1.
I am interested in many things; poetry, music, politics, cosmology and ethics are prominent among them. I am decidedly uninterested in many things, too; guns, stamp collecting, Angry Birds, baking and synchronized swimming are among the many subjects I choose not to be subjected to. To the latter list I must add listening to people debate whether God exists or not. It seems so pimply-adolescent to me. I do realize that it is important to point out to fundamentalists and other religious people who take their mythologies to be facts that their "facts' are at best myths and at worst nonsense.. Fundamentalism, which no doubt provides consolation to some, is on the whole quite detrimental. It often goes in tandem with a denial of evolution; the teaching of so-called intelligent design in schools is undoubtedly creating fetid backwaters in young minds that need to be cleared by the alembics of scientific reasoning. So giving clear indications that the Watchmaker's heart isn't ticking is important. But it is tiresome, since the result of debates between scientific views and backwater religious views are so obvious. I've watched a few of these debates; scientists have won all of them so far. But something inside me protests. Not so fast, it says; it will have more to say in the course of this essay.
2.
One of the scientists with an almost religious zeal in his fight for atheism, is Richard Dawkins. He is a great evolutionary biologist; two of his books, "The Selfish Gene" and "The Ancestors' Tale" have especially delighted me and made me see evolution in a new way. He writes exceptionally well and is almost always exceptionally informative as well. He is also a tireless preacher for atheism. His book, "The God Delusion" falls considerably short in comparison to his books on biology. How often can you inform a reader that myths are myths and facts are facts without boring that reader to tears?
I have seen, in spells of insomnia, some of his debates with "true believers" on YouTube. (These appear "miraculously" as recommendations for me to view, most likely because I frequently write about religion; the internet is apparently omniscient.) The arguments are always the same. There is no evidence for a creator. Things inevitably evolve from the simple to the complex; beginning with God, an incredibly complex being, explains nothing. Physicists have now posited a reasonable theory that the universe originated as a quantum Free Lunch, and needs no creator as an explanation for everything. Believing that Jesus is the Son of God because he is portrayed that way in a book written decades after his death in an age that had no idea about the laws of science is as ridiculous as believing one of the Hindu myths that asserts that creation arose from an ocean of milk. It is not necessary to believe in God to do good, etc. All these arguments are undeniably valid to those who refuse to suppress rationality. Sometimes opponents hold their own for a while, stating science isn't everything, etc. They eventually devolve, however, into utter nonsense, such as asserting that Christ is literally present in the Eucharist.
The result is always the same: Logic KO's Ignorance! Is that really all there is to it?
Before answering that question, I must tell you my version of a well-known story. It is a Hasidic tale attributed to Rebbe Simha-Bunam of Pshishkhe.
3.
Yitzak ben Yekel was a poor Jew who lived in Cracow many years ago. Outwardly he was not the brightest bulb in the Hasidic community; the light of his piety, however, shone inside him with the light of a thousand suns, even though few noticed. He was extremely poor; he was saddled with debt and was greatly saddened by the fact that he could not, due to lack of means, not due a lack of their inner and outer beauty, arrange his daughters' marriages. Although still in the flush of youth, they were not getting any younger, as they say. But Yitzak's faith in his Creator was unshakable. He trusted in Him and was convinced that somehow, some way, things would turn out well.
One night, after going to bed while still hungry, Yitzak had a dream. He found himself at the foot of a bridge that led to a palace. A voice from a great height told him, "This is Prague. The bridge leads over the Moldau, as you can see, to a palace. Look around you and fix the details in your mind. You must go to Prague. Under the bridge you will find a white stone. Remove the stone and dig. You will find a great treasure buried there. Use it to help yourself, your family and your community."
What a strange dream, Yitzak thought the next morning. Prague is very far away and I have no means for travel. I will not risk making things worse--things are bad enough already--by following a silly dream. Then Yitzak went to work, eking out a living as a peddler.
But that was not the end of it. He dreamed the same dream every night. He became convinced that he had received a supernatural message that he dare not disobey. So he set off for Prague. He had no choice but to travel by foot.
When he finally arrived in Prague, he had no difficulty in finding the bridge and the palace, even though he was exhausted. But there was a complication: the bridge that led to the palace was guarded by a soldier. Yi Every day the palace guard watched him walk up and down, shovel in hand, with a troubled expression. The proud guard, having tried his best not to notice the poor Jew who. he thought, was undoubtedly crazy, was eventually unable to contain his curiosity.
