and an absolutely room temperature average member of the British intelligentsia when he stops talking about his field of expertise and starts talking philosophy and religion.
What particularly amuses me is “There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority, [and] science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works.”
Two things are funny about this. First, is the suggestion that “religion” (and by that, members of the UK Chattering classes typically mean “Christianity and especially popery”) doesn’t “work”. I have no idea what that is supposed to mean. It’s true that religion doesn’t “work” if you are trying to use it to determine how many beans are in jar, or determine the velocity of an unladen European swallow, or analyze the composition of the sun. But then again, science doesn’t work very well at helping people answer questions like “What’s the point of it all?” This is particularly true of Hawking’s brand of scientism which says, as Hawking does, that human life is utterly insignificant—like he knows this by looking through a telescope or crunching a bunch of numbers. The sleight of hand substitution of a shallow philosophical nihlism for “Science” simply points to the fact that another thing science doesn’t do well is prepare you to deal with metaphysical questions. Indeed, people who turn it into the only way of treating with reality tend to be like the guy with the hammer who treats everything like a nail or the guy who lost his contact lens at the bar but insists on searching under the lampost because its the only place that that has light. The weird insistence of our Chattering Classes that Science is somehow just about to “defeat” religion is pure superstition, based on absolutely no observation at all and clung to out of pure mindless devotion to group cohesion among members of our Chattering Classes. If there is any narrative that is being spectacularly disproven by demographics, it is the narrative of the triumph of secular western Europe. That does not prove “religion” (whatever that vague amorphous term means) to be true. But it does mean that anybody who claims to live purely by empirical observation is kidding himself if he thinks England’s future is going to be dominated by atheistic materialists.
Which brings me to my next point. namely, the absurd suggestion that religion is based solely on authority and science solely on observation. In reality, Christian faith is rooted in both authority and in the experience and observation of millions of Christians. People become Christian because they have an encounter with the living God, not because some bishop brandished his mitre and threatened them with his Authority. They accept the authority of the bishop because they conclude that they can accept the authority of Jesus, who said, “He who listens to you listens to me.” In short, people conclude that Jesus is trustworthy and knows what he’s talking about, even when the bishop is not such an impressive specimen. Similarly, science is rooted in observation and experience, but scientists (like Hawking) are overwhelmingly treated by many people, especially many secular people, as a High Priesthood mediating truths to the masses by sheer authority. That’s why Hawking expects his pontifical remarks about the insignificance of man to be taken seriously: because of his authority. Likewise, when Carl Sagan magisterially declares “The Universe is all there is or ever was or ever will be” he is making a purely theological statement that science has no competence to make—and demanding that we believe it on his authority. And many New Atheist apostles of Reason are all too ready to prostrate themselve in faith before that Edict of Authority.
These sorts of pristine examples of scientism are particularly common in the Country that Used to be England these days, especially among the allegedly educated classes. And things like these quotes from Hawking or Sagan often wind up as pull quotes circulating around at the bottom of some atheist’s email. Why? Not because the quotes are wise. They are, in fact, wooly-minded nonesense that a thousand cranks in a thousand email bulletin boards might dash off in the midst of some heated argument that is just about to cite Agora as accurate history or compare one’s opponent to Hitler. No. The reason the quote gets recirculated is due entirely to the fact that Stephen Hawking and Carl Sagan are endowed with Sacred Authority because they are members of the High Priestly Caste of Scientists and therefore must be believed when they make a silly remark about the Triumph of Science Over Religion or pontificate about the non-existence of the supernatural. It’s a classic example of Intellect Worship trumping Intellect Use.
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This is exactly true. Looking at the comments on one of your previous blogs on this topic I saw a similar challenge to sciencism characterized as the belief “that nothing came out of nothing for no reason.” The response was that the reason is reproduction, which is not a reason, but rather a fact. Reproduction is an effect, not a cause.
The problem with using only science to explain the universe is that there is no scientific explanation for the first cause. Stephen Hawking is right in that if there is no living, loving God, we are insignificant and our existence here on earth is pointless. Science can never answer the question, “Why am I here?” or “What is my purpose?”
