"Anyone approaching the Resurrection accounts in the belief that he knows what rising from the dead means will inevitably misunderstand those accounts and will then dismiss them as meaningless" (p. 243).

In fact, if Jesus' Resurrection were "merely" coming back to life in any way that we might comprehend, then it would be of little significance.

"Now it must be acknowledged that if in Jesus' Resurrection we were dealing simply with the miracle of a resuscitated corpse, it would ultimately be of no concern to us" (p. 243).

So what then does Resurrection mean? For Benedict it represents a new dimension of reality breaking through into human experience. It is not a violation of the old; it is the manifestation of something new.

"Jesus had not returned to a normal human life in this world like Lazarus and the others whom Jesus raised from the dead. He has entered upon a different life, a new life -- he has entered the vast breadth of God himself..." (p. 244).

Because it is something entirely new, it cannot represent a violation of natural law as understood by science.

"Naturally there can be no contradiction of clear scientific data. The Resurrection accounts certainly speak of something outside our world of experience. They speak of something new, something unprecedented -- a new dimension of reality that is revealed. What already exists is not called into question. Rather we are told that there is a further dimension, beyond what was previously known. Does that contradict science? Can there really only ever be what there has always been? Can there not be something unexpected, something unimaginable, something new? If there really is a God, is he not able to create a new dimension of human existence, a new dimension of reality altogether?" (p. 246-7)

Thus, in this view, Resurrection (as with all true miracles) is not contrary to science, but an indicator that science does not (yet?) describe the full expanse of reality. Indeed, some may argue that science itself contains similar "indicators." The 11 (or so) dimensional universe required by some versions of string theory, the multiverse theory of the universe where ours is but one of an infinite array of universes with variable physical laws, quantum entanglements, "spooky" action at a distance, the mysterious emergence of consciousness from inorganic matter -- all push the limits of human reason and imagination, suggesting to some that reality may be far more complex than the human mind can grasp.

For a moment, let us entertain the possibility that Resurrection is as Benedict interprets it: not a violation of natural law but an indicator of something beyond our scientific understanding of the universe. This has interesting implications for understanding how believers and skeptics approach the issue. If Resurrection does not violate science, then science does not necessarily constitute an impediment to accepting the reality of Resurrection. If the difference between the skeptic and believer is not science, then is it just a matter of imagination? The believer imagines greater possibilities for the universe than the non-believer. While this is possible, it seems questionable. To my knowledge, no research has found differences in imaginative abilities between religious and non-religious people. Moreover, contrarian examples easily come to mind: Isaac Asimov was an atheist but hardly lacking in imagination when it came to science fiction. I tend to think that both believers and non-believers can imagine (with varying degrees of effort, I'm sure) the new possibilities implied by Resurrection.

Thus, if it is neither imagination nor science that prompts skepticism about Resurrection, then what is left? I suggest that it comes down to a question of authority: At what point does one allow imaginative possibilities to have authority over how one lives? To the believer, Resurrection has an authority that science fiction does not. Resurrection is not thought-provoking entertainment. It requires far more than just imagining greater possibilities for the universe. It requires a change of life, here and now. Unlike the microscopic hidden dimensions of string theory, the new dimension implied by Resurrection has "broken though" into everyday reality and demands a response -- even if that response is to actively ignore it.

Now, what convinces the believer that Resurrection merits such authority when other imaginative possibilities such as extraterrestrial life or time-travel do not? The answer here appears to be historical commitment. There's no record of people committing themselves to the point of martyrdom to other imaginative possibilities as they have to Resurrection. The earliest example of such commitment being found, of course, in the dramatic post-crucifixion turn-around of the Apostles. Such an astounding change of heart, followed by an unwavering commitment capable of altering human history demands a categorically unique explanation: Resurrection.

The believer's argument, however, remains unconvincing to the skeptic. However impressive they might be, a change of heart and steadfast commitment do not necessarily add up to a new dimension of reality. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Fair enough. So a key question regarding the interpretation of Resurrection is this: Is the post-crucifixion history of Christianity extraordinary? Does it compel the dispassionate observer to concede that a categorically unique event could plausibly be its best explanation?

It ought to be upon questions such as those above that skeptics and believers respectfully engage one another, rather than the simplistic and often acrimonious sloganeering that has increasingly become the norm.

“This is 2,300 year old wisdom from the Book of Ecclesiastes that seems to very concisely understand the water cycle. That water evaporates from the ocean, gets stored in the atmosphere via clouds, comes down as snow or rain, and when it comes down on the mountain it’s often stored there, as snow is gathered via groundwater, streams, and rivers, and then through the river, returns to the ocean, again. What a beautiful, complex, interdependent, wonderfully mysterious way of providing water, life to the land … But what does this beautiful system teach us, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, about who we are? What is your word, God, about this river, that runs through the center of where we live?”

In this sermon, Pastor Jon Van Sloten of New Hope Church in Calgary, Alberta, describes how he set out to learn where the water from the Bow River, near their home in the Rocky Mountains, actually comes from. He interviewed scientists who study hydrology and have learned a curious truth about how this particular river keeps a steady flow the full year round. This modulating geophysical “safeguard,” which allows the Rocky Mountains to hold water and let it out at a slow trickle rather than a deluge during the annual snowmelt, speaks to Van Sloten of God’s grace at work in the world—grace we can’t see with the naked eye, but is there all the same.

Today, as I write, I am no longer in the desert of southern California, nor in the beech-maple forest of New Hampshire, but on a glacial drumlin in Waubesa Wetlands—a large marsh four miles south of Madison, Wisconsin. Here Ruth and I have our home, and here I study creatures whose watery habitats my neighbors and I have worked to save from eventual destruction. While my desert study site now is covered by a city where people live alone in the land—absent the desert creatures—my wetland study site remains occupied by all kinds of native plants and animals. Embracing it is the Town of Dunn, whose land stewardship plan helps people understand, serve, and maintain this and the other ecosystems. Our town stewardship plan encourages restoration of the landscape, protects agricultural lands, and strives to transmit an intergenerational heritage of secure and wholesome homes, livelihoods, and habitats for the animals, plants, and people that live here. We live largely in harmony and accord.

House-building on slabs poured onto desert sands first alerted me to the question of praxis, the third point on the napkin. But it was later, in my work as organizer of the Waubesa Wetlands Scientific and Agricultural Preserve, and as supervisor and later as chair of the Town of Dunn, that I came to realize that science and ethics do no earthly good unless put into practice. In serving my town, I came to apply what I had learned in the desert: praxis uninformed by science and ethics usually creates more problems than are solved.

“How do you put it all together?” those students in New Hampshire wanted to know. For me, it was building a framework for stewardship that simultaneously considered the questions “How does the world work?” “What is right?” and “What then must we do?” This science-ethics-praxis triad is a framework for living, for learning, for teaching, and most importantly for acting. It is a framework for stewardship.

In order to live and act rightly in the world, we need to know how the world works. We need to know how the systems that sustain us work, and how we interact with them. Without such knowledge we could drown in a flash flood, have our homes undercut by desert winds, cross the street in the path of an oncoming car, or get sick from consuming foods with toxic ingredients. As human beings develop more and more of the world, and as the reach of human actions extends regionally and globally, our knowledge must increase accordingly. This knowledge is not limited to what we acquire from a formal education; it also includes the knowledge we gain from family and friends, and from experience and experiment. In order to live and act rightly in the world, we need to know how the world works.

In order to live and act rightly in the world, we need to know what we ought to do. A century ago, this question was addressed in many colleges across America in a course for graduating seniors on moral philosophy. The purpose of this course was to convict students that they should apply their knowledge for the pursuit of good instead of pursuing self at others’ expense. At my university, this aspect of college education is expressed in a quotation from Abraham Lincoln carved in stone on a bench behind Lincoln’s statue at the top of Bascom Hill: “Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, dare to do our duty.” The question “What is right?” is represented by the ethics corner of our triad. Moving directly from the Science corner to the praxis corner, or from the ethics corner to the praxis corner, proves problematic, even disastrous. Consider the result of going from knowledge of nuclear fission (science) directly to producing and dropping an atomic bomb (praxis), or moving from the belief that death is bad (ethics) to removing dead wood from forests (praxis); both are examples of these disastrous shortcuts.

But knowing the science and observing the ethics of this stewardship framework does absolutely no good if it is not put into practice—placed into service. By themselves, the very best science and the most substantial ethics are no substitutes for action. We need to act appropriately and deliberately in the light of scientific and ethical knowledge. Praxis by itself, without being grounded in science and ethics, results in mere activism—activism that is unlikely to do good and that may produce harm. All three corners of the triad are essential—but not by themselves. Taken together and working interactively, they provide a framework for stewardship.

But will these three operate in dynamic interaction? Will they interact in ways that preserve and achieve the integrity of human life and the environment? The answer depends on what we know and understand about ourselves and the world (science), what we believe we should do (ethics), and what we in fact do, and how we respond to our successes and failures (praxis). It depends on our will, our motivation, our determination, and our dedication to strive for a harmonious world of creatures before their Creator. What might make us strive for such a world?

Part 3 explores the challenge of translating ideals into concrete actions.

Part of the BioLogos mission, then, is to show how all things hold together in Christ—to show how a Christian worldview integrates the knowledge we have of God through the Scriptures with the knowledge we have of God through the other areas in which he reveals himself as Creator and Redeemer. Our website contains a wealth of Christian scholarship in a wide range of fields—from biology, to cosmology, to mathematics, to Biblical studies, to history, to theology—all demonstrating that the best contemporary science is compatible with Biblical Christian faith. But today we introduce a new tool—the BioLogos Navigator—to make these posts more accessible, and to show how they inter-relate (see sidebar on the right).

Modeled on the astrolabes that early astronomers and sailors used to orient themselves under the heavens, our Navigator makes the cross of Christ the starting point by which we understand the cosmos. Each of the four arms of the cross represents one of the domains of knowledge and experience through which God reveals himself to the world: Scripture, the Church, Nature and Culture. These domains are not in opposition to each other, but are complementary and inter-related areas through which we can recognize God at work in the world. Linking these four domains is a network of specific topics relevant to the science and faith conversation. Their arrangement suggests how each relates to the four domains but also to teach other. Clicking on an individual topic tag highlights not only that topic, but other topics that are linked to it—sometimes in unexpected ways.

Clicking a topic tag a second time takes you to the Topic Landing page: a curated selection of the best resources on that subject from the BioLogos archives. (The image above shows the Christianity & Science—Then and Now Landing page, complete with Navigator and highlighted tags.) At the bottom of each page is a link to our Resource Finder, where you can investigate additional materials on that topic, as well. By exploring the relationships between the topics on the Navigator itself, and by delving deep into each topic via the resources presented on the landing pages, readers can focus on specific aspects of the harmony between science and Christian faith while also getting the wide view of God’s providential work in all things in the heavens and on the earth.

