There have been a number of responses complaining that the discussion had concentrated on religion, and that very little about scientific issues had appeared.

This post (and the following one) will partly redress the balance.

I had intended to cover Don’s words about “naturalism” and make some introductory remarks about creationists’ misunderstandings of and objections to the “big-bang” in one post. However when I got down to writing it the post got longer and longer, so I will break this into two: one dealing with the basic presuppositions of science (Don’s claims about “naturalism” do not present an accurate picture of how scientists go about their work), and the other about the “big-bang”.

Little attention has been paid to the preamble in Don’s post, before he got to his item numbered 1. The preamble, and a few isolated mentions scattered throughout the post, will be discussed at some length, because these indicate that Don wants to split science up into two distinct disciplines, one dealing with what he calls the “experimental sciences” and the other with the “historical sciences”.

Two paragraphs from Don’s preamble read:

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I take the Bible as authoritative, so I take seriously the example of the apostle Paul who said, “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Cor 10:5). For the last 200 years or so, perhaps the greatest source of arguments against the knowledge of God has been naturalism; the dogma that nature is all there is. Its corollary, historical naturalism, claims that origins and history can be explained by purely natural processes.

There are elements of the sciences of astronomy, geology and biology that have been developed based on and in turn used to bolster the claims of naturalism: big bang cosmology, historical geology and biological evolution (the origin of the huge spectrum of living organisms). All three, not just the third, stand in opposition to the traditional understanding of the biblical big-picture view of history, which is founded in Genesis 1-11 (not just Genesis 1).

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Don seems to be somewhat ignorant of just how most scientists approach their work. They do not start with the concept that “nature is all there is”, but rather with something along the lines of “This is a fascinating bit of the natural world – how can I investigate it further?” And the techniques used in the investigation differ between the different fields of science.

Don fails to distinguish between the different varieties of “naturalism. He is not alone in this – the USA lawyer Phillip Johnson, who has criticised evolution and the whole of science, has done likewise.

“Naturalism” comes in at least two quite distinct varieties. Don’s phrase “the dogma that nature is all there is” is better termed “philosophical naturalism” or “metaphysical naturalism” or “ontological naturalism”. A glance at the Macquarie Dictionary will indicate that these are philosophical usages of the term “naturalism”, and must be clearly distinguished from the use of the term in science, which is correctly described as “methodological naturalism.

Science works by assuming that there are a consistent set of rules or laws by which the natural world works. Thus it approaches any investigation seeking only to uncover the relationships which hold within the natural world. This implies neither denial nor acceptance of anything outside the natural order. In particular it does not assume that “nature is all there is” – what it does assume is that nature is all that is accessible to scientific analysis.

The scientific approach will be discussed further below, and may be summed up in Einstein’s phrase “The Lord God is subtle, but he is not malicious”. This has been put in terms which would please many readers on page 18 of “The Science of Discworld II: The Globe”, by Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen (Ebury Press, 2002):

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Discworld runs on magic, Roundworld runs on rules, and even though magic needs rules, and some people think rules are magical, they are quite different things. At least, in the absence of wizardly interference. This was the main scientific message of our last book, “The Science of Discworld”. There we charted the history of the universe from the Big Bang through to the creation of the Earth and the evolution of a not especially promising species of ape.

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Many people have pointed out that it is impossible to even attempt a scientific analysis of God, and also that there is no way of testing whether God lies behind any particular phenomenon observed in the natural world. Douglas Futuyma writes on pages 169 and 170 of his “Science on Trial: The Case for Evolution” (Pantheon Press, 1982):

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Similarly, any “theory” that explains phenomena by recourse to the actions of an omnipotent, omniscient supreme being, or any other supernatural omnipotent entity, is a nonscientific theory. I could postulate that all human actions are slavish responses to the suggestions of guardian angels and diabolical incubi, and no one could possibly prove me wrong; for whether a persons actions look rational or irrational, good or evil, I can involve the power of supernatural suggestion. I could similarly postulate that God personally has governed the development and life of every creature that has ever been born, and if you protest that the laws of physics and chemistry and biology explain biological phenomena, I could answer that God in his wisdom sees fit to act in an orderly way that gives the appearance of material laws of causation.

Because such a theory cannot be challenged by any observation, it is not scientific. It isn’t necessarily wrong. It is just not amenable to scientific investigation. Science cannot deny the existence of supernatural beings. It cannot prove that God didn’t create the universe. It can’t prove that God isn’t shunting electrons down the cytochrome molecules in your mitochondria. Science can neither affirm nor deny supernatural powers. Science is the exercise of reason, and so is limited to questions that can be approached by the use of reason, questions that can be answered by the discovery of objective knowledge and the elucidation of natural laws of causation. In dealing with questions about the natural world, scientists must act as if they can be answered without recourse to supernatural powers. There can be no scientific study of God.

