A Little Book for New Scientists by Reeves Josh A.;Donaldson Steve; & Steve Donaldson

Author:Reeves, Josh A.;Donaldson, Steve; & Steve Donaldson [Reeves, Josh A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780830893508
Publisher: InterVarsity Press
Published: 2016-09-09T00:00:00+00:00

ADVANTAGES OF INTELLECTUAL HUMILITY

As mentioned above, Christian scientists are under compulsion to be intellectually humble, not only about both their science and their theology but also about the conjunction of those areas. Let’s imagine for a moment that someone—we’ll call her Emma—manages to obtain the last word about God. What if Emma is right and everyone else is wrong? Well, hooray for her! This is the stuff of book and movie plots, and while she awaits the endorsements Emma can congratulate herself while reveling in her superiority and contemplating how everyone else could be so blind. Unfortunately for her, there is the small matter of how she is going to convince others that she is the enlightened one.15 Perhaps she can persuade some by her intellectual prowess or charisma (assuming she has either), but no one—atheist or theist—will be meaningfully changed simply by her assurances that she has the truth. In fact, we have ignored the crucial question of how Emma even knows she has the ultimate answers. Outside our imaginary scenario, it seems far more likely that Emma has but a piece of the truth about God, and probably an extraordinarily small piece at that. Humility is not a natural attribute of atheists or theists, but without it neither will see much reason to search and any truth that might be found will remain beyond their grasp if for no other reason than they are not reaching for it.16

In his fascinating account of increases in cosmological knowledge, Richard Panek describes the moment in time when it finally became apparent that “for most of the history of the telescope, astronomers had been studying 1 percent of 2 percent of, at most, 10 percent of what’s out there, and calling that the universe.”17 Surely the scientist who thinks deeply about his or her chosen field would echo Panek’s sentiments. In areas as diverse as epigenetics, mind-brain-consciousness, evolutionary learning, artificial intelligence and many others we seem to be only scratching the surface of plausible knowledge. But if God has the infinite attributes traditionally ascribed to him by Christians, a comparable shallowness must be true of our theological understanding. As the apostle Paul put it, “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! ‘Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?’” (Rom 11:33-34). To acknowledge that one might be wrong, and to admit it when one is wrong, is the gateway to greater discovery. Thus the route to deeper insight—be it scientific, theological or the intersection of the two—begins with intellectual humility.18

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