Physicists are from Mars, biologists are from...? (Atheism thread)

[choosybeggar]

In this GQ thread, (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=71718) Chronos posted,

The fact that he believes in God is irrelevant: A disproportionate number of genuine physicists do. It's the biologists who have a tendancy towards atheism

As a biologist and an atheist I found this statement intriguing.

I don’t know if it’s true or not, I know of no supporting evidence, and it goes against my assessment of the religiosity of my biologist colleagues (although I work at a college with affiliations to an orthodox Jewish university;j).

However, if evidence exists for this conclusion (and if you know of any, please contribute it), I’m curious to know why a split regarding religion exists between the disciplines.

Perhaps individuals are drawn to physics by virtue of a desire to discover the “hidden force” which sets nature in motion, thereby verifying a preformed religious hypothesis. Whereas biology may hold more appeal for those with a reductionist bent, who wish to tease out from the extraordinary complexity of life, the basis for a self-sustaining “intelligence,” requiring no captain at the wheel and nobody to get the ball rolling. (BTW, no offence is intended if my characterizations are overly broad)

Then again, the divergence may occur as a result of training.

For myself, I entered biology with preformed atheist notions. And although I genuinely enjoyed my physics classes, I never considered a career in the physical sciences. My training indeed solidified my atheism. I marvel at the “logic” of cellular engineering, of metabolic pathways, of complex ecosystems, and of instinctive behaviors, but find my degree of amazement enhanced by the notion that the origins and character of these phenomena ultimately have a knowable, physical basis. I get a similar kick out of stargazing, watching the trajectory of a frisbee, and playing with lasers.

Do physicists and biologists differ in their tendencies toward atheism? And if they do, what is the basis for this difference?

[CalMeacham]

I've been associated with physics departments at three different universities and optics departments at two, and I have to admit that I've not del;ved deeply into this question. Nevertheless, the professors and students I've been associated with seemed to be a pretty mixed bag, with believers of various flavors mixed in with the agnostic, the atheistic, and the apathetic. I know there were a lot of Catholics and Jews, but the other groups seemed well represented as well.

At one place a religious argument broke out and eventually ended up in the pages of the journal Physics Today (in the Letters section). This caused one of the professors -- a deceptively quiet British guy with a truly devastating sense of humor -- to issue a hack advertising circular that had among its Sale items the following:


Existence of God Disproved ------ $1.00

Existence of God Proved --------- $1.50

Benevolent Deity ---------------- $2.00

[tracer]

My high school biology teacher was religious.

[Podkayne]

What a fascinating question. Here's an article, "Leading scientists still reject God" by Edward J. Larson, Larry WithamNature 394, 313 (23 July 1998) that I think breaks down the stats by field. Unfortunately, I'm at home, and I can't access it without the institutional subscription. Maybe someone else can read it?

Nature article. (http://www.nature.com/cgi-taf/DynaPage.taf?file=/nature/journal/v394/n6691/full/394313a0_fs.html&_UserReference=C0A804EE46B4D0966EB91B1AACE93B0BE932)

I'm in astronomy, and I know three people (out of a department of perhaps fifty) who are practicing religionists--though it's quite likely there are others who I don't know of. The outnumbered religionists will probably tend to keep quiet about it.

When I was an undergrad, one of my physics profs has a picture of a the Pope tacked up next to his Q-machine. I assumed it was a gag, and almost laughed and said, "Ha! Funny! The Pope!" but for some reason my tact was at a high ebb, and I didn't--which was lucky, since I found out later that he's a devout Catholic.

It's . . . refreshing, as an atheist, to finally find myself in the majority. I'm spoiled, I realize. My husband's cow-orkers found out that he's an agnostic, and their heads nearly exploded.

I'm not sure what differences might exist between biologists and physicists . . . except that physicists are dealing with a more fundemental subject--biologists can model the behavior of their systems based on chemistry and physics, but physicists don't have another discipline to fall back on. Cells are made of molecules, and molecules are made of atoms, and atoms had nuclei and electrons, and that's about as far as a biologist has to know, whereas the physicist is left wondering what quarks are made of. Either it's elephants all the way down, or at some level there's a cutoff--something fundemental--and maybe that's god?

[dantheman]

[quick aside: Cal, I thought I read elsewhere that you're a published author, and here I see you're also involved in science, specifically, optics. Have you published papers in the field of optics? I wonder if we've published your work. We're a publisher in the heart of Washington, DC.]

[Liberal]

My husband's cow-orkers found out that he's an agnostic, and their heads nearly exploded.

