Faith is not a highly esteemed word in the scientific community. Richard Dawkins says faith is belief without evidence. In contrast, the Bible says faith is the evidence of things not seen. I contend that Science itself is fundamentally founded on faith. In fact there could be no science at all without this faith. In Science and Civilisation in China historian Joseph Needham explains that despite the intellectual and artistic sophistication of China in ancient and medieval times, science never developed there because

"there was no confidence that the code of nature's laws could ever be unveiled and read, because there was no assurance that a divine being, even more rational than our-selves, had ever formulated such a code capable of being read."

(4)

For it to be a reasonable pursuit, at the very foundation of the science must lie a profound faith in the rational intelligibility of the universe. Albert Einstein once marveled, “The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible”. His astonishment had its fruition in the recognition that the universe doesn't have to be that way. In Einstein’s Letters to Solovine he says

“Well, a priori, one should expect a chaotic world, which cannot be grasped by the mind in any way… the kind of order created by Newton’s theory of gravitation, for example, is wholly different. Even if man proposes the axioms of the theory, the success of such a project presupposes a high degree of ordering of the objective world, and this could not be expected a priori. That is the ‘miracle’ which is constantly reinforced as our knowledge expands.”

(2)

Within the confines of naturalism and materialism there is no rational reason why the laws of physics that work on earth should also apply to the stars trillions of light years away. In like fashion, there is absolutely no logical necessity for a universe that even obeys laws, let alone one that abides by the rules of human conceived mathematics. For as the example given by Einstein above concerning Newton’s gravity shows it is not merely the fact that that the universe is intelligible that is amazing, it is the mathematical nature of that comprehensibility which is even more miraculous.

Atheistic scientists today take for granted the idea that the universe operates according to humanly comprehensible laws. They have conveniently forgotten the bedrock of faith science is founded upon. Naturalism and materialist philosophies do not account for a rational universe. The idea of a rational universe was first invented by the pre-Socratic Greeks like Pythagoras. However the concept was quickly stamped out by the pagan God worship of most Greeks who most believed the Gods controlled the universe at their ever dramatic whims. That being the case, from where can we trace the origin of this modern scientific faith in the rational intelligibility of the universe? History points to Christianity. In Science and the Modern World Alfred North Whitehead concludes that "faith in the possibility of science ... is an unconscious derivative from medieval theology.” (5)


Dinesh D’Souza in What’s So Great About Christianity says,

Christianity reinvigorated the idea of an ordered cosmos by envisioning the universe as following laws that embody the rationality of God the creator. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” The term used here for word is logos, a Greek term meaning "thought" or "rationality.” God is sacred and made the universe, and the universe operates lawfully in accordance with divine reason.

( 1)

In his book God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? Oxford scientist and mathematician Dr John Lennox writes,

Our answer to the question of why the universe is rationally intelligible will in fact depend, not on whether we are scientists or not, but on whether we are theists or naturalists. Theists will say that the intelligibility of the universe is grounded in the nature of the ultimate rationality of God: both the real world and the mathematics are traceable to the Mind of God who created both the universe and the human mind. It is therefore, not surprising when the mathematical theories spun by human minds created in the image of God’s Mind, find ready application in a universe whose architect was that same creative mind.

(3)


I would like to point out that the implications of this line of reasoning go much deeper than the fact of sciences utter reliance on faith. It also clearly defines the limits of science in a more profound way. In recent threads I have participated in on Intelligent Design the common complaint made by the atheist is that ID does not meet the qualifications of science. I replied something along the lines of, “are we searching for truth or are we searching for science?” My point being, there is truth available outside of science. It is only one way of obtaining knowledge, not the only way. For instance I contend by its own rules science is incapable of determining the origins of the universe. Why? The Big Bang theory states that there was a point in time where everything came into being including time. Ah ha, but see that also includes the laws of physics. Since the laws of physics were not in effect you cannot use physics to describe creation. If the universe was produced outside the laws of physics, then its genesis meets the basic definition of the term miracle. Science meet you maker.






