What is Science afraid of?

I happened to be at conference at Emory in 1977 to present a paper on the impact of “belief” on human consciousness. Also presenting that day was another Georgia State student. Her paper held that Science qualified as a “belief system.” She was not the first or the last to put forward that thesis. A belief system, according to Webster, is a fixed, coherent set of beliefs prevalent in a community or a society. It is also defined as faith based on a series of beliefs but not formalized into a religion. Once a little known term from Anthropology, the term “belief system” is much more widely used today, including as an often-used substitute for the word “religion.” This is because, by its very nature, a belief system explains the origin and existence of life and the Earth, the nature and origin of the universe and so on.

There has been much handwringing in recent years about some proponents of Christianity attempting to highjack public education by insisting that some form of Creationism be taught in schools. Well, say some opponents of this view, the Kansas State School Board went completely off the chain last week when it voted 6-4 to allow the theory of evolution to be challenged in the classroom. It is a dark day for public education, some say. It was a victory for the Christian fascist agenda, said one on-line publication.

Ever so slowly entering the fray in recent years is the concept of Intelligent Design, the idea that life and the universe are so complex that they cannot be sufficiently explained by the theory of natural selection. In the minds of some, Intelligent Design is a more secularized form of pure Creationism. And with the action by the Kansas School Board, the priests of Establishment Science are ringing the alarm bells at a fever pitch, echoed by their dutiful disciples in the media.

Though not the originators of the concept, natural selection was promoted by Charles Darwin, Charles Lyell and their endless willing disciples beginning in the mid-19th century. Written in 1839 and published in 1859, Darwin’s landmark book, “The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life,” was the catalyst that changed Science, providing it’s very own foundation for the establishment of a belief system that, like most religions, explains life and the universe. Now nearly 150 years later, the religion called Science has become so pervasive, including in public education, that natural selection is taken for fact. Never mind that it is theory that has yet to be conclusively proved. But this is what happens in the religion of Science. As in other religions, some things must be taken on faith!

All that having been said, I don’t believe there is anything wrong with Science. But there is the matter of keeping things in perspective. Some current disciples of Establishment Science refuse to adhere to what should be a basic premise of the belief. Science has long been touted as objective, yet the emotional subjectivity of some of its True Believers today is eerily reminiscent of what the Catholic Church did with such scientific luminaries as Copernicus and Galileo a few hundred years ago. Suggest that there is another answer, another theory, another possibility and you have committed heresy! And once a heretic, the condemnation quickly follows. In its current manifestation, Establishment Science is no better than the Establishment Church of prior centuries in its intolerance and unwillingness to consider other possibilities. For some (not all) in Science, barricaded inside the temple walls, rage and political deflection is all they can muster. For some of us it begs the question, What is Science afraid of?

Like the males of some species that eat their own young, some of the high priests and disciples of the religion of Science, from the lofty heights of their temples entrenched in grand universities, model their disdain for alternative views along the lines of an academic improvisation of the Inquisition. Such was the fate of Immanuel Velikovsky after “Worlds in Collision” was published in 1950. A few in the scientific community did heed the subsequent request of Albert Einstein, who went to bat for Velikovsky. Yet even Einstein, in 1916 and beyond, resisted the idea of the Big Bang that was embedded in his own General Theory of Relativity. Willem de Sitter, Edwin Hubble and others helped Einstein eventually see that no matter how much he and others protested, the now-accepted “theory” of the origin of the universe, the Big Bang, means that something 6.2 billion trillion miles wide (a conservative estimate) had its origin in something no larger than the period at the end of this sentence. Pretty interesting, huh. It’s the next best thing to saying something from nothing, or creation! And that’s the part that scares some people!

So today, Intelligent Design is attempting to get a foothold in the hallowed ground of the religion of Science. And like most every religion, some in the temples of Science are fighting back with a zeal almost equalled to some of their devotees in the media. (Don’t you love free speech?)

So what’s a body to do? Perhaps the situation between the religion of Science and the religion of Christianity aren’t as far apart as expected. In the words of astronomer Robert Jastrow, “For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”

As for me, I expect to be burned at the stake at any minute. And yet I still wonder, what is Science afraid of?

Dogmatism without Foundation

Submitted by PTC Guy on Mon, 11/21/2005 - 1:53pm.

In actuality many Atheists and Humanists hide behind Science and use it as their Holy Book.

You will not see them conceding that, while the majority of scientist hold to Evolution and theories such as the Big Bang, a great many do not. Many reject evolution and such as myths and issues of faith based upon what criterion? Science!

There is also a myth in science only those into religion, their definition of religion, of course, reject evolution. Which is also totally false since many humanists also reject the theory.

Want to ruffle the feathers of these types? Ask this question:

Where did the matter, energy and very fabric of space of the universe come from in the ultimate past? Which of these options, the only options, is the answer:
1. It all existed without either beginning or cause. Which violates laws of science.
2. It just popped into existence without cause. Which violates science.
3. It was created by something that existed without beginning or without cause. Which violates science.

Some will actually try to answer with a complex statement of non time reality, a fancy term for eternity.

Just remind them that they are, in a convoluted way, endorsing position 1 above. The phrasing is such as to try to escape the reality of what the Bible declares, when describing God, as a Causeless Cause with beginning or end. Which of course violates the Law of Cause and Effect.

Or even better is the argument that such issues go beyond the realm of testable science hence are non applicable. A real gem way of saying they cannot give any answer.

Science is the Holy Book of these kinds. Yet the demands and realities of Science are self defeating to their cause.

But they firmly trust in what they cannot prove. The very definition of faith.

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