It is apparent to many scientists that their must be a
Creator God who is omniscient and omnipotent. Sir Joseph J. Thomson, the Nobel
Prize-winning physicist who is recognized as the founder of atomic physics, had
stated:
·
“As we conquer peak after peak we see in front
of us regions full of interest and beauty, but we do not see our goal, we do
not see the horizon; in the distance tower still higher peaks, which will yield
to those who ascend them still wider prospects, and deepen the feeling, the
truth of which is emphasized by every advance in science, that ‘Great are the
Works of the Lord’.”
Albert Einstein believed that to deny the Creator was to be
closed minded:
·
“The fanatical atheists are like slaves who are
still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard
struggle. They are creatures who – in their grudge against traditional religion
as the ‘opium of the masses’ – cannot hear the music of the spheres.”
Einstein had been inconsistent about his beliefs about God.
However, he had said many things that indicated that this harmonious world
requires an omniscient and omnipotent God to design and maintain it:
·
I want to know how God created this world. I am
not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that
element. I want to know his thoughts; the rest are details.” (From E. Salaman,
“A Talk With Einstein,” The Listener 54 (1955), pp. 370-371, quoted in
Jammer, p. 123).
Physicist Ernest Walton was also convinced that
understanding this universe requires an understanding of God:
·
“One way to learn the mind of the Creator is to
study His creation. We must pay God the compliment of studying His work of art
and this should apply to all realms of human thought. A refusal to use our
intelligence honestly is an act of contempt for Him who gave us that
intelligence.” (V.J. McBrierty (2003): Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton, The Irish
Scientist, 1903-1995, Trinity College Dublin Press.)
Physicist Paul Davies believed that many scientists were
avoiding asking the questions about the origin of the universe, perhaps because
it inevitably raised questions about an omnipotent God:
·
“People take it for granted that the physical
world is both ordered and intelligible. The underlying order in nature-the laws
of physics-are simply accepted as given, as brute facts. Nobody asks where they
came from; at least they do not do so in polite company. However, even the most
atheistic scientist accepts as an act of faith that the universe is not absurd,
that there is a rational basis to physical existence manifested as law-like
order in nature that is at least partly comprehensible to us. So science can
proceed only if the scientist adopts an essentially theological worldview.” (Physicist
Paul Davies, God and the New Physics)
Avoidance of the God question makes it seem to many that an
omnipotent God is irrelevant. However, Robert Jastrow, the astronomer and
physicist who founded NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies, suggested that
to make God irrelevant was also to condemn oneself to irrelevance:
·
“Astronomers now find they have painted
themselves into a corner because they have proven, by their own methods, that
the world began abruptly in an act of creation to which you can trace the seeds
of every star, every planet, every living thing in this cosmos and on the
earth. And they have found that all this happened as a product of forces they
cannot hope to discover….That there are what I or anyone would call
supernatural forces at work is now, I think, a scientifically proven fact.” (God
and the Astronomers)
Lord William Kelvin, who was noted for his theoretical work
on thermodynamics, the concept of absolute zero and the Kelvin temperature
scale based upon it, was convinced by the scientific evidence that science led
to God:
·
“I believe that the more thoroughly science is
studied, the further does it take us from anything comparable to atheism.”
·
“If you study science deep enough and long
enough, it will force you to believe in God.”
Sir Isaac Newton regarded God as the foundational answer for
all scientific understanding:
·
“God created everything by number, weight and
measure.”
·
“In the absence of any other proof, the thumb
alone would convince me of God’s existence.”
·
“I have a fundamental belief in the Bible as the
Word of God, written by those who were inspired. I study the Bible daily.” (All
of these quotes come from https://godevidence.com/2010/08/quotes-about-god-atheism/
Some scientists have even admitted that they refuse to
consider that God might be the foundation answer for all of their questions. Todd
C. Scott admitted:
·
Even if all the data point to an intelligent
designer, such a hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not
naturalistic [mindless and purpose-less].
Richard Lewontin also admitted the bias of present-day
science:
·
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 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.
Yet the establishment has largely covered up this bias,
leaving the public with the impression that science is neutral about the question
of God.
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