A History and Critique of Methodological Naturalism

The Philosophical Case for God's Design of Nature

Okello

• Publisher: Wipf and Stock
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781498283755
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

Methodological naturalism is the thesis that only natural features can be factored into any legitimate explanation. Moreover, the thesis contends, any attempt to explain natural phenomena by appealing to supernatural features is unscientific and, therefore, illegitimate. This book argues that nothing inherently problematic afflicts possible appeals to supernatural agency in the attempt to explain select phenomena in nature. Reputable philosophers of the ancient and medieval periods, as well as prominent scientists of the early modern era, invoked supernatural agency in their attempts to understand nature. For them, miraculous interventions in nature by a supernatural agent were not unreasonable. However, the super-naturalistic worldview has been replaced by methodological naturalism. The assumptions of two pivotal figures--David Hume and Charles Darwin--brought about this change. This book shows that this change was motivated by unscientific means. Hence, the change itself remains inconsistent with the assumptions of methodological naturalism.

1

Introduction

Many religions of the world, most notably Christianity, widely maintain belief in miracles. It is a belief that also had its place in ancient and medieval philosophy and theology. However, methodological naturalism has tried to refute, quite vigorously, the notion that a Supernatural Being has interacted with nature in a manner deemed miraculous.

What is methodological naturalism? It would appear that under this broad term there are at least two predominant strands of thought. One argues that science, by definition, excludes non-naturalistic forms of explanation. Proponents of this view sometimes allow that a given phenomenon might be susceptible to non-naturalistic explanation; they merely insist that such an explanation ought not to be considered scientific. I shall call this view definitional methodological naturalism.

We may take John Macquarrie, Ernan McMullin and Michael Ruse as representatives of this view. Macquarrie insists that the “scientific conviction” is that events occurring in the natural world can be explained in terms of other events within the natural world. According to Macquarrie, the scientific enterprise assumes that all events in our world can be explained by appealing to the occurrences of other events belonging to just this world. Suppose, then, we find ourselves unable fully to explain the occurrence of a given countenanced event, science remains committed to the belief that additional research will expose more factors relevant to the inquiry. Those factors, however, will remain just as natural (as opposed to supernatural) as the factors cognitively accessible to us already.1

As presented here, definitional methodological naturalism would seem to presuppose that any unexplained residue in an event must always in principle be subject to further naturalistic inquiry. Although Macquarrie does not explicitly draw this conclusion, it would seem that on this view there can be no room for non-naturalistic explanations supplementing or complementing those of science; such explanations would always appear to be mere dodges evading the need for further naturalistic inquiry.

By contrast, Ernan McMullin proposes a more modest form of definitional methodological naturalism. He thinks that methodological naturalism accepts the application of epistemological methods different from that of methodological naturalism. He merely insists that for any method to qualify as scientific, it must proceed according to the assumptions of methodological naturalism. According to McMullin, rather than control the scientific investigation of nature, methodological naturalism merely specifies the kind of enterprise that might be deemed properly scientific. Suppose the epistemologist wishes to locate a different approach to nature among the many approaches in existence today. An epistemologist committed to methodological naturalism will find no reason to object, specifically because, as a scientist, the epistemologist committed to methodological naturalism must adopt this kind of openness. However, McMullin adds that the methodological naturalist finds no value in the claim that a specific sort of event in nature might be explained by tracing the origin of is course to a supernatural being.2

McMullin and Macquarrie agree in ruling out epistemological systems that invoke supernatural entities to account for natural events; for such invocations, they argue, are unscientific. As Alvin Plantinga observes, claims of this sort have achieved the status of philosophical orthodoxy.3 Michael Ruse epitomizes this orthodoxy by insisting that methodological naturalism, or part of it, is true by definition. According to Ruse, if Scientific Creationism remained entirely successful in justifying its contention to being scientific, it would still fail to offer a scientific account of the cause of the universe. What it could succeed in proving is the contention that scientific explanation of origins remains unavailable. Consider, for example, how creationists hold that the universe had a miraculous origin. The problem with this view, as Ruse sees it, stems from the consideration that miracles remain profoundly unscientific, specifically because science, by definition, deals only with natural and repeatable phenomena governed by the law of nature.4

Ruse is more explicit than Macquarrie or McMullin in making clear exactly why non-naturalistic explanations do not count as science. Science by definition “deals only with the natural, the repeatable, that which is governed by law.” Like McMullin he seems to allow for the possibility in principle of non-natural explanations, although he adopts toward them a more dismissive tone.

William Alston and Alvin Plantinga have provided a powerful critique of definitional methodological naturalism. In an unpublished article, Alston argues as follows: it is just not true that engaging in the practice of modern science requires assuming a closed natural order. The only thing a scientist is committed to assuming, by virtue of engaging in the scientific enterprise, is that there is a good chance that the particular phenomena he is investigating depends on natural causal conditions to a significant degree.5 Alston observes that the assumption of medical research, for example, is that by discovering natural causes of pathological conditions, we can put ourselves in a better position to forecast, prevent, and cure diseases. Believing that not every detail of every disease and of every recovery is due to natural causes, believing that some are due to particular divine interventions, scarcely precludes one from engaging in medical research. As a matter of fact, every medical researcher and every medical practitioner comes across cases that he finds inexplicable. In Alston’s view, there is no reason to hold that either research or practice is undercut if some of these are due to particular divine intervention. So long as it is generally the case that the onset, development and cure of disease follows certain natural regularities, that will give the scientist all he needs; a few exceptions do not matter.6

The methodological naturalist could give the following objection to Alston: modern science could give us a reason to believe that all that happens in the natural order happens in accordance with the laws of nature. Such a reason would show that a particular divine intervention would be a violation of such laws.7 It is not clear, however, what or how such a reason would look like. This lack of clarity could be taken as a response to the methodological naturalist’s objection.

At any rate, Alston gives the following rejoinder. First, many of the law statements scientists embrace are idealizations to which actual occurrences only approximate. Second, many of the laws discovered by twentieth-century science are probabilistic rather than deterministic in character. Such laws would not be violated by an influence that results in the occurrence of what they imply to be improbable. Third, even for those deterministic natural causal laws which fit the actual phenomena with great precision, if we suppose divine intervention would be a violation, it is because we are thinking of physical laws as specifying unqualifiedly sufficient conditions for an outcome. The most we are ever justified in accepting is a law that specifies what will be the outcome of certain conditions in the absence of any relevant factors other than those specified in the law. The strongest laws we have reason to accept lay down sufficient conditions only within a “closed system,” that is, a system closed to influences other than those specified in the law. None of our laws takes account of all conceivable influences.8

But since the laws we have reason to accept make provision for interference by outside forces unanticipated by the law, it can hardly be claimed that such a law will be violated if a divine outside force intervenes. Hence it can hardly be claimed that such laws imply that God does not intervene. Thus even if physical laws take a deterministic form, the above considerations show that they by no means rule out the possibility of direct divine intervention in the affairs of the physical world.9

What about Ruse’s claim that science by definition deals only with what is natural, repeatable, and governed by law? Plantinga objects t...

Table of contents

• Acknowledgments
• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: Supernaturalism in the Ancient and Medieval Periods
• Chapter 3: Supernaturalism and Epistemology in the Early Modern Era
• Chapter 4: Deism and Supernaturalism
• Chapter 5: Hume’s Argument Against Miracles
• Chapter 6: Evolution of Methodological Naturalism
• Chapter 7: Conclusion
• Bibliography