“God and Science”
USC IV, Nov 12, 2015
David Vosburg
[title slide]
Thanks!
Our question for tonight is:
Are God and science compatible?
Some people might say no .
But saying no, saying science and God are not compatible, is bad for science and bad for faith .
When I’m done tonight, see if you agree or not .
So, are God and science compatible?
[Venn slide]
Well, I am a Christian and a scientist, so yes they can be .
I chose to become a Christian, and I chose to become a chemist .
I have never regretted either decision .
At the end of high school, I claimed my faith for my own.
God reached me through people loving me in ways I did not expect to be loved and I did not deserve to be loved.
In college, I fell in love with chemistry (and also with my wife) [Kate slide]
My talk is structured around these three questions: [slide]
Are the Bible and science in conflict?
Can a scientist believe in miracles?
Can Christians accept evolution?
[reasons slide, read it]
[Atkins slide, read it (he’s an atheist, if you couldn’t tell)]
[transition slide]
Of course, not all scientists agree with Peter Atkins, not even other atheist scientists .
[Medawar slide]
For example, Peter Medawar says…
[2 nd Medawar slide]
Indeed, there are some very important questions that science cannot answer .
[read slide: agency, identity, purpose, value]
[read science has limits slide]
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Well, I’ll tell you what two well-known evangelical Christians say
.
These are both people who have a very high view of the Bible .
[Graham 1]
[Graham 2]
[Packer]
[summary slide]
Both Billy Graham and J .
I .
Packer are saying,
“Don’t look for science in the Bible, look for God in the Bible!”
[next slide, read it]
Let’s examine some of the philosophical beliefs that underlie modern science .
Then we can see if they conflict with a biblical worldview .
[#1…#6]
I think most of you would agree that these are very compatible with studying science, and perhaps even necessary for studying science .
These beliefs, however, are not themselves scientific .
Though they are supported by the success of science, they cannot be proven by scientific means .
Scientists hold these beliefs for philosophical or religious reasons .
Let’s compare those beliefs in science with some biblical beliefs about God and nature .
[#1…#6]
[summary table slide]
And here’s a summary of the two sets of beliefs
.
So perhaps Christian faith and science are inherently more compatible than we’ve been led to believe .
[slide: scientific explanation…]
[kettle slide]
We can see science and faith like two descriptions of a boiling kettle:
Why is the water boiling? It has been heated to its boiling point .
This is a scientific answer .
Why is the water boiling? Because I want to make some tea .
This answer is not scientific, but addresses purpose.
[Frank Rhodes slide]
Geologist Frank Rhodes says…
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Similarly to a boiling kettle, [kiss slide] a kiss is not fully explained by a scientific description .
Scientifically, a kiss is a puckering of the lips, a transfer of saliva, carbon dioxide, and some bacteria .
If you’ve ever given or received a kiss before—and I have reason to believe that some of you have—that’s probably not what you were thinking of when it happened .
Here is a picture from my wedding reception .
Do you think all that was going on there was a puckering of the lips, a transfer of saliva, carbon dioxide, and some bacteria? If that were true, we probably wouldn’t still be married 15 years later .
[pie/cake slide]
Some of us may be tempted to look at the world like a pie, where some pieces of reality have only natural explanations and others have only supernatural ones .
Biblical scholar John Walton instead recommends the image of a layer cake, in which there is potentially both a natural and supernatural explanation to things we observe .
They are not mutually exclusive .
[Eagleton slide]
Agnostic Terry Eagleton puts it this way…(read slide)
Do we see the world as a gift?
[miracles slide] our next question is: Can scientists believe in miracles?
[collage slide]
Well, here are some of my scientist friends who do .
Some of you may recognize computer scientist Randy Hill and bioengineer Katie Galloway, both here at USC .
This is, of course, just a small subset of pictures I could have put on this slide .
[Ecklund slide]
In fact, Elaine Howard Ecklund has found in a recent survey that 61% of scientists in the US identify as Protestant or Catholic .
That hardly sounds like incompatibility to me, and it suggests that a large number of scientists believe in miracles, too, since the miraculous resurrection of Jesus is a core belief of being a Christian .
Is this surprising? Perhaps not . [Matt/Psalm slide]
The Bible encourages believers to engage their minds and to study nature, as seen in these verses…
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[Donne slide]
Regarding miracles, the poet John Donne says this…
[Keller slide]
And here I paraphrase some of pastor Tim Keller’s thoughts on miracles…
[evolution slide]
Ok, miracles are fine, perhaps .
But can Christians accept evolution?
[table of views]
Well, here are four major positions on origins represented in the US .
You will notice that three of them are compatible with Christianity, and one is decidedly not .
The three Christian views all have God creating with purpose and a plan, God being active in our lives and in sustaining the universe .
They also agree that we fall short of God’s desire for us yet still manifest, in some way, the image of God .
Practicing scientists who are
Christians most often fit into one of the two middle categories .
The degree to which the four views accept biological evolutionary processes varies, as does their understanding of the first few chapters of Genesis .
Concordist readings of Scripture assume that the Bible is making scientific claims and try to mesh the text with science .
I used to view Scripture this way, but the more that I’ve studied the Bible and studied biology, the more
I personally have become convinced that God very likely has used evolutionary mechanisms to generate marvelous diversity of life on earth .
