Taking Science on Faith

[malati]

As promised I'm pasting the article below which is an appropriate rejoinder to Nitaidasji's comment on the Greetings from London thread, to which I made a brief comment.

My next post will be replies from top scientists of the world, mostly from the U.S, like Jerry Coyne (take note Nitaidas, Coyne also graduated from the University of Chicago) , Nathan Myhrvold, Lawrence Krauss, Scott Atran, Sean Carroll, Jeremy Bernstein, PZ Myers (not quite a top scientist but maybe a top blogger), Lee Smolin, John Horgan, Alan Sokal.

We all will need to put on our thinking cap but because Davies is a brilliant science writer , I'm sure we will all enjoy it.



TAKING SCIENCE ON FAITH
By Paul Davies

First published as an OpEd piece by The New York Times, November 24, 2007


SCIENCE, we are repeatedly told, is the most reliable form of knowledge about the world because it is based on testable hypotheses. Religion, by contrast, is based on faith. The term "doubting Thomas" well illustrates the difference. In science, a healthy skepticism is a professional necessity, whereas in religion, having belief without evidence is regarded as a virtue.

The problem with this neat separation into "non-overlapping magisteria," as Stephen Jay Gould described science and religion, is that science has its own faith-based belief system. All science proceeds on the assumption that nature is ordered in a rational and intelligible way. You couldn't be a scientist if you thought the universe was a meaningless jumble of odds and ends haphazardly juxtaposed. When physicists probe to a deeper level of subatomic structure, or astronomers extend the reach of their instruments, they expect to encounter additional elegant mathematical order. And so far this faith has been justified.

The most refined expression of the rational intelligibility of the cosmos is found in the laws of physics, the fundamental rules on which nature runs. The laws of gravitation and electromagnetism, the laws that regulate the world within the atom, the laws of motion — all are expressed as tidy mathematical relationships. But where do these laws come from? And why do they have the form that they do?

When I was a student, the laws of physics were regarded as completely off limits. The job of the scientist, we were told, is to discover the laws and apply them, not inquire into their provenance. The laws were treated as "given" — imprinted on the universe like a maker's mark at the moment of cosmic birth — and fixed forevermore. Therefore, to be a scientist, you had to have faith that the universe is governed by dependable, immutable, absolute, universal, mathematical laws of an unspecified origin. You've got to believe that these laws won't fail, that we won't wake up tomorrow to find heat flowing from cold to hot, or the speed of light changing by the hour.

Over the years I have often asked my physicist colleagues why the laws of physics are what they are. The answers vary from "that's not a scientific question" to "nobody knows." The favorite reply is, "There is no reason they are what they are — they just are." The idea that the laws exist reasonlessly is deeply anti-rational. After all, the very essence of a scientific explanation of some phenomenon is that the world is ordered logically and that there are reasons things are as they are. If one traces these reasons all the way down to the bedrock of reality — the laws of physics — only to find that reason then deserts us, it makes a mockery of science.

Can the mighty edifice of physical order we perceive in the world about us ultimately be rooted in reasonless absurdity? If so, then nature is a fiendishly clever bit of trickery: meaninglessness and absurdity somehow masquerading as ingenious order and rationality.

Although scientists have long had an inclination to shrug aside such questions concerning the source of the laws of physics, the mood has now shifted considerably. Part of the reason is the growing acceptance that the emergence of life in the universe, and hence the existence of observers like ourselves, depends rather sensitively on the form of the laws. If the laws of physics were just any old ragbag of rules, life would almost certainly not exist.

A second reason that the laws of physics have now been brought within the scope of scientific inquiry is the realization that what we long regarded as absolute and universal laws might not be truly fundamental at all, but more like local bylaws. They could vary from place to place on a mega-cosmic scale. A God's-eye view might reveal a vast patchwork quilt of universes, each with its own distinctive set of bylaws. In this "multiverse," life will arise only in those patches with bio-friendly bylaws, so it is no surprise that we find ourselves in a Goldilocks universe — one that is just right for life. We have selected it by our very existence.

