Convergence & "ID"

[UNEDITED/Incomplete]

Based on the notes for the keynote address at the AOJS conference (by Dr Avi Rabinowitz)[No video since it was delivered on Friday night.]

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Introduction: Darwin considered the universe to have been created by God, and many religious Jews believe that God created the big bang and the laws of nature and programmed the laws to ensure that complexity increased and life emerged, and then at some point infused the emerged beings with a soul. This is a religious form of "Intelligent Design".

Science may of course eventually lead to the idea that the universe was designed, but even so the designer need not be what Judaism calls “God the creator’, and so intelligent design does not mean that Genesis is ‘proven’. In any case, although there are many enigmas in evolutionary biology, and intelligent design ‘answers’ any such question, most professional biologists believe (note the word) that eventually evolutionary mechanisms will be discovered which do not require design, and it is in their opinion too early to give up the search for such mechanisms.

Even if no answer is found eventually, many scientists and philosophers do not suppose the proposition that an infinite being created everything to be an acceptable answer for anything until one could explain how such a being exists. And if forced to choose one of two possibilities, rather than accept a being whose origin and existence is a mystery beyond science, scientists generally prefer to believe instead in a complex universe whose origin and existence is a mystery beyond science.

In the meantime, scientists would prefer to say ‘we cannot yet find an adequate explanation’ and try to find one, and not jump the gun and conclude that there is no possible explanation, or that the universe was necessarily designed.

Section I:

As we begin to analyze complex systems, and come up with a theory of mind, and if it turns out that the universe is some type of organic whole, and that it mirrors mind in some manner, then it is possible that phenomena which was formerly relegated to 'religion' or 'the supernatural' will come to be seen as part of 'the natural order'. As a result there may eventually be a convergence of the scientific and spiritual types of description of our universe.

Hierarchy from physical to spiritual, and the attitude of Science

· Body, including Brain: dealt with by scientific theory;

· Mind/Consciousness: contentious whether this is indeed a separate phenomenon or is lik the software vs hardware issue for a computer.

· Self-awareness: contentious whether this exists in the scientific sense.

· Free Will: science does not recognize the logic/existence of this.

· Moral awareness and choice: a matter of psychology.

· The Soul: doesn't exist.

If there is a soul, it is a spiritual entity and not physical and could not evolve and so God could have implanted in humans separately from the process of evolution, when the human body/brain evolved to the complexity sufficient to become capable of associating itself to that soul. To the extent that something eg mind or soul is spiritual, it will not be scientifically detectable, and will not be include din scientific theories, and so there can be no conflict with science about them. To the extent that they are physical they can evolve via divinely-created 'laws of nature' designed for the purpose.

If Life and Mind Evolved, What of Free Will (FW) and Moral Choice?

The Evolutionary Significance of Consciousness: MORAL BEINGS AND PURPOSIVE ACTIVITY

Moral activity could begin only upon the emergence of the first true 'moral being' - a being possessing sufficient intelligence and foresight to understand the consequences of its actions, equipped with a moral sense to know the difference between good and evil actions, and endowed with the free will to choose between the two.Clearly there can be no moral choice in a being lacking consciousness and self-consciousness. It therefore behooves us to ask where along the evolutionary chain the phenomenon of consciousness and self-consciousness arose, and then when there arose a moral consciousness.

This is a question under active investigation today, but it already occupied the early scientific pioneers of evolutionary theory. As the eminent evolutionary geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky writes, self awareness is quite possibly unique to human beings:

"Self-awareness is, then, one of the fundamental, possibly the most fundamental characteristic of the human species. This characteristic is an evolutionary novelty: the biological species from which mankind has descended had only rudiments of self-awareness, or perhaps lacked it altogether."

“In point of fact, self-awareness is the most immediate and incontrovertible of all realities. Without doubt, the human mind sets our species apart from nonhuman animals” [Theodosius Dobzhansky et al 1977, p. 453]

If self-awareness arose only in the human humans, or possibly is present in a rudimentary form in 'the species from which mankind has descended', moral consciousness could only have arisen in one of these two species. Although not everyone might agree on definitions of intelligence, consciousness, morality and so on, certainly no-one would consider any animal - even the highest ape - as morally responsible for its actions . This is because no species other than man seems to posses the requisite combination of free will, intelligence, and analytic ability which can allow us to consider their actions as freely chosen. According to Darwin - in agreement with earlier writers: "of all the differences between man and the lower animals, the moral sense of conscience is by far the most important."

