The June 2026 issue of Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith (the academic journal of the American Scientific Affiliation) published a great article titled “Staying in Conversation: Review of Research on the Science Views of Evangelicals and Effective Ways to Respond.” It was written by Deborah Haarsma who was the president of BioLogos from 2013-2024. Dr. Haarsma is an astronomer and an extremely good writer. By the way, please consider joining and / or supporting the American Scientific Affiliation and BioLogos. Both organizations work very hard trying to get rid of the ridiculous idea of the “war between science and religion.” There is no war. Like any potential war in the history of humankind, most people do not want conflict. Typically, only sociopaths want war and the “fundamentalists” on both sides of the so-called war between science and religion desire destruction of the other side — even if it destroys their side. Such conflict is not helpful.

Dr. Haarsma’s article is very long. It is behind PSCF‘s paywall, but the paywall typically goes away 3-6 months after an article is published. So, you can read the article for free relatively soon. I highly recommend you read it.

Scopes Monkey Trial (1925): More of a town marketing event for Dayton, Tennessee

Although the PSCF article is lengthy, it is truly amazing. Although the article concentrates on dealing with the anti-science attitude of Evangelicals, I think it can be extended to other religious groups. By the way, I very much realize that not all Evangelicals are anti-science. Unfortunately, those that are anti-science make up a significant voting block in the U.S. which risks all sorts of problems when it comes to combatting global warming or making sure children get vaccinated.

Dr. Haarsma’s notes the recent data suggesting 36% of white, religious people in the United States now delay or avoid getting their children vaccinated. This percentage is very scary when you read about the consequences of whooping cough, diphtheria, measles, etc. prior to the invention of vaccination.

Image of diphtheria blocking the airway in a child (image from Dateline Health Africa). Preventable with vaccination.

She then goes on to the history of the anti-science movement in the United States and how this issue recently has been amplified to dangerous proportions recently. Honestly, I think social media acclerates the problem of pseudo-science. Pseudo-science is quite large in the field of health and medicine.

Whooping cough (image from Wikipedia). Preventable with vaccination.

The last part of Dr. Haarsma’s article discusses ways to address this problem. I am not going to go into great detail about her solutions. They are all good. They also are numerous, and I am doing a simple blog post.

Let me consider a few ideas, however.

Dr. Haarsma talks about “Kingdom conversations” which in Christian terminology means loving one’s neighbor no matter their political affiliation, nationality, race, religion, or sexuality (see Matthew 22:37-40). Honestly, I have always felt that if we followed this statement from Jesus and just took care of each other as opposed to harming each other for very stupid reasons, we would have all sorts of monetary revenue on our planet to cure diseases, remove poverty, build amazing computers, explore the solar system, and on and on. I sometimes think that the genetics / epigenetics of humans appear to be suggest that we will always be violent to each other, but one can only hope.

Assyrian war relief (British Museum)

Earning trust: This is a big one for me. Yelling at a person who has anti-vaccination beliefs never works. As Dr. Haarsma points out, just telling personal stories helps here quite a bit.

I have had personal experience here. When I talk to families that are vaccine hesitant, I just tell personal stories. I don’t necessaarily tell them stories about children who die from vaccine-preventable illnesses. I talk about my own children who have been vaccinated and who have done very well in life — college, careers, normal contributing lives to society, etc. I try to relate to such parents as I have been a parent of young children too. When you are a parent to young children, you can be a bit anxious about everything. I certainly was.

When I talk to close friends and family about these issues, the conversation often leads to a conversation about my religious faith. Specifically, many of my close friends and family are just as religious as I am, but they do not have my medical training. As a result, I have the opportunity to be very clear about medical science in a loving way. I can state that I am a Christian just as much as they are, and I believe vaccinating children is a gift from God.

Co-create

If I believe God and humans co-create with the capacity for the result to be good, then vaccinations and all of their life saving potential are certainly a miracle. Remember that Jesus could not perform many miracles in his hometown (Nazareth) due to the inhabitants’ lack of faith. Having faith in God is not just hoping God will step in. It requires understanding that God desires us to be creative with God. By being creative, we can be good and kind to our fellow humans and the rest of the planet. By being creative in science, we can make the world a better place in a setting equal to being creative in the arts. We can reduce suffering.

