An Essay Towards a Constructive Theology Part I: Science & Religion; Matter & More

 

            I am currently working on a book of a theological sort.  I am hoping to show here at least some portions of it as they develop.  So below is a beginning in the form of a brief essay:

            This book is intended as a rather unusual essay—or series of essays—in theological reflection.  It is not entirely philosophical theology; nor is it purely traditional.  In fact, it approaches various questions from various unconventional, yet, I am convinced, fruitful, angles.

            Let us start with some basic orienting principles for this work.  I am a firm believer that everything is—ultimately, at least—interesting, and worth knowing.  I also believe that all things are interconnected (and that making those connections is one of the ways we show how interesting things are).  As a result of this prejudice, I tend to mix together in my writing things others might keep apart: science, theology, and story; high literature and pop culture; deep reflection and humor (I believe, as Oscar Wilde did, that life is too important to be taken seriously; and like Shakespeare, I prefer a poor pun or a bad joke to none at all.  Don’t say I didn’t warn you).

            I also practice what I call “philosophical optimism.”  This is the application of the principle that “Everybody is absolutely right about everything all of the time—except, when they’re not.”  I agree with Ken Wilber’s observation that “no one is so smart as to be wrong about everything all of the time.”  So, I ask of any idea, “Could this be true—from a certain point of view?”[1]  It helps me to avoid rejecting good ideas too quickly and, I think, helps me find truth where others might see only falsehood.  So that is where we start.  The goal of this book is to think through some ideas—many of them quite old—from what may, in some ways, at least, be some slightly new directions.  However, it is not my goal to be new or original, but only to be honest, and to think these ideas through so that they can help me, and whoever else might read these thoughts, to seek and find the truth about some of the most important ideas in this world. 

            So come join me as we think some thoughts through, to see if we can come out the other side with a little more truth, a bit more clarity—and perhaps more charity—and hopefully, a little more humor, too. 

            Let us start with some questions.  What can we know about those things that matter most?: How did I get here?  What am I supposed to do now that I am?  Is there anything that comes after this life?  And if so, what?  Is there a God?  And if so, which one?  What is God like?  What, if anything, does religion have to do with these questions?  Or science?  Or spirituality?  It can all seem quite overwhelming.  So, let’s try to break it down.

            The sorts of questions listed above—existential questions of great importance—are the sort that were often answered by religion in times past.  However, in the last few centuries, many have argued against turning to religion for answers, preferring instead the relatively new phenomenon of science.  In fact, for many of us in Western civilization, perhaps especially in the English-speaking world, it has come to be taken for granted that religion and science are opposed to each other.  Usually, those who think thus assume that science offers knowledge and truth, while religion offers only myth (in the pejorative sense) empty ritual, and superstition.[2]  However, there are some who accept this idea of a conflict between religion and science, yet take the side of religion, or at least one particular religion, as a source of truth and light.

            Against those who claim some truth value for religion, it is often argued that, to use a common expression, “all are disproved by all,” that the continued coexistence of so many mutually contradictory religions proves them all to be false.  The source of this claim would seem to be a sort of analogy between science and religion.  Science, we are often told, is progressive.  It may never be certain of anything, but it moves from one theory to the next, increasing in knowledge and understanding, slowly unveiling, one after another, the mysteries of the universe.  The way that science does this is a method.  Initial observations are made.  This leads to the formulation of a hypothesis.  Then, the hypothesis is used to make predictions, and tests are then run; experiments are conducted to test whether the hypothesis predicts outcomes correctly.  If the predictions are confirmed, the hypothesis is considered empirically supported.  If disconfirmed, it is considered disproven.  A hypothesis sufficiently supported by experiment and evidence is considered a theory (literally, a vision of how things work), and, eventually, perhaps, a law (descriptive, rather than prescriptive; although, with the really well supported ones, we often forget the distinction).  Using this method—and asking, we must remember, very specific and focused questions—science is able not only to make progress in understanding, but to achieve broad objective consensus on that understanding.

            This is the basis of the objection given above to religion.  We are told that there is no such thing as “Chinese science” as opposed to “European science.”  Instead, all scientists, across countries, languages and cultures, agree on scientific truth.  Furthermore, the progress of science has allowed more accurate and complete theories to supplement less complete theories (the classic example being the supplementation of Newtonian mechanics by Einsteinian relativity), or to drive out false theories (like phlogiston, or the four classical elements) altogether.  It is implied that religions do not work this way.  Instead, the people in one country have one religion, while those in another country have another.  No agreement exists; no religion has been able to drive out the others as false, and yet, since they contradict each other, they cannot all be true.  The result is a sort of scientistic syllogism:

1.      Since the various religions of the world contradict each other, they cannot all be true.  However, they can, in theory, all be false.