Julian Huxley saw the emergence of moral consciousness as a turning point in the evolutionary process itself: "It is only through social evolution that the world-stuff can now realize radically new possibilities. Mechanical interaction and natural selection still operate, but have become of secondary importance. For good or evil, the mechanism of evolution has in the main been transferred onto the social or conscious level...The slow methods of variation and heredity are outstripped by the speedier processes of acquiring and transmitting experience...And in so far as the mechanism of evolution ceases to be blind and automatic and becomes conscious, ethics can be injected into the evolutionary process....it becomes possible to introduce...moral purpose into evolution."

According to Erich Fromm [italics in original]:"....The religious need is rooted in the basic condition of existence of the human species.......the human species can be defined as the primate who emerged at the point of evolution where instinctive determination had reached a minimum and the development of the brains a maximum . This combination.....had never occurred before in animal evolution and constitutes, biologically speaking, a completely new phenomenon. " Using the terminology of Victor Frankl , one could say that the human being is unique in that it is driven at its most basic level by "the will to meaning". No other member of the evolutionary chain can be so described - and thus man is qualitatively different than his evolutionary forebears.

Note: In order to place this article within the context of my previous writings on these issues, and in order to provide references for further reading, I'll provide bibliographic references to my articles in BH which dealt with these matters.

Meaning and Purpose of life in the universe: from the Human and Divine Perspectives

One could say that until the emergence of man, there was no moral activity on earth, no free willed choice, and thus no true purpose - at least from the point of view of religion - to the existence of the universe. From the perspective of the God of the Bible, until the emergence of morally-responsible free will, all events are either determined or random, and so the universe is purposeless. [See my BH articles "Free Will" and "And God said: "Let there have been a Big Bang" for an extensive discussion of these points.]

A POSSIBLE CREATION SCHEDULE

After creating the 'initial singularity', big bang, and natural law, Gd could 'sit back and watch' creation develop along the path it was designed to follow. Matter would emerge from the initial energy, atoms would be built up from the matter, and stars would form from the atoms. Planets would assume shape and finally after billions of years of 'waiting', life would emerge somewhere in the universe. Then life could evolve towards greater complexity, and with the emergence of the first moral being, the universe could begin to be considered meaningful, to be working towards the achievement of some purpose.

For example on Earth, after a few billion more years, after the extinction of the dinosaurs, with the amoeba finally evolved via the ape into the human being, the long wait would be over, and the drama of moral activity could begin.

See my BH articles "Free Will" and "And God said: "Let there have been a Big Bang" for an extensive discussion of these points.

The Importance of Mind in the Universe

Following Wigner andVonNeumann and others who speculated that consciousness is required to effectuate the collapse of the wave function,

my BH article "Free Will" sets out the speculative thesis that since free will is beyond both determinism and quantum randomness, it is uniquely suited to be that active ingredient of consciousness which collapses the wave function; moreso, since it is moral responsibility which is the fundamental philosophical motivation for assuming the existence of free will, that it is morally-responsible free will which underlies the collapse.

I mention there Wheeler's idea that the universe may have emerged into existence due to an act of the consciousness of a being within the universe.[see footnote 6]...mentions that perhaps consciousness was inherent in the universe and humans tapped into it when their brains became sufficiently developed......

ie the creation of the universe begins with the first collapse of the universal wave-function by a free willed moral being [who in the Bible is Adam].

Aside: Note re the age of the universe:

The application of this idea to Genesis, ie the account of the creation of the universe and of Adam is that according to this model, in some sense the universe is only as old as free-willed moral choice [For an extensive discussion of this point see my BH article "And God Said: "Let there have been a big bang" (submitted to BH with the Free Will article but ony published in issue #13)] .