Vaccinating children to prevent their death is creativity and love via science. This is objective creativity. Objective creativity can go hand-in-hand with subjective creativity. For example, Brahms’ 1st symphony demonstrated that great music could be made after Beethoven. This is creativity and love via the fine arts. Objective and subjective creativity can complement each other to make the world even better.

Blaise Pascal

One last thing. This part is from me. I have a huge issue with American politics. I think our current political structure accelerates the problems above. You may remember this quote by Blaise Pascal: “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of each man which cannot be satisfied by any created thing but only by God the Creator, made know through Jesus Christ.”

I don’t know if agree with Pascal here, but I do think humans have a metaphorical “hole” in their heart that needs to be filled. Personally, I think it would be best if this hole was filled with love of the other, and it doesn’t matter if this love is religion-based or not. I think most humans, sadly, want this hole to be filled by power and especially immediate power over the “other.” Here is where American politics come in. Over time, we appear to have become very disturbed as a country when it comes to the spew coming forth from the two political parties. Loss of friends, loss of family — all over divisiveness caused by the two parties. This divisiveness is worsened when these two parties use pseudo-science or misinformation to carry their messages. Currently, I think one party is more problematic than the other although both parties have been crazy in the history of our country. Just think about the U.S. Civil War.

My point is that the anti-science movement which destroys creativity and the chance for people to thrive has come from both sides of the political spectrum over the course of time.

It has come from the right side of the political spectrum.

It has come from the left side of the political spectrum.

Being anti-science is equivalent to being anti-creative. Through the years, I have seen children get very sick and even die from vaccine-preventable diseases. As someone who is a physician but also is a theologian in the camp of process theology / open & relational theology, I feel strongly that being anti-creative makes the world a much worse place.

I don’t know what we should put in the proverbial holes in our hearts but being anti-science, believing in pseudo-science, and putting your complete faith in political parties is not the answer. Religious and non-religious people of all stripes should agree here. All faith systems, regardless of their background, should work for the improvement of our species, other species, and the planet.

Image created by Gemini Advanced

I subscribe to the journal, Theology and Science, published by Taylor & Francis. Most articles in each issue are fairly interesting. In the latest issue, I read, “A New Hope for Christian Eschatology in Cosmic Perspective: Beyond the Predictions of Standard Big Bang Cosmology” by Hyung-Joo Lee. The author has expertise in theology (PhD, Graduate Theological Union) and cosmology (PhD, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology). His article (unfortunately, behind a paywall) provides theological ideas about how to think about God while living in a universe that appears, based on current science, to have an unsatisfactory end point.

Our universe arose from the Big Bang, although physics equations break down when we try to understand the time before 5.39 x 10^-44 seconds after the Big Bang started. Additionally, the cosmic background radiation shows that our universe is homogenous in every direction. We know that the universe has been expanding and apparently expanding faster, in every direction over the past 13.8 billion years. What eventually happens to the universe?

Cosmic background radiation (image from Wikipedia)

Well, the universe may keep on expanding forever and ever and ever and ever and ever. This is a “flat” or “open universe” with no curvature and with the consequence of all useful energy being used up. The universe will eventually reach a temperature of absolute zero. Nothing happens at that point. All is dead.

On the other hand, the universe may eventually collapse back on itself. I believe that this is the minority view of cosmologists. When it collapses back on itself, the universe is simply destroyed. This is a “closed universe” model. Similar to the “open” idea, all is destroyed. All is dead.

Image from the University of Oregon

Both ideas seem to go against Christian eschatology or what happens when all of this ends — from a Christian perspective. An interesting article is here. It is rather depressing to me to think that any possibility, no matter how remote, of my being remembered will be forever gone. The possibility of our species or our planet or even our galaxy being remembered being forever gone may be traumatic to consider.

The Last Judgment

Lee challenges this assumption of all simply ending. Using the work of others, such as Robert Russell and Wolfhart Pannenberg, Lee discusses the idea that physical theories may be “descriptive” and not “prescriptive”. In other words, our physical theories in relativity and quantum mechanics are indeed brilliant but may be describing a reality while not yet reaching the actual reality of what is occurring. There is a long tradition here as described here and here.

