Why Science Cannot Address the Question of God's Existence
An essay to suppliment the video 'Can you find proof of God?"
UNFFwildcard
Updated 29 Dec. 08.
Atheists often assert that one of the reasons why they appeal to an atheistic worldview is because there is no scientifically verifiable or empirical evidence for the existence of God. Since there is no convincible evidence, they hold the opinion of the universal negative until the faculties of science can demonstrate the positive. There is a problem with this thinking. Over the course of this video, I will argue that even if a God did exist, the scientific method, both by definition and in application, does not possess the methodology to handle such a question. It is both inadequate and ill-equipped, and those who look to science to produce evidence for or against the existence of God will be disappointed. The determination of God’s existence is beyond the capacity of science, and must be handled on philosophical or theological grounds.
Science, being derived from the Latin word scientia, meaning ‘knowledge’ or ‘knowing’, is the effort to discover and increase human understanding of how the physical world works (1). It operates through the sole mechanism of the scientific method, which refers to the methodology and the body of techniques it encompasses for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, and correcting and integrating previous knowledge.(2). For something to be both scientific and in compliance with the scientific method, the method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical, and measurable evidence subjectable to specific principles of reasoning. (3) Furthermore, the scientific method must consist of the collection of data through observation and experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses (4,5).
A variety of qualifications are important in order to be scientific. The most important of them, according to science philosopher Karl Popper, is falsifiability.(6). Most relevant to this discussion however, is the accepted philosophical assertion that science cannot comment on the supernatural, nor can it make ontological assertions.(7). Science operates through presupposing natural causes to phenomena and is constrained to only proposing both natural hypotheses and natural conclusions (7). Ontological assertions, that is, assertions of a statement of being made on metaphysical grounds, cannot be subjected to empirical and scientific analysis unless such assertions include a natural component or element. Put simply, science cannot comment on an assertion that God exists, however, science through investigation can comment on the assertion that some phenomenon that occurs within the realm of time, space, and matter was caused by the supernatural. While science can come to the conclusion that said phenomena was of a natural origin, if science cannot find the causation of said phenomena, science cannot come to a supernatural conclusion because it must presuppose natural causation and natural conclusion.(7). In effect, the proper response to an event to which science cannot derive a cause for, is not ‘God did it’, but rather ‘We don’t know what did it’.
Critiques disagree though, the most prominent among them being atheist writers such as
But if skeptics like Dawkins are not asserting that science as a methodological body can determine the existence of God, what are they asserting? Are they instead making subjective claims based off of scientific knowledge and labelling that as science? On numerous occasions, Dawkins has asserted that “The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference.”(13) It is important to point out though that this is not a scientific observation, but rather an individual’s subjective opinion based off of physical evidence and observations. As John Haught, professor of theology at Georgetown University would put it, if some scientist maintains that certain scientific observations are “conclusive evidence of a godless, purposeless universe, [then] this is a leap into ideology, not a scientifically verifiable truth.”(14) Haught further explains that “…most Catholic theologians and philosophers agree that it is not the job of science to make any reference to God, purpose, or intelligent design.”(14). Furthermore, since this is ultimately such a subjective opinion, no doubt contemporaries – who, by the way, are on equal footing as Dawkins to say whether or not God exists - will strongly disagree with these sediments. Astrophysicist and 1978 Nobel Laureate Arno Penzias holds the exact opposite opinion, as he has suggested on two separate accounts that the structure of the universe suggests an ‘underlying … supernatural plan’(15) and that the universe is “exactly what I would have predicted, had I nothing to go on but the five books of Moses, the Psalms, and the Bible as a whole”(16).
