Review of Claytons God and Contemporary Science

By Daniel K. Brannan

Seeking ways to resolve the apparent conflict experienced when reading scripture and
studying natural history has long been a personal quest. Even before plate tectonics, I
recall as a child realizing that the continents fit together as puzzle pieces and wondered if
"let the dry land appear" referred to continents as they were today or as they might have
been. It was in this lifelong spiritual quest for harmony between science and theology
that I turned to Philip Clayton's God and Contemporary Science (Eerdmans, 1997). The
theological issue Clayton tackles is how God acts in the world. Clayton's conciliatory
tone suggests tentativeness and questioning in this very irenic tome that provides a three
way interaction between science, theology, and philosophy. He re-frames traditional
views within the panentheistic and philosophical views of today to give a more inclusive
view of how philosophy and science can inform theology without giving up core
Christian beliefs.
The first chapter defines the role of theology in a post-modern environment giving
science a more serious voice than usual. Clayton sees post-modernism as a Pauline
opportunity for Christian theology to be heard in the Mars Hill academy. The new task is
deciding what it means to make truth claims of such universal significance as a risen
Messiah. To do this he feels he must relate Christianity to "the major source of
knowledge about the world: science" (p. 5). Clayton grants that science, even though its
practitioners can be value laden, has enough checks and balances that its outcomes tend
to correctly explain "large segments of the empirical world [and] account for the widest
possible range of empirical data with greater adequacy than any of their competitors" (p.
6). He gives full acknowledgment of the need for methodological naturalism in science
but shows that such reductionism is ultimately inadequate to fully explain ideals such as
love, truth, beauty or soul. When theologians take science seriously, Clayton claims that
we may even find biological evolution of consciousness to be compatible with purpose.
Whether this evolution is a result of purpose or accident is unanswered by science.
Clayton accepts the epistemology and metaphysic of assuming purpose to find
compatibilities between science and faith. Indeed the foundational issue that pits
evolutionists against creationists is one of teleology versus "dis-teleology." There is no a
priori reason why science must assume purposelessness in order to be science. This is a
metaphysical assumption, not one that can be deduced empirically. For an integration to
occur, science must admit that teleology is possible (at least in principle). But theology
must allow for non-orthodox interpretations of past cosmologies.
Clayton's most urgent question, however, is divine agency. We rely on naturalistic
explanations to explain daily events. Even the theological argument is against a God who
constantly has to meddle with and fine tune a universe he did not get right the first time to
carry out his will. Natural events are not calamities brought on by God. This conviction

is consistent with a God who sustains, not manipulates; the issue of theodicy is less
pronounced without the claim of capricious divine manipulation. The key question is
"does Christian theology require believers to assert that God acts on a regular basis as a
direct causal agent within the physical world?" (p. 12)
His main theme in chapter two is a Christian theology that does not subordinate the
doctrine of creation to the doctrines of redemption and sanctification. Clayton appeals to
Pannenberg who requires that theology and biblical understanding include the discoveries
of natural science. What scripture does not teach are "quasi- (or pseudo) scientific
accounts of the world" (p. 17). What it does teach is "perhaps the most . . . important
implication of God's unlimited power for a doctrine of nature: the contingence of the
world" (p. 18). This contingence allows the universe to work in a law-like manner within
which the whole cosmos can carry out free will activities but rely upon the Creator's
upholding of cosmological laws that permit it to do so. God has self-limited his
omnipotence. This theology of creation focuses on the grace and love of God for the
entire cosmos to come into oneness (Rom. 8:18-24) with the God who continually creates
and sustains (creatio continua). Clayton leaves many questions unanswered when he
appeals to our "need to struggle with what it means to read Genesis today" (p. 36). He
avoids whether or not there was a historical fall or if a paradisiacal state really existed; he
does acknowledge that he is inclined away from such views.
Clayton's focus instead is to define how panentheism enables the integration of the
Christian faith and science with Christ as a universal revelation to redeem the entire
cosmos unto salvation. Panentheism, in developing a better awareness of the dialectic
between transcendence and immanence, shows that the cosmos is in God and vice versa
but that God is more than the cosmos alone. Clayton makes the claim that "God either is
or is not the actual source of the entire physical universe" (p. 51). However, he also
admits that "theology finds a gap between the scope of its claims and the scope of the
arguments it can make on its own behalf" (p. 51). In the end, accepting the argument of
God as Creator and with a plan for the cosmos will still remain where it should: an article
of faith.
Chapter three shows how Hebrew traditions of Divine agency are changed by Christian
theism and how such claims are, indeed, peculiar. Within the post-modern context,
Christianity finds itself needing to point out its uniqueness so it does not become just
another path. He asks us to consider the uniqueness of the Christian proclamation of a
God who is active in the world beginning with the kerygma. The Christian claim that
God became human as Jesus Christ whose atoning death and resurrection allows all of
creation to commune directly with God by the power of his holy spirit is singular.
Clayton encourages systematic theologians and philosophers to use current philosophy
and science as a means of enlightenment "to find formulations that do justice both to the
Christian tradition and to the intellectual context in which it finds itself" (p. 62).

