How Can I Believe in God and Science?
Series: How Can I Believe?
Brad Bailey – May 20, 2018
Intro
We are continuing in our series entitled: How Can I Believe? We are engaging the questions that can arise in the process of believing in Christ.
So in the recent past weeks we have engaged the questions of How can I believe in God…in the Bible…in the historical Jesus… in there being any distinct truth… in the nature of a good God amidst a world in which there is suffering. And today we are going to engage the question:
How Can I Believe in God and Science?
Or perhaps more accurately…
How Can I Reconcile Biblical Faith with Scientific Discovery?
I want to clearly note that I have no expertise in any of the many disciplines of the sciences. Over the past week I have been engaging lots of thoughts by others…and so I come today feeling very stupid.
The relationship between Biblical revelation and scientific discovery is a rather interesting one. For most would agree that it was Biblical revelation becoming available to the masses that created a foundation for understanding that the world was created with intent and order. To those who had perceived a world run by capricious gods or whom the world was perhaps a playground for their vanities…to discover that there was one true living God who had made the world with order…for the purpose of loving… gave a new perspective to everything. Superstition gave way to exploring rational understanding and order. This affirmed the exploration of the nature of the cosmos and the human body.
All the greatest minds and discoveries were led by those for whom God was the center of life. [1a]
Sir Francis Bacon (1561-1627) whom many consider the father of science… was a philosopher who is known for establishing the scientific method of inquiry based on experimentation and inductive reasoning. He saw where a separation between such science and the larger reality could take place. The observer could lose their sense of depth.
"It is true, that a little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion; for while the mind of man looketh upon second causes scattered, it may sometimes rest in them, and go no further; but when it beholdeth the chain of them confederate, and linked together, it must needs fly to Providence and Deity." - Sir Francis Bacon (1561-1627)
Shortly before him was a man named Nicholas Copernicus.
Copernicus was the Polish astronomer who put forward the first mathematically based system of planets going around the sun. His works were further implored by the younger Galileo… in the mid 1500s.
Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543)
“To know the mighty works of God, to comprehend His wisdom and majesty and power, to appreciate, in degree, the wonderful working of His laws, surely all this must be a pleasing and acceptable mode of worship to the Most High, to whom ignorance cannot be more gratifying than knowledge.”
The tragedy is that the Catholic Church felt challenged by ideas that did not fit what it’s earth centered ideas…and as a result…a conflict began. And the conflict was not rooted in any essential difference…but in holding on to misguided ideas.
This would arise at various points…and most notably around the issue of origins ….who and how was the world created.
As Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution gained notoriety… it seemed to challenge the very foundation of Biblical revelation… as it described a process the was long…and followed “natural laws.”
And a culture war between those who felt they were defending God…and those who felt they were defending facts.
There lies the great deception: that what is at hand is a matter of faith verses facts.
And so today many see the medical and technological advances achieved through science and are grateful for them. Many may be drawn to many things about the Christian faith, but, they say, “I don’t see how I can believe the Bible if that means I have to reject science.”
We may assume…these are two forces that pull in different directions.
However, there are many who see something quite false in this separation. [1b]
One of those is…
John Polkinghorne - famous as a physicist at Cambridge University for his work in explaining the existence of quarks and gluons, the world’s smallest known particles. He had won heaps of awards in his 27 years there, including membership in Britain’s Royal Society, one of the highest honors that can be bestowed on a scientist. He said….“When you say that you’re a scientist and a Christian, people sometimes give you a funny look, as if you’d said, ‘I’m a vegetarian butcher.’
But Polkinghorne…was re-taking the wide space in which faith and science once shared.
“Many people out there think science and religion are actually at war with each other, but I believe that science and religion are friends, not foes.”
The remarkable insights that science affords us into the intelligible workings of the world cry out for an explanation more profound than that which itself can provide. Religion, if it is to take seriously its claim that the world is the creation of god, must be humble enough to learn from science what that world is actually like. The dialogue between them can only be mutually enriching. [2]
He is describing the wide space in which there each can be valid and validating of the other.
Of all the questions that we are engaging through this series… the relationship between science and faith can strike people quite differently. I find that this is where the difference in personal backgrounds and dispositions can lead to very different ways of engaging the potential tension.
It’s like seeing two lives getting into a fight…and your reaction depends on the relationship you have with each. Some really identify with one…and tend to feel negatively toward the other… some like both and see something senseless about the fight.
