The Prime Assumption
Over at Salon Karl Giberson has written about the similarity between certain scientific atheists and religious fundamentalists:
After summarizing what we know about origins in elegant but breathtakingly speculative prose, [Oxford chemist Peter] Atkins borrows biblical language to address the deep question implied by his title: "In the beginning there was nothing. Absolute void, not merely empty space. There was no space; nor was there time, for this was before time. The universe was without form and void."Eventually, as we journey with Atkins, stuff happens -- stars, planets, life, people, music, art, magazines. But how did it start? How did the universe go from being "without form and void" to this fascinating place we see today? "By chance" says Atkins, "there was a fluctuation."
Excuse me, Rev. Atkins, but could you please be just a bit more specific? Can you tell me what you mean by "absolute void"? Is that an empirical, testable concept? It sounds suspiciously like a metaphor for something in which you want to believe. As a matter of fact, the suggestion that nothing can naturally fluctuate into everything sounds a lot like a faith statement on a par with belief in God.
Agreed. This is very much the point I was making in my post "The Miracle."
There remains, however, an important distinction between scientists and religious fundamentalists. Phil touched on it earlier this week in his post "Things We'll Never Understand" - scientists assume that there are no things we'll never understand.
Even if that assumption turns out to be wrong on some big question some day, it has proven to be very valuable way of looking at the universe. A thousand years ago the typical European lived in a world that was assumed to be beyond reckoning. Science has so prevailed against that wall of ignorance that people like Richard Dawkins now assume that you can't be a serious scientist and possess any faith at all.
But whether a scientist takes her God anthropomorphic or Einsteinian is of no importance as to the question of her seriousness. If a scientists assumes that understanding is always possible, and that there are no lines of inquiry too sacred to pursue *, then that scientist is serious... even if she goes to church on Sunday.
To assume otherwise is just religious bigotry.
* Saying that there are no lines of inquiry too sacred to pursue is not the same as saying that we shouldn't consider the ethics of an experiment. Scientists might learn much by dissecting a living human brain, but it shouldn't be done.
In cases like that scientists just have to use different means to continue their inquiry.
Comments
Ultimately, I think belief in God is a side issue (for science.) The issue isn't theology, which arguably* lies permanently outside the purview of scientific inquiry, but teleology, which arguably does not. While some atheists accept that there may be design principles underlying our universe, and some believers hold to a hands-off God whose universe is indistinguishable from one that occurred randomly, these folks are the outliers. One day, science might tell us that our universe is, in fact, a completely artificial construct -- but we'll have to come to that realization around the biases of both believing and atheist scientists. The former don't want any designer who isn't God; the latter don't want any designer, period. Still, if the universe turns out to be designed, and this fact is ultimately knowable, I'm confident that we'll get there eventually. And then the argument shifts to the origin of this greater context in which both we and the designer(s) of our universe exist. Where did that come from? Did God create that?
Turtles all the way down at that point.
* And arguably lies within the bounds of science, too.
Posted by: Phil Bowermaster | August 1, 2008 08:36 AM
Hi Stephen, thanks for this post. I see the point you're making.
As for a quibble, Einstein didn't believe in any sort of God, and in fact had harsh words for those that do. This was revealed earlier this year in a personal letter of his that came to light.
Posted by: Michael Anissimov | August 1, 2008 06:32 PM
I think the letter showed Einstein to be hard on religion ("childish superstition"), but he more than once made the point that he didn't believe in a personal God. That seems an odd distinction to make for someone who doesn't believe in any sort of God.
In the letter, he said that he considered the word God "an expression of human weakness," but once when asked if he was an atheist, he said, "I'm not an atheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn't know what that is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the most intelligent human toward God."
He also wrote, "That deeply emotional conviction of a presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God."
(Found those quotes here.)
So with Einstein you have non-atheistic (although not really theistic) reverence for order in the universe coupled with disdain for religion and belief in a personal God. Apparently, the man didn't like to be pigeonholed.
I can totally relate! :-)
Posted by: Phil Bowermaster | August 1, 2008 11:10 PM
Michael:
I don't think we disagree. I was using "Einsteinian God" as the opposite end from "anthropomorphic God" on a spectrum.
It appears that Einstein used the word God as a metaphor.
Phil:
With belief in God I think its quite possible to go back and forth.
Had there been a First Church of No-God around, I doubt Einstein would have been a deacon. He might have popped in for the No-Easter sermon or the No-Christmas music special, but regular attendance... I don't see it. If he was an atheist he was shaky about it.
Posted by: Stephen Gordon | August 2, 2008 06:55 AM
We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn't know what that is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the most intelligent human toward God.
Posted by: bedroom furniture | March 30, 2009 08:55 AM