Lee then proposes the following:

We know the universe is expanding faster and faster in all directions. Over time (really immense time), the quantum fields in such a gigantic space will still be present. I’m no physicist, but I would define a quantum field as points in all of space in which particles and forces arise simply as excitations of such fields. The electromagnetic field is such a field. The Higgs field is another field. There are others. These fields are possibly statistical (as far as we know currently). Thus, there is a chance, no matter how small, that something could arise in these fields over immense time and immense space.

A particle could arise with such fields over time in a large area of space. From a statistical standpoint, even something complex could arise from these fields. The Boltzmann brain is such a conjecture — not provable. Thus, perhaps even a new Big Bang could arise in such a setting. Heck, from a theological perspective, a “new heaven and a new earth” could arise (Revelation 21:1).

Boltzmann brain (image from Beyond Universe)

Lee looks at the theoretical cosmology idea of quintessence here. Quintessence is a theoretical idea that some type of field is associated with the universe expanding differently depending on the location. Such an idea is opposed to the current idea of the universe forever expanding per the Cosmological Constant.

Let’s think about such an idea in the realm of process theology or the more divine love-oriented open & relational theology. 1) If fields can vibrate to potentially produce anything (a conjecture), 2) if things (comparable metaphorically) to Boltzmann brains can occur in the setting of immense time and large space, and 3) if quintessence allows for the universe to not “die” by forever expanding or by collapsing, then there is the possibility of eternal creativity.

From a process theology / open & relational theology standpoint, this idea matches Christian eschatology. Those who work in process theology as well as open & relational theology use the idea of God desiring (not forcing) novelty or creativity as part of God’s nature (process theology) or as part of God’s nature of love (open & relational theology). Such ideas are basically a type of eschatology occurring over deep time and perhaps eternally. God is forever creative. God’s love desires, but does not force, creativity.

In my book, A Theology of the Microbiome, I express some of these ideas as follows:

“Finally, when one considers the idea of a “Boltzmann brain,” there
is the possibility that a new universe could form even as our current
universe continues onward with increasing entropy and less useful energy
over time. In the far future, thermal equilibrium is predicted to be
reached everywhere. Despite this event eventually occurring, there could
be a real, but incredibly small statistical chance, that particles would move
close enough to each other so that entropy would decrease momentarily,
and structure would form. The “Boltzmann brain” idea suggests that innumerable random particles in an immense universe with thermal equilibrium
over vast time could, simply by statistical chance, form a “brain”
for a few moments that would experience reality. The brain would then
dissipate into particles again as increased entropy once again took over.

Could a large fluctuation of such particles create a new universe in the
far future? It would be highly improbable but mathematically possible.
Dark matter changes, as well as other mechanisms, have been theorized
as potential causes for a new universe in such a setting. Also, the theory
of cyclic cosmology suggests that a new universe would occur regardless
in the extreme long-term future. All such ideas can aid one when thinking
about the unstoppable increase of entropy in the presence of eternal
creativity.”

Consider purchasing my book. : )

So…I like this article.

At the same time, I have some pushback.

1)Boltzmann brains may not be possible if there are no fluctuations in quantum fields (i.e., if quantum mechanics is essentially deterministic). A good reference is here. Determinism would rule out creativity both objectively and subjectively.

2)Here is my biggest problem. I think science and theology can help each other but cannot stand in for each other. I’m not a believer in non-overlapping magisteria per Gould even though Gould is one of my heroes. Science informs theology so that we understand aspects of God better in the setting of potential divinity in the world. I’m rather cataphatic here. Most of the world is religious, and good theology informs science in the setting of morality or ethics. For example, does God want us to have nuclear weapons? Does God want us to be anti-vaccine? Does God want us to ignore famine? Does God want us to ignore war? Does God want us to deny climate change? I think the answer is decidedly “NO.” Thus, Lee’s work adds on to the perspective of God’s continuing desire for creativity (process theology) via divine love (open & relational theology).

