Conservation Laws Physical laws that stipulate the conservation over time of a specific quantity, such as charge, energy, or momentum. Related Topics: Physics Contributed by: CTNS

Human Freedom, and the Laws of Nature.” In his paper Bill Alston studies the philosophical aspects of the problem of divine action in relation to both the laws of nature and the meaning of human freedom. To set the stage, he begins by

as fertile ground because conservation laws need not be violated - a perennial problem for accounts of Divine action. It's common to see the triplet of "matter, energy and information" listed as the basic units of reality, and we

with strict observance of conservation laws. On the other hand, our observations at the quantum scale lead us to the reasoned conclusion that the future is in some limited sense open, or "not decided" (to quote Bohr). Here even

is characterized by two laws: first, the conservation of energy and secondly, the non-decrease of entropy in closed systems isolated from their environment. Examples include gas in a balloon, liquid cooling in a container, wood burning in a

status and phenomenological laws of behavior are assigned to higher, as well as lower, levels. His ontology includes: Worlds 1 (the physical world), 2 (individual and communal consciousness), 3 (Aristotelian possibilities), 4 (Platonic abstract

Take for instance the law of conservation of energy. Although the law is often stated in the form "energy can neither be created nor destroyed," in fact all we have empirical evidence for is the much weaker claim that "in an isolated system energy