentatively suggest three areas that seem worth pursuing.
6.1. Architecture of philosophical issues
So far we have stayed primarily within a given interpretation of quantum physics (namely the Copenhagen interpretation) and sought its
influence on the theology of divine action. How are we to proceed
108
See for example John Polkinghorne, Pannenbergs Engagement with the Natural
Sciences, Zygon 34.1 (March 1999): 1518.
109
Ernest Simmons has developed this approach in relation to divine kenosis. See
his recent article, Toward a Kenotic Pneumatology: Quantum Field Theory and the
Theology of the Cross, CTNS Bulletin 19.2 (Spring 1999): 116.
110
Acknowledgment. I wish to thank Nancey Murphy, John Polkinghorne, and Kirk
Wegter-McNelly for their helpful comments on this essay, and all the participants for
a most enjoyable conference.
395
beyond this initial method? I propose we attempt to find a way to gain

insights from each of the leading interpretations in a broader program
of research, acknowledging that these interpretations and insights often
conflict with each other, yet seeking ways to bring them into a larger
picture so that they each can contribute to the ongoing interaction
with theology.
My first suggestion is to sort out which features are general enough to
be found in most or perhaps all interpretations. Superposition and nonlocality are likely candidates. Raymond Chiao111 distinguishes between
three kinds of quantum non-locality: 1) non-locality as displayed in
the Aharanov-Bohm effect; 2) in the Tunnel effect; 3) in the EinsteinPodolsky-Rosen effect. They all stem from the superposition principle
(i.e., quantum interference), but the first two involve single-particle
interference, while the third involves an entangled state between two
particles.112 Jim Cushing uses locality and separability interchangeably
in his discussion of Jarrett locality, Jarrett completeness, and Howards
factorizability.113 Referring to Chiao and J.C. Garrisons work, he suggests that either objective reality or locality must be given up. Cushings
option is for non-locality, and he stresses the distinction between separability and locality, taking relational holism seriously.114
Other issues and features seem to arise in closer association with individual interpretations of quantum physics. For example, the measurement problem and ontological indeterminism are accepted within the
standard Copenhagen interpretation, but there are a variety of attempts
to resolve the measurement problem. Some work within the perspective of the Copenhagen interpretation broadly conceived, including
1) proposals to modify the Schroedinger equation, either through the
introduction of non-linear terms or through the inclusion of stochastic
factors, and 2) the attempt to understand consciousness (the observers
mind) as bringing about the collapse of the wave function. Others seek
111
Chiao, Raymond Y. Quantum Nonlocalities: Experimental Evidence, esp. pp. 12,
2000.
112
Note: Chiao suggests that the non-localities in nature and the possibility of temporal quantum entanglement may lead to a nonlocal form of divine action. See Chiao,
Raymond Y. Quantum Nonlocalities: Experimental Evidence, 12, 2000.
113
Cushing, James T. Quantum Mechanics: Historical Contingency and the Copenhagen Hegemony, 5660. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. where he also
discusses non-locality in Bohms theory.
114
Cushing, James T. Determinism Versus Indeterminism in Quantum Mechanics:
A Free Choice: DRAFT, 8, 2000.
396
robert john russell
to resolve the measurement problem by interpreting quantum physics in

such a way that it simply does not arise. The most notable of these are
Bohms quantum potential interpretation and the branching of reality
is generic in many worlds and many minds approaches.115
This suggests we can begin to lay out what I will call the architecture
of philosophical problems in quantum physics. A first sketch might
be as follows:
A) generic features:
i) superposition (interference)
ii) non-locality, including:
a) single-particle non-locality (the Aharanov-Bohm effect; the
Tunnel effect)
b) multi-particle (entanglement) non-locality (the EinsteinPodolsky-Rosen effect)
iii) non-separability/relational holism
B) interpretation-specific features:
i) the measurement problem:
a) Copenhagen: acceptance of the measurement problem/ontological indeterminism
b) Copenhagen: overcome the measurement problem
1) modification of the Schrdinger equation
i) non-linear terms
ii) stochastic terms
2) introduction of consciousness
ii) Bohm: the quantum potential/non-classical determinism
iii) Everett/Wigner: many-worlds
iv) Butterfield: many-minds
The task will then be to see how the interpretation-specific features

give particular expression to the generic features as we study the relation between each interpretation of quantum physics to philosophy
and theology.
6.2. Implications of Bells theorem independent of quantum theory
A second strategy is to unpack the implications of the actual data
underlying quantum mechanics in a way that might avoid getting
entangled in quantum formalism and its competing interpretations as
much as possible. There actually might be a way to do this: the data
115
See the article by Jeremy Butterfield in CTNS/VO, v. V.
397
showing the violation of Bells theorem give us a somewhat more direct,

less theory-laden, access to these more general features which quantum physics points to but without requiring us to get at them directly
through the lens of quantum mechanics and its inherent philosophical
subtleties. Of course quantum physics is consistent with the violation
of Bell theorem while local realist (hidden variables) theories are ruled
out. But we can discuss violations of Bells theorem without discussing
quantum mechanics, and this may prove very helpful in getting another,
perhaps even more general, insight into the non-classical character
of microscopic processes and, in turn, the non-classical character of
the effects of special divine action. Moreover, these violations of Bells
theorem will have to be accounted for by any future theory that replaces
quantum physics. Thus any insights they give us regarding divine action
will be less vulnerable to the problems of multiple interpretability and
historical relativism.
A simple example involves the famous Mermin machine116 which
fundamentally challenges a local realist view without explicitly invoking quantum physics. The conclusions from this simple experiment are
direct but profound: by using a local realist set of assumptions we cannot explain the data, and we have thus challenged local realism without
explicitly invoking quantum physics. A number of implications can be
drawn here. From a strictly scientific perspective, one is that any theory
which eventually replaces quantum physics will still have to face up to
this kind of data; in this sense the Bell data give us a preview of what
possibilities exist for future physics. A second implication, that bears
more directly on philosophy of sciences, is that the challenge to local
realism may be more general than the specific way the challenge arises
in the various interpretations of quantum physics. If so, we may be
able to make progress without involving an overly detailed inspection
of quantum physics. Finally it might suggest, for the purposes of the
interaction with theology, that we neednt wait for the philosophical
controversies to be settled regarding quantum physics before engaging with it. We might use the leverage of Bells results to pursue the
116
Mermin, N.D. Is the Moon There When Nobody Looks? Physics Today 38
(April 1985): 38. See also Mermin, N. David. Can You Help Your Team Tonight
by Watching on TV? More Experimental Metaphysics from Einstein, Podolsky, and
Rosen. In Philosophical Consequences of Quantum Theory: Reflections on Bells Theorem,
edited by James T. Cushing and Ernan McMullin. Notre Dame: University of Notre
Dame Press, 1989.
398
robert john russell
conversation and allow some of the philosophical uncertainties to play

themselves out on their own.
6.3. A comparison of the meaning of non-locality and (in)determinism
in Bohms formulation and the Copenhagen interpretation
A final suggestion for further work is to compare the approach to
quantum physics by Bohm and Bohr in order to uncover a clearer
understanding of the similarities and differences in the meanings they
give to such key terms as (in)determinism and non-locality. There are
several reasons for such a comparison: 1) The mathematical route from
the Schrdinger structure of Copenhagen to the semi-classical context of
Bohm is so straightforward that one can almost view them as formally
equivalent, though the ontologies differ remarkably. Thus to compare
quantum (in)determinism and non-locality to classical determinism and
locality, we will first move from Schrdinger to Bohm (who is close to
Newton), and then from Newton to as close to Schrodinger as possible.
2) A comparison helps us avoid the tacit assumption that Bohmian
determinism is more like the classical worldview than is Copenhagen
indeterminism. Clearly Bohm does relativize the fundamental sense of
indeterminism in the Copenhagen approach by offering a deterministic alternative. However, as Jim Cushing and others117 have stressed,
Bohmian determinism is highly non-classical in several important ways
and, making an explicit comparison with Newtonian determinism crucial. 3) In addition, the meaning of Bohmian non-locality differs from
its meaning in Copenhagen. Thus a comparison of Bohm and Bohr
should help clarify just what the Bohmian deterministic alternative
really involves, what one means by Copenhagen indeterminism, and
how non-locality come to play in both approaches.
117
Cushing, James T. Quantum Mechanics: Historical Contingency and the Copenhagen Hegemony. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994; Cushing, James T.
Determinism Versus Indeterminism in Quantum Mechanics: A Free Choice:
DRAFT, 2000; see also Greenstein, George, and Arthur G. Zajonc, Eds. The Quantum
Challenge: Modern Research on the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics. Boston: Jones
and Bartlett Publishers, 1997; Polkinghorne, John. Physical Process, Quantum Events
and Divine Agency, 2000.
399
6.3.1. Mathematical derivation

We start with the mathematical route from the Copenhagen formulation
to that of Bohm, and compare the results with classical mechanics.
From Schrdinger to Bohm
As is well known,118 we can start with the Schrdinger equation:
(2/2m)2 + V = i/t
(1)
and show that this implies a modification of classical mechanics, in

which an additional term, which Bohm called the quantum potential U
U = (2/2m) (2R/R)
(2)
is added to Newtons law to give a modified form of classical mechanics:

dp/dt = (V + U)
(3)
This move requires us to change ontologies from Copenhagen to

Newton, but with the crucial addition of a de Broglie-like pilot wave
which governs the particles motion. We start with a particle of mass
m following a well-defined trajectory with position x and momentum
p = mv. Here x and p are the hidden variables in Bohms account,
and our knowledge of them is statistical in the classical sense: the probability P(x, t) of finding the particle at x and t is given by P = 2 .
We assume that P is conserved. For the purposes of calculation, it is
convenient to represent as Re iS/ where R(x, t) and S(x, t) are real
functions. In a crucial move, Bohm defines the momentum p in terms
of the partial phase S through the guidance condition p = S.
From Newton almost to Schrdinger
We could also reverse the process and see how close we can get to the
Schrdinger equation using classical mechanics as our starting point.
Thus, if we start with Newtons second law:
dp/dt = V
(4)
118
See for example Cushing, James T. Quantum Mechanics: Historical Contingency
and the Copenhagen Hegemony, Appendix 1.1, 6063. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1994.
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robert john russell
and follow Bohm in setting = Re iS/, p = mv = S, P = 2, and in

assuming that probability P is conserved, we will obtain:
(2/2m)[(i/)(R2S + 2 RS) (R/2)(S)2] + VR =
R S/t + i R/t
(5)
This is a truncated version of the Schrdinger equation which, when

written in terms of R and S, takes the following form:
(2/2m)[2R + (i/)(R2S + 2 RS) (R/2)(S)2 ] + VR =
R S/t + i R/t
(6)
6.3.2. Comparison and significance

We can summarize our results as follows:
*Schrdinger equation (1)
Bohms modified classical mechanics (3)
*Standard classical mechanics (4)
truncated Schrdinger equation (5).
In one sense this result is completely obvious: if we know that the

Schrdinger equation leads to the addition of the quantum potential
U, then leaving it out of the Newtonian picture means it will be subtracted from the Schrdinger picture (6) leaving us equation (5). To
emphasize this point, we can rewrite (5) as:
(2/2m)2 + V [(2/2m) (2R/R)] = i/t
(7)
This is clearly the Schrdinger equation minus the quantum potential U.