According to the Torah view that Adam was the first morally-reponsible free willed being, the universe could be said to begin its purposive existence from the point of the emergence of this first moral being, Adam, and this can lead to a discrepancy between the age of the universe as seen by science and by biblical religion [this [pont is made in the article, and was also made in my "Quantum Physics and Halacha" lecture at the Miami conference in 19xx, and later in the articles [Hebrew xxx, English xxx] [the point is made at the conclusion of the article].

The age of the universe can be calculated from different perspectives - and afer all there are known to be 70 facets of torah [see eg the 'perspectives' sections (p12-13) at the end of the big bang article].

Intelligent Design

ID does not mean the conclusion that it is necesary to involve the existence of God n order to explain the emergenc eof humanity. A more scientific version is that Mind is central to ......and also the emergenceof the universe into physical reality ....and consiousness was present in the universe from the outset, and our consciousness is derived from that, and our brain is the antena which alows us to be conscious by taping in to the universal consciousness.... and therefore perhaps mind needs to be taken more into account in...and plays a central role in.evolutionary mechanisms....

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Intelligent Design

ID does not mean the conclusion that it is necesary to involve the existence of God n order to explain the emergenc eof humanity. A more scientific version is that Mind is central to ......and also the emergenceof the universe into physical reality ....and consiousness was present in the universe from the outset, and our consciousness is derived from that, and our brain is the antena which alows us to be conscious by taping in to the universal consciousness.... and therefore perhaps mind needs to be taken more into account in...and plays a central role in.evolutionary mechanisms....

Intelligent Design 

First of all, ID does not mean the conclusion that it is necesary to

involve the existence of God in order to explain the emergence of

humanity. <br>

A possible scenario of the fuure is that scientific theory will teach

that Mind is central to the universe.and perhaps also the emergence of

the universe into physical reality. Mind needs to be taken more into

account in how the big bang emerged, and how it evolved into the

universe of today; and mind would plays a central role in.evolutionary

mechanisms. Consiousness was present in the universe from the outset,

and our consciousness is derived from that. Perhaps our brain is the

antenna which alows us to be conscious, by tapping in to the universal

consciousness. &nbsp;<br>

At some point it may then become part of the scientific pursuit to

investigate the effect of mind on the body, unexpected effects during

meditation or prayer, group effect of mind concentration, the effect of

mind after the body dies, the group effect of all these after-death

mind-residuals, the effect of that which was the prescursor to mind on

the origin of the universe, temporal transcendence of this Mind so that

its eventual emergence can effectuate the big bang (like Wheeler etc),

'communication' between this mind and human minds. These topics,

traditionally associated with spirituality and religion would become

firmly scientific, thereby effectuating some 'convergence' of science,

spirituality and religion. <br>

<br>

<span style="font-weight: bold;">Conclusion</span><br>

The present theory of evolution/big bang is a very convincing one under

the assumption that there is neither a God, nor directedness to

evolution. The Biblical creation account (as understood

non-slavishly-literally) is on the other hand a fitting one for a

universe created by a creator desiring the operation of free-willed

moral choice. <br>

The two perspectives do not conflict, they supplement each other, and

there are also major points of overlap. When consciousness - and more

so, free will - is finally scientifically understood, the resulting

future scientific theory of origins and the religious/biblical view of

origins will possibly merge even more.<br>

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Note; Maimonides was open to the possibility of a radical revision of the understanding of Genesis, and to jettison the concept of creation, if Aristotle’s proof of the eternity of the universe was sound. He showed however that this proof was flawed, and that therefore there was no need to abandon the idea of creation. The implication is that even where there is apparent conflict with Torah, if the proof is sound, a new interpretation must be found. However when it comes to modern science and philosophy, this difficulty does not necessarily present itself: as the many books and articles on the subject indicate, many Orthodox Jews feel that the theory of the big bang and of evolution aren’t necessarily counter to Jewish belief as long as the atheistic theology of assuming that there’s no God or Designer is detached from it.