So instead, are sceptics suggesting that God is a scientific question because science has been filling in the gaps where God was hiding? Throughout history, people have looked at nature and sought an explanation. Why do flowers bloom? How did life come into being? Seeing no obvious answer, people looked to the supernatural. Eventually, we were able to answer those difficult questions without invoking supernatural causation. So the logic is straight forward: Remove the hiding spots and you remove God. However, there’s a serious flaw in this assumption, and it’s that religious faith requires the unknown, whether that be what science has not yet discovered, or an individuals personal ignorance over what has been discovered. Admittingly, while such god of the gaps style of thinking can be common among believers, such as in those who do not accept the theory of evolution and the big bang theory and instead assert that the universe was created within the last 10,000 years, theologically and among academic circles, such thinking only had a very brief history as the idea was quickly dismissed by theologians and non-theologians alike after it was introduced as an argument in the 19th century. It has not been suggested since. I would assert therefore, that the threat to the belief in God lies not in scientific advancement, but in the entrusting of faith within the unknown. Why? Using the example of placing God as the cause of a plant’s flowering, cell biologist Ken Miller explains, “If a lack of scientific explanation is proof of God’s existence, the counterlogic is unimpeachable: a successful scientific explanation is an argument against God. That’s why this reasoning, ultimately is much more dangerous to religion than to science. Eliot Meyerowitz’s fine work on floral induction [genes] suddenly becomes a threat to the divine, even though common sense tells us it should be nothing of the sort.” (17). Pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer once wrote on the dangers of such thinking, when he said that “…how wrong it is to use God as a stop-gap for the incompleteness of our knowledge. If in fact the frontiers of knowledge are being pushed further and further back (and that is bound to be the case), then God is being pushed back with them, and is therefore continually in retreat.”(18) Bonhoeffer then advises that “we are to find God in what we know, not in what we don't know.” (18). In short, if you look to God as an explanation, then you’re liable for disappointment, but if you look to God as nothing of the sort, then there’s no problem to begin with. Instead of validating God in the unknown, do as Bonhoeffer advises and “..find God in what we know.”
Perhaps this is why Dawkins became an atheist in the first place, as a biography of his states that although he was brought up in a traditional Anglican home, he began doubting the existence of God at the age of nine. He reconverted briefly due to a persuasion he received with respect to the apparent order, purpose, and design in nature, but that argument became fully deconstructed as he learned more about evolutionary biology - and had since adopted atheism. (19). There within lies the problem that Miller, Bonhoeffer, and countless other have warned about. In an interview between Richard Dawkins and astronomer and former head of the
So, if those who persist in asserting that science can one day find the answer to the existence or non existence of God, how else could they possibly mean what they say? Perhaps they’re referring to claims made by certain religions - such as the one that God is the cause of the universe - and the ensuing conflict that will erupt as the advancement of scientific investigation will reveal insights into how the universe naturally came into being. The universe, as far as we know it, erupted from an infintessimally small point to create the time, matter, and three dimentional space we know today approximately 13.7 billion years ago, plus or minus 120 million years.(22). Since there is no unifying theory that can unite quantum mechanics with relativistic gravity, the origins of our universe from a scientific standpoint remain an unanswered question. While we can make predictions as to the nature of the universe extremely far back in time, because of a lack of a unifying theory, it’s difficult to say what the universe looked like within the first planck second of existence - that first 10^-43 seconds that we call the planck era - or even before that to the spacetime foam era where time, space, matter, and the four fundamental forces would have been united into a singularity to which we cannot yet decipher.