Suggest a broader range of postures…
Postures Regarding Science and Faith
Note that neither extreme actually operates as the only sphere.
Those who may deem that only the spiritual is real… often rooted more in some eastern worldviews.. more focused on the mystical… still take medicines… operate everyday based on deductions being made in the physical world.
At the other extreme is purely secular naturalistic or materialistic view. This position holds that physical matter and energy are the only fundamental realities of the universe. Therefore, the scientific method is the only reliable path to genuine knowledge. Materialists start with science, but then make broad philosophical and theological claims that cannot be supported by the science. Materialists lives engage non-material nature (love, etc)
Most lives actually live with an inclination towards one or the other. It may be based on cultural background… personal disposition.
It may be helpful to consider what you background and disposition draws you to on this spectrum.
I see a larger space in the middle… a more open space in which the material and spiritual reality are not separated…not in conflict.
It is not a matter of seeing “two worlds” as if the physical and spiritual are completed distinct… hermetically sealed and separated from one another.
NOTABLY the two can and should understand that they presume different assumptions. One tried to focus on the material world… though it may have or make implications for the spiritual…and one is about a relationship with God who is Spirit… transcendent source of the material. Science can consider what the nature of the universe tells us about a potential source…and spiritual beliefs can consider how we should relate to the material world.
I believe that what God created is one reality with physical and spiritual dimensions. When we stand before creation… explore creation… we are engaging what is a relational context.
We do not have to choose between an anti-science religion or an anti-religious science.
God created a physical space that is created with relational purpose.
The conflict is more a reflection of presupposition and posture…than factual.
Before speaking to this further as a pastor…I thought it would be valuable for you to hear from two of your own community whose lives are immersed in the world of science.
Both are brilliant… accomplished… in their fields. Both love science…and love God.
VIDEO two Westside Vineyard members…sharing how they see the integration of science and faith.
• Cory Hogaboam - B.S. in Zoology and PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Calgary. Professor in Pathology at the University of Michigan Medical School. Currently leads new lab at Cedars-Sinai focused on elucidating innate and adaptive immune mechanisms that drive chronic lung diseases at. Serves on the editorial board of several biomedical journals and has authored or co-authored approximately 238 peer-reviewed manuscripts and 32 book chapters.
• Timothy S. Fisher – PhD from Cornell University. Expert in the application of nanotechnologies. Former Professor at Purdue University and Director of Nanoscale Transport Research. Currently Professor of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at UCLA. Winner of numerous awards in engineering and nanotechnologies.
[Following the video…]
What I enjoy so much about Cory and Tim…is that they love God and science (… and their wives I might add.)
They are not only unafraid to explore…. they do so with the joy of being connected to the source of it all. As Tim said…it’s like one does through music or literature.
They are enjoying the space in which science and faith can share.
So… What can serve such a space…a space in which we can love God and science?
1. Biblical faith and science mutually affirm a world with order.
The whole basis for modern science was we can do these investigations, we can make these explorations, we can ask these questions because it’s not a chaotic, irrational universe. And this is a common foundation of faith and science.
We can find principles, we can find laws, we can find things that govern the universe, we can explore.
The conflict arises not in what is found…but in what one chooses to credit it to. One may not only call them “natural laws” but insist that they have no origin…and another may believe that they are designed…and come from God. And many see that which is worthy of faith in an intelligent source. For many, what is discovered belies a belief in randomness and chaos.
JOHN HORGAN is Director of the Center for Science Writings at Stevens Institute of Technology …and former senior writer at Scientific American,
“Science and religion converge in one important way. The more scientists investigate our origins, the more improbable our existence seems. If you define a miracle as an infinitely improbable event, then our existence, you might say, is a miracle. Scientists try in vain to hand-wave our improbability away with silly tautologies.” [3]
Dr. Francis Collins - is a physician-geneticist who discovered the genes associated with a number of diseases and led the Human Genome Project that completed the reading of the 3.1 billion letters of our human DNA. Appointed by President Obama to as the Director of the National Institutes of Health. He declared,
“As a believer, I see DNA, the information molecule of all living things, as God's language, and the elegance and complexity of our own bodies and the rest of nature as a reflection of God's plan. Faith is reason plus revelation, and the revelation part requires one to think with the spirit as well as with the mind. You have to hear the music, not just read the notes on the page. Can a scientist believe in miracles like the resurrection? Actually, I find no conflict here, and neither apparently do the 40 percent of working scientists who claim to be believers. I have found there is a wonderful harmony in the complementary truths of science and faith. The God of the Bible is also the God of the genome. God can be found in the cathedral or in the laboratory. By investigating God's majestic and awesome creation, science can actually be a means of worship.” [4]
So many new discoveries are adding wonder…and suggest that our existence points to a world beyond time and space.