If Stephen Hawking and those like him want to have a real meaningful debate on the meaning of life, I suggest they study theology. If I were to make off the cuff remarks about astronomy, I would be rightly ripped apart as someone who doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Similarly, until these ‘intellectuals’ study theology enough to at least get the theology itself right, they have no place in the debate about the meaning of life.
Scientist types often get a little batty. They don’t believe in a soul because they can’t see it or pound on it with a hammer. But then they childishly believe in “electrons” though they can’t see or hammer those either. “Oh, but we can deduce them from their effects,” they say. Yet they can’t deduce God from His effects? They can’t see that the Earth, a highly sophisticated, interconnected and mutually supportive ecosystem is the effect of some cause? I can only conclude that scientists are more than normally prone to superstition and must resort to authority to excuse their lack of ability to observe.
A quote from Chesterton: “But the modern critics of religious authority are like men who should attack the police without ever having heard of burglars. For there is a great and possible peril to the human mind: a peril as practical as burglary. Against it religious authority was reared, rightly or wrongly, as a barrier. And against it something certainly must be reared as a barrier if our race is to avoid ruin. That peril is that the human intellect is free to destroy itself.”
It reminds me Matthew 22:21, “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”
Let Hawking, Dawkins and the likes be what they are. Let the rest of us be faithful. We have both faith and reason but they only reason. Even that, their reasons are full of flaw. But then, that is another problem for another time.
Dan Bear—Not all scientists are as you describe. I am a scientist and Catholic to the core. I’m not even a “liberal or progressive” Catholic, but a traditional one. I happen to know many other scientists who are practicing Catholics or Christians. Stephen Hawking is a superb cosmologist, but we all know he is no authority in theology; and he has his biases. Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, is an outspoken atheist much loved by the liberal media. But he has little respect in Oxford or anywhere else. To group scientists in general as a bunch of atheists or religion bashers, is an injustice. As scientists, just like theologists, we have a duty to seek the truth, reject falsehoods, and adapt our hypotheses based on the data - while acknowledging our limitations in data acquisition and interpretation. We also have to weed out junk science and refutable theories, as well as take with a grain of salt what non-experts say about a particular subject. Hawking, as I said, is a cosmologist - not a theologist. He’s entitled to his opinion, however erroneous it is. But his opinion is not dogma nor is he the representative for all or most scientists worldwide.
The simple point is, while it is true that religion without science leads you to believe in a lot of things that are nonsense, science without a religion like Christianity or Judaism or Stoicism is impossible.
Unless the world is rational, there’s no point in trying to know it. Unless we are more than “a bag of molecules”, there’s really no point in knowing anything. What is knowing anyway; it’s just making the molecules in one’s brain correspond to the molecules outside one’s brain. How does that have more value than crystallized salt? Why is this conformity so valued by supposed nonconformists?
If we are just a machine, we have no choice in how we were programmed or even if we were “programmed” “correctly” (who did the programming? By who’s criteria do you measure correctness?).
Therefore to say “science will win” is still nonsense since there’s no foundation that a science by dubiously programmed machines has any correspondence with truth. The foundations of Scientism are made of straw.
Science is a sub-category of Reason. Science distinguishes itself as a sub-category by means of its self-imposed limitation of scope which considers ONLY material reality. This results in a limited description of reality.
We need to be able to reason outside of the self-imposed cerebral limitations of a select few. Just because they choose to limit themselves in this way does not mean everyone else should.
Usually, when a scientist talks with certainty about something that’s not within his field, you can be sure he’s way out of his depth. Scientific results are supposed to be published as papers brimming over with honest, reproducible, supporting evidence. This sometimes goes awry—the fiasco surrounding that paper reporting a cloned human embryo by the Korean scientist from some years back comes to mind—but the standard for scientists to speak within science is nevertheless quite high in general. As a result, we have built skyscrapers, roads, automobiles, computers, and avoided famine for more than half a century.
The standard to speak outside science, by contrast, is no higher for a scientist than for anyone else. And scientists are (not surprisingly) badly mistaken about basic facts even of science when they wander outside their immediate field of study. Hawking himself, for example, has a book of great mathematical results (“God created the integers”) which describes Galois Theory completely wrong: so badly wrong that a competent undergraduate math student can show the error.
