Countering threats to Science

Christians target post-modernism, but is the biggest threat within science itself?

Public perceptions of science are deeply influenced by the roles played by scientists in the BSE crisis, the MMR vaccination concerns and the GM food controversy. Scientists used to be respected as independent experts, but no longer. Public confidence has been undermined by evident commercial interest, undue secrecy and unethical cover-ups.

These cases represent the tips of the proverbial iceberg. Beneath these controversies lies intense debate about the nature of science and what science can tell us. The annual conference of the organisation 'Christians in Science' (London, September 29) was devoted to exploring these issues, with the general theme of 'Can we be sure of anything?'

Sociologists of science

The scholars responsible for the scientific revolution were realists: they thought they were tracking down truth. They used their rational abilities to think God's thoughts after him. As time went on, scientists continued to be rational and to be realists, but they abandoned the thought that God has any relevance to their work. They became modernists, defending the concept of objective truth. In more recent years, confidence in realism has waned and many scholars have felt unable to defend anything but relativism. This intellectual movement has been described as post-modernism.

The focus of interest at the conference was the way post-modernist scholars approach science. The most influential group are the sociologists of science who argue that experimentation and testing are generally not the major factors in the development of science. Rather, science is perceived as socially constructed, with human beliefs playing a dominant role. This vision of science leaves no room for science as an objective, authoritative body of truth.

Deconstruction

Much to the surprise of traditionally-minded scientists, the sociologists of science have found a rich mine to dig in! Many well-known examples of scientific discovery make the point very clearly. For example, the Copernican revolution was achieved without experimentation and it was driven by one belief system replacing another. Even Copernicus' delay in publishing his theory was socially constrained.

Most practising scientists, and most philosophers of science, have reacted with alarm at this attempt to deconstruct their activities. They reject vigorously the thought that their research owes more to social factors than to application of the scientific method. They consider that their findings bring them closer to reality and that they deserve to be regarded as objective. The resulting antagonism has been dubbed 'the science wars'.

Trad Dawkins

However, the dominant voices for traditional science have adopted materialism as their working philosophy. Richard Dawkins is the most eminent UK spokesman for this position, which he undertakes with enthusiasm in his role as Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University. The fact that he is widely accepted as a spokesman for science is confirmed by his recent election to be a Fellow of the Royal Society.

Dawkins argues that the scientific method is the only reliable route to knowledge. Science provides the only sure methodology for determining truth. According to his views, alleged sources of truth via religion and belief systems are rejected as worthless superstition. Christianity is viewed by materialists as just as much an enemy of science as post-modernism.

The major emphasis of the Christians in Science (CiS) contribution to debate before now has been to describe materialistic science (of the Dawkins' variety) as scientism, and to argue that science proper operates within constraints. Science cannot be used to gain knowledge about everything, but its sphere of application is the description of God's material creation. This science happens to be indistinguishable from materialistic science when applied to the workings of the world around us. Higher levels of purpose, meaning, design and aesthetics are viewed as complementary dimensions of reality where we can draw from Christian revelation.

Moving on?

Two of the speakers at the 2001 CiS Conference presented arguments that, in my eyes, would tend to move the CiS organisation towards a different position. Roger Trigg, Professor of Philosophy at Warwick University, spoke on 'A Christian basis for scientific reasoning'. The other challenging speaker was Don Carson, Professor of the New Testament at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, USA, with an address on 'maintaining Christian and scientific truths in an age of relativism'.

Roger Trigg identified three competing approaches to truth: materialism, relativism and Christianity. Each approach has metaphysical foundations. However, materialism has a fundamental flaw: it cannot explain the functioning of reason. Relativism also has a fundamental flaw: it elevates social reality to the status of objective truth, thereby making itself internally inconsistent. Only Christianity avoids these flaws and, of course, has a rich historical heritage in the way science's founders were all deeply influenced by Christian theology.

Thus, the past CiS position, that there is an area of science that is common ground for materialists and Christians, is no part of Roger Trigg's approach. It is 'reality' that is important, including the reality about God. Adopting his vision will necessitate many changes in CiS apologetics. Professor Trigg has authored Philosophy Matters (Blackwell, 2001) that expands the arguments presented in the lecture.

Christian perspective

Don Carson's focus was on the challenge of relativism to modernism. While both modernism and Christianity have the conviction that there are universals that make knowledge acquisition possible, modernism has never established a robust defence of its position. Once this became clear, post-modernism was born, and it is not surprising that relativism has emerged as the new agenda. According to Carson, Christians should not challenge post-modernism by aligning ourselves with modernism.

Carson spoke of complementarity as a modernist tendency (for example, science and religion belong to two distinct domains, with science having all the objective knowledge and religion being associated with experiences, meaning, subjective values and beliefs). If we are not to align ourselves with modernism (materialistic science) or post-modernism (relativistic social construction of science), then we need to develop a Christian perspective on science that is unashamed to be called 'Christian'. We will distance ourselves from the 'truth' claims of naturalistic science, but nevertheless we will advocate the view that scientists can know truth, albeit imperfectly, through the practice of science.
Both these presenters argued for what might be described as a 'worldview approach', with conscious thought emerging from a mindset or worldview that may or may not be consciously held. Both presenters suggested that a Christian approach to science is both distinctive and necessary. Responding to these leads will be costly: it will mean distancing ourselves from the mindset of the mainstream scientific community.

Nature's empiricism

To give one contemporary example of the seriousness of the situation, in the 20 September 2001 issue of Nature, the editors wrote: 'Most Western scientists, and this journal too, would consider a denial of Enlightenment values as a betrayal of everything science stands for.' By aligning themselves with Enlightenment values, the editors of Nature are espousing empiricism as the exclusive route to knowledge. Christians are aware that the 18th-century Enlightenment was unflinchingly hostile to revelation in all its forms. Our response is to say that not only was the Enlightenment a betrayal of the values associated with the pioneers of science in the 17th century, but that the heirs of the Enlightenment did not realise that, once they abandoned deism, their methodology became fatally flawed.

For at least a decade, the CiS approach has been critiqued by other Christians, principally those associated with the 'Intelligent Design' initiative in the US. The challengers have explained why there cannot be a domain of science that has an independent authority by virtue of its own methodology to gain objective knowledge. However, these critiques have made little impact within CiS.

The worldview approach means that strategies that minimise foundational differences are weak and unproductive. The need is for all Christians involved in the scientific enterprise to develop a robust Christian worldview anchored to truth, because this alone can meet the challenges to science of materialism, modernism and post-modernism.

Science cannot be autonomous, and this is essentially the message Roger Trigg brought to the conference. Aligning ourselves with modernistic science involves compromising Christian truth, as Don Carson explained. If this conference leads to the wider recognition and adoption of a worldview approach by members of Christians in Science, it will be a landmark in the history of this group. This emphasis will give positive direction and renewed confidence to a whole new generation of Christian students of science.

David J. Tyler

David Tyler is a senior lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University, a member of the Institute of Physics and a member of Christians in Science.