Clayton shows how Trinitarian doctrine compels him to use Thomistic reflection and
Whiteheadian process thought to conceive of God as community, embodying absolute
mutual love. From this perspective, Clayton defines the roles of God's "omnis" "potence, -presence, -benevolence, -science" and defines each Christologically: a God who
fully knows and cares for all parts of his creation at all times. Clearly this position begs
the theodicy question which I felt should have been addressed despite the predictable
outcome. If the book has a major failing, it is this inadequate treatment of theodicy.
What he offers is acceptable to the faithful only: all things including suffering, extinction,
painful evolutionary processes, and death work together for good (Rom. 8:28) ( maybe
not our own but for an ultimate good. This will hardly comfort the believing sufferer. An
answer like this fails for the skeptic. But the skeptic's alternative is to claim we live in an
absurd universe. Either way, the sufferer must resign herself to stoic acceptance. There
is one difference for the believer that gives her an advantage, however. She has hope in a
future within which she personally participates; the skeptic's nave melioristic hope is in
humanity's future goodness in which she cannot participate. As a result, the humanist
skeptic typically burns out long before the believer in doing good for others.
Clayton is convinced that science and philosophy can be in dialogue with theology now
that we have recognized "the myth of scientific objectivity and philosophical absolutism"
(p. 68-9). At this point, I wondered why Clayton earlier conceded so much to science and
philosophy in informing theology only to point out that science and philosophy are just
another voice rather than the voice. I appreciated this slight course correction of keeping
science, philosophy and theology as separate spheres of influence that can inform one
another. Clayton believes a coherence with science and philosophy is needed because we
are rational agents, ignoring challenges from other schools of thought reduces one's
religion to one of extremist fundamentalism, and if God is truth then all truth is God's
truth regardless of its origin. Of course, assuming our minds were forged solely by
biological processes to make sense of our environment purely in order to survive,
however, then there really is no reason to proceed under the assumption that the world is
ipso facto completely explainable by such minds. With this view of ourselves, there is
nothing to prevent us from accepting the idea that some things, including God's action or
purpose in the world, are beyond human comprehension.
In chapter four Clayton explains how God works in the world in a way that does justice
both to the scriptural evidence and to contemporary philosophy and science. Clayton
asks, what framework allows philosophical and scientific considerations to be compatible
with biblical information to define how God's relationship to the world works?
Panentheism is his answer. His synthesis is captured in the single statement, "As God can
be present to every now while still subsuming all nows within the eternal now that
transcends and encompasses finite time, so also God can be present here while still
subsuming all heres with a divine space that transcends and encompasses physical space"
(p. 89). Thus God is in the cosmos and the cosmos is in God. In addition, God and the
cosmos are separate in theologically distinct ways. God is immanent yet transcendent.

