Ways of Knowing: The Complementarity of Scientific and Religious Modes of Understanding Reality
By Sara Schwanke
INTR 342: Final Paper
Professor Crampton
24 May 2003
Scientific and religious approaches to comprehending reality are
deeply complementary. I do not use the word ‘deeply’ for emphasis
alone: the qualities that science and religion hold in common are anything but
obvious. Viewed on the surface, science and religion often appear to be at odds.
Details and dogmas frequently conflict, and misperceptions originating on either
side can lead to rejection of the unfamiliar system. At the lofty level of philosophical
abstraction, a satisfying reconciliation of science and religion will likely
always remain elusive. At the level of personal experience, however, incorporating
scientific and religious modes of understanding is not only possible, it is
profoundly enriching. The impulses, methods, and themes that define both science
and religion are strikingly similar. Curiosity and an insatiable desire to make
sense of the world are qualities that are innate to human life; unsurprisingly,
these impulses are the driving force behind both scientific and religious explorations.
The means that facilitate such explorations are fundamentally alike as well:
both science and religion are system-driven, with an emphasis on unflagging
action in the pursuit of greater understanding. Finally, both scientific and
religious modes of understanding inexorably return to a common set of recurrent
themes, emphasizing the creativity, dynamism, and unity of the world we perceive.
Curiosity is instinctive in humans. We are born knowing nothing
but impatient to know all: where did we come from? Why are we here? How are
we to live? Such questions represent more than a simple probing for objective
"facts": they are attempts to derive meaning and order from the observed
world. Responses to these questions often take the form of religious expressions.
Barbour notes this natural tendency, writing, "Unique to humans is the
need to live in a meaningful world. We have said that myths or sacred stories
are taken as manifesting some aspect of the cosmic order. They offer people
a way of understanding themselves and of ordering their experience." Long
before science arose as a disciplined way of classifying observed phenomena
within the context of the natural order, people developed religious frameworks
to satisfy their search for meaning. The concept of a divine Absolute has proved
to be remarkably consistent among religions distant in both space and time.
The link that connects them has little to do with particular practices or anthropomorphized
deities; instead, it is precisely the common impulse toward greater comprehension
of our world that signifies the existence of an Absolute goal. Armstrong explains
this idea with elegant simplicity:
The very nature of humanity, therefore, demands that we transcend
ourselves and our current perceptions, and this principle indicates the presence
of what has been called the divine in the very nature of serious human inquiry.
As human understanding and capabilities grew increasingly sophisticated, science
evolved as an additional means of inquiring into the reality that exists beyond
immediate perception. No longer content to rely upon symbolic descriptions of
humanity’s origin and position within the world, people gradually came
to separate the "objective" accumulation of verifiable information
from the physical world (at times directly observed, at times conjectured) from
the more intuitive, "subjective" religious accounts of human purpose
in the world. Nevertheless, the core desire to grasp and represent an intuited
sense of greater order within the experienced world remained the compelling
force behind both quests for wisdom. Science, just as much as religion, promised
to help people find coherent meaning in the world and to provide a system of
representative terms with which they could articulate and order the fruits of
their efforts.
Commitment to a systematic approach to knowledge is at the heart
of both science and religion, when practiced in their proper forms. Science
and religion are disciplines, requiring devotion, diligence, and integrity.
The idea of a constructed, guiding system of principles is emphasized in Webster’s
definitions of both science and religion. Science is, among other things, "a
department of systematized knowledge as an object of study" or "a
system of knowledge covering general truths or the operation of general laws."
