Do science and rationality support atheism?No, says a nuclear physicist. To understand why, you must be prepared to face the Fundamental Question of Philosophy: Why is there anything rather than nothing? The challenge of militant Islam is focusing new attention on religion. Many, especially in Europe, are turning from being indifferent to religion to being militantly anti-religious. Christian and Islamic fundamentalism are both being blamed for roles in the bloody war on terrorism. Thus secular Europeans have voiced dismay at American religiosity and worry that faith-based reasoning is spreading in Europe, too. Many Britons, for example, believe the Christian faith of Prime Minister Tony Blair helped lead him to entangle Britain in America's war in Iraq. Thus also, the Oxford zoologist Richard Dawkins, who calls himself "the world's most prominent atheist", asserts the "irrationality of belief in God and the grievous harm religion has inflicted on society, from the Crusades to 9/11".
The resurgence of a militant atheism represented by these remarks has been the immediate impetus for writing this essay. My primary goal is to analyse the question of the rationality of belief in God with emphasis on the claim that such is irrational because it contradicts science. For simplicity, belief in God will be identified with theism and with the assertion God exists. This ignores the distinction between theism, which usually considers God as an active agent in world history, and deism, which does not.
Theism generally comes packaged in a religion. The latter is a complex set of ideas that relate God to all aspects of nature including, especially, human nature. For example, religions explain thunder, stars, good/bad fortune, the existence of humankind, the meaning and proper conduct of life, and so on. Each religion relates these to God or gods. A belief in some religion can and should be distinguished from a belief in God. Religion is a diffuse topic liable to unending disputation whereas theism is not. Unfortunately, most discussions fail to keep this distinction clear. Thus one often reads that religion has made a claim in contradiction to scientific truth, theism is irrational. This is simply a confusion of words and concepts: the rationality of theism does not stand on the scripture of any religion. Relating God to science Another important way in which theism is commonly said to contradict science is in respect to creation. Particular scenarios depend on particular scriptures but God is always the creator of the universe. On the other hand, one often hears that science can or will explain creation (eg, the Big Bang) and so the role -- indeed the primary role -- of God as creator is superfluous or just wrong. Thinking just beyond this shallow point, one realises that science can only explain the creation of something in terms of something else ("something" here includes non-substantials such as laws of nature). After a bit more thought one arrives at the key creation question known as the Fundamental Question of Philosophy: why is there anything at all rather than nothing at all? Analysis of the FQP leads to a clear understanding of the relation between theism and science. As a start, let us try to answer the FQP with science. To do this fairly we grant the stipulation that everything in the universe is explicable, or will ultimately be physically explicable. This means, in particular, that all fields of science are reducible to physics and that every area of knowledge is a proper subject for scientific inquiry. It does not mean that all explanations will be reduced to physics. It means just that they could be, at least in principle. This assumption underlies virtually all of modern science. Biologists seek ultimate causes of biological phenomena in terms of chemistry; chemists, in terms of physics. Even mental phenomena are assumed to be ultimately explicable in terms of the physical brain. Not everyone believes this scheme to be true, but a real scientist would never attempt to base scientific explanations on some sort of non-physical, spiritual essence, force, soul, or will. Even a scientific study of artistic or religious inspiration would not use the classical interpretation of inspirations as the in-taking of a spirit. Science and the fundamental question Returning to the task of answering the FQP, pick anything -- say a drop of water -- and ask yourself: why is there this thing? Why does this drop exist? An attempt to answer this within the framework of science leads to a series of existing things, and a why-question for each of them. The series starting with a drop of water might be sketched as follows. A drop's existence can be understood in terms of its individual water molecules, the particular forces between them, and the general physical laws governing motion: quantum mechanics (QM). Why molecules and inter-molecular forces exist can be understood in terms of atoms, inter-atomic forces, and again, QM. Similarly, atoms and inter-atomic forces, in terms of electrons, nuclei, the electrodynamic forces between them and QM; and so on. Eventually one reaches the most fundamental level of physics, its most basic concepts and equations. All paths of why-questions, starting from all things, all lead to the same end: the basis of physics. At this point, the FQP requires you to ask why this basis -- the set of concepts and equations underlying physics -- exists. The known basis of physics changes in time, and deepens as our understanding of nature deepens. However, at any given time, physics cannot explain the existence of its basis. Its sole job is to explain what is not in its basis in terms