Clayton tests this conception against the origin of sin and the concept of a "fall" from
"perfection." Using Westermann, he establishes sin as an "overstepping of limits," the
human wish "to be God," and to act as if one were God (p. 92). Clayton teases us,
however, with his statement, "a metaphysics of perfection may face problems today that it
did not recognize in the pre-modern period" (p. 92). A thorough discussion would have
been more helpful. I kept waiting for answers to the following: why does the "creation is
good" have to mean "perfect"? Why is eating something that allows us to distinguish
good and evil have to be considered sinful and cause death? Does death really refer to
something physical or spiritual? A discussion of a cosmos that is good yet goes on
cycling between life and death and subsumes from one creature into another until a
consciousness dawns that has sentience enough to conceive of God and wonder about
purpose and his role in the universe, fear death, and conceive of ethics would have fit
Clayton's panentheistic perspective well here. He does promise, however, that his
forthcoming work Infinite and Perfect? The Problem of God in Modern Philosophy will
elaborate more.
Clayton's discussion of process theology relies heavily on Whitehead, Hartshorne, and
Pannenberg. The cogent summary of this discussion is: "Once one has challenged the
hold on theology of a metaphysics of substance, which Christianity had inherited from
Greek thought, and has seen how a metaphysics of process can provide just as adequate a
conceptual framework for thinking about God, then one is hard pressed to say why God's
perfection should require that he be immutable, unaffected by anything that goes on in the
world" (p. 94). Clayton also shows how traditional proofs of God are transformed by
panentheism and postmodernism. He does a good job with the ontological argument, but
his treatment of the cosmological and teleological arguments for God was limited to
simply noting that the panentheistic view is consistent. He ends the chapter showing how
natural theology, philosophical theology, and metaphysics have provided a consistent,
coherent, and comprehensive set of standards for an adequate theory of God, filled with
theological content, and a clearer view of what theological results can be expected.
In chapter five, Clayton explores how scientific cosmology contributes to theology and
how scientific work needs an interpretive framework that theology and metaphysics
offers. The goal of this chapter is to define where theology and science may interact and
where they should not. Clayton does this by summarizing key thinkers in this area. In
covering Wesson and Tilby, Clayton admits that theology may have to limit its concern
with science to that human sense of awe toward nature and our spiritual connection to it.
He should also have detailed how evolutionary philosophy can only offer a disteleological explanation for how we got here - a completely stochastic and serendipitous
ontology. In presenting Tipler's anthropic cosmological principle where "the fundamental
values of the universe are slanted towards the eventual emergence of higher life forms in
an improbable manner" (p. 132), Clayton shows that the argument is an a priori
improbability that allows for intelligent life. Such wonder does not prove God but it
could cause us to seek something more than coincidence or stochastic serendipity.
Clayton, however, sees Tipler's position as pantheism and a scientifically updated version

of Spinoza.
Clayton is cautious about accepting Davies claim for a Designer. While the believer may
easily take refuge in what appears to be exquisite design, at least at a very holistic level, it
is still a believer's gambit and it is still metaphysical interpretation. But it is not proof as
defined by science which plays by the rule of materialistic naturalism. Dawkins, for
example, would simply call such things designoid (not design) and claim fortuitous
serendipity. But neither is Dawkins proven right by science; both intelligent design and
stochastic serendipity are metaphysical claims. 'Proof' of design and Designer are
metaphysical assumptions, indeed they are theology proper, Clayton claims. Just because
the design argument is outside the bounds of a materialistic science, does not keep
theologians from reflecting upon it as they integrate "cultural, moral and existential
experience" (p. 141) into their observations of the physical world. Data may also get
interpreted metaphysically by the scientist at a personal level even though he can only
publish such beliefs in books, not scientific journal articles. Examples on the disteleological stochastic serendipity side include Dennett and Dawkins; on the teleological
religious side are Dembski and Behe. Toss in a political agenda like equal treatment of
"Intelligent Design" in public school science classes and logic devolves into spicy
rhetoric. Clayton should be commended for his even-handed treatment of the design
inference. At least he is one philosopher/theologian who clearly points out its limitations.

Clayton presents Harrison (and Kant) as relying on pantheism (the Universe is God) to
preserve a place for human spirituality so as not to fall prey to the "anomie and chaos" (p.
147) of Francis Crick's astonishing hypothesis view of life: nihilism. Harrison does not
trust science to provide an "adequate overarching framework of belief" (p. 149) for
humanity to have a deeper meaning and mystery that contemplation of the Universe
brings. Clayton then presents Drees' sophisticated religious naturalism. Drees takes the
extremely parsimonious view that religious awe is a uniquely human experience, but only
a Darwinian question of what survival value religion provides for humanity. Clayton
claims this functionalist view "precludes any serious interest in the content of theological
assertions" (p. 152). Just because a numinous experience is described evolutionarily is
not proof that it no longer exists at a spiritual level. If anything, it mystifies me even
more that a physical process occurs at just the right time in the person's life to have the
religious experience she needs to continue on.
Clayton points out that the limits of science require a broader metaphysical discourse
especially since it "functions poorly as a world-view that might guide moral decisionmaking and the human quest for meaning" while theological theories "may provide the
most powerful explanations we possess of the world" from the human experience. (p.
155). Clayton sees that both science and religion can contribute to a correct way of
viewing man in the universe. Theological ideas are "fit and explanatory" (p. 154) as long
as they provide those powerful explanations. Thus the key thesis of chapter five is that