In comparison, religion encompasses "a personal set or institutionalized
system of religious attitudes, beliefs, and practices" or "a cause,
principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith." These definitions,
while admirably highlighting the systematicity of both scientific and religious
ways of perceiving the world, are incomplete. The definition of science neglects
to emphasize the curiosity-driven search for knowledge that, far from being
a static "object of study," informs and propels scientific approaches
to reality. In a similar vein, religion as defined above lacks any intimation
of the active search for understanding which, as devoted practitioners will
affirm, is the very essence of religious pursuits. These weaknesses in Webster’s
definitions ultimately flow from the implicit (but unsupportable) assumption
that science, as a supposedly "objective" means of explaining and
representing reality, reserves all claim to human "knowledge" of the
forces at work in our world, while the more easily recognized subjectivity of
religious explorations relegates religious understanding to the acceptance of
established "beliefs." As I have argued elsewhere, however, both science
and religion are subjective modes of representing what is perceived as real
so that individuals can communicate and expand their comprehension of the reality
that surrounds us. Both science and religion are humanly constructed systems
that enable us to channel our desire for comprehension into orderly and communicable
modes of exploration.
The official definitions of science and religion would be greatly
improved if revised to recognize the subjective limitations, and thus the essential
similarity, of each. When the two disciplines are viewed within the context
of their respective contributions to and limitations in creating a more complex
appreciation for the world, pursuing personal understanding through both is
seen to be perfectly reasonable. Calvin himself was firmly convinced that the
more individuals applied themselves to both religious and scientific learning,
the fuller their comprehension of the underlying reality would be. According
to Armstrong, "Calvin had explicitly commanded the scientific study of
the natural world in which the invisible God had made himself known. There could
be no conflict between science and scripture: God had adapted himself to our
human limitations in the Bible." Scientific systems for ordering observations
of the world need not threaten spiritual efforts to make our experience in it
more coherent and meaningful, nor does a belief in the methods and discoveries
of science preclude appreciation for the enriching potential of religious attitudes
in personal experience. Religious leaders like Calvin were certainly not alone
in recognizing the value of differing approaches for understanding the "what"
and "why" of life on earth. Many professional scientists, too, have
explicitly acknowledged the separate but complementary roles of science and
religion in human experience. William Purves, in the opening chapter of a well-known
biology text, writes,
Evidence gathered by scientific procedures does not diminish the
value of religious accounts of creation. […Religious beliefs] serve different
purposes, giving meaning and spiritual guidance to human lives. They form the
basis for establishing values—something science cannot do.
How to better explain this difference in scientific and religious
purposes? Imagine an art exhibit displaying two works by the same artist: a
detailed photograph of a friend hangs next to a life-sized, abstract sculpture
of the same person. Both works are representational. They reflect the intentions
and perceptions of the artist as much as the actual reality of the subject but,
in offering two very different perspectives, approximate the complex essence
of the friend more fully than any isolated description. The photograph may capture
the precise alignment of features and a hint of expression; the sculpture, while
less detailed, suggests physicality and presence. Which representation is most
"accurate?" This is a subjective question, with no objective answer.
The exhibit would be incomplete without either the photograph or the sculpture,
as each captures essential qualities of the real subject that can at best be
represented through a variety of media. The same is true of scientific evidence
and religious beliefs: both give meaning to human lives by providing us with
alternate, though not competing, glimpses of a common reality.
Before moving on to a discussion of the ideals held in common
by science and religion, there is one more point to be made in regards to the
methods driving both disciplines. The true enthusiast of either science or religion
(or both) is as enthralled by the pursuit of understanding as he is by the ultimate
result. As most any scientist will tell you, the appeal of science is in the
"doing," in the ceaseless generation of new hypotheses and small successes,
not in formulating a grand theory of the universe and then sitting back in smug
satisfaction (if such a thing were possible). The satisfaction gained from experimental
successes certainly adds to the reward of scientific pursuits, but it is only
secondary. There are always new processes to be explored and technologies to
be developed, driving scientific investigation ever forward.
In religion, too, there is an emphasis on activity and ceaseless progression
toward some conception of the Absolute. Religion is not the scrupulous observance
of a set moral or behavioral code; that is religiosity. Religious activity,
instead, is constituted by behaviors that facilitate consistent progress toward
a more coherent acceptance of the world and human purpose within it. The aim
of religion is not to know "God" or "Truth," but rather
to acknowledge the awe-inspiring existence of an order far beyond the reach
of any human endeavor, scientific or otherwise. Behavior that conforms to religious
precepts and traditions, when sincerely understood and undertaken, is a symbolic
enactment of this acknowledgement. For both science and religion, the ultimate
inaccessibility of perfect comprehension is what drives their adherents forward.
