Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to be surprised that a scientist with a doctorate is religious

775 replies

Margaritapracataz · 22/09/2015 07:45

I assumed she was joking, but no she's a very intelligent woman (double first) but she has deeply religious beliefs.

Aibu to think this is a bit strange and to think less of her professionally?

OP posts:
IceBeing · 24/09/2015 10:15

charis I really don't think it is true that the more you study science the more spiritual you become. I have seen no evidence for that whatsoever. People are spiritual or not and do science or not.

I would be gobsmacked if any of the deeply religious physicists I know would at any point say science can't explain this - this bit is God.

Seriously it would never happen.

TwistInMySobriety · 24/09/2015 10:17

YANBU.

RebelliousScotsToCrush · 24/09/2015 10:18

Very late to the thread.

I don't find it at all surprising when a scientist (or anyone else) sees the possible limits of science's ability to explain the world/universe/human experience, etc. (at the moment, or ever).

I don't find it surprising when a scientist (or anyone else) feels a kind of "there must/might be something else, beyond our understanding", as a kind of "spiritual" thing.

But when a scientist (or anyone else) believes fervently in a very specific "God" figure, who supposedly said very specific things, made very specific rules about what people can and can't do (conveniently documented in a book - written by men - which can be used to control people), and whose earthly representatives are men (on the whole) in special hats, then I find that perplexing.

Charis2 · 24/09/2015 10:22

Icebeing, it is true for some people not others.

There is so much in Physics that is totally beyond human comprehension.

Newton said hundreds of years ago "Don't try and understand gravity - it is beyond us, it is the working of God"

The more gravity is studied, the more physicists you hear echoing this view point! Even those that start off entirely non-spiritual!

( I am distinguishing between spiritual and Christian, as I know many physicists who say the study of physics has left them spiritual, as in knocked out in amazement, awe and wonder, and knowing that understanding is totally beyond the human intellect, but stop short of deciding they believe in creation. Others on the other hand, do start believing in creation)

IceBeing · 24/09/2015 10:26

charis you may have seen some isolated correlation - that doesn't imply causation. I am a physicist and am frequently knocked out with awe at the way biology works. That isn't the same at all as thinking we will never understand this.

There is nothing in physics that is outside human comprehension - because it is the product of human comprehension. Just because I don't understand string theory doesn't mean that no one does...and even if no one does, does any one working in physics actually think no one ever will?

I don't think it would be possible to operate in physics if you genuinely thought there were things the human race could never understand about the universe....it would make the whole exercise a bit pointless.

Charis2 · 24/09/2015 10:30

I don't think it would be possible to operate in physics if you genuinely thought there were things the human race could never understand about the universe....it would make the whole exercise a bit pointless

I disagree, I think if you genuinely believe these things are within human comprehension then you have misunderstood the depth and range of miracles we are faced with!

But if it doesn't make you feel spiritual, thats fine, no problem, I'm just saying, in answer to the OP's original question, actually for a lot of people it has that effect.

RebelliousScotsToCrush · 24/09/2015 10:47

I don't think it would be possible to operate in physics if you genuinely thought there were things the human race could never understand about the universe....it would make the whole exercise a bit pointless

I also disagree strongly with this.

How could there not be things beyond our comprehension? I bet there isn't a physicist in the world who thinks the human mind capable of understanding everything. Maybe that's an exaggeration, but I bet they're few and far between.

That's why we try when we invent religions to explain things in often absurdly human terms (a very human-like God figure making rules, etc.) - our minds are really quite limited.

redstrawberry10 · 24/09/2015 11:10

Many atheists become Christian through studying science. Many others don't. Both are fine, both are equally good scientists

really? I'd like to see the stats on that. Why not muslim?

VioletBumble · 24/09/2015 11:24

I do know the answer to 'why is X green' potentially for any inserted X.

But you have to define X in order to begin to answer the question of why or whether X is green, or good, or malicious. As god is indefinable, there is no point in asking questions about him/it.