In the coming days and weeks, the BioLogos Navigator will be more fully integrated into the rest of the site, accessible directly from the Forum homepage and from the Resources dropdown list at the top of every page. We’ll also be including features that help place each blog post on the “knowledge map” defined by the domains and topic tags. Finally, the Topic Pages will also be periodically updated with the latest and best new materials in each topic. In the meantime, you can access the Navigator by clicking anywhere on the small image in the sidebar, above, and find a link to this post at the upper right corner of our homepage. So take some time to explore our site with this new tool, which we think will to help orient our readers in the science and faith conversation, while always pointing to Jesus, the Christ, through whom all things were made.

Alice in Wonderland, by Lewis Caroll

Theology once held a seat of high regard among the sciences. During the Middle Ages theology was the Queen of the Sciences, and it sat enthroned at the core of academic studies throughout Europe. Many of the great European universities developed from the cathedral schools where theology was the nucleus around which all other study revolved and found its meaning.

The reason for this position of favor was that theology was discussion about – or the study of – God himself. In God, believers found their purpose and very existence. Therefore, God was not a position to be reasoned to; rather, reason flowed from one’s understanding of who God is and his relationship to humanity.

As Queen, theology’s function was not to discover all the answers herself but rather to encourage the other subjects – her subjects – to pursue truth. Math should discover that 2+2=4; biology should discover the mechanism of creation; psychology should discover the role of parent bonding in childhood development; but it was the role of the Queen to give meaning to the truths of her subjects.

In other words, 2+2=4 neither proves nor disproves the Creator, but theology – a profound belief in the Creator – sees the beauty in the ordered world around us. Theology and math are not the same. They answer different questions. But they are not completely separate answers; together they form a more complete answer to each of their individual questions. To quote Stephen Jay Gould, they are “nonoverlapping magesteria” to be certain, but they are also “interdigitating in wondrously complex ways along their joint border. Many of our deepest questions call upon aspects of both for different parts of a full answer” (Gould, “Nonoverlapping Magisteria,” Natural History 106 (March 1997).

It is unfortunate that Gould’s later explanation of these nonoverlapping magesteria left so little room for theology; in a sense, banishing the Queen almost completely to the hinterlands of the academic kingdom. The image of these nonoverlapping magesteria “interdigitating in wondrously complex ways,” however, is still worth considering. This image serves as a reminder that one should not reason from God or theological perspectives to mathematical principles or scientific theories anymore than one should reason from mathematical principles or scientific theories to the existence of God or the non-existence of God. In their “interdigitating,” however, in the beautiful harmonies between theology and the other sciences a fuller answer is given – an answer that provides not only facts but also meaning.

Unfortunately, the history of theology’s reign through the ages is questionable at best. The Queen far too often hampered instead of encouraged the pursuit of truth by her subjects. Today, many put the Queen at direct odds with her subjects, and this has led to a comical and tragic caricature of theology in our current society – a Queen who settles all difficulties, great or small, with the same solution, without bothering to look around, and by yelling, “Off with their heads.”

As Christians, who care deeply for the pursuit of truth, we cannot – and must not – attempt to restore theology to a place of prestige by destroying the work of her subjects or by belittling the work of those who practice them. We must not attempt to settle every difficulty between theology and the other sciences by calling for the heads of others to roll while we bury our own heads in the sand.

Rather, as theologians, whether professional or lay, we must assist theology to ascend to her throne as Queen of the Sciences by encouraging the pursuit of truth in all fields wherever they lead, by humbly entering into discussion with her subjects concerning the truth they discover, and by proclaiming the Truth that gives meaning to all truth – Jesus Christ, our Lord.

George Murphy notes that while the science and theology dialogue has grown considerably in the past 30 years, much of it remains at an academic level. While it provides an important foundation, that alone is not going to do the job that the church needs it to do—to come out in Christian education in parishes, in preaching, in pastoral care, in the social action of the church.

During his seminary education, Dr. Murphy also gained a deeper understanding of Luther’s theology of the cross, and he realized that it’s really the best way to approach the science and theology dialogue. The theology of the cross helps us deal not only with an issue like evolution, and but more generally with the whole question of how God acts in the world and how we know God.

Most science and theology dialogue is restricted to discussion of creation and origins. But at the core of the Gospel of is not simply the doctrine of creation—it’s salvation, it’s the work of Christ in saving humanity and in saving the whole creation.

First posted April 29, 2012

The first video, “10 Questions with Katherine Hayhoe”, introduces the scientist in a brief and lighthearted interview. Hayhoe is presented with 10 questions concerning her personal life and beliefs. When asked, she explains that one thing people should know about Christianity is that having a relationship with the God of the universe is one of the most incredible experiences that a person can have. As the video unfolds, the viewer quickly begins to realize that, despite her unique profession of two seemingly incompatible beliefs, Hayhoe is a remarkably sane and “normal” individual. Her role model, she explains, is her father-- the person who first introduced her to science and showed her that it could be “really cool”. On a more serious note, the scientist admits that being both a scientist and a Christian can be difficult. The most frustrating thing about her position, she says, is the amount of disinformation which is targeted at her very own Christian community.

In the second video, “Climate Change Evangelist”, Katharine Hayhoe delves into deeper discussion of the perceived conflict between climate change and Christian faith. She explains that admitting her identity as a Christian scientist can be uncomfortable. Since evangelicals are the targets of much disinformation concerning science in general -- and specifically the science surrounding climate change -- many people in the church have a misguided view of the subject and do not look kindly at her career choice. One woman encountered by Hayhoe at a church in Texas, for example, believed that global warming was a lie taught in schools to mislead her children. In an effort to realign misguided views like these, Katharine Hayhoe and her husband wrote a book addressing the deep-rooted emotions often associated with climate change. People fear that addressing the climate issue will bring forth changes in the economy and uproot their way of life. However, Hayhoe encourages her viewers to act out of love, as the Bible calls us to do, rather than out of fear. Acting out of love inspires us to consider the poor and disadvantaged people around the globe when we respond to the reality of a changing climate.

In the final segment of this three part video montage, Hayhoe addresses the question of what climate change means. Specifically, she is concerned about how global warming affects people on a personal level. While global warming generally brings to mind melting ice caps and polar bears, its implications are far more widespread, affecting the lives of everyone around the world- from cotton farmers in Texas to public health workers in Chicago. If nothing is done to change current emission levels, the number of days per year which exceed 100 degrees Fahrenheit, for example, will begin to increase dramatically, and if emissions are increased, many areas will even develop extreme conditions like those seen currently in Death Valley. Hayhoe’s goal is to demonstrate clearly that the only way to preserve the world for future generations is to significantly reduce dependence on inefficient means of getting energy and instead transition to cleaner renewable energy sources.

Editor's Note: These videos first appeared on the Nova program "The Secret Life of Scientists & Engineers".

Is it possible to fully understand and practice Scripture without connecting with science? If science reveals God’s attributes, how can we fully relate to Him without some ongoing reference to the information revealed in scientific inquiry? Even more specifically, as preaching pastors, how many are we excluding if we ignore important facets of our congregations’ worldviews?

Now in a collaborative environment like this, it is easy to stay on an intellectual level. But we are pastors who are practitioners, so let me speak personally to get the discussion into the realm of the church world and what may or may not work for you. Some 27 years ago, while exploring whether or not to go to pastor Northland Church, I sensed I’d found kindred spirits when reading in its philosophy of ministry:

People are not just to be understood as sinners but as beings greatly affected by the bodies and physical world they inhabit.

How then would I best address that physical world in the context of understanding its value to our spiritual formation?

Different Approaches to Scripture and Science

Since the sermon is the main component used to build the congregation’s collective approach to understanding how the church relates to the world, I want to take a few moments to lay out what has worked in my preaching and what has not when it comes to science and more specifically the subject of evolution:

1. I decided on a hermeneutical approach. How would God’s patterns in creation published in scientific findings inform my understanding of Scripture?

• I would not use the “Science and Faith are in conflict” (J.W. Draper/A.D. White¹) approach, since I am neither a fundamentalist nor someone whom would wish to violate the spirit of those who penned Scripture who understood God to be over all the world, both hill and Temple (Psalm 24:1-10).
• I would not use S.J. Gould’s² “Non-Overlapping Magisteria” approach, which “ghettoizes” both science and faith. To say one only answers “how” and the other only answers “why” is to miss the richness of both.
• I would not use Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s³ or Ian Barbour’s³ “Integration / Unity” approach, since such an approach requires extensive knowledge of both science and theology and almost inevitably leads to process theology.
• I would use the “Dialogue” (W.G. Pollard⁵) approach, since it emphasizes insight and investigation rather than answers, thereby leading to a sense of wonder and worship. Such an approach minimizes the hubris of knowledge (that will almost certainly pass away) and the hostility toward different perspectives.

2. I decided on a related-referential model rather than an issue-oriented one.

• Any model chosen must fit the personal style of the preacher or it will become uncomfortable and soon unused. I am more the Columbo/sloppy trench coat, “Oh that reminds me…one more thing…” investigator rather than a “light bulb hanging over the head breaking down your resistance” kind of confronter. So I use science as “now what do you make of that?” kind of illustration rather than an argument for my perspective.
• The model must also fit the personality of the church. In our church issue-oriented subjects must be taught in classes or small groups where people have the chance to question/comment in ways not usually done in response to sermons.

3. Our church has decided that being a witness of the incarnate Christ means engaging, and learning from, the world as it is presently.

• Following God’s example in Christ is entering into the world and serving in all its realms: spiritual, emotional, physical, and social.
• Christ used the common knowledge people already had (much of it from nature) to reveal God.

Recognizing Cultural Perspectives

Having laid out what seems like a tidy approach, I will now recognize the difficulties I have experienced, as a pastor, pertaining to evolution, for understandable but remediable reasons. The church has a particular culture that prevents fully engaging science.

1. Most in a congregation do not decouple or differentiate the belief in a philosophy of random and purposeless evolution from the instances of incremental improvements that may point ultimately to an Organizing Principal.
2. Most have not been taught the literary genre distinctions between the writings of Genesis 1 and a science textbook.
3. Most have not considered the possibility that Adam and Eve may not have been uniquely and separately physically created for their sole role in the beginning of human kind. They need alternatives involving figures that do not contradict the point of the narrative.
4. Most have not considered the complementary nature of the Biblical narrative of redemption out of death and the evolutionary one.