The multiverse theory is increasingly popular, but it doesn't so much explain the laws of physics as dodge the whole issue. There has to be a physical mechanism to make all those universes and bestow bylaws on them. This process will require its own laws, or meta-laws. Where do they come from? The problem has simply been shifted up a level from the laws of the universe to the meta-laws of the multiverse.

Clearly, then, both religion and science are founded on faith — namely, on belief in the existence of something outside the universe, like an unexplained God or an unexplained set of physical laws, maybe even a huge ensemble of unseen universes, too. For that reason, both monotheistic religion and orthodox science fail to provide a complete account of physical existence.

This shared failing is no surprise, because the very notion of physical law is a theological one in the first place, a fact that makes many scientists squirm. Isaac Newton first got the idea of absolute, universal, perfect, immutable laws from the Christian doctrine that God created the world and ordered it in a rational way. Christians envisage God as upholding the natural order from beyond the universe, while physicists think of their laws as inhabiting an abstract transcendent realm of perfect mathematical relationships.

And just as Christians claim that the world depends utterly on God for its existence, while the converse is not the case, so physicists declare a similar asymmetry: the universe is governed by eternal laws (or meta-laws), but the laws are completely impervious to what happens in the universe.

It seems to me there is no hope of ever explaining why the physical universe is as it is so long as we are fixated on immutable laws or meta-laws that exist reasonlessly or are imposed by divine providence. The alternative is to regard the laws of physics and the universe they govern as part and parcel of a unitary system, and to be incorporated together within a common explanatory scheme.

In other words, the laws should have an explanation from within the universe and not involve appealing to an external agency. The specifics of that explanation are a matter for future research. But until science comes up with a testable theory of the laws of the universe, its claim to be free of faith is manifestly bogus.

[malati]

I will not be posting the reactions to his article to spare you from boredom.

Below is Davies reply to the reactions to his article.

Davies is not atheist. From what I gathered he believes in the "ground of all being" sort of like Advaita Vedanta.

He is partly right of course. BG 9.4: By Me, in My unmanifested form, this entire universe is pervaded. All beings are in Me, but I am not in them.


PAUL DAVIES

I was dismayed at how many of my detractors completely misunderstood what I had written. Indeed, their responses bore the hallmarks of a superficial knee-jerk reaction to the sight of the words "science" and "faith" juxtaposed.

The most common trap my critics have fallen into is in conflating the explanation of natural phenomena using the laws of physics, with an explanation of the laws themselves. I am not suggesting that the application of science is a matter of faith. Doing science involves employing testable hypotheses, refining theories and conducting experiments — in stark contrast to the practice of religion. The scientific method is the most reliable path to truth we know, and there is no more committed or passionate a scientist than I. Yes, "science works" as John Horgan points out. It is tested again and again as a description of nature. We are all agreed on that point. But it isn't the point I was trying to make. My argument refers, not to the scientific method, but to the underlying lawfulness of the universe itself, which raises questions such as where the laws come from, why they have the form that they do, and whether there is anything peculiar about the actual laws of the universe (such as being "fine-tuned" for life), as opposed to other possible laws. The orthodox position (and the one I set out to challenge in my book) is that the universe is governed by a fixed set of laws in the form of infinitely precise mathematical relationships imprinted on the universe from its birth. In addition, it is assumed that the physical world is affected by the laws, but the laws are completely impervious to what happens in the universe — they are immutable. It is not hard to see where this picture comes from: it is inherited from monotheism, which asserts that a rational being designed the universe according to a set of perfect laws. And the asymmetry between immutable laws and contingent states mirrors the asymmetry between God and nature: the universe depends utterly on God for its existence whereas God's existence does not depend on the universe. Historians of science are well aware that Newton and his contemporaries believed that in doing science they were uncovering the divine plan for the universe in the form of its underlying mathematical order. I am depressed that reminding scientists of this well-known historical fact should elicit such a shock-horror response. As Scott Atran points out, the argument that science is based on faith is not new. Evidently Western society is so steeped in monotheism that the monotheistic world view, which was appropriated by science, is now regarded as "obvious" and "natural." As a result, many scientists are unaware of its theological origin. Nor do they stop to think about the sweeping hidden assumptions they adopt when they subscribe to that scientific/theological world view, assumptions that are in fact are not shared by most other cultures.