I do not think it is in human capacity to understand what happens when we die or when a “new heaven and new earth” arise. As a Christian, I can believe in the hypostatic union of Christ Jesus, but I cannot understand it fully. I never will. I hit a wall beyond which no comprehension is present. We can make metaphors, but we are limited by our human brains — both objectively and subjectively.

Lee’s article is very good and should be read.

Good theology recognizes brain limitations of our species — both objectively and subjectively.

Image made by Gemini Advanced

It is kind of a truism in medical conferences (and all sorts of academic conferences) that some people pretend to ask a question after a presentation, when in reality, they just want to give a mini-talk themselves. Typically, such “mini-talks” are ways for people to act like they are important. “More of a comment than a question” is the equivalent of trying to take over a meeting. The statement has become kind of a humorous meme about scientific meeting Q&A periods after a presentation.

Unfortunately, I somewhat did a “comment more than a question” recently on Substack. Matthew Segall has a great Substack account. It is expansive and quite wonderful in the realm of explaining philosophy especially regarding the realm of metaphysics. I highly recommend following his account.

On April 27, Dr. Segall interviewed a person associated with the Discovery Institute. I don’t want to identify this person directly (you can watch the interview) as this individual falls into the camp of Intelligent Design which, in my opinion is a rather spurious belief system. I would rather criticize Intelligent Design (ID) than the individual.

Dr. Segall did nothing wrong. His interview was completely fine. He was much more patient than I could ever be. He was pointing out how different belief systems can converge and diverge. Dr. Segall is an expert in process philosophy which can align theologically with process theology (PT) as well as open & relational theology (ORT). I find myself in the camp of PT and ORT. PT / ORT are definitely religious in orientation and they are very pro-science. People like me may believe in God, but we also have no issues with randomness in evolution, Big Bang cosmology, the weirdness of quantum mechanics, accepting the spectrum of human sexuality, acknowledging the problem of evil, etc.. I’m not sure I believe in non-overlapping magisteria as I quite sure that science can inform one’s belief in God.

ID is very different. ID is basically a Young Earth Creationism (YEC) adjacent movement. ID may state that the universe is old and perhaps biological evolution happens, but it then runs off the rails as being science adjacent. ID often relies on the term “irreducible complexity” in which biological mechanisms or structures are so complex that there is no natural mechanism to explain how the complexity occurred. Additionally, once ID says that a mechanism/structure is “too complex” to be explained, then the obvious answer is “God did it. Don’t ask any more questions.” ID also seems to be very much into guided evolutionary processes from an anthropomorphic perpective. I’m not talking about ideas surrounding evolutionary pathways (such as convergent evolution) which may have underlying physical laws. Convergent evolution is definitely real, and it may have an underlying physical law basis not yet understood. What I am talking about is the awful continuing movement in the United States (and to some degree in other countries) to trying to replace science with specific types of religious thought which includes fundamentalism, YEC, and ID. When one tries to put such constrained religious systems into the realm of science by defining fundamentalism / Y.E.C./I.D as a type of “science”, one will start going down the road of the anti-vaccination movement and climate change denial.

Convergent Evolution, image from the Natural History Museum (London)

So…my comment is more than a question. After watching the interview between Dr. Segall and the person who represents the ID movement, I posted a long comment which I will break down below. Again, Dr. Segall did nothing wrong. He was exposing people to a belief system that they may not be aware of, and I am all about public exposure of belief systems and free speech. He was letting people form their own opinion. I think what he did was wise. I’m just writing this post to expand on my subsequent opinion which I posted on his Substack account.

A. “Good interview, Matt! Intelligent design (IMO) has not progressed since 1998. 1) No matter how hard we try, we cannot prove / disprove God. ID is a tiresome continuation of this argument.” I agree that Dr. Segall did an excellent interview. I did some background work, and it does appear that the ID movement likely started in 1998. I’m sure the book, Darwin’s Black Box, by Michael Behe influenced this movement. The book is well written (I read it when it first came out), but it has some fallacies especially when it comes to ideas surrounding irreducible complexity. In my opinion, humans need to move on from debating if God exists or does not exist. We have so many other problems going on in our world politically and environmentally. I’m a Christian and believe in God. However, I can’t prove that God exists. Atheists can’t prove God doesn’t exist. And the conundrum is perfectly fine. Ultimate meta-physical questions such as the existence of God / No God are metaphysical questions that are influenced by one’s upbringing and societal influences over time. ID is a continuation of this argument and makes the argument even sillier in the setting of pseudo-science.