I've seen the heads of cow-orkers explode before. Not a pretty sight. :D

But sincerely, you make a very interesting point about the fundamental difference between biology and physics. Pity the poor mathematicians and logicians who have nothing to fall back on but their own subjective consciousnesses. Maybe that's why so many of them go mad! When they realize that all their proofs are Godelianly tautological, they can have everything from epiphanies to nervous breakdowns.

Please note that people of faith, just like atheists, fill a broad spectrum. There are many who consider their faith too personal to share, so it could be you have faithers in your midst without even knowing it, as you say. I think it's a shame that science and faith are still at odds after all these years, despite breakthroughs in epistemology and metaphysics that make the two seamlessly compatible.

[edwino]

Molecular biologist-in-training. I work at a large medical school, and nearly everyone here is not religious. I can count the openly religious people on one hand. I am an optimistic agnostic with atheistic leanings, although I was raised conservative Jewish.

Physics deals with the building block of the universe. It deals with the true mysteries of the universe, as physics by definition is examining the most fundamental levels of our surroundings. As Rutherford (I think) said "All science is either physics or stamp collecting." Since physics researches the laws of the universe on their very fringe, it is not hard to imagine a point where those laws break down. This is the realm of the supernatural, as scientific questions cannot be asked where the laws of science cease to exist. Einstein professed himself to be religious because he considered studying the "mystery" of the universe to be akin to religion.

In biology, we deal with the fundamentals of God's pinnacles of creation -- living organisms. Keep in mind we are taught all of our lives that we are the end points of creation, and we have been elevated above the animals by God. Both of these are heavily de-emphasized in biology. What I do every day requires me to examine the striking similarities between a fruit fly and a man. I make a living taking apart the fruits of creation piece by piece. Usually, we end up with a hodgepodge of complicated feedback loops that do anything but reinforce the picture of a beautiful creation. Instead, every day biological life looks more and more evolved. Humans sit on one fork of an unremarkable phylogenetic tree. Our massive prefrontal corticies are only results of some strange natural selection not completely unlike a peacock's tail or a cheetah's sprinting ability.

Unfortunately, since biology is based entirely on physics and chemistry, we can scientifically answer all of our questions (unlike in physics). Much of the "mystery" drops out of the equation.

I had read that Nature article before. It applies directly to this debate. Larson repeated a study performed by Leuba in 1914 and 1934. Leuba questioned scientists about personal belief in God and belief in human immortality. He also stratified it into "lesser" and "greater" scientists by membership in the National Academy of Sciences.

Larson repeated the study in 1998, and also broke it into biological versus physical scientists in the NAS. The trend seems fairly obvious : In 1914, 27.7% of "greater" scientists had a personal belief in God, while 52.7% had a personal disbelief. By 1998, 7% had a belief while 72.7% had a personal disbelief. The numbers are similar for belief in human immortality.

In 1998, 5.5% of NAS biologic scientists believed in God. 7.1% believed in immortality. Physicists and
astronomers were only slightly higher -- 7.5% in God, 7.5% in immortality.

Larson, EJ, Witham, L. "Leading scientists still reject God." Nature 394, 313 (1998).

[The Bad Astronomer]

Originally posted by Podkayne

I'm in astronomy

Oh, I have to know. Do you do Mars work? I mean, given your name and all...

I'm in astronomy too, though maybe not so much Bad stuff. ;-)

[Tars Tarkas]

Well, i'm a biologist, i believe in God, and my handle is from a martian, so i believe i am quallified to post in this thread. Now i am not an active church-goer, i think God has better things to do than worry about whether i go to church, i feel it is more the idea that counts. With biology, i like seeing how things are created from the simplist compounds, where some people seem to think it demistifies everything and leaves no room for God, i see it as further proof of the wonders of God's works. I will agree that scientists in general have a low percentage of religious people.

And, no, i am not a fundie, i don't believe the world is 6000 years old, and i don't try to go around convincing people to "find God or you will burn." If God really cared about dotting the i's and crossing the t's, he wouldn't of bothered to give us free will.

In addition, Libertarian is probably having a heart attack from the lack of capital i's in this post.

[Liberal]

Wow! The Bad Astronomer! [bowing... scraping...]

Are you Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer? I love your web site!



Here's an interesting juxtaposition...

From Joseph McCabe, The Psychology of Religion:

The research which Professor Leuba (The Belief in God and Immortality), made into the proportion of believers and unbelievers amongst freshmen, sophomores, ordinary professors, and more distinguished professors affords very striking statistical evidence of this. As you rise in the scale of age and culture, the believers shrink from eighty to ten percent, the unbelievers grow from twenty to nearly ninety percent... The real meaning is obvious. Religion is just an ordinary conviction in the mind and it is enfeebled when we accumulate knowledge, because it is essentially based upon ignorance. We see this on a very much broader scale in the collective experience of our time. There never was less religion in the world before, and there never was so much knowledge.