2.      If any one of them were true, it should have long since driven out the others as false, as happens in science.  This has not happened.

3.      Instead, there is still a plurality of religions, with most people’s religious affiliation being a function, not of any sort of truth quest, but of their geopolitical, ethnic, and linguistic origin (Americans grow up to be Christians, Indians grow up to be Hindus or Buddhists, etc.). 

Therefore, religions are not matters of truth, but merely of cultural practice.  He who would seek the truth must either abandon religion altogether, or at least put it in its proper place as a thing irrelevant to the truth.  It is science, not religion, which gives us truth.

            At first glance, this would seem to be plausible.  However, a more careful examination of the facts reveals this thinking to be flawed.      First, let us define some relevant terms.  As we began to see above, science is a body of knowledge and theory, largely concerned with the physical world, along with a method of developing theories and refining knowledge through observation, hypothesis, and empirical testing, all applied recursively (observe, hypothesize, test; repeat).  This definition will work, for now.

            But, what is “religion”?  It is perhaps better to ask: “What do we mean by ‘a religion’?”[3]  “Religion,” Sam Harris observes,[4] is a word like “sports.”  Earlier, Wittgenstein had said the same thing about “games.”[5]  In each case, there is no Aristotelean essence defining a category.  Instead, we call one thing a “game,” then apply the same word to something resembling it, then extend the term to another thing resembling that…in the end, some things appropriately called “games” (or “sports” or “religions”) may not have any one property in common.

            Does this, then, mean we cannot define “religion”?  Perhaps there is still hope.  Let us not try to define the thing called religion, to grasp its essence, but simply to define the word “religion,” to determine its semantic domain and range of meaning.  One might suggest that a person’s religion is their basic and ultimate commitment (hence the phrase “to practice something religiously”).  By this definition, everyone has a religion, so long as they do not simply drift aimlessly through life.  This simple, pragmatic definition allows us to answer one of the most basic questions we might wish to ask.

To Be Religious, or Not?

            By this definition of religion, we can say that, outside the drifters, everyone has some sort of ultimate commitment which drives them (and I would suspect that even the drifters are driven by something, even if no one knows what it is; it is difficult to imagine a person living life without some sort of motivation).  So, to the question of whether or not to be religious, we answer that, essentially everyone has a religion—an ultimate commitment—though for some, that might be something not generally classed as a “religion”: science, or politics, or some other secular commitment, for instance.  Thus, we can reframe our question.  Science often seems to assume—even if just as a heuristic procedure and method—the truth of materialism, the idea that the physical, material world of matter, energy, space, & time are all that is.  Most religions, on the other hand, tend to assume that, in some way, to some degree, there is more.  So now we can ask, which is right?  Materialism, or the verdict of More?

            But before efforting that question, let us make one more pertinent observation.  Some religions, at least, are connected to, but not identical with, a thing we might call “theology.”  Theology is, at its best, akin to science (some would even say that it is a science), in that it is a body of knowledge and theory, speculation and reflection, even  a means of investigation and testing of, that thing we have labeled simply as, More.  What science generally ignores or denies, theology claims to investigate.  Thus, I would suggest that he who compares science to religion is at least in danger of committing a category error: comparing two things that are too unlike for comparison.  The comparison of science with theology would be much more appropriate.  However, this is only true if the thing theology claims to study is real.  So the question remains: is materialism true?  Or is there indeed, more?

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[1] Thank you, Obi-Wan Kenobi.

[2] For example, one essay I was recently reading defined science very broadly as “conviction based on evidence, plus rational theory,” while defining religion as “belief without evidence, plus dogma” (David P. Barash, “What the Whale Wondered,” Richard Dawkins: How a Scientist Changed the Way We Think p. 256)

[3] The great Spock (child of Sarek, child of Skon) reminds us to always ask questions, like “What does it mean, ‘exact change’?”—this, after he & Jim Kirk were kicked off a bus in 20^th century San Francisco for not having it (Star Trek IV: the Voyage Home).

[4] In the first chapter of his book Waking Up.

[5] In his Philosophical Investigations.