of its basis--which is why a basis is called a basis. Thus the FQP creates a series of questions all leading to an unanswerable end -- unanswerable, that is, within the framework of science. Science cannot answer why anything (including science itself), rather than nothing, exists. There is nothing in the universe that can explain the existence of the universe. That the answer to the FQP cannot be found within the bounds of science and rationality means only that. It does not mean its answer does not exist. If an answer is assumed to exist, in some sense of the word exist, there can be no error in naming it. The traditional name is God. Thus a very important conclusion: within the framework of science, God is unknowable -- and therefore, unknown. Furthermore, the unknowable God must be conceived to be an indivisible unity. For how can one know of parts of that of which nothing can be known? Common mistakes concerning creation It is worth mentioning two red herrings commonly dragged into this argument. People with a smattering of physics may bring up "quantum mechanical vacuum fluctuations". Could the universe have been created out of nothing via a vacuum fluctuation? Could it have been created all by itself out of nothing (and therefore, it is implied, without need of God)? The scientific answer is No: a physical vacuum is a thing, something rather than nothing. Furthermore, there still remains the question of why quantum mechanics itself exists -- or any natural law for that matter? Others feel that the FQP can have meaning only if one believes that the universe was created at some time, before which there was neither time nor universe. They feel that, therefore, if time extends to the infinite past, then no moment of creation ever existed and therefore it need not be explained. Unfortunately, this still leaves open the question of why the universe exists at all? Furthermore, why, if it exists today, must it continue to do so tomorrow? Alternative views of the FQP Should the Fundamental Question of Philosophy be taken seriously? Many (if not most) people ignore the FQP simply because they are not intellectually serious themselves, but some serious thinkers also ignore it. There seem to be three possible views of the FQP: (1) It is irrational, and hence, uninteresting. (2) It is rational, but scientifically unanswerable and hence uninteresting. (3) It is rational and scientifically unanswerable, but still interesting. In the first of these, the claim of irrationality may rest on the phrase "nothing at all" contained within the FQP. Try to visualise "nothing at all"! It is not empty space because space is something. It is not altogether clear that we can conceive of "nothing at all"; but we cannot coherently talk or ask about that of which we have no conception. In a similar vein, some people may feel that the claim that God created the world ex nihilo (from nothing) is irrational since we have no conception of nihilo. Another possible irrationality in the FQP is contained in the word "why". Some thinkers read motivation into "why", not causality. Since there is no reason to assume that every cause has human-style motivation, and certainly no scientific cause includes motivation, the FQP seems to include an irrational assumption. Many serious people (such as the 18th century Scottish philosopher David Hume) view scientifically unanswerable questions of this sort as uninteresting. It is also possible to argue that a question which is unanswerable is therefore uninteresting. Why, for instance, hit your head against a stone wall? Or, similarly, one could argue because a question lacks a rational answer, the question is irrational. If this is the case, it is meaningless and therefore uninteresting. As these examples illustrate, "rationality" is ambiguous and "being interesting" is subjective. Hence, the first two views listed above cannot be argued; and no one who maintains either of them can be argued into seriously considering the FQP -- that question which is central to a belief in the concept of God. Tackling the existence of God What if we take the third view, that the FQP is rational and scientifically unanswerable, but interesting nonetheless? The modern and highly influential German metaphysician Martin Heidegger maintained that the FQP is the only genuine philosophical question. Oddly enough, he called himself an atheist -- but also claimed that atheists do not deny the existence of God. Rather, they deny that "God has an existence". This obscure wording serves to emphasise the ambiguity in the concept of existence. Heidegger's basic point was that simply stating that God does or does not exist, without further clarifying the sense of the word "exist", is ambiguous. To say that something "exists" normally means that it is within the universe (of every thing and every being). If we were to say that God "exists" in this sense, it would imply (since God is the reason for or explanation of why anything rather than nothing exists) that the universe explains its own existence. Or, if one prefers to think in terms of creation ex nihilo, that the universe created itself into something out of nothing: no-thing created some-thing out of no-thing! This incoherence amounts to merely a denial either of the meaning of the FQP, or an unwillingness to face its meaning. We now approach the end of our chain of logic. To say that God exists is to understand existence in an enlarged sense. It means that we accept his complete transcendence, that: the reason for the existence of the universe lies completely beyond the universe. In fact, it lies beyond nature -- it is, strictly speaking, "super-natural".