we need a common framework for formulating agreements and disagreements between

scientific and religious claims regarding theism. Metaphysics should be "something like
long-term science, speculation about how it will all fit together in the end" (p. 156). Just
as science promises to eventually understand how things work eventually through the
collective and self-correcting nature of its enterprises, so theology should work to
understand "why things are" through various philosophers, theologians, and scientists
working together with a collective dialogue. To admit that religious ideas may need
revamping and rethinking as a result of new discovery is refreshing.
Still, Clayton is cautious and warns us "to guard against the over-quick movement from
scientific results to conclusions about the nature of God and his relation to the world" (p.
157). Using science to explain how God works, creates God in our image. God is not an
engineer. If anything, nature seems far more a result of a rococo abstract artist
comfortable with indeterminacy and contingency rather than a designer with a specific
plan. Fortunately, Clayton concludes that the theologian really cannot find confrontation
or falsification from the natural world regarding belief in God. Clayton shows that the
overwhelming mystery of a beginning we may attribute to God but we are not
constrained to do so. But to attribute the origin of the universe to pure stochasticity is
also presumptuous. The theologian is free to claim the universe "begins and ends within
the divine being outside of which there is nothing" (p. 158). But such a claim comes
through the eyes of faith.
Clayton concludes the chapter realizing that science lacks the ability to provide us with a
"quest for meaning in the world" (p. 160) unless it is placed within a metaphysical
context. To best provide this metaphysic, he turns to panentheism. I wondered, however,
how much of this claim is rooted in the uniquely human value of seeing purpose in the
universe and in one's life. Clayton's argument hinges on this assumption: it is critical for
humans to have purpose and meaning in their lives. We turn to theology to validate that
we are here for a reason. Science qua materialistic naturalism certainly doesn't provide
that hope for purpose, at least not if Dennett and Crick are the models.
In chapter six, we try understanding Divine agency, "one of the most difficult and urgent
questions facing theologians today" (p. 169), in light of what we understand about the
universe through science. Clayton focuses on science's primary assumption that for any
event in the natural world there should be a natural cause rather than a supernatural one to
explain it. The key theme of chapter six is that "no other competitor is in the position to
provide what the natural scientist can provide: a law-based framework . . . unparalleled in
its ability to explain and predict events in the world . . . . but such success does establish
an epistemic presumption in favor of natural explanations" (p.172-3). Clayton still grants
theology some say "The success of science does not establish the impossibility,
metaphysically speaking, that divine agency . . . could not be another type of causal force
at work in the world" (p. 173). It is refreshing to encounter a Christian philosopher

unafraid of science.
So where do religious explanations of physical events find validity? Clayton evaluates
Hume's position that divine activity occurs before the universe's creation and after its
end. But Clayton questions Hume's assumption that experience-based induction suffices
for this belief. Clayton sees Kant as having greater impact when he claims there are no
epistemic criteria "naturalistic or theistic" that can claim knowledge of the before and the
after of the universe. Clayton finally chooses Pannenberg's concept of "universal history"
as the place where the revelation of God's role in the universe is best experienced.
Whether or not one sees purpose or direction in history still seems, to me, to be
dependent on the eyes of faith. To resolve the issue of physically describing a spiritual
experience, Clayton turns to Austin Farrer's "double agency" position. God's role is
understood in a metaphysical sense as "the force that causes contingent beings to
continue existing" (p. 177) or that God allowed the neuronal firings and chemical
releasers and brain architecture to evolve in such a way that they are capable of
conceiving God. Since double agency is untestable scientifically, Clayton is critical of its
ability to resolve tensions between science and religious claims of agency. This concern,
to my mind, is unwarranted. Religious claims do not have to be subject to scientific
validation since their epistemic base is revelation and personal experience informed by
community and discovery while science is based solely on discovery and the human
processes of observation with the five senses. Secondly, just because science chooses to
box itself into a belief system that trusts only perception, or its extensions, does not make
it more truthful or valid than other pursuits, especially those such as art, literature, or
music. It seemed to me as if Clayton may be prematurely giving more credence to
science's ability to discover truths than theology's ability to explain Truth. After all, the
best that the materialistic naturalism philosophers can conjecture is stochastic serendipity
without purpose. Considering how desperate we are for purpose, I doubt that such
nihilism will ever be compelling.
Clayton likes panentheism's argument by analogy to develop a theory of mind for the
God-world relationship being like our own mind-body relationship. He provides this
argument in the seventh chapter. Clayton, as theologian, is burdened with the onus to
define what it means for God to be active in the world especially when one wishes to do
so in dialogue with science. Clayton's goal of explaining emergentist supervenience
theory of God's action in the world is based on the mind:body::God:cosmos analogy and
how "mind" is unlikely to be reducible to purely physicalist terms. Theological claims of
activity in the material world grow more and more difficult as physical causes are
discovered for phenomena that once were considered beyond explanation (e.g. as the
gaps get filled in). Of course, once human thought gets explained, even this last bastion
is destroyed. Theologians should play the game conservatively and develop their
theology based on the assumption that this bastion will be breached rather than keep our
fingers crossed that it doesn't.

