Belief and Science

New Zealand Tablet, Volume L, Issue 40, 11 October 1923, Page 21

Belief and Science

(By Very Rev. T. Gilbert, S.M., M.A.)

In the first of a series of lectures recently delivered in Wellington— and elsewhere in New Zealand— speaker, who described himself as a “pedlar of culture,” categorically affirmed the essential conflict of Science and Religion in the second lecture, the same popular exponent of “science” rudely mangled his own claims to be regarded as a reliable witness to Truth by cavalierly remarking that no scientist would waste his time proving the “fact” of Evolution.

The weakness of philosophical method betrayed in the first unwarranted affirmation was only equalled by the lamentable dearth of scientific method that begot the second assumption; for neither is there an essential conflict between Science and Religion, nor is the theory of Evolution any more than a theory. The unqualified assertion of a conflict on the one hand, and the unscientific assumption on the other spring from the common underlying error that there is no God. Science now is God, says the secretary of the Rationalist Press Association, for with the death of Alfred Russel Wallace there died the last man of science who still believed in a God Truly a clever piece of the pedlar's art to exclude the witness of Mendel and Pasteur "Windle and Wasmann and Dorlodot were forsooth not worthy of notice from the translator of Haeckel and Klaatch! From his gaudy-box the "pedlar" brought forth the newest trinketsall now according to him bearing the hall-mark of "Science and Culture"— underneath the veneer one still could see the pre-war "made in Germany"; for what the "pedlar" proffered as Science and Culture is merely Haeckel's materialism "writ large."

It might well be pleaded that good time, and good paper too are wasted in noticing these age-old errors of the pedlar's wares—but it is well to realise that these are the views current at ■ our local University Colleges; boys and girls in their teens are taught them as the foundation of their Philosophy and Science; to refuse to accept these views is to range oneself with the dwindling ranks of the obscurantist. It is well again to remember that these views represent the basis and spirit of many popular manuals that find favor at our Universities and Training Colleges—to take only one example, H. G. Wells's Outline of History is a piece of purely materialistic propaganda. Read the following from page 659 of the Outline:— "If all the animals and man had been evolved in this ascendant manner, then there had been no first parents, no Eden, and no Fall. And if there had been no Fall, then the entire historical fabric of Christianity, the story of the first sin and the reason for an atonement, upon which the current teaching based Christian emotion and morality, collapsed like a house of cards." These words epitomise the spirit of the Outline. If you read through 780 pages of "History" permeated with this spirit, some mental stock-taking will be necessary; and yet Training College students (at least in one centre) are asked to study and summarise the Outline. These students are not trained logicians, nor philosophers, nor theologians, but. for the most part boys and girls, many of whom have not passed even Matriculation. These students of to-day will be the teachers of tomorrow. If we further recall the fact that our "national" system of education is virtually based on the "no-God" theory it looks very much as if, in its anxiety to avoid the "war of the sects," the "national" system is lending its effective aid to make the world "unsafe for theocracy" (pace Woodrow Wilson). In fact in this "loyal" Dominion, the prophecy of the end of all religious belief, and the coming reign of materialism has been more than once applauded to the echo. And is there any wonder? Our "national" system of education certainly does not teach there is a God; our universities teach there is no God; what wonder then if many of us find ourselves adrift on the ice-fields of unbelief with no prospect before us but the chilly gloom of another ice-age, "when

"Tears fell, and hopes, and men, 7 r And crowns, and cities, and blood, and trampled plain, And nations, and honor, and God, and always rain" ?

The present trend of education in New Zealand as in many other countries is. towards sceptical indifference and agnos-