To be sure, when a pastor addresses the alternatives, or even makes an explanatory reference using evolution, that pastor can expect a variation of this conversation I had with a parishioner (who walked out during a sermon) a little over a year ago:

____________, I know I upset you with the reference I made to evolution. You have been listening to my teaching for many years. I hope you know by now how the high view of Scripture as the final source of truth and authority I hold and this church holds. 'Well, I thought I did but now I am not so sure,' answered this lady who has been trying to get Ken Hamm to our church for some years. You know I would never do anything to lessen the importance of Scripture. 'Pastor, when you confess evolution, you not only make a liar out of Scripture, you become the reason young people are not following God and are living lives without regard to the Bible, and are in some cases committing suicide.'

This woman is not an unintelligent person. She is a professional nurse and is leading in a mission organization. She was just scared. Happily, she is still in the church and has decided after some more reflection that maybe I do not want to lead young people into orgies and death after all.

Summary Thoughts

In 1632 Galileo warned his fellow believers of a trap they were walking into by resisting the conclusions of a scientific investigation:

Take note, theologians, that in your desire to make matters of faith out of propositions relating to the fixity of sun and earth you run the risk of eventually having to condemn as heretics those who would declare the earth to stand still and the sun to change position--eventually, I say, at such a time as it might be physically or logically proved that the earth moves and the sun stands still.⁶

We would do well to be the church learning God’s truth as discovered by scientists, not resisting its discomfort or its perceived threat to our traditional interpretations of Scripture.

We worship a God of history, and references to our physical world fit well, given some time, into our metaphysical journey. One only has to look at the Old and New Testaments to see how central the elements of creation are to understanding the activity, and thus the “nature” of God. The references are not simply meant to be objective facts; they are to open the door to vistas beyond. If postmodernism has made us aware of the illusion of pure objectivity, then it has also taught us something of the value of pre-modernism, where the lines between the physical and spiritual are connecting points.

Of course nature is not prescriptive, nor does it present comprehensive pictures of God’s personality. One of the most intellectually capable scientists I know does not believe in God because of his observations of ants organizing slave colonies. It offends his sense of egalitarianism. Talk about making a mountain out of an anthill! Theologizing from particular scientific observations is hyper-interpretive.

Yet, as all creation was made by and for Him (Colossians 1:16-17), when it comes to the insights that may be offered by scientific information (especially evolution) it is difficult for those who have been given a modicum of faith not to see the possibility of:

• An Organizing Principle
• An Orchestrated Similarity among the physical, personal, social, and spiritual realms
• An increased ability and likelihood to respond to the outside world in ways that benefit all
• Redeeming relationships involving sacrifice, not all of which are initially positive or intentional (Romans 8:28)
• Problematic instances that would seem to negate the idea of a loving kind Creator may be a part of a more positive trend.
• Greater confidence, as a result of faith, in uncontrollable circumstances being used for good eventually

My goal as a pastor is to equip the saints in my sphere of influence to see Christ and to worship Him. If those in my influence only can see God in Scripture, then they are half blind. But if we together can help each other see the unfolding redemptive purposes of every realm - of scientific inquiry, of business practice, of artistic expression, of church/family support for every individual in every field of endeavor – then we will be not only 20-20 but 3-D in every direction!

Of course, such a result will require a more comprehensive approach in preaching. And such comprehension will require a continuing dialogue with those who can help us see the truth from different perspectives.

Notes

1. John William Draper, A History of Conflict Between Religion and Science, 1874; Andrew Dickson White, History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom, 1894.
2. Stephen Jay Gould, Rock of Ages, 1999.
3. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man, 1959.
4. Ian Barbour, Religion and Science, 1997.
5. William G. Pollard, Physicist and Christian: a dialogue between the communities, 1961.
6. Galileo Galilei, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, 1632.

Asa Gray

If Thomas Huxley earned the title of "Darwin's bulldog," then Asa Gray should be remembered as "Darwin's dove." Whereas Huxley enjoyed a good fight in his defense of Darwin's theory, Gray sought to mediate and bring sides together around a common understanding of "good science." As Darwin's strongest and most vocal scientific ally in the United States, Gray recognized the scientific importance of Darwin's efforts for the growing professionalism of biological researchers.

But as an orthodox Christian, a Presbyterian firmly devoted to the faith expressed in the Nicene Creed, Gray saw in Darwin's theory both evidence for his philosophical commitment to natural theology and support for his opposition to the idealism advocated by Louis Agassiz and the Naturphilosophen in both Europe and America. Indeed, Agassiz's advocacy of Platonic forms as a basis of biological understanding (e.g., "A species is a thought of the creator")¹ would be a major source of American opposition to Darwin's theory.

Professor of botany at Harvard during most of the middle half of the nineteenth century, Gray was one of the few members of the scientific community to whom Darwin revealed his theory before the publication of On the Origin of Species, and, from what I can tell, the only American. Gray and Darwin met briefly in January 1839 during one of Gray's visits to England. Later, during the 1850s, Darwin wrote Gray on several occasions requesting information--a practice that Darwin frequently employed. In 1854, Darwin's friend and confidant, Joseph Hooker, showed Darwin Gray's review of Hooker's Flora of New Zealand, in which Gray had argued strongly against Louis Agassiz's idealism and had raised questions from his own work on the stability of species. Gray was not yet ready to deny their permanence, but hybrids and other observations were beginning to trouble him.

The next year Gray wrote a lucid and penetrating positive evaluation of Alphonse De Candolle's two-volume Géographie botanique raisonnée, a pioneering work dealing with plant geography and distribution from a statistical perspective. Hooker had sneeringly dismissed the work. In A. Hunter Dupree's authoritative biography of Gray, he describes Gray's puzzlement at Hooker's response in these terms:

Although in the long view Gray's evaluation of the epoch-making nature of De Candolle's book was more justified than Hooker's sneers, [Gray was confused by his response, for] Hooker seemed to be talking with a more comprehensive theory definitely in mind, some reason for taking his position, which he did not divulge and which his friend [Gray] did not possess.²

Darwin, however, saw in both Gray's review of Hooker's book and in his comments on De Candolle's tome that Gray was troubled by some of the same empirical data that had been bothering him. In April 1855, Darwin wrote Gray to urge that Gray update his Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States first published in 1848, and especially to address the issue of the range of Alpine plants in the United States. Specifically, he said: "Now I would say it is your duty to generalise as far as you safely can from your as yet completed work."³

Behind this request was Darwin's desire to test his impression that Gray could make a good ally. Gray passed the test, and finally, in July 1857, Darwin let Gray in on his theory of the transmutation of species. Gray was never an uncritical supporter, and there are many evidences in the correspondence between these two scientists that Gray was willing to challenge Darwin and disagree with some of his conclusions. Nevertheless, Gray saw the importance of Darwin's work and the ways in which it provided answers to the troublesome issues that he had confronted in his own botanical efforts.

Gray responds to Darwin's theory

After considerable interchange--one might even say debate--among Gray, Darwin, and Hooker, Gray wrote to Hooker in October 1859 (one month before the publication of On the Origin of Species) saying that he had absolutely no problem with cognate species arising by variation. He did, however, raise a concern that would be the source of much future discussion. He wondered about Darwin's "carry[ing] out this view to its ultimate and legitimate results,--how [do] you connect the philosophy of religion with the philosophy of your science." He added: "I should feel uneasy if I could not connect them into a consistent whole--i.e., fundamental principles of science should not be in conflict."⁴

When Origins was published, Gray wrote a clear, positive, yet critical review in The American Journal of Science. Aware of mounting religious opposition, he ended his review by arguing that whereas one could use Darwin's theory in support of an atheistic view of Nature, one could use any scientific theory in that way. He wrote: "The theory of gravitation and ... the nebular hypothesis assume a universal and ultimate physical cause, from which the effects in nature must necessarily have resulted."⁵ He did not see the physicists and astronomers who adopted Newton's theories as atheists or pantheists, though Leibniz earlier had raised such reservations. And a similar situation existed with the origin of species by natural selection. Darwin, Gray continued: "merely takes up a particular, proximate cause, or set of such causes, from which, it is argued, the present diversity of species has or may have contingently resulted. The author does not say necessarily resulted."⁶

This far Gray could go with Darwin. But there was a point at which he parted company, and that was the fortuitous randomness of the process that Darwin's theory seemed to imply.

In part 2, Dr. Miles describes Darwin's struggle with the problem of natural evil and design in nature.

Notes

1. Cited in A. Hunter Dupree, Asa Gray: American Botanist, Friend of Darwin (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1959), 151. 2. Ibid., 236.
3. Charles Darwin, More Letters of Charles Darwin, ed. Francis Darwin, (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1903), 252.
4. Dupree, Asa Gray, 266.
5. Asa Gray, "The Origin of Species" in Darwiniana (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University, 1963), 44.
6. Ibid.

Darwin’s finches are some of the most visible and recognizable symbols of evolution in the world today. Biology textbooks feature them prominently, and the National Academy of Sciences has enshrined them in the entrance of their headquarters in Washington, DC. Surely the finches that Darwin collected on the Galápagos islands were a central feature of his evolutionary theory, right?

Lobby of The National Academies Building. Courtesy of CPNAS. Photo by Robert Lautman

Actually, the Galápagos finches are never even mentioned in Darwin’s famous work On the Origin of Species. Nor do they appear in Darwin’s famous notebooks on “Transmutation of Species”, in which he formulated the idea of evolution by natural selection.¹ Even Darwin’s private diary of his voyage on the HMS Beagle only mentions the Galápagos finches briefly in passing.²

It was only in 1845, in the second edition of The Voyage of the Beagle, that Darwin included a tantalizing sentence about the Galápagos finches:

Seeing this gradation and diversity of structure in one small, intimately related group of birds, one might really fancy that from an original paucity of birds in this archipelago, one species had been taken and modified for different ends.³

However insightful this statement may have been, Darwin never published anything else about the Galápagos finches for the rest of his life. Nor did he publically present these birds as direct evidence for this theory of evolution.⁴

If these finches were so important to Darwin’s evolutionary theory, why did he remain silent about them? One of his comments in The Voyage of the Beagle provides us with a clue:

Unfortunately most of the specimens of the finch tribe were mingled together; but I have strong reasons to suspect that some of the species of the subgroup Geospiza are confined to separate islands.⁵

When Darwin was exploring the Galápagos himself in 1835, he had not formulated his theory of evolution yet, and thus he did know what data would be necessary to make definitive conclusions about finch evolution. In particular, he did not keep careful track of which of his specimens came from which islands. Moreover, as was customary among naturalists at that time, Darwin only collected a small number specimens—he brought home only 31 finches and 64 total birds from the Galápagos.⁶

Though Darwin sensed that these birds were truly special, he lacked sufficient evidence to reach any specific conclusions about their evolutionary origins. It would be up to the rest of the scientific community to carry out the necessary empirical research. Subsequent expeditions in 1868, 1891, 1897, and 1905 brought back thousands of Galápagos finch specimens, but instead of unlocking the mysteries of evolutionary theory, the Galápagos finches became a great enigma.⁷

A century after Darwin's voyage, scientists still struggled to explain the staggering variety of finches on this tiny, remote archipelago. By the mid-1930’s, British Museum ornithologist Percy Lowe argued that the finches presented a "biological problem of first class importance", and he told the British Association for the Advancement of Science that the finches displayed a "bewildering diversity, intergradation, and distribution".⁸ Who would be up to the challenge of making sense of such tremendous biological complexity? It was David Lack.

