An Author Interview from Books At a Glance
What if what often passes for science isn’t really science after all?
I’m Fred Zaspel, executive editor here at Books At a Glance, and that’s the question Dr. J.P. Moreland wants to press. He’s with us today to talk about his new book, Scientism and Secularism: Learning to Respond to a Dangerous Ideology.
Dr. Moreland, welcome – great to have you with us!
Moreland:
It’s so good to be with you, Fred.
Zaspel:
Maybe we could begin on a more personal note. You’ve had an interest in all things science for a long time, and in fact you have quite a background in science. But you teach philosophy. Can you tell us how all this came about? You survey this in the Introduction to your new book, and I think our listeners will be interested to hear.
Moreland:
Well, Fred, ever since I was a little boy I was interested in science, and I majored in physical chemistry at the University of Missouri. I became a Christian my junior year and that opened up to me a whole new world of study and ideas: biblical studies, theology. And I didn’t know anything about philosophy, I thought it was psychology, misspelled. I joined the staff of Cru (it used to be called Campus Crusade for Christ) and began to witness and share my faith in very hostile environments. I led some people to Christ, and in my evangelism and discipleship, I realized that there were a lot of hard questions that were being raised from the people I was witnessing to or that people were getting in their classes, and so on. And I discovered that almost every single one of these questions boiled down to a field of study called philosophy, they were philosophical questions. In those days I would read C. S. Lewis and Francis Schaeffer and Norm Geisler and people like that, and it became clear to me that philosophy was a very, very important field because it really dealt with the basic questions people are asking. How do we know things? Is there a God? Do I have a soul? Is there free will? What should the state be responsible for? Is there right and wrong and how do we know? Those are the fundamental questions. Now I’ve taught philosophy for thirty-five years. My new book, Scientism and Secularism is the result of my passion for evangelism and discipleship and in keeping people from leaving the church as they are now in record numbers.
Zaspel:
Okay, to your specific subject: what is scientism? And how did it become such a dominant worldview?
Moreland:
Scientism is a philosophical view of knowledge, what we can know. It says that the only way that we can know reality is through the hard sciences. If you can test it and prove it in physics and chemistry and biology and neuroscience and so on, you can know it. But if you can’t quantify your data and prove it in the laboratory, then it can’t be known and it’s really nothing but idle opinion, emotion, and blind faith. That’s why when you witness to people and they say, “You can’t prove that God exists, scientifically,” they are saying that if you can’t prove something scientifically, then don’t tell me about it because nobody can know it. This is marginalized Christianity because theological, religious, moral claims are considered to be relativistic expressions of emotion because they cannot be demonstrated scientifically.
So that’s why this ideology is so dangerous, Fred, because it is really on the basis of knowledge, not faith or belief, that people are given the authority to act and speak in public and they have boldness. For example, dentists can speak about teeth and they can do things in public, namely work on your molars, because we assume they have a certain body of knowledge that gives them that authority. If my dentist said to me, “Look, I don’t know a thing about molars, but I gotta tell you, I have some really passionately held faith commitments about molars, and I’ve actually got a few CDs I listen to in my car that play great music about teeth and the mouth,” that guy is not getting a hundred miles from my mouth. Well, if society, now, has been able to get to the place where it labels biblical and theological and religious and moral claims as nothing but relativistic truths that are true for you, and that’s great for you, but they’re not true for me, it follows, then, that witnessing and the Gospel and ethical claims, if you try to force them on other people, you’re being intolerant; you’re legislating religion and morality, because nobody can know whether you are right or not. Whereas in chemistry, if a chemistry prof said, “There’s hydrochloric acid in that beaker,” nobody is going to say, “Hey, dude, stop legislating chemistry.” So, that’s what it’s done – it’s caused the Christian community to retreat to blind faith, which was never true up until about the 1920s.
Zaspel:
How did it come about?