B. “ID is not Popperian so its validity to, say, biology, chemistry, medicine, etc. makes it definitely not a scientific field. It can be a theological or philosophical construct, but it cannot be science.” Personally, I believe that there is a line that exists in the setting of falsifiability in science, but the line is dependent on the scientific field. Medicine (my field) is very, very hard because the human body is complex, and we need very objective research to identify a body mechanism or pathology, to prove that a lab test works, or to prove that a medication works. One can read the New England Journal of Medicine to see how complex such research can be. By trying to be as objective as possible, a medical study allows for falsifiability. The problem is that medicine is filled with quacks throughout the world who promote pseudo-science that borders magical thinking (chiropractors and homeopaths come to mind). Their work allows for no falsifiability and is essentially “magic.” Chemistry research is very strict in its protocols. Thus, outcomes in chemistry research can typically be falsified, if needed. Karl Popper has been very clear here about falsification in science.

Karl Popper

However, there are fields that are science yet not Popperian. Theoretical physics such as in the field of string theory and Everettian mechanics come to mind. Such fields are still science as they are exploring the edges of what humans know. Ideas in theoretical physics often cannot be falsified because the objective data would need be obtained with high energy experiments beyond current human capacity. I get that aspect. One thing that theoretical physics does not do is state that the answer to complex questions in the field of physics is God. Medical research does not state a patient is cured due to God, yet chiropractors often talk about “body energy” — whatever that is (likely magic). ID as well as YEC typically state evolution happens due to “God.” Sorry. God is a very important concept for humans. God is a very important theological concept. BUT God is not a scientific concept.

C. “The continuing appeal to ‘irreducible complexity’ by ID always runs into walls when we are discovering how the eye has evolved, how flagella have evolved, how DNA may have formed, how cytoskeletons may have formed, and on and on. ID seems to always ‘move the goalpost’ once we make scientific progress on a subject once deemed irreducibly complex by ID.” I’m the first person to state that I don’t think that our singular species on one little planet in a unremarkable solar system in an unremarkable galaxy will solve every scientific problem in the universe.

The “pale blue dot” of Earth seen from Saturn. Image from the BBC.

However, that fact doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try to advance science. And we have made progress. We have a great understanding about eye evolution. We have a great understanding about flagella evolution. We are starting to understand how DNA came about. The evolution of the cytoskeleton is becoming more clear. Indeed, if one follows ID writings (which is a painful endeavor), ID simply moves on to another subject without ever acknowledging the science that has been done to go against their hypotheses. It is an unending cycle of willfully ignoring work that has been done by the scientific community. ID is very frustrating here.

D. “ID is a weird variant of positivism. Instead of saying that proof only exists when we experience a concept via the sensory process (i.e., measurement), ID states that proof [of God] only exists if we can’t measure a concept.” Positivism basically means that a thing is true if it can be objectively proven to be true, preferably by the scientific method. Any other potential topic such as God would not be true since the concept is not provable. Metaphysics is not compatible with positivism. A good review article is here.

Rudolf Carnap, a famous proponent of positivism

I like to think that positivism abounds in objective ideas but fails in subjective thought. It also may fail in some parts of science, such as theoretical physics (see above). ID is kind of a variant or even, dare I say, a reciprocal of positivism. Instead of stating that facts are true only if we can prove them through deduction or observation as in positivism, ID states that one specific “fact” (i.e., evidence of God) is true if we haven’t been able to observe / measure a concept. This ID fallacy easily can be seen in the concept of “irreducibly complex.” One simply cannot say “God is here” if one cannot find a solution to a physics/chemistry/biology problem. Time and research progress have not been considered! As I have shown above, prior ID ideas surrounding the evolution of the eye or the flagella have been shown to be demonstrably false.