In another sense, the result is intriguing, for it explicitly shows
how the sources of the non-local and non-mechanical features associated strictly with the quantum potential U in the context of Bohms
interpretation carry over and are placed within the context of the
Schrdinger equation when one moves to the Copenhagen interpretation. In particular, the quantum potential U, which acts as a separate
factor in Bohms U+V picture, results in an atrophied 2 term in the
Schrdinger picture. In essence, if the Newtonian picture were correct,
we could get a Schrdinger-like equation and still have classical physics,
but the equation would not be a complete wave equation, since the 2
term would be incomplete: it has the necessary terms in 2S, RS
and (S)2 but it is missing the crucial term, 2R.
I propose we view this result in the following light: a) The Bohmian
formulation, with its delineation between and linear addition of V + U,
401
allows us to separate out quantum (non-local and non-mechanical)

aspects from the classical (local and mechanical) aspects of the governing equation dp/dt = (V + U); all of the uniquely quantum aspects of
this equation are carried in one term, U. b) The Schrdinger formulation seamlessly combines the term U with the rest of the mathematical
machinery available from the classical picture to produce one term,
2. In this sense all of the non-local and non-mechanical aspects of
U are hidden in and mingled with the classical aspects to yield the
term 2.
This allows us to make a further point: One could ask how much of
the quantum features of the Copenhagen picture are carried by the
wave function and how much by the Schrdinger wave equation,
(2/2m)2 + V = i/t. The answer, regarding , is straightforward: features such as superposition, entanglement, quantum statistics,
etc.. We know this answer immediately because we explicitly and intentionally build them into the wave function. But which quantum features
does that leave out? Now, from a comparison with the Bohmian picture
we can conclude that the Schrdinger equation carries all those quantum
aspects which we attribute to the quantum potential U; moreover, they
are carried precisely within the 2 term. This is all the more interesting since the motivation for the Schrdinger equation, and particularly
for the 2 term, is so straightforward. Thus it is surprising to see
how much of the overall quantum picture arises from these seemingly
minimal assumptions.
In summary, then, the meaning of determinism in the Bohmian formulation is highly non-classical, involving non-local and non-mechanical features simply not found in the classical sense of determinism one
takes from the Newtonian picture. Bohm does not offer a return to
classical determinism in comparison with the quantum indeterminism of Bohr. Instead both Copenhagen quantum indeterminism and
Bohmian quantum determinism are highly non-classical. The use of
either view in a discussion of divine action thus requires a thorough
rethinking of the conversation compared to its traditional context.
I believe future work in relating quantum physics and divine action
will benefit from a Copenhagen/Bohm comparison such as this to sort
out how the source and significance of superposition, non-locality, and
entanglement, are grounded in the wave function and the governing
equations of motion, respectively.
402
robert john russell
6.3.3. The significance of the quantum potential

Finally we may also analyze the significance of the quantum potential
in contributing to the non-classical (particularly the non-local and
non-mechanical) aspects of Bohms formulation, and to set up our
comparison with the Copenhagen version. One can delineate several aspects easily. Here I will follow the illuminating discussion by
Greenstein and Zajonc.119
1) Consider the double-slit experiment from Bohms perspective. The
trajectory of each particle is influenced both by the slit through which
it passes (note: it passes through only one slit!) and by the quantum
potential U. The quantum potential, in turn, depends on the pilot wave
which is conditioned by the entire experimental arrangement, including the fact that there are two slits. U has road plateaus cut by deep
valleys . . . where U changes quickly, leading to a strong quantum force
(which) guides the particles into the interference maxima and away from
the minima.120 Now, close either slit and the wave function, and thus
the quantum potential, changes instantaneously, causing a force that
alters the particles motion. But the non-locality of U is more complex
that this simple example, as we shall next explore.
2) The quantum potential does not fall off with distance, because U
depends on R which appears in the numerator and denominator. In
this sense, the quantum potential U brings the influence of the whole
system to bear on each part with an intensity and immediacy that we
do not see with the classical potential V, even though the influence of
either U or V can come from arbitrary distances.
3) Finally, consider a many-particle problem: Here is a function
of the coordinates of all n particles (r1, r2, . . . ,rn, t). The force on the
ith particle is a function of the gradient of the total potential V + U at
the particles coordinates, ri , making the problem seem like ordinary
mechanics. But the force on each particle due to U actually depends on
the position of all the particles in the system through the factor R. This
is because U = (2/2mR) (21 + 22 + . . . + 2n)R . Thus it depends on
the coordinates of all of the particles both through the 2 terms and
119
Greenstein, George, and Arthur G. Zajonc, Eds. The Quantum Challenge: Modern
Research on the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, Ch. 6. Boston: Jones and Bartlett
Publishers, 1997.
120
Research on the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, 145 and Figures 611, 612.
Boston: Jones and Bartlett Publishers, 1997.
403
through the factor R=R (r1, r2, . . .,rn), and not just on the coordinates
of the particle at ri . As Cushing stresses, the many-body quantum
potential entangles the motion of the various particles.121 In essence,
the force is a function of a local gradient on a non-local potential U
as well as on a local potential V. It thus combines both classical and
highly non-classical features in producing the net acceleration of each
individual particle.
4) Moreover, quantum nonlocality is highly non-mechanical in the
sense that the quantum potential U depends not only on the positions
of the other particles, but also on their wave functions and thus on the
state of the entire system. As Greenstein and Zajonc write: The interpretation of Bohm and colleagues . . . goes beyond simple non-locality,
and calls upon us to see the world as an undivided whole. Even in a
mechanical world of parts, the interactions between the parts could,
in principle, be nonlocal but still mechanical. Not so in the quantum
universe.122
In short, it should now be abundantly clear that the meaning of
determinism in the Bohmian formulation is highly non-classical,
involving these strikingly non-local and non-mechanical features simply
not found in the Newtonian picture. This point is crucial if we compare
Bohm and Bohr: Bohm does not offer a deterministic interpretation
in comparison with the indeterminism of Bohr, as though the term
referred to its ordinary, classical sense. Both quantum indeterminism
and quantum determinism are highly non-classical. The use of either
in a discussion of divine action thus requires a thorough rethinking of
the conversation compared to its traditional context.
121
An important exception arises with independent systems in which the wave
function factors out and the quantum potential reduces to a linear sum of terms for
each system. See Cushing, James T. Quantum Mechanics: Historical Contingency and
the Copenhagen Hegemony, 6263. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.
122
Research on the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, 148. Boston: Jones and Bartlett
Publishers, 1997. In a helpful example, Greenstein and Zajonc show how even in
Bohms case the motion of electrons in an atom is not mechanical in the way the
motion of the planets is.
APPENDIX
OVERVIEW OF THE CTNS/VO SERIES
Editors note: In the first chapter of the capstone volume, Scientific

Perspectives on Divine Action: 20 Years of Challenge and Progress
(Berkeley: CTNS, 2008), Robert John Russell offered a critical appraisal
of the whole project, including the process for interdisciplinary engagement and the resulting five volume series. The following selections are
from that chapter, Challenge and Progress in Theology and Science:
An Overview of the CTNS/VO Series, pp. 38, 1726, and 3536.
CHALLENGE AND PROGRESS IN THEOLOGY AND SCIENCE:

AN OVERVIEW OF THE CTNS/VO SERIES
Robert John Russell
Science can purify religion from error and superstition; religion can purify
science from idolatry and false absolutes. Each can draw the other into a
wider world, a world in which both can flourish.1
Introduction and Historical Background

Of the many remarkable events and publications that marked the decade
of the 1990s as a watershed in the burgeoning interdisciplinary field
of theology and science, one of the most significant was the series of
five international and ecumenical research conferences co-sponsored
by the Vatican Observatory (VO) and the Center for Theology and
the Natural Sciences (CTNS). Some fifty scholars participated in the
series, many with cross-disciplinary expertise in physics, astronomy,
cosmology, mathematics, evolutionary and molecular biology, the
neurosciences and cognitive sciences, philosophy of science, history
of science, philosophy of religion, history of religion, Old and New
Testament, philosophical and systematic theology, and theological ethics. Ninety-one essays were published in the five volumes, along with
detailed analytic introductions to each volume. The overarching goal
was to engage theology, philosophy, and natural science in a process
of constructive dialogue and creative mutual interaction. The purpose
of this chapter is to provide an overview of the topics addressed, to
offer a brief assessment of the divine action project represented more
specifically by two dozen chapters in the series, and to conclude with
a survey of the problems and progress achieved.
First, though, we will take a brief look at the historical background
of the series. The Vatican Observatory, or Specola Vaticana, is housed
John Paul II, Message to George Coyne, in PPT, M 13.
408
appendix
in the Papal Palace in the picturesque town of Castel Gandolfo overlooking Lake Albano thirty miles southeast of Rome. Since 1935 it has
been the site of basic research in both observational and theoretical
astronomy. It is also here that Pope John Paul II often resided during
the summer. In earlier years the Pope, then Cardinal Archbishop of
Krakow, had regularly entered into conversations on cosmology and
philosophy with Polish friends and colleagues. On becoming Pope in
1978, he continued his interest in this dialogue and sought to improve
the relationships between the Church and the scientific community. In
1979, in an address to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth
of Albert Einstein, John Paul II said:
I hope that theologians, scholars, and historians, animated by a spirit of
sincere collaboration, will study the Galileo case more deeply and, in loyal
recognition of the wrongs from whatever side they come, will dispel the
mistrust that still opposes, in many minds, the fruitful concord between
science and faith, between the Church and the world. I give my support
to this task which will be able to honor the truth of faith and of science
and open the door to future collaboration.2
In response George Coyne, S.J., the Director of the Vatican Observatory,

together with Michael Heller, a member of the Philosophy Faculty at
the Pontifical Academy of theology and the Center for Interdisciplinary
Studies in Krakow, organized a conference in Poland in 1984 which
resulted in a major publication on the Church and the Galileo case.3
Next, George Coyne, together with Bill Stoeger, S.J., the senior cosmologist at the Specola, and Michael Heller, invited me to help plan a
conference in the late spring, 1987, also held in Poland, on the theological implications of the rise of modern science.4
Following the success of these conferences and publications, the
Pope asked the Vatican Observatory to organize a major international
conference to further the science-faith dialogue on the occasion of
the 300th anniversary of the publication of Isaac Newtons Principia.
It was held at the Specola in September 1987. It concluded with a
2
Discourses of the Popes from Pius XI to John Paul II to the Pontifical Academy of
Sciences (Vatican City State: Pontificia Accademia Scientiarum, 1986), Scripta Varia
66, 7384.
3
G.V. Coyne, M. Heller and J. Zycinski, eds., The Galileo Affair: A Meeting of Faith
and Science (Libreria Editrice Vaticana: Vatican City State, 1985).
4
G.V. Coyne, M. Heller, and J. Zycinski, eds., Newton and the New Direction in
Science (Libreria Editrice Vaticana: Vatican City State, 1988).
overview of the ctns/vo series
409
remarkable Papal Audience at the Vatican. The resulting publication,

Physics, Philosophy and Theology (PPT), has been frequently used in
courses and conferences on theology and science. It includes a message by the Pope given during the audience on the relations between
the church and the scientific communities. As the first major Pontifical
statement on science and religion in three decades, the Message has
been widely discussed and quoted. In 1990, the Papal Message was the
centerpiece of John Paul II on Science and Religion: Reflections on the
New View from Rome5 which included nineteen responses by scientists
and theologians.
Based on the accomplishments of PPT and the vision offered by the
Papal Message, George Coyne took steps to initiate a major new series of
conferences on theology and science. He convened a week-long meeting
at the Specola in June 1990, to plan the overall direction of research.
During this meeting he asked Nancey Murphy, from Fuller Theological
Seminary, to join Bill and me in forming the long-term steering committee for the series. Our task was to build on the accomplishments of
PPT by moving further into areas in the physical and biological sciences
already touched on in PPT as well as to expand the basis of research
in science into new areas such as the neurosciences and cognitive
sciences. Coyne invited CTNS to co-sponsor the series and co-publish
the resulting volumes and asked me to serve as General Editor.6
An Overview of the Series