Not all scientists envisage the laws of nature in the theological manner I have described, however. One person who evidently doesn't is P.Z. Myers, who declares his a lack of faith in science and simply takes science "as it comes." I have found that his is a familiar position among biologists, for whom contingency as opposed to law looms so large in explanation. Unfortunately, Myers goes on to attribute to me precisely the point of view I am seeking to refute: "That Davies seems to believe that order must rule everywhere and at every level is a stronger presupposition than is warranted by a scientific approach, and sounds remarkably theological." Well, yes, that's the whole point of my article! It is theological — but it is nevertheless the orthodox view among theoretical physicists, especially those working on the search for a unified theory. Such physicists believe there are perfect laws "out there", existing in some Platonic realm, even if the laws we find in our textbooks today are merely approximations to what Steven Weinberg calls "the final theory". And that is the position that, contrary to Myers' statement, I seek to challenge in my book. In doing so, I encountered fierce opposition from my physics colleagues. For example, when I suggested in my book that infinitely precise mathematical laws might be an unjustified idealization, i.e. that there might be an intrinsic uncertainty or flexibility in the laws, many of my physics colleagues were aghast at this heresy. Jerry Coyne, in his response to my article, asks, "What do we [orthodox scientists] believe to be true without evidence?" Well, how about belief in infinitely precise laws which incorporate real numbers and differentiability? Show me the evidence for that. Or, to take another well-known example, laws that transcend the physical universe and exist in some sense prior to it, because the said laws are intended to explain the origin of the universe. Many cosmologists believe in such laws, which must be accepted without explanation or testability, as the basis of a scientific theory of cosmogenesis.

My article pointed out that the widespread belief in immutable perfect transcendent prior laws underpinning the physical universe, while not necessarily wrong, is nevertheless held as an act of faith, similar in character to belief in an all-perfect divine lawgiver. Let me be clear about the sense in which I am using the word faith here. Obviously faith in the laws of physics isn't on a par with "faith" in the popular religious sense (such as belief in miracles, prophecy, the bible as historical fact, etc., all of which I personally regard as completely ridiculous). Rather, in using the word faith I refer to the metaphysical framework, shared by monotheism and science (but not by many other cultures), of a rational ground that underpins physical existence. It is the shared faith that we live in a universe that is coherent, a universe that manifests a specific mathematical scheme of things, a universe that is, at least in part, intelligible to sentient mortals. These tacit assumptions running through science, that stem from monotheism, can all be challenged. The universe doesn't have to be that way! But most scientists believe it is that way.

Because the monotheistic world view pervading science is so deeply entrenched, asking where the laws of physics come from or why they have the form they do is frowned upon. Many respondents to my article ticked me off for venturing into such murky waters, or for expecting there to even exist an answer. I am grateful to Sean Carroll for so cogently expressing the orthodox view among physicists that the laws of physics must simply be accepted as a brute fact — that is, they exist without explanation, for no reason. "That's just how things are," writes Carroll. "There is a chain of explanations concerning things that happen in the universe, which ultimately reaches to the fundamental laws of nature and stops." For Carroll, as for many scientists, unexplained laws are thus are the starting point of scientific reasoning, the levitating superturtle at the bottom that holds up the whole tower, just as God is the levitating superturtle that holds up physical existence in monotheism. After 30 years of listening to sterile bickering in the science/religion debate I am utterly bored with the refrain from each side that, in effect, "my superturtle is better than your superturtle." So I have tried to elevate the level of discussion and move on.