From Jesus of Nazareth:

In those days, men will learn more and more, and be further and further from the truth.

Tars:

It's all good. ;)

[SPOOFE]

I've seen the heads of cow-orkers explode before.
Wow... I wanna see a Cow-ork. Is that like a regular orc, or is that closer to an ogre? Or is that what orcs use as a source of meat?

[Liberal]

Cow-orkers are pretty messy when their heads explode, but what breaks my heart is when it happens prematurely to the little calf-orkers.

[CalMeacham]

dantheman:

[quick aside: Cal, I thought I read elsewhere that you're a published author, and here I see you're also involved in science, specifically, optics. Have you published papers in the field of optics? I wonder if we've published your work. We're a publisher in the heart of Washington, DC.]


I are indeed a published author, but in real life I'm an Optical Engineer, with a doctorate in physics. Writing is my hobby (and not a particularly lucrative one, I must note. I work to support my writing habit.)

[CalMeacham]

dantheman:

[quick aside: Cal, I thought I read elsewhere that you're a published author, and here I see you're also involved in science, specifically, optics. Have you published papers in the field of optics? I wonder if we've published your work. We're a publisher in the heart of Washington, DC.]


I are indeed a published author, but in real life I'm an Optical Engineer, with a doctorate in physics. Writing is my hobby (and not a particularly lucrative one, I must note. I work to support my writing habit.)

I've published several papers in JOSA, Physica Status Solidi, Optics Letters, and other tchnical journals. Not mention Parabola (The Magazine of Myth and Tradition), Scientific American, and New Jersey History. It's my fond desire to be published in Mad.

[choosybeggar]

Originally posted by Libertarian
I think it's a shame that science and faith are still at odds after all these years, despite breakthroughs in epistemology and metaphysics that make the two seamlessly compatible.

Please elaborate or link to threads regarding the breakthroughs. I'm very curious.

Also please explain why you think it's such a shame. Aside from my theoretical obejections to faith, I have no desire for it. I feel profound fulfillment even in the absence of faith.

[The Bad Astronomer]

Originally posted by Libertarian


Wow! The Bad Astronomer! [bowing... scraping...]

Are you Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer? I love your web site!




Thanks! But I suspect you won't for long. I plan on publishing a series of pages showing why creationism is not only not science, but is in fact quite wrong.

I know of many scientists who are religious, many who are agnostics, and others who are atheists. In most cases, the religion need not be at odds with the science.

However, with creationism, I think they are at odds. All the evidence of modern astronomy points to an old Universe, and creationism demands a 6000 year old Universe. These are contradictory concepts; both cannot be true. A (young Earth) creationist astronomer must either ignore all the evidence or alter it somehow to fit his/her world view, and that ain't science.

I don't know if you are a creationist, but you appear to be sympathetic to it being taught in school (as I read in another thread). That's why I started off the way I did here. Sorry if this winds up being a hijack!

[Ben]

Originally posted by Libertarian
I think it's a shame that science and faith are still at odds after all these years, despite breakthroughs in epistemology and metaphysics that make the two seamlessly compatible.

Let me guess- they're still at odds because "bigotted scientists" have an "Inquisition-level tolerance" for religion, right?

:rolleyes:

-Ben

[Miller]

Just want to say that it was a link from The Bad Astronomy webpage that first brought me to the Straight Dope. So it's all Phil Plait's fault.

[Tars Tarkas]

originally posted by Ben

Let me guess- they're still at odds because "bigotted scientists" have an "Inquisition-level tolerance" for religion, right?


Yeah, those poor atheists, they are sooooooooooo persecuted. Just look at the public atheist floggings on CNN! The atheist/lion fights on ESPN! The Presidental Palace made from the skulls of the Atheist minority.

Blame here goes both ways, from creationists who can't understand the words "metaphor" and "story" to athiests with "i'm right and everyone else is stupid" mentalities. One of the athiests i know is so "hot dog" on atheism that he brings it up repeatedly, several times a day. He is more annoying that a Jack Chick fanatic. If i wasn't a Christian, i'd smack 'im around some. Maybe i should anyway, then when he gets all mad "i thought you were a christian," i'll be like "Hey, now i'm not, you got your wish, Mo-Fo!" and kick 'em in the spleen.

Naahh....

[Liberal]

Hmmm. Well....

ChoosyBeggar

Please elaborate or link to threads regarding the breakthroughs. I'm very curious.