The Invention and Deployment of a New Method for Theology
and Science
Looking back from the vantage point of 2007, it is evident how far the
theology and science dialogue has come since 1990. In those days several
major issues loomed over the entire discussion and impeded progress
5
Robert John Russell, William R. Stoeger, and George V. Coyne, eds. (Vatican
Observatory Publications, 1990).
6
CTNS was able to accept the invitation thanks to a generous grant from a local
Bay Area family foundation which supported our participation for the entire series
of conferences.
410
appendix
and they all focused on methodology. Granted many scholars had

already moved beyond the sterile conflict or independence models of the
relation between theology and science. Still the first issue that impeded
progress regarded the role science should play in the conversations. Too
often scientists were asked to make the first presentations at a conference
with the unspoken assumption that the results they described were to
be taken verbatim and that the theologians really had nothing to say
of interest to the scientists. In practice this usually meant that after the
science presentations were finished, the philosophers, theologians and
religious scholars were left to try to decide what had been said and why
it was significant to them. Often the conversations got bogged down
over terminology (when a physicist speaks about causes is it the same
thing as when a theologian does?). If that obstacle was surmounted the
real challenge arose: can scientific results, like the details of Big Bang
cosmology or the role of DNA in molecular biology, be taken directly
into theology or should they be mediated by a philosophical discussion
of their meaning and significance? If philosophy is needed, does this
require the adoption of an entire metaphysical system, such as process
philosophy or contemporary Catholic philosophy, within which both
science and theology can be situated or is a topic by topic philosophical
analysis sufficient for the purpose of theological appropriation?
From the beginning it was the clear intention of the steering committee that our research methodology should take us beyond these
obstacles and insure a two-way interaction between scientists and
theologians. In order to achieve this goal we created whole-cloth a
new, four-fold strategy.
Guiding Theme of the Series of Conferences: Scientific Perspectives
on Divine Action
First, we searched for a topic in philosophical theology to thematize the
entire series of conferences and to inspire interdisciplinary discussion
by both scientists and theologians. The topic would therefore have to
satisfy two broad criteria: a) It should function at the presuppositional
level underlying the spectrum of particular doctrines in and approaches
to systematic theology. This would allow scholars from a variety of
perspectives and denominations to pursue their individual theological interests and at the same time gain from their interactions with
each other as they engaged with specific scientific topics through the
lens of the trans-conference topic in philosophical theology. It should
also serve to draw out the philosophical and theological implications
411
of the variety of sciences to be explored and it should do so in a way

that would allow for a diversity of theological approaches to the way
science is appropriated (e.g., natural theology, theology of nature, etc.),
replacing the usual debates over which one is preferable. b) The topic
in philosophical theology should be of interest to scientists, thereby
making the conversations genuinely two-way. As scientists at the
conference saw the impact of their discoveries on the theologians work,
they might, in turn, be led to examine their own presuppositions about
and conceptions of nature, a process which potentially might inspire
them to ask new questions and develop promising new lines of scientific
research. During that fateful meeting in June 1990, the topic of divine
actionGods action in and interaction with the worldwas eventually
singled out as a promising candidate for the thematization of the series
of conferences since it met both of these criteria nicely.
Cross-disciplinary Expertise of the Participants
To overcome some of the terminological issues and to increase the
genuine interaction between science and theology we gave strong
preference to participants who already had achieved solid expertise
in both fields. This meant inviting cutting-edge scientists who were
versed in philosophy and theology and leading theologians who were
passionate about the issues raised by science and willing to learn more
of the underlying technical material. In some cases we were blessed
with scholars who were already steeped all three fields.
Pre-conferences and Papers Read in Advance
We agreed to hold regional pre-conferences to provide an introduction
for participants to relevant technical issues in science, philosophy and
theology and to foster joint research and collaboration among participants prior to the conference. Participants would circulate pre-conference drafts for written responses and these drafts, in turn, would be
revised and recirculated before the conference. During the conference
papers would not be read; instead each paper was critically discussed
during a designated session. To be published in the conference volume,
post-conference revisions had to reflect these discussions.
The Results
With these strategies in place the organizing committee then planned a
series of five conferences to span the decade of the 1990s. Each would
involve a two year cycle: the first year for pre-conferences and critical
412
appendix
reading of papers, the second year for post-conference revisions, final

selection of papers for publication, and the drafting of the analytic
introductions, etc. The cycles overlapped, with the post-conference
activities of one conference being simultaneous with the pre-conference activities of the following conference, making for a demanding
schedule but a very productive result.
The first conference focused on quantum cosmology and the origin
of the laws of nature. It built on the initial exploration of cosmology
in PPT and included such issues as t = 0 and the Anthropic Principle.7
Next came an examination of the sciences of chaos and complexity,
followed by evolutionary and molecular biology, and then by the
neurosciences, all of which greatly expanded the scope of research
presented in PPT.8 The fifth conference returned to one of the central
themes of PPT:9 quantum mechanics. The first and third conferences
were held at Castel Gandolfo in 1991 and 1996; the second was held in
Berkeley in 1993. For the fourth conference we gathered at Pasierbiec,
Poland, at the invitation of Michael Heller and the Pontifical Academy
of Theology in Krakow. We returned to beloved Castel Gandolfo for
the final quantum mechanics conference in 2000. In summary, the five
volumes are titled:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Quantum Cosmology and the Laws of Nature (QC)

Chaos and Complexity (CC)
Evolutionary and Molecular Biology (EMB)
Neuroscience and the Person (NP)
Quantum Mechanics (QM)
with each containing the subtitle, Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action.

Number of authors in the series: 51
...
Number of chapters in the series: 91
7
8
9
See QC.
See CC, EMB, and NP.
See QM.
413
Conclusions: Challenges and Progress in Theology and Science

In this section I will briefly touch on the six areas in which I believe
progress has been made through the CTNS/VO research series, including the initial publication (PPT) that served as a basis and warrant for
the series. I will then suggest five areas of challenge generated by the
serieseither as unresolved issues in the series or as resulting from
the progress of the series itselfand offer recommendations for future
research.
Progress
This short overview paper is not the appropriate place for a detailed
assessment of the ways the eight areas in philosophy and the seven areas
in theology were developed by the authors in the series. (A sample of
these developments can be found in Appendix E.)10 However I will
briefly touch on six areas in which I believe significant accomplishments were made and progress achieved in the series as a whole. Then
I will suggest several ways in which progress has been achieved on the
specific topic of divine action and science.
Areas of Progress in The Series as a Whole
New Methodology
The new methodology developed for and deployed in the CTNS/VO
series included a) choosing a guiding theme for the entire series rooted
in philosophical theology that could unify the theological interests of all
its participants and bridge between theology and science, b) choosing
participants with cross-disciplinary expertise, c) building in preconference interactions, d) agreeing to reading the conference papers in
advance, and e) thorough postconference revisions of papers in light
of conference discussions.
10
The text is excerpted and edited from the analytic introductions to the five volumes,
four of which I wrote and one (NP) which was written by Nancey Murphy. It goes
without saying that the choice of which to include reflects my own perspective and not
necessarily those of the other editors in the series. More to the point, it was a difficult
task both because I sincerely appreciate all of the chapters in the series and because I
truly value the lasting collegiality, team effort and friendship with the authors.
414
appendix
Landmark Publications
This series includes several pieces that have been extremely influential
in the field. These include the statements by Pope John Paul II: on science and religion (Message to George Coyne in PPT), and on evolution (Message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in EMB). It also
includes Ian Barbours 4-fold typology on science and religion in PPT,
preceding its publication in Religion in an Age of Science, which was to
become a standard for the field in the following decade.
Important Introductory Resources in Science and Philosophy
The series contains important introductory resources for future research.
This includes key essays on science by Arbib, Ayala, Berry, Brothers,
Cela-Conde, Chela-Flores, Chiao, Crutchfield et al., Ellis and Stoeger,
Hagoort, Heller, Isham, Jeannerod, Kppers, LeDoux, Shimony, Stoeger;
essays on metaphorical language in science and theology by Happel,
Hesse, Lash, McFague, Soskice; and essays on the philosophy of science
and philosophical issues raised by science, by Arbib, Alston, Barbour,
Butterfield, Clarke, Clayton, Cushing, Drees, Ellis, Happel, Heller, Hesse,
Leslie, Meyering, Murphy, Peacocke, Polkinghorne, Redhead, Russell,
Shimony, Soskice and Wildman/Russell.
Jointly-authored Essays and Coordinated, Separately-authored Essays
on Interdisciplinary Research Topics in Theology, Philosophy and
Science
This includes the joint essay by Isham and Polkinghorne on time in
special relativity and its philosophical and theological significance, the
joint essay by Wildman and Brothers on neuroscience and religious
experience, the joint essay by Wildman and Russell on the philosophical and theological implications of chaos theory, and the joint essay by
Cela-Conde and Marty on biology and culture. In addition there were
coordinated essays on the theological significance of cosmological finetuning (i.e. the Anthropic Principle) by Ellis and Murphy, coordinated
essays on evolutionary biology and human nature by Edwards and
Hefner and coordinated essays on the philosophical and theological
implications of quantum physics by Barbour, Clayton, Ellis, Murphy,
Peacocke, Polkinghorne, Russell, Stoeger, and Tracy.
Novel Directions in Research in Theology and Science
This includes research on the ontological status of the laws of nature
and the degree to which our scientific laws represent the laws of
415
nature (Polkinghorne, Stoeger), on metaphor in science and in theology (Soskice, Barbour, Clifford, Happel, McMullin, Soskice), on time
in nature and in theology (Drees, Happel, Isham and Polkinghorne,
Lucas), on science and atheism (Buckley, Ellis), on science and models
of God (Barbour, Edwards, Gilkey, McFague, Moltmann, Peters), on
science and creation (Barbour, Ellis, Haught, Isham, Leslie, Murphy,
Peacocke, Peters, Russell, Tracy), on science and the intelligibility of
nature (Davies, Heller), science and human nature (Barbour, Clayton,
Edwards, Ellis, Hefner, Murphy, Watts, Wildman and Brothers), on
divine action and science (Alston, Barbour, Birch, Clayton, Edwards,
Ellis, Happel, Murphy, Peacocke, Polkinghorne, Russell, Tracy) and on
science and theodicy (Ellis, Russell, Tracy).
Major Impact on Scholars and the General Public
Sales of PPT and the series have been surprisingly high considering that
science and religion is still a fairly specialized field among scholars.
Over 3000 copies of PPT had been sold by the end of 2003, and it had
been translated into Spanish and Arabic. Total sales for the five volumes
in the series have topped 10,000 copies. Records taken by the CTNS
Science and Religion Course Program indicate that over 250 courses
internationally have included PPT or the volumes in the series. Finally,
the CTNS website, which makes available summaries of all the chapters
in the series, typically receives over 60,000 extensive visits per year.
Special Focus on Divine Action
I believe the series resulted in progress on the philosophical and theological topic of divine action in several ways.
On Terminology Regarding Divine Action
Over time we tended towards a shared meaning for key terms and concepts so that genuine differences and disagreements could be adequately
illuminated by the common use of these terms and concepts. This in
turn led to the possibility of solid conceptual progress on the diverse
meanings of divine action in light of science. An early version of this
commitment to shared meanings was published in the Introduction
to the second volume in the series, CC, Section 3.4, pp. 913. Additional
clarification came in key chapters throughout the series, with particularly helpful insights by George Ellis, Nancey Murphy, Bill Stoeger, and
Tom Tracy, to which I also sought to contribute. Key terms include:
416
appendix
laws of nature
ontological indeterminism
objective vs. subjective divine action
direct (basic) vs. indirect divine action
mediated vs. unmediated divine action
compatibilist and incompatibilist views of divine action
On Distinguishing Between Six Approaches to Divine Action

