Weird Science

I have always enjoyed science and science related subjects. With the exception of the annual science fair project, it was always one of my strongest and most loved subjects in my school days. Even during my brief, and I mean brief, college career I managed to squeeze in a science course. I believe it was around this period when I began to doubt science.

During this period of my life I wasn't exactly "living for the lord", to use a church phrase. My thoughts and priorities were more focused on worldly things and wordly ways and wordly relationships. To live in the world, I wanted to understand the functions of the world and how it all fit together; socially, psychologically, politically, physically, and scientifically. None the less, I had faith in God and believed he was the creator of all things and I felt science would help explain how and why God did the things he has done. So I was very open to alot of scientific theories and was ready to use them to explain God.

Then one day we studied the theory of evolution. I was aware of the controversy behind the theory, and to be quite honest I thought it was just a bunch of uptight people trying to draw lines in the sand, on both sides of the argument. And being a voracious reader, I had already read some of it and was now waiting for someone to help me make sense of it; because it didn't make alot of sense to me after I had read through it a couple of times. So I was eager to hear a lecture on this topic.

So the day to learn evolution came. The professor began teaching and talking, talking and teaching, going over all of the points and theorems and doctrines. And it still didn't make sense. He would get to a point where the theory didn't jibe and basically have to say,"this is where science is uncertain. But to the best of our assumptions...", Whoa! What is this? I got this much from reading the book! You are supposed to fill in the gaps. How will I ever make sense of this? And science is one of my strongest suits. I think like a scientist...

I tell that story to begin today's blog not to blur the line between religeon and science for I have little respect for either. I find both to be dogmatic and fearful, opinionated and harmful. But most people who know me or have begun to follow this blog know that I am a Christian and that my faith has grown to where I don't feel the need for science or God to support the other. I merely wanted to give some background and to state that I was very open to theory and very open to learning. And I still am. Science still interests me very much.

But the interest is different now. Now I find myself more interested in the headlines and the absurdity of the place where science is now. And I am amazed at how people accept "science" so blindly and how little we really know for certain. We speculate and fill in gaps like my old professor did but we don't really know very many things to be as certain as they are taught, written about, professed, fought over, or claimed. We can't even decide if eggs are good for you or not. Or if saturated fat is a bad thing or not. Test after test we find different results and the results are then "modified" and shaped to fit into a previous theory, never to have the previous theory proven accurate. Science has built a legacy on guesswork and theory and artist renditions instead of having much "proof in the pudding", so to speak.

With that being said, I still think science should continue to be studied and tested. Many great things have been discovered and found, and our lives are all the better for it. I don't find science void of substance just substancially innaccurate. But we can still better ourselves and our understanding by some of the by-products of accuracy and theory.

Look at all of the household items we have thanks to the space program. VCRs, microwaves, plastics, thermometers, computers, etc. and etc. the list is very lengthy. Our lives have benefitted immeasurably from these items. But how helpful is it that they have now potentially found a possible planet that may support life some light years away? Did you get that? Scientists have now claimed(claimed) to have potentially(not certain) found a possible (again, not certain what the oibject is) planet that may( theory?) support life light years away. Does that sound preposterous to anyone besides myself? And I'm not making it up. That is a real supposition being passed as not quite fact but as much certainty as if it were. And do you know what the proof is? A dot in a telescope and an artist rendition of what the planet may look like. And those things based upon a previous theory that is just as unexplained and incomplete as the one before that. But it will be defended as hard fact with much vim and vigor. People who believe this will be treated as intellects while people who dismiss it will be treated as archaic and simple.Or vice versa. And these lines will be drawn in the sand without any evidence or discipline.

And what about the article dealing with some breed of eyeless lizards that a handful of scientists found in a cave? They are using the lizard to support evolution. The lizard has eye sockets but only a thin layer of skin grown over where the eyes previouslly were, some million years ago. They have said that they doubt a God who would give something eyes only to have them evolve into a being that would lose its eyes and live in a cave. Now remember, this is their words, almost verbatim, not my words. Not even much of a paraphrase on my part. But back to the lizard; it is still a lizard and not a fish or a frog or a monkey. And according to science, it has had enough years to evolve into another form. So what is innaccurate? The date of the Earth, age of the animals, something with the species? Several theories that are accepted as absolute cross over each other here. And all can't exist simultaneouslly. Does it sound like blind dogmatic double talk to you?

And what about the animals and dinosaurs? My son love these things. And I do as well. We watch movies and cartoons about creatures of all types. And my son even likes to watch the documentaries on any beast that is covered on History channel or Discovery. So I get alot of exposure to these sciences. Have you ever noticed how many artist renditions are used as fact? The fossil record rarely supports any of the creatures that are depicted in the "documentary". They find a tooth, a piece of a skull, part of a broken femur, and maybe a bit cervical bone and then they form a new theory based upon a previous, partial theory of a dinosaur's existence. Then there is some doodling and sketching and then an artist's rendition. Now we have a dinosaur that we know the skin color of, the eating habit of, that it listened to prey using it's feet, the mating habits of, and many other small, yet distinguishable features. All of this based on what fossil record? On what proof?

There are many more examples that could be made and many more "scientific facts" that could be disputed. But I believe eveyone understands the point that I am trying to make with the sciences. Our lives are made better by science, but it is still as the apostle Paul wrote to the churches in Asia Minor, "all science is not good science". And if all science is not good science then maybe we shouldn't treat all science as science. And we shouldn't draw lines in the sand and stand so certainly on something so uncertain. We shouldn't treat worldy things so absolutley, regardless of which side of the line we stand on.