So why do people spend endless amounts of time pontificating/wondering about the nature of god? Confused

SBGA · 24/09/2015 12:18

Maidofstars
You said: Fundamentallt incompatible with creationism.

But that isn't true. Both depend on a belief about whether the number crunching of past dates (which no one in the modern day can observe, test, or repeat), and so are arguably a faith.

If you believe that the rate of decay is constant, you will believe that the right something decays in the modern time is exactly the same rate that it decayed in the past. However, if the right in the past (which none of us were present to observe) was in fact influenced by anything else, making it either slower faster, then the readings would come out with completely different set of numbers.

Evolutionists believe that the rate of decay is on changed, creationists believe the rate of decay changes over time. You can pick up the same rock and an evolutionist will tell you that it's billions of years old but a creationist will tell you that it's thousands of years old if you apply the idea of decay being changeable over time.

The starting point, where you believe that the rate of decay now is exactly the same as it was thousands of years ago, or in the case of an evolution billions of years ago, depends on what you believe took place back then. It has to be what you believe because simply none of us were there! The scientists are equally valid and equally clever, but they simply start from a different world view/belief system. That's all the difference. If it were not so, the point made about the creationist scientist creating the MR I scan (which is incredibly valuable in modern day science - probably half of us writing on this thread know someone who has been in an MRI scan because they need to) would be impossible. So obviously a belief in God doesn't mean a scientist can't invent amazing breakthrough scientific discoveries, life-changing in fact.

MaidOfStars · 24/09/2015 12:38

SBGA I have never suggested that religious people - even fundamentalists - cannot execute science well.

My post was highlighting your assertion that creationism is only contradicted by evolutionary theory: Not every branch, only the evolutionary science part

That's simply not true. Creationism is incompatible with pretty much all of science. For example, in Genesis, both light and plants came before the sun....

Not to mention that the necessary rate of decay for creationsim to be correct would melt the planet....

redstrawberry10 · 24/09/2015 12:48

Evolutionists believe that the rate of decay is on changed, creationists believe the rate of decay changes over time. You can pick up the same rock and an evolutionist will tell you that it's billions of years old but a creationist will tell you that it's thousands of years old if you apply the idea of decay being changeable over time.

the difference is that evolutionists aren't trying to prove the earth is X days old for a particular X, whereas creationists have a target for X (=6000). Evolutionists are making assumptions about decay rates because it is the most reasonable assumption to make. If there is evidence to the contrary, i.e. they have hard evidence that decay rates were different in the past, they will adjust accordingly.

Creationists won't do that. They assume that the decay rate is different in the past because they have a target of 6000 years. They will make the necessary assumptions so that is the conclusion.

That's not science.

BertrandRussell · 24/09/2015 12:51

"Many atheists become Christian through studying science."

Name three.

Lweji · 24/09/2015 13:07

AFAIK some creationists do claim that they have become religious because of the complexity of what they study and assume that such complex systems couldn't have arisen independently and require a creator.

The ones I saw claiming this know very little about evolution and how it works.

catsrus · 24/09/2015 14:37

That's simply not true. Creationism is incompatible with pretty much all of science. For example, in Genesis, both light and plants came before the sun....

There are two creation stories in genesis. one in ch1 and a different one in ch2. Neither were written to be scientific texts or history books - they have a different literary genre to that. Note that the chapter and verses of the bible were inserted at a MUCH later date and can be a bit random to modern eyes, this is a case in point.

Genesis 1 probably dates from after the Babylonian exile (570 + BCE) and was a hymn to creation, probably sung in the Temple. there is a chorus "And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day." etc. It's a song essentially. The order of 'creation' is pretty interesting - and the human being is presented as being the last thing created. This song finishes at the beginning of what is now ch2

"Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.

2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done."

Then the next creation story starts - this was probably written before the hymn and is of a different literary form - it's a myth not a song.

Genesis 2 (The good old Adam and Eve story) starts at Ch 2verse 4

"4 This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

5 Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth[a] and no plant had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to work the ground, 6 but streams[b] came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground. 7 Then the Lord God formed a man[c] from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being."

