On God's Gestures : Miracles, Laws of Nature, and Special Divine Action
- Degree Grantor:
- University of California, Santa Barbara. Philosophy
- Degree Supervisor:
- C. Anthony Anderson
- Place of Publication:
- [Santa Barbara, Calif.]
- Publisher:
- University of California, Santa Barbara
- Creation Date:
- 2015
- Issued Date:
- 2015
- Topics:
- Religion, Philosophy of., Philosophy, and Metaphysics
- Keywords:
- Miracles,
Special Divine Action,
Special Divine Acts, and
Laws of Nature - Genres:
- Online resources and Dissertations, Academic
- Dissertation:
- Ph.D.--University of California, Santa Barbara, 2015
- Description:
This paper largely focuses on miraculous events and laws of nature in lieu of the famous remarks made by David Hume in his "Of Miracles." After doing minor expositional work in Hume's essay, I argue that Hume believed a miracle was an event that falsified a law of nature. If so, this presents the theist with a challenge because the theist cannot maintain that there are miracles, that miracles falsify laws, and that laws of nature are true. So, the theist must either modify the definition of 'miracle', the definition of 'law of nature', or become a deist.
After presenting a survey of the literature, I present two solutions of my own to help the theist. I offer an original account of what is meant by a 'miracle' and an original account of what is meant by a 'law of nature'. However, given the magnitude of Hume's definition of 'miracle', I propose all miracles be defined as Humean, which suggests the solution I adopt is accepting my account of what is meant by a 'law of nature'.
Finally, I consider other events that are beyond the norm, but do not falsify any laws of nature---e.g., a cloud that forms the words "Made by God" though each water molecule's spatiotemporal location can be accounted for by some law of nature. This event would not satisfy the Humean definition of a miracle, but it is still an event some may attribute to God. So, I outline an original account of a new category of events---what I call Special Divine Actions---which are all the actions that are not apart of God's creation or sustaining of the physical universe. Such Special Divine Actions likely include all the (Humean) miraculous events, but also events that are non-miraculous.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (117 pages)
- Format:
- Text
- Collection(s):
- UCSB electronic theses and dissertations
- Other Versions:
- http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&res_dat=xri:pqm&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:3689905
- ARK:
- ark:/48907/f30v8b0k
- ISBN:
- 9781321695946
- Catalog System Number:
- 990045119320203776
- Copyright:
- Christopher Dolson, 2015
- Rights:
- In Copyright
- Copyright Holder:
- Christopher Dolson
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