…But what about biological development? Does one have to choose between accepting evolution of denying it?
2. Biblical faith and science each hold more open possibilities for understanding the nature of creation than those often presumed as irreconcilable.
I find freedom to enjoy the space that can be shared by faith and science because of how I view the Scriptures…and how I view science. Let me first explain how I view Scripture as allowing wider space for understanding the process of creation.
I believe that the Bible is God’s Word… and that it is inspired by God…and is without error in the foundational truth God intended it to convey.
As I have noted before…the fundamental nature of what it means to “believe” or trust in the Bible, is to believe and trust in God’s ability to accommodate human understanding. [5]
I believe that God, as the infinite creator of all, is able to engage and ultimately enter human history… and communicate to finite and flawed human life… bound within the limits of human culture, understanding, language, and historical transmission… that which he deems essential for the redemption and restoration of all things.
Illustration: If you were to tell a child it’s time to get up because the sun came up…are you telling the truth? Technically no. The sun did not come up… the earth rotated in such a way that the sun came into view. But from the limited perspective we have… it is fitting and makes no difference to the point being made. One should get up.
You could not have conveyed the entire cosmological process…but that was not the point.
So we have to be thoughtful about how we read the first chapters of the Book of Genesis … the first book of the Bible. It begins with declaring that “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth…” and then speaks of six stages or days…and then in the second chapter gives another form or account.
It is not merely a matter of trying to reconcile the Biblical account of creation with the possibility of some evolutionary process. Rather it’s a matter of considering what the account of Genesis is intended to tell us.
It is clearly intended to convey truth…but it clearly isn’t interested in providing a scientific cosmology.
There are…
Different views about how the early chapters of Genesis 1-11 are to be read.
• All strictly literal
• Genesis 1 as “semi-poetical summary” followed by historical account (Though notably ancient writing of history commonly used much compression and figurative language, to speak of events that actually happened.)
• Genesis 1-3 as “semi-poetical summary” followed by historical account. - Genesis 1 to 3 is poetic in nature… using that term only in a broad sense… to speak of it capturing actual truth in a way that is more about what than how… summary than a discourse.
• Genesis 1-11 as more a “mythological or symbolic version” of actual early history
I state these to note that those who truly receive the Scriptures as authoritative have different perspectives on how we are to interpret these first chapters which summarize creation… what is usually referred to as “the Fall” of human nature… and the initial depravity which leads to a flood.
It is not simply a matter of accommodating one’s views to match up with the current beliefs in evolution. It is a matter of realizing the enormity of an infinite creator communicating to a finite being. The more I allow myself to grasp that, the more I allow myself to hear truth in what I can understand is a simplified finite form. It is this understanding that leads me to realize that some of the ways things in the Bible are described…are probably more ways of accommodating or conveying to common human perceptions.
• I don’t think heaven is literally “up” nor hell “down.” I think they speak of realms entirely outside our realm…but I understand that it is common to speak in these terms.
• I don’t feel certain that the roads in heaven will actually be paved with gold. They may be…but I can certainly understand if that is a way to convey that which is beyond my imaginations. (Revelation 21:21)
• In the same way, I have come to realize…how much more should I presume that I should not force a literal nature into every aspect of description of creation…especially given it’s obvious poetic summation and symbolism?
I believe we should read the Bible literally…when that is clearly what is intended. But I understand that there is a cultural bias to what we want. We in our western culture have been shaped by Greek and Latin thinking which values wanting to define and explain…but Hebrew culture was focused on the purpose and meaning of something. This is what we find affirmed…as the Apostle Paul declared…
Colossians 1:16-17 (MSG)
For everything… got started in him and finds its purpose in him. He was there before any of it came into existence and holds it all together right up to this moment.
So in regards to how I best understand and read the initial chapters of Genesis … my best sense is that Genesis 1 is given as a semi-poetic summary … and Genesis 2 then provides a more historic explanation …but with some degree of symbolic language.
