wfn.org | Harvard conference explores interface between science and religion

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2001-317

Harvard conference explores interface between science and religion

by Barbara Smith-Moran

     (ENS) Those who minister in a scientific and technological milieu know how 
difficult it is to induce scientists and engineers to talk about their religion 
or spiritual expression. While they belong to parishes in the same proportion as 
other Americans, they are often consider it taboo to speak about it with each 
other.  Perhaps it's tantamount to admitting to a lapse in intellectual 
integrity.  Perhaps it's too private a matter for discussion among colleagues.  
Whatever the reason, a project called Science and the Spiritual Quest has sought 
to change the cultural pattern.

     The project is the brainchild of two theologians connected with the Center 
for Theology and the Natural Sciences (CTNS), part of the Graduate Theological 
Union of Berkeley, California--the Rev. Dr. Robert John Russell and the Rev. Dr. 
Mark Richardson.  Russell, the center's director, is also a high-energy physicist 
and United Church of Christ clergyman.  Richardson, an Episcopal priest, was 
formerly the program director at CTNS and is now professor of theology at the 
General Theological Seminary in New York.

     The October 21-23 conference on "The Quest for Knowledge, Truth and Values 
in Science and Religion" at Harvard's Memorial Church was the second of four 
planned over a span of four years. The conferences are designed to give some of 
the nation's leading scientists, who have met with each other in closed sessions 
over a year's time, to publicly discuss their conclusions about the connections 
between their scientific and their spiritual practices.  Between the bookend 
presentation by two prominent scientist-theologians, 16 participants spoke of how 
they feel that their own spiritual expression interfaces with their practice of 
science.

Guru-scientists

     Oxford biochemist and eminent Anglican theologian, the Rev. Arthur Peacocke, 
delivered the opening keynote address.  Winner of the 2001 Templeton Prize for 
Progress in Religion, he spoke of the emergence of the "guru-scientists" who "are 
calling the tunes in the general intellectual scene"--especially among other 
scientists, and also in the wider culture.  Some of these guru-scientists deny 
the legitimacy of theology as an intellectual pursuit in a contemporary 
university.

     Peacocke admits the need for change in the way theology is done today.  He 
sees the need for an "open, revisable, exploratory theology in all religions."  
Such a global theology would not be wholly dependent on authoritative scriptural 
sources read uncritically.  The findings of science, he said, are a global 
resource that offer new images, metaphors and symbols for exploring and speaking 
of the "creative Ultimate Reality" that is God.

     The views represented by the speakers were wide-ranging.  Physicist Paul 
Davies, of Imperial College London and the University of Queensland, spoke of a 
"cosmic religious feeling," inspired by his study of a universe whose laws permit 
it to become self-creating, self-organizing, and self-aware.  He was critical of 
religions that are based on stories that tell of a God active in history. 

     Appearing opposite him in the same session, Nobel laureate physicist William 
Phillips spoke of the joy it brings him to know about God's personal care for 
him.  "If we look at the world just through the window of science," he said, 
"then love is just biochemistry."  He moved the audience to hand-clapping with a 
rousing video of his church's gospel choir, with himself in the bass section.  He 
says that he doubts that any scientific experiment can be designed that will 
support what brings him such joy, his belief in a personal God.  

Realities of violence

     Many speakers referenced the terrorist attacks of September 11. The session 
entitled "What Does it Mean to Be Human?" confronted the realities of human 
violence and altruism.  Primatologist Jane Goodall spoke to the conference by 
live videocast from Calgary, Alberta.  Her classic studies of chimpanzees in the 
wild have demonstrated that these closest relatives of human beings share with us 
the capacity for cooperation, modifying and using tools, sense of humor and 
wonder, self-awareness, fear, despair, happiness, mental suffering, empathy--and 
brutal behavior. 

     She identifies speech as the ability that makes human beings unique.  It 
allowed an explosion of intellectual development, which has, in turn, enabled our 
species to be both better and worse than the chimp.    Because of the ability to 
think through the results of actions, human beings alone among all animals are 
capable of terrorism and altruism.  

     Paired with Goodall in this session was neurobiologist William Newsome, of 
the Stanford University School of Medicine.  Newsome said that in order to answer 
the question of what it means to be human, he found he needed "to take off his 
neuroscientist hat and put on his human hat.  We're the only species pondering 
the possibility that there is no meaning to our existence."

     His own scientific work has led him to believe that the most significant 
aspects of who he is are rooted in the functioning of his central nervous system, 
especially  the cerebral cortex.  The most fundamental aspect of being human is 
not addressed by facts from science, he said. " The facts are ambiguous about our 
meaning and our role in the universe.  We must all go beyond science in search 
for ultimate meaning.  He concludes that the Central part of what it means to be 
human is to come into relationship with "the central reality of the universe and 
find it to be good."

Spiritual quest

     The session on "Information Sciences, Intelligence, and Creativity" paired 
computer scientist Manuela Veloso of Carnegie-Mellon University with Praveen 
Chaudhari, a research staff member of IBM's Research Center.  Veloso, who is 
Roman Catholic, works with multi-robot systems, each member of which is designed 
to be autonomous.  Autonomy involves perception, response to stimuli, and 
cognition--the ability to reason, experiment, and learn.  While robots may 
eventually do all the tasks a human being can do, and perhaps better, she does 
not believe that that is the same as being human.  Robots will always be missing 
something, she says.  She struggles with the question of whether a robot can ever 
have feelings, even if programmed to have them.

     Chaudhari addressed the issues connected with spirituality by quoting from 
the sacred texts of different world cultures and traditions.  He said that in the 
culminating state of spiritual growth, the distinction between doing science and 
being spiritual vanishes.  "We cannot describe, there are no words for, our 
underlying humanity and what is at the cosmos at depth," he said.  "We struggle 
with words to do that, but they are the wrong medium."

     As the final bookend for the conference, physicist-theologian Ian Barbour 
provided the summary.  Conference organizer Phillip Clayton rightly introduced 
him as the founder of the field of science and religion.  Now retired from 
Carleton College, his most recent book (2000) is When Science Meets Religion.  

     In his summary, Barbour noted that none of the scientists tried to use 
science to prove the existence of God.  He observed that the physical scientists 
have been more receptive than the biological scientists to the idea of a 
spiritual quest.  He noted the agreement among the scientists that there hasn't 
been much progress toward understanding consciousness.  It may turn out to be 
inaccessible to science, he ventured.  

     Regarding human nature, not much reference was made to the contributions 
that religion might make to this topic.  The dualism of body/spirit, critiqued by 
neuroscience, is also rejected by modern theology.  He proposed that since so 
little attention was given to ethical issues, an entire conference should be 
devoted to it in the future.  Observing that all religious traditions have their 
scriptural fundamentalists, Barbour concluded with a question:  "From this 
conference, how can we help our religious communities to take the findings of 
science more seriously and to practice the spirit of inquiry?"

--The Rev. Barbara Smith-Moran of Massachusetts is co-chair of the  Executive
Council Committee on Science, Technology and Faith.