Even then, there is one question that the Big Bang theory cannot answer(a): where did this dot come from? There are multiple hypotheses, such as M-theory(also known as brane theory)(23), Chaotic Inflation theory (also known as bubble theory)(24), Oscalatory universe theory(25), (now being drawn into question due to accelerated universal expansion caused by dark energy (26)), or any number of other multiverse theories that may or may not involve extradimentionality and/or infinite time scales(b). While none of these hypotheses have ever been demonstrated to be plausible other than through mathematical physics, and while many of these hypotheses cannot be theoretically demonstrated empirically by principle, if one of them was to be demonstrated as safely valid, even then it could provide no comment on the existence or non existence of God, or even whether God is ultimately the creater of the universe for that matter. If we are indeed living in a polydimentional multiverse that had existed ad infinitum, and ignoring the fact that there are major philosophical problems concerning the nature of infinity when applied to reality(c), such an existence cannot comment on the big question: Why does the system exist? If the grand system really is infinite, how does that exclude God from creating it in the first place? If we attribute the classical charcteristics of God – all knowing, all powerful, and all-present, how, in any possible way, does the existence of an infinite multiverse exclude God from creating it? Do you require a starting time in order to qualify as a creator? I answer that question with a resounding ‘no’. Creation implys cause of existence; it does not necessitate that the existence had a temporal beginning. Where did this polydimentional infinite multiverse and all the laws that allow it to create it’s own universes come from? Why does it exist? Most relevant to the question however, is why couldn’t God create such a univere? I see no reason why not. Furthermore, such theoretical models require far less effort of reconciliation when when you stop thinking in western terms and start thinking in eastern terms. In Hindu religious philosophy for example, there’s hardly a thing as ‘one or the other’. If one person believes that the Hindu God is personal, and if one person believes that the Hindu God is impersonal, they’re both right. This is a foreign concept to westerners, who thrive on ‘one or the other’ patterns of thinking and of dichotomies. God could, as the same time, logically be a creater and not be a creator. Such a notion is not so farfetched for people of east-Indian or traditional Oriental backgrounds. Even so, while we who follow the abrahamic God would stuggle with the concept of multiverses and infinite time scales with the western concept of creation, eastern adherents would have little problem. Even ancient Hindu creation stories, unlike those of the abrahamic religions, tell of multiverses and infinite time scales, complete with their own births, deaths, and rebirths within a system of systems.(27) Afterall, within a system where one universe gives birth to another, what could be more at home to eastern religions than reencarnation within reencarnation? Eastern concepts of God would be at home to the world that science may one day reveal to us.
Perhaps then critiques who assert that science can be used to determine the existence of God instead imply that science can comment on the validity of modern notions of God based off holy scriptures, such as the one displayed by the Judeo-Christian religions or the Islamic religion. (d) I would love to see their arguments for how a methodological body that must presuppose natural causation and conclusion has come to the conclusion that no God exists. The most common argument presented is of someone correctly asserting that scientific discoveries invalidate certain claims made within the Bible, such as a literal account of Genesis or a global flood, but they then incorrectly assert that since God is directly or indirectly claimed to be the caused of these disproved events, this is evidence against the existence of God. There are two problems with this assertion, the first being that the existence of God is independent from validity of scripture and is therefore the very reason why biblical interpreters do not assume scientific accuracy in the text by default. If I experiened a divine revelation, and then proceeded to describe such a revelation within the context of my social, cultural, and geopolitical circumstances, as a fallible human I can very easily equate such a revelation within an incorrect understanding of my environment. Thus, while I could try and communicate my divinely inspired message, I will do so both within my social and cultural contexts and with the current finite knowledge that I, and others who I am trying to share the message with, can relate to. For example, with relation to a literal interpretation of Genesis, Pope John paul II, in a 1981 address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, said