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Apologetics
5. Questions about Science & Faith
(How
they are so similar - and yet so different)
A
series that helps consider the foundations for faith
Contents:
Introductory
Comments
•
The claims of science need checking.
Part
1 : Should Science be so sure of itself?
1.
What is Science?
•
Defining
its limits
2.
Why is Science Uncertain?
•
Observing
that science isn't as sure as is sometimes proclaimed.
3.
Why is Science about the Past, a Leap of Faith?
•
Working into
the Past means assumptions, not certainty.
4.
is Science Constantly Improving the World?
• A
recognition that science in the hands of sinful men has caused
great harm
Part
2 : Scientific Misconceptions about Faith
5.
Is God only the God of the Gaps?
• Recognition
that God didn't just make what we don't understand.
6.
Can't religious Experience be explained by Scientific Explanations?
• Various
possibilities
7.
Is there a War between Science and Religion?
• Not
when you listen to a lot of scientists.
8.
So how can the natural world be interpreted?
• Different
starting places mean different views, not the science itself.
9.
Do Scientists Jump to Conclusions?
• Yes,
when they stray into other disciplines.
10.
Don't Scientists Need Ethical Standards that only the Faith Community
can
Provide?
• Unrestrained
applied science needs outside help.
Conclusions
Questions
So
often the image conveyed by scientists is that they are the
masters of all knowledge and the more knowledge they have the
more in control they will be. Let's check it out.
So
often science seems so sure of itself and seeks to make other
disciplines feel 'lowly cousins'. We're going to see here
why that is not so.
From
the point of view of apologetics we're going to see why Christians
don't have anything to fear from science.
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Part
1 : Should Science be so sure of itself?
Answer:
Science,
generally speaking, is about acquiring knowledge
using the scientific method.
The
‘scientific method'
is about gathering measurable evidence, producing
an hypothesis, testing that and then producing a theory.
Put
in its simplest form, science is about finding
out how the material world works, or 'knowledge
obtained by careful observation'.
Applied science is the way knowledge of the material
world is put to use.
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| 2.
Why is Science Uncertain? |
a)
The Changes of Assumed Answers
Within
pure science,
knowledge is constantly changing.
With
advances in technology, methods of investigation and research
become more and more complex and more and more data is obtained.
Often
this complexity means that research questions are
not certain and scientists may describe their
results as “most likely”, “more likely
than not”, or even “possibly”.
With
complexity, scientists will often use ‘models' to communicate
what they believe they are finding, but sometimes data
needs interpreting and models need
adjusting as more and more data is compiled.
b)
The Introduction of Ethics
Within
applied science,
the same is true but there is an added dimension.
What's
the difference between pure and applied science?
In
the ‘applying' we often find the questions of ethics cropping
up – should we do this, should we do it this way?
c)
The Uncertainty of Science
To
continue what we started saying above, somebody
has said,
“Scientific
knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty
- some most unsure, some nearly sure, none absolutely certain.”
“The
universe does not behave according to our pre-conceived ideas.
It continues to surprise us."
“all
scientific ideas are open to revision in the light of new
evidence”
Thus
the scientist who decrees absolute is in fact expressing his
arrogance.
Popular
science writer, Carl Sagan, suggested one of
three essential elements of scientific study is an openness
to see the Universe as it really is.
It
seems the more we observe the more we have to adjust our thinking.
Alister
McGrath – The Twilight of Atheism – commenting
on Richard Dawkins' assertion that faith is an evil not found
in science:
“As
Michael Polanyi (1891—1976), a chemist and noted philosopher
of science, pointed out, natural scientists find themselves
having to believe some things that they know will
later be shown to be wrong—but not being sure which
of their present beliefs will turn out to be erroneous.