See eg the author’s article: “And God Said, "Let There Have Been a Big Bang"

B'Or Ha'Torah Volume 13E 2002

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Possible Future Directions for a Scientific Theory of Origins

There may well be some natural mechanism which causes self-organization, and can explain the emergence of the complexity underlying both the galactic and stellar structure in the large and inorganic, and the molecules and cells of our bodies in the small and organic. A natural ‘guiding hand’ to evolution such as this would deepen the seeming teleology of the evolutionary process, and would make the scientific origin theory seem like an account of creation.

The nature of consciousness is a scientific enigma:

INSERT

The inability of scientific theory to account for the evolution of consciousness is a serious lacuna of origin theory.

INSERT (Eccles etc)

Sir John Eccles, [ Nobel Prize for medicine in 1963] The Wonder of Being Human 1984, pages 36-37:

…. nowhere in the laws of physics or in the laws of derivative sciences, chemistry and biology, is there any reference to consciousness or mind….its emergence is not reconcilable with the natural laws as at present understood...

Second, all materialist theories of the mind are in conflict with biological evolution. Since they all (panpsychists, epiphenomenalists, and identy theorists) assert the causal ineffectiveness of consciousness per se, they fail completely to account for the evolutionary expansion of consciousness, which is an undeniable fact. There is first its emergence and then its progressive development with the growing complexity of the brain. Evolutionary theory holds that only those structures and processes that significantly aid in survival are developed in natural selection...

Eccles, John C. and Daniel N. Robinson (1984), The Wonder of Being Human: Our Brain and Our Mind (New York: The Free Press).

Gregory:

If the brain was developed by Natural Selection, we might well suppose that consciousness has survival value. But for this it must, surely, have causal effects. But what effects could awareness, or consciousness, have? (1977, p. 276, emp. added).

Gregory, Richard L. (1977), “Consciousness,” The Encyclopaedia of Ignorance, ed. Ronald Duncan and Miranda Weston-Smith (Oxford, England: Pergamon), pp. 273-281.

Eccles and Robinson, 1984, p. 17,18:

We believe that the emergence of consciousness is a skeleton in the closet of orthodox evolutionism.... It remains just as enigmatic as it is to an orthodox evolutionist as long as it is regarded as an exclusively natural process in an exclusively materialist world.

Sir Karl Popper and Sir John Eccles The Self and Its Brain, (1977, p. 129). “the emergence of full consciousness...is indeed one of the greatest of miracles”

Eccles and Robinson (1984, p. 37):

[A]ll materialist theories of the mind are in conflict with biological evolution.... Evolutionary theory holds that only those structures and processes that significantly aid in survival are developed in natural selection. If consciousness is causally impotent, its development cannot be accounted for by evolutionary theory .

A complete theory of evolution must account for the emergence of consciousness. Since consciousness is the most complex phenomenon and of an entirely different qualitative level than any other phenomenon, the theory accounting for it will presumably be far more sophisticated than the present day origin theory, and indeed may be of an entirely different qualitative level.

As consciousness involves elements of self-reference and holism, is the source of subjectivity and crosses the mind-body divide, presumably the theory of it will do so as well. As such the complete origin theory will possibly take on features more reminiscent of some of the underlying themes of the Eden account.

We do not know whether there are mutiple-universes, or areas of the universe with different laws of nature some of which will inevitably permit life to evolve etc.

We do not yet know the mechanisms whereby evolution takes place etc, and so we do not know how to compute the relevant probabilities, we also do not yet know how many planets there are and what conditions are necessary in order to allow for the emergence of life on a planet, and therefore we do not know whether or not it is reasonable that somewhere in the universe – specifically, here on Earth - life should evolve.

We do not yet know everything we need to know about cells, and about the mechanisms whereby evolution takes place, etc, and so we do not know how to compute the relevant probabilities of for example cellular life emerging from the inanimate mineral world.

We also do not know yet enough about chaos and attractors, complexity, quantum gravity etc and their possible role in guiding evolutionary processes, and other possible natural mechanisms which would do so, let alone the possible role of consciousness about which we know virtually nothing, in the emergence of life and of humanity - especially if there was a primordial consciousness [see more on this below].