Summary
The upshot of this is that it is simply foolish to assert that science and rationality support atheism. Finally, it is possible to reach a rational belief in the existence of God. One must have first the mental (and perhaps, emotional) wherewithal to ask the fundamental question. Then one must understand and accept the fact that its answer is unknowable through science. God, the answer, transcends the universe of knowable things. Edward A. Remler is a professor emeritus at the College of William and Mary, in Virginia. He has worked in nuclear and particle physics theory for the last 50 years. |
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Comments (78)
Nel said...I like the way Mr. Remler presents his ideas. I’m going to pass this article to my friends!
Philippines | Sunday, 19 August 2007 at 7:31 pm
exmoron said...Congratulations, Professor Remler, you have successfully translated the “first cause” arguments of Plato and Aristotle (and Aquinas and others) into modern physics terminology. But there is a simple response to your argument that has existed for centuries:
If God is the “first cause,” who/what created god?
In epistemology this is referred to as an infinite regression and it is basically uninteresting because positing “god” as the “first cause” gets us no closer to understanding the “first cause.” It’s the equivalent of saying “something caused the universe to begin, but we don’t know what it was. We do, however, have a name for it - blark or god or whatever you want to call it.” Wow, that’s useful!
As for the existence of god being logical or being ruled out by science… There are no “militant atheists” who claim as much. God is an unknowable concept. As such, it is outside the purview of science. This was not always the case, as the realm of religion has slowly receded in the face of scientific advance (read up on the “god of the gaps"). Today, god is relegated to the cracks of scientific knowledge. Those cracks may eventually be filled, just as the origins of the universe may eventually be explained. We don’t know that, but claiming the answer once removed from what we know is always god is futile and meaningless. Is it uninteresting? Only in the sense that it is uninformative. It is kind of fun to ask, but sometimes fun things are also pointless.
I know many of the readers of this piece are going to find your use of big, physics related words compelling. But this really is an old, simple argument that has been rehashed thousands of times. As noted above, the rebuttal is always simple - who caused the first cause? The assumption is that there always has to be a cause. We don’t know that to be true. That is an assumption. As this argument stands, it’s not new, just a new package.
United States | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 12:30 am
RX said...God is a word which has no meaning, so to argue where what it represents is a moot point.
Dawkins atheism speaks of the God and associated texts as described in the Bible and followed by Christians. The bible’s God and related ‘facts’ do contradict science.
The problem is that in the end God becomes what ever definition people want to satisfy their own beliefs. The other thing that happens is that people will refuse to actually to forward their definition in writing. This article is no different.
Once the definition of God is actually out of the mind and on to paper, that is the only time one can objectively see what it is and if one does not believe.
The problem is not if God exists, but which of the 6 billions Gods we are talking about. Atheism will also be valid - it just a matter of what God they don’t believe in.
One thing atheists and theists will agree on - they all can’t be right.
-- | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 4:58 am
David Fairthorne said...The professor claims to have proved the existence of God, but in doing so he has used some verbal sleight of hand. If you examine the “proof”, you will see that his definition of God is by no means what is commonly meant by “God”. First he asks what he calls the “Fundamental Question of Philosophy (FQP)”: “Why is there anything at all rather than nothing at all?” Then he defines “God” to be the answer to that question.
