Surely, you have experienced some mystery, an encounter, an event, even possibly an object that you have never fully explained. I think most humans have.
I think of a fish, peering just above the water line while keeping gills submerged. Not that the act is a conscious one, a planned movement driven by curiosity about what exists in a forbidden world, but rather is an accidental brief encounter across a forbidden boundary with whatever the fish observes being unintelligible, akin to a phantasm yet very much tangible as any fished fish knows as the fisherman removes the hook and tosses it onto the ice that also keeps the beer cold.
I’ve seen fish jump out of water to escape predators like dolphins swimming up tidal creeks in South Carolina, herding the fish landward during high tide before those same dolphins retreat to the sea as the water ebbs. The brief visit to the world of air gives the fish a possible escape from the harsh reality of the persistent world of predation populated by dolphins and larger fish. Pelagic flying fish also escape predators by visiting the atmosphere and gliding with rigid pectoral fins, their view of our world limited to the length of their glide that some say can last more then ten seconds.
Out of Our Element
We are in some ways like fish that have rarely peeked above the water when we have an occasional inexplicable experience. In spite of intellectual capabilities that separate us from fish, we are similar to them in our inability to convey strange experiences to others. I envision a fish returning to its watery world where other fish scoff at the tale of a different dimension the way polygon characters in Edwin Abbott Abbott’s novel Flatland scoff at one of their kindred two-dimensional beings who experiences a third dimension and attempts to explain that strange extra dimension.
Enter the Haughty
Have you ever discussed God with an atheist, maybe an Ivy League theoretical physicist who holds that design in the universe is not an indication of nor proof of a Designer? You might be one of those fish who has seen the world above the ocean or a Flatland Square who has seen a Sphere, but your intellectual opponent, intractable in his stance, is not only skeptical, but also derisive.
Let’s dream up a friendly conversation between a person of faith (F) and an atheist (A). Make the latter an Ivy League theoretical physicist and the former an erudite nun.
A: Humpf. Faith. Can’t account for it scientifically unless you want me to go neurological and say that as the brain seeks meaning, it finds it in a hypothetical orderliness. Chaos underlies insecurity. Finding order, finding design is the job of brains. We have an innate desire to find patterns. Patterns, I say, give meaning to the world. Life is all about finding and living in patterns. We have discovered the Standard Model of the universe by identifying all the quantum particles that fit into the pattern of the model. The world as we know it derives from the interactions of the basic constituents like quarks and other subatomic entities all constrained by the fundamental forces like electromagnetism. There’s no need to ascribe the world to the work of a Creator. There’s no science of God, only science of the world from its tiniest components to its largest, from neutrinos to galaxies, and maybe eventually to Dark Matter. There’s no need to go back to the world run by a Prime Mover. We can discover, observe, and quantify patterns in our daily lives.
F: There’s no reason to think a person of faith needs a scientific explanation of God though the argument from design is more difficult to refute than you probably think. I think believers and unbelievers continuously argue at cross purposes and from incompatible premises. You want to argue for a logic of the scientific view because it fits into your model. But that’s a bit circular because it’s the model that supports itself. You’re in a Kurt Gödel trap; you have underlying axioms that are incapable of self-proof. You have a Standard Model of the universe that you use to explain the Standard Model, but you theorists admit that even though gravity is one of the fundamental forces, it doesn’t fit into the model.
A: Not yet, but we’re working on it. I think we will have a quantum gravity explanation soon, and then the model will be complete, and it will reveal an order that derives from purely natural causes. The universe is merely the product of random fluctuations of quantum stuff writ large. There is no scientific or testable way to prove there is a God. All patterns can be explained as responses to the fundamental forces of Nature or as machinations of brains. Brains seek patterns as I said. We know that from both experiment and daily experience. Given a partial picture of someone you know, your brain fills in the rest to complete your identification. Similarly, your brain through your senses gives you a big picture; your eyes, for example, have a blind spot that obscures a part of any scene. Your brain fills in the gaps. You are a pattern maker even when no pattern exists. Responses to optical illusions demonstrate that. Mirages demonstrate that.
