John Timpane- Fundamentalism Fails
John Timpane
John Timpane is the Commentary Page editor for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
He came to this position in August 1997 after more than 20 years as a teacher of college English (specialties: Renaissance literature and composition theory) at Lafayette College, Rutgers University, the University of Southampton, Stanford University and elsewhere. He has a PhD in English and Humanities from Stanford. Throughout his undergraduate, graduate, and scholarly career, he wrote op-ed and perspective pieces for magazines and newspapers, and he had a flourishing freelance writing career that included film scripts, interactive video scripts, books (It Could Be Verse, about poetry; Writing Worth Reading, about composition), poetry, essays (on biotechnology for Science magazine), and research articles. He was also a writing coach at various companies and newspapers--which is how he and the Inquirer first fell in love. To make a long bio just a little longer, writing is what he's always done and always taught. He has loved all his old jobs and very much loves his new one. He lives near Princeton, N.J., with his wife, Maria-Christina Keller (copy chief of Scientific American), and two children.
The Philadelphia Inquirer
published October 23, 2005
Fundamentalism Fails, On Both Sides
by John Timpane
It's the end of absolutes for both religion and materialist unbelief.
Neither has the knockout card, the open-and-shut, slam-dunk, airtight case.
And that should knock both of them back a step.
Each has something to say to the other, indeed the same thing: "Give up your fundamentalism—it's toxic, and it's hurting you."
Healthful words now, when evolution and intelligent design are being debated in Dover, Pa.
Both belief and unbelief may be much qualified in the coming decades. In a trend already 50 years old, belief increasingly may get hauled out of church, as believers feel less and less need for an institutional lens through which to believe.
Materialism (sometimes called "naturalism," sometimes "rationalism") is the belief that all that exists is the visible, concrete universe of matter. That's it—nothing else, no spirit realm, no divinities, no afterlife. There is a fine, august tradition behind materialist unbelief. But—especially in the minds of some who believe they are representing or defending science—it has taken on a dismissive energy. In years to come, materialism may actually benefit from admitting it's just a guess, more like other beliefs than most materialists admit.
At least, such are my conclusions after participating in the Templeton-Cambridge Journalism Fellowships in Science and Religion. This summer, 10 journalists attended seminars for two weeks at Cambridge University in England, went home for five weeks to prepare presentations, and returned for a last week of seminars, presentations, debate, English ale, and amazement at our chance to study God and science in 15th-century splendor.
Many stars joined us: evolutionary biologists Richard Dawkins and Simon Conway Morris; cosmologists John D. Barrow, Owen Gingerich, and Paul Davies; theologians Russell Stannard, Nancey Murphy, and Ronald Cole-Turner. They gave brilliant talks, argued with one another, with us, and with the cosmos; challenged us to stretch our minds and write better about science, religion, and the interface (if there is one!) between the two.
All my friends want to know: So who won?
Nobody. And that should temper all those who think their team already has.
Despite the trial in Dover, the current American conflict is not between "science" and "religion." It is, to quote Karen Armstrong, author of A History of God and other books, a conflict between tightly defined subsets: "those who adhere to the scientific theory of evolution and those who believe that the biblical story of the six-day creation is literally true." As she points out, this boils down to "a struggle between two religions." The culprit on both sides in this American standoff is the mental habit of fundamentalism itself. And it could well hobble both sides.
Book-based religious fundamentalism will, I suspect, gravely wound the cause of religion. It holds sway today among about 20 percent of Americans, but that's only now. In many minds, the underhandedness and the coercive truculence of religious fundamentalist rhetoric confirm that religion is bad. It gives individuals no choice, nowhere to go, no way to grow. That's why, when science enlarges our view of the cosmos, one often hears fundamentalist yelps.
The current uprising may be a harbinger of the death of religion for many people. We'll continue to be a believing people, but more and more of us will do our believing out of doors.
Religious fundamentalism got beat up good at the Templetons, especially by religious people. Fraser Watts, who teaches theology and science at Cambridge and is co-director of the fellowship program, said: "I am a follower of Christ, not the Bible, and if I'm forced to make a choice, which I hope I am not, I will choose Christ."
But religion is not the only fundamentalism in the room. Let us now turn to the other bad boys: the fundamentalist materialists.
Some say, "I believe in science. Evidence. Empirical demonstration. What I can see. And that's it."
But many materialists don't stop there. Fighting hard, against religion and other forms of "ignorance," they claim their view is scientific. When, strictly speaking, it is not. It strains the proper bounds of science to enlist it for these purposes, and most honest scientists will say so.
Rightly does biologist Kenneth R. Miller (who testified against intelligent design in the Dover trial) complain of materialists who go "well beyond any reasonable scientific conclusions that might emerge from evolutionary biology."
Miller cites biologist William Provine, who wrote: "Modern science directly implies that there are no inherent moral or ethical laws, no absolute guiding principles for human society. … We must conclude that when we die, we die, and that is the end of us."
Science doesn't imply anything about morality, ethics, or afterlifes. It just doesn't go there. But Provine sure wants it to, and then vaults to "must conclude."