Moreland:
Well, in two ways. There were great awakenings in the Civil War period where thousands upon thousands came to Christ in those awakenings. But the problem was that the awakenings shared the Gospel in a highly emotionally charged way. There were altar calls for the first time in the history of the church; the choir would sing; and you were to be moved emotionally. Now, there’s nothing wrong with that. I’m a big advocate of feeling deeply toward God and experiencing him. But these awakenings moved Christianity from a religion that involved the head and the heart, to just the heart. And that carried on into the 20th century and on to today.
The other thing that happened is that by the mid-1920s the universities in America, the University of Michigan and Harvard, they were all planted by Christians except for Cornell, and they saw theology as a branch of knowledge every bit as much as chemistry. But by the Scopes trial, the evolution/creation trial, which the creationists lost in 1925 – 1926, from that point on, religion in the universities increasingly came to be seen as something that was not to be taught, at least as objective truth. So, we have the universities start espousing a view that science, alone, gives knowledge; and so the humanities: theology, religion, ethics, became postmodernized. In other words, just relativized. The chaos, the postmodern relativistic chaos we are seeing in culture is ultimately due to this view of knowledge called scientism. Most people have never heard the word, but it is in the drinking water, now, let me tell you.
Zaspel:
Why does scientism matter? What is at stake in this discussion?
Moreland:
I got an email last May from someone I did not know. He said that he and two friends were working with about twenty to twenty-five people in their mid-twenties to mid-thirties. There were four or five atheists in this group they were working with, but about twenty of them were on a razors edge of abandoning Christianity and belief in God altogether. It was because they had serious questions about the truths of Christianity, but when they asked people that were dismissed and told, “You are overthinking. This is all about faith. What you need to do is to just have faith.” And if people did give them answers that were really bad. This guy said, “Will you come to my home and have a Q&A with these people because they are going to become agnostics or atheists.” I went there and had a Q&A with about twenty-five people for two and a half hours. As a result of the time, I had person after person say, “You have saved my faith. I am a committed Christian because you were able to answer my questions.” The reason scientism matters is because if people don’t believe that we can really know why we believe what we believe, we just have to believe, then when they get out in college or in a secular culture that’s going to hammer and beat up on them, they can’t defend what they believe so they just give up.
Barna did a study of why millennials are leaving Christianity. Those would be people from let’s say the mid-thirties, down to say, twenty-two. They found six reasons, and they were all intellectual. They were things like: the teaching is superficial; I can’t express doubts or I’m shunned. One of the six reasons was: the church is not helping me grapple with the discoveries of modern science and know how to relate that to my Christian beliefs.
I was concerned because we’re losing our kids and parents, youth pastors, thoughtful laymen, pastoral staff members and parachurch members have got to start equipping people, not just with what we believe, but why. They’ve got to be given reasons or we’re going to lose them. And one of the top areas we are losing people is because of this belief that you can only have knowledge in the hard sciences, and everything else is just emotion and blind faith. That’s not going to cut it, today. Because we live, as you know, in the most chaotic, secular culture that I have ever seen in America. I’ve been a Christian for fifty years and I had to write this book to plug the hole and to give people answers to why scientism is not true, so that when they are in the office and something comes up, they can push back in a winsome way, but in a thoughtful, intelligent way.
Zaspel:
Explain to us how scientism is self-refuting.
Moreland:
Something is self-refuting if it makes itself false. So, the statement, “no sentence is longer than three words,” is self-refuting because it, itself, is longer than three words. The statement, “I can’t speak a word of English,” is self-refuting if I state it in English. “There are no truths,” is self-refuting because I’m offering that, itself, as a truth.
Scientism is the idea that the only thing that you can know, that could be true, is what could be proven in the hard sciences. But that, itself, can’t be proven in the hard sciences, because it is a statement of philosophy, it’s not a statement of science.
