Chewing on this one today…
In the past few years we have heard the mantra “Follow the science” as an argument for why we should engage in this recommendation or that. And while (as a physician) I place a huge weight on the importance of science, science is not and should not be preeminent in our epistemology. It is a means by which we understand truth but certainly not the sole means. As I have been reading C.S. Lewis, I found him very helpful in explaining this idea.
“When I accept Theology I may find difficulties, at this point or that, in harmonising it with some particular truths which are imbedded in the mythical cosmology derived from science. But I can get in, or allow for, science as a whole. Granted that reason is prior to matter and that the light of the primal reason illuminates finite minds, I can understand how men should come, by observation and inference, to know a lot about the universe they live in. If, on the other hand, I swallow the scientific cosmology as a whole, then not only can I not fit in Christianity, but I cannot even fit in science. If minds are wholly dependent on brains, and brains on biochemistry, and biochemistry (in the long run) on the meaningless flux of the atoms, I cannot understand how the thought of those minds should have any more significance than the sound of the wind in the trees. and this is to me the final test. This is how I distinguish dreaming and waking. when I am awake I can, in some degree, account for and study my dream. The dragon that pursued me last night can be fitted into my waking world. I know that there are such things as dreams; I know that I had eaten an indigestible dinner; I know that a man of my reading might be expected to dream of dragons. But while in the nightmare I could not have fitted in my waking experience. The waking world is judged more real because it can thus contain the dreaming world; the dreaming world is judged less real because it cannot contain the waking one. For the same reason I am certain that in passing from the scientific points of view to the theological, I have passed from dream to waking. Christian theology can fit in science, art, morality, and the sub-Christian religions. The scientific point of view cannot fit in any of these things, not even science itself. I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen, not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.”
C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory: Is Theology Poetry?
So whether you join Lewis and I in holding Christian theology or approach the world from a different, theological perspective, think about the underlying statement.
"Theology can fit in science, art, morality, etc. The scientific point of view cannot fit in any of these things, not even science itself."
Science answers many questions in our universe. But it raises more. It is constantly changing with new discovery. And it is insufficient in providing the basis for a comprehensive and meaningful epistemology.
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