Communio: International Catholic Review, v. 11, n.2,
Summer 1984, 186–192.
[David L. Schindler]
This past spring the Board of Editors of the North American edition of Communio sponsored a conference at the University of Notre Dame entitled, "Beyond Mechanism: The Universe in Recent Physics and Catholic Thought." The conference centered largely around the work of David Bohm of Birkbeck College, University of London. Bohm, long recognized as one of the world's leading theoretical physicists, has in his writings, most recently in Wholeness and the Implicate Order, continuously challenged the assumptions which have prevailed in modern physics. His view is that those assumptions, which take their classical form in the seventeenth century and which can aptly be termed mechanistic, continue to shape the interpretations of twentieth-century physics, despite a widespread claim by physicists and others that this is not so. The term physics comes from the Greek word meaning "nature," and the term "mechanistic" of course refers to something which is "machine-like" in character. A mechanistic physics, then, is an approach to the study of nature which consists in considering nature in so far as it manifests in machine-like ways. What does this mean? And what is the significance of such an approach in terms of the tradition of Catholic thought?
Initially, we can describe a mechanistic approach to the study of nature as one which seeks to give an account of the behavior (movement) of any given entity A in terms of forces outside A. Such an approach seeks to learn exactly what determines A (from outside) to behave as it does, in order thus to be able to control and predict A's behavior. Of course physics has never been able exhaustively to provide an account of nature in terms of such deterministic necessity. And indeed twentieth-century physics, notably quantum theory, now recognizes what appears to be an irreducible ambiguity in the way microphysical entities manifest, an ambiguity which seems to render impossible the sort of deterministic account which had been sought at least in principle in modern (classical) physics. But it is crucial to consider carefully the sense in which recognition of this ambiguity might rightly be taken to challenge the mechanism characteristic of that earlier physics.
The heart of a mechanistic approach to the study of nature, as already suggested, is that it seeks to give an account of A in terms of forces external to A, forces, that is, which determine A from without to behave as it does. Such an approach is said to be deterministic, then, precisely in this effort to account for A in terms of forces external to A. How is the meaning of this characteristic feature of mechanism affected by recognition of an ambiguity surrounding the appearance of A?
The possibilities seem to be at least two: on the one hand, in accord with the interpretation which currently prevails in physics, one can assign this ambiguity a chance-like character and continue to consider A in so far as A nonetheless still manifests in ways which render it accessible in terms of external forces, that is, as determined from without. Of course one will now no longer expect an exact account of A, which would presuppose necessity in the behavior of A. Rather, one will expect an account in terms of a statistical probability which presupposes a blend of chance and necessity in the behavior of A. But the crucial point to note is that the account of nature which this interpretation seeks is still an account in terms of externality, in terms of forces which are external. Such an interpretation just so far cannot legitimately be taken to challenge determinism in the pertinent sense; cannot, that is to say, be said to provide a properly non-deterministic alternative to the mechanism of modern physics.
The approach which prevails in contemporary physics, then, can be summarized in terms of the following two characteristic features: (1) any given entity A is considered only in terms of forces external to A which are thus seen to determine from without the behavior of A. (2) In so far as the behavior of A is not accessible in terms of such external forces, as so determined from without, such behavior is taken to be a matter precisely of what is assumed to be the disorder called chance, that is, rather than an indication (at least possibly) of order of a different sort. In other words, as these points together indicate, the only sense of order which is considered in this first approach is order of the mechanical sort. For just this reason contemporary physics would seem to continue rather than to challenge the mechanism of modern physics.
The significance of the issue being focussed here becomes clearer when we contrast this first approach which prevails in contemporary physics with another possible approach. This second approach, likewise recognizing the ambiguity introduced in quantum theory, does not begin by assuming that such ambiguity is simply a kind of surd element which merely serves to render statistical the only sort of order which can possibly be considered as order, namely, the mechanical one. On the contrary—and this is the heart of the second approach—it takes the ambiguity introduced in quantum theory rather to be (at least possibly) an indication of order of a different sort: that is, of what is at once order (not simply chance), and order which is non-mechanical (properly non-deterministic: in the sense of not being conceived in terms of external forces).
In contrast with the first approach, then, this second approach bears the following characteristic features: (1) It considers the behavior of A to be (at least possibly) a function, not only of forces external to A which thus determine A from without, but also (indeed possibly primarily) of forces or activity internal to A which thus leave A just so far non-determined from without. (2) It considers such internal and non-determined behavior of A to be, not a function of the kind of dis-order called chance, but on the contrary an indication (at least possibly) of order of a different sort: that is, of the sort of order which one would expect as proper to behavior (activity) recognized to be internal and—in this sense—non-determined. In these ways, then, in contrast with the first interpretation which has been adopted by the majority of contemporary physics, this second approach does present a genuine challenge to the mechanism of modern physics.