Clayton has high hopes that the five-volume series produced by the Vatican Observatory
and the BerkeleyCenter for Theology and the Natural Sciences will address the causal
joint for divine agency. The hope lies in quantum mechanics and chaos theory to
postulate "God, who could presumably know the initial state of some system . . . could
cause changes at the quantum level and then use . . . chaotic systems to amplify these
changes into macrophysical outcomes" (p. 196). But why subject theology to the role of
quantum mechanics and chaos when most scientists believe they are not applicable to life
at a macro level anyway? Ontological indeterminacy of quantum particles does not
translate into indeterminacy at macro levels except in metaphysical leaps in philosophical
scientist's minds. Of course, this is the beauty of the concept since science does not
detect patterns at the subatomic level that would translate into action at the macro level.
How convenient, a scientific theory that cannot extrapolate into how it applies to 'higher'
macro levels because of its indeterminate structure. Metaphysics gets clothed in scientific
garb to gain respectability. Probably neither the naive parishioner in the pews nor the
naturalistic scientist at the bench will find the arguments compelling, however.
The attraction to these two ideas for divine agency has always perplexed me. It may be a
quantum universe theoretically at really small or really large scales but Newton still
works quite adequately at the in-between human scales. Let's face it, it's been nearly fifty
years now and Pollard has yet to find a dead cat mysteriously poisoned by Schroedinger.
Even Polkinghorne, although leaving open the possibility for quantum events to affect the
brain and thus human thought, doubts the idea in the end. Polkinghorne has always been
critical of quantum mechanics and chaos when considering divine causality. He may
allow chaotic systems if they are influenced by information input because it is more akin
to pure spirit or thought. But he is careful to consider theological constraints: God's
action should somehow be continuous and sustained not capricious. And it should allow
interaction with the physical rather than intervention. Polkinghorne also considers
synchronicity, the idea that certain events just seem to happen at just the right time to
carry out God's will.
Clayton does offer other options to the theologian: give up the quest to specify how God
acts in the world, decide that how God acts is a matter of pure faith beyond all grasp of
human reason, or give up on the claim that God acts. Clayton recognizes a criticism
presented by Maurice Wiles: if God's actions or existence are inaccessible to empirical
study, then why should a scientist believe in his existence or action when that scientist's
system of belief is based on physical evidence alone? Wiles suggests we are better off
not claiming God's action in specific events but only in the context of furthering the
overall intention of God in universal history. Clayton appreciates Wiles' position when he
points out that human freedom is denied if God's outcomes are pre-determined. Clayton
prefers Tracy's final position that God's actions are not in directing but instead in
persuading and preparing us to take certain actions that carry out his will for the universe.

