- Based on the strongest pronouncements of a number of atheist scientists and science writers, one might picture science and religion at each other's throats. But Kenneth Miller, professor of biology at Brown, has written in “Finding Darwin's God,” that a belief in evolution is compatible with a belief in God.
Then there was Stephen Jay Gould, paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science, who said that "science and religion do not glower at each other…” but, rather, represent Non-overlapping magisteria." (above from Wikipedia).
And Einstein: 'Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.'
a. " According to the poll, just over half of scientists (51%) believe in some form of deity or higher power; specifically, 33% of scientists say they believe in God, while 18% believe in a universal spirit or higher power. "
Scientists and Belief Pew Research Center s Religion Public Life Project
Is there a rapprochement?
2. " To be clear, atheistic scientists have as their raison d'être:
a) understanding the origins of the universe, and b) the inchoate fear that it may not be understandable sans a supernatural force. Based on this framework, any sort of word salad or hypothesis will do, so long as it conforms to a and b above."
David Berlinski, "The Devil's Delusion."
a. How to explain all of the efforts and vituperation that the atheist scientists put into berating believers? And, to what end...after all, believers don't behave in the same way toward atheists, do they?
The reason is that said atheists demand absolute and unquestioning prostration before them.
"Despite the immense ideological power that the American scientific establishment wields, it still resents the stature of organized religion. On crucial matters of faith and morals, which loom so large in the lives of most individuals, they take a back seat. Members of the National Academy of Sciences are by a large majority persuaded that there is no God; men and women by the millions that there is."
Ibid.
3. What is the strongest of weapons these scientific atheists can bring to bear? Well....the most abstract and abstruse level of science, of course: they try to apply the rules of quantum mechanics to argue that God doesn't exist, that somehow these laws replace the concept of God.
See, there's the problem: there is no real understanding of quantum physics....it is all guesses and probabilities.
"If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don't understand quantum mechanics."
Richard Feynman ( "....an American theoretical physicist known for his work in the path integral formulation ofquantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, and the physics of thesuperfluidity of supercooled liquid helium, as well as in particle physics (he proposed theparton model."
Richard Feynman - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia
a. "When scientists appeal to various unobservable entities- universal forces, grand symmetries, twice-differential functions as in mechanics, Calabi-Yau manifolds, ionic bonds, or quantum fields- the shovel is in plain sight, but what is about to be shoveled is nowhere to be seen. Why physicists should enjoy inferential advantages denied theologians is not explained."
Berlinski, “Devil’s Delusion,” p. 143.
4. There is prominent scientific atheist, Lawrence Krauss, "... an American theoretical physicist and cosmologist...known as an advocate of the public understanding of science, ...and works to reduce the impact of superstition and religious dogma in pop culture. He is also the author of several bestselling books, includingThe Physics of Star TrekandA Universe from Nothing." Lawrence M. Krauss - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia
Krauss has said "we all, literally, emerged from quantum nothingness..."
Clearly an attempt to avoid the central question. Where are the quantum rules that imply a universe that must appear out of the void?
5. What is quantum theory?
A good scientific theory is defined as one that allows us to make valid, verified predictions about future observations. But quantum theory is so weird that its predictions are usually understood only as probabilities....According to this interpretation, developed by German physicist Werner Heisenberg, we can only predict the probability of an outcome, not cause and effect: in the quantum world you could not tell if a match thrown on the ground caused a forest fire or if the forest fire caused the match to light.
Amir Aczel, "Why Science Does Not Disprove God," chapter six.
The point?
If quantum theory cannot predict actual outcomes, how does it serve the argument of our scientific atheists?
