It Takes a Lot Of Faith...

The Higgs Boson - One Interpretation

Recently my mother told me about a conversation with her brother.  He had written a number of articles about evolution that had been published in the local newspaper.  These articles were cause for spirited lunchtime debates over whether or not there was a God.  My uncle, an atheist apparently, did not believe in God.

This troubled my mother for a variety of reasons.

I speak with her every day and occasionally we  touch on this subject.

My uncle is quite gregarious and good at arguing his points and, being the older brother, this places my mom at a disadvantage.

So while she was telling me about all of this I ask her "does he believe in science?"

She paused, "well, of course".

"So science is a belief system then - you have believe in the math, the scientific method, and so on" I said.  "But I don't have to believe in science in order to live - I can believe in anything I like - aliens - whatever."

"Well, yes," she replied.

"Ask him why science as a belief system is different than religion as a belief system."

She was silent for a moment, then "that's a good point."

I went on "Science is a system of belief for organizing human knowledge - the result of which is a collection of theories - but there is no requirement that science explains all.  Science does not tell you why there is electricity, for example, it merely explains the observations humans have made about it.  We posit theories on the big bang, electrons, quanta, the Higgs Boson, and so forth.  But science just tells us about electricity - it does not offer any real demonstrable proof as to why its there in the first place.  If you believe in Science then you are putting your faith, as it were, in a set of collective observations made by humanity about humanity."

"Of course one can extrapolate this into "Science as the answer to all" - but to do this requires faith that  science is correct and offers a complete explanation of everything - which, because humans create it based on observation, it cannot provide because we cannot observe everything.  Religion, on the other hand, is also the result of collective observations by humanity - albeit with a different conclusion - but observations by humanity none-the-less.  And, like science, these observations also require faith."

"Unlike science mathematics can be used to define logically and rigorously complete systems of thought, i.e., as with mathematical logic.  Since mathematics does not require any "observations" of the "real world" it can be logically complete on its own as long as its consistent.  Thus if you create a set of basic axioms (for example, you might recall the Peano axioms for adding and creating natural numbers) you can build up a complete system of thought based on those rules (the manipulation of natural numbers as derived from the basic axioms). 

"However, a man named Kurt Gödel proved in the 1930's that, no matter how rigorously you set about to define a mathematical system with basic axioms you cannot prove all the statements in your system."

"This means that no matter how "complete" our definition is of mathematics is there will always be mathematical statements which you cannot prove.  If you create more axioms to cover the holes left by the less powerful axioms you might be able to close those holes, but you will also create new ones. And since science itself is based on mathematical logic and reasoning we cannot ensure that science can in fact explain everything - hence its an inadequate system of belief - from a mathematical perspective.  Just as inadequate as he, I am sure, believes religion to be."

"So really, ask him what the difference is..."