"Hey you, there! What do you think you're doing? Are you mad? Do you want me to have you arrested? Why are you here?"
Poor Yitzak was unable to lie. He blurted out the truth.
The palace guard began to laugh. Oh, you Jews are so simple-minded!, he said. A grown man wasting his time on dreams! I for one had a dream every night for a long time; I ignored it and it went away. Unlike you, I am a rational man. In my dream, a Jew comes to Prague to find a treasure. When he arrives in Prague, he learns that he has made a terrible mistake. He realizes that the journey to Prague was merely a test and that the treasure is to be found under the stove of his humble home. Ha! Ha! Do you think I'm crazy enough to believe that? The similarity between your dream and mine is just a coincidence. Besides, God doesn't answer the prayers of Jews. Don't you even know that?"
Yitzak realized that he had received a message from a supernatural source--perhaps from an angel--even though the guard was completely unaware of this fact.
He traveled back to his home town as fast as his feet would allow. He pushed the stove aside and began to dig. He soon found a fabulous treasure. He used it, as you may have guessed, to pay off his debts and get his daughters married. The rest--a considerable sum--was used to build a synagogue and to help Jews in need in Cracow, of which there were many. Despite his wealth, however, the light of his piety remained undiminished. The difference was that people who had thought he was merely a shadow of a man--if they had thought of him at all-- now could see it.
The Lord, blessed be He, had answered his prayer without Yitzak ever having put it into words.
4.
What does this story have to do with debates about science vs. religion? Plenty. We foolishly seek our treasure beyond the stars while it is actually within us. The mystery of mysteries is not in deep space or in religious dogmas; it is consciousness, it is ourselves. The wonderfully strangest thing that we know of does not have to do with the origin of our universe or the possibility of a multiverse; it is the fact that we are able to learn about such things. That the vastness of the cosmos is able at least partially fit into our tiny skulls, as it were, is amazing beyond belief. Stones, as far as we can tell, lack this ability; consciousness is, indeed, the mystery of mysteries.
We take consciousness for granted, yet are at a complete loss to explain the subjective experience of being self-aware. Sure we are increasingly able to locate areas in the brain involved with perception, but the subjective experience of consciousness, at least at the present, remains completely elusive. We take consciousness for granted so much that we imagine what we perceive is objective reality. We actually have no idea, as Kant taught, what objective reality is, or more radically, if anything at all exists beyond consciousness. (Where do stars go when a cosmologist sleeps?) Knowledge is, in my opinion, the confrontation of consciousness with an unknown substrate, creating our apparently known reality. Consciousness precedes all knowledge; scientists are wrong when they believe to have a body of facts independent of it. (Most scientists know this, they just tend to forget it, since consciousness, the basis of everything, is so basic that it is easily overlooked.)
Cosmologists assert that the laws of quantum physics underlie reality. They also assert the amazing fact that galaxies are the result of ancient quantum variations! But we are able to ignore quantum gravity in our everyday lives, since we cannot directly perceive their effects. But they are indeed there; a great many technological advances would have been impossible without taking these laws into account. Just so with consciousness: we think of ourselves and the objects of our thought to be independent entities, but they are not. Without quantum laws, there would be no world. Consciousness is even more basic; without it the knowledge contained in the previous sentence would not exist.
We also take for granted the subjective feeling of a personal "I" that seemingly underlies our consciousness. Modern science--as well as ancient Hinduism-- holds that this subjective feeling is an illusion. The intuitive feeling of a subjective observer in our heads is probably nothing more than the strongest thoughts or impressions among many in the brain at a given time. They are responsible not only for awareness, but for the illusion that there is a separate being, our "I," doing the observing. If the "I" is not an illusion, what constitutes it? Every atom in our body can be found in inanimate things. Where are the "I"-carbons, as it were?
Scientific facts are impersonal. I am certainly convinced that science will never find evidence of intelligent design in creation. But this evidence is obtained by a vehicle that is convinced that it is a person; the deepest insights of some religions and science reveal this to be an illusion. But if we are not persons, what are we? Would we ever treat a daughter as if she were, well, an illusion? Are we not convinced that our "I's" are real? Here falls the shadow; the mind results in a profound paradox which I don't think will ever be fully explained. It is indeed a paradox, but it is a live one, and it is here.
So don't bother traveling to Prague; you'll return empty-handed. Or as the Buddhists say, "Some fish imagine that they're dying of thirst. How silly! Don't they realize that they live in water?"
5.