ticism. When to these is added the arrogant dogmatism of certain popular exponents of Science, you have the chief negative and positive forces that are calculated to bring about, in the eyes of the unwary and uneducated, the “collapse” of Christian teaching, of which Wells speaks in the Outline. But iss the voice of the “popular exponent” really the lion’s voice, or has ( the “exponent” merely tricked himself out in the lion’s skin, the better to imitate his roar ? Let us free ourselves from the sound and fury of battle awhile, and see where we stand. Leaving aside Revelation for the moment, the Christian believes in the existence of a Supreme Being—Creator of all things visible and invisible God. To him God is the necessary First Being, and the ultimate reason for the existence of all things. That truth the Christian believes as he believes the truth that normal man has ten fingers, though, of course, the grounds of belief, —or the motives of credibility not be identical. When therefore the believer in God’s existence is bluntly told that Science will tolerate “no Carpenter God,” but demands our acceptance of the “fact” that Matter, of itself and by itself, evolved, from its primal chaotic mass, into the aspiring mind of man, he very naturally asks himself is “Science” speaking of what it knows, or has it passed beyond its proper borders into the legitimate realm of another Science? Hence one very naturally makes a distinction between admitting what is undoubtedly a fact, and the theories of knowledge and philosophy which underlie the interpretation of these facts. After all, no branch of science is independent of philosophyit derives its national basis from metaphysics. Hence, the great difficulty for any man to take an absolutely unbiassed view of the evidence of the facts of physical science. A biologist or an astronomer is not necessarily briefed as a logician; a schoolmaster’s authority is not recognised beyond the precincts of his class-room; but the biologist will view everything in terras of life the astronomer is for ever seeing stars, and the schoolmaster grows sick of the presence of perpetual boy. Professional specialisation and professional pride too are apt to color our outlook on the world at large. Speaking particularly on the very question of absolute evolution (i.e. materialistic) M. Yves Delarge, Professor of the Sorbonne, remarks: “I am absolutely convinced that a man supports or does not support transforraism (i.e. materialistic evolution) not for reasons taken from natural history, but because of his philosophical views. If there were any other scientific hypothesis than that of descent to explain the origin of species, a number of transformists would give up their present opinions as insufficiently proved.” ' And even Kellogg in his Darwinism To-Day speaks of “the curiously nearly completely .subjective character of the evidence for both the theory of descent and natural selection.” (Page IS.) The distinctive mark of the age is undoubtedly the enormous advance made by the experimental sciences; but when we leave the laboratory and proceed to the lecture room and use our newly discovered fact to illustrate an hypothesis or theory, then we are no longer entitled to claim for our theory or hypothesis the same respect as we claim for our fact. We begin then to generalise and thereby enter the domain of metaphysics. Here we may expect to meet with some who will question, not the fact we have so patiently and laboriously discovered, but the application or interpretation of the evidence of that fact. Truth is not the monopoly of the laboratory. If philosophy teaches me there is an Omnipotent Creator I am surely justified in striving to harmonise that truth with the proven facts of science, and no scientist as such is within his rights in telling me I dare not. If all the scientists in the world professed that they had no belief in a God, yet God might still exist. If we depended solely on the facts of science to prove the existence of God then that argument—a mere counting of heads—might ’have some value, and scientists would be justified in the unqualified dogmatism of some of their popular exponents. But, let- me repeat, there qre truths other than those demonstrable , by experimental science, and the existence and claims of these truths should be recognised and considered before we accept such generalisations that the theory of Evolution is a proved fact, and secondly that it destroys the arguments for the existence of God. For some scientists, who are absolutely neu-

tral on the question of God’s existence, the theory of Evolution is the only possible explanation—every’ tittle of' evidence in support of the theory becomes unduly exaggerated; and it is spoken of .as an established fact of j science without reference to God’s existence at all. For j other scientists who have either positively postulated the : non existence of God, or who have reasoned themselves into belief of His non-existence, every particle of available evidence is brought into commission to break down and batter the teleological argument in favor of God’s existence —familiarly known as the argument from design. Now the first class to whom I referred, having no positive belief in God’s existence, should not in justice be quoted as among those who “oppose” belief s in God. They simply do not count one way or another. But those whose philosophical views necessitate no first necessary Being will not be slow in using the silence of their, brother scientists as an admission of sympathy with and co-operation in their own views. They want no God, and knowing that the argument from design is the least subtle of all arguments in': favor of God’s existence, they attempt to break it down in the name of Science. If you want to be heard you have only to shout loud and long enough, and the people on the highway will take you as the official crier. “Science,” you shout, “says there is no God.” Whereas Science says no such thing. It is your philosophy that teaches you there is no God; 'and you use the cloak of Science to spread your philosophy. “The doctrine of Evolution,” declares the Princeton biologist, Edwin Grant Conklin (The Direction of Human Evolution, p. 210), “neither affirms nor denies the existence of God” and on page 221 of the same work he says: “And yet where science ends faith begins, and like the child or the savage, the philosopher or scientist may still say: “In the beginning God.” Professor Conklin is recognised as “one of the foremost living biologists.”