that “The Bible itself speaks to us of the origin of the universe and its make-up, not in order to provide us with a scientific treatise, but in order to state the correct relationships of man with God and with the universe. Sacred Scripture wishes simply to declare that the world was created by God, and in order to teach this truth it expresses itself in the terms of the cosmology in use at the time of the writer. The Sacred Book likewise wishes to tell men that the world was not created as the seat of the gods, as was taught by other cosmogonies and cosmologies, but was rather created for the service of man and the glory of God. Any other teaching about the origin and make-up of the universe is alien to the intentions of the Bible, which does not wish to teach how heaven was made but how one goes to heaven." (28). This is an essential concept to theology, as it is first important to identify the purpose of the text in order to most appropriately interpret the meaning. Not only is this essential for receiving the deep-rooted spiritual message of the text, but such a fundemental understanding of the purpose of scripture also negates all conflict with secular scientific discoveries as these is no default assumption that scripture must convey scientific accuracy. The fith century Christian theologian St. Augustine wrote extensively on this, and warns of the concequences of Christians who refute accepted scientific theories on religious grounds, where he wrote, “It not infrequently happens that something about the earth, about the sky, about other elements of this world, about the motion and rotation or even the magnitude and distances of the stars, about definite eclipses of the sun and moon, about the passage of years and seasons, about the nature of animals, of fruits, of stones, and of other such things, may be known with the greatest certainty by reasoning or by experience, even by one who is not a Christian. It is too disgraceful and ruinous, though, and greatly to be avoided, that he [the non-Christian] should hear a Christian speaking so idiotically on these matters, and as if in accord with Christian writings, that he might say that he could scarcely keep from laughing when he saw how totally in error they are. In view of this and in keeping it in mind constantly while dealing with the book of Genesis, I have, insofar as I was able, explained in detail and set forth for consideration the meanings of obscure passages, taking care not to affirm rashly some one meaning to the prejudice of another and perhaps better explanation."(29). Keep in mind that St. Augustine wrote this in the early 5th century AD, at a time where there was no reason whatsoever to doubt strict literal interpretations of text. His forsight is the theological principle that is the trade secret of Christian doctrine, and the very reason why, because of the works of St. Augustine and other early theologians, Christian bodies throughout history have had little or no problem altering their interpretation of scripture when substantiated scientific evidence is presented that contradicts a certain Biblical assertion(30).(e,f). This thinking is emulated today as well. Dinosaur paleontologist and pentecostal preacher Robert T. Bakker once said that ‘to treat the bible as common history is to degrade it’s eternal meaning’.(31) Theologian Thomas Jay Oord also writes that “the Bible teaches us how to find abundant life, not on how life became abundant”(32). This is why, for example, in a prior video, I had asserted the danger of denying ourselves the calculated observations of our physical world, as doing so holds the potential to skew and marginalize any held spiritual beliefs by limiting the range in which we can understand and value our existence as a whole. It damages religion’s credibility as a source of rational dialogue and damages the methodology to which we examine matters of faith, the end concequence being an alienation of religion from all rational discourse and the subjection of religion to a fundamentalism that can be used to justify any behaviour without consideration of ethical boundaries or alternative perspectives of faith. (33). Unfortunately, some Christians do not abide by this rule, as anyone in the United States can tell you of creationist decietfulness and the dogmatism they display as they attempt to spread scientific ignorance motivated through literal interpretations of text. Perhaps the tragedy with these people is not only do they reject a sound scientific theory that has been supported by 150 years of evidence(34), but they also reject a sound theological doctine that has guided Christian thought tried and true for over 1600 years. Scientific refutation of specific claims within the Bible do nothing to invalidate Christian doctine, the existence or God, or the validity of the Bible as a source of spiritual revelation, as Christianity has already been for the last 1600 years abiding by St. Augustine’s basic theological principle that the Bible is a book of God, not of nature.