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And Michael Behe, who supports “intelligent design”, writes on page 203 of his “Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution” (Simon and Schuster, 1998):

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We must also consider the role of the laws of nature. The laws of nature can organize matter — for example, water flow can build up silt sufficiently to dam a portion of a river, forcing it to change course. The most relevant laws are those of biological reproduction, mutation, and natural selection. If a biological structure can be explained in terms of those natural laws, then we cannot conclude that it was designed.

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Many others could be quoted along the same lines, but these are sufficient to show that the approach adopted by science, looking for natural explanations of natural happenings, cannot be taken as in any way denying the existence of God.

One writer who has challenged Phillip Johnson about his misunderstanding of “naturalism” is the philosopher Robert Pennock. In an article “Naturalism, Evidence, and Creationism: The Case of Phillip Johnson”, published in “Biology and Philosophy”, vol. 11 (1996) 543-549 he points out the confusion of terminology used by Johnson and provides support for the use of methodological naturalism in science. This article may be more readily accessible on pages 77-97 of the volume of reprinted articles “Intelligent Design Creationism and Its Critics” (MIT Press, 2001), edited by Pennock. The index guides the reader to many other items supporting methodological naturalism.

Most modern scientists, if they have thought about the matter at all, would deny that they assume the non-existence of entities outside the natural world. After all, it is impossible to prove such a universal negative. I have not found even a single book, technical or popular, on cosmology in which the writer states that his work “bolster[s] the claims of naturalism” by showing that “nature is all there is”. The closest I have found is a paragraph on page 205 of “Dreams of a Final Theory” by Steven Weinberg (Hutchinson, 1993):

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Among today’s scientists I am probably somewhat atypical in caring about such things. On the rare occasions when conversations over lunch or tea touch on matters of religion, the strongest reaction expressed by most of my fellow physicists is a mild surprise and amusement that anyone still takes all that seriously. Many physicists maintain a nominal affiliation with the faith of their parents, as a form of ethnic identification and for use at weddings and funerals, but few of these physicists seem to pay much attention to their nominal religion’s theology. I do know two general relativists who are devout Roman Catholics; several theoretical physicists who are observant Jews; an experimental physicist who is a born-again Christian; one theoretical physicist who is a devout Moslem; and one mathematical physicist who has taken holy orders in the Church of England. Doubtless there are other deeply religious physicists whom I don’t know or who keep their opinions to themselves. But, as far as I can tell from my own observations, most physicists today are not sufficiently interested in religion even to qualify as practising atheists.

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After that long excursus on the varieties of naturalism, I will now present what most modern scientists take as the basis for their work.

Kitty Ferguson, in her very readable “The Fire in the Equations” (Bantam Press, 1984), which carries the subtitle “Science, Religion & the Search for God” on the dust-jacket, has discussed the nature of both science and religion. After writing about “… a gamble that certain articles of faith which cannot be proved by science are nevertheless well-founded enough to provide a springboard for all scientific investigation.” (page 7) she write, on pages 8 and 9:

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Perhaps the explanation lies in the origins of science as we know it today. Scientists of the seventeenth century, most but not all of whom had religious views closer to my grandparents than to Hawking (many of the first Fellows of the Royal Society in England were Puritans), developed a procedure to be used in the search for scientific knowledge, a procedure that would systematically separate what is true from what is not true. That is the procedure we call the scientific method. It has served us splendidly ever since its birth and made our spectacular technology possible. Whatever the scientific method’s origins or its philosophical foundations, we have no cause to doubt its usefulness.

Depending upon whether we believe in God, you or I might leave God out of the following articles of faith, but otherwise we would find little in this seventeenth-century world-view with which to disagree. In the seventeenth century a scientist could have it both ways without risking charges of contradiction. What he learned from his religion and his direct experience of the universe led him to believe the following:

* The universe is _rational_, reflecting both the intellect and the faithfulness of its Creator. It has pattern, symmetry, and predictability to it. Effect follows cause in a dependable manner. For these reasons, it is not futile to try to study the universe.

* The universe is _accessible_ to us, not a closed book but one open to our investigation. Minds created in the image of the mind of God can understand the universe God created.

* The universe has _contingency_ to it, meaning that things could have been different from the way we find them, and chance and/or choice have played a role in making them what they are. Whether this is contingency in the sense that chance and choice play an on-going role within the universe, or merely in the sense that there was an initial chance occurrence or choice which brought about this universe instead of a different one or none at all, one cannot learn about the universe by pure thought and logic alone. Knowledge comes by observing and testing it.

