Epistemic Theory Of Miracles
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Epistemic Theory Of Miracles
The epistemic theory of miracles is the name given by the philosopher William Vallicella to the theory of miraculous events given by Augustine of Hippo and Baruch Spinoza. According to the theory, there are no events contrary to nature — that is no "transgressions", in Hume's sense, of the laws of nature. An event is a miracle only in the sense that it does not agree with our ''understanding'' of nature, or fit our picture of nature, or that it thwarts our expectations as to how the world should behave. According to a perfect scientific understanding there would be no miracles at all. The name of the theory is derived from the Ancient Greek word , ''episteme'', meaning "well-founded knowledge". Augustine's account In The City of God, Book XXI, Chapter 8, Augustine quotes Marcus Varro, ''Of the Race of the Roman People'': :There occurred a remarkable celestial portent; for Castor records that, in the brilliant star Venus, called Vesperugo by Plautus, and the lovely Hesperus ...
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William Vallicella
William F. Vallicella is an American philosopher. Biography Vallicella has a Ph.D. (Boston College; 1978), taught for a number of years at University of Dayton (where he was a tenured Associate Professor of Philosophy; 1978–91) and Case Western Reserve University (Visiting Associate Professor of Philosophy; 1989–91), and retired to Gold Canyon, Arizona from where he now contributes to philosophy mainly online. He is the author of many published articles, primarily on the subjects of metaphysics and philosophy of religion. In the short chapter on him in the book ''Falling in Love with Wisdom: American Philosophers Talk About Their Calling'', Vallicella discusses the philosophical questions which he happened to think about in his youth, such as "What if God hadn't created anything?", "What if even God didn't exist", and "Why is good, good, and evil, evil?", and his thoughts on the inquiry of philosophy. Publications Books *Kant, subjectivity and facticity', Boston College ...
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Theologico-Political Treatise
Written by the Dutch philosopher Benedictus Spinoza, the ''Tractatus Theologico-Politicus'' (''TTP'') or ''Theologico-Political Treatise'' was one of the most controversial texts of the early modern period. In it, Spinoza expounds his views on contemporary Jewish and Christian religion and critically analyses the Bible which underlies both. He argues what the best roles for state and religion should be and concludes that a degree of democracy and freedom of speech and religion works best, like in Amsterdam, while the state remains paramount within reason. The goal of the state is to guarantee the freedom of the citizens. Religious leaders should not meddle in politics. Spinoza prepares the ground for his work on metaphysics and psychology, '' Ethics'', published posthumously in 1677, for which he anticipated harsh criticism. Historical context Publication history The treatise was published anonymously in 1670 by Jan Rieuwertsz in Amsterdam. In order to protect the ...
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William Overton (judge)
William Ray Overton (September 19, 1939 – July 14, 1987) was a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. Education and career Born in Malvern, Arkansas, Overton received a Bachelor of Arts degree and a Bachelor of Science degree concurrently from the University of Arkansas in 1961, and a Bachelor of Laws from the University of Arkansas School of Law in 1964. He was in private practice of law in Little Rock, Arkansas from 1964 to 1979. Federal judicial service Overton was nominated to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas by President Jimmy Carter on March 7, 1979, to a new seat created by 92 Stat. 1629. He was confirmed by the United States Senate on May 10, 1979, and received his commission on May 11, 1979. Overton continued to serve on that court until his death of cancer on July 14, 1987 at his home. Notable case Overton is known for his ruling on Act 590 "The Arkans ...
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Arkansas
Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the Osage language, a Dhegiha Siouan language, and referred to their relatives, the Quapaw people. The state's diverse geography ranges from the mountainous regions of the Ozark and Ouachita Mountains, which make up the U.S. Interior Highlands, to the densely forested land in the south known as the Arkansas Timberlands, to the eastern lowlands along the Mississippi River and the Arkansas Delta. Arkansas is the 29th largest by area and the 34th most populous state, with a population of just over 3 million at the 2020 census. The capital and most populous city is Little Rock, in the central part of the state, a hub for transportation, business, culture, and government. The northwestern corner of the state, including the Fayetteville–Springdaleâ ...
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McLean V
MacLean, also spelt Maclean and McLean, is a Gaelic surname Mac Gille Eathain, or, Mac Giolla Eóin in Irish Gaelic), Eóin being a Gaelic form of Johannes (John). The clan surname is an Anglicisation of the Scottish Gaelic "Mac Gille Eathain", a patronymic meaning "son of Gillean". Gillean means "the Servant of aintJohn [the Baptist">he_Baptist.html" ;"title="aintJohn [the Baptist">aintJohn [the Baptist), named for Gilleathain na Tuaidh, known as "Gillian of the Battleaxe", a famous 5th century warrior. Eachan Reaganach and his brother Lachlan were descended from Gilleathain na Tuaidh, and are the progenitors of the clan. The family grew very powerful throughout the Hebrides and Scottish Highlands, Highlands through alliances with the Catholic Church in Scotland in the 9th century, the MacDonald (name), MacDonalds in the 13th century, and the MacKays and MacLeods in the 16th century. Other spellings of the name include McClean, MacLaine, McLaine, McLain, MacLane, and many ...