E. “As you know, I’m a religious person. I have a hard time believing that ID is helping people believe in God.” Some atheists (not all of course) may read this post and be shocked to learn that I am a Christian. But I am. I have been a Christian for a long time, and I find that working in the field of science has increased my belief in God. What do I mean? Working in science has allowed me to see amazing progress, especially in the medical sciences. Seeing patients now recover from once deadly diseases allows me to have awe about the human body as well to be impressed as to how humans have advanced scientific knowledge. This “awe” makes me think that God being the strut in a matrix of complexity and progress makes sense. Readers of my blog know that I think there is the presence of a Creator although such a Creator is not involved in forcing human progress (God may simply lure). Quantum physics, biological evolution, the cosmic background radiation are all examples of my personal experience of “awe.”

Cosmic background radiation. Image from Wikipedia.

However, in the interview with Dr. Segall, the representative for the Discovery Institute states that the public is finding their work helpful. Now, such a statement is interesting and may not be accurate. Data have demonstrated that churches that are antagonistic to science are causing young people to leave church. In a manner similar to “Release the tapes!” (see the 1972 Watergate break-in), places like the Discovery Institute and the Creation Museum never seem to release their data as well as how such data was collected when they make such claims. In other words, “release the data!” I strongly believe that places like the Creation Museum, the Ark Encounter, and the Discovery Institute more than likely do the exact opposite of what they are claiming. A good video which supports my thoughts is here. Just release the data and how the data were collected.

Science done well improves the human condition. Theology done well also improves the human condition. Our species and the planet always does well when science and theology inform each other.

And please read Matthew Segall’s Substack account. It truly is informative and excellent.

My AI image of “More than a comment, than a question.” Image made by Gemini Advanced.

This past weekend I was a speaker / moderator / advice-giver at the 2nd year fellows’ conference for the North American Society For Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology & Nutrition (NASPGHAN). NASPGHAN is the international association of all pediatric gastroenterologists from Mexico, the United States, and Canada. As background, a “fellow” is a trainee who subspecializes after residency. In the case of pediatric gastroenterology, a fellow spends 3 years in training (after a 3-year pediatric residency) before they can sit for their pediatric gastroenterology board exam and become an official pediatric gastroenterologist.

This year, I taught at the 2nd year fellows’ conference in Inverness, Colorado. I have taught at the first, second, or third year conferences something like 10-12 times in my academic career. It is always rewarding. This year, my talk was titled, “Balancing Work and Life?”. I have given this talk many times before. Basically, the lecture is about working as a pediatric GI fellow (which is a VERY hard job) while trying to balance life outside of work.

Me…speaking at the fellows’ conference this year

I added one slide to this year’s presentation. In the slide, I added the figure below which I made on Google Gemini.

Academic medicine works best when there are 3 equal parts contained within it. The three parts are: 1) Clinical work (taking care of patients), 2) Clinical education (teaching medical students, residents, fellows, and even other faculty), and 3) Clinical and basic science research.

Think about what would happen if one of those interacting parts went missing. Medicine would suffer. In fact, medicine is currently at risk of significant deterioration (at least in the U.S.) when we think about how medical education has slowly been degraded over time. Medicine also is at risk of deterioration when we think about the massive reductions in NIH funding. Of course, clinical work declines when science in general has become less trusted in the United States with the horrible rise of the anti-vaccine movement as well as other problems.

Graph from the Los Angeles Times

Thus, the 3 wheels of academic medicine (clinical, education, research) work best when working together like a well-run clock.

A three-wheel clock

Let us extend this idea to another realm? What about theology and specifically, what about the interaction of science and religion? Does a well-run clock metaphor work here? Absolutely. The problem currently is how viable this interaction exists when considering how science and religion currently engage with each other. There is no “war between science and religion.” This so-called war is quite silly as humans have always been objective (sensory based regarding the environment, science, engineering) as well as subjective (metaphysics, art, literature).

So…I have made this Gemini image for this post.