David Lack

Ornithologist David Lack

David Lack had an exceptionally keen eye for bird-watching, and he possessed a passion to match it. By age 15, he had already observed 100 distinct species of birds, and before entering college, authored his first scientific paper. At Cambridge University in the early 1930’s, Lack was disappointed to find that his zoology professors taught “nothing about evolution, ecology, behavior or genetics, and of course nothing about birds.”⁹ In fact, at that time, there were only two professional ornithologists in all of Britain!

Thus David Lack took it upon himself to create his own learning opportunities. As an undergraduate, he became the president of the Cambridge Ornithological Club, traveled to Greenland for a bird-watching expedition, and cultivated a relationship with the prominent biologist Julian Huxley (grandson of Thomas Henry Huxley). Huxley was an inspiring mentor and encouraged Lack to expand his research further by studying tropical birds.¹⁰ Following this advice, Lack embarked on a research trip to Tanzania in the summer of 1934, but his greatest adventure was yet to come.

In 1937, Lack became fascinated by the scientific mysteries surrounding the Galápagos finches. But in order to study their behavior, Lack would need to travel to remote islands halfway around the world. How could he possibly get there? Once again, Julian Huxley was tremendously supportive and raised funds from two prominent scientific societies to pay for his expedition. After a long delay, David Lack and five companions finally set off on their journey.

Instead of residing in comfortable quarters aboard a royal naval ship, Lack’s group subsisted on a shoestring budget, traveled on commercial steamers, and stayed with local settlers. Their experience was definitely not a romantic tale of imperial expedition:

The Galápagos are interesting, but scarcely a residential paradise. The biological peculiarities are offset by an enervating climate, monotonous scenery, dense thorn scrub, cactus spines, loose sharp lava, food deficiencies, water shortage, black rats, fleas, jiggers, ants, mosquitoes, scorpions, Ecuadorian Indians of doubtful honesty, and dejected, disillusioned European settlers.¹¹

Whereas Charles Darwin spent only nineteen days on the shores of the Galápagos, Lack and his crew conducted more than five months of meticulous and exhausting study in the harsh climate. At that time, even the finches themselves provided little solace. Lack wrote,

Darwin’s finches are dull to look at, not only in their orderly ranks in museum trays, but also when they hop about the ground or perch in the trees of the Galápagos, making dull unmusical noises. Only the variety of their beaks and the number of their species excite attention.¹²

Large Cactus Finch on Española Island in the Galápagos Islands

The repetitive tedium requisite for important scientific discoveries is rarely discussed in public, and even today many bright-eyed science students become disillusioned by the painstaking work demanded by their Ph.D. programs. But one of the things that distinguishes great scientists is their unwavering commitment and tenacity in completing major projects. David Lack's efforts were not in vain:

"Despite his personal discomforts (or perhaps because of them), Lack did see something on the Galápagos that no one had ever seen before—natural selection at work among its finches through interspecies competition." ¹³

When the birds’ breeding season ended in 1939, Lack was ready to return to his home in England. But the captive finches that he had brought with him fared so badly on the voyage home that he detoured to San Francisco and put them in the care of the California Academy of Sciences. Turning this mishap into an opportunity, Lack stayed there for five additional months to study the Academy’s enormous collection of Galápagos finch specimens.¹⁴

To complete his systematic research, Lack then travelled across the United States to study the Galápagos finch collection housed at the American Museum in New York.¹⁵ Altogether, Lack examined more than 8000 specimens and specifically measured the length, width, and depth of all their beaks.¹⁶

Lack’s final obstacle was in getting his research published. Though he completed his academic manuscript “The Galápagos Finches—A Study in Variation” in 1940, paper shortages during World War II delayed its publication by the California Academy of Sciences until 1945. Were he only interested in making an original contribution to science, Lack could have stopped here and congratulated himself on a job well-done. However, his motivation sprung from a deeper source:

David Lack's drawing of 14 species of Galápagos finches, p. 19 of Darwin’s Finches

"I did not watch birds primarily for scientific reasons but for sheer enjoyment, and from the age of 15 onward returned day after day in a glow of excitement after seeing a new bird or a new habit." ¹⁷

Lack’s joyful fascination with the Galápagos finches inspired him to continue developing his conclusions long after returning from his expedition. While waiting for his academic paper to be published, he began writing a book that would enable students and the general public to share his excitement about these remarkable birds and the evolutionary processes that shaped them.

First published in 1947, Lack’s book became tremendously influential. Before this time, biology textbooks had never even mentioned the Galápagos finches. But after David Lack’s study, the finches became a primary example of evolution by natural selection, specifically adaptive radiation. Not only did textbooks fully rely on Lack’s findings, they also followed his lead in calling them “Darwin’s finches”, the title of Lack’s famous book.¹⁸

Iconic Finches

What was it about these birds that made them such a prominent symbol of evolution? As Darwin himself pointed out, the numerous Galápagos finch populations each have distinctive beaks, and he speculated that they could have evolved from an ancestral species that came to the islands. But a complete picture of finch evolution would have to wait another hundred years, when David Lack arrived.

During his five months on the Galápagos, including both the rainy and dry seasons, Lack observed that these beak differences enable the finches to subsist on different kinds of food:

The beak differences between most of the genera and subgenera of Darwin's finches are clearly correlated with differences in feeding methods. This is well borne out by the heavy, finch-like beak of the seed-eating Geospiza, the long beak of the flower-probing Cactornis, the somewhat parrot-like beak of the leaf, bud, and fruit-eating Platyspiza, the woodpecker-like beak of the woodboring Catcospiza, and the warbler-like beaks of the insect-eating certhidea and Pinaroloxias.¹⁹

Lack's image of beak adaptations from Darwin’s Finches

Specializing in such different sources of food enables these finches to live in close proximity without directly competing with each other or driving populations to extinction. The fact that so many of these closely related finches are able to co-exist is a remarkable fact in itself. As Lack himself put it, “It is not only the origin, but also the persistence, of new species which require explanation.”²⁰

But it is also fascinating to consider how these birds got to be so different in the first place. How did a finch come to have a beak like a “parrot”, “woodpecker”, or “warbler”? The answer lies in the distinct characteristics of the Galápagos. Because the islands are so remote, no actual parrots, woodpeckers, or warblers ever settled on it. In the absence of these species, the Galápagos finches were able to adopt feeding habits and forms that they would never have taken on a large continent full of other birds competing for food. The isolation of these islands offered just the right conditions for us to see living examples of adaptive radiation.²¹

Conclusion

Considering the immense popularity of the Galápagos finches, it is quite surprising to learn that Charles Darwin himself had so little to say about them. In fact, it was actually David Lack, one century later, who conducted the critical research that immortalized the finches in biology textbooks and popular lore. By naming his landmark book Darwin’s Finches,²² Lack paid homage to the man whose voyage on the HMS Beagle helped transform the study of natural history. But at the same time, Lack also obscured the fact that evolutionary biology is an enterprise conducted by a large community of brilliant scholars, not just the product of one man’s efforts.

This tendency to immortalize “great men of science” has also led many people to refer to modern evolutionary theory as Darwinism, despite the fact that it has substantially changed and developed over the past 150 years. It is important to give credit where credit is due, and if that’s the case, we should seriously reconsider how we refer to the Galapagos finches. Evolutionary biologist Dolph Schluter, who studied the finches several decades after David Lack, had this to say:

I find Lack's intuition really stunning given how little information he had. He's my hero actually… They should be called Lack's finches.²³

In the second part of this series, we’ll explore the fact that David Lack, in addition to being a world-renowned evolutionary biologist, was also a devout Christian. His study of evolutionary theory did not cause him to lose his faith; in fact, he actually converted to Christianity after completing his Galápagos finch research.

For Discussion

Further Reading

• Grant, Peter R.; Grant, B. Rosemary. How and Why Species Multiply: The Radiation of Darwin's Finches, Princeton University Press, 2008.
• Sulloway, Frank J. (Spring 1982), "Darwin and His Finches: The Evolution of a Legend" (PDF), Journal of the History of Biology 15 (1): 1–53.
• Weiner, Jonathon. The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our Time. Vintage Books, 1995.

Notes

1. Sulloway, F. (1983). "Darwin and his finches: The evolution of a legend." Journal of the history of biology 15(1): 32. Darwin’s notebooks on transmutation mentioned Galapagos tortoises and mockingbirds, not finches.
2. Lack, David. Darwin’s Finches. Cambridge University Press, 1947: 9. Confirmed by Sulloway (1983), p5.
3. Darwin, Charles. Journal of researches into the natural history and geology of the countries visited during the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle round the world. London: John Murray. 2d ed. 1845: 379-80. This edition of the book also contained the drawings of four different finches that have become enshrined in biology textbooks and on the walls of the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC.
4. Sulloway, p35. Sulloway points out that the first published evolutionary account of the Galapagos finches was not until 1876, by Osbert Salvin: "On the Avifauna of the Galapagos Archipelago." Trans. Zool. Soc. London, 9:447-51.
5. Darwin (1845), p395.
6. Sulloway, p40.
7. Sulloway, p40.
8. Larson, E. J. Evolution's Workshop: God and Science on the Galapagos Islands. New York, Basic Books, 2001: 166-67.
9. Lack, David. (1973) “My life as an amateur ornithologist.” Ibis: 424.
10. Lack (1973), 425-27.
11. Lack (1947), p1.
12. Lack (1947), p11.
13. Larson, 167-68.
14. The California Academy of Sciences sponsored an expedition to the Galapagos in 1905-06 and collected nearly 9000 Galapagos finch specimens (Sulloway, p40).
15. In New York, Lack roomed with the curator of the finch collection—German émigré zoologist Ernst Mayr. By developing this relationship, Lack had close ties with two of the biggest figures in the neo-Darwinian synthesis, Julian Huxley and Ernst Mayr (Larson, 168).
16. Larson, p168.
17. Lack (1973), p424.
18. Larson, p198.
19. Lack (1947), p60.
20. Lack (1947), p158.
21. See Lack’s concluding chapter on “Adaptive Radiation”, pp146-159 of Darwin’s Finches (1947).
22. British ornithologist Percy Lowe originally proposed the name “Darwin’s finches” in 1935, but the name did not catch on until Lack used it in his book. See P.R. Lowe, (1936) "The Finches of the Galapagos in Relation to Darwin's Conception of Species." Ibis, 13th ser., 6:310-321. (Cited in Larson, p287)
23. Schluter, in an interview with Edward Larson, 16 March 2000.