So it’s no surprise that Hawking can’t talk about religion with the same insights he has brought to physics.
I believe I heard Dr. Hawking say something to the effect that his grounds for feeling that humanity is insignificant are the immense size of the universe. In a universe this size, he reasons, humanity takes up such a relatively minuscule portion of space that its significance is therefore proportionately negligible.
By that reason, I suppose, were the size of the universe half of what it is, we’d be that much more significant?
Hawking seems to be appealing to some principle that says size or number is an indication of importance.
There is another principle at work in nature which can be easily observed and quantified. A man’s body produces millions or billions of sperm cells throughout his lifetime, and how many actually carry out their function? One? Two? Three or four? In this case, the total number compared to usage is extremely low, like the size of the universe in comparison to the number of worlds harboring human life.
The real reason science may be more popular than Christianity is that someone like Stephen Hawling will never tell you that you must stop drinking and chasing women.
My dear Stephen,
All God lovers, are praying for yor conversion to Truth. How about your very own eyes help your self-deluded mind?:
http://www.youtube.com/swf/l.swf?video_id=MBiXbJmGzc4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbg_dhI4XCs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1KhlC9DrqE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpfTPoLOIaI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_B8f_Ar6Ng
http://www.therealpresence.org/eucharst/mir/a3.html
Search youtube for “incorrupt bodies”
Did you know that the Catholic Church is the only one which can provide scientific evidence of the supernatural world?
Did you know that all “miracles” point in the direction of the Catholic Church, even if they occur in other religions such as the stigmatist protestant Adrianne von Speyer who obviously converted to the true religion?
Yes, it is possible to scientifically prove that there is one true religion.
Did you know that miracles are not exceptions to the laws of the physical world but actually the current physical laws are the exceptions to what it was originally designed in paradise: the material world subjected to the spirit?
Did you know that we only have this life to gain as much heaven as we will enjoy for eternity but also as much hell as we will endure for “eons”?
May the Queen of the universe help you open your closed eyes to real Love, Jesus.
Yours in the Heart of the Holy Family
Professor Fred Nazar
fred at nazar.info
A question that deserves serious scientific investigation is why scientists believe they can find the whole of truth by using only half of the brain. Most modern scientists are the most incomplete thinkers imaginable, satisfied with repeating invariable calculations and for ever adding up numbers that come to… nothing. And from that imperial perch they seize the authority to expound on all matters of existence, discarding 2000+ years of Catholic wisdom that has thoroughly examined cosmic truth by the most complete thinkers in history. It is astonishing how many otherwise intelligent scientists cling to an illogical, inflexible, dogmatic, and ‘fundamentalist’ certainty that empirical science should be regarded not only as a source of factual knowledge and theoretical hypotheses but as an final judge of values or of moral and metaphysical truths. Such is the tyranny of modern science, removed from any transcendent aspiration, leading us toward very dangerous places. When the half of the brain that rationalizes man to be nothing more than a calculating ape overrides the more complete vision of man as a fallen angel, a certain lazy and destructive thinking results in which the vacuous universe demands nothing more of us than rejoicing in the contentment of being an ape.
There are many books that address the dangers of scientism and the loss of a Christian worldview. Here are two: “Chesterton, A Seer of Science” by Stanley Jaki, and “The Beginning of All Things” by Hans Kung. These men are complete thinkers.
Beware: Hans Kung is separated from the Church. Not so brilliant!
Errata of my previous message (bad wording, plus no clarifying the definition of miracle vs. sign)
For instance check this videos:
http://www.youtube.com/swf/l.swf?video_id=MBiXbJmGzc4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbg_dhI4XCs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1KhlC9DrqE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpfTPoLOIaI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_B8f_Ar6Ng
http://www.therealpresence.org/eucharst/mir/a3.html
Search youtube for “incorrupt bodies”
Did you know that miracles are not exceptions to the laws of the physical world but actually the current physical laws are the exceptions to what it was originally designed in paradise: the material world subjected to the spirit?
Yes, it is possible to scientifically prove that there is one true religion.