As an aid in understanding what is being suggested in this second approach one might usefully recall (without necessarily ascribing to Aristotle the full scope of what is intended) the sort of order in natural entities which Aristotle recognized and which he took to be a function of the internal act called form (and finality). In a way which is in some important respects reminiscent of Aristotle, David Bohm makes central in his work a non-mechanical order whose key feature is internality, and he does so thematically in terms of an order which he calls implicate. Bohm develops this understanding of order with the intention of providing an alternative, in the way indicated by the second approach as outlined, to the mechanism which dominates contemporary physics.
It is important that we take note here of an objection which is commonly raised in connection with the form in which I have cast the problem of mechanism. The burden of the objection is that the seriousness of any charge that mechanism continues to predominate in physics is removed when one recognizes that most contemporary physicists would claim that they, unlike many of their modern counterparts, assume the mechanical view of order not as a matter of metaphysical dogma but as a matter of a method which is provisional. For present purposes the following observation must serve as a response to such an objection.
On the one hand, if contemporary physicists adopted the mechanical view of order in a genuinely provisional way, it would seem that they would just so far be open, that is, especially in light of the evidence—ambiguity—introduced in quantum theory, to considering an alternative view of order and indeed the possible difference such an alternative view might make for their practice. On the other hand, in so far as these physicists were unwilling to consider such an alternative view and its possible implications for practice, once again in the face of the evidence introduced in quantum theory, it would seem that they could just so far no longer call their adopted mechanical view provisional. The point, then, is that, in either case, contemporary physicists cannot both refuse to consider alternatives to mechanism and legitimately continue to call that refusal provisional. On the contrary such a refusal can only—once again in light of the possibilities opened up in quantum theory—be called properly dogmatic. For this reason, then, and in this sense, the objection which would appeal to the provisional character of the mechanism that prevails in physics, that is, as testimony to the relative insignificance of the fact of such prevalence, cannot be sustained.
The issues raised with respect to mechanism require far more attention than can be given in the present context. Our purpose is rather to note these issues with a view to suggesting their significance for the tradition of Catholic thought. There is a sense in which developments in physics often seem to be matters of relative innocence as far as the Catholic tradition is concerned, matters which have at best only an extrinsic bearing on what is central to that tradition. However physics might choose to approach the study of nature, the Catholic philosophical and theological tradition can approach such study in terms of methods proper to itself; and in any case what is most crucial for that tradition is that it continue to secure a proper understanding of realities other than nature, which is to say spiritual and divine realities. There is of course much truth in this suggestion. What such a suggestion fails to take into account, however, at least in the form it ordinarily assumes, is how much the approach to nature which has prevailed in physics in recent centuries has in fact already served to shape the horizon within which a Catholic often undertakes to work out an understanding of spiritual and divine realities. What I wish to propose in this connection is that a horizon set by a mechanistic view of nature, in so far as it remains operative, however tacitly, in one's thinking, just so far renders impossible a proper understanding of these realities, renders impossible, that is to say, an understanding which secures the integrity of those realities in the way intended in the tradition of Catholic thought. What does this mean?
We can begin by recalling the characteristic features of mechanism: namely, that it views nature in terms of externality, force and chance. Or, in other words: on the one hand, in so far as nature is viewed as a matter of order, it is taken to be exhausted in external and forceful activity. On the other hand, in so far as nature is not able to be viewed in terms of external and forceful activity, it is taken to be a matter, not of order at all, but rather of dis-order or chance. Our question then becomes this: what are the implications for the Catholic theological tradition of a view which thus simultaneously both equates order with external and forceful activity and considers as dis-order (chance) whatever appears not to be active in external and forceful ways?
There are many contexts in which one might work out an answer to this question. For present purposes we will suggest an answer in terms of an issue which is central to the Catholic tradition: namely, that of how grace might be said to affect, to be effectively present in, nature. Now the term nature as used in a theological context, in relation to grace, is of considerably broader in that same term as used to refer to the entities studied in physics. Nonetheless, that such a difference is not directly pertinent to the consideration introduced here should become apparent when we recall, in light of the preceding paragraph, the focus of concern. That concern can be expressed as follows: what implications does a mechanistic understanding of order—an understanding which in an important way has been derived from and shaped by the approach to nature as practiced in modern and contemporary physics—carry in a theological context, as that context bears on questions of order? Specifically here, what implications might a mechanistic view of order be said to hold for the theological judgment that grace is effectively present in nature?