Judging from the flurry of headlines over the past week, one might be tempted to think that proof positive of God’s existence (or lack thereof) had just appeared out of a 27-km-tunnel buried beneath the Swiss-French border. This frenzy of news headlines and blog titles hailed the recent news that CERN’s Large Hadron Collider has discovered a brand new particle of a mass of 125-126 GeV, which is assumed to be the Higgs boson, or the so-called “God particle.” The discovery of the Higgs boson would certainly be a breakthrough for particle physics and cosmology, but would such a finding also radically redefine theology’s understanding of God or challenge the existence of such a deity? Is there actually any theological or religious significance in Higgs physics at all?

The short answer is “no,” which becomes apparent when one considers the widely-reported story of how it got named. In 1993, Nobel Laureate physicist Leon Lederman, along with science writer Dick Teresi, wrote a book detailing the history of particle physics starting with Pre-Socratic Greek philosophy Democritus and culminating with the hunt for the Higgs boson. Until this latest discovery, the Higgs boson was the elusive final missing piece of the puzzle known as the Standard Model—a collection of the fundamental particles that constitute our universe and the complex and mathematically-sophisticated relationships between them. Considering how incredibly difficult finding the Higgs boson was proving to be, Lederman wanted to name the book after that “goddamn particle,” according to some of his collaborators. His editor, however, would not allow it and so the name was shortened to “The God Particle: If the Universe Is the Answer, What is the Question?” And thus ‘the God particle’ was born, carrying with it more than enough social baggage for such a miniscule particle.

Particle physicist Dr. Zosia Krusberg (at right) is visiting assistant professor of physics and astronomy at Vassar College and thinks “the term ‘god particle’ is unfortunate. The Higgs boson is no more (or less) divine or spiritually significant than any other elementary particle within the standard model of particle physics.” It may be fundamental to explaining one of the most basic characteristics of the universe—namely the existence of matter and mass in addition to energy—but “it is no more (or less) important than any other physics principle underlying the Standard Model.”

Last week’s discovery was monumental in that it may have finally provided experimental evidence for the Higgs Mechanism and defined the specific energy of the resulting Higgs boson, but even this “breakthrough” for particle physics leaves many scientific questions unresolved. Finding the Higgs boson completes the Standard Model, but it does not do away with many other questions and shortcomings of the current state of particle physics, such as the constituent particles of dark matter, a quantum theory of gravity, and other “mathematically subtle problems.” Not to mention that there is still significant work to be done to determine the exact nature of this newly-found particle. According to Dr. Krusberg, this particle might behave just as the Standard Model predicts or it could instead be “a Higgs-like particle that will serve as a gateway into explorations of physics beyond the Standard Model." Krusberg continued, “And I guarantee that it is this latter scenario that most of us are hoping for: physicists love nothing more than discovering the shortcomings of their theories, since this is the first step toward more fundamental theories with even more predictive power!”

No, finding the Higgs boson does not answer all the questions of particle physics, much less lend insight into the existence (or not) of God. For that reason, Dr. Krusberg (like most physicists) bemoans the term ‘God particle’ and insists, “There really is nothing either literally or metaphorically god-like about the Higgs boson.” Indeed, one writer for the British journal The Guardian reached such a point of frustration about the name that he ran a competition for alternatives. The winner was “the champagne flute boson,” ostensibly because the bottom of a champagne bottle is an excellent and oft-used demonstration of the energy potential of the Higgs Mechanism. Or then again, perhaps it is simply because physicists thought that finally finding this shy particle would call for some of the bubbly.

On the other hand, some science writers and scientists can appreciate the ‘educational benefits’ of such a mysterious and controversial name because it attracts the attention of the general public and puts a relatable face on an extremely esoteric physics concept. Krusberg herself admits that “People are naturally drawn to the mysterious and the controversial, providing educators with great teaching opportunities.” But she worries about the larger social implications involved in “mixing the vernacular of physics and spirituality,” not least because such uncritical mixing can lead the non-scientific community to draw conclusions about the authority and reach of science that are not justified.

Understanding that the Higgs boson is not the literal stuff of God and that it does not prove or disprove God’s existence (as the name seems to suggest) extinguishes the fire under any sort of religious outcry. But this does not mean that its discovery is irrelevant to the discussion of science and faith, nor to the Christian community as a whole. As Dr. Krusberg remarks, “The recent discovery of [this] new boson at the LHC perfectly embodies the scientific process at its best (and thereby illustrates to the public why and how science works).” Scientific exploration of nature is not a fool-proof endeavor; healthy skepticism and accountability to a wide community of other researchers are absolutely critical to its success. But such evidence of the power and finesse of well-executed science as we saw last week is a testament to our ability to explore and understand the ‘how’ of the universe. God has equipped humanity with the desire, the intellectual abilities, and the collective will to recognize and explore the cosmic order and beauty of his creation. God has made our home knowable, and has given us the tools and capacities by which to know it.

At left, Cern researchers present their findings to a few hundred of their colleagues in Melbourne, Australia. Image © 2012 CERN

It is valuable, then, for the Christian community to understand and appreciate how science works, in part to recognize that there are many instances in which science and the church work in tandem in order to better understand and better serve the world. But I think there is something else we can draw from the story of the Higgs boson, too. The nickname ‘the God particle’ has touched nerves in religious communities because it implies that science has the ability to prove or disprove divine existence by physical means. Even though the physics community is by no means claiming insight into the divine, it is sometimes assumed by the religious community that scientists view their work as chipping away at God’s existence when they begin to understand something that was previously unknown, or known only “by faith” in esoteric theories and models.

And yet, regardless of motives or metaphysical interpretations, perhaps physicists' search for the Higgs boson is in fact an apt picture of our own search for God. How many times have we stared up at the starry ceiling in times of crisis and prayed fervently for some kind of sign from God to assure us of his presence? And how many times has that much-desired evidence appeared only in retrospect, when we look back to see God’s hand faithfully and elegantly working in ways inscrutable at the time? It took a community of physicists to discern the presence of the Higgs boson. But even so, they could only do so after the fact from the cascade of particle decays it sparked; they could not observe the particle itself directly. In a similar way, though we often do not see the working of God directly, “in the moment,” we still trust in his presence and providence, often depending on friends, family and the community of the church to help us see his hand in hindsight.

So while the discovery of the Higgs boson does not itself explain God, we rejoice at the subtle yet striking new insight we have into God’s creative genius via the Higgs boson and at the way God gives evidence of his faithfulness in the ordered creation itself. Perhaps, however, the greatest insight we can glean from this breakthrough is an analogy for the way God calls us to seek him and find him together, in the community of those who follow his son.

Tomorrow, Baylor University physicist Gerald Cleaver answers the question, "What is the Higgs boson?"

A scientist, my dear friends, is a man who foresees; it is because science provides the means to predict that it is useful, and the scientists are superior to all other men. --Henri de Saint-Simon¹

Scientism is a rather strange word, but for reasons that we shall see, a useful one. Though this term has been coined rather recently, it is associated with many other “isms” with long and turbulent histories: materialism, naturalism, reductionism, empiricism, and positivism. Rather than tangle with each of these concepts separately, we’ll begin with a working definition of scientism and proceed from there.

Historian Richard G. Olson defines scientism as “efforts to extend scientific ideas, methods, practices, and attitudes to matters of human social and political concern.” ² But this formulation is so broad as to render it virtually useless. Philosopher Tom Sorell offers a more precise definition: “Scientism is a matter of putting too high a value on natural science in comparison with other branches of learning or culture.” ³ MIT physicist Ian Hutchinson offers a closely related version, but more extreme: “Science, modeled on the natural sciences, is the only source of real knowledge.” ⁴ The latter two definitions are far more precise and will better help us evaluate scientism’s merit.

A History of Scientism

The roots of scientism extend as far back as early 17th century Europe, an era that came to be known as the Scientific Revolution. Up to that point, most scholars had been highly deferential to intellectual tradition, largely a combination of Judeo-Christian scripture and ancient Greek philosophy. But a torrent of new learning during the late Renaissance began to challenge the authority of the ancients, and long-established intellectual foundations began to crack. The Englishman Francis Bacon, the Frenchman Rene Descartes, and the Italian Galileo Galilei spearheaded an international movement proclaiming a new foundation for learning, one that involved careful scrutiny of nature instead of analysis of ancient texts.

Descartes and Bacon used particularly strong rhetoric to carve out space for their new methods. They claimed that by learning how the physical world worked, we could become “masters and possessors of nature.” ⁵ In doing so, humans could overcome hunger through innovations in agriculture, eliminate disease through medical research, and dramatically improve overall quality of life through technology and industry. Ultimately, science would save humans from unnecessary suffering and their self-destructive tendencies. And it promised to achieve these goals in this world, not the afterlife. It was a bold, prophetic vision.

As this new method found great success, the specter of scientism began to emerge. Both Bacon and Descartes elevated the use of reason and logic by denigrating other human faculties such as creativity, memory, and imagination. Bacon’s classification of learning demoted poetry and history to second-class status.⁶ Descartes’ rendering of the entire universe as a giant machine left little room for the arts or other forms of human expression. In one sense, the rhetoric of these visionaries opened great new vistas for intellectual inquiry. But on the other hand, it proposed a vastly narrower range of which human activities were considered worthwhile.

The Enlightenment

A century later, many of the Enlightenment intellectuals continued their love-affair with the power of natural science. They claimed that not only could science enhance the quality of human life, it could even promote moral improvement. The Encyclopedist Denis Diderot aimed to collect, organize, and preserve all human knowledge so that “our children, becoming better instructed, may become at the same time more virtuous and happy.” ⁷ Many of the French philosophes even claimed that science could be a substitute for religion. In fact, during the French Revolution, numerous Catholic churches were converted into “Temples of Reason” and held quasi-religious services for the worship of science.⁸

Positivism

The 19th century witnessed the most powerful and enduring formulation of scientism, a system called positivism. Its founder was August Comte, who built his positive philosophy from a deep commitment to David Hume’s empiricism and skepticism. Comte claimed that the only valid data is acquired through the senses. Nothing was transcendent, and nothing metaphysical could have any claim to validity.⁹ The task of scientists was twofold—first, to demonstrate how all phenomena, including human behavior, are subject to invariable natural laws.¹⁰ Second, they would reduce these natural laws to the smallest possible number, and ultimately unify them under the laws of physics.¹¹

Comte also subsumed all of human intellectual history into a single process which he called the Law of Three Stages. In his view, each branch of knowledge passes through three stages: the theological or fictitious, the metaphysical or abstract, and lastly the scientific or positive state. He believed that through the continual advancement of human understanding, religion would fade away, philosophy and the humanities would be transformed into a naturalistic basis, and all human knowledge would eventually become a product of science. Any ideas outside that realm would be pure fantasy or superstition.