We need some kind of interaction between the real and ideal…between the objective and subjective…between science and religion. The problem with doing this interaction well is similar to the problem of doing academic medicine well. If one of the circles is not emphasized, the whole prospect of increased human understanding, cooperation, and love can be damaged. I put a “?” in one circle as I think one of the essential interactions of this model is currently missing in the world. Such resultant crippling effects can be seen in how terribly we treat each other when we try to make life difficult for people of different religious backgrounds, ethnicities, human sexualities, etc. Such crippling effects also can be seen when humans use religion to deny the importance of scientific concepts such as global warming, biological evolution, and miracle of vaccines. Finally, such crippling concepts can be seen in the setting of war.

Atomic bomb at Hiroshima, Japan. Image from University of Pennsylvania.

Religious institutions that do not provide at least a minimal but accurate science education risk having their religious leaders or laity believing an inaccurate fact-based belief system as opposed to dealing with of the real problems of the world.

Scientific institutions that do not provide some education about the subjective belief of our species risk sounding pompous and uninformed regarding how most humans (not all, of course) want some type of divinity in their lives. This aspect also leads to an inaccurate belief system which blocks progress when dealing with the real problems of the world.

We need a good interaction here. Of course, some religious institutions are great at understanding science, and some scientific institutions are great at understanding that people are often religious.

What we need is better translational work between religion and science. Theology often can be helpful here, but theology is not helpful if the theology is poor. I believe that in the current political climate of our country as well as in many parts of the world, translating between these two spheres of thought is more needed than ever. There are people who work in this intersection of belief systems. I try to do work at this intersection — sometimes well, sometimes not well. These 2 belief systems are not diametrically opposed. They can be synthesized into ways which improve the human condition, the condition of other species, and the condition of our planet in many ways. Such synthesis can include:

1. Advancement of science
2. Improved funding of science / funding of science education.
3. Improved education of non-scientists about the importance of science
4. Improved education of accurate science
5. Increased religious engagement with science to potentially improve the ethics of science
6. Increased religious engagement with science to properly educate religious groups in the setting of a church, mosque, temple, or synagogue.

The album, “Hemispheres” by Rush. Even though the album was produced in 1978, the A side of the album still is very relevant today. Also, I am a huge Rush fan.

Perhaps this critical connection between science and religion, when done well, may be one of the most important things that our species should be doing currently. I don’t know. However, the pathways leading to potential disease prevention, poverty prevention, war prevention, and prevention of pollution or global warming all seem to stream mightily from this interaction.

Graduates from the Open & Relational Theology program at Northwind Theological Seminary do an on-line journal club every few weeks. This past week we read “Evolution: Like any other Science it is Predictable” written by Simon Conway Morris and published in Philosophical Transactions B. Luckily, this article is open access. Here is the link.

Dr. Morris is a widely known paleobiologist who has done groundbreaking work on the Burgess Shale which is a rock formation in the Canadian Rockies. The Burgess Shale is a geological area that provides immense information about the Cambrian Explosion which is when life on Earth likely began to diversify very rapidly.

Cambrian Explosion — Image from Nature

Morris has written many articles and books. One of his interests is trying to determine if biological evolution has specific laws — similar to physical laws. Two aspects are to be considered here: 1) Do species become more complex over time? and 2) what does convergent evolution tell us about the potential of nature to repeat itself? His ideas suggest the potential for biological “laws” and thus perhaps concise mathematical statements about patterns in evolution and in life. There have been some attempts at making laws in biology such as Bergmann’s Rule.

Example of Bergmann’s Rule — Wikipedia

You can read Morris’ RSTB article for yourself since it is open access. However, I found certain aspects fascinating.

A. Morris is a better writer than I am. Here is a main part of his thesis: “The basis of this view relies on the phenomenon of evolutionary convergence. This concept is, of course, not only entirely familiar to evolutionary biologists, but also provides
some of the strongest arguments in favour of adaptational explanations. However, much less appreciated is the ubiquity of this convergence, with examples spanning the entire biological hierarchy from molecules to social systems and cognitive processes.”

This statement is interesting. Basically, he thinks evolutionary convergence extends from biology but perhaps to social systems which could be part of group selection. Theologically, one could state his idea lends itself to God being deterministic.