Let me give you an example. I was invited to give an evangelistic talk to a bunch of very highly educated people at a person’s home a few years back. I was told that there was one gentleman who had a PhD in physics from Johns Hopkins and he was an engineer. He was coming, and he hated Christianity. Well, before the meeting began, I was at the hors d’oeuvre table and he comes over to me and we introduce each other and he says, “I hear you are a philosopher and a theologian.” I said, “Well, I give it my best shot.” And he said, “I used to be interested in that kind of stuff, myself, when I was a teenager; but when I matured and grew up, intellectually, I began to realize that if you can’t quantify your data and prove it in a laboratory, it’s just hot air, it’s just personal opinion and blind faith and hot air.” He talked about two or three minutes and made about thirty or forty assertions, and I stopped him. I said, “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I’m having a problem. You claim that the only thing that you can know is what can be proven in the laboratory in physics and chemistry, and everything else is hot air and blind opinion, like religion and ethical claims and so on.” He said, “That’s exactly my view.” And I said, “You’ve made thirty assertions or forty, in the last few minutes, and I can’t think of a single thing that you’ve asserted that could be proven and tested in the laboratory. If I’m wrong, tell me which statement you’ve made that could be proven in the hard sciences. But if I’m right, then I’ve got a dilemma because what that means is everything you said for the last two or three minutes, by your own standards, is nothing but hot air and blind opinion.” Well, I kid you not, this dude turned pale and he immediately changed the subject.
Scientism is self-refuting and that’s one of the three major things that I point out in detail in the book as to what is wrong with scientism.
Zaspel:
You argue that scientism is actually the enemy of science. This is important – can you explain this for us?
Moreland:
It’s a good question, Fred. Science is built on a number of assumptions, and I lay out all of these assumptions in very, very clear ways in the book. These assumptions are all being challenged today in the universities, every single one of them. Science assumes a certain view of truth. It assumes a certain view of what a good explanation looks like. It assumes a view of knowledge. It assumes that the laws of mathematics and logic apply to reality. And it assumes a whole bunch of other things. Now, the problem is that not a single one of these assumptions can be proven, scientifically. The job of stating these assumptions and critiquing or defending them is actually a task in the field of philosophy. It’s called philosophy of science. Scientism, by undermining anything outside of science, including philosophy, leaves science hanging in midair because it undermines the field that can state and defend the assumptions of science and thereby scientism leaves science vulnerable to critique and rejection. People say, “How can you reject science?”
The answer is easy. What’s happening is that people are now treating science, not as something that gives us real knowledge and truth of reality, but as a field that’s pragmatically useful to make accurate predictions and develop technology. But the usefulness of science doesn’t demonstrate it’s true. So, scientism undermines science by not allowing for the defense and the clarification of the very assumptions on which science itself rests.
Zaspel:
Scientism says that only the hard sciences have the intellectual authority to give us a knowledge of reality. But how is it, in fact, that scientism actually undermines a genuine knowledge of reality?
Moreland:
Scientism undermines a knowledge of reality in two ways. The first is like I said, it undermines the ability to defend the assumptions of science. Science assumes a certain view of truth called a correspondence theory of truth. But that theory has been hammered and criticized widely in the humanities and in literature and in philosophy. If that theory of truth isn’t any good then science cannot claim to give us truths that correspond to reality. And so, by defending the correspondence theory of truth, philosophers who do defend that theory gives science the right to claim that it gives us knowledge of reality. So that’s one way.
The other way that scientism undermines our ability to know reality is that there’s a lot of ways we know things that have nothing to do with science. For example, we can have theological and ethical knowledge. We can have knowledge of logic and mathematics. Logic and mathematics are not known by scientific tests. In fact, we know logic and mathematical truths in what philosophers call a priori way. That means we know them without an appeal to sense experience. This statement “all ravens are black” is known by empirical studies in science and it’s a truth that is called a contingent truth. It’s true, but it could have been false. But “all examples of two plus two are examples that equal four” is a necessary truth. It’s not only true, but it couldn’t possibly be false. Even God couldn’t make two plus two equal to the square root of minus one. We know the laws of logic and math by a grasp of the intellect and not by scientific test. So, there are a whole range of things that we know that have nothing to do with science. Scientism robs us allegedly of the right to claim to know truths in ethics and so on, and therefore it undermines not only scientific knowledge but knowledge that we have outside of science.
Zaspel:
Science is alleged to explain everything, but you remind us that science has its limits. What are some things science cannot explain?