Evolutionary theory is a MODEL, an ATTEMPT to find a naturalistic answer, a mechanism which perhaps could have given rise to what we see about us. It is simply too early to determine whether or not the laws of nature actually permit the emergence of life, and of humanity; and it is certainly premature to discuss whether or not there is some way we could determine if it actually happened in that way.

For the moment, so far, the big bang and evolutionary model (or theory) is the best naturalistic theory of the emergence of humanity.

The Ant Fugue and Emergent Mind

If a thought is resident in/associated to the brain because it is a complex organism of interacting elements, then other such networks could conceivably support thought. For example, society, or the collective of intelligent activity in the universe, or the universe as a whole. Perhaps there is such a cosmic mind, and we are its neurons, as unaware of the Mind as our neurons are of us.

Such a Mind could have helped shape the universe in which it arose, or perhaps the element of thought which was present at the initial stages was itself responsible in some way for the big bang and the design of the laws of nature.

Possible Future Convergence of Spirituality/Religion and Science

The most complex entity we know is the human brain, and the highest-level interaction/phenomenon is consciousness. To many people it seems unlikely that consciousness can arise at some late stage in the universe’s existence without it having been present at its inception. All the more so regarding free-willed consciousness; it seems to many of those who believe in the existence of this phenomenon that it cannot have evolved from any non-free-willed-conscious prior state. And so that there must have been some aspect of free-willed consciousness existent at the outset: indeed the very emergence into existence of the universe is itself a non-causal event of the same type as are free-willed choices.

Free willed consciousness by its very nature is inherent “intelligent” and motivated, a higher-level process. As such, if it was present at the inception of the universe, it is possible that it played some role in the future development of that universe. Therefore, the directedness that lies at the root of free-willed conscious choice should be factored in to the equation of evolution as a teleological agent. An evolutionary process involving such an agent in some way would likely show a greater tendency to the emergence of complexity, life, intelligence, and consciousness than would a purely random process driven by a universe devoid of all consciousness.

Examples of the possible types of effect of an underlying Mind-level would be the known and claimed effects of mind on the body, a real physical effect arising via concentration during meditation or prayer, or a group effect of mind concentration; an effect of mind after the body dies, and the group effect of all these after-death mind-residuals. On a cosmic level: the precursor to mind could have had an effect on the origin of the universe, and in fact if there wad temporal transcendence of this Mind, its eventual emergence can retroactively effectuate the big bang (like Wheeler's idea). And at a combined cosmic/human level, 'communication' between this mind and human minds.

The present theory of evolution/big bang is a very convincing one under the assumption that there is neither a God, nor directedness to evolution. The Biblical creation account is on the other hand a fitting one for a universe created by a creator desiring the operation of free-willed moral choice.

The two perspectives do not conflict, they supplement each other, and there are also major points of overlap. When consciousness - and more so, free will - is finally scientifically understood, the resulting future scientific theory of origins and the religious/biblical view of origins will possibly merge even more.

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Mutual Respect for Scientific Theory and Jewish Biblical Creation:(No Contradiction)

Misusing a scientific critique of Big Bang theory as a support of creationism

There are many assumptions underlying the big bang theory, there are plenty of discussions of these assumptions; there are various weaknesses of the theory, and there are critiques: these are well-known and acknowledged by scientists, indeed they come from scientists, there are many quotes from scientists available on the web, and all these scientists are constantly seeking to improve the theory.

Obviously none of the scientists quoted as critiquing the big bang theory meant that they are therefore choosing the biblical account of creation over the big bang theory, or are giving up seeking a scientific theory and simply concluding that it is beyond human understanding, merely that there are holes or flaws they feel ought to be addressed.

Science looks for rationalistic explanations, and scientists assume such can be found, and try to create them. The assumptions they make are all part of this program, and make sense from within it.

It is a tribute to science and scientists that they are willing to seek holes in scientific theories, and to change these theories: the fact that the theories have flaws and need to be changed is not an indication that the scientific pursuit of a theory of cosmology is wrong-minded, it simply means that scientists are constantly innovating to make the theories progressively better.

When scientists critique cosmological theory, obviously they are NOT proposing that one should as a result choose the biblical account of creation over the big bang theory - they are merely indicating that there are holes or flaws in the scientific theory which they feel ought to be addressed in order to develop a better scientific theory.