Tt is not Science that rails against God—it is the modern creed of the eternity of matter—Haeckelism pure and simpleand it is undoubtedly to the influence of this materialism exerted consciously in some cases, and unconsciously in others, that we witness the unscientific eagerness of some eminent scientists to accept as facts what still yet are theories, and it is certainly due to this same materialism that we j find the names of many eminent scientists listed as opponents of religion, though they have never written a word on religion and perhaps are not competent to do so. It cannot be denied that there has been haste simply ..materialists were anxious to establish their philosophy. Not only have scientists been in a [way stampeded into this undue haste, but the votaries of this philosophy have gone further, and now try to make people believe there is a necessary conflict between science and religion. There is no such conflict. There may be and often is a considerable conflict between two views or interpretations of factsthere may be even difficulties in harmonising one truth with another —but conflict in the sense popularly used, there is none. The conflict is between two philosophiesor two religions if you likematerialism and Christianity. Formerly we used to Conjure up the story of Galileo, and prove conclusively that the Catholic Church opposed science. Now, however, a more subtle means is used. The new philosophy postulates its identity with science, and thus tries to comprise- the issues. It is a clever ruse, and is of a piece with what Newman long ago called "poisoning the wells." All the brains in the world do not belong to scientists, and believers in God are not all so .hopelessly benighted as sometimes you are told. In its modern phase the alleged conflict between science and religion is due chiefly to two causes. First to the fact that theists took the statements of some scientists too seriously. ; What was really, only a disguised (conscious or unconscious) philosophical view they regarded as an actual fact of supermental science. What was really only "a big bluff" they mistook for truth; hence they very .naturally took fright, and very often without examining the adduced facts and theories for themselves blindly accepted their opponents' estimate, of the position. But that misguided" fear is no evidence of conflict; Christians are quite familiar with the gentle rebuke "0 ye of little Faith." Even granting that there have not been wanting Christian writers, who,'because of their erroneous notions

of science, and of the requirements of the Christian •economy, have comprised the Christian religion "in falsely representing it as irrenconcilable with scientific theories" {Dorlodot, p. 62), yet they are not the voice of the Church; their views, begotten of a false loyalty, are their own. If we seek the real mind of the Church on this important question, we shall find it in the Encyclical Letter "Providentissimus Deus" by Leo XIII. "There can never, indeed, be any real discrepancy between the theologian and the physicist," wrote the learned Pope, "as long as each confines himself within his own lines, and both are careful, as St. Augustine warns us, ' not to make rash assertions or to assert what is not known as known.' If dissension should arise between them, here is the rule also laid down by St. Augustine for. the theologian:—' Whatever they can really demonstrate to be true of physical nature, we must show to be capable of reconciliation with our Scriptures; and whatever they assert in their treatises which is contrary to these Scriptures of ours, that is Catholic Faith, we must either prove it as well as we can to be entirely false, or at all events we must, without the smallest hesitation, believe it to be so.' " , tion, believe it to be so.' " In another Encyclical, "Aeterni Patris," the same Pontiff wrote: —."Every wise thought and every useful discovery, whatever it may come from, should be gladly and gratefully welcomed." If these sentiments betray a conflict, then words have lost their meaning. _ To support this theory of conflict between religion and science, it is now the fashion to limit your witness on the latter side to the men of the last decade or so. Is it not a little ungrateful to forget the names of Lamarck, •Mendel, and Pasteur?: not to speak at length of the other Christian scientists of modern times (see Encyclopaedia Britanmca, eleventh edition, article "The Beginning of Science"). Lamarck, the founder of the whole theory of Evolution was a believer in God; Mendel was a monk and an abbot at that; and Pasteur's testimony is worth quoting even at the risk of being hackneyed :-«C'est pour avoir refiechi et etuche beaucoup que. j'ai garde une foi de Breton; si f avals reflechi et etudie da-vantage fen serais venu a une foi de Brctonne" It i s no harm to know too that according to the authority of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, out of the eleven founders of the various biological divisions, all with the single exception of Darwin-and here there is " 0 certainty-were positive believers I wonder did Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn (who lately discovered in Mongolia the Dinosaur's eggs, ten million years old-) believe in the boasted conflict when he dedicated his "Men of the Old Stone Age" to Abbe Henri BreuilP Or was Vernon Kellogg " s when in Darwinism To-Day he wrote of the Jesuit Eric Wasmann, -whose remarkable studies on an and their mess-mates have made him well known to biologists'? In our anxiety to prove our point, let us not be ungrateful and overshoot the mark. "But for a few thousand such pioneers as Newton and Pasteur in conceivably rare, the rest of us," declared Bateson, "should be in the Palaeolithic era, knowing nothing of metals writing, arithmetic, weaving nor pottery."- ' Now while it is freely admitted that some Italian writers, erred in their attitude to Science, let it be understood that the odium theologicvm is not their distinctive ailment.. In modern times the incidence of the complaint has been curiously diverted to the other side. Listen to this reason, given by Huxley, for supporting the theory of Evolution: "One of ,ts greatest merits is that it occupies a position of complete and irreconcilable antagonism to hat vigorous and consistent enemy of the highest intellectual moral and social life of mankind-the Catholic Church " Very little Science in that pious sentiment! Haeckel we know, described his Materialistic Evolution as Monistic heavy artillery" directed against Christianity To him God was a "gaseous vertebrate" a conception which even Conklin described "as gross and blasphemous." Such outbreaks of "Theophotia" do good neither to pure science nor to materialist evolution. Lately a learned lecturer in Wellington spoilt the effect" of an otherwise excellent axiom by a subsequent mental confusion, when he enunciated the pursuit of truth through reliance on science much knowledge can be gained. And most important of all, by the pursuit of truth our intellectual