Lawrence Krauss, the eminent cosmologist, recently wrote a book entitled, "A Universe from Nothing." It is a fascinating book; a review of it by me can be found online. The only tedious parts of the book is his total rejection of religion. Dawkins, crusader that he is, wrote an afterward. It contains this glaringly inaccurate statement: "If you ask religious believers why they believe, you may find a few "sophisticated" theologians who will talk about God as 'the Ground of all Isness' or as "a metaphor for personal fellowship" or some such evasion."
Or some such evasion!! Dawkins here is like Mr. Gradgrind in Dickens's novel, "Hard Times." Facts, facts, facts; that's all there is. But I hope I have made it clear that there are no facts without the subjective experience of consciousness. Professor Dawkins, if you gave some thought to who you really are instead of to what you know, I think you would sing a new tune, one which I have no hesitation of calling a religious or a spiritual one--(I use both terms more or less interchangeably.) There is more to religion and more to life than becomes apparent in those tiresome debates.
6.
Tina Turner famously sang, "What's love got to do with it?" Consciousness evokes radical amazement, but, you might ask, "What does God have to do with it?" Nothing or something, I reply; it depends on your choice of words. (No, Mr. Dawkins, this is not an evasion.) We humans are conscious, but some of our conscious or unconscious actions are sometimes at best stupid or at worst evil. These actions are largely the results of out-of-control desires of our egos. Through acts of kindness and wisdom, which help overcome egotistic obsessions, and, importantly, by turning inward, we become aware of something higher. It is so high that it is eventually experienced not as your truth, but as everyone's truth, as Truth itself. And it is not a fact; it can only be expressed metaphorically, such as by using the term, "God." Realizing this, one experiences profound feelings of joy. I have no objection if one chooses to call that something within us God. I also have no objection if that term is not used, such as in classical Buddhism. The ineffable experience and the joy it produces are what counts, not what you call it. Nothing factual or scientific can be said about it, it's just too close to and too far from us. We can be certain, however, that without this "something higher," without this unknown known there isn't even the possibility of an objective and absolute void, which is Lord-knows-what without consciousness to conceive it. Our only adequate response to consciousness is the silence of radical amazement.
7.
The debate of ultimate importance is thus not between science and religion, but between idle chatter and Silence. Which side are "you" on?
I am interested in many things; poetry, music, politics, cosmology and ethics are prominent among them. I am decidedly uninterested in many things, too; guns, stamp collecting, Angry Birds, baking and synchronized swimming are among the many subjects I choose not to be subjected to. To the latter list I must add listening to people debate whether God exists or not. It seems so pimply-adolescent to me. I do realize that it is important to point out to fundamentalists and other religious people who take their mythologies to be facts that their "facts' are at best myths and at worst nonsense.. Fundamentalism, which no doubt provides consolation to some, is on the whole quite detrimental. It often goes in tandem with a denial of evolution; the teaching of so-called intelligent design in schools is undoubtedly creating fetid backwaters in young minds that need to be cleared by the alembics of scientific reasoning. So giving clear indications that the Watchmaker's heart isn't ticking is important. But it is tiresome, since the result of debates between scientific views and backwater religious views are so obvious. I've watched a few of these debates; scientists have won all of them so far. But something inside me protests. Not so fast, it says; it will have more to say in the course of this essay.
2.
One of the scientists with an almost religious zeal in his fight for atheism, is Richard Dawkins. He is a great evolutionary biologist; two of his books, "The Selfish Gene" and "The Ancestors' Tale" have especially delighted me and made me see evolution in a new way. He writes exceptionally well and is almost always exceptionally informative as well. He is also a tireless preacher for atheism. His book, "The God Delusion" falls considerably short in comparison to his books on biology. How often can you inform a reader that myths are myths and facts are facts without boring that reader to tears?
I have seen, in spells of insomnia, some of his debates with "true believers" on YouTube. (These appear "miraculously" as recommendations for me to view, most likely because I frequently write about religion; the internet is apparently omniscient.) The arguments are always the same. There is no evidence for a creator. Things inevitably evolve from the simple to the complex; beginning with God, an incredibly complex being, explains nothing. Physicists have now posited a reasonable theory that the universe originated as a quantum Free Lunch, and needs no creator as an explanation for everything. Believing that Jesus is the Son of God because he is portrayed that way in a book written decades after his death in an age that had no idea about the laws of science is as ridiculous as believing one of the Hindu myths that asserts that creation arose from an ocean of milk. It is not necessary to believe in God to do good, etc. All these arguments are undeniably valid to those who refuse to suppress rationality. Sometimes opponents hold their own for a while, stating science isn't everything, etc. They eventually devolve, however, into utter nonsense, such as asserting that Christ is literally present in the Eucharist.