Over time we also began to discover that a variety of distinct approaches
were being taken by various scholars regarding divine action. Most followed one of these approaches, but in some cases scholars stipulated
that eventually, at least, some combination of them would be needed as
natural systems of increasing complexity and with increasing numbers
of emergent properties and processes were considered. These approaches
include four types of causality (termed top-down, whole-part, lateral,
and bottom-up) as well as two broad metaphysical systems (process
metaphysics and neo-Thomistic metaphysics/contemporary Catholic
philosophy). An early attempt at listing these approaches was published in the same section in the Introduction to the second volume
cited above. For details on the types of approaches to divine action
see below.
Non-interventionist Objective Divine Action (NIODA) in Light of
Science
In my own writings in the series I have suggested a goal for the divine
action project which I believe represents what many of the other scholars
in the series sought in their own ways. Drawing on the terminology
noted above, I use the term NIODA as an acronym for this goal,
namely non-interventionist objective divine action. My goal is, then,
an account of Gods action in which certain events in nature mediate
Gods direct and objective action in a non-interventionist mode. In
essence, NIODA would offer us, for the first time, an account of objective divine action that is not necessarily miraculous (in the Humean
sense of divine acts which violate or suspend natural regularities/the
laws of nature). Now in order for such divine action to be truly noninterventionist, nature at least at some level must be thought of as
causally indeterministic. The focus of my research, then, is to search
for and assess candidate theories in science for their capability of being
given an indeterministic interpretation. In principle this could involve
many theories at many different levels of complexity in nature. But even
417
Special Divine Action
Nature is Deterministic
Subjective Acts
Objective Acts
Non-Interventionist
Interventionist
LIBERAL
CONSERVATIVE
Nature is Indeterministic
Subjective Acts
Objective Acts
Non-Interventionist Interventionist Non-Interventionist
LIBERAL
CONSERVATIVE
NIODA
Figure 1
On the left half of the figure, nature, viewed through the lens of classical physics,
is interpreted deterministically. This in turn leads to the historical split between
liberal and conservative approaches to special divine action. For liberals, the
notion of subjectively special divine action reduces, in essence, to a verbal redescription of what is in fact ordinary divine action. For conservatives, objectively
special divine action requires interventionism and thus amounts to miraculous divine action (in the Humean sense). Note that determinism, as a philosophical interpretation of classical physics, forces the theological split between
these approaches to divine action. On the right half of the figure, nature, understood through contemporary science, is interpreted indeterministically. Here
we see that, while liberal and conservative approaches to divine action are still
options, a third possibility arises for the first time: NIODA. NIODA combines
the virtues of the liberal approach (non-interventionism) and the conservative
approach (objective divine action) without their corresponding disadvantages.
Note in particular that the indeterministic interpretation of nature allows us
to separate out miraculous objective divine action from non-miraculous
(non-interventionist) objective divine action, a move which has tremendous
theological promise. The challenge is to find one or more areas in contemporary
science that permit such an indeterministic ontology for nature. CTNS/VO
scholars pursued a variety of areas in science in response to this challenge.
when we have one such scientific theory at one level which permits an
indeterministic interpretation, we can claim that the direct, mediated
effects of the objective acts of God occur within that domain of nature
without intervention. The crucial role of science in thus offering the
possibility for non-interventionist objective divine action is portrayed
schematically (Figure 1), given ontological determinism or indeterminism in nature.
418
appendix
Results to date: I believe that quantum mechanics provides a particularly promising area for NIODA because it is clearly capable of
supporting an indeterministic interpretation. I am not optimistic about
chaos theory as it currently stands, since its only interpretation is deterministic, making objective divine action interventionist. Perhaps more
complex theories of chaotic systems will one day be found which will,
in turn, be open to an indeterministic interpretation, but these theories
have yet to be discoveredand interpreted. I am not optimistic about
top-down approaches which focus by analogy from open systems
embedded in larger boundaried systems to the universe-as-a-whole and
which depict divine action on the boundary of the embedding system
because technical problems in scientific cosmology preclude us from
viewing the universe as having a boundary (and because Gods action
on the boundary, if it existed, would still be interventionist).
Process theology clearly allows for non-interventionist divine action
through the metaphysical conception of the intrinsic role of the divine
subjective lure for each actual occasion, but that is only a starting point.
One must still search the sciences to determine whether Gods lure can
actually be said to affect the outcome of these occasions in an unpredictable way and thus the debate over the ambiguous interpretations of
science is still required. Neo-Thomism might be interpreted as including events which suggest objective divine action within the standard
primary/secondary causal context but I am unconvinced that this can
be done without violating the metaphysical distinction between primary
and secondary causality and without the intervention of miracles.
Challenges
There are also a number of topics and issues that have emerged in
the discussion which call for continued exploration. They constitute
challenges, problems and insights whose sustained analysis is pivotal
in making further progress. The importance of these topics and issues
has been brought out by our work so far. They include previously
recognized and newly formulated areas on the growing edge of theology/science research.
Actually new challenges are to be expected, even celebrated, because
a mark of real progress is that initial problems come to be seen as
partly confusions over terms and partly genuine issues to be addressed.
When these issues are successfully addressed, this in turn leads to new
insights into the depth and character of the overall problematic and
419
to new questions requiring further attention. The CTNS/VO series is

clearly successful in having responded to and having moved beyond
many of the problems that the series initially faced in 1990. In doing
so, it has exposed deeper issues and challenges for future research. The
following is a brief itemization of some of these issues together with
recommendations that they be addressed in the future.
Differences in the Doctrine of God
Most scholars referred to God in the language of generic monotheism. Some, however, made explicit reference to the Trinity (including
Edwards, Moltmann, Peters, Russell). Still others worked explicitly with
a doctrine of God as found within the framework of panentheism (both
generic panentheism, i.e., Clayton, Peacocke, and process panentheism,
i.e., Barbour). To what extent did these theological differences enhance
or hinder progress in the theology/science research?
Recommendation: More explicit attention to similarities and differences in the doctrine of God should be made in future theology/science
research.
The Relative Merits of Differing Metaphysical Systems
Some scholars adopted a specifically Whiteheadian metaphysics with
variations (e.g., Birch, Barbour, Haught), others a neo-Thomistic/
modern Catholic metaphysics with variations (e.g., Clifford, Edwards,
Happel, McMullin, Stoeger). Most did not discuss metaphysics extensively. To what extent did this philosophical diversity enhance or
hinder the conversations from making further progress? Moreover,
while most scholars adopted some form of realism, at least in relation
to science, some scholars (notably Drees) criticized this move in crucial
ways. To what extent is a realist view of science or of theology helpful
or problematic?
Recommendation: More explicit attention to the question of the
need for an explicit metaphysics (or not) as well as to the assumption
of a philosophy of realism (or its liability) should be given in future
theology and science research.
Compatibilist/Incompatibilist Views in Divine Action
Some scholars (e.g., Happel, Peacocke, Soskice, Stoeger and Ward)
seemed to assume a form of compatibilism regarding objective special
divine action while others (e.g., Ellis, Polkinghorne, Murphy, Russell
and Tracy) seemed to presuppose an incompatibilist view. My general
420
appendix
concern is that the ambiguities in the way (in)compatibilism was

being used and its relation to (in)determinism in nature actually complicated and even confused the conversations during the conference.
This, in turn, may account in part for why some participants (notably
Peacocke) tended to call quantum mechanical based forms of NIODA
interventionist.
Recommendation: Further clarify the meaning of (in)compatibilism
and its relation to (in)determinism and (non)interventionism in future
research.
The Ontological Status of the Laws of Nature
Some scholars (e.g., Peacocke, Ward, Soskice) seemed to presuppose a
Platonic view of the laws of nature (e.g., they govern the processes in
nature). Most scholars, however (e.g., Russell, Stoeger, Tracy), seemed
to presuppose that causal efficacy lies within nature as a gift of God and
that the laws we formulate are descriptions of such efficacy in nature.
Recommendation: Further examination is needed of the concept of
the laws of nature and their ontological status.
Criteria of Assessment for Proposals for NIODA
While there has been significant agreement, noted above, by scholars
in the CTNS/VO series about the goal of obtaining a successful theory
of non-interventionist objective divine action and its importance for
theology as a whole, there has been significant disagreement about
the best way to develop such a theory, i.e., which scientific theory
to use, which philosophical interpretation of it is most persuasive,
which model of the God/world causal relation should be used, etc.
These areas of agreement and disagreement are discussed in many of
the chapters of Parts II and III of the capstone volume.11 There have
also been important criticisms of the divine action project as a whole
from scholars outside the series, notably from Nicholas Saunders.12
Wildmans chapter in the capstone volume13 includes a careful analysis
11
For an earlier criticism of the way the concept of divine action was formulated in
terms of direct vs. indirect and mediated from a neo-Thomistic perspective see Stephen
Happel, Divine Providence and Instrumentality: Metaphors for Time in Self-Organizing
Systems and Divine Action, in CC, 416, esp. Section 4.6, 197201.
12
Nicholas Saunders, Divine Action & Modern Science (Cambridge: Cambridge
13
Wildmans chapter in that volume was previously published in Wesley J. Wildman,
The Divine Action Project, 19882003, Theology and Science 2.1 (2004): 3175.
421
and assessment of Saunderss arguments. The reader should note

the criticisms of Wildman and Saunders published in Theology and
Science from Clayton,14 Polkinghorne,15 Stoeger,16 and Tracy,17 as well
as Wildmans response to them.18 I include my criticism of Saunders
and Wildman in the endnotes briefly.19
Recommendations: There are clearly a variety of issues here regarding what should count, in principle, for an acceptable theory of divine
action. I suggest that the issues raised by Saunders can be laid to rest
14
Philip Clayton, Wildmans Kantian Skepticism: A Rubicon for the Divine Action
Debate, Theology and Science 2.2 (2004): 186190.
15
John Polkinghorne, Response to Wesley Wildmans The Divine Action Project,
Theology and Science 2.2 (2004): 190192.
16
William R. Stoeger, S.J., The Divine Action Project: Reflections on the Compatibilism/Incompatibilism Divide, Theology and Science 2.2 (2004): 192196.
17
Thomas Tracy, Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action?: Mapping the Options,
Theology and Science 2.2 (2004): 196201.
18
Wesley Wildman, Further Reflections on The Divine Action Project, Theology
and Science 3.1 (2005): 7183.
19
Saunders stipulates a test that any successful theory of non-interventionist objective
divine action must meet, and the test is spelled out in terms of four distinct criteria. In
my opinion, two of the four criteria of the test are mutually contradictory: that there
is genuine openness in nature (i.e., ontological indeterminism) and that the laws of
nature, viewed as ontological realities, determine individual events whether the laws
are stochastic or deterministic. Because of this contradiction, Saunderss test fails to
constitute be a valid test for assessing theories of divine action and Saunderss assessment of the failure of the proposals deployed by scholars in the CTNS/VO series based
on his test should be set aside.
Wildman is also highly critical of the possibility of successful theories of non-interventionist objective divine action, but in this case his reasons are based on his agreement
with Kant. According to Wildman, Kant showed that we must inevitably understand
nature in terms of causal closure. Thus any theory of objective divine action will always
be interventionist. My response is that quantum mechanics challenges Kants insistence
on causal determinism (in ways similar to how non-Euclidean geometry challenged
his view of Euclidean geometry as a synthetic a priori judgment) and thus, contrary to
Kant, quantum mechanics does allow for the possibility of ontological indeterminism
in nature. For this reason I think Wildmans criticisms of the CTNS/VO proposals
based on his agreement with Kant should also be set aside.
Note: Wildman offers an additional, and I think more serious, criticism of the divine
action project based on what he understands to be the view of God underlying the
proposals on divine action: namely, the problem of theodicy. Whether or not Wildman
correctly represents that underlying view of God, the problem of theodicy is a serious
one for any theory of objective divine action, non-interventionist or not. That is why
it has already been raised and discussed frequently in the five volumes, particularly
by Tracy, Ellis, Murphy and me. That is also why the problem of theodicy, whether
or not it is genuinely exacerbated by the possibility of non-interventionist objective
divine action, is a driving factor in the formulation of an overarching theme for a new
series of CTNS/VO research.
422
appendix
now, but the challenges raised by the other scholars noted here should
be pursued vigorously as part of future CTNS/VO research.20
Natural Theodicy/Suffering in Nature
To the extent that the case for non-interventionist divine action in light
of science has been strengthened by these volumes, so the problem raised
by suffering in nature and Gods relation to it (e.g., natural theodicy)
is, arguably, exacerbated. (Note: Tom Tracy raises important objections
to the claim that it is, in fact, exacerbated).21 If God really does act in
nature in ways that make a difference in the course of natural history,
what is the relation between such divine action and suffering in nature:
Does God cause it? Does God allow it? Does God suffer with creation?
What is the result of Gods suffering with creation?
Recommendation: A new series by CTNS/VO on natural theodicy has
already been launched to address these questions. The first conference,
held at the Specola Vaticana in September 2005, focused on physics and
cosmology.22 Future conferences are being planned which then shift the
scientific focus to evolutionary and molecular biology and, perhaps, to
anthropology, the neurosciences and cognitive science, exploring the
preconditions for the possibility of human moral evil in our biological,
genetic and neurological roots.
Eschatology
Perhaps the most promisingand most challengingtheological
response to natural theodicy is to move the conversation from the locus
of creation theology where it is at present to that of redemption. If one
claims that Gods response to suffering in nature is to suffer with nature
and in doing so to redeem nature, as many CTNS/VO scholars have
suggested, this takes us directly to the various forms of the theology of
the cross. Of course this, in turn, takes us to the Resurrection of Jesus
20
I offer an extended analysis and critical assessment of the preceding issues in
Robert John Russell, Cosmology from Alpha to Omega: Theology and Science in Creative
Mutual Interaction (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 2007), chaps. 46.
21
Thomas F. Tracy, Evolution, Divine Action, and the Problem of Evil, in EMB,
51130.
22
Nancey Murphy, Robert John Russell, and William R. Stoeger, S.J., eds., Physics
and Cosmology: Scientific Perspectives on the Problem of Natural Evil, Vol. 1 (Vatican
City State: Vatican Observatory Publications/Berkeley, Calif.: Center for Theology and
the Natural Sciences, 2007).
423
and this finally opens onto the question of eschatologythe coming

