Hide Notes 

Slide 1: Science, Ego and Religion What we know, What we'd like to think we know, and What we can't know
Slide 3: Biology: 'Playing God' with life Physics: 'Playing God' with the universe Maths: Knowing everything
Slide 4: Human Genome Project Taking someone's DNA and writing it all out on a computer
Slide 5: The issue is more about journalists than scientists
Slide 6: Genetic Engineering Swapping genes from one organism to another to create custom hybrid organisms
Slide 7: But if we can create life in the lab from scratch, will it alter our view of what we are? Will we, in a sense, have become gods? Mycoplasma genitalium: The smallest free living bacterium "Is life just genes?"
Slide 8: Tech Author Jon Katz Finding the formula for life would dwarf almost any previous scientific achievement that comes to mind, not to mention knocking conventional religion and theology on their antiquated behinds. What is a theologian supposed to tell some kid who can read the recipe for human life? If we can make it, doesn't that raise certain ultimate questions?
Slide 9: The Human Genome Project did not give us the 'answer to life'
Slide 10: It does have the potential to help us analyse hereditary problems
Slide 11: Understanding genetics by looking at it is very different from creating it in the first place
Slide 13: Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and shrewd in their own sight! Isaiah 5:21
Slide 14: If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. 1 Corinthians 8:2
Slide 15: If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants Isaac Newton [I am like] a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me Physicist Mathematician Astronomer Philosopher Alchemist Theologian
Slide 16: 4 Physical Forces • Gravity • Electricity and Magnetism • Strong Nuclear Force • Weak Nuclear Force
Slide 17: Gravity Holds planets, solar systems and galaxies together Holds us down, and gives us air to breathe
Slide 18: Electricity and Magnetism Responsible for every other force that we feel, including friction and propulsion
Slide 19: Strong Nuclear Force Holds atoms together. Also called Quantum Chromodynamics
Slide 20: Weak Nuclear Force Responsible for β radiation, by turning a neutron into a proton
Slide 21: Theory of Everythin g Gravity Electromagnetism Electronuclear Force Strong Nuclear Force Electroweak Force Weak Nuclear Force
Slide 22: If we do discover a complete theory, it should in time be understandable in broad principle by everyone, not just a few scientists. Then we shall all, philosophers, scientists and just ordinary people, be able to take part in the discussion of the question of why it is that we and the universe exist. • If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason - for then we would know the mind of God. Stephen Hawking
Slide 23: Theory of Everythin g Gravity Electromagnetism Electronuclear Force Strong Nuclear Force Electroweak Force Weak Nuclear Force
Slide 24: As science explains more and more, there is less and less need for religious explanations. Stephen Weinberg Nobel Laureate in Physics 'the god particle' does takes away one of the original motivations for religion.
Slide 25: For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. Romans 12:3
Slide 26: Limits to what we can know: Gödel Heisenberg
Slide 27: Kurt Gödel
Slide 28: Gödel's ontological proof of the existence of God
Slide 29: One of the Cretans, a prophet of their own, said, “Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons” Titus 1:12
Slide 30: This sentence is false
Slide 32: ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed’ Job 38:11
Slide 33: Heisenberg
Slide 34: There are limits to what we can know Limits that neither study nor arrogance can overcome
Slide 35: Gödel’s theorem implies that pure mathematics is inexhaustible ... Because of Gödel's theorem, physics is inexhaustible too. Freeman Dyson Theoretical Physicist The laws of physics are a finite set of rules, and include the rules for doing mathematics, so that Gödel's theorem applies to them.
Slide 36: Theoretical Physicist Stephen Hawking Some people will be very disappointed if there is not an ultimate theory, that can be formulated as a finite number of principles. I used to belong to that camp, but I have changed my mind.
Slide 37: For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:8,9
Slide 38: But you, Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book, until the time of the end. Many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase” Daniel 12:4
Slide 39: What we know Science What we guess about Faith
Slide 40: Science How Faith Why
Slide 41: Science isn’t disproving God Arrogance is often a barrier to thinking clearly So What?