Most likely the same scientists have far sharper critiques of the biblical creation account etc than of the big bang theory, so it is hypocritical to quote them as somehow undermining the scientific approach in favor of the fundamnetalist/literalist interpretation of breishis.

The flaws in present scientific cosmology theory will eventually be addressed and a better SCIENTIFIC theory will emerge; of course that will also be flawed, and analysis will lead to yet a better theory: we may never reach apoint where we know absolutely everyhing we need to know about cosmology, but maybe we will - in any case it is in my view naive/absurd to suppose that a scientific theory will EVER emerge which proves that the universe emerged as described in breishis according to a literal reading and in six days, and 6,000 years ago, with proof that it was the work of a God. It is a forgone conclusion that the scientific search for rationalistic explanations will lead to rationalistic explanations, not to God or breishis. And this is not in any way a problem for religion or for the torah. {Note: see discussions in my book "The Instant Universe".]

Lord of the Flaws

Rambam said about Aristotle's theory of the eternal universe, that since his proof is flawed, one need not accept it as true and therefore one can believe in creation.. Perhaps those who believe in fundamentalist/literalist interpretation of breishis believe that although no scienific theory will ever lead directly to the literal reading of breishis, nevetheless eventually all scientific theories of cosmology will prove to be flawed - and they will always seek out and hold to these flaws so as not to feel obligated as rational people to accept any scientific theory of cosmology.

Supreme (Being) Irony

There is an incredible irony in all this: The big bang theory was originally taken by scientists as being 'too genesis-like' since it overturned the concept of an eternal universe, which was the central counter-Torah tenet of philosophy - indeed this alleged contradiction was the central reason Rambam wrote the moreh nevuchim. These scientists were not concerned with the issue of the 6 days or the 6,000 years, and considered the central idea of breishis to be creatio ex nihilo, and that this fundamental torah-concept was vindicated by the big bang theory. However, somehow later on the big bang theory was considred by religious people to be a contradiction to breishis because they felt that one needs to interpret the 6 days literally and that the torah meant us to count up the numbers and arrive at an age of 6,000 years.

So whereas some scientists viewed the big bang theory as problematic because it was pro-torah, some religious people (due to their literalist/fundamentalist inteprretation of brieshis) considered it problematic because it was anti-torah! [See more extended discussion of all these points in my book "Einstein's blunder and the god who plays dice"]

[Note: As I've said in my lectures, I think that this may mean that some scientists understood the meaning of breishis better than did some religious people.] [Ilana, I'm sure the above is a problematic sentence - it'd probably be a death sentence!]

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Is Evolutionary Theory Correct?

In an infinite universe with the appropriate initial ingredients and laws, the evolution of the purely physical aspect of humanity is inevitable.

However in order to determine whether or not evolutionary theory is the correct explanation for the emergence of humanity here in our universe, with our laws of nature, we need to examine the following:

1. Do the known laws of nature and the conditions as they were on Earth really permit a process of evolution of progressively more complex entities?

2. Is there something about what we call life that is not purely physical, and therefore no natural system could produce life?

3. Was there really sufficient time to allow for the evolution of life?

4. Is there something unique about humanity so that even if some natural system could produce life, it could not produce humanity

5. If there was sufficient time, and the laws allow the evolution of humanity as outlined by the theory of evolution, did humans actually emerge that way?

Some people - particularly religious critics of evolutionary theory - somehow expect that science should already have all the answers, and today. It does

not. Evolutionary theory is still very young. In a few hundred years science will presumably know a lot more about how life emerged.

We do not yet know the mechanisms whereby evolution takes place etc, and so we do not know how to compute the relevant probabilities, we also do not yet know how many planets there are and what conditions are necessary in order to allow for the emergence of life on a planet, and therefore we do not know whether or not it is reasonable that somewhere in the universe – specifically, here on Earth - life should evolve.

We do not know whether there are mutiple-universes, or areas of the universe with different laws of nature some of which will inevitably permit life to evolve etc.