However, consider the concept of Open & Relational Theology (ORT). When considering ORT, one is exposed to the idea that the future is open to God. God also is relational to all of nature. This relation is one of creativity, and this creativity encompasses all of its many forms, including the potential of evolutionary convergence. In my book, A Theology of the Microbiome, I discussed the theological concept of “lim Δ;” i.e., “a limit [lim] to change [Δ].” I state, “As an example, limits to creativity are observed throughout nature. God has the attribute of desiring eternal creativity while existing in time and in an open future. As part of this desire, God prioritizes nature’s freedom even if nature itself puts limits on its creativity.”

I think ORT and lim Δ work well metaphysically with evolutionary convergence.

B. Morris states, “Thus, when we consider the origin of the birds, the story of Archaeopteryx and its theropod connection, not to mention the spectacular
evidence of subsequent bird evolution in the Cretaceous…” We recognize Archaeopteryx as a dinosaur with wings and feathers, but did you know that birds already existed in the Cretaceous before the tragedy of the K-Pg event? Yes, Archaeopteryx (a transition fossil) and animals that we would recognize today as birds co-existed. Here is a good article explaining this discovery. The air was a niche space to be filled and was already being filled with insects and ancient flying lizards like the pterosaurs. In other words, evolutionary convergence has a long history.

Archaeopteryx — image from Live Science

C. Another paleontologist that I respect greatly is Stephen Jay Gould. Gould did many amazing things in his lifetime, and similar to Morris, they both write like English professors when discussing science. Just brilliant. Gould believed that if one replayed the “tape of life”, different outcomes in life would occur. Personally, I think Gould’s idea makes perfect sense. However, there is some possibility that he is wrong.

Richard Lenski has a long and distinguished history of growing E. coli (the bacteria) over time and isolating subsequent colony generations from each other to follow evolutionary change. It is a long story, but basically he has found evidence that life, at least among bacteria, tends to repeat itself. He (and others) have found that when older E. coli generations are isolated and exposed to similar stressors (for example, exposure to citrate), the subsequent generations in general figure out a way to utilize citrate. They don’t die off. These isolated strains all proceed in a similar manner through their generations and through time. Good references to read are here and here. This evidence seems to point to the idea of convergent evolution. Bacteria are not charismatic megafauna, but the work of Lenski and others suggests the potential for evolutionary convergence and directionality occurring in larger forms of life. Perhaps God lures but does not force life to go in a certain direction?

E. coli — Image from the CDC

D. Morris states “Just as the present evidence indicates a monophyletic
origin for animal musculature, so too the nervous system is restricted to the eumetazoans. Once again, however, we can see significant precursors that point
to a deeper inevitability. Thus, it is not particularly surprising to find among the sponges, which evidently lack any nervous tissue, a series of proteins that (with
some notable absences) are otherwise central to the post-synaptic configuration in higher animals (Sakarya et al. 2007). These proteins have been identified in a
distinctive group of flask-shaped cells and the fact that they display molecular mechanisms that are also the hallmark of neurogenesis…”

If evolution does eventually lead to a neurological system, then is evolution directed towards eventual conscious awareness? I have no idea, but it is fascinating to consider. Such a suggestion would seem to be metaphysical in context. In the setting of the theological (and philosophical) idea of “panpsychism” or perhaps “panexperientialism“, then all small droplets of experience might combine and lead to things such as human consciousness. The evolution to human consciousness would take probably millions if not billions of years as life comes out of non-life materials and biological evolution proceeds. If God is in the mix here, then panexperientialism (which I prefer to panpsychism) would be the effect of all of nature having some type of experience with the material as well as with God. Since God is in / around / through all entities (panentheism), the idea of all creatures communing with God and every entity communing with God would make sense.

Perhaps the idea of directionality towards an eventual nervous system and even consciousness matches what has been explained by Information Integration Theory (IIT). I don’t know.

“Convergence”, Jackson Pollock

My conclusion: I believe in God, and I am a Christian. However, I don’t know if we can take the potential for evolutionary convergence or evolutionary directionality as evidence for God. I have no clue. I worry that humans are built to look for patterns — perhaps we see a pattern here in biology (expressed by Morris) that does not exist. For example, we think we see patterns in the art of Jackson Pollock when they really may not be there.

However, Morris’ ideas are fascinating from a scientific, philosophical, and theological perspective.

Image generated by Gemini Advanced