A Little Concept Called Creation

Science and religion, religion and science – any way you put them (at least in my eyes) you got two studies of the beginning of life that would never intersect. After reading a portion of Paul Davies’ G-d and the new physics I have learned otherwise. In the section’s I read, I found that while the book tended to get a bit intellectual and less college friendly, certain topics produced a yield that was really unlike anything I’ve read before.

It should be put out there prior to diving into discussion topics that obviously two schools of thought will be presented, the sciences and the religious. The following are two almost definitions given by Davies:
“Science is based on careful observation and experiments enabling theories to be constructed which connect different experiences. Central to this approach is the willingness of the scientist to abandon a theory if evidence is produced against it…Religion is founded on revelation and received wisdom. Religious dogma that claims to contain an unalterable Truth can hardly be modified to changing ideas. The true believer must stand by his faith whatever the apparent evidence against it is. (6)
It is by these two definitions that most of this paper will be centered around, and very important that everyone who reads this knows how I have defined these topics and those who subscribe to them.

“…Any system of thought that claims to provide an understanding of the physical world must make some statement about the origin of the world.” (7) It is with that thought I would suggest that there is very strong importance and continuing relevance of the religious concept “creation” both in the secular (science) world and the spiritual (religious) world. We learn almost from the beginning of this book that for the greatest amount of people on earth, religion is the biggest influence over the way we conduct our affairs.

What got me so involved in this idea that the continuing relevance of religion and creation theory began really on page 18. There we learn time itself began at the big bang, which lead me to question what happened before that – perhaps that is the religious aspect. If we agree that space and time really did erupt out of nothing in the big bang, we must believe a creation and the universe has a finite age. Even if G-d did something small at the beginning (18 billion years ago) then that certainly cooperates with the creation (religious) story.

The concept of “creation” affects how we understand the material world. The concept of the creation of matter can mean the abrupt appearance of an entire physical world, including materials. It is safe to say that in our everyday life, we “…rarely doubt that all events are caused in some way.” (33) I believe that creation affects how we understand the current physical world as giving us a sense of where everything started. Chapter four opens in saying, “there is a reason in nature why something should exist rather than not” (Leibniz). The end result in discussing this is always gaining a greater understanding of who we are and where we came from.

First I found it essential that the term “new physics” was understood to proceed in stating how the worldview changed the concept of life. New physics to me implied the concepts of the modern ages in terms of the advances in where the universe came from, centered on a handful of scientists and also included in high energy (and temperature). I suppose the reason I have still not fully understood the argument is that I still don’t understand completely what new physics are.

“G-d, who is infinite simplicity, chose to create the laws of physics and the constituents of matter in complex variety, in order to produce an interesting universe.” (54) I believe this is how a religious person would view the concept of the new physics. Steven Hawking was a philosopher who proposed something called a “principle of ignorance” which says that singularity is the ultimate unknowable, and therefore it should be totally devoid of information. This theory is one I subscribe to. Ignorance, I believe was once a factor in the explanation of creation from a religion as nothing really opposed it. Now with the new physics, it is a different story. It was said that many religious people are ready to accept that once life had arisen on earth, the subsequent actions and development combined with physics and chemistry yielded Darwin’s theory of evolution.

In my first reading I would say the two chapters I enjoyed the most were mind and soul (chapter six) and the self/death (chapter seven). “I simply believe that some part of the human Self or Soul is not subject to the laws of space and time” (Carl G. Jung). I gained many insights about the nature of the mind, soul, and death.

The first line we should draw is between the mental and physical world. The material objects and the like inhabit the physical world. The mental world is populated not by the materials such as the other, but the thoughts. This is the first thing I learned when speaking about the mind and soul – they come from two different worlds, sometimes however, they are connected. The mental world acts on the physical world through the “phenomenon of volition.” The thoughts in ones mind set off physical activity via the body and is then rearranged within the surroundings.

A dualist theory is something I also was exposed to for the first time. “Central to religious doctrine is the idea that the soul is a thing, and a sharp distinction must be drawn between body and soul. This so-called dualist theory of the mind was developed by Descartes and has been widely incorporated in religious (Christian) thinking” (78). The body will act as a receptacle for the mind and the body, coupled with the mind, is used to acquire and store information. One issue that is brought up is that a soul cannot be timeless or logical difficulties to the highest magnitude are created.

The quantum theory/factor mystifies many physicists, even at a fundamental level. Uncertainty is the fundamental ingredient of the quantum theory, as it leads to unpredictability. The quantum factor is important for understanding the religious nature in the world. The factor “breaks the chain,” allowing effects to occur with no cause – almost like a higher power has chosen the fate. “If we had complete knowledge of all forces concerned, we could (at principle at least) anticipate every twist and turn” (102). While it may seem too inconceivable to accept, its nice to know that Davies sites Einstein would have agreed. In its simplest form we learn that the quantum theory opens the door to a better understanding of free will. Another principle that we learn is that of an uncertainty from Heisenberg, it says you cant know where an atom, or whatever is located and how its. To me this theory plays into that of the quantum because they are to the religion argument, one says there is an uncertainty and one says you cant know and do everything.