Science and Christianity

To become a Christian, do you need to throw away your mind & ignore the findings of science? Au contraire!

 
One of my five (yes, five!) majors as an undergraduate was biology. As a biology student who was also a Christian, I struggled with how to reconcile the theory of evolution with my faith. I knew Christians who felt strongly that evolution was contrary to Christianity, but in biology, evolution was the foundation upon which classes were taught. I wanted to stay true to my faith but was unsure how to reconcile this apparent contradiction. The symbols in the picture in this post testify to the hostility between some who hold these “opposing viewpoints”, and represent a sort of warfare mentality of the relationship of science to faith.

For me, probably the thing that bothered me most was the link, at least in my mind, between evolutionary science and naturalism, a concept adopted by many atheists. Naturalism denies the existence of God and teaches that only natural laws and forces (as opposed to supernatural ones) operate in the world and that nothing exists beyond the natural world; life is solely the product of random forces guided by no one (i.e., accidental). I read articles explaining the “evolutionary basis for morality” and “religion as a natural phenomenon”. In a nutshell, they argued that morality and belief in God exists simply because they helped our ancestors adapt to their environments and survive, and not because they are true. In effect, the things our brain tells us about God, morality, and even love and beauty are not real, but merely a set of chemical reactions which only have the purpose of passing on our genetic code (i.e., natural selection).

These assumptions seem reasonable at face value, which only intensified my quandary as an undergraduate biology student who was also a Christian.

My journey on this road was long, but for the sake of brevity I will summarize my view by citing from “The Reason for God” by Tim Keller, who addressed this topic as well as any I have ever heard. Here is a synopsis of his argument:

If we can't trust our brains to tell us the truth about God, as naturalism suggests, then why should we trust our brains in any area, including to tell us the truth about any scientific theory (including evolution)? For that matter, how certain can we be in our ability to apply reason to anything at all? Indeed, reason itself can have no power if it is only a product of natural selection. Charles Darwin himself saw this major vulnerability, writing “the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man’s mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy” (1). If our brains are products of random, unguided evolution, then it is as likely we live in a sort of dream world as that we actually know something about ourselves and our world (2). It is disingenuous for naturalists to apply the scalpel of their skepticism to what our minds tell us about God, but not to what our minds tell us about naturalism itself. Conversely, if we believe God exists, then our view of the universe gives us a basis for believing that cognitive faculties work, since God could make us able to form true beliefs and knowledge. Also, if God exists, our intuitions about the meaningfulness of beauty and love are to be expected. If you don't believe in God then these things are profoundly inexplicable. When evolution is turned into an All-encompassing Theory explaining absolutely everything we believe, feel, and do as the product of random forces through natural selection, then we are not in the arena of science, but of philosophy, and it has insurmountable difficulties as a worldview.

You may be wondering what my position is on this topic after all my wrestling. I believe that scientific thought can be compatible with religious belief, which is important since I am a scientist! Many Christians do not believe the theory of evolution; after all, it is only theory. But many Christians do accept evolutionary theory, although in the sense that God created life with purpose and evolutionary processes do exist. Since Christians have differing viewpoints on evolutionary theory, skeptical inquirers do not need to accept one of these positions in order to embrace the Christian faith. Rather they should concentrate on and weigh the central claims of Christianity such as the person of Christ and the resurrection.

There is much more to say about this but I have already gone long. As always, I am interested in your thoughts on this, whether you agree or disagree. Please feel free to share your thoughtful comments!

(1) Charles Darwin, Letter to W. Graham, 1881, The life and letters of Charles Darwin: including an autobiographical chapter;  (2) Alvin Plantinga, "Is Naturalism Irrational?" in Warrant and Proper Function (Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 218.