Wow, there's lots. Probably my favorite is the work of Macksood Aftab, a Muslim. He begins with the contemporary western view (itself a recent breakthrough) that justifies faith by the epistemology of experience, and develops it nicely, weaving it together with the work of Iqbal, noting that "Iqbal is trying to point out that, intellectual reason and intuition are inseparable, and that in the act of comprehending something by intuition, the intellect plays an indispensable role, which cannot be discounted... Iqbal saw both of these avenues as complimentary, towards ultimate knowledge."

Iqbal, incidentally, had already provided an important breakthrough of his own regarding Kant's grandest impediment, his fear that noumanal objects (objects that lie outside all possible experience) cannot be derived from phenomenal objects (objects that are directly experienced) by developing intuition (and other forms of knowledge) as a valid form of experience.

If you're a regular reader of this forum, you'll recognize those points from my posts. It is entirely possible that your subjective experience and mine might differ since our respective consciousnesses are closed to one another.

Also please explain why you think it's such a shame. Aside from my theoretical [objections] to faith, I have no desire for it. I feel profound fulfillment even in the absence of faith.

Well, it's a shame because there is no reason for us to be enemies. I grant you your experience that there is no evidence for God as far as you are concerned. I ask only that you grant me my experience that God does exist in it. We each have our own moral journey.

Bad Astronomer

Thanks! But I suspect you won't for long. I plan on publishing a series of pages showing why creationism is not only not science, but is in fact quite wrong.

I'm afraid you've taken a wrong inference. I don't subscribe to creationism except to the extent that I believe that God is the metaphysical cause of existence, something that will be outside the purview of your pages (assuming you stick to science).

Ben

Let me guess- they're still at odds because "bigotted scientists" have an "Inquisition-level tolerance" for religion, right?

And because bigotted people of faith have an inquisition-level of tolerance for science. Both sides are equally ignorant and destructive.

I can sense from your sarcasm and rolled eyes that you still harbor a grudge against me for the points I made in your thread, despite that I left from it as you requested. The topic there was not how to debate debate against evolutionists (which would have raised the point in the previous paragraph) but how to debate effectively against creationists. I stand by my opinion that attacking their faith is a mistake on so many levels.

Nimune

Just want to say that it was a link from The Bad Astronomy webpage that first brought me to the Straight Dope.

Me, too!

[hardcore]

Tars Tarkas, I'm not sure how you arrived at "atheist persecution" from Ben's statement. Care to elaborate?

As I read it, Ben is challenging (as I do) Libertarian's continued fascination with the supposed persecution of religious beliefs by scientists. I feel the aforementioned "persecution" exists primarily within Libertarian's subjective experience, and is therefore lacking much in the way of objective evidence. Atheists may use "scientifically based" arguments to advance ideas about the nonexistence of a supreme being, but peer-reviewed scientific journals are resoundingly silent on this issue.

[The Bad Astronomer]

Originally posted by Libertarian

Bad Astronomer
Thanks! But I suspect you won't for long. I plan on publishing a series of pages showing why creationism is not only not science, but is in fact quite wrong.

I'm afraid you've taken a wrong inference. I don't subscribe to creationism except to the extent that I believe that God is the metaphysical cause of existence, something that will be outside the purview of your pages (assuming you stick to science).



Ah, good. I wasn't sure about that.

Anyway, I think that God is not necessarily outside of science's realm. If there is a Prime Mover, then perhaps there is evidence for one. If so, then the scientific method applies. Certainly, creationism makes predictions, and if you try to follow them through you see they are based on incorrect understanding of physics, math, astronomy, biology, etc. But creationism is but one of thousands of flavors of religion.

[Podkayne]

Thanks for the rundown, edwino.

Bad Astronomer: Nope, sorry, I'm not a Mars person--I work on Saturn's rings. But Heinlein didn't write any Saturn stories, per se, so I'm stuck with Poddy.

By the way, my one-word reply to people with questions about that vile Fox moon hoax show is, "Badastronomy.com!" You've got the most accessible point-to-point rundown I've seen. Plus, if they wander around your site, maybe they'll learn a thing or two.

*sigh* It's so sad to see a Great Debates thread degenerate into a hugfest. ; )

[tracer]

Um ... I do some astronomy too! (Hey, everybody, pay attention to meeeeeeeee!)

Unfortunately, the astronomy I pursue is more of the stellar than the planetary variety. I built and maintain a website I call "the Internet Stellar Database" at http://www.stellar-database.com, which serves up just about everything you'd want to know about most nearby stars (including how far they are from each other). It's running entirely on one server in my den, honest!

[Liberal]

Tracer

What a fantastic page! I've bookmarked it.