We also do not know yet enough about chaos and attractors, complexity, quantum gravity etc and their possible role in guiding evolutionary processes, and other possible natural mechanisms which would do so, let alone the possible role of consciousness about which we know virtually nothing, in the emergence of life and of humanity - especially if there was a primordial consciousness [see more on this below].

We do not yet know everything we need to know about cells, and about the mechanisms whereby evolution takes place, etc, and so we do not know how to compute the relevant probabilities of for example cellular life emerging from the inanimate mineral world.

Evolutionary theory is a MODEL, an ATTEMPT to find a naturalistic answer, a mechanism which perhaps could have given rise to what we see about us. It is simply too early to determine whether or not the laws of nature actually permit the emergence of life, and of humanity; and it is certainly premature to discuss whether or not there is some way we could determine if it actually happened in that way.

Proponents of democracy are fond of saying that democracy is a terrible political system - except when compared to all other political systems. Even critics of evolutionary theory can perhaps agree that for the moment, so far, the big bang and evolutionary model (or theory) is the best naturalistic theory of the emergence of humanity.

The Scientific and Biblical Cosmologies Will Never Be Identical

It is certainly unlikely that through experiment, science will eventually prove that the correct cosmological model can be best described precisely as follows: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth, ... one day, day four...... God rested... etc.

Even the fundamentalist is unlikely to claim that the scientific method, if applied correctly, will eventually lead inevitably to this picture of the origin of all.

· What model for universal and human origin does the fundamentalist expect scientific theory to arrive at? If this model is NOT the same as the creation account, then how does the fundamentalist explain this discrepancy?

· What account would scientists accept as a reasonable Genesis creation account for a creating God to give to the Jews at Sinai 3,500 years ago? Given that the universe is as it is, ie God if one exists at all is definitely hidden. If there was a divinely-revealed creation account, there are certain assumptions that a scientist could reasonable expect about it: it would not explicitly constitute a proof of God; it would be comprehensible to contemporary humans; etc…. If the actual creation account is different than this scientifically-expected account, how does the traditionalist explain the discrepancy?

FROM ID project description FILE:

What Science Is and Isn't

A Chinese Communist and a Hassidic American may disagree about whether or not there is a God, whether or not life has meaning - or what its meaning is, whether one ought to marry for love or for other reasons, and on much else, however they can agree that objects fall to the ground, will agree on the speed at which they fall, as well as that the sun gives of light and heat and so on.

For the sake of this discussion, let's define 'objectively exisiting physical phenomena' as those which can be agreed upon by all (or at least by 'reasonable people')(without quibbling about each of these words). Issues related to whether or not there is a God, and whether or not life has meaning, or what its meaning is, and what the meaning of love is will, in contrast, be referred to here as 'subjective' or 'supernatural' or 'spiritual'. To many people, including to many students in science classes, the subjective/spiritual issues are more interesting and important than the 'objectively exisiting physical phenomena', but nevertheless with a bit of training they too can agree on the distinction between the two categories.

When we find a concise mathematical equation which predicts/describes objectively exisiting physical phenomena, for example Newton's or Einstein's law of gravity, or the laws of electricity, for our purposes here we'll call these 'naturalistic explanations' for the phenomena (though of course there's a difference between a description or equation and an explanation).

Note that a person may believe that there is a God, that God created the universe and the laws of nature, and that the explanation for why there are laws of nature at all lies in the fact that God created them; one may also believe that humans can understand the laws of nature only due to God's granting of this ability to humans.. However, even if one believes all this one does not need to explicitly invoke the existence of God in order to write down the laws of gravity or of electricity, and thus they constitute 'naturalistic explanations'. Physics (science) is the programmatic effort to find such naturalistic explanations for all objectively exisitng phenomena

Note however that when we say "Physics (science) is the programmatic effort to find naturalistic explanations for objectively exisitng phenomena " we do not mean to imply either that there ARE phenomena which are NOT objectively existent (eg subjective or supernatural or spiritual) or that science cannot deal with them, nor do we mean to imply that there are NO such phenomena - our statement simply does not refer to such, it refers only to objectively exisitng phenomena. Science also does not say that there are no other explanations for these objectively exisiting phenomena, nor even that science provides the 'best' explanation; it is simply the naturalistic explanation. Science does not claim that a natrualistically-describable universe necessarily emerged without God etc, it makes no statements about the reason anything exists, nor about the possible existence of a God.