Bibliography:

1. D’Souza,Dinesh.What’s So great About Christianity Regenery Publishing, Washington DC. 2007 p.64

2. Einstein, Albert.Letters to Soloivine: 1906-1955 Citadel Publishing. 2000. p. 31

3. Lennox, Dr. John C.God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God?Lion Publishing, Oxford England. 2007 p.61

4. Needham, Joseph. Science and Civilisation in China Cambridge University Press. 1995.

5. Whitehead, Alfred North. Science and the Modern WorldThe Free Press: Simon and Schuster, NY, 1953.


[edit on 5/7/2008 by Bigwhammy]

Well my friend you have made a ton of great points here, I myself am a believer and have never understood how any one can put the creation of our universe into a box. While I believe in God I do not claim to know how he created all things. As an example many believers want to argue against evolution as the birth of man kind, only being able to argue that God CREATED everything. I personally believe even the bible itself makes a good arguement that evolution was the process he used. It is widely believed even amongst many people of faith that the 6 day period in which the lord made the universe was in fact a week in His time not our sense of what time is. The bible states that 1000 years to us is but a blink of an eye to Him. Using this formula Genesis states it took him a full day to create man, it also states that He breathed life into the earth to create us. While I don't believe we evolved from monkeys due to a lack of proof, either in fossil evidence of the missing link, or the fact that we are genetically no where near monkeys in our dna. I believe Genesis makes a good arguement that He created us at a single cell level and over the period of one day in his time guided our evolution into a primative man. Many will argue against this, but my reply is this. The bible admittedly states that the story of our creation was told to Moses by God so assumably future generations would know where they came from. But he was talking to a primative man in Moses, so if I was God in trying to explain to him what I had done, knowing he had no knowledge of science or any of the advancements we now take for granted. I would have had to dumb it down to his level. Add to this that the scientific laws that you reffered to are no more than a mans theories with a little evidence to back them. Not to mention every time we turn around science is changing what they say these laws are because truth fully they don't know how or what happened in the first place, they just use their version of science to talk them selves out of believing because they didn't want to in the first place. How can you claim to be objective when you begin your processes with a preconceived notion of what you want to disprove in the first place.

Very intriguing angle ya have there Whammer especially the part about physics not being created yet and the pun like spin ya have saying science meet your maker.


God!

ha ha ha

Very Good and as usual I expect you have already done the anticipated possible arguments with ready to rip replies.

I had just researched some similar reasoning regarding faith. I just don't think faith is something most understand but we ALL use faith everyday we have to have faith in so many areas of our lives and most of the time our faith is what gets the job done.

Thank you by the way for sending me the God Delusion, It will come in handy for something someday.

If you don't see what I see in this quote by the Dawkinator you got to be an Atheist. Tell me if you can see what I think you will see lol

I believe, but I cannot prove, that all life, all intelligence, all creativity and all 'design' anywhere in the universe, is the direct or indirect product of Darwinian natural selection. -- RICHARD DAWKINS, Evolutionary Biologist

Guy doesn't even know what he is not agreeing he agrees with lol

- Con

Firstly, science is essentially driven by the human desire to understand. It has nothing to do with God unless one chooses to force him upon it.

Secondly, who says we can understand the universe? There are plenty of phenomenon we cannot possibly comprehend in this current age. Quantum mechanics, and the tendency of certain particles to "vanish" is currently far beyond our reasoning. We may never understand it. That fact that we understand, or at least think we understand, certain things is due not to "God made it understandable" but rather that we have slowly figured out what was previously impossible to comprehend.

Dickie Dee should have stated that he cannot prove it yet; because that is the truth.

Originally posted by SlyCM
Firstly, science is essentially driven by the human desire to understand. It has nothing to do with God unless one chooses to force him upon it.

faith is more than belief in god.

science says the sun will be there tomorrow. but how do you know? you say the sun has been there for millions of years? how do you know? you werent there personally to witness the process.

science IS essentially a faith in process. the whole of science is based on a faith in constants. it allows us to come to conclusions even though we may not have observed it ourselves.

Originally posted by SlyCM
Firstly, science is essentially driven by the human desire to understand. It has nothing to do with God unless one chooses to force him upon it.

I can't begin to tell you the contradiction in terms you're making in this brief statment. The first part makes a good slogan but that's all it is. Science like the quote I gave from Dawkins, and the arguments that have been going on in this regard, Science only wants to guard and protect its monopoly and has nothing to do with understanding a damn thing. It tries harder to NOT understand, NOT investigate, NOT teach, but preach and indoctrinate and has pretty much become a religion of sorts.

