Theos-Talk Archives (May 2009 Message tt00008)

Hi Pedro,  

Your simple question seems to call for a simple this or that response.  Is that what you are hoping to get?

 I pasted your question into google.  Here is 1 of 72,900 responses  :).

"Philip Clayton's book Mind and Emergence presents a highly sophisticated argument against any kind of uncritical theology that might want to follow science into a world of overly narrow, compartmentalized disciplines that do not sufficiently communicate between themselves. Clayton argues persuasively that the basic structure of the phenomenal world is multileveled, with emergent properties and degrees of freedom that cannot be adequately described, predicted, or explained in terms of lower-level phenomena only. Moreover, the various levels of organization are linked to one another by interfaces of mutual constraint in terms of upward and downward causation. The most valuable part of Clayton's argument, however, is that in a philosophy of emergence one must also, if not especially, account for the role of the biological sciences and especially for the influence of human thoughts and skills, human choices and actions, and-one of the most important causes of all-human purposes. Clayton's biggest challenge is that the level of human personhood offers us the only appropriate level to introduce the question of God and the possibility of divine agency."

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118588156/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0





regards,

Bill
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Pedro Oliveira 
  To: theos-talk@yahoogroups.com 
  Sent: Friday, May 01, 2009 7:33 AM
  Subject: Theos-World a simple question





  Is the sense of a separate self natural to the human consciousness or is it acquired through the evolutionary process?

  Pedro



  


------------------------------------------------------------------------------



  No virus found in this incoming message.
  Checked by AVG - www.avg.com 
  Version: 8.5.322 / Virus Database: 270.12.12/2090 - Release Date: 05/01/09 06:17:00

  ----------


  ----------


No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com 
Version: 8.5.323 / Virus Database: 270.12.12/2090 - Release Date: 05/01/09 06:17:00


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]