So here we go again… Higgs- boson may well have been identified, and both factions rant on again defending their extremist opinions in the perpetual “Religion vs Science” debate.
I would challenge you for once to lay aside your inherent conviction that the other faction is essentially contradicting what you so firmly believe…
Yes, granted there are religious nutcases out there who would cling to every word of the scriptures and interpret it as being irrefutable literal truth. There are however just as many scientologists, who dispel each and every notion of a deity, simply because they have had no personal encounter with such a being or force.
Ladies and gentlemen, I put it to you, that as with so many contentious issues, the truth may in fact lie somewhere in an integration of your respective perceptions on the matter.
When observing a grey object from different perspectives, and different lighting conditions, one party observing the shadowed side of the object may be justified in defining it as dark, tending towards black. Meanwhile the other party, privy to a different angle of observation, may describe it as reasonably light, but not quite white. All that differs is the angle at which it is viewed relative to the available light source.
When one transposes this analogy to the matter of “creation vs big- bang” it would not be too difficult to understand the simile. We could very well conceive that there are two ways of looking at the same occurrence.
Where the huge pitfall however looms, is when we instinctively infer that our own opinion is by default the more enlightened one, and that the other party is seeing the shadowed side of the matter under investigation.
In the simplistic model I sketched above, the truth is that the object is grey… and the two parties actually agree to that, although their perspectives are skewed by the fact that they are observing under different conditions, hence creating disagreement as to the precise shade.
I put it to you, that if we exclude the extremists on either end of the opinionated scale of the argument at hand, we may well discover that there is room to accept that the creationist and the scientist are in fact merely portraying two perspectives of the same event.
I as a believing Christian, with a basic scientific education, honestly believe that the two explanations are in fact not as extremely far apart as what is commonly portrayed.
We need to be so careful not to be roped in to the age- old “war” between the narrow minded church and the heretic scientists.
We would make significant progress if Christians would be a little less pious, and allow their brains to concede that much of Scripture was in fact an archaic record, often in poetic form, and subject to the limited understanding of those who interpreted and recorded it. Although we believe the underlying truth to be God inspired, that does not necessarily imply that everything is to be seen as literally accurate, there is a host of metaphor and “shadow in type” included in the biblical texts.
On the other hand, perhaps the scientists among us would do well to concede that not everything has yet been revealed in the quest for all knowledge, and perhaps a more tolerant approach to traditions, myths and even religion might well shed light on fundamentals which actually endorse, rather than contradict modern science.
Let us touch very briefly on evolution… not to force either side of the argument, but rather to highlight some obvious similarities.
Do you honestly believe that it is co- incidence that the creation account in Genesis actually follows a similar progression order to the widely accepted evolution model? Is it co- incidental that Genesis clearly spells out life originating in the sea, then on land, and only then birds are mentioned?
Does this not correspond with the progression of life from ocean based organisms, through to amphibians, and eventually to birds and mammals as portrayed by the evolutionists?
Granted, a major difference is that creationists believe that man descended directly from God, in His image, while evolutionists uphold that he was the final progression of evolution, but is it not strange that both camps have mankind being introduced at the end?
Where I anticipate the greatest contest between the two parties though, has to be on the matter of the origin of the universe.
Scientists slate Christians for believing that God existed before time, and outside of the Universe. Because they cannot explain this, their belief that He created everything is automatically flawed.
Scientists on the other hand support the Big Bang theory, where matter combined by chance to provide the origin of everything that exists today. I can get my mind around the statistical improbability of that, and concede the minute possibility that it could have happened, but where exactly did the initial matter come from then?
So here we are, anticipating that the affirmation of the Higgs- boson particle might eventually prove the big- bang…. A bit of an extreme deduction I would say?
Maybe we could be a step closer to scientifically explaining sub- atomic bonds and forces which hold matter together. Maybe we could give another name to “the force” which could have catalysed creation… Maybe we are just seeing what faith and religion has always claimed, but we are seeing it from another perspective.
As a Christian, I believe that when I pray, I envoke a power, which I don’t understand to actually bring about changes in a dimension which I can’t see, which will eventually manifest in the physical world around me.
Some New Age movements today advocate “the secret” of meditation and positive thoughts reverberating through the universe, and changing the alignment of particles of matter to bring about physical change.
Some religions support the concept of “transcendental meditation” which can go on to include such concepts as travel through time and space and also levitation.
Is it not strangely co- incidental that these are some of the very principles which commentators on the news article claimed might be the outcome of further research into the Higgs- boson particle? What?? Is science also hoping to find a “super- natural” force which is able to transcend the laws of nature as we know them?
I put it to you that religion and science have always been looking at the same fundamental truth, but from different perspectives. We all agree that a force exists which we have not yet been able to accurately analyse or define. We agree that our current knowledge of the universe is limited, and that there are some things which we just cannot explain….
I also believe that we are all looking for “the force” which can offer us a means of escape from the boundaries we know and have been unable to transcend.
Maybe we are all looking for a god, but we just call him, or her, or it by different names…
So how about we get together and start looking at the things we agree on, and stop being so damned divisive, and try to learn from each other and build together a stronger case for the truth instead of perpetually trying to break down the other’s progress?
All strength to the guys at CERN… may you bring us ALL one step closer to the ultimate realization of the truth, that there is indeed something out there which is infinitely larger than we are…. Whatever we may choose to call it.
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