How can Dawkins be so sure that his current beliefs are true,
when history shows a persistent pattern of the abandonment
of scientific theories as better approaches emerge? What historian
of science can fail to note that what was once regarded as
secure knowledge was eroded through the passage of time? Conveniently
enough, Dawkins turns a blind eye to history.”
d)
The Answers that are beyond Science
Alister
McGrath - The Dawkins Delusion - commenting
on the extent of scientific knowledge possibilities:
"The
fundamental issue confronting the sciences is how to make
sense of a highly complex, multifaceted, multi layered reality.
This fundamental question in human knowledge has been much
discussed by philosophers of science, and often ignored by
those who, for their own reasons, want to portray science
as the only viable route to genuine knowledge. Above all,
it pulls the rug out from under those who want to talk simplistically
about scientific ‘proof' or ‘disproof' of such things as the
meaning of life, or the existence of God.
The
natural sciences depend on inductive inference, which is a
matter of ‘weighing evidence and judging probability, not
of proof'. Competing explanations are evident at every level
of the human endeavour to represent the world — from the details
of quantum mechanics, to what Karl Popper termed ‘ultimate
questions' of meaning.
This
means that the great questions of life (some of which are
also scientific questions) cannot be answered with any degree
of certainty. Any given set of observations can be explained
by a number of theories … the great questions remain unanswered.
There can be no question of scientific ‘proof' of ultimate
questions. Either we cannot answer them, or we must answer
them on grounds other than the sciences."
In
other words, the really big issues of life - about meaning and
purpose, are beyond simple observation that science brings to
the table.
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3.
Why is Science about the Past, a Leap of Faith?
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Answer:
Science
that is about the past involves making lots
of assumptions
Example
1: Carbon Dating
Carbon
Dating may well be highly accurate and has become more so
in recent decades, but is actually based on the assumption
of uniformity of cosmic rays and other physical and not so
physical phenomena.
Dates
have already been adjusted in recent decades as information
about the Sun became more available. Is it possible we will
redate again and again and other information appears?
Whenever
we specify dates, we do so with a certainty that may well
be undermined in the future.
Example
2: Big Bang Theory
A
quick search of the Internet will soon reveal to the student
the uncertainty when looking backwards to ‘the beginning'
and to ‘the end', that produces a number of scientific theories
for both ‘ends'.
What
is intriguing is the reporting of such theories. Rarely do
the media pick up on a scientist saying, “Well, I think it
is this…” or “My latest best guess is this…”
Perhaps
it is that such non-dogmatic comments are not newsworthy and
do little to advance the prestige that comes with a new possibly
valid theory.
The
number of theories and the number of adjustments that have
been made in the past hundred years only go to point up
the uncertainty of these areas.
Our
point here is not to deride science or scientists, but merely
to point out that often, if not almost always, theories
about the past in science, are just that - theories, which
may need adjusting as further knowledge becomes available.
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4.
Is Science Constantly Improving the World?
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A
sub-heading of this section could be, ‘Has science made man
the master of the Universe?'
The
existence of postmodernism, that we referred to on page 1, suggests
otherwise.
The
world of the 19th and early 20th centuries was incredibly optimistic.
The
truth is that pure science is entirely neutral.
Applied
science in the hands of men, has the potential for
both good and evil.
Yes,
our day-to-day living standards have dramatically improved
in a variety of ways, but over shadowing that positive comment
is the recognition that without science in the past century:
- we
could not have fought two world wars and a multitude of lesser
wars,
- we
could not have raped the world's resources never to be used
again,
- we
could not have created a variety of environmental crises from
the misuse of those resources,
- we
could not have released the horror of nuclear holocaust,
- we
could not have brought the spectre of global warming upon ourselves,
- we
could not have produced the terrible fear that terrorists might
steal and use hundreds of deadly viruses and bacteria.
The
latter four mentioned above could yet terminate our tenure on
earth. That is the effect of applied science in the hands of
sinful, egotistical men.
If
mankind had been different in this period of time we might had
fed the world, healed the world and created an environmentally
friendly world society – but it didn't!
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Part
2 : Scientific Misconceptions about Faith
| 5.