Why? Let me mention a few reasons…
• Genesis 1’s prose is extremely unusual. It has refrains, repeated statements that continually return as they do in a hymn or song. There are many examples, including the seven-time refrain, “and God saw that it was good” as well as ten repetitions of “God said”, ten of “let there be”, seven repetitions of “and it was so,” as well as others. Obviously, this is not the way someone writes in response to a simple request to tell what happened. In addition, the terms for the sun (“greater light”) and moon (“lesser light”) are highly unusual and poetic, never being used anywhere else in the Bible, and “beast of the field” is a term for animal that is ordinarily confined to poetic discourse.
• The word used in the original Hebrew language for “day” is the Hebrew word “Yom,” which while it can mean a 24-hour solar day, ...it can also mean a segment of time, anywhere from weeks to a year, to several years, to an age, or even an era.
We use the word “day” in a similar way today. When we say, it sure was different in our grandparents day.”
The use of the word “day” in Genesis could have stood for any period of time - even indefinite periods.
It was a literary device, not a scientific declaration.
• This might help explain how it describes the sun being created on the fourth day… which would further suggests that the reference to previous “days” were not solar based 24 hour days.
So what does this mean?
It means nothing in the Bible clearly precludes the universe being about 13.8 billion years old, and the earth about 4.5 billion years old, which are currently the best estimates of science. [7]
It means that Gad may have created the world… over time… in some evolutionary manner.
Believing that evolution happened as a biological process does not necessarily mean that one has to embrace the “Grand Theory of Evolution” involving naturalism and social Darwinism.
And just as the Scriptures offer a wider potential…so does science when it is separated from various presumptions…
Separating Actual Science from Human Presumption
Science has discovered clear signs of adaptation.
Science has discovered clear signs that creation had a monumental start.
Science has not discovered anything relating to our ultimate source… or ultimate meaning. It comes to the mystery of what transcends our nature of space and time…but not what or who that may be.
I don’t see any conflict between Biblical faith and the fundamental nature of science.
What I see as a problem has nothing to do with science itself…but rather with the defiant pride and presumption that human nature can bring. The problem is not with the basic nature of science but with the loss of proper perspective.
David Berlinski, A secular Jew…is an acclaimed author who has spent his career writing about mathematics and the sciences. He confronted the assumptions being made… and dared to call it out. He wrote:
• “Has anyone provided a proof of God’s inexistence? Not even close.
• Has quantum cosmology explained the emergence of the universe or why it is here? Not even close.
• Is there a narrow and oppressive orthodoxy of thought and opinion within the sciences? Close enough.
• Does anything in the sciences or in their philosophy justify the claim that religious belief is irrational? Not even ballpark.
• Is scientific atheism a frivolous exercise in intellectual contempt? Dead on.” [8]
The truth is that every field of academic or creative discipline has a self-validating nature. There is a tendency to circle up and validate how much we know or how substantial it is. What is lost is our most basic perspective.
We have lost of our most basic sense of limited knowledge.
The wisdom of the great minds of the past was:
“The more you know, the more you know you don't know.”
It was common to hear that truth stated even thirty years ago …but that basic insight seems to have faded over the past ten years.
So let me ask some simple questions:
• Was anyone here at the start of existence?
• Was anyone who speaks with certainty about our origins at the start of existence?
• If we are ultimately able to actually get a human life all the way to the planet Mars… will we gain much perspective on the scope of the universe?
• Will we gain much perspective on the scope of ultimate reality?
Whatever our disposition… I would encourage this last point…
3. Remember who we are.
We are finite creatures… standing in a finite point in time… with finite abilities to understand reality.
We do well to remember what God said to Job…
Job 38:4 (GW)
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have such insight.”
Let’s pray…
Resources: The topics of science and faith is broad in both the topics involves and the viewpoints that can be made. The following provide a few potential resources for those who would like to explore more.
A listing of articles developed through Patheos on Sconce and Faith – http://www.patheos.com/blogs/jesuscreed/science-and-faith/
General ideas from a more recent voice – Mike McHargue… “Science Mike” – http://mikemchargue.com/about/
Creation, Evolution, and Christian Laypeople – by Tim Keller - https://biologos.org/resources/scholarly-articles/creation-evolution-and-christian-laypeople
In this article, Tim Keller presents that which at least supports the possibility of theistic evolution. In light of his popularity among Evangelicals with a high view of Scripture, this has been a point in which Keller has received some criticism. I believe that theistic evolution does raise several difficult issues which Keller does not address, however I also believe that it should be affirmed as a possibility within orthodox faith.