F: You argue that given enough time and numerous experiments, you will understand the universe, but there’s much that lies in darkness. For example, you haven’t figured out definitively whether math is invented or discovered. You haven’t tied pure math to the physical world. And to me it means that you recognize different kinds of worlds, and I’m not talking about dimensions. There’s a mental world, the one in which there are mathematical entities that seem to have no practical use: Number theory, for example. There’s a physical world that seems to have many practical uses but that lacks full explanations, such as the origin of life, the origin of RNA, and the origin and working of DNA. We know that seeds turn into plants, but do we know why this process occurred? In fact, that is the question for the mental and physical worlds: Why? Sure, you can say why a sun shines, but that’s a secondary answer. We can know the “what’s” and “hows” for much of our universe’s components, but we really don’t know the ultimate “whys.” That is, we don’t know unless we accept your randomness. But there’s more I’d add on this. The very method of understanding might be flawed. Morris Kline makes a point in this regard. I’d like to paraphrase from his Mathematics: The Loss of Certainty. Math which you would argue enables you to “objectively describe Nature” might be an effective “tool,” but we don’t know why it is effective.
You atheistic types might learn something from Kline’s work because you regard math as…
A: Whoa, “atheistic types”? Sorry, Sister, but that seems uncharacteristic of you. That won’t move this conversation anywhere. What if I say, “You believer types”?
F: It’s I who should apologize for falling into a stereotype and ad hominem argument. I get your point. There are probably as many different kinds of atheism as there are kinds of faiths. Okay, I’ll not make any more assumptions about your “beliefs” and…
A: Beliefs?
F: Well, yes, “beliefs.” You believe there is no God, but you really can’t use your own methodologies and epistemology to “prove” there is no God.
A: Good point. I guess I do rely on “absence of evidence” as my proof.
F: Let me go back a bit to Kline’s work. Mathematical explanations underlie Relativity, quantum mechanics, string theory, the four fundamental forces, Newtonian physics, determinism, the Standard Model, and features associated with those systems like black holes. Kline says, and here’s a direct quotation, “The current predicament in mathematics is that there is not one but many mathematics and that for numerous reasons each fails to satisfy the members of the opposing schools. It is now apparent that the concept of a universally accepted, infallible body of reasoning—the majestic mathematics of 1800 and the pride of man—is a grand illusion.” * Remember your high school geometry lesson: It all begins with axioms. And note that people are still arguing over Euclid’s parallel lines.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that the “WAY” of knowing the world is up for debate. You assume, I believe, that knowing the world through faith is flawed, but I can show the so-called rational scientific and mathematical way of knowing the world is equally flawed. I have seen the inexplicable occur, acts I would call miracles and you would probably say are just temporary mysteries.
A: No, no, no. I’ll admit to some inexplicable phenomena and to problems in my approach to the Cosmos, but science backed by math works. We have chemistry obeying numbers, forces obeying numbers, processes obeying numbers. There’s no need for God in any of that.
F: Except to say you don’t know why they obey numbers. And “obey”? I’d probably say the numbers more or less describe; yes, the numbers describe. Galileo figured out the rate of fall for dropped objects, but he didn’t know why. And even with Einstein’s curvature of Space-Time, you can’t say we know why the universe has such curvature unless you simply argue like Mark Twain’s Eve, things drop because they are supposed to drop. Well, not exactly. Twain has Eve say in Eve’s Diary “I followed the other Experiment around, yesterday afternoon, at a distance, to see what it might be for, if I could. But I was not able to make [it] out. I think it is a man. I had never seen a man, but it looked like one, and I feel sure that that is what it is.” Ultimately, your reasoning seems similarly circular. But you reason that way with pride.
A: But you do exactly what you accuse me of doing. You say the world works the way it does because God said that’s the way it is supposed to work.
