Science and Religion

‘Quakerism and research science fit together. In Quakerism you’re supposed to develop your own understanding of God from your own experience in the world. There isn’t a creed. There isn’t a dogma. There is an “understanding” but nothing as formal as a dogma or creed. And this idea that you develop your understanding also means that you keep redeveloping your understanding as you get more experience. And it seems to me that’s very like what goes on in “the scientific method.” You have a model of a star, it’s an understanding, and you develop that model in the light of experiments and observations. And so in both you’re expected to evolve your thinking. Nothing is final. Everything is held provisionally.’[1]

Experiments and observations develop an understanding in scientific method

As

Experience of the world develops an understanding of God in Quakerism

Follow on questions might be:

    • Who are the Moses, Jesus and George Fox of scientific method?

    • What results in Quakerism stand as Einstein’s Theories of Relativity stand to Galileo’s Principle of Relativity?

[1] Bell, J., interviewed on Beautiful Minds, BBC Productions, 2010