To achieve progress, I set out to see how far we can go in describing the deepest properties of the physical universe without appealing to anything outside it — such as an unexplained transcendent god, an unexplained set of magically-imposed Platonic mathematical laws, or infinitely many unseen alternative universes. I concede that, so long as we are stuck with human modes of thought, we will ultimately have to accept something on faith, but I see no reason to stop with the laws of physics. So I question the idealized concept of immutable perfect laws that must simply be accepted as a brute fact — "on faith" (since we can test the laws only to finite precision). The time has come to seek a theory of the laws, to bring the laws of physics within the scope of scientific inquiry, and if possible to explain their intelligibility, their "unreasonable" mathematical efficacy and their celebrated (and baffling) bio-friendliness. A possible way to formulate a theory of laws was mooted thirty years ago by John Wheeler, who abandoned the traditional theological notion of immutable laws "cast in tablets of stone from everlasting to everlasting." In my book I have sought to extend Wheeler's ideas in the light of recent work in the foundations of quantum mechanics, the theory of computation and holographic cosmology. Another possible approach to a theory of laws has been developed by Lee Smolin, and is mentioned briefly in his response to my article.

My interest in pursuing this project is to critically examine ultimate explanations of existence, for which there is a long tradition within religion, and a rather short one within science. I plead guilty to Lawrence Krauss' complaint that I am sidestepping some hugely important issues, such as the moral dimension of religious faith, the tragedy of human existence and suffering, and the question of purpose in the universe. My concern is admittedly with a restricted physics/cosmology agenda, as that is the only area in which I can claim some modest authority. However, the conceptual framework I am developing can accommodate a universe with something like "purpose," albeit one that is inherent in, and emergent with, the universe, rather than imposed upon it from without.

[Ekantin]

Malati, are you a regular reader, or intermittent reader, of PZ Myers?

[spiritualbhakti]

can someone give a summary? my brain cant comprehend

[Ekantin]

Sept 15, 2009 3:26:36 GMT -6 @Paul Davies said:

All science proceeds on the assumption that nature is ordered in a rational and intelligible way.

And you thought this guy was a "brilliant science writer"? The sentence above is pure nonsense.

When I heard Paul Davies mentioned here, I thought 'where have I heard that name before?' I've just remembered; he was the guy who wrote that book The Mind of God, obviously taking his cue from the last sentence of Stephen Hawking's Brief History of Time. Davies is also a recipient of the Templeton Prize, so that tells me all I need to know about his 'brilliant' science writing.

Now I'll tell you why I think that sentence above (and the essay that follows from that assumption) is nonsense. Clearly Davies is in the field of physics and is talking primarily of physics. I come from the field of psychology and neuroscience, but I get that various scientific disciplines have some small features in common. One of them is the element of chaos. Davies can't have been that naive (when he was a student) as to actually believe that the universe operates perfectly according to a set of laws? He must have known that to take that assumption seriously would be a foolish thing to do. The situation is similar in psychology: the mind is a disparate collection of thoughts, concepts, ideas, identity, emotions, all mixed up into one big mush. Chaos, what to speak of independent variances. When psychological experiments are carried out, it is acknowledged that inconsistencies in data are usually (but not always) down to individual variances, and that experiments have to be carried out in such a way as to reduce these independent (chaotic) influences to a minimum. In fact, I could go as far as saying that the story of an experiment is the story of keeping chaos out as far as possible, and how well you did it. If you read actual scientific papers published in scientific journals, you'll see how scientists spend an inordinate amount of time trying to cover all their bases. It takes a lot of work.

No one, in their right mind and who knows anything about science, proceeds under the impression that nature is ordered intelligibly and rationally. I get the impression that Davies' op-ed was all about how hurt he was when he found out that working on the frontlines in science was very different to what he has been taught in school. Duh, even a ten year old should know that. Anything a soldier is taught in the army is tested to extreme limits on the battlefield, so why is Davies wailing?