of the new creation by Gods transforming action modeled proleptically on the bodily Resurrection of Jesus. Now the scope of creation
in the theology/science discussions has always been the universe as a
whole as understood by science. This, then, means that the scope of the
new creation must also be the universe as a wholenot just human
society/history (as in the varieties of liberation theology), or the earths
ecosystem (as in various forms of environmental ethics and ecofeminist
theology), or even planet Earth itself (as reflected, say, in the writings
of Teilhard de Chardin).
But how then are we to think about the transformation of the universe into the new creation in light of science? In my view this is the
most serious challenge to, and most promising direction for, future
research in Christian theology and science. Conversely without dealing
explicitly with the eschatology and science question it is hard to see
how the promissory notethat we can respond to natural theodicy by
a theology of Gods redemptive suffering with naturecan be cashed
out. In the process, the importance of lifting up a Trinitarian doctrine
of God mentioned previously becomes all the more urgent given the
theological complexities raised by the cross and resurrection.23
Recommendation: The new series on natural theodicy should also
take up the issue of Christian eschatology and science and frame it
within an explicitly Trinitarian doctrine of God.
23
Initial research includes the following: John Polkinghorne and Michael Welker,
eds., The End of the World and the Ends of God: Science and Theology on Eschatology
(Harrisburg, Pa.: Trinity Press International, 2000); John Polkinghorne, The God of
Hope and the End of the World (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2002); Ted
Peters, Robert John Russell, and Michael Welker, eds., Resurrection: Theological and
Scientific Assessments (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2002);
Robert John Russell, Eschatology and Physical Cosmology: A Preliminary Reflection,
in The Far Future Universe: Eschatology from a Cosmic Perspective, George F.R. Ellis,
ed. (Philadelphia: Templeton Foundation Press, 2002), 266315; idem, Cosmology
and Eschatology, in Oxford Handbook of Eschatology, Jerry Walls, ed. (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, in press).
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appendix
Typology of the Approaches to Divine Action
Six distinct approaches to the problem of divine action were pursued in

the CTNS/VO series. Their main difference lies in the relation between
where Gods direct act is thought to take effect and where its indirect
effects are experienced and understood as acts of God.
Top-down
This refers to Gods action at a higher epistemic and phenomenological
level than the level of the effects. So, for example, in the mind/brain
problem, where language about mental states cannot be entirely reduced
toalthough it is constrained bylanguage about neuroscience, God
might be thought of as acting at the level of mind (e.g., revelation) and
thereby affecting the pattern of neuron firings. (The converse model of
revelationGod affecting neuron firings to bring about mental inspirationwould be a form of bottom-up as discussed below.)
Whole-part
This type of causality or constraint refers to the way the boundary of
a system affects the specific state of the system. One example is the
formation of vortices in a bucket of water being heated. The vortices
form because the shape of the bucket as well as the applied heat bring
about large-scale patterns of movement in the water. Another example
is the universe considered as a whole with the effects played out in local
events in the universe (assuming that the universe can be said to have
a boundary). In these cases, God may be thought of as affecting the
boundary of the system, perhaps the boundary of the universe itself,
and this action leads to specific states within the system/universe which
we call objectively special, indirect divine acts.
Lateral
This refers to effects lying in the same epistemic level (e.g., physics) as
their causes but at the end of a long causal chain. So the butterfly
effect in chaos theory depicts small differences in the initial states of a
chaotic physical system leading to large differences in later states of that
same system. God, then, might act directly to set the initial conditions
and thus bring about bulk states indirectly.
425
Bottom-up
This causality refers to the way the lower levels of organization affect
the way more complex levels behave. Here God might act at the most
elementary domains of an organism to achieve specific results which are
manifest at the level of ordinary human experience. Quantum physics
seems the most promising candidate for further inquiry into divine
action through bottom-up causality.
Actually, most scholars want to combine most, or even all four, types
of causality when it comes to human agency in the world and to Gods
action in human life and history. The challenge, however, is to conceive
of God as acting in the processes of biological evolution or physical
cosmology long before the arrival of any kind of complex biological
organism (let alone humanity). Here bottom-up causality may be the
only approach available.
It should be noted that these four approaches can be appropriated by
scholars from a diversity of philosophical perspectives as can be seen
in the chapters on divine action in the CTNS/VO series. However two
additional approaches to divine action involve more explicit dependence
on a specific overall philosophical system, even while using one or more
of the preceding approaches:
Process Theology
This provides a metaphysical basis for a non-interventionist interpretation of divine action. Every actual occasion is influenced by God, who
provides the subjective lure, by efficient causality from the past (prehension) and by the innate creativity of the occasion itself (its mental
pole or interiority). Entities at all levels of organization are capable
of experiencing Gods action as the (non-interventionist) subjective lure
without violating the regularities reflected in the laws of science.
Contemporary Catholic Theology
Much of contemporary Catholic theology has been influenced by a
recovery of Thomistic views of divine action. Here a basic distinction
is made between God acting as the primary cause of all events, creating them ex nihilo and holding them in existence, and God granting
to all events a degree of natural or secondary causality (while still acting through these secondary causes), as reflected in the laws of nature
426
appendix
discovered by science. In some cases, particularly where humankind

is involved, God can also bring about special events of discernment and action without intervening in the ordinary flow of natural
processes.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Ian G. Barbour, (retired) Professor of Physics, Professor of Religion, and

Bean Professor of Science, Technology and Society, Carleton College,
Minnesota, USA.
Philip Clayton, Ingraham Professor of Theology, Claremont School
of Theology and Professor of Philosophy and Religion, Claremont
Graduate University, Claremont, California, USA.
George F.R. Ellis, Distinguished Professor of Complex Systems,
Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics, University of
Cape Town, Rondebosch, South Africa.
Nancey Murphy, Professor of Christian Philosophy, Fuller Theological
Seminary, Pasadena, California, USA.
Arthur Peacocke, Former Director, Ian Ramsey Centre, Oxford, England,
Former Warden Emeritus of the Society of Ordained Scientists, Former
Dean of Clare College, Cambridge, England.
John Polkinghorne, Past President and now Fellow, Queens College,
Cambridge, and Canon Theologian of Liverpool, England.
Robert John Russell, Ian G. Barbour Professor of Theology and Science
in Residence, Graduate Theological Union, and Founder and Director,
The Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences, Berkeley, California,
USA.
F. LeRon Shults, Professor of Theology and Philosophy, Institute of
Religion, Philosophy and History, University of Agder, Kristiansand,
Norway.
William Stoeger, S.J., Staff Astophysicist and Adjunct Associate Professor
of Astronomy, Vatican Observatory, Vatican Observatory Research
Group, Steward Observatory, Universtiy of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona,
USA.
428
about the authors
Thomas F. Tracy, Phillips Professor of Religion, Department of

Philosophy and Religion, Bates College, Lewiston, Maine, USA.
Wesley J. Wildman, Associate Professor of Theology and Ethics, School
of Theology, Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
SUBJECT INDEX
Abrahamic religions 12, 56, 179, 237

absolute space 6
acts of God, see divine action; problem
of divine action
action theory, see philosophy of action
active information, see information
actual occasion 3901
aesthetics 305
agency, see divine action; human agency
all-that-is, see system-of systems
amplification 37, 2569, see also
quantum effects, amplification of
animals 1523
anthropic principle 137, 162, 3278
see also Christian Anthropic Principle;
design; fine-tuning
anthropology, see dualism,
anthropological
anti-reductionism 212, 23, 30, 72,
309
causal 30, 59
epistemological 29, 58
methodological 29
ontological 30
see also reductionism; top-down
causation
arguments for the existence of God,
see design; teleological argument
Aristotelian thought 1, 5, 1468,
15053, 1634, 169, 173, 2745,
see also hylomorphism
artificial intelligence 31
artificial neural network 31, 45
atomism 5, 18, 218
attractor, see strange attractor
autocatalysis, see Zhabotinsky reaction
Baldwin effect 21, 445, 322
Bells inequalities 37980
Bells theorem 2178, 3656, 3968
Bnard phenomenon 612, 656
biology
evolutionary, see evolution, theory of
developmental 234
molecular 17
teleology in, see teleology
block universe, see special relativity
body-soul dualism, see dualism

Bohmian interpretation, see
interpretations of quantum mechanics
Bohr interpretation, see interpretations
of quantum mechanics
bottom-up accounts of divine action,
see quantum divine action
bottom-up causality, see causation,
bottom-up
boundary condition 656, 117, 315
brain, see divine action in human
brains
Buddhism 146, see also philosophy,
Eastern; thought, Eastern
Buridans ass 283
butterfly effect 28, see also chaotic
systems
Catholic Church and science 4089
causal closure 230, see also causal
openness; determinism
causal determinism, see determinism
causal efficacy, see causation
causal gap, see gap, causal
causal integrity of nature, see integrity
of nature
causal joint 81, 1012, 133
causal nonreductionism, see
anti-reductionism
causal openness 252, 260
causal power of creatures 260, 288,
see also integrity of creatures
causal reduction / reductionism, see
reductionism
causal role of mental states, see mental
causation
causal underdetermination, see
indeterminacy
causation
Aristotelian account of 146, 1503
bottom-up / part-whole 30, 38, 60,
102, 279, 425
concept of 4, 1667, 2757
downward see top-down causation
divine, see divine action
efficient 153, 165, 1667
final 10, 153, 157, 202
430
subject index
Humean 60, 63
primary 10, 36, 151 n. 17, see also
divine action
top-down, see top-down causation
and science 4
secondary 10, 122, see also divine
action
Whiteheadian account of 154
whole-part, see top-down causation
see also principle of sufficient reason;
whole-part constraint / influence
Center for Theology and the Natural
Sciences 2, 407
chance 35, 23942
in biology 256, 1569
and divine action 183, 2401, 374
as intersection of causal chains 27,
117, 239
in quantum events, see quantum
indeterminacy
chaos theory 4, 2829, 31, 37, 41,
1047, 264
role in biology 224
chaotic systems 1047, 1145, 117,
154, 259
as deterministic 2667
indeterminacy of 2656
and quantum effects 289
Christ 41, 46, see also Jesus; Logos;
Wisdom; Word
Christian Anthropic Principle 1378,
3445
Christian practice, see practices of the
church
classical field theory 393
classical mechanics, see mechanics,
classical
classical theism, see theism, classical
coarse-graining 3156
coherence, see decoherence
cognitive neuroscience 74
collapse of wave function, see wave
function, collapse of
communication, human 779, see also
Gods communication
compatibilism vs. incompatibilism,
see free will
complex systems 31, 57, 6079, 99101
in biology 224
and teleology 1545
complex systems theory 116
complexity 183
biological 1423
levels of 23, 143
see also hierarchy
computer science 3103

consciousness 75 n. 57, 100, 115, 204,
3237, 365
as emergent 35, 160
and quantum mechanics 3245
conservation of energy 118
contingency 1567, see also chance;
indeterminacy
Copenhagen interpretation 9, 11, 189,
202, 205, 2513, 3567, 3645, 3689,
3713, 394, 398401
and special relativity 379
cosmic absurdity 1889
cosmology 187
Aristotelian 13
Newtonian 13
created cause 2435
creation 71, 79, 834, 1189, 185, 209,
2335, 282, 355, 422
of boundary conditions 319
continuous 1225, 234, 3735
and divine action 1225, 177
from eternity 121
ex nihilo 12, 11822, 173, 2334,
235, 319
goodness of 119
integrity of 134
of laws of nature 319
of the universe 319
creative mutual interaction 2, 367, 394,
407
creativity 43, 173
creatures, integrity of 134, 235, 2812,
284, 295, 303, 338, 383, 388
critical realism, see realism
cross / crucifixion 46, 136, 389
culture 25, 34, 88
Darwinism, see evolution, theory of
death 356
decoherence 99
deism 36, 159, 182, 186, 230, 234, 263,
271, 2978
design / design argument 17, 142, 168,
328
criticism of 155
Paylean 142, 155
determination, see causation; divine
determinism
determinism 12, 18, 108, 113, 117, 207,
229, 230231, 236, 284, 287, 324, 362,
398
Bohmian 3667, 403
divine 5, 378, 287
theological 244
subject index
deterministic laws, see laws of nature
developmental biology, see biology,
developmental
difference vs. sameness 5, 7
directionality
in biology 256
see also teleology
discernment 331
dissipative systems 62
divine action 14, 34, 97, 1113,
1178, 173, 175, 183, 200, 227,
375
bottom-up 13, 38, 265, 35360,
see also quantum divine action
and chance 2401, 371
compatibilist 41920
as conservation 234, 378
as cooperation 284
direct 1258, 2345, 23940, 245,
248, 24950
evidence for 260, 2967, 339, 3447,
3534, 355
in evolution, see evolution, divine
action in; evolution and design;
teleological argument
extraordinary 13, 271, 288, 307,
32839, 338, 382
and free will, see free will
as governance 2345, 284, 383
immanent 86, 268, 329
incompatibilist 41920
indirect 1258, 2345, 23945, 245,
248, 320
interventionist 17, 36, 37, 55, 1234,
231, 260, 263, 333, 354
in human brains 378, 56, 2934,
331, 342
medieval conceptions of 1, 10, 263
and metaphysics 1445, 1612,
1656, 1702, 177, 1846, 264
non-interventionist 9, 556, see also
NIODA
non-interventionist objectively special
(NIODA), see NIODA
ordinary 13, 31928
panentheistic 2213
personal 1369, 227, 260, 3601
and prayer 2701, 297
as primary cause 12, 1012, 112,
1202, 12835
problem of, see problem of divine
action
special 12, 127, 130, 1315, 2323,
237, 248, 2701, 362, 375
subjectively special 131, 237
431
as sustenance 79, 122, 130, 234, 236,

