I know I have plugged this before, but I find the AAAS Career Forums to be a wonderful resource for clowns like me. Dave Jensen really runs a first class site and the information you can get there is for the most part (99 and 44/100 % of the time), honest and accurate. There is the occasional troll… but they are thankfully rare.
Recently, I was perusing said forums and happened upon a post that caught my eye. The major point of the post was to ask: “Is there a place for God in a scientist’s life?”
I say yes.
The idea of science and spirituality coexisting is a tough one for some people to swallow. I don’t know why. I like to think of the universe as having been created by a God who used a highly complex set of rules. Our job, as scientists, is to use our God given curiosity and gray matter to try to figure out those rules. We observe, hypothesize, test and repeat till we think that we have one of God’s rules figured out. If not… well we go around again. As long as we rely on logic and not faith in our investigations, God and science are AOK together.
Where it gets a little squirrely is when faith is used to debunk science and science is used to debunk faith. The whole evolution/creationism debate comes to mind here…
Consider evolution, that topic of debate that is almost as polarizing as the abortion issue. I don’t think there is any problem with believing in God and accepting evolution. Believing in God does not mean you believe in the story of Creation. Not at all. It means that you believe in higher power, not a book.
I don’t know… it just seems to me that spirituality and science are two side of the same coin: Life.
Update: The link to the career forums should now actually take you to the forums.
January 28, 2007 at 11:08 am
I agree 100% with your views here. I too don’t believe that being a scientist and believing in God are two mutually exclusive things. I think they complement each other nicely. The Bible was written based on the evidence and knowledge available at the time. Evolution is based on our current understanding of the beginnings of our world. However inspired the writers of the Bible were by a Higher Power, they were still essentially men writing withing their own capabilities and understandings. I think until we all die and hopefully meet the Big Man (or women, or “thing”
and ask ourselves, we can but speculate based on our current awareness.
January 28, 2007 at 11:39 am
I also agree with you 100% a belief in God (aka. Flying Spaghetti Monster) is compatible with a scientist’s life.
January 29, 2007 at 11:42 am
“spirituality and science are two sides of the coin” rightly so , they never see eye to eye.
January 29, 2007 at 10:03 pm
SKS,
They are not supposed to see eye to eye… each provides what the other does not.
January 29, 2007 at 10:27 pm
Yay for the Flying Spaghetti Monster! Atheism suits me fine, since I was raised Southern Baptist. I do respect most religious people, though, until they either start talking about six-days-six-thousand-years-ago or attempt to lay claim to my uterus.
January 29, 2007 at 10:51 pm
I believe in God and Science. I don’t think they are mutually exclusive. Milo makes a great point that in essence, they are a great compliment. What really annoys me is the far-right religious nutjobs that protest military funerals while blaming gays for the war, and blow up abortion clinics just to get their point across etc… That just pisses the rational people off. In science, both extremes exist also.
January 29, 2007 at 11:36 pm
The spaghetti monster alters are data to make the Earth look older than it really is. I have no un/funny comment about your uterus though.
Mitch
January 30, 2007 at 5:56 am
Religion and the belief in God (spirituality) are certainly not the same.
January 30, 2007 at 6:12 am
Mitch: Would you like a uterus? Ebay won’t let me sell human organs.
January 30, 2007 at 6:45 pm
…even if they come from your least-favorite prof?
January 30, 2007 at 11:15 pm
That would be nice, wouldn’t it? …Actually, I can’t think of anyone in this department I really dislike. Wasted opportunity, huh?
January 31, 2007 at 5:43 am
Spirituality and science are not opposite sides of the same coin. Some of the most moving and wondrous moments in my life have been directly due to science. When I learned that every heavy atom in my body was forged in a star I felt like the universe had opened up and claimed my soul. Religion is not a prerequisite for feeling spiritual.
The belief in non-corporeal, omnipotent, omnicognoscent, immortal beings whose ways are ineffable does seem to be contrary to every thing I love about science.
December 30, 2007 at 11:28 pm
[...] Milo and David have recently discussed God and spirituality in science, chemistry, and in the classroom. I am not religious or spiritual by any means. But, for those who believe in God and want a prayer, even I could endorse, see below. [...]