The actual Hebrew is best translated as "human from the humus" or "earthling from the earth" as it's a play on words - "adam from adama"

Most scholars agree that while Gen 1 is a temple hymn to the glory of creation, Gen 2 is a myth written to tackle the question "why are there two sexes?". The story goes on say that god made all sorts of beasts to keep adam company but none did the trick, so god took a rib (the Hebrew implies a whole side, like a rib of beef) and created male and female - ish and ishah (in Hebrew) In the Jewish tradition this is always seen as God split the human, Adam, into two types of being
"The man said,

“This is now bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called ‘woman,’
for she was taken out of man.”

24 That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh." They were trying to make sense of why there were two sexes who were attracted to each other and told a story about the two originally being one. Thus the notion of the 'other half'.

The reason why I, as a scientist doing science A levels, became fascinated by religion in my teens is because we had a bloody good RE teacher who made me realise that religion is about people trying to make sense of their world - and they could only do using the language and concepts available to them.

Having a religious faith does not mean a person believes any of those stories are supposed to be history! Clearly some people do (yes America I am looking at you) but I would be shocked to meet a UK scientist, who was a person of faith, who took any scripture literally. Seriously. people are knocking down straw men here.

MaidOfStars · 24/09/2015 15:01

I would be shocked to meet a UK scientist, who was a person of faith, who took any scripture literally

I know three. Two have been very clear that they are unwilling to view Genesis as a metaphor/whatever, because that would open the rest of the bible up for interpretation, and thus they would have to accept that there is no absolute truth, only that they determine themselves.

redstrawberry10 · 24/09/2015 15:07

Francis Collins. is american and a very prominent scientist. not sure if he is a literalist, but very christian. Very.

IceBeing · 24/09/2015 15:16

rebel and charis

What miracles are we faced with that you think will forever evade human understanding?

I mean computers are pretty bloody miraculous but they aren't outside human understanding (obviously).

I base my extrapolation that humans could understand everything on the past 500 hundred years.

In 500 years we have gone from wondering whether heavier things actually fall faster to wondering if doubling the power on the large Hadron Collider will reveal any flaws in super symmetry.

It would be unwise to bet against our understanding anything in particular that currently puzzles us in say 5000 years time.

Lweji · 24/09/2015 15:25

Two have been very clear that they are unwilling to view Genesis as a metaphor/whatever, because that would open the rest of the bible up for interpretation, and thus they would have to accept that there is no absolute truth, only that they determine themselves.

Their choice, although the Bible has been known to contradict itself, and particularly the New Testament has given a new message in relation to the Old Testament.
Furthermore, the texts were clearly chosen by humans (men, mostly :)).
Not sure what they'd want to accept literally.

whatsthatcomingoverthehill · 24/09/2015 15:47

Francis Collins is very much against intelligent design.

It is worth pointing out that a lot of what we broadly called fundamentalism (young earth creationism, very literal reading of the bible) is a relatively modern phenomena that can in part be traced to the enlightenment. If you speak to eastern orthodox christians for example they just don't get the way fundamentalist protestants view the bible.

BertrandRussell · 24/09/2015 16:57

I don't understand why anyone would assume that there are things we will never understand and be able to explain. What sort of things are they?

IceBeing · 24/09/2015 17:03

yup - still waiting for an answer on that one.

I don't feel like there are many things we aren't mostly there on now....let alone where we will be in hundreds of years time.

Lweji · 24/09/2015 17:03

Different dimensions are not likely to be able to be fully apprehended by the human mind.
Whatever was there before the big bang?

IceBeing · 24/09/2015 17:06

You don't have to be able to visualize something to understand it though.

IT is hard to comprehend an object that sometimes behaves more like a classical particle and sometimes more like a classical wave but certainly isn't either.

But it is actually pretty doable to solve the maths and accurately predict how such objects behave.

That means we understand them...even if we can't picture them easily in human terms.

BertrandRussell · 24/09/2015 17:24

"Different dimensions are not likely to be able to be fully apprehended by the human mind.
Whatever was there before the big bang?"

Why shouldn't we understand those things one day?