The end result of his op-ed is that he wants to do what all religious scientists want to do: pursue an agenda of artificially equating religion and science on the same platform by pointing out how they both operate on "faith". Jagat tried (and failed) to do the same on his blog recently. In a way, science probably does work on a faith, but they call it theory. (By the way, the scientific definition of theory is very different from the popular definition.) The grand difference is that theories in science are posited, accepted and thrown out on the basis of evidence, while religious theories tend to become doomed to fossilisation and transform into meaningless dogma that is clung to in the face of all opposition.

So I'm not very impressed with Davies' article. I was intrigued by the mention of numerous responses though. Malati didn't wish to post them but I found them all here if anyone's interested:

www.edge.org/discourse/science_faith.html

Frankly I'm not surprised at the number of criticisms. There should be more, because Davies' article was junk.

[avadhuta]

Ekantin, I think you misread this. I don't think this article tries to claim science to be religion's twin separated at birth. In fact, no one pursues such an agenda. So, how can there be failure. Yours is the objection raised by fierce atheists who would be very convenienced, of course, if the charge were true. But the actual argument is that science in itself is a non entity and therefore purposeless - it dwells in chaos because its very nature is chaos. It has no reason, and never will. How can it be comparade to religion? Its also a stretch to say that theory is to science what faith is to religion. Again, science has no pupose of its own. To pure science, faith, of any kind, is inconsequential. Science does not seek answers but simply registers perceivable data. In science theory is a system, not a search per se. Evidence, in science, if anything, proves the possibility of chaos becoming meaning. Obviously you are going through a phase of hatred towards religion. So now science has become a very personal matter. Thats ok, it happens, but just don't expect reciprocation. If you left the room in a huff, science would only determine that you did. You would have to find out why by other means.

[Ekantin]

Avadhuta, I don't know why you think I'm going through a phase of "hatred towards religion", it actually means very little to me these days. The reason why I display a little animosity towards people such as Paul Davies is that he is part of a small but increasing cadre of "scientists" who wish to confuse and confound. He wrote his op-ed in the New York Times, which is a public newspaper to be read by the public, not for an audience of scientists. When you do something like that, you are playing an informative role, an edifying role. His article was anything but. It is pure junk. It is no surprise that heavy criticism was encountered, and his second piece didn't help his position very much. You probably don't know this, but for a long time a grassroots movement has been growing among scientists to prevent misreportage of scientific findings in public newspapers. This includes criticising even those who deliberately talk carelessly. It has nothing to do with religion vs. atheism, although it might be a factor in Davies' case because of his beliefs like it was about Francis Collins, but is mainly managed to prevent careless talk.

But as far as your comments on science are concerned, they are unlike anything I've heard before and are conceptually very different to what we scientists do on a daily basis. Science is "chaotic" depending on the issue being addressed, such as in side-disciplines like quantum physics, but it is pretty much "organised" everywhere else. Science tries to bring order to chaos to make sense out of what is going on, before it gets enough grounding to make sense out of things in their natural chaotic state. Davies doesn't understand this, he thinks that science proceeds on an assumption of organisation and that the reality is chaotic. Perhaps he can think that way because his field is physics, and there is a lot about the universe that remains unknown. But generally speaking, from a 'scientific' point of view, his position is ass-backwards.

You are right when you say that science is impartial towards "results" and only functions as a tool. That is kind of the whole point. It finds things out and then we (people) draw our conclusions about things from the observations and data.

By the way, which particular science were you referring to in your comments? Any particular discipline, or the field as a whole?

[avadhuta]