The second reason why it is incorrect to assert that scientific knowledge refutes the existence of God through refutation of specific biblical claims is because even if a rationalization was presented based off of physical observations that challenged some characterization of God, this is not a scientific argument. It is entirely philosophical in nature, and philosophical assertions are fallible. If I asserted for example, that the presence of disease in the world refutes the existence of a benevolent God, this is not an argument on scientfic grounds, but on philosophical grounds. All one could do is provide a fallible rational argument that can be countered with, or theoretically countered with, and equally impressive and persuasive fallible rational argument. I could counter this argument and support the existence of a benevolent God, but it’s ultimately impossible to judge who’s right because there’s no empirical way to falsify either claim. How would you falsify such a claim? Although both arguments may involve elements that refer to what exists in the physical universe, and although either argument may be valid, neither of them can be falsified by any empirical means and is therefore not scientific(6,7). I cannot stress this enough - there is a sharp difference between the physical observations made by science and the methodological body of science. Forming philosophical arguments based off of physical observations is not scientific. Hypothesis forming, data gathering, evidence based conclusion forming, all under natural presumptions, is. (1,2,3,4,5,7)
Lastly, what about miracles? The common objection is that miracles are impossible because they violate the laws of nature and therefore they are no longer laws. There is a problem with this logic. While the constants or the laws of nature cannot be violated as long as the source of causation is within the same acting system, when you have a source of causation that is external to the time, space, and matter that the constants act upon and within, they can still be constants, and they can be suspended, as long as the source of suspension is independent from the influence of those laws. The supernatural qualifies as one possible source, by definition. (10). Put simply, suspensions of laws do not qualify as a violation and negation of that law in so long as the source of the suspension is external to the realm to which such laws occupy, since a law is only a law in the context of being unchangeable only from within the physical system it occupies.
But even if miracles are possible on theoretical grounds, surely if there was some suspension of the laws of nature, we should be able to observe it, and scientists should be able to analyse it. If for example, my laptop began defying the laws of gravity by floating in the air, scientists should be able to subject it to rigourous examination and conclusively prove that the causation is supernatural, right? There are two problems with this reasoning, the first being that it violates the philosophy of science, as science can only come to a problem with natural presumptions and either come to a natural conclusion, or none(7), and the the second problem being that coming to a supernatural conclusion excludes the possibility that it could have been some natural event that current science does not know about. Even worse, it’s an investigative dead-end as instead of spending the time and effort trying to find out what why or how some phenomenon happened by natural causes, we have concluded that it was of supernatural origin. Thus, no futher investigation is required, when if only we assumed we didn’t know what it was, could we eventually continue investigating and eventually unravel yet another one of nature’s many mysteries. Scientists in the 17th century could not reason how life could have arose from non-life, but today, due to the experiements of Miller and Urey and others after them, scientists are just beginning to figure it out (35). Had science as a methological body accepted the supernatural source of life simply because we could not figure it out, we might not have known something valuable about our world. Likewise, my floating laptop, which by now is undergoing rigorous examination in CERN laboratories, might have revealed some great secret about the laws of nature that could of benefited humanity, but because science as a methological body concluded it was supernatural, such secrets were never revealed to us. Of course, individual scientists may look at this floating labtop, or they may look at the complexity of life three centuries ago prior to biological evolution and the emerging abiogenesis, and conclude as individuals that maybe there is a supernatural agent involved, but to conclude that methologically is a scientific dead end. And here’s the take home message, the one thing I would like you to understand as we close up this video: If methological science accepted the supernatural as an acceptable presumption or conclusion, science as we know it would break down before our eyes. Natural presumption is necessary for the preservation of the scientific method because supernatural presumption negates the possibility of progress. Investigation is no longer required if science assumes the supernatural. Civilization as we know it would never have progressed to the point it is today if the universal language of science allowed the supernatural as a conclusion. This is the reason why you will never find a peer reviewed publication regarding the existence of God, and this is the reason why the answers to such questions is something you need to seek out on non-scientific grounds. To keep supernatural presumption and conclusion out of science is to keep it safe. When questions of God arise, or any other unknown for that manner, as far as science is concerned, it’s far safer to say, ‘I don’t know’.