Hardcore

As I read it, Ben is challenging (as I do) Libertarian's continued fascination with the supposed persecution of religious beliefs by scientists. I feel the aforementioned "persecution" exists primarily within Libertarian's subjective experience, and is therefore lacking much in the way of objective evidence.

Did I take an improper inference from the quote above? Here it is again for your convenience:

"Religion is just an ordinary conviction in the mind and it is enfeebled when we accumulate knowledge, because it is essentially based upon ignorance."

Bad Astronomer

If there is a Prime Mover, then perhaps there is evidence for one. If so, then the scientific method applies.

As I understand it, the scientific method, as an epistemology, applies solely to things that are repeatable, and not necessarily to things for which there is evidence. That is, it is strictly tautological and can prove only what is hypothesized. The implications of its results, however, might be evidence of something else besides just the hypothesis, since evidence can be interpreted non-tautologically. For example, if scientists succeed in producing life from non-life, it can be argued that that success is evidence that God might have done the same thing! To test for a Prime Mover, it must not only create a universe out of nothing — repeatedly — but it must somehow "create" a Prime Mover that has always existed.

[hardcore]

Libertarian, your quote from Joseph McCabe supports my point. This was a man born in 1867 who was a well-known Atheist, not a scientist. If you intend to portray him as somehow representing the field of Science attacking the realm of Faith, I think you are sorely missing the mark. He may have tried to use logic and "scientific evidence" to bolster his argument, but this can hardly be said to indicate an "Inquisition" against Faith waged by Science. Joseph McCabe was nothing more than an atheist who promoted his beliefs, and did so quite a long time ago.

[choosybeggar]

The data so far (such as they are) do not support the notion that there exists a gap between the religiosity of physicists and biologists. I'll email Chronos, tell him that this thread is here, and ask him if he wishes to contribute. However, if he doesn't show up soon, nobody produces evidence that physicists are less likely to be atheist than biologists, then the debate topic, namely the reason for the difference, is moot.

Mods, please don't let the sun rise on this thread without someone, anyone, producing substantive evidence that we have a genuine debate going here.

[Liberal]

Hardcore:

I think you're right. As I began to search for evidence to back my suspicion, I uncovered very little of it, but I uncovered a lot more that indicates I have held an exaggerated estimation of the contempt that scientists might have for people of faith. Apparently, I made two errors in reason: (1) I extrapolated the specific to the general, and (2) I synthesized an undistributed middle.

One of my first encounters with an atheist here was with one who said that if he encountered my God he would rip out His heart with a sword (or some such), which was pretty familiar stuff in my dealings with hand-stabbling atheists. I attribute my number one error perhaps to my own skittishness which I ought not to hold because of the many counter-examples among the atheists here, like you and Gaudere, for example.

As to my second error, I likely distributed the 90% of exalted scientists who are reported to be atheists into a population of atheists who hold religion in contempt, when it is entirely possible that the scientists do not hate religion, but merely do not practice it. Sort of like I don't hate homosexuality, I just don't do it. Nor do I hold homosexuals (or homosexuality) in contempt.

All I can say in my defense is that it is hard sometimes to see where we ourselves are unreasonable. But that's one thing that's good about this place. We get to see how others see us.

I found this in my search that really impressed me. Some guy (http://www.rice.edu/armadillo/Sciacademy/riggins/things.htm) was really ripping into the Creationists, but he disclaimed himself with what I considered to be great aplomb:

The following is not intended as an attack upon the Bible as inspirational, divinely inspired, or of literary merit. Nor is it in any way an attack upon Christianity or any other religion, or upon the moral fabric of American society (although, inevitably, many creationists will see it as such, since any questioning of their own views is seen as an attack upon God Himself, and all that's holy). Neither is it an attack upon those who see divine purpose or design in evolution, or view evolution as the handiwork of a divine Hand. It most emphatically IS intended as a verbal pie-in-the-face to those who insist that the Bible is to be read as an accurate science book and description of the natural world. I hope it is an affront to those who demand that Genesis, in particular, be taken as literal, historical fact. And most particularly, I wish to be downright offensive to those who would remove evolution from our public schools or insert into schools sectarian religious teachings under the guise of "scientific creationism".

Now, all that said, be forewarned that, when dealing with people of faith who have had disproportionate exposure to the hand-stabbers, it might help your cause to be empathetic. Tell them what you told me, that atheism is not a science, and what the fellow I quoted said, that when you attack Creationists, you aren't attacking their faith, but their perversion of science.

[hardcore]

What a well-reasoned and intelligent post! Particularly the part where you think I'm right ;)

Great site, by the way. Another in the long list of bookmarks you have contributed to my collection.