Did you know that all “miracles” point in the direction of the Catholic Church, even if they occur in other religions such as the stigmatist protestant Adrienne von Speyer who obviously converted to the true religion?
Did you know that the Catholic Church is the only one which can provide scientific evidence of miracles? (others, such as Satanists, can provide evidence of the supernatural, but not miracles for the salvation of souls).
Did you know that we only have this life to gain as much heaven as we could enjoy for eternity or as much hell as we could endure for “eons”?
May the Queen of the universe help you open your closed eyes to real Love, Jesus.
Fred
Thankyou for your wise insights. They are very much needed in this world gone mad. You are like a modern day G.K. Chesterton.
Yes, saying that “religion is based on authority” is rather silly. It would be more accurate (but an oversimplification) to say that religion is based on collective and personal experience.
Having read several of Hawking’s works (popular treatments of his scientific analyses), I point to his discussion of attending a meeting in Rome in the 1970s, and his acute discomfort when a cardinal, speaking on behalf of the Vatican (welcoming the scientists in attendance) said that the Church had “no problem” with the Big Bang theory, and the comcomitant projected age of the universe at roughly 15 billion years.
This caused Hawking turmoil. He had grown up (both parents outspoken atheists) supposing that “the Catholic Church is always wrong on scientific matters”, and using the case of Galileo as the touchstone for his belief. His book continues to ruminate: “If the Church can accept the Big Bang theory, then the theory must be wrong; and I (Hawking) must have made a mistake in my computations!” (The quotation is NOT exact, but my recall suggests that this was the sense of his written statements.)
Apparently, then, Hawking has overcome his memory of the meeting in the 1970s, and reverted to his earlier understanding. It is sad that he has wiped this memory, which could have led to a conversion experience for him.
TeaPot562
“The scientific world-picture vouchsafes a very complete understanding of all that happens — it makes it just a little too understandable. It allows you to imagine the total display as that of a mechanical clockwork which, for all that science knows, could go on just the same as it does, without there being consciousness, will, endeavor, pain and delight and responsibility connected with it — though they actually are. And the reason for this disconcerting situation is just this: that for the purpose of constructing the picture of the external world, we have used the greatly simplifying device of cutting our own personality out, removing it; hence it is gone, it has evaporated, it is ostensibly not needed. In particular, and most importantly, this is the reason why the scientific worldview contains of itself no ethical values, no esthetical values, not a word about our own ultimate scope or destination, and no God, if you please. Whence came I and whither go I? “
—Erwin Schroedinger
Stephen Hawking needs to study Kurt Godel’s work. It amazes me that all these scientific atheists create god according to their own image only to prove it that he/she cannot exist.
Mark, I think when Hawkings refers to religion being based on authority, he’s referring to the perceived ultimate authority of a god, as opposed to an ultimate “grand” observation. Your arguments, Mark, seem correct, but I’d suggest that truthful observation and reason DO ultimately result in authority, the authority of..truth. Hawkings seems to have it all wrong about religion, about it’s relationship to science and about authority. Yep…out of his field.
Re: the Church having no problem with the Big Bang - a Belgian monsignor formulated it, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lemaître http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/science/sc0022.html
Science without God has no purpose. Faith without science degenerates into Fundamentalism. At the end of the day, it is the Eucharist which utterly confounds both the aethiest scientist and the Fundamentalist.
I try to remember that my faith is a grace from God and try not to be too hard on those who do not (yet) have that gift of faith, to bear with them and especially, to pray for them. Imagine what a testimony it would be for someone like Hawkings or some prominent Evangelical to profess faith in the Eucharist.
-Tim-
This is a great article! I’m a philosophy major at a Catholic University that has a minority Catholic student body. The students who are atheist or agnostic that I have engaged in conversation with have been shocked at my ability to use logic in defense of faith. Most expect me to begin by saying something such as “I just feel happy when I think about God.”
“They accept the authority of the bishop because they conclude that they can accept the authority of Jesus, who said, “He who listens to you listens to me.”
Unfortunately in my case it’s more along the lines of: ‘Listen to them because because they know the scriptures, but don’t follow them.’ Better to be dead than a pervert.
BTW, is there anyone here risen that wasn’t risen from the dead?