Science in our Schools.

is pathetic

- Con




[edit on 8-5-2008 by Conspiriology]

Originally posted by Bigwhammy

What Dawkins does not seem to appreciate is that his blind watchmaker is something even more remarkable than Paley's watches. Paley finds a "watch" and asks how such a thing could have come to be there by chance. Dawkins finds an immense automated factory that blindly constructs watches, and feels that he has completely answered Paley's point. But that is absurd. How can a factory that makes watches be less in need of explanation than the watches themselves?

Yeah,, and as drop dead common sense as that last statement is,, the Atheist Dawkins, the most over rated zoo keeper in history next to the naturalist turned con artist Darwin, wouldn't agree because he really IS that silly and that over rated.

His book is turning out to be a real let down. I was expecting some brilliant arguments here.

Pffffy typical Atheism

Science Fiction

- Con




[edit on 8-5-2008 by Conspiriology]

So if I understand you correctly, you're saying that science is a faith-based belief system because we take for granted the fact that the universe seems to be resting upon several core systems that are readily predictable and measurable? That's an interesting angle.

Firstly, the presumption is made that science "started" by dealing with the base functionality of the universe and has made its discoveries outwards from that point, assuming that those core systems are immutable and absolute as it goes. I would argue instead that science started at a much more general, day-to-day level and progressed inwards, eventually discovering that the universe runs on a basic set of human-understandable and mathematically definable systems which are not yet fully understood, but generally accepted to work seeing as we haven't found any cases where they produce different outcomes.

The question of whether or not the knowledge of the sun rising every day is faith based is, I think, the result of a misunderstanding. We did not approach the question scientifically from the start. Indeed, the concept of the sun rising and setting once was a faith-based issue, but no longer. While I can't tell you what the sunrise looked like in 15000 BCE, I can explain to you the systems that hold our planet in place around the sun, and the optical illusion caused by our rotation both in place and in orbit around it making it appear as though the sun is rotating around us. We know about these things because intense research has been conducted, and the data gathered has shown us that in 100% of recorded instances, the sun has risen in the morning. We've taken the sun's behavior and obtained a very consistent set of rules from it, rules which hold true in 100% of our observations. Because of this, I can say with honest confidence that the sun will rise tomorrow because that is the way it physically behaves. Is it faith that tells me that this is true, and that the sun will not spin a loop tomorrow morning? No, it is my experience, my observations that tell me that it won't. Saying that I think the sun will rise tomorrow only because I take for granted the fact that it will not rotate backwards doesn't take faith. Holding the belief that the sun may just rotate backwards, even though it has never been observed to have done so...that's faith.

I can assure you that if we one day find a particular segment of the universe where these laws do not hold sway, there will be a lot of very interested people immediately working on an answer as to why they do not.

Two other things of note, the first being:

Originally posted by Bigwhammy
The idea of a rational universe was first invented by the pre-Socratic Greeks like Pythagoras. However the concept was quickly stamped out by the pagan God worship of most Greeks who most believed the Gods controlled the universe at their ever dramatic whims. That being the case, from where can we trace the origin of this modern scientific faith in the rational intelligibility of the universe? History points to Christianity

I'm going to have to go ahead and say that this little quote is more than a bit sensationalist. The image presented of the Greeks being a people chained to eclectic religious belief which completely overrode all other aspects of their lives, whereas Christianity is the font from which all modern science sprang is more than a bit hard to swallow. Greeks such as Epicurus had already begun laying the foundation for atomic theory in the third century BCE, and Heron of Alexandria constructed the world's first steam engine nearly 2000 years before the industrial revolution in Europe. These were terrifically intelligent people, capable of incredible feats of engineering for their time. Contrast that to the height of Christianity's power during the Dark and Middle ages, when scientific discovery was at an all time low and even the mention of the Earth orbiting the Sun was heretical, and you'll see that the above quote is almost humorously inaccurate. I will give Christianity some things, such as Gregor Mendel (sorry, he was Catholic, which doesn't count), but for the most part it has only given us a backward march towards fundamentalism, driven by the power hungry and fueled by the uneducated (in the case of the Dark Ages, anyway. They weren't called dark because light bulbs were not yet invented)

