From: julian@fraser.sfu.ca (Julian Shillcock)
Subject: Science and God
Summary: Does God work in Science
Keywords: Science, God
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 22:22:14 GMT

s is my first post to this group so I shall probably screw up
enormously in repeating what has already been said (not to mention
typing mistakes). But I could not resist the chance to throw my
penn'orth in.
There seem to be a lot of arguments about creation vs evolution (!!!)
with the "christians" taking one side and "others" taking the opposite
(guess which is which).
So to start: science is a means of building models of understanding.
It seems to work pretty well when applied to almost everything we
can do experiments on. But... it does have limits. The most obvious
being the definitions of certain terms used in science. 
What is an electron really? Within science this is a meaningless
question unless you can come up with an experiment to ask the
question for you. It is easy to design experiments to ask things
like "what does an electron do in a magnetic field".
So, within science there will always be some terms which cannot be
defined in terms of other quantities but have to be "assumed".
Religion also has its "Givens": terms which cannot be defined
without self-reference: God, for instance. I do not see much point
in arguing about terms which can have as many meanings as there are
people to argue, only about common things that we can "all" relate to.
You'll never know what I mean exactly when I sasy "God" (for that
matter neither do I) but we can argue about what we think God
has done, is doing etc.
Evolution is a pretty good summary of the observations we make about
the distribution and forms of life on earth, but it s a model,
jsut as General Relativity is a model. (Why do we not see
arguments about those passages in Psalms where it speaks about
God calling the stars by name and leading them across the sky,
versus warping of space-time causing matter to move in geodesics
???)
Within this model many assumptions are made and many observations
explained, so it satisfies the criterion for a scientific theory.
Of course it does not mention God, neither does Schrodinger's equation
but presumably God made electrons too?
At the other end of the argument is the interpretation of Genesis etc,
but now one has to understand the model involved in the Bible.
Unless the terms used are put in context they cannot be discussed.
This is where it gets tricky. Most scientists agree on the broad
theories in science (Quick aside: How many theories are there in
science? Guess, answer on a $20 bill to me please), but people
disagree on a lot of things about religion (not to mention the number 
of religions). 
Ok, given the above description of evolution I do not see how it
can be used for/against faith as they are disjoint models of the 
world. Unless you want a physical universe where God "physically"
(not metaphorically or allegorically or mystically) moves stars
around in space and causes water to flow downhill by direct act
(Divine Fiat perhaps?) why do some people want God to physically create
life forms at a specific time and place? God may be in control
of the universe (in some generally non-physical sense) in its entirety,
and we can still explain the behaviour of the universe using 
scientific models, 
but we should not use Him to explain bits of the physical world 
and ignore others simply because it suits our theological bias.
So I guess I am saying that if I do not invoke God to move stars
and bind electrons together in atoms then why should I use Him
to describe the evolution of the physical universe from the Big Bang
and to create life? But if I do believe that God is in control
(somehow) then it is matter of understanding His interaction with
the world not giving supernatural causes for physical effects
(Miracles apart, of course...)
julian

:wq

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