Dembski's Intelligent Design - Book Report/Review Example

This account is not a description of the composition of the iron rod (which is actually a nexus) but an explanation of my taking over of the rod's feelings in a manner appropriate to my perspectival situation, for the eternal objects ingress into my feeling of the rod and not into the rod. In contributing to the determination of feelings, eternal objects thereby contribute to the structuring of the concrescence. Dembski uses examples from current literature and theoretical studies in order to illustrate his opinion and prove his position.

Dembski states that the full, determinate structure of the actual occasion is the goal of the subjective aim as it proceeds toward satisfaction. In this regard, some aspects of the world will be appropriated as relevant to this aim, and others will be neglected. At the same time, eternal objects are subject to a primordial valuation in God. Dembski comes to conclusion that this primordial ordering provides a background of limiting principles of potentiality against which concrescence is set. New occasions could never arise without some general, potential coordination of process.

God's valuation of pure potentials, then, provides the basis of universal coherence in terms of physical laws that must be obeyed by the concrescence as part of its factual base. "A design theorist attempting to do actual design-theoretic research on that ecosystem might reply, "Although that's an intriguing theological possibility, as a design theorist I need to keep focused on the informational pathways capable of producing that variety" (Dembski n.d.). The eternal object makes possible the conformity of the past to the present without events being merely repeated in their objectifications in succeeding actual occasions.

Past events are "reenacted" but in relation to a new interpretive purpose found in the subjective aim (Herrick, and Iltis 23). The main weaknesses of Dembski's arguments are that they lack scientific evidence and theoretical argumentation. All arguments are excellent but they reflect personal opinion of science fiction writers and novelists rather than a true scientific explanation of the phenomenon. Dembski underlines that the transition of feelings from one actual occasion to another is better described as reproduction or conformation than as the literal replacing of the same feeling into another occasion.

The fact that there are many that can become (not the same) one is explained on Dembski's view by eternal objects' having different modes of ingression into individuals, so that actual occasions are in part different syntheses of applicable eternal objects. These different modes of ingression are the eternal objects' conformity to the actual occasions' subjective aims. All possibilities relevant (and irrelevant) to a concrescence are contained in God. The strengths of Dembski's arguments is a unique vision and perception of reality.

Given its concrete situation, that is, its unique perspective with an aim toward a novel wholeness, the actual occasion positively experiences certain items as part of its constitution while yet being potentially defined by its negative facts. Given its concrete historical situation -- that is, its unique spatiotemporal and factical placing within its environment - object creators directly experiences certain items through its circumspective concern while yet being open toward a larger world that includes and refers to items not