And the other point of note, is that I see this thread is an attempt to discredit science because it is faith based. Fair enough, opinions being what they are. However, setting aside my previously-stated thoughts concerning the validity of your argument, I do have a question about this kind of thought process that I have always been curious about. You're trying to demonize science because it is faith based and therefore...not reliable, I'm guessing? If the "fact" that it is faith based causes it to be nothing more than unreliable guesswork, then what makes any faith reliable? If science can't work because it's all made up without final, concrete proof to back it up, why should we look on Christianity as a viable alternative? Isn't it faith based, and therefore in the same hokum league as science? How do you reconcile this in your own mind before presenting it as an argument? I'm honestly curious about this.

Originally posted by Bigwhammy
Faith is not a highly esteemed word in the scientific community.

You're absolutely correct. Faith is scoffed at in scientific circles but it sure does take some faith to believe in evolution.

Richard Dawkins says faith is belief without evidence.

Dawkins is a man of faith, I suppose then, as he devoutly believes in his religion of evolution. Maybe his church can achieve tax exempt status.

---

On a more serious and not so sassy note, good thread. Well researched, as always, BW. 'Science meet your maker' is an appropriate title and a very succinct statement in itself. All science really is, is discovering the process God created and uses in His creation. Gravity, DNA, geology, space exploration, biology, etc. When we learn about such things, we are learning about His techniques.

Originally posted by Thousand
The question of whether or not the knowledge of the sun rising every day is faith based is, I think, the result of a misunderstanding. We did not approach the question scientifically from the start. Indeed, the concept of the sun rising and setting once was a faith-based issue, but no longer. While I can't tell you what the sunrise looked like in 15000 BCE, I can explain to you the systems that hold our planet in place around the sun, and the optical illusion caused by our rotation both in place and in orbit around it making it appear as though the sun is rotating around us. We know about these things because intense research has been conducted, and the data gathered has shown us that in 100% of recorded instances, the sun has risen in the morning. We've taken the sun's behavior and obtained a very consistent set of rules from it, rules which hold true in 100% of our observations. Because of this, I can say with honest confidence that the sun will rise tomorrow because that is the way it physically behaves. Is it faith that tells me that this is true, and that the sun will not spin a loop tomorrow morning? No, it is my experience, my observations that tell me that it won't. Saying that I think the sun will rise tomorrow only because I take for granted the fact that it will not rotate backwards doesn't take faith. Holding the belief that the sun may just rotate backwards, even though it has never been observed to have done so...that's faith.

so you saying that because there is proof and information have how the sun works that faith is not involved?

i submit that you have faith in the data. not in god. but faith doesnt have to be about god.

how do we know that the sun wont go supernova, or that gravity will not simply stop? we have faith in our experience and observance.

what im saying is that in faith, people assume its a belief in something unprovable. but its not. faith is very close to trust.

science is built on a faith or trust in the data. and as i said before, it allows us to draw conclusions about things that we may not have personally witnessed.

you cant with your literal eye see magnitism. but we do see its effects. those effects give us data that allow us to predict and use something we will never see.

Great thread Whammy!
S&F'd!
Thank's for doing homework!

One thing about the atheist belief system is that it chooses to believe that life is nothing more than a random act of science and continues to evolve. However, both atheist and science have not yet been able to explain how something as random as a fractal still has elements of design and mathematics.
Every design has a designer.

The title of this thread can also be named:
Science, who's yo daddy!

I'm loving that faith alone allows me to enter this sequence of letters onto a wireless keyboard and they 'magically' make their way onto a little screen where faith based science angels pick them up and fly them to millions of computer screens around the world.

Or that faith alone allows some science angels to magically create vaccines that will prevent my children from dying of polio or some other virus.

Looks to me like faith in scientific miracles is a lot more logical than faith in anything else. After all, these science faeries have a lot more documented success than the other kind.

The difference between science and religion is the ability to dispassionately accept new evidence, and the passionate unwillingness to do so.

Science is not a religion, atheism and evolution are not faith based. "God of the gaps" arguments and BigWhammy's attempts to lower opponents down to his/her level, fortunately, do not have an effect on real evidence, which science is based on.