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Inherit The Wind Trailer (1) Spencer Tracy Fredric March
Inherit or Inherited may refer to: * Inheritance, passing on of property after someone's death * Heredity, passing of genetic traits to offspring * Inheritance (object-oriented programming), way to compartmentalize and re-use computer code * ''Inherit'' (album), 2008 work by the group Free Kitten * ''Inherited (script) ISO 15924, ''Codes for the representation of names of scripts'', is an international standard defining codes for writing systems or ''scripts'' (a "set of graphic characters used for the written form of one or more languages"). Each script is give ...
'', name for dependent script characters, like diacritics (ISO code ) {{disambig ...
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Quantum Mysticism
Quantum mysticism, sometimes referred pejoratively to as quantum quackery or quantum woo, is a set of metaphysical beliefs and associated practices that seek to relate consciousness, intelligence, spirituality, or mystical worldviews to the ideas of quantum mechanics and its interpretations. Quantum mysticism is criticized by non-believers with expert knowledge of quantum mechanics to be pseudoscience or quackery. Early controversy and resolution Olav Hammer stated that Werner Heisenberg, one of the main pioneers of the theory of quantum mechanics, was so interested in India that he got the nickname "The Buddha". "However," Hammer said, "in Heisenberg's ''Physics and Philosophy'' (1959) there is no substantial trace of quantum mysticism;" and added "In fact, Heisenberg discusses at length and endorses the decidedly non-mystical Copenhagen interpretation." Hammer also said that "Schrödinger’s studies of Hindu mysticism never compelled him to pursue the same course as quantum me ...
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Strange Attractor
In the mathematical field of dynamical systems, an attractor is a set of states toward which a system tends to evolve, for a wide variety of starting conditions of the system. System values that get close enough to the attractor values remain close even if slightly disturbed. In finite-dimensional systems, the evolving variable may be represented algebraically as an ''n''-dimensional vector. The attractor is a region in ''n''-dimensional space. In physical systems, the ''n'' dimensions may be, for example, two or three positional coordinates for each of one or more physical entities; in economic systems, they may be separate variables such as the inflation rate and the unemployment rate. If the evolving variable is two- or three-dimensional, the attractor of the dynamic process can be represented geometrically in two or three dimensions, (as for example in the three-dimensional case depicted to the right). An attractor can be a point, a finite set of points, a curve, a mani ...
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Nonlinear System
In mathematics and science, a nonlinear system is a system in which the change of the output is not proportional to the change of the input. Nonlinear problems are of interest to engineers, biologists, physicists, mathematicians, and many other scientists because most systems are inherently nonlinear in nature. Nonlinear dynamical systems, describing changes in variables over time, may appear chaotic, unpredictable, or counterintuitive, contrasting with much simpler linear systems. Typically, the behavior of a nonlinear system is described in mathematics by a nonlinear system of equations, which is a set of simultaneous equations in which the unknowns (or the unknown functions in the case of differential equations) appear as variables of a polynomial of degree higher than one or in the argument of a function which is not a polynomial of degree one. In other words, in a nonlinear system of equations, the equation(s) to be solved cannot be written as a linear combination of the un ...
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Chaos Theory
Chaos theory is an interdisciplinary area of scientific study and branch of mathematics focused on underlying patterns and deterministic laws of dynamical systems that are highly sensitive to initial conditions, and were once thought to have completely random states of disorder and irregularities. Chaos theory states that within the apparent randomness of chaotic complex systems, there are underlying patterns, interconnection, constant feedback loops, repetition, self-similarity, fractals, and self-organization. The butterfly effect, an underlying principle of chaos, describes how a small change in one state of a deterministic nonlinear system can result in large differences in a later state (meaning that there is sensitive dependence on initial conditions). A metaphor for this behavior is that a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil can cause a tornado in Texas. Small differences in initial conditions, such as those due to errors in measurements or due to rounding errors i ...
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Phase Transition
In chemistry, thermodynamics, and other related fields, a phase transition (or phase change) is the physical process of transition between one state of a medium and another. Commonly the term is used to refer to changes among the basic states of matter: solid, liquid, and gas, and in rare cases, plasma. A phase of a thermodynamic system and the states of matter have uniform physical properties. During a phase transition of a given medium, certain properties of the medium change as a result of the change of external conditions, such as temperature or pressure. This can be a discontinuous change; for example, a liquid may become gas upon heating to its boiling point, resulting in an abrupt change in volume. The identification of the external conditions at which a transformation occurs defines the phase transition point. Types of phase transition At the phase transition point for a substance, for instance the boiling point, the two phases involved - liquid and vapor, have identic ...
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John Polkinghorne
John Charlton Polkinghorne (16 October 1930 – 9 March 2021) was an English theoretical physicist, theologian, and Anglican priest. A prominent and leading voice explaining the relationship between science and religion, he was professor of mathematical physics at the University of Cambridge from 1968 to 1979, when he resigned his chair to study for the priesthood, becoming an ordained Anglican priest in 1982. He served as the president of Queens' College, Cambridge, from 1988 until 1996. Polkinghorne was the author of five books on physics and twenty-six on the relationship between science and religion; his publications include ''The Quantum World'' (1989), ''Quantum Physics and Theology: An Unexpected Kinship'' (2005), '' Exploring Reality: The Intertwining of Science and Religion'' (2007), and '' Questions of Truth'' (2009). ''The Polkinghorne Reader'' (edited by Thomas Jay Oord) provides key excerpts from Polkinghorne's most influential books. He was knighted in 1997 and in ...
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