Ekantin, regarding your question, yes I speak of science as a whole. And I am sorry, I didn't mean to get personal, but its a fact that religion in general is under attack these days and not without good reason. But just as there are pseudo scientists out there, whom you so rightly want to dennounce, there are very emotional individuals out there dennouncing religion in not quite honest terms. Also, as a psychology student I am sure you know it takes the element of emotion for a person to consider himself religious or not. Lets just say that its impossible for a human being to be absolutely "scientific" at all times. That ironically is a science based challenge. And where you are not scientific, you are religious, there is no third option. Psychology as a science has evidence that individuals are emotion driven and emotion seekers. You are upset that science is made cheap by snake oil salesmen. I hear you on that one. But it seems there isn't a way around being scientific without simply being, which is to say, one will be religious along with being scientific. Or vice versa. I think thats what both parties are talking about. The so called pure scientists, and scientists with a license to interpret, both present a legitimate argument, but end up trampling each other by sheer lack of order. Chaos occurs when there is opportunity for such. Harmony eliminates the opportunity. It seems the problem is in both sides missing key points in each others' speech. Personally I find myself quite dazzled by the possibilites on each side. The world of science is like an infinite cathedral. The world of faith is like a deep embrace by a soft, perfumed blue beloved filling up every inch of your being.

You say: "Science tries to bring order to chaos to make sense out of what is going on, before it gets enough grounding to make sense out of things in their natural chaotic state. "

Actually, science does not trie but simply is. The ones who try are us, humans. Because we need order. Science is chaotic in that it does not have an agenda. Its natural state is chaos, it simply is without a purpose, and we humans make it into becoming. This is why you say that we "people" are needed to draw out scientific conclusions. Scientifc conclusions in themselves are irrelevant for us humans because ultimately they don't add anything to the human quest. They are just confirmation of what is already known, of random facts, that is, 2 plus 2 is 4 and clouds are evaporated water. Without a purpose science is not even existent. And here is where pure scientists don't understand the argument, that science alone is a falsety, a myth. Devoid of religion, of purpose, it can't entirely BE. But once its made into being by its necessity, its in fact a form of religion. Its an expression of humanity, of being. And the purpose of science, which is to explain life, simply does not deliver because explaining life is actually a relative matter, relative to how much humans want to know. Science alone is infinite, it can account for eveything. In that, it is similar to the God of the faithful. Religious sentiments, however, are what sets science in motion. They are like lenses to be fit on the microscope: they are of varying degrees and availble on demand. Now, how deep into things we really want to know, THAT is a matter besides science. Its a matter of faith, of purpose, of individual management of chaos. Of becoming gods ouselves. But whatever way you look at it, there you have it, Godness is inescapable.

[Ekantin]

OK Avadhuta, I think I understand your points a little better now. No worries, I wasn't upset by any of your comments. By the way I am not a student; just last week was my Masters graduation ceremony, a year after the qualification was awarded.

I have to say that I'm not keen on the way you suggest that there are only two ways of being, either 'religious' or scientific'. I personally take the third option of being neutral (as possible!) between the two. The reason is because my experiences with religion have shown me that many religionists attack and criticise science without the faintest idea of what it is all about. I am now seeing the same thing among scientists (PZ Myers for instance, who is becoming very notorious) where they attack religion as a matter of course. This has led me to grow sick of having to pick a position and become a "party member", so I personally stay aloof from the two and tend to comment only on errors and misunderstandings. This is what I did with Davies' article. There is plenty of opportunity for me to attack Davies on the basis of his religious beliefs but it would be of no consequence, what was important was the way he tried to artificially equate religion and science on the basis of "unknowable" things. I even tried to make allowances for him because of his field of physics where a lot of things about the universe remain unknown, but he seemed to ignore only his own field and make statements about science as a whole. With little wonder, he pissed a lot of people off.

Now because I am more and more familiar with the rhetoric of the creationist crowd, I can spot similar elements in your thoughts and theirs'. Respectfully, I think you are falling into the same trap as Paul Davies. The danger lies speaking of science as a whole and not any specific discipline. As I mentioned, not all disciplines are as "unknowable" as physics. At least a couple of the reactions at Edge.Org were biologists, and biology is fairly "knowable". Ditto for a lot of other disciplines. At least three of those reactions were from physicists. They evidently don't think much of Davies from even within that field. But then again, scientists disagreeing with each other is nothing new. And that's also another of my points: Whenever someone voices thoughts about God, religion, or some other comment that opens the door for all sorts of airy-fairy things to come in, they tend to be seen as desperate crackpots who turn to it as a last-resort explanation. The trouble is that those last resorts don't offer any more help that scientific/rational enquiry in understanding those issues, but only appear to fulfil the function of absolving the scientists of the intellectual responsibility of understanding them by saying "Goddiddit!" The kindest thing one can say about them is that they are mavericks.