F: I’m not putting it that simply. I take an Augustinian stance—and before you say it, I know he was Neoplatonist—anyway, Augustine of Hippo argued that God made the potential for the world, made forms possible. That is my position on Creation. I’m not a fundamentalist. I accept an evolving universe because that potential, the many possibilities were what was created, from muons to moons and everything in between and beyond. I accept our physical relationship to the other hominids and to all other species, millions of them. That’s why I can accept many aspects of evolution though Darwin’s theory has numerous problems. I see humans as one of those possibilities Augustine’s philosophy or theology permitted. On a larger scale lies the possibility for life in a universe with fine tuning. How is it that you, my physicist friend, accept the random balance of the four fundamental forces? The nuclear strong force is 100 times stronger than electromagnetism. Electromagnetism is 10,000 time stronger than the nuclear weak force. And the weak force is 10 thousand billion billion billion times stronger than gravity. And if you alter any one of those forces by just a tiny amount, the universe we know can’t exist, and therefore, we can’t exist. To me the fine tuning argument is difficult to refute.
A: But it’s an assumption that the fine tuning was the work of a fine tuner.
F: Yes, but an assumption that is difficult to refute. The balance of forces makes the possibilities we know, and I can’t accept that such a delicate balance is random, especially since it appears to have risen from nothing—well, I would say by fiat.
A: Look, I have to run to class. Let’s pick this up some other time.
F: Yes. We’re far from having exhausted this discussion. But I would have you ponder how sure you are of your explanations. I accept God not because I have scientific evidence, but rather because I have scientific questions. Why is so much of the universe inexplicable? Is there a limit to our ability to explain? How can I reconcile fine tuning with seeming randomness? If life proceeded from abiotic chemical reactions, why doesn't it recreate itself under similar chemical reactions today? Why did the origin of the universe result in the balance of forces we believe it produced? If life is organized elements, how did it come to think about its composition?
A: Gotta run. That's much to think about.
*1980. New York, Fall River Press. p. 5
I think of a fish, peering just above the water line while keeping gills submerged. Not that the act is a conscious one, a planned movement driven by curiosity about what exists in a forbidden world, but rather is an accidental brief encounter across a forbidden boundary with whatever the fish observes being unintelligible, akin to a phantasm yet very much tangible as any fished fish knows as the fisherman removes the hook and tosses it onto the ice that also keeps the beer cold.
I’ve seen fish jump out of water to escape predators like dolphins swimming up tidal creeks in South Carolina, herding the fish landward during high tide before those same dolphins retreat to the sea as the water ebbs. The brief visit to the world of air gives the fish a possible escape from the harsh reality of the persistent world of predation populated by dolphins and larger fish. Pelagic flying fish also escape predators by visiting the atmosphere and gliding with rigid pectoral fins, their view of our world limited to the length of their glide that some say can last more then ten seconds.
Out of Our Element
We are in some ways like fish that have rarely peeked above the water when we have an occasional inexplicable experience. In spite of intellectual capabilities that separate us from fish, we are similar to them in our inability to convey strange experiences to others. I envision a fish returning to its watery world where other fish scoff at the tale of a different dimension the way polygon characters in Edwin Abbott Abbott’s novel Flatland scoff at one of their kindred two-dimensional beings who experiences a third dimension and attempts to explain that strange extra dimension.
Enter the Haughty
Have you ever discussed God with an atheist, maybe an Ivy League theoretical physicist who holds that design in the universe is not an indication of nor proof of a Designer? You might be one of those fish who has seen the world above the ocean or a Flatland Square who has seen a Sphere, but your intellectual opponent, intractable in his stance, is not only skeptical, but also derisive.
Let’s dream up a friendly conversation between a person of faith (F) and an atheist (A). Make the latter an Ivy League theoretical physicist and the former an erudite nun.