260, 279, 284, 3201
as sustenance at quantum level
35760, 3735
and teleology 1702, 176, 1814
see teleology
and theodicy, see theodicy
typology of 141, 1846, 238 n. 14,
352, 417
as ubiquitous 279, 2816, 295,
3756
via chance 374
via chaotic systems, see divine action
via chaos
via downward / top-down causation,
see top-down divine action
via information transfer 37, 44, 267
via laws of nature 1234, 231,
3201, 374
via quantum events, see quantum
divine action
via secondary causes 101112,
1225, 12830, 2359
via whole-part constraint,
see top-down divine action
see also creation
divine action project 23, 13, 54, 191
n. 1, 211, 212, 351, 405
overview of 40726
divine action via chaos 41, 292, 333
criticisms of 2658
divine action terminology 4158
divine concurrence 36, 284
divine creativity, see creation
divine determinism 5, 378
divine foreknowledge 37, 2467, 300,
381
divine hiddenness 37, 138, 2902, 296,
334, 383
divine immanence 14, 86, 268, 329
divine intervention, see divine action
divine knowledge 37, 1089, 236, 246,
300, 3801
divine love 41, 11920
divine purpose, see end; teleology
divine providence, see general
providence; special providence
divine sovereignty, see God, sovereignty
of
divine transcendence 14, 46
DNA 19, 33, 70
and divine action 269
expression of 21
as information 33
doctrine of creation, see creation
432
subject index
double agency 13035, 244,

299300
double-slit experiment 402
downward causation, see causation
dual-aspect monism, see monism
dualism 54, 207, 220
anthropological 54, 92, 326
natural vs. supernatural 125
Eastern thought 2159, see also
Buddhism; Indian thought;
philosophy; mysticism
ecology 31, 701, 321
embodiment model of God 39
embryology 223, 33, 321
emergence 5960, 74, 309, 347
of complexity 35
of consciousness 35, 75, 160
of life 2526, 35, 123
of mind 76, 123, 324
of novelty 115
emergent monism 55, 5779
emergentism 20001
end /ends 1478
Aristotelian conception of 1634
as apparent only 155, 16370
in biology 16370
criteria for 14850
meaning of 1468
in nature 1445, 1559
as real 16670
see also purpose; teleology
energy, expenditure of 40
entanglement, see quantum
entanglement
entropy 22
epistemic chance, see chance
epistemic distance, see God,
hiddenness of
epistemic gaps, see gaps, epistemic
epistemology 10, 1578
critical-realist, see critical realism
foundationalist 4
role in divine-action problem 4
see also knowledge; methodology;
philosophy of science
EPR (Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen
experiment) 252, 395
eschatology 3924, 4234
eternal life, see resurrection
ethics 1314, 35, 151, 152, 332, 171
n. 32
role in divine-action problem 45
see also morality; moral responsibility
evil 346
moral 387
natural 15, 387
see also pain; problem of evil;
suffering; theodicy
evolution 58, 322, 336
divine action in 1413, 360
evolution, theory of 1724, 1413,
15559, 17981, 229
and chance 1569
development of 1724
direction of 256, 1416
and design 1413, 155, 322
and ends 16370
and teleology, see teleology in biology
see also modern synthesis
evolutionary biology, see evolution,
theory of
existence of God, see design; teleological
argument
explanatory gaps, see gaps, epistemic
experience of God, see religious
experience
feedback mechanism 26
feminist theology 48
fine-tuning 35, 345, see also anthropic
principle
first cause, see creation; divine action
flow
of energy 22
of information 6870, 84, 87
flowing time, see special relativity
foundationalism 4
free-process defense 35, 388
free processes in nature 284
free will 12, 13, 14, 38, 48, 174, 2059,
239, 2425, 300, 303, 3237, 332, 346,
3823
compatibilist 2069
counterfactual 2069
and divine action 45, 12, 14, 378,
2435, 2934, 3001, 345
incompatibilist 242, 386
and indeterminacy 35, 2069,
23945
libertarian 2069
and pain 335
and quantum divine action 3857
and quantum theory 2423, 3856
freedom of God, see divine freedom
gap 3467
causal 12, 81, 106, 354, 386
subject index
epistemic 34, 261, 354
ontological 83, 84, 1037, 205, 354
between nothing and something
115
general providence 3735, 383
via quantum mechanics 35760,
3735, 3834
see also providence
genetic information, see DNA
genetics, population 17, 19
geology 229
God 43, 173, 178, 179
action of, see divine action
as creator, see creation
doctrine of 419, 423
existence of 118, 219, see also
design; teleological argument
of the gaps 34, 50, 81, 834, 248,
249, 261, 285, 307, 354
goodness of 119
love of 119, 121, 127, 136
as morally ambiguous 1823
as necessary condition 13031
omnipotence of 46, 48
omnipresence of 40, 55, 285, 378
omniscience of 2467
as one cause among others 261, 267,
355, 382
as personal agent 867
personal relationship with 247
power of 119
as primary cause 10, 129, see also
divine action
and time 14
as self-limited 93, 386, see also
kenosis
as self-sacrificing 119, 331
as source of order 122
sovereignty of 36
transcendence of 81, 1335
as vulnerable, see kenosis
as watchmaker 35
see also Christ, Spirit, Trinity
God-centered minds 338
and divine action 3379
God-world relation 39, 43, 2213
Gods relation to nature, models of,
see models of Gods relation to
nature
Gods action, see divine action
Gods communication 536, 77, 80,
83, 87, 915, 2934, 32932, see also
revelation
Gods forgiveness 119
433
Gods knowledge, see divine knowledge;

divine foreknowledge
Gospels 227
gravitational theory 196
Greek metaphysics, see metaphysics,
Aristotelian, Platonic
Ground of Being 11
Heisenberg uncertainty principle 27,
98
hermeneutics, see interpretation, biblical
hidden variable theory, see quantum
mechanics, interpretations of
hiddenness, divine, see divine
hiddenness
hierarchy 2932
of complexity / complex systems
2324, 25, 29, 5760, 115, 208,
27881, 14, 38, 2425, 30910
functional 29
of the sciences 589, 175, 199201,
309
of software 310
of teleological processes 14950
holism 116, 218, 225
in biology 224, 3032
in physics 10001
see also quantum entanglement
Holy Spirit 489, 119, 120
human agency 73, 77, 97, 100, 1023,
104, 106, 117, 148, 220, 236, 2435
direct vs. indirect 126
human choices, see human agency;
free will
human experience 45, see also
religious experience
human freedom, see free will
human psychology 45
human relations 779
human volition, see free will
Humean philosophy, see causation,
Humean
hylomorphism 1512
image of God / imago Dei 119, 138
immanence of God 10, 46, 86, 1335,
268, 329
incarnation 11920, 127, 132, 136
incompatibilist freedom, see free will
indeterminacy 24, 2629, 2059, 207,
232, 23945
and free will, see free will
vs. unpredictability 2657, 316
see also quantum indeterminacy
434
subject index
indeterminism 249, 356, 362, 3645,

398
in chaotic systems 1078
in quantum events, see quantum
indeterminacy
see also determinism
information 41, 78
active 106, 108
communication of 24, 324, 402, 43
flow of 6870, 84, 87
as negative of entropy 689
processing of 32
theory of 10, 32
types of 689
initial condition, see boundary condition
interpretation, biblical 228
interpretations of quantum mechanics
14, 27, 1034, 1912, 197210, 2504,
327, 3637, 3956
Bohmian 989, 217, 2523, 365,
366, 398
Bohrs 252, 364, 398
Copenhagen, see Copenhagen
interpretation
Einsteinian 252, 3645
Heisenbergs 3645
hidden variables 252, 365
indeterministic 251
many-worlds 99, 20105, 2534, 365
interventionism, see divine action
irreducibility, see anti-reductionism
jaw structure 61
Jesus 1189, see also Christ; Logos;
Wisdom; Word
kenosis 489, 331, 3445, 386, 390
kinesis vs. stasis 5, 13, 42
knowledge
aesthetic 305
of God 194, 300
limitations of 175
middle 246
philosophical 305
scientific 1167, 215, 230, 305
theological 1134, 305
see also divine knowledge; divine
foreknowledge; epistemology;
philosophy of science
language 171 n. 32
causal 299300
irreducibility of 30913
religious 112
law-like regularities 37, 2734, 27780,

28692, 335
laws of nature 14, 124, 183, 2367,
241, 2634, 2734, 373
as constituted by divine action 123,
28992
character of 124, 210
as designed by God 143
holistic 10001
ontological status of 124, 2778, 420
statistical 300
levels of complexity, see hierarchy of
complexity
levels of description, see hierarchy of
sciences
levels of emergent systems, see hierarchy
of complex systems
Logos 41, 84, see also Christ; Jesus;
Wisdom; Word
many-particle problem 4023
many-worlds interpretation,
see interpretations of quantum
mechanics
matter
concept of 4, 12, 2745
self-organization of 114, see also
self-organization
meaning 187, 228, 332
see also purpose; teleology
measurement, see quantum
measurement
measurement problem 213, 2512,
2546, 325, 3678, 36872, 3956
and irreversibility 36971
and indeterminism 3713
mechanics
classical 18, 363, 399400, see also
physics, Newtonian
statistical 18
see also quantum mechanics
mental causation 323, 325
mental properties
and downward causation 756,
3234
as efficacious 75, see also mental
causation
as emergent 756
as nonreducible 75
as supervenient 667, 75
metaphysical ambiguity 17881, 187
metaphysics 10, 11, 12, 51, 97101,
1702, 179, 186, 192, 198201, 203,
211, 230, 2645, 2749, 366, 419
subject index
Aristotelian, see Aristotelian thought;
hylomorphism
comparative 1789
dual-aspect monism 1078
Eastern 218, see also philosophy
emergentist monist 5779
Neo-Thomist 390
Newtonian 2745
and physics 21013
Platonic 5
process, see process thought
relation to epistemology 989
role in theology-science relations
34
and teleology, see teleology and
metaphysics
see also atomism; mechanism;
naturalism; pantheism;
panentheism; physicalism; vitalism
methodology
scientific 1567, 230
theological 1923
mind
as cause, see mental causation
as emergent 76, 324
mind-body / brain relation 56, 68,
737, 867, 195, 100, 195, 221
as analogous to divine action 867,
195, 221
in hierarchy of complexity 737
mind-body problem, see dualism;
physicalism; monism, dual-aspect
miracle 79, 81, 127, 141, 2312, 260,
327, 3324, 3357
see also divine action; special,
extraordinary
models of Gods relation to nature
17, 3442, 47
as designer 35, see also design
as designer of self-organizing
processes 356, 42, 46
as determiner of indeterminacies
36, see also quantum divine action
as embodied in world 39
models in science and religion 8
modern synthesis 1922
molecular biology 17
monism
dual-aspect 1078
emergentist 57, 5779
vs. pluralism 176
Spinozistic 2145, 2212
moral insight 332
moral responsibility 2912, 323
435
morality 35, 37, 346, see also ethics