Notes
a) A common misrepresentation of the Big Bang theory is to say that it suggests that the universe came out of nothing. This is incorrect. The Big Bang theory only describes the natural progression of the universe once the ‘dot’ was already there; it does not at all comment on how the dot came into existence in the first place. This concept is not unlike the difference between the theories of abiogenesis and evolution; evolution describes how life evolved once life already exists, while abiogenesis describes how life came into being prior to evolution. As of yet, while the Big Bang theory is the universally accepted explanation for the natural progression of the universe, there is no accepted scientific explanation for how the universe came into being.
b) When I refer to infinite time, or the application of the concept of infinity to some multiverse, I am not refering to temporal time as it cannot exist outside of our universe, but rather to an eternal state of existence that has no relevance to the relativistic time that we are embedded in and commonly experience. This is exactly the trouble with trying to relate concepts of infinity to the universe and to God, as we have no perception as to what infinity is and how relates to the existence of something within or external to what we percieve as time and space and matter.
c) How for example, do I exist within a finite period of time when there was an infinite period of time before me? In an infinite universe, the universe would have to be in existence for an infinite period of time before producing me – an impossibility since infinity knows no end. Note that this gets very complicated when point 'b' is considered as well.
d) While there may or may not be contradictions to modern understanding of nature written within the Holy Koran, it should be noted that while Judeo-Christian theology assumes fallible human involvement in the production of the Holy Scripture and how revelation is expressed, Islam cannot apply to the following argument as Muslim theology assumes that the Holy Koran is the direct chosen words of God - and hence why no translation from the original language will ever do justice in some Muslim’s eyes as human choice of words will introduce imperfection to a perfect dictation from God.
e) One apparent contradiction to this statement is the Galileo trial. It should be noted though that geocentrism was a respectable scientific theory up through the 16th and 17th centuries. Although the Church initially embraced Galileo’s discoveries, and was already teaching Copernican cosmology as a respectable scientific hypothesis in Jesuit schools, the relationship turned sour as Galileo was presenting his unproven heliocentric hypotheses as proven fact. The Chuch, having just been through the Protestant reformation, was not eager to change it’s interpretation based off of a hypothesis that also had respected dissent in the form of geocentrism, a model that more or less worked well with the available data. If the earth orbited the sun, why couldn’t astronomers observe parallax with neighbouring stars?
f) By Christian bodies, I mean ecclesiastical bodies that have the capacity to analyze scripture on a scholarly level, have accessibility to secular scientific information (in any time period in history), and the organization necesssary to enact it's theological conclusions. One example would be the Roman Catholic Church, although there may be others. No doubt there are Christian groups/private churches who are the antithesis of the video message, but within the video I am referring to those Christian bodies who possess the capacity to examine the Bible with scholarly quality and the organization to enact their conclusions across the board. While RCC priests very often require a university degree in theology, and the popes likely a Ph.D (if not two, as Pope John Paul II had), Westboro Baptist Church preachers need to be very good at holding signs next to a road.
References
1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science, acc. 19 Dec. 2008.
2) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method, acc. 19 Dec. 2008.
3) “[4] Rules for the study of natural philosophy”, Newton 1999, pp. 794-6, from the General Scholium, which follows Book 3, The System of the World., and Newton, Isacc (1687,1713,1726), Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, University of California Press, ISBN 0-520-08817-4, 3rd Ed. Trs. By Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman, 1999.
4) “scientific method”, at Merriam-Webster Dictionary., http://www.merriam-webster.com/
acc. 19 Dec. 2008.
5) Potholer54. 10-The Scientific Method Made Easy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcavPAFiG14. acc. 19 Dec. 2008.
6) “a theory should be considered scientific if and only if it is falsifiable.” Carl Popper, Popper’s Philosophy – Philosophy of Science, as paraphrased in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper, acc. 19 Dec. 2008.
7) Rosenberg, A. 2005. The Philosophy of Science: A Contemporary Introduction, 2nd Ed. TR_ROUTL.
8) Dawkins, Richard. The God Delusion. London: Bantam Press, 2006. pp. 48.
9) Ibid., pp. 59.
10) “supernatural”, at http://dictionary.reference.com/, acc. 19 Dec. 2008.
11) Hitchens, Christopher. Mommie Dearest – The Pope Beatifies Mother Theresa, a Fanatic, a Fundamentalist, & a Fraud. Slate Magazine. 20 Oct. 2003. http://www.slate.com/id/2090083/ acc. 24 Dec. 2008.