A: Humpf. Faith. Can’t account for it scientifically unless you want me to go neurological and say that as the brain seeks meaning, it finds it in a hypothetical orderliness. Chaos underlies insecurity. Finding order, finding design is the job of brains. We have an innate desire to find patterns. Patterns, I say, give meaning to the world. Life is all about finding and living in patterns. We have discovered the Standard Model of the universe by identifying all the quantum particles that fit into the pattern of the model. The world as we know it derives from the interactions of the basic constituents like quarks and other subatomic entities all constrained by the fundamental forces like electromagnetism. There’s no need to ascribe the world to the work of a Creator. There’s no science of God, only science of the world from its tiniest components to its largest, from neutrinos to galaxies, and maybe eventually to Dark Matter. There’s no need to go back to the world run by a Prime Mover. We can discover, observe, and quantify patterns in our daily lives.
F: There’s no reason to think a person of faith needs a scientific explanation of God though the argument from design is more difficult to refute than you probably think. I think believers and unbelievers continuously argue at cross purposes and from incompatible premises. You want to argue for a logic of the scientific view because it fits into your model. But that’s a bit circular because it’s the model that supports itself. You’re in a Kurt Gödel trap; you have underlying axioms that are incapable of self-proof. You have a Standard Model of the universe that you use to explain the Standard Model, but you theorists admit that even though gravity is one of the fundamental forces, it doesn’t fit into the model.
A: Not yet, but we’re working on it. I think we will have a quantum gravity explanation soon, and then the model will be complete, and it will reveal an order that derives from purely natural causes. The universe is merely the product of random fluctuations of quantum stuff writ large. There is no scientific or testable way to prove there is a God. All patterns can be explained as responses to the fundamental forces of Nature or as machinations of brains. Brains seek patterns as I said. We know that from both experiment and daily experience. Given a partial picture of someone you know, your brain fills in the rest to complete your identification. Similarly, your brain through your senses gives you a big picture; your eyes, for example, have a blind spot that obscures a part of any scene. Your brain fills in the gaps. You are a pattern maker even when no pattern exists. Responses to optical illusions demonstrate that. Mirages demonstrate that.
F: You argue that given enough time and numerous experiments, you will understand the universe, but there’s much that lies in darkness. For example, you haven’t figured out definitively whether math is invented or discovered. You haven’t tied pure math to the physical world. And to me it means that you recognize different kinds of worlds, and I’m not talking about dimensions. There’s a mental world, the one in which there are mathematical entities that seem to have no practical use: Number theory, for example. There’s a physical world that seems to have many practical uses but that lacks full explanations, such as the origin of life, the origin of RNA, and the origin and working of DNA. We know that seeds turn into plants, but do we know why this process occurred? In fact, that is the question for the mental and physical worlds: Why? Sure, you can say why a sun shines, but that’s a secondary answer. We can know the “what’s” and “hows” for much of our universe’s components, but we really don’t know the ultimate “whys.” That is, we don’t know unless we accept your randomness. But there’s more I’d add on this. The very method of understanding might be flawed. Morris Kline makes a point in this regard. I’d like to paraphrase from his Mathematics: The Loss of Certainty. Math which you would argue enables you to “objectively describe Nature” might be an effective “tool,” but we don’t know why it is effective.
You atheistic types might learn something from Kline’s work because you regard math as…
A: Whoa, “atheistic types”? Sorry, Sister, but that seems uncharacteristic of you. That won’t move this conversation anywhere. What if I say, “You believer types”?
F: It’s I who should apologize for falling into a stereotype and ad hominem argument. I get your point. There are probably as many different kinds of atheism as there are kinds of faiths. Okay, I’ll not make any more assumptions about your “beliefs” and…
A: Beliefs?
F: Well, yes, “beliefs.” You believe there is no God, but you really can’t use your own methodologies and epistemology to “prove” there is no God.
A: Good point. I guess I do rely on “absence of evidence” as my proof.