The result is always the same: Logic KO's Ignorance! Is that really all there is to it?
Before answering that question, I must tell you my version of a well-known story. It is a Hasidic tale attributed to Rebbe Simha-Bunam of Pshishkhe.
3.
Yitzak ben Yekel was a poor Jew who lived in Cracow many years ago. Outwardly he was not the brightest bulb in the Hasidic community; the light of his piety, however, shone inside him with the light of a thousand suns, even though few noticed. He was extremely poor; he was saddled with debt and was greatly saddened by the fact that he could not, due to lack of means, not due a lack of their inner and outer beauty, arrange his daughters' marriages. Although still in the flush of youth, they were not getting any younger, as they say. But Yitzak's faith in his Creator was unshakable. He trusted in Him and was convinced that somehow, some way, things would turn out well.
One night, after going to bed while still hungry, Yitzak had a dream. He found himself at the foot of a bridge that led to a palace. A voice from a great height told him, "This is Prague. The bridge leads over the Moldau, as you can see, to a palace. Look around you and fix the details in your mind. You must go to Prague. Under the bridge you will find a white stone. Remove the stone and dig. You will find a great treasure buried there. Use it to help yourself, your family and your community."
What a strange dream, Yitzak thought the next morning. Prague is very far away and I have no means for travel. I will not risk making things worse--things are bad enough already--by following a silly dream. Then Yitzak went to work, eking out a living as a peddler.
But that was not the end of it. He dreamed the same dream every night. He became convinced that he had received a supernatural message that he dare not disobey. So he set off for Prague. He had no choice but to travel by foot.
When he finally arrived in Prague, he had no difficulty in finding the bridge and the palace, even though he was exhausted. But there was a complication: the bridge that led to the palace was guarded by a soldier. Yi Every day the palace guard watched him walk up and down, shovel in hand, with a troubled expression. The proud guard, having tried his best not to notice the poor Jew who. he thought, was undoubtedly crazy, was eventually unable to contain his curiosity.
"Hey you, there! What do you think you're doing? Are you mad? Do you want me to have you arrested? Why are you here?"
Poor Yitzak was unable to lie. He blurted out the truth.
The palace guard began to laugh. Oh, you Jews are so simple-minded!, he said. A grown man wasting his time on dreams! I for one had a dream every night for a long time; I ignored it and it went away. Unlike you, I am a rational man. In my dream, a Jew comes to Prague to find a treasure. When he arrives in Prague, he learns that he has made a terrible mistake. He realizes that the journey to Prague was merely a test and that the treasure is to be found under the stove of his humble home. Ha! Ha! Do you think I'm crazy enough to believe that? The similarity between your dream and mine is just a coincidence. Besides, God doesn't answer the prayers of Jews. Don't you even know that?"
Yitzak realized that he had received a message from a supernatural source--perhaps from an angel--even though the guard was completely unaware of this fact.
He traveled back to his home town as fast as his feet would allow. He pushed the stove aside and began to dig. He soon found a fabulous treasure. He used it, as you may have guessed, to pay off his debts and get his daughters married. The rest--a considerable sum--was used to build a synagogue and to help Jews in need in Cracow, of which there were many. Despite his wealth, however, the light of his piety remained undiminished. The difference was that people who had thought he was merely a shadow of a man--if they had thought of him at all-- now could see it.
The Lord, blessed be He, had answered his prayer without Yitzak ever having put it into words.
4.
What does this story have to do with debates about science vs. religion? Plenty. We foolishly seek our treasure beyond the stars while it is actually within us. The mystery of mysteries is not in deep space or in religious dogmas; it is consciousness, it is ourselves. The wonderfully strangest thing that we know of does not have to do with the origin of our universe or the possibility of a multiverse; it is the fact that we are able to learn about such things. That the vastness of the cosmos is able at least partially fit into our tiny skulls, as it were, is amazing beyond belief. Stones, as far as we can tell, lack this ability; consciousness is, indeed, the mystery of mysteries.