Moreland:
Well, it can’t explain the laws of logic and mathematics, like I just mentioned. Those are truths that are known outside of science. It can’t explain the origin of the universe, because science needs a universe to be there before it can start explaining anything. Science takes one part of the universe and uses it in an explanation to explain another part of the universe. For example, the coming into existence of water is one part of the universe that is explained by another part of the universe, namely, the properties of hydrogen and oxygen and the laws of chemical change. Science cannot explain the origin of the universe because it’s not the nature of scientific explanation to explain the existence of the very thing that it has to start with before it can start explaining anything. It can’t explain the laws of nature, why they are the way they are. It can identify the laws of nature, but why do these laws of nature exist instead of another set of laws of nature? It cannot explain the existence of philosophical claims. It can’t explain the difference between a good piece of literature and a bad piece of literature. And it can’t explain the existence of moral absolutes and how we know them. Do we have time for a really interesting story on that?
Zaspel:
Sure. Absolutely.
Moreland:
I’ve struggled with several cancers in the last three years; and right now, I seem to be clear. But I was in the hospital a few years ago for nine days, after a very serious colon cancer surgery and I had several nursing crews come and take care of me. One day a new nurse came in and she was checking my vitals and she said, “Tell me, what do you do?” And I said, “Well, I started off in physical chemistry, but then I went in and got graduate degrees in theology and philosophy and I’m a philosophy professor.”
Well, she got a really kind of funny look on her face. And I said, “You have a funny look on your face and I’ll bet I can tell you what you’re thinking, tell me if I’m wrong. You’re thinking that I started off in a field, physical chemistry, that deals with hard facts where you can really know whether you’re right or wrong; but then I went into theology and philosophy that doesn’t deal with hard facts and is just a bunch of theories that if you believe them, that’s great, but nobody can know whether any of its true. And you’re wondering why I made that shift.” And she looked at me and said, “You know what? That is exactly what I was thinking.”
And I said, “There are some things that we know in ethics with greater certainty than some things we know in science.” And she said, “What do you mean?” And I said, “Well, I know that torturing babies for the fun of it is wrong with a greater rational certainty than I know that there are electrons.” And her jaw dropped and I said, “Let me explain. Do you know anything about the history of the electron?” She said, “Well, no.” And I said, “Well, if you study the history of the electron there was the German wave theory of the electron, and then there was J. J. Thompson’s view that the electron was a particle. But an atom, for him, contained eighteen hundred and thirty-six electrons that were embedded in the atom like raisins in plum pudding, they didn’t move. And then there was a view that the electron exerted a force on protons by creating a vortex through the ether that sucked the proton toward the electron. Then we had the Bohr electron; and today we have the quantum electron. Now, when somebody says, ‘Do you believe in electrons?’ I have to ask them, ‘Which model of the electron are you talking about?’ Because every view of the electron up until the current quantum view, we no longer believe that there were such things as Bohr electrons or Thompsonian electrons.
Now, doesn’t it make sense that in fifty years from now it’s at least plausible to think that nobody will any longer believe in the current model of the electron that we have right now? Couldn’t evidence be discovered that would change our understanding and that we would no longer believe in quantum electrons?” She said, “Sure, that could happen.” “But,” I said, “I cannot imagine any new evidence that we would discover that would make the belief that it is wrong to torture little babies for the fun of it no longer a rational belief to hold. I could imagine culture changing where nobody believed that any longer, but I can’t imagine discovering new evidence that would show that my belief that torturing babies for fun is wrong was an irrational, false belief. So, I have greater certainty that torturing babies for the fun of it is wrong than I do that electrons exist because in fifty years we might no longer believe in the current electron.”
Well, I’m telling you, her head was spinning and it was an unbelievable moment for her. And I got to talk to her about Christ because I was able to establish that her implicit scientism, (which she wouldn’t know what the word meant and didn’t know she had absorbed it; but she believed in it), that it was nonsense. And I was able to have a discussion with her about the credibility of God’s existence.
Zaspel:
How is or how ought science to be a Christian endeavor?