I also don't think much of the argument that science is an impartial tool and that scientists are "religious" in their passion and search for truth, just like religionists are. This is meaningless and of no consequence. It isn't an issue of "taking science on faith" as Davies says. What matters to me (and hopefully everyone else) is results, so from that point of view if one were to witness a tussle between science and religion, I think science would win hands-down because it brings results. Religion unfortunately offers nothing in comparison. That is why people like Davies turn to it as a last resort. But these days it is losing a lot of credibility because a lot of it's dearly-held concepts are in danger of being eradicated. I would like to discuss some of these issues soon on this forum, possibly in the 'Psychology and CV' sub-forum. Two of my favourite topics are the neuropsychology of spiritual experience, and the existence of the soul.

[malati]

For someone with a master's degree reading an article in his own language, how can you miss Davies' point.

Davies equates science with religion because atheists always gripe that theists' explanations always stop with God. He points out that science in a way is theological. He cited the most obvious and pervading of all natural laws, the law of gravity. The law of gravity is taken as just is, without explanation of its origin and nature, which is contrary to the nature of science. It's like the law of gravity stops with itself like God.

You are wrong to say that the field of physics has many unknowns. As I mentioned in another thread physics with few laws has explained much much more than other fields.

I will venture that not many in the sceintific community got pissed off with Davies. I'll give you statistics. More than 40% of scientists believe in an Absolute power, whether its the personal God or Spinoza's God (Baruch, if you don't know). The rest are agnostics and atheists. Therefore only a very small fraction of scientists are atheists. And the statistics have not changed much for decades despite predictions that "Krishna will die".

I'm not against science. For me science is a reality that human beings have discovered and to be discovered.

Results do not happen only in science. Result is not only physical and a product of active intervention. Rain is a result of natural occurence in the sky.

God consciuosness and love is a powerful force that can bring about a positive result to humanity.

Bring on your psychology thread. Expect your ideas to be trampled on here. After all this forum is called Chaitanya Symposium. And remember a piece of paper will not automatically increase IQ. It's genetic.

[Ekantin]

Sept 25, 2009 3:52:23 GMT -6 malati said:

For someone with a master's degree reading an article in his own language, how can you miss Davies' point.

Well frankly, I expected nothing better than for you to drag the discussion down to a low level and start getting personal with everything.

Malati, if you like Davies' article, good for you. You asked us to discuss it with our thinking caps on and that's what I did. If you didn't like my views, fine. Nobody else has to like it just because you like it. I think the article was pure trash for all the reasons given and your defence of it hasn't done anything to support Davies' point. The artificial equation that Davies makes is wholly unjustified. I know that people like you have a romantic idea that one day science and religion will enjoy wedded bliss, but I'm sorry to be the cynical spoilsport who says it'll never happen. You said that not many in the scientific community got pissed off with Davies. Hmm? At Edge.Org were all the responses from those who even bothered to respond, and there were some big names there. Here are some more (that's four new articles there under each link). I'm sure I could find more if I really started digging. Unfortunately your statistics are also incredible, I have never heard such statistics before. Where is the study that backs up your statistics? What survey methods were used to collect them, and what type of analyses were carried out on them? Rather, the only survey that I have heard of is the as-yet-unpublished one that was carried out on members of the Royal Society, finding that only 3.3% of scientists (RS members) believed in God. Normally I don't trust media, but I've read the original paper that discusses these figures in a wider context. Your figure of 40% is most likely coming from a 1999 Scientific American article, but that figure applied only to undergraduates (BSc. holders) and not professional scientists regarded as 'eminent', of whom only 10% stated that they believed in God or an afterlife. Even so, it looks like the figures for belief are decreasing among scientists. I haven't heard of any longitudinal surveys, because that type of study would bring very interesting results.