James Emery White – Sermon “Thinking About God and Science” (C. 2016 Serious Times). For those interested, White also has a series available on “Astrophysics... for people who are open to God” These messages are available at http://www.churchandculture.org/media.asp
Can God and science share the same space?| Bryan Enderle | TEDxACCD
Presentation by UC Davis Chemistry professor
Science & Faith -- Dr. James Tour – a good example of one having love of science and faith
How was the Genesis account of creation interpreted before Darwin?
Is Genesis 1-3 Literal? Historical? Poetical? - MAY 9, 2012 | Justin Taylor
Believe in God in 5 Minutes (Scientific Proof) – by Gerald Schroeder of MIT. I cannot speak to the veracity of this presentation… but it appears respectable simple summation of physics related to creation.
A Post-Empirical God by James Emery White - Church and Culture blog - Vol. 11, No. 11
Here White notes that science is currently recognizing that it’s empirical deamnds are too limiting…and that the new ideas about origins and cosmology involve that which cannot be observed… but may fit a larger picture. As such, it is leading back to the very inclusion of the potential belief in God. As he concludes…
It reminds me of those wonderful words penned by Robert Jastrow, who for 20 years was the Director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, as he reflected on the pursuit of ultimate truth:
“For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”
No wonder that post-empirical science is being called “science’s most dangerous idea.”
Why? It may just lead to God.
Notes:
1a. It should be noted that this expansion of the sciences and medicine arose in the Islamic East as well… as Europe was still emerging from the dark ages. The Reformation led to the printing of the Bible for all to read…which become the transforming movement in the west. Regarding the faith of early scientists, a few more quotes…
Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543) Quote used from Copernicus, as cited in Neff 1952, 191-192; and in Hubbard 1905, v).
Also…
"[It is my] loving duty to seek the truth in all things, in so far as God has granted that to human reason."
And
“Not the Grace received by Paul do I desire,
Nor the good will with which Thou forgavest Peter,
Only that which Thou didst grant the thief on the cross,
That mercy I ask of Thee.”
(Copernicus, as cited in Trepatschko 1994, Vol. 44).
Sir Francis Bacon (1561-1627)
Bacon was a philosopher who is known for establishing the scientific method of inquiry based on experimentation and inductive reasoning. He rejected atheism as being the result of insufficient depth of philosophy, stating, "It is true, that a little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion; for while the mind of man looketh upon second causes scattered, it may sometimes rest in them, and go no further; but when it beholdeth the chain of them confederate, and linked together, it must needs fly to Providence and Deity."
A full list can be found at http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/sciencefaith.html
1b. Drawn from Tim Keller – Creation, Evolution, and Christian Laypeople https://biologos.org/resources/scholarly-articles/creation-evolution-and-christian-laypeople
He cites as recommended sources: Denis Alexander: Creation or Evolution-do we have to choose? (Oxford: Monarch Books, 2008.) as a good popular level book by a scientist and notes Christian Smith, ed. The Secular Revolution: Power, Interests, and Conflict in the Secularization of American Public Life (University of California Press, 2003.) and Rodney Stark For the Glory of God : how monotheism led to reformations, science, witch-hunts, and the end of slavery (Princeton: 2003.)
2. John Polkinghorne (1995). “Serious Talk: Science and Religion in Dialogue”, p.75, A&C Black
Elsewhere he states,…“Because people of faith worship the God of Truth, they should welcome truth from whatever source it comes,” Polkinghorne says. “Not all truth comes from science, but some does. It grieves me when I see Christian people turning their backs on science in a willful way, not taking seriously the insights it has to offer. All truth interacts with each other, and all truth is helpful.”
From God vs. Science By: Dean Nelson, Ph.D; In Issue: September/October 2011 - http://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2011/08/16/trends-and-opinions/god-vs-science.html
3. JOHN HORGAN (Scientific American & Stevens Institute of Technology) - https://thestute.com/2015/02/27/can-faith-and-science-coexist/
Similarly, Dr. Stacy Trasancos - Ph.D. chemist who has worked as a chemist at DuPont
“When I accepted faith, I finally had the answer to the biggest question, ‘Why?’ In neuroscience you don’t have an answer for it (in science), so you just turn around and ignore that question. When I found faith and started rigorously studying philosophy and theology, I understood the biggest answer – God created it.”