So if he has proved anything, he has proved that there exists an answer to the question. But you don’t need to read the entire essay to know that the question has many possible answers, not all of which can be correct. For instance possible answers could include “a supernatural entity created the universe” or “the universe was formed from a black hole in another universe” or “an imaginary hen laid it” or even “nobody knows”. Just write down any answer to the FQP, and you have created a God in the sense that Professor Remler has defined the word “God”.
Canada | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 10:56 am
Michael Roscoe said...An interesting essay – it’s always good to think about fundamental issues such as ‘why are we here?’ The only problem is that there is no reason to our existence other than to reproduce and keep the species going. There is no rationality to the universe – it just happens to have worked out the way it is. Professor Remler seems to agree with us atheists that all religions are totally irrational and obviously wrong, but still wants to have a creator and call it God. What’s the point? If we accept the Big Bang theory, and there’s no good reason not to, we must accept that we may never know what comes before the Big Bang – perhaps there is no ‘before’. To bring a god into things is to revert to the superstitions of previous centuries when people knew so much less. Why would a creator make a universe that evolves through chance? Why make billions of stars in the hope that somewhere, maybe, human life just might begin? It makes no sense – to believe in God is to be totally irrational. Better to accept that life is the result of chance encounters – it has no meaning, but you can still make the most of it.
France | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 5:02 pm
redewenur said...Atheism has it that the universe is the way it is because the laws of physics are such as they are, and the laws of physics are such because that’s just the way they are, or possibly because of another scientifically explicable cause, and so on, possibly ad infinitum.
Theism has it that, ultimately, an atemporal and super-universal first cause underlies all of existence, be it a multiverse or whatever, and this first cause does indeed ‘proceed’ all by ‘infinite regression’, being the ‘absolute’ infinity beyond all infinities.
Some find the theistic view “uninteresting” because “it gets us no closer to understanding the first cause.” This is a scientifically valid perspective which leads them to declare, incredulously, “Wow, that’s useful!”
In fact, people do find it useful. It allows them to conceptualise - based upon their experience, and however vaguely - an actual first cause, lying at the ‘point’ of infinite regression, i.e. in absolute transcendence, that necessarily determines the purpose of all else. Whilst concepts of God are many and varied, leading to discussions of the subject are fraught with mutual misunderstanding and confusion (to paraphrase, one person’s God may be another person’s poison), I suspect that the aforementioned concept was that of Einstein, and is perhaps shared by many scientists, be they religious or non-religious.
David Fairthorne: “The professor claims to have proved the existence of God.”
I haven’t found that claim.
Thailand | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 5:07 pm
William Howell said...Your entire argument is “We can’t explain it therefore god did it!” as if this is actually some kind of answer! We can’t explain how something came out of nothing so god must have done it! - So where did god come from? Out of nothing too? So in fact your answer to the creation of the universe is the spontaneous creation out of nothing of a god that can make universes out of nothing!
Just because science can’t currently explain something doesn’t mean that the explanation can only be god!
Throughout history religions have attributed lightning, earthquakes, disease etc. to god and, with the knowledge available at the time this was not unreasonable
Science has now identified the causes and shows that these things can and do happen without any kind of divine intervention.
Every time we discover something new we don’t find god, we find science.
Religious people are left scrabbling at the margins of knowledge to find gods hiding place ever on the retreat before the truth.
United Kingdom | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 8:11 pm
ck :-) said...Yup! It looks like it is a true and valid argument.
Some will eventually know “how” things comes about through some kind of science, if mankind tries really hard enough. Some within his/her life time, and some will not be privileged to do so.
We can only know “why” through some kind of “way of life,” which becomes religion or the so-called science of the “way of life,” and mankind has invented a lot of them. But not many were successful too.