Materialists often idealize science. They speak of science, not as it is, but as they wish it were. They pretend science is a unitary practice with a stable, complete, sufficient view of the cosmos. They pretend—beyond the capacity of logic—that you can draw hard and fast definitions between what is science and what is not.
I heard many such pretenses at the Templetons, and you cannot know how irritating that is.
Scientific practice bypasses what can be seen, tested, or demonstrated all the time. The structure of the benzene ring came to August Kekulè not through an experiment, but through a dream. No one has ever seen such a string, but many physicists now have high hopes for "string theory" (in which the structure of the universe is made up of resonating submicroscopic strings). Cosmology relies on arguments based on what cannot be seen (dark matter) to explain what can.
Sometimes that works, sometimes not. Science is a search for what works—and sometimes that's empirical, and often it's not. It often proceeds through undirected play. Thank you, Yale neurobiologist Robert Wyman, for saying so: "You get curious about something and you mess around. That's what science is in the beginning; you mess around."
It's amazing how angry people get when you say such things. That doesn't make science any more wonderful, its triumphs any less spectacular.
Some people just insist on a purity that science does not have and never did. Such insistence hurts them, their babes-in-the-woods politics, and any chance of discussion. They should drop it, acknowledge the humanity of their endeavor, and listen.
Materialism is a good guess. A very intelligent good guess.
It was none other than zoologist Richard Dawkins, an eminent nonbeliever, who told us that materialism can't really close the argument against God. So even he knows it. I wonder how many other materialists would admit the same.
The high point of the Templetons, for me, came after a stellar presentation by cosmologist John D. Barrow, including an explanation of multiverse theory, which argues that our universe is not alone but is only one of about 10550 universes. Dawkins raised his hand and, after praising what he had just heard, asked why anyone would want to look for divine characteristics in the universe.
To which Barrow replied: "For the same reason that somebody might not want to."
A throwaway line? No: the single most honest, most incisive thing I heard at Cambridge. Barrow spoke the thing neither institutionalized belief nor institutionalized unbelief will admit—the great scandal—that neither side can close the deal, leaving it to you and me. There are wonderful reasons to believe—and not to believe. Go out, look around, keep your mind and senses wide open, and decide for yourself; for nothing—no book, no experiment, no theory, no minister in his smoke and vestments—can make up your mind for you. It's just you and the cosmos within and without.
And throughout this lifelong quest, if ever you feel your mind hardening—don't let it happen. That's how belief and unbelief got into this mess in the first place.
John Timpane is the Commentary Page editor for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
He came to this position in August 1997 after more than 20 years as a teacher of college English (specialties: Renaissance literature and composition theory) at Lafayette College, Rutgers University, the University of Southampton, Stanford University and elsewhere. He has a PhD in English and Humanities from Stanford. Throughout his undergraduate, graduate, and scholarly career, he wrote op-ed and perspective pieces for magazines and newspapers, and he had a flourishing freelance writing career that included film scripts, interactive video scripts, books (It Could Be Verse, about poetry; Writing Worth Reading, about composition), poetry, essays (on biotechnology for Science magazine), and research articles. He was also a writing coach at various companies and newspapers--which is how he and the Inquirer first fell in love. To make a long bio just a little longer, writing is what he's always done and always taught. He has loved all his old jobs and very much loves his new one. He lives near Princeton, N.J., with his wife, Maria-Christina Keller (copy chief of Scientific American), and two children.
The Philadelphia Inquirer
published October 23, 2005
Fundamentalism Fails, On Both Sides
by John Timpane
It's the end of absolutes for both religion and materialist unbelief.
Neither has the knockout card, the open-and-shut, slam-dunk, airtight case.
And that should knock both of them back a step.
Each has something to say to the other, indeed the same thing: "Give up your fundamentalism—it's toxic, and it's hurting you."
Healthful words now, when evolution and intelligent design are being debated in Dover, Pa.
Both belief and unbelief may be much qualified in the coming decades. In a trend already 50 years old, belief increasingly may get hauled out of church, as believers feel less and less need for an institutional lens through which to believe.
Materialism (sometimes called "naturalism," sometimes "rationalism") is the belief that all that exists is the visible, concrete universe of matter. That's it—nothing else, no spirit realm, no divinities, no afterlife. There is a fine, august tradition behind materialist unbelief. But—especially in the minds of some who believe they are representing or defending science—it has taken on a dismissive energy. In years to come, materialism may actually benefit from admitting it's just a guess, more like other beliefs than most materialists admit.
At least, such are my conclusions after participating in the Templeton-Cambridge Journalism Fellowships in Science and Religion. This summer, 10 journalists attended seminars for two weeks at Cambridge University in England, went home for five weeks to prepare presentations, and returned for a last week of seminars, presentations, debate, English ale, and amazement at our chance to study God and science in 15th-century splendor.
