[Hazen] I want to ensure a task the actual question
of the session: Is atheism winning the battle for science? Do you have anything to say on that?
[Zweerink] You know, I think there are some very prominent
scientists who are atheists
who get to be the spokespeople for a lot of what science has a say.
And you know that's why I think this popular
debate plays out as, you know, science and Christianity and they're opposed to one
another. I think because we've allowed that
to be the way the discussion has happened
but if you ask the question: Do the discoveries we find
in studying the universe, and I'll kinda restrict myself to
physics and cosmology, do those discoveries
point towards an atheistic worldview or do those discoveries point towards
a
theistic-Christian worldview? I would say that when you look at the
major discoveries over the last 100 years those almost uniformly say -
those fit far more comfortably in a Christian worldview than they do
in an atheistic worldview.
So you at least on that sort of measure,
no, atheism is not winning the battle. That doesn't mean you can't be an
atheist and be a good scientist but
when you look at what the data points to, it really does point to Christianity.
I think strongly it points to Christianity.
[Craig] I think that's very well said Jeff.
I think that contemporary physics is more open
to a creator and designer of the universe than it has been
in any recent memory. When you think of physics at the end of the 19th century,
for example,
it was thought to be a closed science almost.
And then came relativity theory, then came quantum theory, and it just
upended the classical view of physics
and that old world view which
operated like a kind of machine independent of God,
and excluded God, is gone. And I i think now
scientists are very open to
metaphysical realities
like a creator and designer of
the universe. Not to speak of a ground for
moral values and ethics, for example, and then history as well with
the advance of New Testament studies and the historical Jesus. So
if there is a battle for science that is being won by
secularism, that would only be in pop culture.
In popular culture, you have to say the Dawkins
and the Krauss', and others, they get a lot of popular press in the media. They
really do seem to, in some ways, be winning the media war.
But that isn't what's really happening
in the Academy and I have great confidence that
in time this is going to straighten itself out. One of the great things I
appreciate about science
is that it's self-correcting. When it goes off the track, when it veers off
the track,
eventually it comes back online because it has to deal with the
a recalcitrant reality
out there that is the way it is regardless of how we
think about it. And so science has this wonderful self-correcting
nature to it and so I'm
very optimistic about where the future direction lies.
[Zweerink] I would add to that, one of the things that I find interesting is,
you know eventually it'll get around to
that. Eventually may be much longer than I like it. It may be
tens have years to hundreds of years, but
you know, I think one of the strongest pieces of evidence
in support of a Christian worldview from a scientific perspective is that
our universe began to exist.
And you look at the history of what's gone on over the last 100 years and that
idea was fought vigorously
in a scientific community and in part because they look -
- scientists look for so many ways to get around the beginning.
It is one of the better establish facts in science. So it's
that investigation, that testability, these ideas that are playing out there
that ultimately have produced, what I would argue, is one of the strongest
apologetic arguments we have for the Christian faith. And so
that interplay I found to be remarkable that that's happened over the last 100
years. And that's one of the reasons why I think,
I don't think you can say that atheism is winning.