But this thing called Love? It must be coming from some where else. There is so much of it that it created a whole “universe.” Of course, it is only possible to know and learn more about such through a “way of life.” Maybe it’s now time to know the science of Love?
ck :-)
Philippines | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 9:47 pm
Mark Allen said...Well that all sounds oh so clever, but all you’ve really done is push the “God of the gaps” back a stage further, and said, there is something which I believe science is unable to answer. I know, lets call it God.
United Kingdom | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 9:53 pm
ck :-) said...Maybe it does sound so… but it’s not coming from me, really. It’s very mysterious. From childhood, I was introduced to Him as the God of Love. And to this very day and maybe even to the day I die… He will remain as such. But one thing for sure. I may try my best to learn all the sciences, I can muster, ...and by the looks of the discussions from all the learned colleagues on this board. He will always be as Mysterious. Try to study Him too sometime… Maybe you’ll be able to tell me more about him through your experiences of the science of Love?
ck:-)
Philippines | Monday, 20 August 2007 at 11:06 pm
Laughing Man said...“Why is there anything rather than nothing?” is a false dichotomy. There is no such thing as nothing. You could say why is there *this* thing rather than this other thing. Time is fashioned by the mind, a linear ordering of events. Creation and destruction are arbitrary points on an infinite line which is merely our psychological way of getting our bearings. The thing doesn’t need initiation or closure if it simply IS.
United States | Tuesday, 21 August 2007 at 3:29 am
Gareth Edwards said...If you remove the wrappings of any particular religion from your definition of God, you are left with hardly any definition at all.
Is he/she/it a conscious and inteligent entity?
If so then inventing this entity to try to explain the FQP leaves us with an even bigger fundemental question in explaining where God came from. When there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that this entity exists it is certainly an irrational position to take.
If the force/entity that causes the existance of the universe/multiverse is not a conscious inteligent entity then why call it God rather than just defining it like any other law of science.
United Kingdom | Tuesday, 21 August 2007 at 4:48 am
Eracerhead said...Ok, so why is there something rather than nothing?
“God” is not an answer to the question, anymore than “splunge” is an answer to the question. Theologians always rely on magic to answer questions like this, which is inconsistent with science. Did you even read Dawkins?
This essay is nothing more than one long non-sequitor.
United States | Tuesday, 21 August 2007 at 5:46 am
Nigel Harrison said...A good article. Well constructed.
Patrick said “Developing theories based entirely on assumptions is pointless and uninteresting.” - It is hardly “entirely” on an assumptiont, it has some assumptions but not just assumtions. That’s what science does all the time with theories in any case, where is the evidence of multi-verses, and dare I say transitional forms for evolution, where is the evidence of global warming as opposed to cyclical temp flucuations - I have heard scientists say both points of view are true. Unless you know everything then assumptions to varying degrees have to be made.
As José Roberto Bonilla Alvarado said It boils down to whether you believe the universe (nature) is contained in God (something outside nature) or believe God (or no God, I guess) is contained in the universe. If you believe the latter I really question why you care at all, as you are just a random spec in a random universe that appears for an incredibly short amount of time thinking you have purpose and meaning which is delusion on a grand scale.
http://logicalworldview.blogspot.com/
United States | Tuesday, 21 August 2007 at 6:09 am
Nigel Harrison said...Michael Roscoe said;
“An interesting essay – it’s always good to think about fundamental issues such as ‘why are we here?’ The only problem is that there is no reason to our existence other than to reproduce and keep the species going. There is no rationality to the universe – it just happens to have worked out the way it is......Better to accept that life is the result of chance encounters – it has no meaning, but you can still make the most of it.
How can you say, “life has no meaning, but you can still make the most of it” - listen to how irrational you are being. Why do you want to “make the most of it”? And why if our reason is to reproduce and keep the species going do you think we have such an terribly slow means of re-production, after all our babies can’t even fend for themselves once born, cell division makes much more sense.
United States | Tuesday, 21 August 2007 at 6:24 am
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