Is God only the God of the Gaps? |
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Answer:
a)
God of the Gaps
When
I was a young Christian there was much debate about the 'God
of the gaps'. It is something some scientists
still put forward.
The
supposition was that God was only God of those areas that we
didn't understand.
Thus
as science revealed more and more ‘how things work' it doesn't
need, the argument goes, the presence of God as an answer.
The
assumption was that one day God would be completely squeezed
out and be seen to be not needed to explain creation.
b)
God of everything
If
we now look at it from the way the Bible describes things, we'll
see it differently.
God
designed and created the world to work in the way it does. He
designed it so that when water boils it evaporates. He also
designed every other scientific fact you can think of.
It's
not a case of ‘we don't need Him now' – He's there! We need
Him as much as any small child needs its parents.
As we'll see
in later pages, God does intervene for His own purposes in the
present creation.
There
is also a Biblical suggestion (see Heb 1) that He also upholds
this world and could thus stop it and end it at any moment
- but that is a matter of belief and won't be proved until
you see Him face to face!
c)
God of the Bible
A further
point worth picking up here, is that when discussing scientific
interpretations and interpretations of the Bible, we would
do well in both cases to ensure that we realise when we are
playing with 'interpretations.'
Scholar
Ravi Zacharias in The Real Face of Atheism
makes a variation of this point well as he says:
Any
student of history or science is quite familiar with the
tragic display of power and ignorance when the mathematician,
physicist, and astronomer Galileo was forced by the Inquisition
in 1633 to recant his support of the Copernican theory of
the solar system. But many of these students do not know
that this censorious autocracy, which the church arrogated
to itself, was not based on any biblical pronouncement,
but rather, on a fallacious assumption from the teachings
of the second-century Greek astronomer and mathematician,
Ptolemy. He postulated that the earth lay at the center
of the universe with the sun, moon, and other planets revolving
around it. The ecclesiastical hierarchy of the day espoused
this Aristotelian-Ptolemaic cosmology, with its erroneous
conclusion, as being the worldview of the Bible. The Bible,
in fact, states nothing of the kind. Critics have never
allowed the church to forget the Galileo blunder, and have
consistently expelled
it from the halls of academic credibility.
In
other words the rash church leaders of the day followed a
philosopher's theory to refute a scientist's theory,
but this was not a Biblical interpretation that they were
using!
We
would do well, therefore, when setting up apparently opposite
views, to ensure the validity of both, and for those of us
who are Christians, we would do well to ensure that the Bible
does actually say something and we are not relying purely
upon our interpretation.
Similarly
scientists would do well not to attack Biblical interpretations
but only consider factual statements of the Bible.
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| 6.
Can't Religious Experience be Explained by Scientific Explanations?
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Answer:
a)
An Example of Scientific reporting
Example:
The Question of the Brain
An
example of this difficulty was seen in the reporting of neurotheology
- the role that the brain plays in religious experience
- in early 2003.
Here
are some extracts from a slightly unwise reporting in the
Times on April
17, 2003 by Anjana Ahua:
God
on the brain: is religion just a step away from mental illness?
(Referring
to discoveries about neurotheology) "They
imply that the brain created God, not the other way round;
that religious leaders throughout history were touched not
by supreme beings but by mental illness; that moments of serenity
common to ardent believers of all faiths are simply hiccups
in brain chemistry. The findings suggest that our attitudes
to religion are underpinned by biology"
Put
in its simplest form, scientists were reported as having identified
certain brain patterns or behaviours with known religious
experience.
[Remember,
science, we have said, is the 'knowledge acquired by careful
observation'.]
Watch
this carefully: what they were suggesting (quite possibly
correctly - we don't know how careful and accurate their investigations
were - but let's assume they were right!) was that:
Now
the two things are quite different. They are:
1.
Experiencing God creates certain brain patterns.
2.