It seems an impasse has developed when Clayton acknowledges that many theologians
have abandoned any idea that divine action can be compatible with natural science. But
he still asks, what concepts of divine agency would or wouldn't be consistent with
modern science? He identifies three models: Schleiermacher and Kaufman's
deterministic model; Hebblethwaite and Compton's gap-free model; and Tracy's nondeterministic, gap-dependent model. Towards the end of chapter seven, Clayton
recognizes that a theory of divine action cannot be derived solely from natural science.
Clayton states, "If God acts occasionally but stays within the statistical probabilities, the
summation of the probabilities will cancel out the effects of the action" (p. 214). He
discusses others (e.g. Murphy) who hope chaos theory can amplify the effect perhaps by
activating a brain state in a human to allow a thought that, if freely chosen, would carry
out God's will for example. So we have a physical theory that operates at the subatomic
level only and then couple it with a mathematical theory that is deterministic but
dependent on initial conditions to finally affect human choice to do God(s will and thus
meet theological requirements for divine action. Like Brecha (Zygon 37:909-924; 2002),
I just don't buy it.
Such an approach reduces God down to ways of human thinking. We have taken the cat
out of the box and put God in its place wondering if, when we open the box, whether or
not he will be active in the world. Even the science behind how quantum perturbations
can affect small photons or large molecules, much less macro-organisms, is theoretical
not real [Science 298:342-3 (2002); 299:185 (2003)]. Sure, theoretically, the cat might be
dead when we open up the quantum box but, practically, we will never need quantum
veterinarians to study strange feline deaths. I'm glad Clayton limits his commitment to
quantum chaos to affection. After all, Schroedinger's cat is still a pet notion and Einstein
always loathed quantum entanglement as "spooky action at a distance" since information
had to exceed the speed of light. As a practical macro-level notion of God's agency,
quantum chaos is just a dumb idea.
Theology may end up having to modify some beliefs about God if science shows the
world to be radically different than theistic belief once claimed. This rather large
concession for theology would demand an equally large compromise by science
philosophers: give up the claim that the cosmos is dis-teleological and all an accident.
After all, the claim is non-scientific anyway. It is metaphysics, impure and complex.
Clayton's favorite idea, however, is panentheism as he feels it provides the clearest
scientifically-amenable theory of God's action in the world. Clayton tracks Peacocke
here. God's immanence is found in the natural world even though God is profoundly
more than the creation itself. Peacocke's approach is to only use general statements about
God's purpose in the world. Peacocke still allows for top-down causation as a lure in a
supernatural manner.
Chapter eight is the climax of the book where Clayton presents his own synthesis of
divine agency based on "the best theories we have of the relationship of our minds to our

bodies, and then corrected for by the ways in which God's relation to the universe must
be different from the relation of our mental properties to our brains and bodies" (p. 233).
Using this analogy, Clayton puts a panentheistic spin on it to "make progress toward a
theology of the God/world relation by thinking our way more deeply into the so-called
mind/body question, making full use of developments in the theory of human personhood
(neo-emergentism, supervenience theory) in recent years" (p. 234). Clayton's favored
position is emergentist supervenience to describe the irreducibility of consciousness. It
becomes a capstone of his argument for God's agency in the world, the panentheistic
analogy. The argument starts with the proposition that materialism (or physicalism) is
insufficient to describe human consciousness. When the parts of the brain (the
'postulated entities' as van Fraassen calls them) are together, they form a whole that takes
on an existence of its own, one that supercedes the 'entities' of which it is made. Clayton
is proposing a whole new field of inquiry to develop a formal theory of emergent
properties, one that will be composed of theories of explanatory adequacy, causal activity,
and on what exists. We will need to agree on epistemology, teleology, and ontology to do
this. What better place to do this than in the brain sciences themselves?
The argument appeals to human agency as an analogy because ours is the only type of
personal agency familiar to us. He admits the potential for mystery here. If God's
agency is nothing like our own, then the mystery is complete. But if God does work like
us, the mystery remains only until our own agency in the world is understood. By
limiting the argument to one of analogy, Clayton prevents the last God of the gaps
arguments from being filled in. Should human mental functioning ever "be fully
explained in terms of neuro-physiological states and laws . . . If physicalism (whether
(reductionist( or not) wins this battle, I [Clayton] will argue, the most hopeful means for
making sense of divine causation will be removed" (p. 234-5). If science ever equates
mind with brain, and theology makes the mistake of equating mind with soul, then
physical reductionism collapses soul into brain and we concede defeat. The
neuroscientists and philosophers are divided on whether or not consciousness is
reducible. One side fully believes that consciousness qua thinking will be explainable as
neuronal chemical and electrical signaling eventually. The other disagrees that such
physical events and brain states will ever be sufficient to fully grasp that inner dimension
of thinking - what it's like to be oneself.
Clayton sides with the irreducibilists because "if minds are reduced by explanation to
their physical substratum or 'hardware', then God would have to be reduced in a similar
manner as well" (p. 243). Most of the argument hinges on how we define mind. If we
define it as consciousness or personhood or even soul, then we will always have an
unfillable gap. The best way I can represent this is by the following equation: Brain Mind - Consciousness - Personhood -Soul, where "-" represents the scientist's conjecture
that I doubt will ever be resolved adequately. But, even if done, the "-" represents a
conjecture that is impossible to resolve. After all, personhood, much less soul, cannot be
defined scientifically anyway (and claiming that it does not exist if it cannot be detected