faculties grow, and the love of Truth for Truths' sake comes with the pursuit of it; whereas"— note "whereas, if we rely on the authority of the Bible or of the church and refuse to exercise our own reasoning faculties', then these faculties' suffer atrophy, and any possible progress of the race is so far retarded."* It would be difficult in these days to parallel such a farrago of truth and fiction.

Probably the most lamentable result of all modern thought is the scepticism of the world to-day, and while the votaries of this new.philosophy enjoy their joke about the "myths and superstitions" of poor simple minded believers,- let them ask themselves if their own ranks are so united as they think? Even Kellogg, in the 1919 edition of the Encyclopaedia Amrcicana, under the' article, says:—" ... the most modern theory in explanation of Evolution is both essentially anti-Lam-arkian and anti-Darwinian, and allies itself with that type of explanation, which may be called orthogenetic and vitalistic." After all the scientist can ill afford to indulge in unalloyed dogmatism until his theory has been absolutely proved. The true scientific spirit will always distinguish between theory and fact, and will always gladly welcome information from any quarter, even though it does not harmonise with preconceived ideas and long cherished ideas. "In the light of the new knowledge which has come to us," writes the Rev. T. J. Walshe, in the Principles of Christian Apologetics, "and which has in some directions materially modified our scientific teaching—knowledge to be subsequently modified by* a fuller and deeper revelation of Nature's secrets— appreciate the import of the words:

Our little systems have their day, They have their day and cease to be They are but broken lights of Thee, And Thou, 0 Lord, art more than they!

And when the play is over and the song is sung, it is interesting, at least, to know what the audience thinks of it all. Though Sir Arthur Keith and Sir Ray Lancaster, and Sir Ernest Rutherford, and the many others whom Mr. Joseph McCabe loves to call his friends, would spurn to take their Science "from the London Times, yet even they must have enjoyed the humor and realised the truth of the-little homily that' "Granny" read them on June 9 1905:

"No one possessed of a sense of humor can contemplate without amusement the battle of Evolution, encrimsoned (dialectically speaking) with the gore of innumerable combatants, encumbered with corpses of the (dialectically) slain and resounding with the cries of the living, as they hustle together in the fray. There are ' zoologists, embryologists, botanists, morphologists, biometricians, anthropologists' sociologists, persons ; v with banners and persons without; Darwinians and neo-Darwinians, (what a name!), Lamarck-ia-ns and neo-Lamarckians, Galtonians, Haeckelians, Weismannians, de Vriesians, Mendelians, Hertwigians, and many more whom it would be tedious to enumerate. Never was seen such a melee ! The humor of it is that they all claim to represent "Science," the serene, the majestic, the absolutely sure, the undivided and immutable, the one and only vice-gerent of Truth, her other self. Not theirs the weakness of the theologians or - the metaphysicians, who stumble about in uncertainty, obscurity, and ignorance, with their baseless assumptions, flimsy hypotheses, logical fallacies, interminable dissensions, and all the other marks of inferiority on which the voteries ,of science pour'ceaseless scorn. Yet it would puzzle them to point to a theological battlefield • exhibiting more uncertainty, obscurity dissension, assumption and fallacy than their own. For the plain truth is that, though some agree in this and that, there is not a single point in which all agree; battling for Evolution, they have torn it, to pieces nothing is left, nothing at all on their showing, save a few fragments strewn about the arena."

. * What is Unitarianism—Rev. W. Heathcote.