When making statements about the past science essentially is saying 'if all happened according to the laws of nature, then it happened this way', but science cannot of course say what actually occurred, ie whether there was some supernatural event involved. Even if science has an explanation for why something would have occurred in the past, it may actually have occurred in a different way, supernaturally, but that doesn't mean that science is wrong, since it is only saying what would have happened if the known laws of nature were the only causes operating. Even if eventually explanations are found for everything, this in no way constitutes a proof of the non-existence of a creator etc and so the issue of this or that naturalistic explanation is not relevant to the question of the existence of a creator.

Intelligent Design (ID): The issue of ID has nothing to do with religion, or atheism; it should be an issue for science to deal with, without the involvement of any religious or atheistic agendas. So far it has proven very useful to pursue a programatic search for naturalistic explanations. As a result, there's a confidence in most scientists that there is still much about the universe and humanity which will be explained in this way if the effort is made and so they wish to continue to explore. They feel that even regarding problems which are intractable today, there's no way one can rule out the possibility of finding a naturalistic explanation, and they are motivated to continue to research these problems.

From the scientific point of view of course it may be that the universe will turn out to have been designed, but then science will wish to detect the designer and to discover how the designer came to be. An atheist who is a true scientist should not shy away from such a prospect, it would be an incredibly exciting discovery for science, but on the other hand religious people would have to expect that the resulting scientific theory of that entity could be far from the religious conception of God [eg perhaps it would be closer to the science fiction conception of a super-alien]. The bottom line is that the questions of science have to be dealt with form the scientific perspective, and sothe issue of whether or not there is scientific evidence of design (rather than philosophical or metaphysical etc indication of the existence of God or of divine design) should be treated purely from the scientific perspective, and atheists and religious people should be open to science's taking things to wherever they honestly lead.

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Attempting to Arrive at 'Neutral' Statements

It's hard to find one presentation of international news which all viewers will agree is unbased. Similarly re religion/science. Even among those who agree that science should be neutral regarding religion, there will not necessarily be agreement as to what constitutes a neutral position. Similarly, the law requires public schools to reflect separation of religion and state, but of course this does not mean favoring atheism, and what is taught in public schools as 'neutral' is viewed by many religious people as 'atheist'.

Often in order to create statments which satisfy two radically different positions one needs to use such neutral terms, and terms which have different meanings to the different sides, so that it is essentially an empty statement. I am looking to formulate statements regarding science and religion, eg regarding ID, which can be viewed by both sides as neutral, and which nevertheless have content.

What is an 'objective' statement of science re the big bang and evolution? A possibly neutral treatment of the issue can be something like the following:

To the extent that 'scientific' means 'provable' then atheists and religious people have to appreciate that their beliefs in the non-existence or existence of God are equally 'non-scientific'.

Religious people should admit that when one seeks naturalistic explanations for the universe and humanity, one is led to something like the theories of the big bang and evolution, and that from the scientific perspective the holes in a theory do not point to the necessity for accepting te lack of a naturalistic explanation, only to the need for a better naturalistic explanation. The atheist should admit that although it seems untenable to them, to most people including to many scientists it seems logically possible that the universe could have been created by God as a big bang designed carefully to produce humans via evolution; also, if there is a soul, it is a spiritual entity and not physical and could not evolve and so God could have implanted in humans separately from the process of evolution, when the human body/brain evolved to the complexity sufficient to become capable of associating itself to that soul.

Science should not take sides and deal with whether or not there is a God or a soul or if the universe was created or emerged on its own - science's mandate is to attempt to arrive at better and more accurate naturalistic explanations, honestly confronting the difficulties in theories, and when stuck, not to give up but rater to attempt to overcome all obstacles, revising theories or paradigms as needed until a more satisfactory naturalistic explanation is found.

It would be interesting to test the above statements on people on either side, and based on the responses to hone them so as to produce statements which are acceptable to both religious people and atheists.

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