is a cop out).
There is a Polanyian tacit-knowing-of-oneself that goes beyond even an intimate soulmate's knowing who you are, much less someone merely studying your neurons firing.
You still have to tell the technician what you are thinking before he can make sense of the
MRI. Describing neurophysiological functioning cannot be translated into what a person
is thinking unless she tells you "what's going on inside of my head." Of course, one
could survey enough people telling you what they were thinking and then a correlation
made with which neurons were firing at the time. But the translation still required
something irreducible and intangible to begin with: that person's tacit knowledge of her
inner mentality communicated to you in inaccurate and incomplete symbols or words.
I was surprised that Clayton did not engage Crick's The Astonishing Hypothesis in this
chapter. Or that Dennett's Consciousness Explained wasn't more than just a footnote.
These and the Churchlands' works really do "make materialist assumptions that set them
at odds with theological reflection" (p.266 footnote 8). The key issue to resolve is the
difference between two concepts of emergence. Clayton uses the term emergent in the
sense that the entity composed of the combination of separate parts takes on a new level
of being that cannot be explained even by thoroughly comprehending all the components
and how they interact. Crick, in a straw-man argument, calls this the mystical concept of
emergence. He calls the scientific concept of emergence the one that realizes that the
whole really can be understood from the behavior of the parts once they are all
catalogued and once it is known precisely how they all interact, including mental states.
Clayton likes Hans Flohr and Jaegwon Kim's take on supervenience and how it preserves
the reality of mental states against the Churchland's reductive stance. This argument
should be developed more thoroughly because, as I see it, Dennett would dismiss mental
states as "qualia", epiphenomenal qualities that seem to be but really are not.
Consciousness is considered to be just another quale by Dennett.
Assuming that consciousness will always remain in the realm of mystical emergence, or
what Clayton calls strong supervenience, he develops the case for how God's agency can
be understood from the panentheistic analogy. His argument has three steps: mental
predicates supervene on physical states; one supervening mental property can cause
another; and finally, mental states are not epiphenomenal but can cause physical events.
Clayton would claim that one's mental state derives from the physical neurons of the
brain and their interactions. From here, one's own mental state can be communicated to
another and then influence that other's mental state which in turn would "rewire" that
person's physical substratum of a brain. One mental state acting on another (like one idea
giving rise to another) is not a substance as such but it does seem to affect the physical
brain perhaps by rerouting the flow of neurons or causing a new neuronal synapse to
occur.

In this sense, an idea has the ability to rewire the brain! Now, is that ability mere qualia?
Clayton says no and I would agree. Consciousness is not "a metaphysical surd" (p.257).
Dennett, Crick, the Churchlands, and all physicalists are wrong! Of course, they will just
respond that we are getting into metaphysics in the bad sense. I'd say they're just mad
because their rules of the science game won't let them play metaphysics which they'd
really rather be playing. Nothing in the natural world or the mechanisms to study it
(science) can resolve the impasse. Of course we still must have consistence, coherence,
comprehensiveness, and comprehensibility to play the game fairly; otherwise, we could
claim anything we wanted.
In the end, Clayton admits that he is on a journey of fides querens intellectum and not
trying to prove providence scientifically. But it is good for theological reflection to be at
least somewhat consistent with what is known about the natural world. Ultimately,
however, one has to wait for verification in an eschatological sense. Similarly, I'm still
trying to fit together puzzle pieces whether they are continents or ideas. I have long ago
stopped trying to literally read scripture for anything more than spiritual direction. This
non-superstitious faith bothered me greatly when I was in the drinking-milk-only stage of
faith; I wanted a Santa Claus God who could solve my problems, reassure me who I was,
where I came from, and where I was going. I continue seeking to understand the
juxtaposition of such aphorisms as "all truth is God's truth" and "the truth shall make you
free." Most of the time, however, my prayers are simply asking, "What is truth?" And, I
get the same silent response Pilate got . . . and I wonder why burning bushes are reserved
for obscure Semitic pastoralists. At least Clayton's book is a step in the right direction
toward truth, but I think I'll still have to wait until I can see clearly face to face rather than
through a glass darkly.