RT Article
T1 Theological Appropriation of Scientific Understandings: Response to Hefner, Wicken, Eaves, and Tipler
JF Zygon
VO 24
IS 2
SP 255
OP 271
A1 Pannenberg, Wolfhart 1928-2014
LA English
PB Wiley-Blackwell
YR 1989
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1827948639
AB Abstract. Philip Hefner's focus on contingency and field as the guiding concepts in my thinking and his characterization of my theological enterprise as a Lakatosian research program are appropriate and helpful. I welcome Jeffrey Wicken's holistic approach to the emergence of life. Theology can appropriate the language of self-organizing systems exploiting the thermodynamic flow of energy degradation for interpreting organic life as a creation of the Spirit of God. However, I cannot sympathize with Lindon Eaves's equation of “hard science” with a reductionism which raises the double helix to the status of icon; the “meaning” of DNA derives from its place in the total phenomenon of life—not the reverse. Frank Tipler's cosmology raises the prospect of a rapprochement between physics and theology in the area of eschatology. A Christian cosmology, however, would require at least three modifications: contingency in the history of creation; the uniqueness of Jesus' resurrection; and the relation of these to the problem of evil.
K1 Thermodynamics
K1 self-organizing systems
K1 Lakatosian research program
K1 eschatology and the Omega Point
K1 double helix
K1 contingency and field
DO 10.1111/j.1467-9744.1989.tb01113.x