Logical Positivism

Positivism did not lose its appeal in the 20th century. To the contrary, a group known collectively as The Vienna Circle reinvigorated the fundamental tenets of positivism with enhanced symbolic logic and semantic theory. They called their approach, fittingly, logical positivism. In this system, there are only two kinds of meaningful statements: analytic statements (including logic and mathematics), and empirical statements, subject to experimental verification. Anything outside of this framework is an empty concept.¹²

Given its sweeping claims, logical positivism came under heavy scrutiny. Karl Popper pointed out that few statements in science can actually be completely verified. However, a single observation has the potential to invalidate a hypothesis, and even an entire theory. Therefore, he proposed that instead of experimental verification, the principle of falsifiability should demarcate what qualified as science, and by extension, what can qualify as knowledge.¹³

Another weakness of the positivist position is its reliance on a complete distinction between theory and observation. Observations, essential to the empirical approach of science, were claimed by positivists to be brute facts which one could use to establish, evaluate, and compare the theories. However, W.O. Quine pointed out in his “Two Dogmas of Empiricism” that observations themselves are partly shaped by theory (“theory-laden”).¹⁴ What counts as an observation, how to construct an experiment, and what data you think your instruments are collecting—all require an interpretive theoretical framework. This realization does not deal a death-blow to the practice of science (as some post-modernists like to claim), but it does undermine the positivist claim that science rests entirely on facts, and is thus an indisputable foundation for knowledge.

Scientism of Today

Scientism today is alive and well, as evidenced by the statements of our celebrity scientists:

The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will be. –Carl Sagan, Cosmos

The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless. –Stephen Weinburg, The First Three Minutes

We can be proud as a species because, having discovered that we are alone, we owe the gods very little. –E.O. Wilson, Consilience

While these men are certainly entitled to their personal opinions and the freedom to express them, the fact that they make such bold claims in their popular science literature blurs the line between solid, evidence-based science, and rampant philosophical speculation. Whether one agrees with the sentiments of these scientists or not, the result of these public pronouncements has served to alienate a large segment of American society. And that is a serious problem, since scientific research relies heavily upon public support for its funding, and environmental policy is shaped by lawmakers who listen to their constituents. From a purely pragmatic standpoint, it would be wise to try a different approach.

Physicist Ian Hutchinson offers an insightful metaphor for the current controversies over science:

The health of science is in fact jeopardized by scientism, not promoted by it. At the very least, scientism provokes a defensive, immunological, aggressive response from other intellectual communities, in return for its own arrogance and intellectual bullyism. It taints science itself by association.¹⁵

Noting that most Americans enthusiastically welcome scientific advancements, particularly those in health care, transportation, and communications, Hutchinson suggests that perhaps what the public is rejecting is not actually science itself, but a worldview that closely aligns itself with science—scientism.¹⁶ By disentangling these two concepts, we have a much better chance for enlisting public support for scientific research than we would by trying to convince millions of people to embrace a materialistic, godless universe in which science is our only remaining hope.

Distinguishing science from scientism

So if science is distinct from scientism, what is it? Science is an activity that seeks to explore the natural world using well-established, clearly-delineated methods. Given the complexity of the universe, from the very big to very small, from inorganic to organic, there is a vast array of scientific disciplines, each with its own specific techniques. The number of different specializations is constantly increasing, leading to more questions and areas of exploration than ever before. Science expands our understanding, rather than limiting it.

Scientism, on the other hand, is a speculative worldview about the ultimate reality of the universe and its meaning. Despite the fact that there are millions of species on our planet, scientism focuses an inordinate amount of its attention on human behavior and beliefs. Rather than working within carefully constructed boundaries and methodologies established by researchers, it broadly generalizes entire fields of academic expertise and dismisses many of them as inferior. With scientism, you will regularly hear explanations that rely on words like “merely”, “only”, “simply”, or “nothing more than”. Scientism restricts human inquiry.

It is one thing to celebrate science for its achievements and remarkable ability to explain a wide variety of phenomena in the natural world. But to claim there is nothing knowable outside the scope of science would be similar to a successful fisherman saying that whatever he can't catch in his nets does not exist.¹⁷ Once you accept that science is the only source of human knowledge, you have adopted a philosophical position (scientism) that cannot be verified, or falsified, by science itself. It is, in a word, unscientific.

Notes

1. "Un savant, mes amis, est un homme qui prévoit; c’est par la raison que la science donne le moyen de prédire qu’elle est utile, et que les savants sont supérieurs à tous les autres hommes." Translated into English by Valence Ionescu in The Political Thought of Saint-Simon. Oxford University Press, 1976. Page 76
2. Olson, Richard G. Science and Scientism in Nineteenth-Century Europe. Urbana, University of Illinois Press, 2008.
3. Sorell, Tom. Scientism: Philosophy and the Infatuation with Science. New York: Routledge, 1991.
4. Hutchinson, Ian. Monopolizing Knowledge: A Scientist Refutes Religion-Denying, Reason-Destroying Scientism. Belmont, MA: Fias Publishing, 2011.
5. Descartes, Rene. Discourse on Method
6. Sorell, p176
7. Sorell, p35
8. Ozouf, Mona. Festivals and the French Revolution. Harvard University Press, 1988.
9. Zammito, John H. A Nice Derangement of Epistemes : Post-Positivism in the Study of Science from Quine to Latour. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004.
10. This view is a form of strict determinism, and current popularizers of continue to enthusiastically endorse it. Perhaps they are “determined” to do so?
11. This view is a form of extreme reductionism, also widely endorsed by current popularizers of science.
12. Zammito, p8
13. Popper, Karl. Logic of Scientific Discovery. 1959
14. For an extended discussion, read Zammito’s chapter “The Perils of Semantic Ascent: Quine and Post-positivism in the Philosophy of Science” in A Nice Derangement of Epistemes. University of Chicago Press, 2004.
15. Hutchinson, p143
16. Hutchinson, p109
17. Giberson, Karl, and Mariano Artigas. Oracles of Science: Celebrity Scientists Versus God and Religion. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

The astronomy community is particularly interested in this event because exoplanets throughout the Milky Way galaxy regularly transit their parent stars in just the same way. This local example will allow astronomers to test and refine techniques used to determine the composition of these exoplanets' atmospheres, providing insight into whether these distant planets could possibly harbor life.

As Venus begins to cross in front of the disk of the Sun, Venus's atmosphere will refract the Sun's light, illuminating the backlit portion of the planet's atmosphere. Telescopes on the ground and in orbit will be trained on this thin arc of atmosphere lit up by the Sun. Astronomers will use spectrometers to break the light up into its constituent colors, from which they can determine the chemical composition of our over-heated sister planet's atmosphere. Once perfected, this same technique can be used to examine the atmospheres of planets far beyond our own solar system, offering us one of our best clues as to the habitability of these distant worlds.

Not only is this process of discovery exciting for natural science, but it has profound theological ramifications as well. Surely a God capable of orchestrating both the majestic swirls of a spiral galaxy and the intricate language of DNA could bring forth life where and when He chooses, but only now are we on the verge of being able to answer the age-old question: “Did God confine His creative life-giving actions to our own planet, or does His abundant fertility extent far beyond our limited experience?”

In 1882, William Harkness, the Director of the U.S. Naval Observatory, was one of two astronomers to determine from the transit of Venus the distance from Earth to the Sun. Just as previous viewers could never have imagined calibrating the scale of the solar system from such an event, Harkness could not predict its importance in 2004 and 2012 (the most recent Venus transits). As we look to the future, we can hardly imagine what new frontiers the next Venus transit of 2117 will find us exploring.

The image above shows Venus on the eastern limb of the Sun during the 2004 transit. As described in Tucker's essay, the faint ring around the planet comes from the scattering of light through its atmosphere, which allows some sunlight to show around the edge of the otherwise dark planetary disk. The faint glow on the disk is an effect of the TRACE telescope through which the image was captured. For more on the historical significance of the transits of Venus (including the voyage of Captain James Cook), see this article from NASA, which also includes links to several live webcasts of today's transit.

What's the Problem?

Many secular and many evangelical voices agree on one ‘truism’—that if you are an orthodox Christian with a high view of the authority of the Bible, you cannot believe in evolution in any form at all. New Atheist authors such as Richard Dawkins and creationist writers such as Ken Ham seem to have arrived at consensus on this, and so more and more in the general population are treating it as given. If you believe in God, you can’t believe in evolution. If you believe in evolution, you can’t believe in God.

This creates a problem for both doubters and believers. Many believers in western culture see the medical and technological advances achieved through science and are grateful for them. They have a very positive view of science. How then, can they reconcile what science seems to tell them about evolution with their traditional theological beliefs? Seekers and inquirers about Christianity can be even more perplexed. They 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.”

However, there are many who question the premise that science and faith are irreconcilable. Many believe that a high view of the Bible does not demand belief in just one account of origins. They argue that we do not have to choose between an anti-science religion or an anti-religious science.¹ They think that there are a variety of ways in which God could have brought about the creation of life forms and human life using evolutionary processes, and that the picture of incompatibility between orthodox faith and evolutionary biology is greatly overdrawn.²

For example, there have been a number of efforts to argue that there may be evolutionary reasons for religious belief. That is, it may be that capacity for religious belief is ‘adaptive’ or is connected to other adaptive traits, passed down from our ancestors because they supported survival and reproduction. There is no consensus about this among evolutionary biologists. Nevertheless, its very proposal seems to be completely antithetical to any belief that God is objectively real. However, Christian philosopher Peter van Inwagen asks:

Suppose that God exists and wants supernaturalistic belief to be a human universal, and sees (he would see this if it were true) that certain features would be useful for human beings to have— useful from an evolutionary point of view: conducive to survival and reproduction—would naturally have the consequence that supernaturalistic belief would be in due course a human universal. Why shouldn’t he allow those features to be the cause of the thing he wants?—rather as the human designer of a vehicle might use the waste heat from its engine to keep its passengers warm.³

Van Inwagen’s argument is sound. Even if science could prove that religious belief has a genetic component that we inherit from our ancestors, that finding is not incompatible with belief in the reality of God or even the truth of the Christian faith. There is no logical reason to preclude that God could have used evolution to predispose people to believe in God in general so that people would be able to consider true belief when they hear the gospel preached. This is just one of many places where the supposed incompatibility of orthodox faith with evolution begins to fade away under more sustained reflection.

However, many Christian laypeople remain confused because the voices arguing that Biblical orthodoxy and evolution are mutually exclusive are louder and more prominent than any others. What will it take to help Christian laypeople see greater coherence between what science tells us about creation and what the Bible teaches us about it?