Moreland:
Science is so wonderful, and for centuries all the modern advocates of science were deeply committed Christian believers. Boyle, who discovered a number of the laws of chemistry, was a deeply devoted believer. It is a wonderful calling for people to go into science because scientific discoveries have brought tremendous help to humans: modern medicine, air conditioning. I love air conditioning, I don’t know about you. (laughter) Christians should go into science and honor God by discovering things that help the human race.
In my view, science is wonderful. It is scientism that is in the drinking water today, and that is an enemy. In my view, 95% of science has nothing to do with Christianity in the sense that I couldn’t care less, as a Christian, whether water is H2O or H3O; it doesn’t make any difference. I don’t care whether the continents move by resting on plates or not. Most of what scientists discover has nothing to do with any of my theological beliefs. My guess is 3% of the remaining 5% has actually helped Christianity. We’ve discovered that the universe had a beginning; that’s what the Bible teaches. We’ve discovered that the universe is precisely fine-tuned and balanced so that life could appear in this universe. And that lends itself to belief that God rigged the dice ahead of time so life could appear. Archaeology has regularly confirmed the reliability of the New Testament documents. So, I think 3% is actually in our favor. There is 2% that raises serious problems for us, but here’s what’s interesting, Fred. Of that 2%, none of it raises questions about whether God exists or whether Jesus rose from the dead and the New Testament is historically reliable. That 2% almost all targets the credibility of the first eleven chapters of Genesis. And so, the problems with science are raised, not against Christian theism in general, but against the inerrancy of the Scriptures and the credibility of those early chapters of Genesis. In my book, Scientism and Secularism, I show how to deal with those 2% and how people in the sciences can integrate their Christian knowledge and truth claims with problems that come from science.
Zaspel:
Before I let you go, give us a brief overview of your book.
Moreland:
Thank you for asking, Fred. In Scientism and Secularism, I start off by stating simply what scientism is and then I lay out why it’s a serious danger that Christians need to know about. I lay out what’s happened to the culture and to the church by not knowing about this. I explain why it is something that we all need to get up to speed on. The second thing I do is I make very clear what scientism is, and then I go into showing three areas that refute scientism. I show that it’s self- refuting; I show the assumptions that it cannot justify; and then I show the things that we know that it cannot explain. I finish the book by trying to explain how people can integrate claims that science makes that are contrary to what appear to be biblically reliable assertions. My book is an attempt to help people deal with scientism and with some of the problems raised in science in a readable and understandable way so that we can plug the exodus of our young people who are abandoning Christianity because of scientism, though they might not know the name for it.
Zaspel:
I think it’s just an enormously important book.
While I have you maybe you could mention something about another book you’ve helped produce recently: Theistic Evolution.
Moreland:
In Theistic Evolution we gathered twelve scholars from European universities, that teach in major universities in Europe, and about twelve or so North American scholars, and we wrote a critique of theistic evolution. It’s a thousand pages and it’s a theological, philosophical, and scientific critique of theistic evolution. Scientists today are almost universally agreed that there was no Adam and Eve. We have four chapters on the science of this issue and we demonstrate that the case against an original human pair is full of holes and that there is, in fact, evidence that there was an original man and woman from which the human race sprang, as is consistent with the biblical record. This book is challenging, but if you know someone who is a scientist, who is a theistic evolutionist, they owe it to themselves to read what is now being widely touted as the finest critique of theistic evolution and defense of the intelligent design view that’s ever been written. I would humbly agree, not because I was an editor of the book, but because we gathered a team of people that are at the very top of their fields.
Zaspel:
We’re talking to Dr. J.P. Moreland, author of the new book, Scientism and Secularism: Learning to Respond to a Dangerous Ideology. It’s a fascinating, important, very well-informed, yet very accessible book that contemporary Christians will want to read. Let me read just one of the endorsements – this from James Anderson of Reformed Theological Seminary: “Moreland has been reflecting on these issues for decades, and I can think of no one better qualified to write on this topic. This incisive takedown of scientism is long overdue and most welcome.” There it is. We gladly commend it and hope it receives a wide reading.
JP, thanks so much for talking to us today.
Moreland:
It’s been a joy, Fred, and I hope I can come back again. Thanks for what you’re doing.