To me, that makes God even more amazing and awesome than I imagined him before .
[Kingsley slide]
A friend of Charles Darwin’s, the Rev .
Charles Kingsley, said it like this…
[billiards, Lego slide]
Two analogies I sometimes use to illustrate this idea of God making things make themselves are billiards and Legos .
In billiards, a very good player
(let’s say someone named Jill) could perhaps put one ball into the desired pocket with each stroke, and never accidentally knock the wrong ball into the wrong pocket .
A spectacularly amazing player (let’s say God), in contrast, can knock every ball into whichever pocket he chooses, in any order, with a single stroke .
Without scratching .
While onboard a yacht being tossed about in a stormy sea .
Which feat impresses you more, Jill’s or God’s?
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Likewise, I am super impressed by Warren Elsmore’s design of Westminster
Abbey using 180,000 Lego bricks .
I am sure I could not have done it nearly so well .
How much more amazing would it be if Warren had designed the bricks so that, when a box of 180,000 bricks was shaken in just the right way for the right amount of time, the pieces would selfassemble into Westminster Abbey just like this? To me, that’s a rough approximation of what God does using evolutionary mechanisms .
[Oord slide]
Evangelical theologian Tom Oord says this…
[science impacting faith]
So how does my science impact my faith?
Well, I’m a synthetic chemist, a molecule maker, and the creative possibilities in chemistry lead me to awe at God’s creativity .
[Tolkien slide]
Tolkien captures this idea well in the creation story of Middle-earth .
Aulë, who has just made the first dwarves, says…
[cage slide]
Some of the molecules I like to make look like this .
Here you see a tetrahedral cage that has captured the dangerous chemical warfare agent white phosphorus, or P
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, and rendered it inert.
[ChemDraw slide]
Some other favorites of mine are shown here: isocanthin-6-one, fumagillin, cyclostreptin, and davanone
Each of these is the product of anywhere from four to twenty steps .
And that’s only counting the steps that “worked .
” Some of the molecules that we made along the way had probably never even been imagined before by humans .
And each of them is beautiful in its own way .
Does God delight in them? I think so .
I sure do .
[faith impact science slide]
How does my faith impact my science?
[Lewis slide]
Actually, my faith impacts everything about me .
Tolkien’s friend C .
S .
Lewis describes it this way…
Chemistry has more purpose and value to me because of my faith .
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[green leaf slide]
One way this is expressed is that I care more about the environment because of my faith .
If this is God’s world, and he loves it, then I am motivated to care for it, too .
My students and I develop new laboratory experiments with specific sustainability goals .
[davanone slide]
We also design more efficient syntheses of molecules like davanone, an antifungal natural product .
It had previously been made in 20 steps, and we found a new way to make it in just 7 steps .
It’s quicker, faster, cleaner, and more elegant .
So to me, science and faith are not only compatible, they are mutually enriching .
[humility slide]
To sum up, how should we treat theology and science? With humility .
[scroll slide]
God’s Word and God’s world should not be in conflict if they both come from God and if God is a God of truth .
But human translation and interpretation are required to give us the Bible in English .
And further systematization and interpretation are needed to give us theology .
Likewise, human expectation and interpretation give us observations of the natural world, and further systemization and interpretation get us to science .
So when we think there is conflict between theology and science, it could just be bad theology or philosophy masquerading as science, yet it could also be a result of the human interpretive steps that are required to get to theology and science .
It does not necessarily mean that there is a conflict between God’s Word and God’s world
.
[Augustine slide]
My final quote is from St .
Augustine, who warns us against hasty claims and endorses humility .
He says…
[resources slide]
I would strongly encourage you to dig deeper into faith and science if it is an area of interest to you or to your friends .
There are now many excellent resources available, some of which I have brought with me, and some that are on the slide here: three books, a booklet, a documentary film, a few organizations with great websites, and my email address .
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I will close with a chemistry psalm that I wrote, based on Psalm 148 from the
Bible. Don’t worry if you don’t know what all of the words mean. I’m sure each of you could write similar poems of praise out of your own experiences and areas of expertise. I call it “A psalm of David.”
Praise the LORD.
Praise the LORD from the classroom,
Praise him in the laboratory, too.
Praise him, all his molecules,
Praise him, all his proteins and nucleic acids.
Praise him, all alkaloids and steroids,
Praise him, all you sweet carbohydrates.
Praise him, you manifold terpenoids and you polyketides and peptides.
Let them praise the name of the LORD, for he commanded and they were created.
He formed them from the elements; he decreed how they should bond.
Praise the LORD from the NMR, all you chemists in industry and academia, whether you be famous or not, carbon and oxygen, sulfur and nitrogen, electrons that do all his bonding, you fluorine and chlorine, light hydrogen and heavy iodine, all alkanes and alkenes, every alkyne and aromatic ring, all amines and aldehydes, ketones and carboxylic acids, esters, amides, and anhydrides, alcohols and ethers.
Let them praise the name of the LORD, for his name alone is exalted; his splendor is revealed in our every molecule.
He has raised up for his people a savior, the praise of all his saints, of the church, the people close to his heart.
Praise the LORD.
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