Certain brain patterns create an experience that might be
akin to
that expected by some form of spiritual
or religious encounter.
b)
An Example of Scientific Interpretation
But
have you realised what we are doing?
We are arguing about
the interpretation of the observable facts.
How
we interpret them will NOT depend on science, but will depend
on the presuppositions we have about life and experience already.
If
we are a scientist who already does not believe in the existence
of God, then possibility no.1 above, HAS to be ruled out.
Yes,
they may be able to stimulate the brain in a variety of ways
to create similar emotions or psychological experiences to that
experienced by a genuine encounter with God, but then we know
that any genuine human experience can be duplicated or falsified.
If
our scientist was a believer in God, he might say, "Oh
this is interesting. We've simply found another human experience
that occurs when there is an encounter with God, just another
one among the many physical / mental / emotional things that
can take place in such an encounter."
Science
can only provide the observable information in such cases.
What then follows is personal interpretation which is NOT
made on the basis of that information, but upon a whole range
of other factors, as we'll see below.
Lesson:
When you read of such 'scientific
discoveries' learn to distinguish between the observable phenomena
and the assumptions about what cause those phenomena or the
meaning behind them.
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| 7.
Is there a War between Science and Religion? |
Answer:
Under
Question 5 above, we cited Ravi Zacharias' comments in respect
of Galileo. The folly of the past revealed there is that past
church leaders went to war on a wrong foundation - a philosophical
one, not a theological one. 
If
you listen to atheists like Richard Dawkins, yes there is
a war, but if you listen to many other scientists, the answer
is no. Perhaps Dawkins does exactly the opposite and yet does
the same thing - uses a wrong foundation of belief, but in
this case it is one that does not understand theology.
Within
this section, Chapter 2 of Alister McGrath's
book, The Dawkins Delusion (which we have already
quoted above) is particularly useful, from which we quote
below, and thoroughly recommend you get if you want to think
these things through more fully.
McGrath
quotes atheist scientist Stephen Jay Gould
who, in his his book, Rock of Ages, speaking about
the fact that many scientists are believers in God, says,
"Either
half of my colleagues are enormously stupid, or else the
science of Darwinism is fully compatible with conventional
religious beliefs - and equally compatible with atheism."
In
this McGrath was simply repeating what he had said in the Introduction
of his book where he wrote:
"Though
an atheist, Gould was absolutely clear that the natural sciences
- including evolutionary theory - were consistent with both
atheism and conventional religious belief. Unless half his
scientific colleagues were total fools - a presumption that
Gould rightly dismissed as nonsense, whichever half it applied
to - there could be no other responsible way of making sense
of the varied responses to reality on the part of the intelligent,
informed people that he knew."
McGrath also refers to the fact that in 1916, active scientists
were asked if they believed in a God who communicates. The results
were 40% who did believe in this kind of God, 40% who didn't,
and 20% who were unsure. This survey was repeated in 1997 with
exactly the same question and now 40% believed, 45% didn't believe
and 15% were unsure.
From this it is very obvious that, even in this age when people
such as Richard Dawkins would have us believe faith in God is
on the way out, the facts show that is far from the truth.
McGrath
makes two further points. First that the question was very specific
about a God who communicates and so that ruled out a lot who
believed in a deity but beyond our contact, so the 40% and later
45% who said no, would actually include others who did believe
in God but not to this degree.
His second point was that,
"Most
unbelieving scientists of my acquaintance are atheists on
grounds other than science; they bring those assumptions
to their science rather than basing them on
their science."
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| 8.
So how can the Natural World be Interpreted? |
Answer:
If
many scientists are NOT atheists, it suggests that they must
be able to view the world in different ways
Alister
McGrath - The Dawkins Delusion:
"Some 'read' or 'interpret' nature in
an atheistic way. Others 'read' it in a deistic
way, seeing it as pointing to a creator divinity, who is no
longer involved in its affairs. God winds up the clock and
then leaves it to work on its own. Others
take a more specific Christian view, believing in a God who
both creates and sustains. Others take a
more spiritualized view, speaking more vaguely of some 'life
force'."