mysticism 175, 179, 2159, 331
narrative, biblical 2278
natural evil, see evil
natural law, see laws of nature
natural regularities, see law-like
regularities; laws of nature
natural rights, see integrity of creatures
natural sciences, see hierarchy of
sciences
natural selection 18, 2021, 24, see also
selection
natural theology, see theology, natural
nature of God, see God
nature / natural world
integrity of 356, 48, 338
as purposive 1503; see also
teleology
neo-Darwinian evolution see evolution,
theory of; modern synthesis
neo-Thomist metaphysics, see
metaphysics
Newtonian determinism, see
determinism
Newtonian mechanics, see mechanics,
classical
NIODA (non-interventionist objective
divine action) 160, 249, 3523, 367,
375, 3835, 4168
objectively special 8, 12, 238, 279,
384
criteria of assessment for 4201
non-local hidden variables, see hidden
variables
nonlinearity 26, 289
nonlocality 100, 210, 252, 352, 358
n. 16, 377, 380, 393, 395, 398, 403
nonreductionism, see anti-reductionism
nonreductive physicalism, see
physicalism
non-western religions 14, see also
Buddhism; mysticism; philosophy,
Eastern
occasionalism 235, 271, 282, 2978
Ockhams razor / Ockhamist
minimalism 165, 167, 176
omnipotence, see God
omnipresence, see God
omniscience, see God
ontological determinism, see
determinism
436
subject index
ontological gap, see gap

ontological openness, see gap,
ontological; causal openness
ontological reductionism, see
reductionism
ontology, see metaphysics
openness of nature 2402, 24950,
327
see also causal openness;
indeterminism
origin of laws of nature, see laws of
nature
pain 36, 44, 335, 306, 390, 393
see also suffering; evil, natural
panentheism 39, 80, 219, 2213, 812,
225
panexperientialism 49
pantheism 9, 39, 182
paradigm shift in biology 24
part-whole causation, see causation,
bottom-up
particular providence, see special
providence
personal relations 779, 1189
personhood 769
philosophy
of action 235 n. 9
Aristotelian, see Aristotelian thought;
hylomorphism
Buddhist 146, 174, 1889
Eastern 174, 1889, 2159
Indian 146, 174
late modern 3, 57, 1213
of nature 366
role in science-theology relations
see theology-science relations
see also anti-reductionism; critical
realism; dualism; determinism;
indeterminism; metaphysics;
physicalism; reductionism; vitalism
philosophy of science 18
post-positivist 4, 11
physicalism 74, 207, 220
anthropological 55, 5960
as a metaphysic 5960, 99101
nonreductive 5960, 789
physics
atomistic, see atomism
classical 18, 363, 399400
Einsteinian 6
Newtonian 202, 357, 362
philosophy of 210
quantum, see quantum mechanics

Plancks constant 363
Platonism 5
practices of the church 227, 269, 382
practice of science 2734
prayer and divine action 2701, 297
predestination 37
primary causality, see causation,
primary
prime mover 151 n. 17, 173
principle of sufficient reason 283
probability 1819
problem of divine action 12536,
1456, 195, 225, 228, 246, 287, 354,
3946
capriciousness charge 3067, 3347
centrality of 41011
criteria for solution 26874, 2958
future challenges in 3013, 41823
meaning of 368
role of philosophy in 27, 14
role of science in 1
and theodicy, see theodicy and divine
action
problem of evil 11, 13, 195 n. 5, 244
n. 24, 279, 3067, 3347
and divine action, see theodicy and
divine action
process thought 8, 17, 426, 148, 154,
167, 183, 222, 3902, 425, 171, 173
and biology 425
and indeterminacy 43
and interiority 42, 445
objections to 4951
and top-down causation 43
process theism, see process thought
propensities 64
providence 17, 38, 2445
see also divine action, special;
general providence; special
providence
punctuated equilibrium 20, 143
purpose
in nature 1413, 1503, 157, 170
see also teleology
Quaker experience 330
qualia 100
quantum chaos 104, 375
quantum correlation, see nonlocality
quantum cosmology 167
quantum decoherence 99
quantum divine action (QDA) 1114,
368, 401, 467, 1034, 1967,
subject index
20001, 209, 23950, 2579, 2816,
3424, 3512, 35360, 3739, 38196
criticism of 28, 104, 115 n. 4, 118,
255, 298300, 3067
evaluation of 295303
evidence / justification for 308,
3603
in evolution 360
and free will 13, 2934, 30001, 303,
3823, 3857
global vs. episodic 2402, 348,
3768, 3825
and theodicy 382, 3879, see also
theodicy and divine action
as ubiquitous 3756
quantum effects 3712
amplification of 278, 104, 2569,
302, 3167, 3178, 35960, 3701
dampening of 257
in mutations 267, 37, 258
quantum entanglement 217, 224, 368,
3934, 401
quantum event 3713, 3901
quantum indeterminacy 4, 12, 278,
36, 1034, 117, 279, 316, 3189,
3247, 403
and measurement 3713
see also Copenhagen interpretation
quantum measurement 104, 2512,
198200, 3012, 3167, 325, 375
quantum mechanics / quantum
theory 4, 1034, 167, 189, 193, 196,
2123, 224, 3169
Aristotelian view of 202
and chaotic systems 259
and free will 2059, see also free will
and indeterminacy
interpretations of, see interpretations
of quantum mechanics
and macroscopic world 3579
role of observer / subjectivity
in 198204
and theology 1913, 2216
quantum nonlocality, see nonlocality
quantum potential 402
regime of law 2869
randomness, see chance
realism 4
critical 4, 9, 112, 124, 3689
redeemer 245
redemption 38990, 4223
reductionism 18, 99100, 144,
199201, 284
437
causal, see causation, bottom-up

epistemological / explanatory 29,
157
methodological 29
ontological 30, 32, 157
see also anti-reductionism
regularity, law-like, see law-like
regularities
relationality vs. substance 56, 13, 42
relations, internal 1601, 180
relativity, see special relativity
religion-science relations, see
theology-science relations
religious experience 9, 12, 50, 54, 56,
127, 294, 3301, 337
resurrection
general 392
of Jesus 46, 132, 136, 227, 248 n. 29,
302, 333, 335, 336, 3923, 4234
revelation 9, 13, 401, 54, 56, 8795,
114, 1189, 136, 238, 294, 32932,
336, 342
general 889
mediated 935
special 8990
unmediated 923
via patterns in world 912, 32930
via religious experience 901
via whole-part constraint 89
sacrament 127
salvation 179, see also redemption
Schrdingers cat 2045, 256, 302,
3834
Schrdinger equation 99, 104, 365,
369, 3712, 373, 3778
science-religion literature 172
science-religion relation, see
theology-science relation
science and religion, see
theology-science relation
science of complexity 57, see also
complex systems theory
scientific knowledge, see knowledge,
scientific
scientific method, see methodology,
scientific
scientific realism, see critical realism
scientific worldview 1569
scripture 2278
secondary causation 12, 36, 101,
see also divine action
selection
group 19
438
subject index
kin 19
species level 1920
self-limitation 489, 386, see also
kenosis
self-organization 24, 42, 99, 114, 122
and teleology 1545, 166
self-sacrificing love, see kenosis
sovereignty of God, see God
space 379
concept of 4
space-time 4
special providence 7880, 108, 260,
362, 375, 383, see also providence
special relativity 37981
block-universe interpretation of
3801
flowing-time interpretation of
3801
see also quantum field theory
speed of light 363
Spirit of God 51, 54, 108, 118, 119,
120, 136, see also Holy Spirit
spirituality, see religious experience
spiritual insight 32932
strange attractor 1023, 105
statistics
Boltzmannian 3589
Bose-Einstein 3589, 3734
Classical 373
Fermi-Dirac 3579, 3734
Stoicism 5
strange attractor 1023, 105
structuring cause 63
suffering 13, 3347
problem of 356
see also, evil; pain; problem of evil;
theodicy
supernatural 14, 81, 125
superposition 201, 204, 252, 3712,
384, 393, 395, 401
supervenience 668, 171
systems
chaotic, see chaotic systems
complex, see complex systems
dissipative 22, 1145
dynamical 22
far from equilibrium 22, 35, 99101
feedback 321
nature of 3134
nonlinear 22, 119
nonlinear thermodynamic 28, 37
self-organizing 223, 62, 99101,
115, 321, see also self-organization
system-of-systems 55, 7075, 83
t=0 320
teleological argument 1426, 162
critiques of 1559, 1635
and divine action 166, 168, 1702,
176
and evolution 1426
as inconclusive 143
stages of 1445
teleological categories 143, 150, 171
teleology / teleologies 11, 1413
as apparent only 1559
Aristotelian 1468, 1504, 173
in biology 11, 1416, 1549, 179,
3223
Buddhist 154
and chance 1569, 161
and divine action 1416, 153, 156,
15960, 172, 1814
East Asian 154
Hegelian 154
Hindu 154
and intention 1478, 15960
and laws of nature 161
levels of 14950
meaning of 14950
and metaphysics 1445, 1612,
1656, 1702, 177, 1846
and open vs. closed processes 149,
159
Paylean 142, 154, see also design
process 154
as real 156, 16570
rejection of 153
types of 1545, 1612
see also directionality; end; meaning;
purpose
teleonomy 1567, 171
temporality 167
theism, classical 81, 182, 186, 21923,
225, 233
see also pantheism; panentheism
theistic evolution 362
theodicy 45, 13, 174, 270, 393, 4223
Augustinian 389
and divine action 45, 14, 45, 195
n. 5, 279, 3067, 3345, 352, 3879
see also death; evil; free-process
defense; pain; problem of evil;
suffering
theological determinism 244
theology 171 n. 32
from below 1923
Catholic 425
feminist 48
subject index
kenotic, see kenosis
mystical 92, 176
natural 34, 90
nature of 1134
panentheist, see panentheism
process, see process thought
Protestant 230
revealed 90
Trinitarian 6, 13, 80, 3924, 423
theology-science relation 12, 80,
172, 2236, 192, 197, 210, 21213,
22933, 233, 259, 268, 2867, 299,
3056, 3467, 357, 3634, 373, 3879,
38994
methods in 3678, 40912, 413,
4145
models of relations between, see
models in science and religion
progress in 41318
role of philosophy in 17, 14
theology of creation, see creation
theology of nature 34, 367
thermodynamics
non-equilibrium 101
classical 18
Thomism / Neo-thomism 36, 112
time 379
nature of 10
top-down causation 10, 24, 2932,
61, 827, 1023, 1356, 264, 27881,
3078, 3089, 33942, 3445, 347,
424
in biological systems 317
in computers 317
mental 323, 325
in physical systems 3146
physical mediation of 313
in quantum systems 3167
top-down divine action 3840, 47,
2923, 3445, 424
439
analogy with mind-body relation 39

criticisms of 3940, 2801, 293,
3401, 3613
transcendence, see God, transcendence
of
triggering cause 63
Trinity 80, 119, 134, 137, 419
uncertainty principle, see Heisenberg
uncertainty principle
unpredictability 4, see also chance;
indeterminacy
vitalism 157
Vatican Observatory
2, 4076
watchmaker, see God

wave function 2512, 369, 3756
collapse of 2512, 254, 256, 3712,
378
wavepacket, collapse of 201, 202, 203,
3678
Whiteheadian metaphysics, see process
thought
whole-part causality, see top-down
causation; whole-part constraint
whole-part constraint 38, 55, 6079,
82
whole-part influence 82, 83
Wigners friend 2045
Wisdom 136
women 1523
Word of God 41, 84, 136, see also
revelation
world-as-a-whole, see system-of-systems
world as Gods body 39, 47
worship 50
Zhabotinsky reaction 612
Zoroastrianism 182
NAME INDEX
Abraham 227
Alston, William 238, 414, 415
Aquinas, Thomas 10, 51, 101, 121, 234,
235, 237 n. 11, 243
Aristotle 6, 51, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150,
151, 152, 153, 154, 163, 164, 166, 168,
169, 173, 174, 176, 202, 263, 274, 275,
286
Augustine 51, 86 n. 78, 269 n. 9
Ayala, Francisco J. 20, 149 n. 15
Ayer, A. J. 178, 211 n. 28
Churchland, Patricia 73 n. 51, 74