12) D’Souza, Dinesh. What’s So Great About Christianity? Regnery. Wash., DC. 2007. pp. 194.
13) "God's Utility Function," Scientific American, November, 1995, pp. 85.
14) Steinfels, Peter. A Catholic Professor on Evolution and Theology: To Understand One, It Helps to Understand the Other. New York Times. 20 Aug. 2005. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/20/national/20beliefs.html?_r=1 acc. 22 Dec. 08.
15) H, Margenau, and Varghese, R.A., Cosmos, Bios, and Theos. La Salle, IL, Open Court, ed. 1992, pp. 83.
16) Bergman, Jerry. 1994. Arno A. Penzias: Astrophysicist, Nobel Laureate. Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith, 46.3: 183-187, (9/1994). The Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation.
17) Miller, Kenneth R. Finding Darwin’s God – A Scientist’s Search For Common Ground Between God and Evolution, Harper Perennial, 1999. ISBN 978-0-06-123350-0. pp.266.
18) Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letter to Eberhard Bethge, 29 May 1944.. Letters and Papers from Prison, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1997. ISBN 978-0-684-83827-4. pp. 310-312.
19) Hattenstone, Simon. Dawrin’s Child. The Guardian. 10 Feb 2003. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/feb/10/religion.scienceandnature, acc. 20 Dec. 2008.
20) Interview between Richard Dawkins and Fr. George Coyne available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=po0ZMfkSNxc&feature=channel_page acc. 20 Dec. 2008.
21) Easterbrook, Gregg. SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY: Science and God: A Warming Trend? Science. 15 Aug. 1997. Vol. 277 no. 5328 pp. 890-893., and Larson, Edward J. & Witham, Larry. Scientists are still keeping the faith. 1997 poll, University of Georgia. Nature. 386, 435-436 3 Apr. 1997. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v386/n6624/abs/386435a0.html acc. 20 Dec. 08.See also http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_n22_v91/ai_19332942
22) Chang, Kenneth. Gauging Age of Universe Becomes More Precise. New York Times. 9 Mar. 08. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/09/science/space/09cosmos.html?_r=1 acc. 20 Dec. 08.
23) See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-theory
24) See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaotic_Inflation_theory
25) See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscillatory_universe
26) Peebles, P.J.E., & Ratra, Bharat. The cosmological constant and dark energy. Reviews of Modern Physics. (2003) 75: 559-606.
27) Sagan, Carl & D’Souza, Placido P. Hindu cosmology’s time-scale for the universe is in cosonance with modern science. Dick Teresi (2002). Lost Discoveries: The Ancient Roots of Modern Science – from the Babylonians to the Maya. http://www.rediff.com/news/jan/29sagan.htm acc. 23 Dec. 2008.
28) Pope John Paul II. Cosmology and Fundamental Physics. Address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, 3 Oct. 1981. http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP2COSM.HTM acc. 23 Dec. 2008.
29) St. Augustine. The Literal Interpretation of Genesis 1:19–20, Chapt. 19. 408 A.D.
30) Read Woods, Thomas E. Jr. How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization. Rengery. Wash, DC. 2005. ISBN 0-89526-038-7.
31) As quoted in AronRa’s 1st Foundational Falsehood of Creationism at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnJX68ELbAY&feature=PlayList&p=126AFB53A6F002CC&index=0&playnext=1
32) See Proponents in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theistic_evolution acc. 24 Dec. 2008.
33) See UNFFwildcard’s A Message to All Creationists, available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17L1ygQIt4U , 14 Aug. 2008.
34) See CDK007’s What Every Creationist Must DENY, available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nj587d5ies&feature=channel_page, acc. 29 Dec. 2008.
35) See, for example CDK007’s video, titled The Origin of Life – Abiogenesis, available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6QYDdgP9eg&feature=related , or DonExodus2’s video, How Biogenesis Works at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhWds7djuWo&feature=related
