“For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak. As he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.” — Robert Jastrow, astronomer
I found this quote while reading What's so great about Christianity By Dinese D'Souza and I have to say it struck me. Yes it is mildly humerous, but the depth and meaning behind the statement is what I want to talk about. It says a few things about modern science and societies view of it.
First off, I love the phrase "...his faith in the power of reason..." because it sums up my point of view on modern secularism. In the news, we are bombarded with statements like the war between faith and reason or Science versus Faith, but none of these truly embody the conflict. It is a war between ideologies. One faith opposed to another. The secular faith in reason and chance; the religious faith in reason and revelation.
The point is that it takes faith to believe that the world will be here tomorrow — that we live within an ordered system of laws keeping this lump of rock from falling into a 27,000,000 *F furnace only 93,000,000 miles away! Scientists believe that they can study and measure nature because they have faith that it is understandable. And yet, modern secular theories state that all has happened by chance — by a chaotic roll of the dice. Studying our universe has told us quite the opposite.
The crux or "punch-line" of the quote is when the scientist pulls himself over the last rock to find a bunch of theologians who had been there for centuries. Jastrow, being an astronomer, is likely referring to recent discoveries about the origin of the universe. For the large part of the 20th century, scientists have believed in some form of the steady state theory. The basic premis was that the universe is in flux. It has neither a beginning nor an end. The theory presented secularists with an option that did not include God. Its problem? In 1965, scientists discovered "background radiation" pointing, inextricably, to a beginning to the universe.
Now, the Big Bang theory and its variants have become the standard cosmological theory. But what does it mean that the universe had a beginning? We know from the laws of phisics from nothing, nothing comes. So what about the beginning of time and space? It had to have come from something transending itself and it could not have created itself as nothing can be the cause of itself. What, then?
Back to the the scientist and the theologians. What Robert Jastrow is rather deftly saying is that modern secularist, defying "crude religious beliefs" in favor of rationality, has proven what Christians have believed for centuries. A bow to science for bringing us one step closer to the true revelation of God.
Cheers
First off, I love the phrase "...his faith in the power of reason..." because it sums up my point of view on modern secularism. In the news, we are bombarded with statements like the war between faith and reason or Science versus Faith, but none of these truly embody the conflict. It is a war between ideologies. One faith opposed to another. The secular faith in reason and chance; the religious faith in reason and revelation.
The point is that it takes faith to believe that the world will be here tomorrow — that we live within an ordered system of laws keeping this lump of rock from falling into a 27,000,000 *F furnace only 93,000,000 miles away! Scientists believe that they can study and measure nature because they have faith that it is understandable. And yet, modern secular theories state that all has happened by chance — by a chaotic roll of the dice. Studying our universe has told us quite the opposite.
The crux or "punch-line" of the quote is when the scientist pulls himself over the last rock to find a bunch of theologians who had been there for centuries. Jastrow, being an astronomer, is likely referring to recent discoveries about the origin of the universe. For the large part of the 20th century, scientists have believed in some form of the steady state theory. The basic premis was that the universe is in flux. It has neither a beginning nor an end. The theory presented secularists with an option that did not include God. Its problem? In 1965, scientists discovered "background radiation" pointing, inextricably, to a beginning to the universe.
Now, the Big Bang theory and its variants have become the standard cosmological theory. But what does it mean that the universe had a beginning? We know from the laws of phisics from nothing, nothing comes. So what about the beginning of time and space? It had to have come from something transending itself and it could not have created itself as nothing can be the cause of itself. What, then?
Back to the the scientist and the theologians. What Robert Jastrow is rather deftly saying is that modern secularist, defying "crude religious beliefs" in favor of rationality, has proven what Christians have believed for centuries. A bow to science for bringing us one step closer to the true revelation of God.
Cheers
2 comments:
By the way, Dr. Jastrow passed away some time in early February.
The thing about the Big Bang is that we now have something called quantum gravity, thanks to Stephen Hawking, which states that before the great expansion time did not really exist. There was merely a quantum instability. Therefore, they seek to get around the whole "beginning" issue.
For a great explanation of the science involved in modern cosmology, check out "God, Time and Stephen Hawking" by David Wilkerson, who is both an astrophysicist and a Methodist minister.
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