He
continues:
"The point is simple: nature is open to many legitimate
interpretations. It can be interpreted in atheist, deist,
theist and many other ways - but it does not demand to be
interpreted in any of these. One can be a 'real' scientist
without being committed to any specific religious, spiritual
or anti-religious view of the world"
In
other words, as we have said previously, it is the presuppositions
with which we come to science, that determine our outlook, not
the science.
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9.
Do Scientists Jump to Conclusions?
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Answer:
Example:
See the Question of Genetics
The
early part of the 21st century has seen incredible leaps forward
in the whole area of genetics.
It
seems a month rarely goes by without headlines proclaiming
that a certain behaviour is now found to have a genetic cause.
If
you have THIS particular gene then you will be disposed (forced)
to behave in this particular way, is what is being said.
Now
note again exactly what is being said here:
"In
people with this particular gene, we observe this particular
behaviour".
Again,
that is the "knowledge acquired by careful observation"
part of the equation. This particular one is more difficult
and science will no doubt get more and more refined in this
area.
Think
some more about this:
To
quote the Telegraph newspaper back in April 1999,
"The
enormity of the task is hard to grasp. Wading through the
genetic code distributed in the 46 chromosomes that lie in
every cell, scientists must read every letter of the code,
known as a base, and understand the 100,000 or so genes which
combine to produce the mammoth encyclopedia that constitutes
a human."
A
hundred thousand or so genes and we are attributing behaviour
to one? Perhaps not!
Then
the language changes sometimes to:
"people with this gene are disposed to act in
this manner".
Now
this comes down to language that the psychologist or the pastor
understand. We are all disposed to be self-centred, we
are all disposed to get angry when we are thwarted. The
Bible is full of 'negative behaviours' that we are disposed
towards, but that doesn't mean to say that we HAVE to be like
that.
We
actually know that with the exception of fairly rare cases,
the vast majority of us have choices at every turn in life.
Whether to smile at someone or scowl. Whether to
tell the truth or a lie. We know by our experience that
we can genuinely make these choices. (the Determinist who says
we are predetermined to act in a particular way flies against
every sense that we have, and also cannot ever prove his assertion)
So,
'scientific language' that says people HAVE to act in certain
ways because of having a certain gene, is actually unscientific.
It is an interpretation of the facts.
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| 10.
Don't Scientists Need Ethical Standards that
only the Faith Community can Provide? |
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Answer:
This
is the problem of deciding what to do with
the information or "knowledge acquired by careful observation."
We
have found out much about how life 'works' and indeed, how to
change things, but then comes the question, SHOULD we do this
or that? This is the area of ethics.
For
example, science can provide the basic information of 'how'
but it cannot tell you:
-
if
carrying out an abortion is wrong
-
if
using stem-cell cloning for spare parts is wrong
-
if separating Siamese twins so one of them dies is
wrong
These
are questions outside of the "careful observation
producing knowledge" process.
The
science of nuclear technology is neutral. It can be used for
good (producing power) or for harm (producing nuclear weapons).
The
United States produced the weapons that killed millions in
Japan on the basis of one evil to prevent a bigger evil.
That's
all we're left with in a Fallen World sometimes, but the decision
to proceed with that research was an ethical one.
Increasingly cries
are made for greater controls on scientists at the forefront
of new developments.
Is
their work energised by the profit motive? Is it being
done partly to gain personal fame?
And
because, in the human equation, those less than perfect motivations
are frequently present, should decisions as to what is done
with the information they are producing, be left to them.
These
are the dilemmas of modern science, and answers will often NOT
come from the scientific information, but from the world-view
that the individual holds.
In
a society where moral restraints are being removed, because
THE one sure secure base (a belief in and submission to God)
is being removed, the future is worrying.
As
will be argued elsewhere, remove God from the equation and anything
goes ethically – as history has clearly shown.
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