Pastors and People

In my estimation what current science tells us about evolution presents four main difficulties for orthodox Protestants. The first is in the area of Biblical authority. To account for evolution we must see at least Genesis 1 as non-literal. The questions come along these lines: what does that mean for the idea that the Bible has final authority? If we refuse to take one part of the Bible literally, why take any parts of it literally? Aren’t we really allowing science to sit in judgment on our understanding of the Bible rather than vica versa?

The second difficulty is the confusion of biology and philosophy. Many of the strongest proponents for evolution as a biological process (such as Dawkins) also see it as a ‘Grand Theory of Everything.’ They look to natural selection to explain not only all human behavior but even to give the only answers to the great philosophical questions, such as why we exist, what life is about, and why human nature is what it is. Doesn’t belief in the one idea—that life is the product of evolution—entail the adoption of this whole ‘world -view’?

The third difficulty is the historicity of Adam and Eve. One way to reconcile what current science says about evolution is to propose that the account of Adam and Eve is symbolic, not literal, but what does this do to the New Testament teaching of Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 that our sinfulness comes from our relationship with Adam? If we don’t believe in an historical fall, how did we become what the Bible says we are—sinful and condemned?

The fourth difficulty is the problem of violence and evil. One of the greatest barriers to belief in God is the problem of suffering and evil in the world. Why, people ask, did God create a world in which violence, pain, and death are endemic? The answer of traditional theology is—he didn’t. He created a good world but also gave human beings free will, and through their disobedience and ‘Fall’, death and suffering came into the world. The process of evolution, however, understands violence, predation, and death to be the very engine of how life develops. If God brings about life through evolution, how do we reconcile that with the idea of a good God? The problem of evil seems to be worse for the believer in theistic evolution.

I have been a pastor for almost 35 years, and during that time I’ve spoken to many laypeople who struggle with the relationship of modern science to orthodox belief. In the minds of most laypeople, it is the first three difficulties that loom largest. The fourth difficulty—the problem of suffering and death—has not been posed to me as often by parishioners. Yet in some ways the problem of suffering goes along with the third question regarding the historicity of the Fall. Without the traditional view of the historicity of the Fall, the question of evil would seem to become more acute.

Therefore, below I will lay out three basic problems that Christian laypeople have with the scientific account of biological evolution. Nothing here should be seen as meeting the need for rigorous, scholarly arguments in answer to these questions. These are popular-level pastoral answers and guidance. As a pastor I have had to draw heavily on the work of experts. The first question, about Biblical authority, requires that I draw on the best work of exegetes and Biblical scholars. To answer the second question, about evolution as a ‘Grand Theory of Everything,’ I need to draw on the work of philosophers. When we come to the third question regarding Adam and Eve, I must look to theologians.

In short, if I as a pastor want to help both believers and inquirers to relate science and faith coherently, I must read the works of scientists, exegetes, philosophers, and theologians and then interpret them for my people. Someone might counter that this is too great a burden to put on pastors, that instead they should simply refer their laypeople to the works of scholars. But if pastors are not ‘up to the job’ of distilling and understanding the writings of scholars in various disciplines, how will our laypeople do it? This is one of the things that parishioners want from their pastors. We are to be a bridge between the world of scholarship and the world of the street and the pew. I’m aware of what a burden this is. I don’t know that there has ever been a culture in which the job of the pastor has been more challenging. Nevertheless, I believe this is our calling.

Next week, Keller begins to unpack the individual questions, beginning with how we can understand evolution in relation to a literal reading of the Bible.

Notes

1. A good popular level book by a scientist is Denis Alexander, aptly titled: Creation or Evolution-do we have to choose? (Oxford: Monarch Books, 2008.)
2. See 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.)
3. Peter van Inwagen, “Explaining Belief in the Supernatural”, in J.Schloss and M.Murray, ed. The Believing Primate: Scientific, Philosophical, and Theological Reflections on the Origin of Religion. (Oxford, 2009) p.136.

Josh wrote:

Hi Aron,

Thanks for taking the time to discuss this. I am still skeptical. Please consider the following:

Suppose:

1. The evangelical Christian God exists, is omnipotent, omniscient, loves people and wants them to believe in him so that they can join him in heaven.
2. There are sincere truth-seeking people who have not seen evidence that convinces them that this God exists, but if they just saw Jesus walk on water, feed thousands with a few fish and loaves, rise from the dead, have vivid and non-contradictory dreams about heaven, etc, they would believe. It does not have to be one single awesome event. It can be many different signs to different people. If God employed a multitude of miracles and awesome ways to reach people, people will not idolize one single manifestation. They would understand that these diverse awesome signs are just different ways that God is using to show his presence and not God himself.
3. God has no other agenda more important than the agenda of loving people and having people believe in him that would prevent him from showing evidence like the ones above.

Then, I believe God would show himself more clearly to these people, but he isn't doing so, so one of the above statements must be false.

The first step in communicating yourself is to signal your presence. 'Creation' may or may not convincingly point to the existence of a Creator, but I don't see how it points to the Christian Creator and not some unknown Creator that is not the Christian God. To many people, the Bible is just a religious book, and not special compared to other religious books of other religions. Just because it is claimed to be true and to have had its accuracy preserved doesn't mean that claim is true. A non-believer who requires more substantial evidence in order to be convinced should not be required to just accept the Bible, because he has no prior reason to believe in it.

In essence, God is letting these people go to Hell because they fail to believe as a result of his failure to provide convincing evidence. In this situation, humility doesn't really matter.

Aron wrote:

Dear Josh,

In my last email, I was discussing only of this life, and what reasons God might have for partially concealing himself for the sake of our spiritual development here. The issue you raise in this email regards the final judgement and Hell. Any discussion of this must necessarily be more tentative than discussions of life on earth, because the final judgement hasn't happened yet, so we don't know right now exactly what it will be like. If the life of Jesus reveals what God is like, then God is very merciful (even though he is also very severe towards hypocrisy and unforgiveness). If Christianity is true, then Jesus will be the one doing the judging. If he was merciful when he was on earth, then he will also be merciful when he comes again.

Your objection to Christianity is this: How could a loving God possibly arrange things so that a sincere truth-seeking nonchristian, (an atheist, polytheist etc.) goes to Hell through no fault of his own?

In order to check to see if this is a problem, we should first check to see whether there are any sincere truth-seeking non-Christians who go to Hell. One could imagine two different kinds: 1) people who have never been exposed to Christianity, and therefore have no opportunity to know it is true, and 2) people who have been exposed to Christianity but claim there is not enough evidence to believe it.

With respect to the people in the category (1), how do you know that the Christian God would send them to Hell just for not being Christians? I think the Bible teaches quite explicitly that God does NOT do this. In Acts 17, Paul is trying to convince the Athenians not to worship idols. He says, "In the past God winked at this ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent." In other words, Paul explicitly says that God did not hold the idol worship of the pagans against them before they had an opportunity to hear the gospel and repent. Furthermore, it says in the book of Revelation that people are redeemed from every "nation, tribe, people, and language". Since many groups went extinct before having an opportunity to hear the gospel, it is clear that at least some people are saved without having explicitly heard the gospel in their lifetimes. Finally, Peter seems to suggest that there is some opportunity for people to believe the gospel even after they have died, when he says:

"For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit. After being made alive, he went and made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits—to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built....the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, so that they might be judged according to human standards in regard to the body, but live according to God in regard to the spirit." (1 Peter 3:18-20 and 4:5-6).

This text goes against the standard evangelical view that there is no chance to be saved after death. On the other hand, evangelicals also say you're supposed to go with the Bible rather than what any particular church says, so I think I'll go with the Bible. :-)

Now let's turn to category (2), the case of a person who has been exposed to Christianity but doesn't believe it because they claim not to have enough evidence. I think there are several different possible things that might be going on here:

First of all, just because they claim to be seeking the truth doesn't mean they really are:

(A) They might actually have enough evidence to believe in God, but dishonestly refuse to admit it to themselves, because they don't want it to be true. In this case, they are not actually sincere, and have rejected God not because of inadequacy of the evidence, but because of stubborn rebellion. In this case, there is no reason to think that they would accept God even if they did have more evidence. So it is not God's fault that they do not believe. It should be pointed out that many of the people who saw Christ multiply the loaves, heal people, raise the dead etc. nevertheless refused to believe. It is naive to think that if everyone saw miracles, everyone would believe. Rather the people who don't want to believe become more firm in their rejection of God.

(B) Or, although they don't have enough evidence to believe, they choose not to investigate to see whether it is true or not. In this case, it is their own fault that they don't have enough evidence. If people claim to base their decisions on evidence and reason, it is hypocritical if they reject Christianity without carefully considering whether there is sufficient evidence for Christ's Resurrection and other miracles to show that Christianity is true. In particular, it is utterly irrational to insist on seeing a miracle personally in order to believe if there is lots of evidence that other people have seen miracles. People don't refuse to believe in scientific results unless they personally witness the experiments, so long as multiple reliable people say they have done the experiments, that is enough. Why should religion be different?

I never assume that anybody is intellectually dishonest until I have some specific reason to think they are dishonest. But I've talked to enough atheists to know that most of them do fall into categories (A) or (B), at least to some extent. However, I'm sure that there do exist cases in which atheists are sincere. In this case:

(C) It might be that although right now they do not have enough evidence to believe, later God will give them enough evidence to believe and they will become Christians. This might happen either before or after death, for all we know.

(D) Or, although they will die without explicitly believing in Jesus, it may be that through caring for the needy, Jesus will regard them as having accepted him without knowing it. (See Matt 25:31-36)

(E) Or, although they do not have enough evidence to believe, they live wicked lives without love. Since God is love, this means that what little they do know about God, they hate (even though they do not know it is God that they are hating). If people hate God, there is no reason to think they will stop hating God if God reveals himself more clearly. Why should God reveal himself to someone who would not benefit from it?

Given all of the possibilities A-E, it is not at all obvious that there ARE any sincere, truth-seeking atheists who are going to Hell. I think that most of them aren't really sincere or truth-seeking, and also that many of them aren't going to go to Hell.

Jesus says "Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or the age to come." In other words, when people reject Jesus without knowing his divinity, God forgives them and does not hold it against them. But when someone by the influence of the Spirit receives the insight necessary to understand that God is working through Jesus, and then rejects him, this is a sin that cannot be forgiven. (God forgives everyone if they repent, but the point is that people who persist in this attitude won't repent.)

It should also be made explicit that no one deserves to go to heaven; God saves people by his mercy. But God will not overrule people who insist at every opportunity that they want nothing to do with his mercy. If people would hate God if they knew him, God is being merciful by not revealing himself to them yet. It gives them a chance to grow and develop, so that maybe later they would be prepared to accept him.

