The fire in the equations: science, religion, and the search for God

Abstract

This is one of the increasingly common genre of books so beloved of the Templeton Foundation. That is, one which tries to find some new 'religious meaning' compatible with all of the scientific conclusions of today (especially evolution). Not surprisingly, such works (which invariably dismiss Biblical authority, implicitly or explicitly) seldom consider that these conclusions are often (for example, macroevolution itself) based upon a chain of reasoning which begins, arbitrarily, on the anti-Biblical presuppositional foundation of materialism. Such authors therefore set themselves a heroic task — to try to establish a non-materialistic conclusion upon a materialistic base. The blurb on the dust jacket assures us that Ferguson has definitely disposed of the tiresome argument that science has done away with religion. It also contains the comment by Anglican physicist (and renowned theistic evolutionist) John Polkinghorne that the author 'weaves together science, philosophy, and theology with verve and clarity'. This is the same John Polkinghorne of whom Phillip Johnson points out that his 'God-ofthe-gaps theology has defined God almost into non-existence as the 'lighter of the fuse of the Big Bang', as it were. However, the glowing commendations on the cover do not mislead when it comes to the clear, 'simple yet profound' writing style. Reading this book would help Christians concerned with Bible/science intellectual issues in a number of ways. Firstly, they would obtain some very engagingly explained insights into some of the 'big picture' issues of modern science — cosmology, chaos and complexity, quantum theory and so on — in a way that is genuinely enjoyable for the non-specialist. (Ferguson herself was trained in music, but that is by no means a putdown. Reading this book allows one to appreciate how her grasp of her secondary passion, science, enables her to now make a living as a full-time scholar and lecturer on the subject.) Secondly, those who are actively engaged in creation/evolution apologetics can never, in my view, obtain too much insight into the philosophy of the scientific endeavour in order to help dispel some of the common mythology which surrounds it. Ferguson, despite weaknesses in some areas, excels in explaining this, also. Thirdly, this book would help one to become immune to any premature excitement about future comments (by successors to Davies, Hawking et al.) reported to be evidence of 'scientists coming closer to God' or seeking 'the mind of God' and the like. Ferguson is adept at maintaining a stance of apparent scholarly neutrality, dancing back and forth with ease between the starkly atheistic conclusions of a Dawkins and the theistic 'loopholes' of a Polkinghorne. However, one gets the impression that her innate preferences (presumably on the basis of her upbringing) lie with a deity at least somewhat akin to the Biblical God, even though she claims in an entire chapter that Biblical evidence is inadmissible. She occasionally speculates freely about such things as miracles occurring without God interfering in the physical laws. When she does so, her reference is often to Biblical miracles — Joshua, Jonah and the Resurrection, for example. She asks — could these simply be the permissible, but highly unlikely exceptions to natural law, akin to extremely improbable molecular fluctuations causing temporary, localised exceptions to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, for example? Could God have set the Universe up in such a way from the beginning that these exceptions were 'built in'? Her aim is not so much to conclude, but to take the reader on a tour of all possible options, as it were. Many readers may have never stopped to consider the matter she raises on page 24, namely, that certain 'constants of nature' (for example, the mass and charge of the electron and the speed of light), while they can be