Great stuff Mark - I want to mention your article in the next episode (www.catholiclab.net) if you don’t mind.
Ian:
Feel free!
I enjoy your articles wherever I find them, thank you!
Bravo! Well done. As I have often said, “All science is the handmaiden of philosophy, and all philosophy is the handmaiden of ontology.”
I think it is easy to forget our human condition, “from dust thou art…”—a seemingly fragile existence and yet we thrive and explore and publish! It is easy for the scientist to forget the incredible foundation of our existence on which their theories and laboratory work depend.
This is one of your best posts! The irony is that Stephen Hawking, as brilliant as he is, is not the end all of physicists, just as Richard Dawkins is not the end all of biologists. There are many other far more brilliant, though far less advertised, scientists in these fields who believe in “Complementation of Faith and Science.” They are not all Christians, some are Agnostic, but they are out there and they are “wise” enough to know where science ends and faith begins. GREAT POST!!!
The notion that religion is based upon authority is not something Stephen Hawking and his ilk thought up: it’s the considered judgment of many of Catholicism’s revered theologians, St. Thomas Aquinas among them. Faith is accompanied by a certitude which far exceeds any arguments reason could bring to bear upon the matter. That certitude is not increased by “experiential” arguments, nor diminished by their absence. This is not to say accumulating such reasons for believing is not a good and necessary thing, only that such arguments are “extrinsic and merely probable”, as Aquinas would say. We do faith a disservice in leading others to believe that our faith is founded upon such “experiential” arguments.
This passage from Aquinas’ “Summa Contra Gentiles” says it all: “Now, to make the first kind of divine truth [knowledge of God which is accessible to philosophy] known, we must proceed through demonstrative arguments, by which our adversary may become convinced. However, since such arguments are not available for the second kind of divine truth [faith], our intention should not be to convince our adversary by arguments: it should be to answer his arguments against the truth; for, as we have shown, the natural reason cannot be contrary to the truth of faith. The sole way to overcome an adversary of divine truth is from the authority of Scripture—an authority divinely confirmed by miracles. For that which is above the human reason we believe only because God has revealed it. Nevertheless, there are certain likely arguments that should be brought forth in order to make divine truth known. This should be done for the training and consolation of the faithful, and not with any idea of refuting those who are adversaries. For the very inadequacy of the arguments would rather strengthen them in their error, since they would imagine that our acceptance of the truth of faith was based on such weak arguments.”
Yes its finally happened to science - Stephen Hawking has turned into the Pope for Science. I can see why he came to this conclusion. Since the last great bs about Blackholes he originally proposed died he accepted he screwed up now off to Religion why not eh.
Listen people who are too smart for their own good ought to stop thinking so much afterall its mental masterBa$%on. Smart people are no good to anyone not even to themselves thats why the nerd and geeks get a beating and finally end up working for someone else with more human and social skills and commonsense.
I wish this crackpot was more physically able so some one could give him a good nerd beating. First of all i don’t think he can speak he only makes noises my cat speaks more than him, second of all i think that translating machine can’t translate senility and the Atheiest like Dawkins are using him as a hand puppet to promote a God Less world thanks Dawkins you dim wit.
For pissing of the Great Spirit i hope you both are next to each other during your great debates when in Hell and you get your behinds kicked there.
PHILOSOPHIA PERENNIS.
The Old Lady’s TORTOISE (Hinduism) and DRAGON (Taoism) are symbols for WAVE (energy), both are analog with MAGEN DAVID (Judaism). “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” is the metaphor, and also similar with allegory of rituals Thawaf circling around the Ka’ba and Sa’i oscillating along “the sinus” Marwah-Shafa (seven times) during the Hajj pilgrimage (Abraham). CROSS is the symbol for “Balance of Nature.”
“A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME - From the Big Bang to Black Hole” by Stephen W. Hawking is the best scientific interpretation of AL QUR’AN by a non believer. It is also a “genuine bridge stone” for comprehensive study of Theology. Surprise, this paradox is a miracle and blessing in disguise as well. So, it should be very wise and challenging for Moslem scholars and others to verify my discovery.
I am just an “ordinary people,” so would you mind to verify my point of view, please. Thank you.
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