THE POLITIZATION OF SCIENCE

We usually think of science as a search for truth. However, increasingly it has become a search for what will justify the establishment worldview. Let me give you one profound but virtually invisible example. Science has been co-opted by philosophical naturalism (PN), something that is utterly non-scientific.

PH requires that all explanations are naturalistic ones. It has banned any consideration of Intelligent Design (ID) as “unscientific.” However, what is left unsaid is that PN is equally unscientific. In fact, there is not a single scientific finding that provides any evidence that causation is natural and without intelligence. Admittedly, we cannot put ID into a test-tube to prove God, but neither can we do this with PN. In fact, there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that these laws are not intelligently derived.

Instead, ID proposes that the underlying laws of science were intelligently designed and even maintained. Why? Our laws are elegant, universal, and immutable in a universe that is always changing. This suggests that they are the products of something beyond the universe, Transcendently derived.

Consequently, PN proponents are like a detective who refuses to consider any suspect under 6-feet-tall. He might be able to solve some crimes. However, his unwillingness to consider all possible causal agents will limit his effectiveness and will make him defensive when questioned about his unsupportable methodology.

The politization of science is evidenced in many other ways, after receiving a grant to investigate the effects of transgenderism, the university put the kibosh on this research fearing that findings might clash with what is politically correct and endanger the reputation of the university.

How often does this happen? No one can say. However, it suggests that science might have also been taken captive in this critical area. Consequently, its findings would be seriously skewed, like those published by the drug companies to validate their drugs. Theoretically, they can run a hundred trials but only publish the one which shows the “results” they seek.

Where does research money go? Certainly not to find evidence in favor of ID, but instead to justify the naturalistic paradigm! Some scientists have been very candid about this. PN Richard Lewontin had written:

·       We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs . . . in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated commitment to materialism. . . . we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes [PN] to create an apparatus of investigation and set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. (Review of The Demon-Haunted World, by Carl Sagan. In New York Review of Books, January 9, 1997.)

Scott C Todd was likewise candid:

·       Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic. ("A View from Kansas on the Evolution Debates," Nature (vol. 401. September 30, 1999), p. 423.)

Perhaps this bias is most clearly demonstrated by the theory of the multiverse invoked by PN as an ID substitute to explain the fine-tuning of the universe. Physicist Paul Davies explains how the discovery of our finely tuned universe poses a massive problem for PN:

·       “Scientists are slowly waking up to an inconvenient truth – the universe looks suspiciously like a fix. The issue concerns the very laws of nature themselves. For 40 years, physicists and cosmologists have been quietly collecting examples of all too convenient “coincidences” and special features in the underlying laws of the universe that seem to be necessary in order for life, and hence conscious beings, to exist. Change any one of them and the consequences would be lethal. The crucial point is that some of those metaphorical knobs (of which there are 40) must be tuned very precisely, or the universe would be sterile. Example: neutrons are just a tad heavier than protons. If it were the other way around, atoms couldn’t exist, because all the protons in the universe would have decayed into neutrons shortly after the big bang. No protons, then no atomic nucleus and no atoms. No atoms, no chemistry, no life.”

What are the chances that these 40 laws would be calibrated just right for life and the stability of our universe. One physicist calculated the possibility as one chance in 10 followed by 100 zeros – a virtual impossibility. Therefore, some scientists have called this “miraculous”:

·       “Amazing fine tuning occurs in the laws that make this [complexity] possible. Realization of the complexity of what is accomplished makes it very difficult not to use the word ‘miraculous’ without taking a stand as to the ontological status of the word.” (British Astrophysicist George Ellis)

The theory of the multiverse suggests that if is an infinite number of universes, it stands to reason that one of them will be our “miraculous” universe. However, there is no evidence for even a second universe lurking somewhere out there, let alone an infinite number. However, PN must be salvaged even at the price of absurdity.

This desperate attempt to unscientifically salvage PN has dismayed many of its allies.  In Discover Magazine, Tim Folger, wrote:

·       Short of invoking a benevolent creator, many physicists see only one possible explanation: Our universe may be but one of perhaps infinitely many universes in an inconceivably vast multiverse. Most of those universes are barren, but some, like ours, have conditions suitable for life….The idea is controversial. Critics say it doesn’t even qualify as a scientific theory because the existence of other universes cannot be proved or disproved. Advocates argue that, like it or not, the multiverse may well be the only viable non-religious explanation for what is often called the “fine-tuning problem”—the baffling observation that the laws of the universe seem custom-tailored to favor the emergence of life. (“The Multiverse Theory,” Dec. 2008)

Anything to keep the “Divine Foot” from placing His toe in the door! However, in the case of fine-tuning, it is more  a matter of denying the presence of the unwanted Guest who has already gained entrance and will not leave. After all, this is His house.