Now I ask this question in the context of the Catholic tradition, and what seems to me to be carried in the intention of that tradition as it bears on such a judgment is the following threefold assertion. (a) Grace transforms nature in a genuinely inner way; (b) in so doing grace nonetheless does not violate the integrity of nature; (c) and finally grace transforms nature in a way which is recognized to be a distinct ordering (or re-ordering, as it were) of nature (that is, at once distinct and an ordering). To retrieve the intended meaning of these suggestions, it will suffice here to note what the suggestions seem to require in turn by way of negation.
First of all, grace cannot be said properly to transform nature in a genuinely inner way, and in a way which nonetheless does not violate the integrity of nature, if the effective presence of grace in nature is conceived in terms of externality, in the following two ways: (a) if grace is viewed as in nature in the sense of what is disjoined or separate (somewhat after the manner in which we might picture a gremlin lurking at the center of a machine: not genuinely within the machine, but rather remaining external to the machine albeit now from somewhere imagined to be its center); (b) if grace is viewed as effectively in nature after the manner of what acts in the first instance from without, and hence just so far forcefully. Secondly, then, grace's transformation of nature cannot properly be said to be a distinct ordering (a reordering) of nature (that is, an ordering which, for all its being distinct, is an ordering nonetheless) if the only ordering recognized as such is of a mechanical sort, of the sort proper to externality and force. In other words, given the meaning of "effective presence in nature" as understood in the first point, it would follow either (a) that there could be no genuinely inner transformation of nature by grace, or (b), if such a transformation, then in any case a transformation only of a kind which would (as forceful) destroy the integrity of nature. Given the meaning of "ordering" as understood in the second point, it would follow that grace's transformation of nature could in fact be considered, not a matter of ordering at all (albeit of a distinct sort), but rather, and precisely, a matter of something like the dis-ordering called chance. In either case, it seems to me, something essential is lost relative to the intention of the Catholic tradition.
These brief comments, of course, raise numerous difficult and delicate issues, which another context would require that we take up. The comments are introduced here simply to suggest how a mechanistic view of order might be seen to hold important implications for Catholic theology. The point of the example can be summarized as follows: the mechanistic view of order, in so far as it continues, however tacitly, to operate when one undertakes to develop a theological understanding of spiritual and divine realities, just so far leads—as is exemplified here relative to the problem of interpreting the effective presence of grace in nature—to an understanding of such realities in terms proper to externality, force and chance (dis-order). Such a mechanistic horizon just so far precludes—again, in so far as the case of the grace-nature distinction may be taken as illustrative—a proper understanding of those realities as intended in the Catholic tradition.
Of course the importance of the point suggested here hinges on the accuracy of the assumption that a mechanistic horizon has in fact, even if only in a manner which has often remained tacit, influenced theological thinking in recent centuries—that is, in the decisive sorts of ways indicated by the example. In the face of the objection that such an assumption is not accurate, that the mechanistic view of order has in fact been confined to physics and thus remains a matter of concern only to physicists, I can in conclusion only invite attention to the theological debates and discussions in recent centuries as they have borne on the grace-nature issue, not only in the explicit form in which I have cast the issue, but also in the variety of its distinct but related forms: the effective presence of God in Jesus; the effective presence of God in the Church, in the sacraments, in the cosmos; the cognitional side of the grace-nature issue, namely what may be called the faith-reason issue along with its further implied question regarding the nature of theology as a unifier of the sciences. The examples could be multiplied, but these will suffice: it seems to me that attention to the patterns of theological thinking in recent Western history as they bear on these issues will disclose how much theology has been affected by the mechanistic horizon which has prevailed in physics, by a horizon, that is to say, which views things alternatively in terms of externality and force (= what is non-arbitrary and rational) on the one hand, and chance (= what is arbitrary and irrational) on the other.
These are some of the concerns, then, which served as the backdrop to the conference mentioned at the outset. The purpose of the conference was two-fold: to discuss David Bohm's proposed alternative to the mechanistic view of order which has dominated physics; and to reflect on various aspects of the problem of mechanism at once in the light of Bohm's proposed alternative and in terms of their systematic implications relative to some central concerns of the Catholic tradition. Among the central concerns focussed in formal presentations were the following: the nature of God's relation to (transcendence of and presence within) the cosmos; the problem of time and eternity; evolution; dualism and reductionism in the understanding of man; and the order among the disciplines in Catholic higher education.
David L. Schindler
Author's [1984] address: Program of Liberal Studies, University of
Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556
Communio: International Catholic Review, v. 11, n.2, Summer 1984, 186–192.