[Liberal]

Hardcore:

Thanks. I found a most interesting site, The Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences (http://www.ctns.org/). I'm reserving an opinion for the moment until I dig deeper, but so far, I must say I'm very impressed. It gives tons of history and context on the Theory of Evolution, along with how creationism evolved. I believe (again, so far) that this is the most well-balanced and informative site I've seen yet. Their mission statement is short and sweet: "CTNS strives to bridge theology and the natural sciences through research, education and public service."

Here's an excerpt from the site:

I advance three propositions. The first is that Darwin's most significant intellectual contribution is that he brought the origin and diversity of organisms into the realm of science. The Copernican Revolution consisted in a commitment to the postulate that the universe is governed by natural laws that account for natural phenomena. Darwin completed the Copernican Revolution by extending that commitment to the living world.

The second proposition is that natural selection is a creative process that can account for the appearance of genuine novelty. How natural selection creates is shown with a simple example and clarified with two analogies, artistic creation and the "typing monkeys," with which it shares important similarities and differences. The creative power of natural selection arises from a distinctive interaction between chance and necessity, or between random and deterministic processes.

The third proposition is that teleological explanations are necessary in order to give a full account of the attributes of living organisms, whereas they are neither necessary nor appropriate in the explanation of natural inanimate phenomena. I give a definition of teleology and clarify the matter by distinguishing between internal and external teleology, and between bounded and unbounded teleology. The human eye, so obviously constituted for seeing but resulting from a natural process, is an example of internal (or natural) teleology. A knife has external (or artificial) teleology, because it has been purposefully designed by an external agent. The development of an egg into a chicken is an example of bounded (or necessary) teleology, whereas the evolutionary origin of the mammals is a case of unbounded (or contingent) teleology, because there was nothing in the make up of the first living cells that necessitated the eventual appearance of mammals.

I conclude that Darwin's theory of evolution and explanation of design does not include or exclude considerations of divine action in the world any more than astronomy, geology, physics, or chemistry do.

Let me know what you think.

[Chronos]

As summoned, I arrive. Ya gotta love the SDMB: Any offhand comment in any old thread can be dissected and analyzed in excrutiating detail. And yes, that's a good thing.

I was basing that comment on an article I had seen in Scientific American, which seems to have been based on the same data as the Nature article that Podkayne linked (by the way, Poddy, congratulations. That's the first time I ever saw vB break a URL in two places). I recalled that the belief rate was higher for physicists than for biologists, but either the SciAm article didn't mention the specific numbers, or (more likely) I didn't remember them. I've also found, in my personal experience, that there seem to be a good number of religious folks in physics (although I have little to no firsthand knowledge of biologists), so it seemed reasonable to me. It's certainly possible that I was wrong, or at least, not as right as I thought.

Since this is GD, I might as well say a few words more. I, personally, am a physicist, and I believe that God created the world. I don't, however, that His methods resembled those outlined in Genesis in anything other than the most superficial manner: I believe that the entire act of Creation took less than a Planck time (how much less, I'm not willing to say), and occured somewhere in the neighborhood of 1010 years ago. I've never seen any sort of inconsistancy between science and religion, and in fact, I consider science to actually reinforce my beleif. But then, that's just me.

[Liberal]

Welcome to Great Debates, Chronos! What an honor!

Hardcore

Here's another excerpt from that site I mentioned above that deals with that ICR thing about the human eye. It's worded so perfectly that it's ending is almost, well, surprising!

The creative role of natural selection must not be understood in the sense of the "absolute" creation that traditional Christian theology predicates of the Divine act by which the universe was brought into being ex nihilo. Natural selection may rather be compared to a painter which creates a picture by mixing and distributing pigments in various ways over the canvas. The canvas and the pigments are not created by the artist but the painting is. It is conceivable that a random combination of the pigments might result in the orderly whole which is the final work of art. But the probability of Leonardo's Mona Lisa resulting from a random combination of pigments, or St. Peter's Basilica resulting from a random association of marble, bricks and other materials, is infinitely small. In the same way, the combination of genetic units which carries the hereditary information responsible for the formation of the vertebrate eye could have never been produced by a random process like mutation. Not even if we allow for the three billion years plus during which life has existed on earth. The complicated anatomy of the eye like the exact functioning of the kidney are the result of a nonrandom process — natural selection.

[choosybeggar]

Actually, mods, the kids are having fun playing in here. Why rain on their good time? Can I take back my request to close the thread?

[jab1]

Originally posted by hardcore
Great site, by the way. Another in the long list of bookmarks you have contributed to my collection.Did you notice it was recommended by Dr.Matrix?