From – https://clarionherald.org/2017/07/24/foundations-shows-harmony-of-faith-and-science/
“As Terence McKenna observed, “Modern science is based on the principle: ‘Give us one free miracle and we’ll explain the rest.’ The one free miracle is the appearance of all the mass and energy in the universe and all the laws that govern it in a single instant from nothing.”
From Rupert Sheldrake, Morphic Resonance: The Nature of Formative Causation
4. From http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/03/collins.commentary/index.html
5. I believe this is what the testimony within the Bible understood about itself. Consider the words the Apostle Paul wrote to the younger Timothy whom he had mentored:
2 Timothy 3:15-17 (HCSB)
From childhood you have known the sacred Scriptures, which are able to give you wisdom for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
The Scriptures are “inspired”… that means that ultimately what they are bring forth emanates from God…they bring forth that which is from God.
And they are able to fulfill a purpose.
The Word of God has the purpose and power to know the One who saves … who can lead us towards becoming “complete” (who we were meant to be)…and able to begin living accordingly.
6. I would follow the line of thought which Tim Keller provides in a great piece on this subject .
Creation, Evolution, and Christian Laypeople – by Tim Keller - https://biologos.org/resources/scholarly-articles/creation-evolution-and-christian-laypeople
Keller notes:
Perhaps the strongest argument for the view that the author of Genesis 1 did not want to be taken literally is a comparison of the order of creative acts in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2. Genesis 1 shows us an order of creation that does not follow a 'natural order' at all. For example, there is light (Day 1) before there are any sources of light--the sun, moon, and stars (Day 4). There is vegetation (Day 3) before there was any atmosphere (Day 4 when the sun was made) and therefore there was vegetation before rain was possible. Of course, this is not a problem per se for an omnipotent God. But Genesis 2:5 says: “When the Lord God made the earth and heavens--and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth, and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, because the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth, and there was no man to work the ground." Although God did not have to follow what we would call a ‘natural order’ in creation, Genesis 2:5 teaches that he did. It is stated categorically: God did not put vegetation on the earth before there was an atmosphere and rain. But in Genesis 1 we do have vegetation before there is any rain possible or any man to till the earth. In Genesis 1 natural order means nothing--there are three 'evenings and mornings' before there is a sun to set! But in Genesis 2 natural order is the norm.
See also: Biblical Reasons to Doubt the Creation Days Were 24-Hour Periods - | Justin Taylor (JANUARY 28, 2015) - https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justin-taylor/biblical-reasons-to-doubt-the-creation-days-were-24-hour-periods/
7. Tim Keller cites: There have been numerous convincing arguments put forth by evangelical Biblical scholars to demonstrate that the genealogies of the Bible, leading back to Adam, are incomplete. The term ‘was the father of’ may mean ‘was the ancestor of’. For just one account of this, see K.A.Kitchen, On the Reliability of the Old Testament, pp.439-443.
8. From David Berlinski, The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions (Basic Books, September 2009)
Regarding the limited nature of what science resolves, consider also:
As John Horgan says…
“Anti-religion scientists such as Dawkins, Lawrence Krauss and Stephen Hawking have overstated science's power to solve all the secrets of the universe. Yes, science has helped us map out the structure and history of reality, from the largest to the smallest scales. And yet the origin of the universe and of life and the nature of consciousness remain paradoxically as mysterious as ever.”
Spanish Philosopher José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955…we need a “big picture”, an “integral idea of the universe”.
“Scientific truth is characterized by its precision and the certainty of its predictions. But science achieves these admirable qualities at the cost of remaining on the level of secondary concerns, leaving ultimate and decisive questions untouched.
For Ortega, the great intellectual virtue of science is that it knows its limits. It only answers questions that it knows it can answer on the basis of the evidence. But as human beings, we want to go further. We need answers to the deeper questions that we cannot avoid asking.
Peter Brian Medawar, the 1960 Nobel Prize winner in the field of immunology, wrote:
“That there is indeed a limit upon science is made very likely by the existence of questions that science cannot answer and that no conceivable advance of science would empower it to answer… It is not to science, therefore but to metaphysics, imaginative literature or religion that we must turn for answers to questions having to do with first and last things.”
? Peter Medawar, The Limits of Science at -wjastore / December 20, 2013
