New-York tribune., 1922-11-06
Science No Foe
OF Religion, Is
Stein11etz View
Not Necessarily Incompat-
ible, but Unrelated and
Different, He Tells a
Schenectady Au dience
Belief Is the Foundation
Can't Solve Question of
Whether There Are Com
ceptive, Infinite Entities

SCHENECTADY, Nov. 5.-Scicncc
and religion, regarded as increasingly
antagonistic, are not necessarily incom-
patible, but are different and unrelated
activities of the human mind, said DIR.
Charles P. Steinmesz, consulting engi-
neer of the General Electric Company,
in an address delivered to-day in All
Souls Church at the annual Laymen's
Sunday of the Schenectady Chapter of
the Unitarian Laymsn's League.
DR.. Steinmet1 declared that there
could be no scientific foundation Of re-
ligion, but that belief must always. re-
main the foundation of religion. The
negative answer Of science, he insisted.
infnity in time and space, imm ortality,
God, etc, and the question is still as
open as it ever was. Dy. Steinmetz
said, in part:
"Undoubtedly experience led to the
first conception of superior beings, or
gods the forces of nature personified,
the experiences in dreams, the orderly
progress Of natures, which seemed to
imply manager of the universe. The
terror of the Thunderstorm led primi-
tive man to the conception of Su-
preme Being, whose attribute WAS the
thunderbolt. But when Franklin
brought the lightning from the clouds
and showed 1t to be a mere electric
spark; when we learned to make the
lightning harmless by the lightning
rod, and when finally we harnessed
electricity to do our work, naturally
our reverence for the thrower Of the
thunderbolt decayed.
Sense Perception
Kant. the greatest and most criti-
cal of all philosophers, denies that time
and space are the product of expert
ence, but shows them TO be categories;
conceptions in which our mind clothes
the sense perceptions. Modern physics
has come to the same conclusion in
the relativity theory, that absolute
space and absolute time have no exist
eree, but time and space exist only as
ffar as things or events fill them, that
Is, are forms of sense perception.
Still greater and more pertinent is
another limitation of our sense per-
cceptlons; our senses can perceive only
finite things, but cannot perceive the
Infinite. No reasoning from any foun-
dation can put anything into the con-
clusiors which is not contained in the
perceptions finite, all conclusions from
them, that is, the entire structure of
silence. is limited to the finite. Hence
any attempt of science TO deal with
an infinite conception RS the infinite
In time and in space, immortality, the
conception Of God, etc, must fail and
lead to contradictions, be illogical.
Thus, the proof of the non-existence
in science of the conception of God.
immortality, etc, really means nothing
except that we cannot get by reason.
ing a conclusion which is not contained
IN the premises on which we started
our reasoning.
Furthermore, science derives it's
conclusions from the sense perceptions
ny the laws of logic. But what proof
is there OF the correctness of the laws
OF logic except experience, which, no
matter how comprehensive. aiwavs
must remain limited?
Thus, the negative answer of
SCIENCE on the question whether there
are conceptive entities Of infinitiye
character, as infinity in time and space,
immortality OF the ego, God, etc, is
not conclusive, and the question still is
as open as it ever was.
Beyond Minds Limits
AAN" 10" wv "PpiOdCH lIS solution
and can we ever get an answer on the
question of the existence of the in
finite? Tie best we can expect to do
is to search into the foundations and
limitations of our mental processes, to
determine how far conceptions are
really illogical and contradictory, and
hoy far they appear so maraly because
they involve conceptions beyond the
limits of our mind.
But there can be no scientific foun.
dat'on of religion, but belief must al
ways remain the foundation of religion,
while that of science is logical rea-
soning from facts; that is, sense per-
ceptions, and all that we can say is
the two, science and religion, are not
necessarily Incompatible, but are diff
tferent and unrelated activities of the
human mind"
To-day's observance of Laymen's
Sunday by Unitarian laymen here was
part of the national program of the
Unitarian Laymen's League, which has
designated the first Sunday in Decem-
Der as Laymen's Sunday.