[jab1]

Lib, where did you get the idea that natural selection was a random process?

[Ben]

Originally posted by hardcore
As I read it, Ben is challenging (as I do) Libertarian's continued fascination with the supposed persecution of religious beliefs by scientists.

Indeed I was. Tars, I have started a Pit thread on Lib's original comments to which I was referring, if you're interested in the context:

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=71973

Despite his comments about how he's rethought his views on scientists, I have found other recent comments of his to be so slimy that I thought a Pit thread was in order.

-Ben

[hardcore]

Originally posted by jab1
Did you notice it was recommended by Dr.Matrix?
jab1, I guess I missed it, because I didn't even notice that he had posted to this thread; nevertheless, I really like the site as a suggested read for a creationist, due to its simplicity.

Libertarian

I kinda have mixed feelings about the CTNS site. One of the first items I opened was this (http://www.meta-library.net/evoprov/index-frame.html), and there's Duane Gish giving his "evolution is not a science -- evolution is a great evil" speech. Almost like listening to someone scrape their fingernails across the blackboard, though I must admit to watching with a "train wreck" sort of fascination. It's easy to see why so many are seduced by his folksy, Southern Baptist preacher type of delivery.

At least the side of Science was well represented, with Eugenie Scott and others getting equal time at this particular gathering. And the representatives from CTNS did seem to come down firmly on the side of science, though obviously positing a supreme being behind it all.

[tracer]

I have to drive past the "Gish Road" exit from Interstate 880 North every day on my way to work. I just hope that road's not named after Duane.

[Liberal]

Jab

Lib, where did you get the idea that natural selection was a random process?

Where did you get the idea that I had that idea? Because I said the ending was surprising?

Hardcore

Believe me, it's better to put Gish and company on display in a forum like theirs alongside reputable scientists of faith. That way, people can see for themselves who makes a better argument. Pretending they don't exist might raise a whole set of questions of its own.

Ben

Please stop hijacking Great Debates to advertise your Pit rant. You already linked to it in your own thread. That's called cross-posting around here.

[knappy]

One possible explanation for physicists believing in God more than biologists is the subject matter in question. I would describe the current state of biology and evolution as classical, in the sense that it embodies an elegant underlying mathematical model which is clearly consistent, intellectually satisfying, and apparently complete. As a result, biologists may be likely to say, like Laplace, that they have no need of a hypothesis regarding God. Some may disagree , but I believe there is no evidence that any explanations needed for the diverse and complex fields of biological study can’t be found within the current theories of biology. In other words, we believe we’ve got the big picture, and the rest is just details.

With physics, you’ve got an unsatisfying situation where we basically don’t have the big picture. We do have 2 medium-sized pictures (i.e., the quantum & classical levels), but they don’t appear to fit together easily.

Then there’s the fact that quantum physics is profoundly weird. Biology doesn’t have anything weird like this. There’s a variety of possible reactions to this weirdness (hey, Frank Tipler), and for some, it may lead them to religious belief.

Side point: You might get the impression that physicists are more spiritual than biologists by browsing the popular science books at the bookstore, but I suspect this method of surveying beliefs is quite skewed.

[Tars Tarkas]

okay, for hardcore, i was seeing the rolled-eye smilie as a sarcastic jab to puntuate was he said, and i was just taking it to a sarcastic extreme.

Hey, Lib, i think you need to set up a website, so whenever someone asks you the same questions again and again, you can just direct them there, instead of repeatedly saying the same thing, getting annoyed, then everyone end up thinking you're a jerk (i know i did at first before i realized why you got snippy sometimes). Then you can tell who hasn't taken the time to read you site and deem them unworthy of acknowledgment.


for jab, the random part of evolution is the mutations, coupled with what is happening in the environment at the time. white hair may be a wonderful advantage in the polar region or the desert, but if you live in a heavily forested area, you tend to stick out more and have a better chance of being eaten. most mutations are bad for whatever gets them, that is part of evolution also, the part you don't see walking around the forest.

[jab1]

Originally posted by hardcore
Originally posted by jab1
Did you notice it was recommended by Dr.Matrix?
jab1, I guess I missed it, because I didn't even notice that he had posted to this thread; nevertheless, I really like the site as a suggested read for a creationist, due to its simplicity.No, no. Just below "Poor Fossil Record" (http://www.rice.edu/armadillo/Sciacademy/riggins/things.htm#poor), you'll see a little box that says "Recognized By Dr. Matrix. World-Wide Web Science Excellence." I assume it's the same person as our Dr. Matrix. (Unfortunately, that box is a broken link.)