Rather than acting as a deterrent, acceptance of the fact that absolute knowledge
is an impossible ideal liberates us to pursue understanding in whatever avenues
open before us. Giacometti is recorded as saying, "The more I work, the
more I see things differently, that is, everything gains in grandeur every day,
becomes more and more unknown, more and more beautiful. The closer I come, the
grander it is, the more remote it is." The wonder of knowledge, be it scientific
or religious, is inextricable from the ceaseless pursuit of an infinite reality.
We have considered similarities in the impulses and methods inherent to both
scientific and religious understandings of the world; now we can examine a few
of the specific themes that arise repeatedly in each. As noted earlier, creativity,
development, and unity are concepts that are essential to science and religion
alike. While the bulk of this discussion has taken a broadly comparative approach
between science and religion, the particular examples that will be used to illustrate
these themes are taken from a Christian viewpoint. The reliance on Christian
imagery and philosophies, however, does not imply that these themes are absent
from other religious traditions; indeed, just as the preceding sections were
written to apply to a variety of religious approaches, the following concepts
figure largely in the writings of Jewish mystics, Sufi poets, and many others.
Creativity is the mechanism by which the original instant of creation
is continuously reenacted. Whether you approach it from a scientific or religious
perspective, the universe came into existence in a moment of unfathomable power,
sparking the conditions that allowed for the incredible complexity and interconnectivity
of the world in which we are privileged to take part. Attempting to describe
the first instant of existence, Sidney Liebes writes,
Our words refer to this later world in which we live, but all
that is about us descends from that compact beginning and thus each thing and
even our words themselves must carry some faint and stable relationship with
the original fire. Though we have no single word sufficient for that singular
event at the beginning of time, perhaps with a spectrum of words—fire,
rock, blaze, radiant energy—we can with all humility intimate something
of that originating mystery.
The profound sense of humbleness in the face of this "originating
mystery" is essential to Christian perspectives of creation as well. Interpreted
symbolically, the Genesis creation stories emphasize the incomprehensible power
that prompted the first emergence of energy, light, and matter. Creation is
not limited to this moment of origin, however, but is a cumulative cycle of
growing order and form, the process of creative power in action. The writers
of Genesis call this creative force "God," the animating power that
both initiates and sustains the harnessing of energy into matter, activity,
and, eventually, life. Thousands of years later, Aquinas refers to it as "the
Divine Omnipotence" that "must not be taken as the power to effect
any imaginable thing, but only the power to effect what is within the nature
of things."
Creativity extends far beyond the moment of creation. In science,
it is the continual restoking of Liebes’s "original fire," the
amazing force in nature that prompted the development of eukaryotes from prokaryotes,
that causes genes to reshuffle, and that produces ever greater diversity of
life on earth. In religious terms as well, we can conceive of Aquinas’s
"Divine Omnipotence" as the creative force that injected a capacity
for novel change into the very "nature of things," so that creativity
remains a primary channel through which the divine effected and affects the
changing universe.
It is impossible to discuss the concept of creativity without
talking, too, about development and change over time. Adopting a scientific
perspective, Liebes states simply, "Life is a story of permanence and change."
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, French paleontologist and Jesuit priest, utters
a similar sentiment: "We live surrounded by ideas and objects infinitely
more ancient than we imagine; and yet at the same time everything is in motion."
On another occasion, Chardin expresses the sense of wonder that the idea of
incessant change provokes: "Till the very end of time matter will always
remain young, exuberant, sparkling, new-born for those who are willing."
Change, like creativity, is a source of inspiration for believers in science
and religion alike.