Many stars joined us: evolutionary biologists Richard Dawkins and Simon Conway Morris; cosmologists John D. Barrow, Owen Gingerich, and Paul Davies; theologians Russell Stannard, Nancey Murphy, and Ronald Cole-Turner. They gave brilliant talks, argued with one another, with us, and with the cosmos; challenged us to stretch our minds and write better about science, religion, and the interface (if there is one!) between the two.
All my friends want to know: So who won?
Nobody. And that should temper all those who think their team already has.
Despite the trial in Dover, the current American conflict is not between "science" and "religion." It is, to quote Karen Armstrong, author of A History of God and other books, a conflict between tightly defined subsets: "those who adhere to the scientific theory of evolution and those who believe that the biblical story of the six-day creation is literally true." As she points out, this boils down to "a struggle between two religions." The culprit on both sides in this American standoff is the mental habit of fundamentalism itself. And it could well hobble both sides.
Book-based religious fundamentalism will, I suspect, gravely wound the cause of religion. It holds sway today among about 20 percent of Americans, but that's only now. In many minds, the underhandedness and the coercive truculence of religious fundamentalist rhetoric confirm that religion is bad. It gives individuals no choice, nowhere to go, no way to grow. That's why, when science enlarges our view of the cosmos, one often hears fundamentalist yelps.
The current uprising may be a harbinger of the death of religion for many people. We'll continue to be a believing people, but more and more of us will do our believing out of doors.
Religious fundamentalism got beat up good at the Templetons, especially by religious people. Fraser Watts, who teaches theology and science at Cambridge and is co-director of the fellowship program, said: "I am a follower of Christ, not the Bible, and if I'm forced to make a choice, which I hope I am not, I will choose Christ."
But religion is not the only fundamentalism in the room. Let us now turn to the other bad boys: the fundamentalist materialists.
Some say, "I believe in science. Evidence. Empirical demonstration. What I can see. And that's it."
But many materialists don't stop there. Fighting hard, against religion and other forms of "ignorance," they claim their view is scientific. When, strictly speaking, it is not. It strains the proper bounds of science to enlist it for these purposes, and most honest scientists will say so.
Rightly does biologist Kenneth R. Miller (who testified against intelligent design in the Dover trial) complain of materialists who go "well beyond any reasonable scientific conclusions that might emerge from evolutionary biology."
Miller cites biologist William Provine, who wrote: "Modern science directly implies that there are no inherent moral or ethical laws, no absolute guiding principles for human society. … We must conclude that when we die, we die, and that is the end of us."
Science doesn't imply anything about morality, ethics, or afterlifes. It just doesn't go there. But Provine sure wants it to, and then vaults to "must conclude."
Materialists often idealize science. They speak of science, not as it is, but as they wish it were. They pretend science is a unitary practice with a stable, complete, sufficient view of the cosmos. They pretend—beyond the capacity of logic—that you can draw hard and fast definitions between what is science and what is not.
I heard many such pretenses at the Templetons, and you cannot know how irritating that is.
Scientific practice bypasses what can be seen, tested, or demonstrated all the time. The structure of the benzene ring came to August Kekulè not through an experiment, but through a dream. No one has ever seen such a string, but many physicists now have high hopes for "string theory" (in which the structure of the universe is made up of resonating submicroscopic strings). Cosmology relies on arguments based on what cannot be seen (dark matter) to explain what can.
Sometimes that works, sometimes not. Science is a search for what works—and sometimes that's empirical, and often it's not. It often proceeds through undirected play. Thank you, Yale neurobiologist Robert Wyman, for saying so: "You get curious about something and you mess around. That's what science is in the beginning; you mess around."
It's amazing how angry people get when you say such things. That doesn't make science any more wonderful, its triumphs any less spectacular.
Some people just insist on a purity that science does not have and never did. Such insistence hurts them, their babes-in-the-woods politics, and any chance of discussion. They should drop it, acknowledge the humanity of their endeavor, and listen.
Materialism is a good guess. A very intelligent good guess.
It was none other than zoologist Richard Dawkins, an eminent nonbeliever, who told us that materialism can't really close the argument against God. So even he knows it. I wonder how many other materialists would admit the same.
The high point of the Templetons, for me, came after a stellar presentation by cosmologist John D. Barrow, including an explanation of multiverse theory, which argues that our universe is not alone but is only one of about 10550 universes. Dawkins raised his hand and, after praising what he had just heard, asked why anyone would want to look for divine characteristics in the universe.
To which Barrow replied: "For the same reason that somebody might not want to."
A throwaway line? No: the single most honest, most incisive thing I heard at Cambridge. Barrow spoke the thing neither institutionalized belief nor institutionalized unbelief will admit—the great scandal—that neither side can close the deal, leaving it to you and me. There are wonderful reasons to believe—and not to believe. Go out, look around, keep your mind and senses wide open, and decide for yourself; for nothing—no book, no experiment, no theory, no minister in his smoke and vestments—can make up your mind for you. It's just you and the cosmos within and without.
And throughout this lifelong quest, if ever you feel your mind hardening—don't let it happen. That's how belief and unbelief got into this mess in the first place.