We take consciousness for granted, yet are at a complete loss to explain the subjective experience of being self-aware. Sure we are increasingly able to locate areas in the brain involved with perception, but the subjective experience of consciousness, at least at the present, remains completely elusive. We take consciousness for granted so much that we imagine what we perceive is objective reality. We actually have no idea, as Kant taught, what objective reality is, or more radically, if anything at all exists beyond consciousness. (Where do stars go when a cosmologist sleeps?) Knowledge is, in my opinion, the confrontation of consciousness with an unknown substrate, creating our apparently known reality. Consciousness precedes all knowledge; scientists are wrong when they believe to have a body of facts independent of it. (Most scientists know this, they just tend to forget it, since consciousness, the basis of everything, is so basic that it is easily overlooked.)
Cosmologists assert that the laws of quantum physics underlie reality. They also assert the amazing fact that galaxies are the result of ancient quantum variations! But we are able to ignore quantum gravity in our everyday lives, since we cannot directly perceive their effects. But they are indeed there; a great many technological advances would have been impossible without taking these laws into account. Just so with consciousness: we think of ourselves and the objects of our thought to be independent entities, but they are not. Without quantum laws, there would be no world. Consciousness is even more basic; without it the knowledge contained in the previous sentence would not exist.
We also take for granted the subjective feeling of a personal "I" that seemingly underlies our consciousness. Modern science--as well as ancient Hinduism-- holds that this subjective feeling is an illusion. The intuitive feeling of a subjective observer in our heads is probably nothing more than the strongest thoughts or impressions among many in the brain at a given time. They are responsible not only for awareness, but for the illusion that there is a separate being, our "I," doing the observing. If the "I" is not an illusion, what constitutes it? Every atom in our body can be found in inanimate things. Where are the "I"-carbons, as it were?
Scientific facts are impersonal. I am certainly convinced that science will never find evidence of intelligent design in creation. But this evidence is obtained by a vehicle that is convinced that it is a person; the deepest insights of some religions and science reveal this to be an illusion. But if we are not persons, what are we? Would we ever treat a daughter as if she were, well, an illusion? Are we not convinced that our "I's" are real? Here falls the shadow; the mind results in a profound paradox which I don't think will ever be fully explained. It is indeed a paradox, but it is a live one, and it is here.
So don't bother traveling to Prague; you'll return empty-handed. Or as the Buddhists say, "Some fish imagine that they're dying of thirst. How silly! Don't they realize that they live in water?"
5.
Lawrence Krauss, the eminent cosmologist, recently wrote a book entitled, "A Universe from Nothing." It is a fascinating book; a review of it by me can be found online. The only tedious parts of the book is his total rejection of religion. Dawkins, crusader that he is, wrote an afterward. It contains this glaringly inaccurate statement: "If you ask religious believers why they believe, you may find a few "sophisticated" theologians who will talk about God as 'the Ground of all Isness' or as "a metaphor for personal fellowship" or some such evasion."
Or some such evasion!! Dawkins here is like Mr. Gradgrind in Dickens's novel, "Hard Times." Facts, facts, facts; that's all there is. But I hope I have made it clear that there are no facts without the subjective experience of consciousness. Professor Dawkins, if you gave some thought to who you really are instead of to what you know, I think you would sing a new tune, one which I have no hesitation of calling a religious or a spiritual one--(I use both terms more or less interchangeably.) There is more to religion and more to life than becomes apparent in those tiresome debates.
6.
Tina Turner famously sang, "What's love got to do with it?" Consciousness evokes radical amazement, but, you might ask, "What does God have to do with it?" Nothing or something, I reply; it depends on your choice of words. (No, Mr. Dawkins, this is not an evasion.) We humans are conscious, but some of our conscious or unconscious actions are sometimes at best stupid or at worst evil. These actions are largely the results of out-of-control desires of our egos. Through acts of kindness and wisdom, which help overcome egotistic obsessions, and, importantly, by turning inward, we become aware of something higher. It is so high that it is eventually experienced not as your truth, but as everyone's truth, as Truth itself. And it is not a fact; it can only be expressed metaphorically, such as by using the term, "God." Realizing this, one experiences profound feelings of joy. I have no objection if one chooses to call that something within us God. I also have no objection if that term is not used, such as in classical Buddhism. The ineffable experience and the joy it produces are what counts, not what you call it. Nothing factual or scientific can be said about it, it's just too close to and too far from us. We can be certain, however, that without this "something higher," without this unknown known there isn't even the possibility of an objective and absolute void, which is Lord-knows-what without consciousness to conceive it. Our only adequate response to consciousness is the silence of radical amazement.
7.
The debate of ultimate importance is thus not between science and religion, but between idle chatter and Silence. Which side are "you" on?
I'm on the side of "idle chatter". There will be an eternity of Silence when we are dead. John R. Haws
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