F: Let me go back a bit to Kline’s work. Mathematical explanations underlie Relativity, quantum mechanics, string theory, the four fundamental forces, Newtonian physics, determinism, the Standard Model, and features associated with those systems like black holes. Kline says, and here’s a direct quotation, “The current predicament in mathematics is that there is not one but many mathematics and that for numerous reasons each fails to satisfy the members of the opposing schools. It is now apparent that the concept of a universally accepted, infallible body of reasoning—the majestic mathematics of 1800 and the pride of man—is a grand illusion.” * Remember your high school geometry lesson: It all begins with axioms. And note that people are still arguing over Euclid’s parallel lines.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that the “WAY” of knowing the world is up for debate. You assume, I believe, that knowing the world through faith is flawed, but I can show the so-called rational scientific and mathematical way of knowing the world is equally flawed. I have seen the inexplicable occur, acts I would call miracles and you would probably say are just temporary mysteries.
A: No, no, no. I’ll admit to some inexplicable phenomena and to problems in my approach to the Cosmos, but science backed by math works. We have chemistry obeying numbers, forces obeying numbers, processes obeying numbers. There’s no need for God in any of that.
F: Except to say you don’t know why they obey numbers. And “obey”? I’d probably say the numbers more or less describe; yes, the numbers describe. Galileo figured out the rate of fall for dropped objects, but he didn’t know why. And even with Einstein’s curvature of Space-Time, you can’t say we know why the universe has such curvature unless you simply argue like Mark Twain’s Eve, things drop because they are supposed to drop. Well, not exactly. Twain has Eve say in Eve’s Diary “I followed the other Experiment around, yesterday afternoon, at a distance, to see what it might be for, if I could. But I was not able to make [it] out. I think it is a man. I had never seen a man, but it looked like one, and I feel sure that that is what it is.” Ultimately, your reasoning seems similarly circular. But you reason that way with pride.
A: But you do exactly what you accuse me of doing. You say the world works the way it does because God said that’s the way it is supposed to work.
F: I’m not putting it that simply. I take an Augustinian stance—and before you say it, I know he was Neoplatonist—anyway, Augustine of Hippo argued that God made the potential for the world, made forms possible. That is my position on Creation. I’m not a fundamentalist. I accept an evolving universe because that potential, the many possibilities were what was created, from muons to moons and everything in between and beyond. I accept our physical relationship to the other hominids and to all other species, millions of them. That’s why I can accept many aspects of evolution though Darwin’s theory has numerous problems. I see humans as one of those possibilities Augustine’s philosophy or theology permitted. On a larger scale lies the possibility for life in a universe with fine tuning. How is it that you, my physicist friend, accept the random balance of the four fundamental forces? The nuclear strong force is 100 times stronger than electromagnetism. Electromagnetism is 10,000 time stronger than the nuclear weak force. And the weak force is 10 thousand billion billion billion times stronger than gravity. And if you alter any one of those forces by just a tiny amount, the universe we know can’t exist, and therefore, we can’t exist. To me the fine tuning argument is difficult to refute.
A: But it’s an assumption that the fine tuning was the work of a fine tuner.
F: Yes, but an assumption that is difficult to refute. The balance of forces makes the possibilities we know, and I can’t accept that such a delicate balance is random, especially since it appears to have risen from nothing—well, I would say by fiat.
A: Look, I have to run to class. Let’s pick this up some other time.
F: Yes. We’re far from having exhausted this discussion. But I would have you ponder how sure you are of your explanations. I accept God not because I have scientific evidence, but rather because I have scientific questions. Why is so much of the universe inexplicable? Is there a limit to our ability to explain? How can I reconcile fine tuning with seeming randomness? If life proceeded from abiotic chemical reactions, why doesn't it recreate itself under similar chemical reactions today? Why did the origin of the universe result in the balance of forces we believe it produced? If life is organized elements, how did it come to think about its composition?
A: Gotta run. That's much to think about.
*1980. New York, Fall River Press. p. 5
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