* There is such a thing as _objective_ reality. Because God exists and sees and knows everything, there is a truth behind everything. Reality has a hard edge to it and does not cave in or shift like sands in the desert in response to our opinions, perceptions, preferences, beliefs, or anything else. Reality is not a democracy. There is something definite, some raw material, out there for us to study.

* There is _unity_ to the universe. There is an explanation — one God, one equation, or one system of logic — which is fundamental to everything. The universe operates by underlying laws which do not change in an arbitrary fashion from place to place, from minute to minute, or even millennium to millennium. There are no loose ends, no real contradictions. At some deep level, everything fits.

Divorced now from the assumption that there is a God, these five assumptions about the universe, these five articles of faith, if you will — rationality, accessibility, contingency, objectivity, and unity — continue to underlie the practice of science. Some would argue that upon them depends all possibility of doing science as we know it. The best argument for their validity is not that they are obvious but that the scientific method seems to work so well! The proof (dangerous word) is in the pudding.

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Many modern scientists would combine these five principles into three.

1. There is a reality external to our minds, and because this is external it is universal, and the same reality for everyone. (Combining Ferguson’s numbers 2 and 4)

2. This external reality, which we call the universe, runs according to some rules or laws, which hold at all places in the universe and for all times – they are the same everywhere and everywhen – and the human mind is capable of understanding these rules, at least in part. (Combining Ferguson’s numbers 1 and 5)

3. The only way to discover these rules or laws is to get your hands dirty by going out and having a look – observing what there is “out there”, making measurements and, if possible, applying some tests. (Ferguson’s number 3)

The first of these principles is usually adopted implicitly, and not specifically mentioned in scientific writing. If it is denied, communication between different people, not only scientists, becomes incoherent and full of problems.

The second assumption can be, and has been, checked, and has passed all the tests which have been applied to it. Scientific data obtained by scientists in different parts of the world, and at different times, can be (and is) compared and agrees within the limits of accuracy of measurement. Observations of distant parts of the universe shows that the same laws hold there as hold in our immediate neighbourhood, and held in the past as they hold now.

The third principle can be summed up in the motto of the Royal Society of London, which translates roughly as “Don’t take anybody’s word for it”, or, as some put it in the 17th century, “Don’t rely on Aristotle or any other ancient writings”. The test of any scientific concept is how well it fits in with the data. As more and more data are accumulated scientific ideas may need to be modified or revised, and, on fairly rare occasions, replaced by more comprehensive concepts, which include the earlier ideas as special cases.

If anyone wants a name by which this approach to science is called, it is “critical realism”. Taking the noun first, “realism”, because the first principle assumes that there is a genuine reality “out there”; it is not something which is constructed by the human mind as some modern philosophers fondly imagine. And “critical” because the third principle insists that agreement with the data is crucial; sitting in an armchair thinking about how the universe might behave (as Sir Arthur Eddington did in his later years with his “Fundamental Theory”), or applying an interpretation of some ancient text (as was done with Aristotle up to the rise of modern science in the Renaissance) simply are not good enough to handle the complexities of the real world, both those which are apparent to the naked eye and those more subtle ones which only emerge during the course of scientific investigation using modern instruments.

One of the best discussions of critical realism can be found in the second volume of Alister McGrath’s “A Scientific Theology”, entitled “Reality” (T & T Clark, 2002). Chapter 9, `The Foundations of Realism in the Natural Sciences’ (pages 121-193), and Chapter 10, `Critical Realism: Engaging with a Stratified Reality’ (pages 195-244) are the relevant ones, but need careful study.

McGrath has written a simplified and condensed version of the three volumes as “The Science of God” (T & T Clark, 2004), and the chapters occupy pages 125-152. McGrath provides ample references for anyone who wishes to read further in the topic.

For those interested in McGrath’s background and qualifications, he was awarded a doctorate (D.Phil.) from Oxford University in molecular biology in December 1977, and then spent nearly 20 years learning enough theology to start writing about the interactions between science and religion. The full story can be found on pages 4-7 of his “The Foundations of Dialogue in Science and Religion” (Blackwell, 1998).

Reading over what I have written above, I realised that I promised near the beginning to say something about Don’s attempted division of the sciences into “experimental sciences” and “historical sciences”. Given the length of this post, I’ll defer this until I’ve posted the second part of my response to Don’s preamble.

Now that some clarification has been provided about just how scientists in general go about investigating the world around us, let us return to the topic which started all this off – the “big-bang” and the theory which predicted it, general relativity.

This post is already too long, so this part of the discussion will be deferred to the next post. I won’t submit these two posts on the same day – I’ll give people a couple of days to think about the above before posting in support of the “big-bang”.

Salaam

Dr Ken Smith