In both science and religion, certain thinkers have arrived at
very similar interpretations of the essentiality of change and development in
the universe. In the 1980s, two Chilean biologists developed a definition of
life with change as its essence. Distinguishing this novel definition of life
by the name autopoiesis (literally, self-organization or self-composition),
the biologists asserted that life can be recognized by the capacity to re-create
itself and to engage in continual self-renewal. By this definition, systems
such as the lithosphere and hydrosphere that are self-regenerative and that
provide the water and minerals essential to living things may themselves be
classified under this expanded notion of "life." Isaiah, the Old Testament
prophet, writes of the "word of our God" as the animating force behind
all natural regeneration, asserting that the withering of grass and the shifting
of mountains reveal the "glory of the Lord" at work in the natural
world. The only true constancy in the universe, this "glory," is the
force of change.
In scientific discourse, the mention of change inevitably sparks
a discussion of evolution, a concept which, in the end, underlines the utter
significance of both change and the incredible interconnectedness of the world.
All systems in the universe are engaged in perpetual evolution, as established
orders are altered and new orders spring from chaos. Some Christians have found
it difficult to reconcile the idea of evolutionary biological change with strictly
literal interpretations of Biblical accounts of creation and natural change,
but this incompatibility disappears when Scripture is viewed as a symbolic representation
of the world. Chardin presents one view of evolutionary change that is compatible
with the symbolic significance of both creation and Christ. For the sake of
brevity, I borrow from a summary of Chardin’s attempt to merge scientific
and religious ideas of development. Referring to Chardin, Armstrong writes,
"[h]e saw the whole evolutionary struggle as a divine force which propelled
the universe from matter to spirit to personality and, finally, beyond personality
to God. God was immanent and incarnate in the world." Evolution can thus
be viewed as a religious as well as a scientific concept, one which values change
and development over time.
As scientific and religious understanding progresses, increasing attention is
being given to the concept of unity, both immanent and potential. The idea of
a divine force at once progressive and immanent, as presented by Chardin in
the preceding quotation, is intriguing; in the tension it posits between directed
change and present wholeness, it recalls the scientific "paradox"
that ever-increasing complexity is accompanied by ever-increasing order. Returning
once again to Armstrong’s synopsis of Chardin, "Scripture tells us
that God is love, and science shows that the natural world progresses towards
ever-greater complexity and to greater unity in this variety." For both
Chardin’s interpretation of Scripture and scientific conceptions of change,
unity and reconciliation appear to be the ultimate endpoint of all development.
For Chardin, "unity-in-nature" is at once the animating force of creation
and the essence of material and spiritual change. For scientists such as the
Chilean biologists mentioned earlier and those who developed the Gaia hypothesis,
the fundamental interconnectedness and unity of all natural systems similarly
points to the conclusion that creativity and change are the essence of unity
and, indeed, life itself. Responding to increasing scientific evidence that
inanimate matter, living creatures, and the energetic forces through which they
act are ultimately inseparable, Liebes asks, "Can it be that what we call
life and nonlife are simply complentarities in the great dance of life over
time, as physicists have found with mass and energy, particle and wave?"
Whether or not one explicitly equates the unified "dance of life over time"
with the belief in unity as the preeminent value of divine power, it is possible
from both a scientific and religious perspective to answer this question with
a confident "Yes."
This exploration into the similarities in impulse, approach, and theme among scientific and religious understandings of the world attempts to be neither comprehensive nor immune to attack. There are any number of challenges that can be raised by critics bent on insisting that science and religion are philosophically incompatible. Instead, this paper seeks simply to demonstrate the complementarity of scientific and religious approaches to understanding the world, in the hopes that these observations can help to enrich others’ understandings of this complex, wonderful world we live in.
Isaiah 40: 3-8
The voice of one crying in the wilderness:
"Prepare the way of the Lord;
Make straight in the desert
A highway for our God.
Every valley shall be exalted
And every mountain and hill brought low;
The crooked places shall be made straight
And the rough places smooth;
The glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
And all flesh shall see it together;
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken."
The voice said, "Cry out!"
And he said, "What shall I cry?"
"All flesh is grass,
And all its loveliness is like the flower of the field.
The grass withers, the flower fades,
Because the breath of the Lord blows upon it;
Surely the people are grass.
The grass withers, the flower fades,
Because the breath of the Lord blows upon it,
Surely the people are grass.
The grass withers, the flower faces,
But the word of our God stands forever."