On Spirit and Evolution Theory

Watson's collected sermons in 'Body of Divinity' comprise a catechism in the faith in order that Christians 'may be well-grounded in the faith'. The work is edifying obviously and beautifully written-a permanent edition to one's library that may be read and reread over the years.

Consider that while Thomas Aquinas was a scholastic theologian with a neo-Aristotelian method 'proving' points about God with logic, Thomas Watson was a scriptural theologian using inferences and inductions from scripture to inform readers (or originally listeners to his sermons) of the attributes and purposes of God. I suppose one might find a history of theologians or an encyclopedia of theologians to learn just where Watson's method of theology fits into the history of theology, yet I would guess that the early reformers broke some ground in the development of theological method.

Aquinas' scholastic approach in comparison to Watson's scriptural approach seems somewhat wide of the mark of relevance to Christians, though of course Aquinas was a brilliant theologian who wrote centuries earlier and contributed to the development of methods of using logic in application to theoretical and actual reality. His inductive and inductive reasoning deliberations that consider God phenomenally still serve as a model for consideration of design characteristics to investigate abstract topics.

Recently I encountered a philosophical and cosmological world view of Brian Josephson- the eponymous inventor of the Josephson effect and Josephson junctions (for quantum tunneling)- a Nobel laureate, that resembles G.W.F. Hegel's idea about God realizing himself in history (described in The Phenomenology of Mind). The idea transcends the boundaries of naive evolution vs. creationism quite a bit. Josephson believes that quantum mechanics can evolve its own complexity inclusive of mind, yet his theory stipulates an initial observer starting the development or evolution of a system of evolving quanta that becomes sentient biologically. I want to expand the parameters of the Josephson theoria to extrapolate and explain theological implications.

http://www.tcm.phy.cam.ac.uk/~bdj10/

The physics and what is known of biological systems of aggregating change and in creasing complexity and complex structures appear to support Josephson's thesis that is comparable to a neo-Hegelian evolution of spirit realizing itself in history. Josephson's theory obviates the need for the extra dimensions of M and String theories. In those theories there is a vast number(10 to the 500^th power?) of ways of putting dimensions together to form a Universe such as this and hence equally as many mathematical forms to describe it. Finding the right formula and dimensional model to account for the nature of this Universe would be rather challenging. Instead of a virtually infinite number of dimensions that with randomness or perhaps logical permutation experiment (an anthropomorphism) with the generation of a Universe capable of supporting life-an approach often used by atheists to negate the anthropic principle/Goldilocks 'just rightness' physical constants of this Universe such that it supports life, and observer initiates or primes the initial quanta to be and become.

Such an observer could be hypothesized to have evolved for-himself in some way before the Universe existed, although Christians stipulate that God existed from eternity rather than having a beginning. One might consider that the 'ancient of days' did not simply evolve mind as the first created Person and become God to all subsequent Universes. In a way that is incomprehendsible to the human mind, God always was. God was and is prior to the existence of the first virtual particle, erg of energy or dimension of possible space-time. In any event once God was, and as God was, with omniscience and omnipotence all potential creations, Universes and evolutions were with God and for-God. Wheeler's ideas about retro-causality would not substantially alter the relationship of God to His being except that it might illustrate an eternal loop of God bootstrapping His existence. I do not prefer that approach. Causal explanations for the being of eternal God just don't seem right.

At any rate though, since God existed He would be able to jump-start any number of possible Universes though they could be designed to evolve like a growing, branching tree. Because God is a sentient mind who may evolve sentient minds in contingent Universes it is likely that as an omniscient mind he foreknows all contingent minds that exist or would exist in any possible Universe. God's being transcends and encompasses all temporal space-time and contingent sentient beings within a given universe.

Though this is a scholastic sort of theological speculation rather than scriptural it is useful to show that evolution theory is not incompatible with God creating the Universe, with physical determinism nor with God continuing a sustaining role knowing the content of all sentient thought within a physically evolving Universe. Alpha through Omega.

Romans 8:“27 And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

30 Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.”

Josephson's theoria has I think primarily a steady state Universe criterion and that steady state Universe and its quantum material are field phenomena that are entangled in a field and that field in an unknowable order (of God I would think). Being certain of the actual physical composition of a meta-field containing the Higg's field and all of the steady-state material in it inclusive of black holes and space-time is unrealistic for some time I would think. One can however be certain of Jesus Christ .