Your next point is that I was wrong to say that physics has many unknowns. Ok, so do you have proof for String Theory? The Higgs-Boson? How much dark matter is there out there? And how about your favourite topic of quantum physics, is there any real understanding about it?

As for the exciting prospect of your trampling on my ideas when I 'bring them on', I'm sorry, but I don't think you're capable of it. Your last statement about how intelligence is genetic and nothing to do with a "piece of paper" just illustrated to me how appallingly illiterate you are about the most basic concepts in cognitive science. Assuming you were serious, fundamental things such as identity, personality, intelligence, and so on, are a result of the nature and nurture and the polarisation or interaction between the two. What is the point of educating people in schools if intelligence is just genetic? We should just do away with schools, colleges, universities, and let peoples' "natural intelligences" manifest. We educate people because it is possible for intelligence to grow with learning, just like yours.

You see what I mean? This is why I can't expect anything from you in a serious scientific discussion until you show how capable you are of understanding these things. In another thread you mentioned that scientific knowledge was of no practical use to you and that you're just a simple person, but you clearly enjoy when scientific findings appear to support your ideas. Confirmation bias much? If I spent time addressing all of your errors and misconceptions I'd be here forever. And much of it isn't even science but basic common sense.

[Ekantin]

I should probably qualify my statements about 'religious' scientists and the statistics involving them. Larsen & Witham (1998) reported that "among the top natural scientists, disbelief is greater than ever — almost total." They quoted a 1914 study where 58% of scientists expressed disbelief in God. They repeated the study among members of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and found similar results (60.7%) and then repeated again with more 'eminent' scientists, finding that only a mere 7% were believers.

There is a more interesting a deeper question: what type of scientists were they? Because the type of scientist you are accounts for a lot. Botanists, for example, have relatively high levels of religiosity because they deal with plants and flowers most of the time. In such a field, it isn't hard to be captured by the beauty of foliage and marvel at the "glory of God" if one is already predisposed to religion, and in botany there isn't a requirement or scope for much critical thinking unless you were carrying out an evolutionary study or something. So here's an interesting extract from the Larsen & Witham paper:

"Our survey found near universal rejection of the transcendent by NAS natural scientists. Disbelief in God and immortality among NAS biological scientists was 65.2% and 69.0%, respectively, and among NAS physical scientists it was 79.0% and 76.3%. Most of the rest were agnostics on both issues, with few believers. We found the highest percentage of belief among NAS mathematicians (14.3% in God, 15.0% in immortality). Biological scientists had the lowest rate of belief (5.5% in God, 7.1% in immortality), with physicists and astronomers slightly higher (7.5% in God, 7.5% in immortality)."

Bear in mind that for 14% of mathematicians that do believe in God, for example, 86% of them don't. Also bear in mind that beliefs in God and religion consist of a lot more than the existence of God, immortality and afterlives. Fairly recently I found out about the newly-developed Religious Zeal Scale, which I may be interested in employing sometime during my career.

And this is only one study and a rather old one at that. The more recent study by Lynn et al. (2008) is the one that reports a 3.3% belief among members of the Royal Society, 78.8% had no belief and the remainder were undecided. Lynn et al. remark about the disparity between the 'intelligence elite' and the general population, 68.% of which expressed belief in a god when surveyed. They also report various findings about the decline of religious belief with age, the course of the 20th Century, as well as comparing results across 137 countries.

I wonder what the figures would look like if researchers questioned neuroscientists. I'd expect belief among them to be fairly low, precisely because they work with brain function and know exactly which parts of the brain activates where religious beliefs are involved. Why do biologists have the lowest rate of all? These are interesting questions. One of the most recent studies that I'm aware of was carried out by Inzlicht et al. (2009), where they tried to find neural markers of religious conviction. I wrote an analysis of that paper on my blog. Here it is.

All in all, it looks like belief is on the decline. These are real statistics, not figures like "40%" plucked out of the air.

[Ekantin]