Clarke, Chris 224, 365, 414
Clayton, Philip 8, 11, 12 n. 6, 60
n. 11, 76
Cobb, John B., Jr. 46, 160 n. 25, 185
Compton, Arthur 385
Coyne, George 408, 409, 414
Crain, Steven D. 76 n. 59
Cushing, John 191, 196, 253, 364, 365,
369 n. 43, 380 n. 68, 395, 398, 403,
414
Barbour, Ian G. 7, 8, 300, 309, 356,

365, 367, 372, 385, 389, 390, 414
Barth, Karl 51
Bartholomew, David J. 300, 301
Behe, Michael 197
Bell, John 252
Bhavaviveka 174, 188
Birch, Charles 42, 160 n. 25, 185, 390,
415, 419
Bohm, David 98, 216, 217, 221, 222,
223, 252, 253, 255, 352, 365, 366, 380
n. 68, 394, 395, 396, 398, 399, 400,
401, 402, 403
Bohr, Niels 252, 255, 364, 366, 398,
401, 403
Boltzmann, Ludwig 18
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich 355
Brillouin, Leon 40, 108
Brown, David 92
Bultmann, Rudolf 141, 230
Buridan, Jean 283
Butterfield, Jeremy 199, 368, 379, 396,
414
Darwin, Charles 17, 18, 20, 22, 35,

142, 155, 164
Davidson, Donald 66
Davies, Paul 35, 159 n. 24, 171, 184,
241, 277, 278, 356, 415
Dawkins, Richard 148 n. 18, 155, 181,
182, 187, 188
de Chardin, Teilhard 159, 423
de Laplace, Pierre Simon 229
de Molina, Luis 246
Deleuze, Gilles 7
Dembski, William 197
Democritus 163, 164, 168
Dennett, Daniel 322 n. 39, 324
Depew, David 18
Derrida, Jacques 7
Descartes, Ren 207 n. 23, 274, 275,
276
Dewitt, Bryce 201, 203
dEspagnat, Bernard 212, 214, 215,
221, 222, 223
Dobzhansky, Theodosius 18
Domb, Cyril 197
Drees, Willem B. 65
Dretske, Fred 63, 64
Cain, Steven 76
Calvin, John 243
Campbell, Donald 61, 64, 68, 386
Campbell, Neil 309, 386
Capra, Fritjof 197, 215, 216
Catterson, Troy 185 n. 35
Chiao, Raymond Y. 197, 379, 380, 395,
414
Christ, Jesus 118, 119, 136, 260, 269,
291, 296, 302, 303, 331, 334, 337, 338,
392, 393, 423
Eccles, John C. 326

Eddington, Athur 385
Edwards, Denis 6, 330, 390, 414, 415,
419
Einstein, Albert 6, 252, 364, 365, 393,
408
Elijah 9, 53, 54, 92, 94, 95
Ellis, George R. 8, 13, 38, 115 n. 4,
137, 209, 224, 257, 359, 363, 372
442
name index
n. 51, 382, 385, 386, 388, 389, 390,

414, 415
Everett, Hugh 201, 202, 365, 366, 396
Faraday, Michael 393
Farrer, Austin 81, 101, 102
Feynman, Richard P. 163 n. 28
Folse, Henry Jr. 392
Fox, George 337
Galileo 408
Garrison, J. C. 395
Gilkey, Langdon 229 n. 3, 415
Gleick, James 30
Goodwin, Brian 23
Goswami, Amit 222
Gould, Stephen Jay 20, 21
Greenstein, George 402, 403
Gregersen, Niels Henrik 63, 72, 73
n. 50, 76 n. 60
Griffin, David Ray 46, 50
Happel, Stephen 112, 114, 118 n. 8
Hartsthorne, Charles 8, 43, 47, 50, 392
Haught, John F. 42, 390, 415, 419
Hawking, Stephen 39
Hegel, G. W. F. 154, 159, 178
Heidegger, Martin 7
Heisenberg, Werner 98, 202, 206, 251
n. 35, 364, 365 n. 35
Heller, Michael 212, 408, 412, 414, 415
Hempel, Carl 277
Heraclitus 6
Hick, John 290, 292
Hitler, Adolf 13, 298, 335
Hobbes, Thomas 275
Hoyle, Fred 322
Huchingson, James 43
Hume, David 60
Huxley, Julian 19
Isham, Chris J.
356, 368, 380, 414, 415
Jones, William 392

Joseph 299, 300
Kant, Immanuel 6, 51, 98, 144 n. 7,
171, 178, 203, 207, 210, 421 n. 19
Kaufman, Gordon 230
Kaufman, Stuart 22, 24, 26
Kellert, Stephen 28
Kierkegaard, Sren 7, 178
Kim, Jaegwon 67, 75, 76
Kuhn, Thomas 24
Kppers, Bernd-Olaf
414
65, 307, 309, 340,
Lamarck, Jean-Baptiste 18, 21

Lakatos, Imre 24, 268 n. 8
Laplace, Pierre-Simon 229
Levinas, Immanuel 7
Levy, Edwin 149 n. 16
Lewontin, Richard 20, 21
Locke, John 141
Loyola, Ignatius of 127
MacKay, Donald 300, 301
Margenau, Henry 365
Marshall, John 78 n. 64
Mary 127, 131
Maxwell, Grover 18
Mayr, Ernst 19, 21
McMullin, Ernan 83 n. 73
Misner, Charles 363
Moltmann, Jrgen 6, 14, 392, 415, 419
Monod, Jacques 156, 157, 158, 181,
182, 187, 188, 189
Morrison, M. A. 325
Murphy, Nancey 8, 12, 13, 37, 67, 115
n. 4, 171, 306, 307, 308, 319, 327, 329,
334, 338, 341, 342, 343, 344, 346, 347,
348, 356 n. 12, 361 n. 26, 362 n. 27,
382, 383, 384, 385, 386, 388, 389, 390,
409, 415
Nagarjuna 188
Neville, Robert Cummings 184, 185
Newton, Isaac 6, 13, 18, 205, 229, 263,
274, 275, 276, 277, 286, 398, 399, 408
Niebuhr, H. Richard 228, 238
Ockham, William of
Oyama, Susan 33
165, 167
Pailin, David 91 n. 85
Paley, William 142, 155, 166, 168
Pannenberg, Wolfhart 14, 338, 390,
393
Parmenides 6
Paul, the Apostle 271
Pauli, Wolfgang 100
Peacocke, Arthur 7, 9, 11, 38, 39,
40, 41, 101, 106 n. 14, 128 n. 25, 160
n. 25, 184, 185
Peirce, C. S. 144 n. 7
Penrose, Oliver 341
Penrose, Roger 204, 324
Peters, Ted 387 n. 87, 390, 415, 419
name index
Plato 5, 6, 41, 51, 152, 173, 222, 277,
278
Polanyi, Michael 65
Polkinghorne, John C. 7, 9, 10, 41, 84
n. 75, 185, 196, 212, 250 n. 32, 255,
265, 266, 267, 268, 270, 284, 293, 301,
302, 307, 346, 375, 380, 388, 389, 390,
393, 414, 415, 419, 421
Pollard, William G. 250 n. 31, 300,
307, 382
Pope John Paul II 408, 414
Popper, Karl 64
Postle, Dennis 216
Prigogene, Ilya 22, 62
Puddefoot, John 68, 69
Quick, Oliver
56, 57
Rae, Alastair 258

Ramanuja 188
Rahner, Karl 159
Redhead, Michael 380 n. 68
Ricoeur, Paul 7
Rorty, Richard 144 n. 7
Ruse, Michael 354 n. 6, 387 n. 88
Russell, Robert John 2, 8, 13, 14, 38,
128 n. 24, 184, 185, 197, 207, 212,
250 n. 30, 256, 257, 258, 302, 307,
316, 319, 414, 415, 419, 420
Sankara 188
Saunders, Nicholas 356 n. 11, 420,
421
Saunders, Peter 23
Schleiermacher, Friedrich 230
Sejnowski, T. J. 73 n. 51
Shannon, C. E. 68
Sharpe, Kevin 216
Shimony, Abner 212, 224, 365, 391,
392, 414
Socrates 178
Spinoza, Baruch 215, 223, 275
443
Stapp, Henry P. 203, 217, 365, 392

Stebbins, Ledyard 20
Stengers, Isabelle 62
Stoeger, William 8, 10, 12, 36, 197,
212, 278, 318, 335 n. 83, 337, 408,
414, 415
Suchocki, Marjorie Hewitt 160 n. 25
Swinburne, Richard 92, 94
Szilard, Leo 40, 108
Taylor, John V. 267
Taylor, Richard 276 n. 21
Thaetetus 5
Thomas, Owen 123 n. 17, 182 n. 34,
195, 390
Tracy, Thomas F. 8, 12, 38, 63, 64, 115
n. 4, 197, 307, 319, 342, 344, 346, 347,
382, 383, 384, 385, 386, 388, 389, 414,
415, 422
van Inwagen, Peter 240
von Neumann, John 203, 365
von Weizscker, Carl Friedrich 203
Wallace, Alfred Russel 142
Weber, Bruce 18
Wheeler, John A. 202
Whitehead, Alfred North 8, 42, 43, 50,
148, 154, 164, 166, 167, 173, 183, 184,
185, 233, 390, 391, 392
Wicken, Jeffery 22
Wigner, Eugene 203, 204, 365, 396
Wittgenstein, Ludwig 178
Wilber, Ken 217
Wildman, Wesley 8, 10, 11, 420, 421
Wilson, E. O. 19
Wimsatt, William C. 59 n. 10
Wright, G. Ernest 229 n. 3
York, Carl
358 n. 16
Zajonc, Arthur
402, 403

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Philosophy, Science and Divine Action

F. LeRon Shults, University of Agder

Philosophy, Science and

F. LeRon Shults, Nancey Murphy and

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

A Philosophical Introduction to Divine Action ........................

Chapter One Five Models of God and Evolution .....................

Chapter Two The Sound of Sheer Silence: How does

Chapter Eight Divine Action in the Natural Order:

Chapter Nine Ordinary and Extraordinary Divine Action:

Chapter Ten Divine Action and Quantum Mechanics:

Appendix: Overview of the CTNS/VO Series ..............................

A PHILOSOPHICAL INTRODUCTION TO DIVINE ACTION

Philosophy, Science, and Divine Action

new ways of constructing a discourse that teases the boundaries of these

a philosophical introduction to divine action

Classical Philosophical Themes and Late Modern Trajectories

(cosmo-logy) constrain ones options for thinking about the relation of

a philosophical introduction to divine action

Western thought. Although Aristotle challenged Platos division between

a philosophical introduction to divine action

One can also trace a third late modern philosophical trajectory in

R. Stoeger, S.J, one of the foremost Roman Catholic participants in

a philosophical introduction to divine action

Arthur Peacocke introduces his essay with a reference to the ancient

openness to chaos theory, which deals with macrophysical objects and

a philosophical introduction to divine action

a philosophical introduction to divine action

the shift from Aristotelian to Newtonian cosmology. In Murphys own

a philosophical introduction to divine action

encouraged discussion of the ethical issues raised by the problems of

FIVE MODELS OF GOD AND EVOLUTION

1.1. From Darwin to DNA

five models of god and evolution

Ibid., Part II.

species by speciation, and it perishes by extinction. The speciation rate

five models of god and evolution

change.7 The communication of information from DNA to proteins is

and their irreducibility to the concepts of physics and chemistry, as I

five models of god and evolution

that attempts analysis at a variety of levels, avoiding the reductionism

developmental dynamic is the main source of macroevolution.15 Their

2. Philosophical Issues in Biology

five models of god and evolution

five models of god and evolution

seem to occur at random. A few individuals may form a small isolated

in which a single molecular bond in a gene is formed or broken, and

five models of god and evolution

concept than law because it includes formal, holistic, historical, and

c. Ontological reduction is a claim about the kinds of reality or the kinds

five models of god and evolution

Chaos is anti-reductionist. This new science makes a strong claim about

studies the dynamics of urban, industrial, and electronic systems. In all

five models of god and evolution

3. Models of Gods Action in Nature

five models of god and evolution

3.1. God as Designer of a Self-organizing Process

challenge to the classical argument from design. For competition and

five models of god and evolution

which atheists take as an argument against theism, may be the very

five models of god and evolution

concerning which we have at least some understanding of relationships