[Liberal]

Not a bad idea, Tars. Thanks.

[jab1]

Originally posted by Libertarian
Where did you get the idea that I had that idea? Because I said the ending was surprising?Well, yeah.

So why was the ending so surprising?

Ben

Please stop hijacking Great Debates to advertise your Pit rant. You already linked to it in your own thread. That's called cross-posting around here. Who died and made you moderator?

[Ben]

Originally posted by jab1
Ben

Please stop hijacking Great Debates to advertise your Pit rant. You already linked to it in your own thread. That's called cross-posting around here. Who died and made you moderator?

Thank you, jab1. In any event, it's blatantly obvious that I am not, in fact, hijacking threads, nor am I cross-posting. I provided one link in the original thread where the trouble started, and a second link in this thread where Lib continued his false accusations, because, as I explain in my Pit "rant," I felt that Lib was trying to smear me in this thread using the fact that folks here wouldn't be aware of what had transpired in the original thread. By "advertising" my Pit thread here, I'm only trying to set the record straight for all the spectators- precisely why anyone links to any Pit thread from GD.

Moreover, I'm involved in plenty of threads right now, and Libertarian is even in some of them, but I've only provided the link in ones relevant to my troubles with Lib.

-Ben

[Liberal]

So why was the ending so surprising?

It will be surprising from the point of view of the person to whom you present it. One secret to empathy is to think outside your own box.

Who died and made you moderator?

[shrug...]

Who died and made you Jack Webb?

[jab1]

Originally posted by Libertarian
It will be surprising from the point of view of the person to whom you present it.I asked why YOU specifically found the ending surprising, not why some hypothetical person would find it surprising.

One secret to empathy is to think outside your own box.And here I thought my mind (box) was a "closed reference frame."

Who died and made you Jack Webb? I'm not Jack Webb, I'm just a concerned citizen.

[tracer]

Libertarian wrote:

Who died and made you moderator?

Who died and made you Jack Webb?
Oh yeah? Well ... well ... well, um, who died and made you the "who died and made you" guy, huh? Hm? Huh?

(Hah! I guess I showed 'im that time, I guess I guess.)

[jab1]

Lib is head of the Redundant Department of Redundancy Department.

[Liberal]

Oh, Tracer, is that all you wanted? Why didn't you say so? Here...

[handing knife to Tracer... holding vest open...]

Jab

Okay, let's go back and look at where this started. I was debating with Hardcore. We came to an agreement (i.e., he changed my mind). I showed him a snippet from a website that tolerates both faith in God and science, saying, "Here's another excerpt from that site I mentioned above that deals with that ICR thing about the human eye. It's worded so perfectly that it's ending is almost, well, surprising!" The human eye thing is quite a famous argument ... okay, still with me? ... BY CREATIONISTS.

The snippet I showed Hardcore is intended for presentation to anti-evolutionists. Whether it surprises you or me or Hardcore is irrelevant. It will surprise the anti-evolutionists (for whom it is intended) because they will not expect the resolution at the end. It is almost baiting, and is ingenious in its conception. Watch this...

You: "...so you see, the human eye could not possibly have evolved by random chance, not even after billions of years."

Creationist: "Aha! So you admit that!"

You: [wicked grin...] "Why, yes, of course. A nonrandom process is required — natural selection."

:D Get it?

[elelle]

At this point it might be a hijack, but I haven't seen this particular address to the OP:

My parents are biologists, marine & environmental, to be specific. My (step)Dad was raised as a Mormon, and even did the bicycle thing as a teen, but after his time at Cornell, said he was an agnostic when pressed. It was mostly a moot issue though: I can't remember any talk of God or prophets when I was a kid, but a lot of conversations on how amazing this or that critter was.

For field biologists, the world is an incredibly beautiful, yet savage, place. To observe the daily death match necessary for survival by the majority of the world's population doesn't predispose one to thoughts of a benevolent, or even decent, God. Perhaps that would guide observrant minds to an atheist position. My Dad was a sweet person though, and enjoyed people, so he wasn't the sort to take a hard tack.

Here's a fine pertinent quote:
"The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the power of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. To know that which is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms- this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong to the rank of devoutly religious men."
-That'de be Albert Einstein

Maybe those drawn to explaining physics are of a more poetic, abstract bent, while those drawn to biology are of a more journalistic nature. Those tendencies, and subsequent observations, while grounded in scientific discipline, would carry over onto speculations of a spiritual nature. (Being human and all.)

[Liberal]

What splendid analysis! Thank you, ElElle.

[elelle]

Gracias, Libertarian, and for not spidering my on the fly. Y'all weave some intricate webs here.