Thinking about God, Jesus and The Big Questions

Earlier this year, I read an article on AP News, titled " In wrangling dark matter, some scientists find inspiration in the Torah, Krishna and Christ ". The article, which I encourage you to read in the link given above, talks about how dark matter is still largely a mystery to us. The authors interview physicists working in the field of dark matter, and many (but not all) of these scientists feel that dark matter and faith are complementary to each other, not oppositional. What I particularly liked was that they interviewed physicists of different faiths - not just Christian. The Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, and Buddhist religions were represented in these interviews. There was no one-size-fits-all answer to the precise details of how each of these scientists viewed how dark matter intersected with their faith. But one common thread in a broad sense was that they each viewed dark matter as simply one part of how the world was created by the deity they believed in. Extending from t...

In this high tech day and age, it's tempting to think we are enlightened. We like to think we keep an open mind. Almost everyone in this era believes in the existence of atoms. In part, of course, this is because of the large amount of evidence for atoms. This evidence has emerged as our technology has been able to produce instruments capable of testing hypotheses about the existence of atoms. But supposing we were able to somehow communicate without language barriers with a very intelligent Stone Age person. We could explain atomic theory to him or her. But no matter how well we explain atoms, and the lead-up to the discovery of atoms, and all of the scientific discoveries therein, the Stone Age person isn't very likely to believe in atoms. This is because he or she has no personal experience with atoms and no context in which to put this. They might think it's a conspiracy theory or a lie. Even if we describe the chemical process of combustion (for example in the case of ...

It may seem a bit odd to draw parallels between the programming language Lisp and effective prayer, but this was a revelation that struck me recently. No prior knowledge of Lisp, or of prayer, is necessary to understand this post. A brief look at Lisp - specification and implementation First let's take a very quick look at Lisp. Lisp is a programming language that has a specification , meaning that each command (or function, to use Lisp terminology) is defined to produce a certain result. As a concrete example, the + function must take in as many numbers as desired and must provide the result of adding those numbers. For example (+ 4 5 10) should result in 19.  Exactly HOW the nuts and bolts work for producing the result (i.e. the steps of adding up all the numbers in the + function) is up to the implementation of Lisp.   The programmer doesn't need to know or care how the implementation works , the programmer just needs to know that if they call the + function, they will get...

I have become a little concerned by the attitude of some people that the spread of germs through a community is desirable to God - for example, the idea of not being concerned about catching (and therefore spreading) Covid. There is actually plenty of biblical evidence against that attitude. The book of Leviticus shows a lot of instructions for cleanliness, which back in those days the instructions may have seemed inexplicable. These may have seemed like a long list of things to be obedient about without a clear reason why. However, if we read this book of the Bible with our modern-day knowledge of bacteria, viruses and fungi, these instructions quickly make sense. The instructions were designed to avoid the spread of germs. Here is an example from the Bible of what to do with clothing (made of cloth, wool, or animal skin) that has a spreading disease in it. This referred to a discoloration such as mold or something similar: If the priest makes an examination, and the disease has not ...

There were scholars long ago in Biblical times. Scholars are not a new modern-day thing. Of course, scholars were rarer back then, since there were not many equivalents of universities. Let's look at some of the most well-known scholars of Biblical times: the three wise men who went in search of Jesus. It seems that these men were scholars of some sort, most likely astronomers. They had taken note of a new star that had appeared in the sky: Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the prophet: “‘And you, O Bethlehem, in the l...

While it appears that both Creationism and Intelligent Design have some reason behind their different stances, from where I see it, it seems like Creationism is being used as a political pawn, which is unfortunate. I don't think that all proponents of Creationism are involved in this, but at least in my field of vision in today's world, I'm seeing it be used as a political pawn. I feel that is a danger area, where getting involved in all that might make us like Sadducees or Pharisees, who put political agendas ahead of God's word. The Creationism in and of itself is not the issue: if anything, the proponents are going very literally by God's word, for which they can hardly be faulted. No, the problem lies where atheists claim that evolution is proof that the Bible is untrue. (That itself is a flawed argument - read my other post about why ). Instead of calling out atheists and pointing out that evolution does not tell us one way or another about whether the...

Some Christians believe in Creationism (that the earth was created in exactly six days, and evolution did not occur) while other Christians believe that God designed us through the process of evolution, also known as Intelligent Design. The reason for this divide is because of different ways of interpreting the Bible. Proponents of Creationism believe that the beginning of Genesis should be interpreted literally, taking six 24-hour periods to create the earth and everything in it. Proponents of Intelligent Design believe that the beginning of Genesis should be interpreted figuratively, with the six days representing 6 ages. Let's take a look at that portion of Genesis: In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the ligh...

One thing I have noticed in my scientific career is that those who have a religion tend not to invoke it during scientific conversations.  In contrast, those who are atheist (or at least who see science and religion as incompatible) tend to mention religion the most often. To me, that is interesting and unexpected. This topic is timely because my husband and I were watching a DVD lecture series by a prominent scientist.  Although incredibly gifted at explaining his own topic, I watched his scholar-ship fall down several times by commenting (negatively) about religion and its role in scientific history.  I was puzzled, because, although I do believe in Christianity, it would never occur to me to mention religion (whether positively or negatively) during a scientific talk.  The reason is not that I would be ashamed to do so, but rather that I take it for granted that as a scientist I am investigating the physical laws of this universe that God made. This universe ...

The movie "The Matrix" (1999) is probably the best-known secular fictional illustration of the concept of a universe within a universe.  In the movie, people think they are living life, yet in reality their bodies are actually in a state of suspended animation while their brains are engaged in a virtual reality simulation of the real world.  Naturally, this simulation (the Matrix) appears so real that you cannot possibly realize that this is not in fact the real world.  It is only when the main character, Neo, is told the truth (still within the Matrix) that this is not the real world and that there is a more real one out there, that movie viewers realize what is going on.  In fact it is not until he is physically removed from the Matrix that Neo has proof and finally believes what is happening. Like the Matrix, our world of Earth and outer space is a universe within a Universe .  There is a bigger reality out there: God's realm.  Our universe, includin...

Just as atheists cannot prove that God doesn't exist, neither can Christians prove that He does.  However, many atheists are under the mistaken impression that it is the 'job' of Christians to prove God's existence (even though they make no attempt to prove their opposing stance!) No, is not up to believers to prove the existence of God, and this is why.  Jesus and God want us to come to believe in them of our own free will, and to come to them via faith (as opposed to deductive reasoning).  If there was absolute, total proof of God's existence, there would be no reason to have faith.  It would then be a no-brainer that God exists, and we would have come to him via a mere act of observation instead of by faith.   Why is faith important? Because it triggers our spiritual development. The spirit is not something which is wishy-washy - it is there, but hard to detect. Make no mistake: whether someone is Christian or atheist, either way i...

I was fortunate enough to take part in a conversation with two other biochemists once. We all came from different religious backgrounds (one Hindu, one Jew and one Christian). We posed the question "Can science explain everything? [about the universe]". This was quite an interesting question, especially as we didn't already know the others' viewpoints (we were only working together briefly). The discussion didn't last long because we all had exactly the same viewpoint, which was that "Science can explain a lot… but only up to a certain point. Beyond that there is something more." In my scientific career, I've noticed a few scientists having the poor logic of "Everything can be explained by atoms, therefore God doesn't exist". Even if you could explain all of the physical laws by atoms and quantum mechanics (which in itself is a matter up for debate!), this is not necessarily proof that there is no God. It's simply a discovery of t...