Today's video features Michael Ramsden of the Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics and is courtesy of filmmaker Ryan Pettey, director/editor of Satellite Pictures.

In today’s video, Michael Ramsden discusses the importance and meaning of mystery in the Bible. It does not come from ignorance, as the word is often used in modern times, but rather it is mystery born out of insight and wonder, one that is informed by understanding the world around us. As Ramsden notes, Jesus’ use of children to describe the nature of faith isn’t meant to emphasize their ignorance, but rather their sense of trust for those who love them. Likewise, we should not be afraid to search out answers, as if knowledge will lessen our faith in God. Rather we should trust that our explorations will only strengthen our understanding in Him.

Today's video is courtesy of filmmaker Ryan Pettey, director/editor of Satellite Pictures and features physicist Ard Louis.

In today's video, Oxford physicist Ard Louis discusses the famous debate between renowned evolutionary biologists Stephen Jay Gould and Simon Conway Morris. Gould believed (and wrote in his book Wonderful Life) that if the "tape" of evolution were rerun, the chance that anything like human intelligence would emerge is essentially zero. In other words, humanity is here through random accident. Gould pointed to the work of Morris and fellow scientists in their research of the Burgess Shale as evidence for this view.

However, Morris himself disagrees, pointing to what is called evolutionary convergence. As Morris notes, there are numerous examples of identical features evolving multiple times throughout the history of life independently. Morris believes that if the tape of life were replayed, we would see something like humans emerge. A Christian might say, it looks like we were planned.

Some Christians might find Simon Conway Morris' viewpoint, with its implicit teleology, more attractive. Others, perhaps motivated by a high view of providence, may find Gould's emphasis on contingency equally congenial to their faith. What do you think?

As we noted in our response to the June article in Christianity Today “The Search for the Historical Adam,” the evidence for gradual creation is overwhelming, with more studies supporting the evolutionary process being published each year. We’ve looked at many of these evidences: from fossils, from comparative anatomy, from genetics. Today, we’d like to highlight for our readers a compelling video from the annual TED Conference featuring geneticist Svante Pääbo. You may remember Pääbo from his efforts to extract and sequence DNA from 30,000(+) year old Neanderthal bones (we mentioned his work here).

In this eighteen minute video, Pääbo covers a lot of ground, noting several lines of genetic evidence for the evolution of modern humans from earlier hominids in Africa, as well as for the interbreeding between early humans and Neanderthals. We’ve covered some of this data before, but it’s particularly compelling to hear it described by one of the scientists leading the field of study.

However, our goal at The BioLogos Foundation isn’t just to make the Church aware of the fascinating and convincing scientific evidence for gradual creation. As we have said before:

BioLogos exists to help Christians think carefully about the ramifications of these new data in light of long-standing traditional ways of viewing human creation. We have some re-thinking to do, but it can be done and will be done within the context of a Christian faith that is fully orthodox and thoroughly evangelical. Any time we draw closer to truth, to God’s truth, we have nothing to fear. There is still much to learn, but we can look back at what we have learned with awe—absolute awe.

It is truly amazing that we know so much now about our early days. For example, Africans do not have DNA which is specifically derived from Neanderthals, whereas people in the rest of the world do carry a small amount. This confirms the picture of human history derived from studying fossils. Neanderthal bones have not been found in Africa, so it isn’t surprising that their DNA is not there either. The fact that non-Africans have some of the DNA found in Neanderthal bones confirms that which geneticists knew from other studies: we have two distinct groups of human ancestors—those who left Africa in ancient times and those who stayed.

God chose to reveal himself and to begin working with a distinct sub-group of ancient humans, those descended from Abraham and Sarah. To Abraham, God made a marvelous promise. Drawing his attention to the stars above, God said that someday Abraham’s descendents would outnumber the countable stars in the universe. And so it came to be. Indeed through our adoption into the family, we are all children of Abraham. The God of Abraham is our God too and each one of us is one of those stars too numerous for Abraham to count.

Sometimes, it seems that we are uncomfortable with the notion that God made us through a gradual process that included apes in our family tree. It is almost as though we would prefer dirt to apes. Perhaps, in at least some cases, this is due to an inadequate appreciation for the fact that God loves, really loves, all of creation, not just us. As special as we know we are, we can’t read Psalm 104, Genesis 1, Genesis 9 (where the covenant is not just with Noah but with all living creatures), or Job 38-41 without being reminded that all living creatures are God’s creation (see here). The Neanderthals, the Denisovans, Homo erectus, and the australopithecines were God’s creation too! Still, we modern humans have been singled out. We’ve been called out.

True our family tree, as Pääbo shows here, is intriguing. But let us never forget, that the most important thing about this tree is that God is the vine which exists at its core, and we are called to be the branches which bear fruit. The fact that many of us have a small amount of Neanderthal DNA, some of us have Denisovan DNA, and others have neither is interesting, but it is really just a side issue for people of faith. As a result of God’s visit to Abraham, followed eventually by God’s taking on flesh in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, we can all know God as our heavenly Father. We are children of God and as such, we are God’s representatives. We are called to image God. We are called to love God. And we are called to love each other and to deeply respect all that he has made.

Though some may believe that moving the science/faith dialogue forward is best left to scientists, scholars, and theologians, we at BioLogos recognize that our pastors play an invaluable role in the conversation. Across the globe, pastors are helping their congregations work through difficult issues of science and faith with honesty, insight, and a gentle spirit. To this end we present an ongoing series recognizing sermons (and the pastors who give them) that are helping to promote the harmony of science and faith. Today's sermon comes from Rev. Tim Keller, pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church. Click above to hear an excerpt. Below, is a brief summary written by BioLogos editorial staff. The full sermon can be downloaded here.

In tracing the story of the Bible, Dr. Keller’s previous sermons examined the early chapters of Genesis, which relate the events that lead to humanity’s fall from right relationship with God. Currently, he is exploring God’s redemption of the human brokenness in Paul’s epistle to the Romans. This particular message focuses on chapter two where the Apostle Paul exposes the hypocrisy of Law-observing Jews: while they judged Gentiles by the standard of the Law, they themselves failed to fulfill its requirements. He also asserts that outward performance of the Law by no means exempts them from God’s judgment or from the disease of Sin, which entered the human heart at the Fall. Keller affirms, therefore, that all are in need of a “regenerate new heart” through Jesus Christ, who perfectly fulfilled the requirements of the Law and who alone is able to accomplish this transformation through the power of his cross.

Paul’s message first illuminates what Keller identifies as the failure of religion. The church in Rome no doubt consisted of both Gentiles and Jews. With this in mind, Paul speaks to both groups. Up to this point, Paul has been highlighting the idolatry of the Gentiles. He then reorients his focus in Romans 2 to address the Jews, who were likely to stand in judgment of their gentile brothers and sisters because of the Jewish Law. He declares in verse one, “You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge another, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things.” Keller explains that this statement exposes the hypocrisy of the religious who look to observance of an outward behavioral code for justification rather than to grace through Jesus, which leads to an inward observance of the Law. For example, although Law observers did not bow before physical graven images as the Gentiles did before faith in Christ, idols occupied their hearts. These inner idols, for both the religious Jews and present Christians, could take the form of power, career, achievement, etc. All in all, Paul demonstrates that religion fails since neither the moral nor the immoral person is perfect by God’s standards. Dr. Keller sums up this point nicely with this statement: “I’m not okay, you’re not ok.” There is not one person who measures up to the standard of the Law of God, and not one person, therefore, has a right to pass judgment according to it.

Dr. Keller then discusses why no one can measure up to the terrible beauty of God’s Law “no matter how good” one’s actions may be. Primarily, it is because the standard is not focused on performing the right deeds. Rather, the major sins described by Paul in Romans 1 include greed, insolence, heartlessness, etc. Although actions accompany such characteristics, they begin as inner attitudes of the heart. Often people read God’s ordinances at the behavioral level, as the religious Jewish people did, in an attempt to justify themselves as a moral person, but God’s requirements are much more demanding. This is revealed in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, for example, when he examines the Ten Commandments. He says in Matthew 5: 21-22 (NIV), “You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that…anyone who says to a brother or sister, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the court.” In using the Hebrew word ‘raca’ meaning ‘nobody,’ Jesus is revealing that the sin of murder is birthed from a heart that devalues another person who is infinitely valuable in God’s eyes. Simply put, the Law of God is after a certain type of person whose right actions flow from a right heart. For example, the Law points to a person so filled with God’s love that they not only refrain from murder, but rather treat others as royalty. Keller continues as he explains the impossibility of such a standard for a human being, yet the Law demands it. What is more, people will demand a similar standard of others. Keller also emphasizes the Day of Judgment. Because God is just, he will hold a person accountable to either the standard of grace or to the standard that one person required of another. No person is perfect, and therefore, none will be able to stand in either God’s judgment or the judgment of their own heart. This creates the need for a transformed heart as Dr. Keller expounds in the final point of this passage.

In the last verses of Romans 2, the Apostle Paul relates the “failure of religion because of the terrible beauty of the Law” to the need for a regenerate heart. This is only possible through the circumcision of the heart in Christ by the Holy Spirit. Keller first explains the significance of circumcision. Circumcision was a physical distinction between the pagan cultures and the Jewish people who were in covenant with the God of Israel. On a deeper level, this act symbolized the consequence of disobedience to the covenant first established between Abraham and God: one would be cut off from the covenantal relationship with God. As Dr. Keller explains, all people have fallen short of the Law. For this reason, God sent Jesus, his son, to fulfill the requirements of the Law. He then died on the cross to receive upon himself the consequence of death that all deserved. Therefore, Paul argues that it is no longer one who receives physical circumcision who is saved, but one who receives the circumcision of the Spirit in Christ. Romans 2:28 (NIV) establishes this point saying, “A person is not a Jew who is one only outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code.” Finally, Dr. Keller explains the significance of the Old Testament Law: the perfect standard describes not a moral code, but our Savior Jesus Christ. Ultimately, one seeks to obey the beautiful Law which Jesus embodied, yet one receives grace in the times of failure, confident that Christ has indeed paid it all.

In today’s video, Pastor Brian McClaren discusses the idea of the “slippery slope”. As he notes, the metaphor itself is problematic, because we often assume that we are on the top of the slope to begin with, when in fact changing our views may help us ascend the slope, or to reach a new peak of understanding on the other side.

He also notes two dangers that face the science and faith dialogue. On one side is excessive confidence, when we are so sure of being right that we refuse to consider other ideas. But being too afraid of excessive confidence can lead to an insufficient confidence, where we feel incapable of knowing anything for sure. McClaren proposes that what Christians need, rather, is proper confidence, the confidence that we are moving ahead yet still willing to learn. This, he says, is what it means to be a disciple: to be interested in the truth and always learning, but always willing to be pensive again rather than set in our current knowledge.