The paper is mine.
I can fill in the blank spaces on the go.
For flow charts: Newbie, could not add links, as previously said
regards,
ismail
A Trial of Synthesis of Religious Beliefs and Contemporary Science
By İsmail German
Avrasya Assist
isoger1@hotmail.com,
ismailgerman@alo118.com
Ben gelmedim davi için, benim işim sevi için, Gönüller dost evi için, gönüller yapmaya geldim. (Yunus Emre)
( I am not here for claims, I am here for love, I am here to win hearts for the One belove’.)
Abstracts: Religion and science have, in the past, most of the time been at odds with each other, as they mostly are today. This work is a trial to make a logical synthesis.
Religious beliefs are classified , in Section 2, into 6 subgroups as theism, deism, panentheism, pantheism, atheism and agnosticism.
In Section 3, a synthesis consistent with contemporary science, is given as
• Matter is made up of tiny particles continuously moving in space as predicted by Democritus
• Matter is conserved, it is not possible to create and destroy these particles, as claimed by Lavoisier.
• So, they exist overall in the whole infinite vacuum and they will continue to exist
• There, at least in our Galaxy, exists a first intelligent Object, spontaneously formed on the way from chaos to order whom we may call God, Great Architect of the Universe, Great Soul, etc. who has been very active on the initiation of the life on Earth.
• Very probably local in space , in the neighborhood of Orion, possibly eternal (implying that He has infinite energy, since even limited power gives end to infinite energy in infinite time), and with weakened omnipresence, omnipotence etc.
Section 4 contains the flow diagram of this synthesis and justifications.
1. Introduction
Man, differing from his primitives, shows a tendency to have beliefs. Among these beliefs, a noted one is the belief in the existence of a possible Creator , though there also exist disbelievers, and though a minority (agnostics) assesses treating these matters to be without value.
This above mentioned tendency should be pretty old, since we observe it even among the primitive clans. There are also claims that a special gene being responsible for this broad tendency exists [1]. It is a fact that, more than half of the world population belongs to the group of believers today and I think just genetic tendency alone is insufficient to explain this fact. Such a tendency without support would certainly fade away. We may, in addition, cite the followings in brief:
• We observe certain programs around us that are unlikely to develop randomly and stay as they do.
• When we compare, on the way from chaos to order, the probabilities of development of a sole “First Cause” and development of the total body of observations, we see the first one is more probable.*
• Our ancestors are probably believers and we implicitly assume they are rational people who have observed miraculous phenomena that made them believers.
• We observe phenomena going in a certain direction and suddenly changing this direction (making almost a U-turn) without any observable reason.
• There exist holy books that we may call revelations collected together and these explain life, as seen from the spiritual point of view, in a pretty good fashion.
• We do have difficulties on the way to explain the observed piecewise continuation of species. It is also not very easy to explain the observed development in the last 5 millenia in comparison with the observed prehistoric slow development.
• There exists predictions about the destiny of mankind and the planet it inhabits. When we observe keenly, we, especially nowadays, are not able to deny the relevance of these predictions.
• There exists certain units within the holy books, e.g. in the Qur-an, not known at the time of revelation or publication, observed afterwards to be scientifically true.
On the other hand we have reasons to be nonbelievers or side believers or agnostics just because of the facts that;
• Radical beliefs, as they live today, do contain certain issues that stay in contradiction with the scientific principles and facts**,
• Weak beliefs that crone reason like masonry, and ufo religions etc. do have, as it is pointed out in this article, their shortcomings as well and
• Agnosticism gives no answer at all
* See Note 1 at the end., ** See Note 2 at the end
Said in another way, there exist need for both science and the religion. We do need science because we do want, and probably are supposed to, to influence the unfoldng of the Universe at least in our neighborhood. We do need religion, because continuation of life on earth may be endangered without satisfactory integration with the Creator.
In order to be integrated with the Creator, the movements should first be integrated. Any religion, any integration or synthesis can not be at odds with science. An integration should necessarily be a scientific one or at the least should not be in conflict with the contemporary science. This work is such a trial.
2. The Spectrum
The quoted claim “God is too big to fit into a single religion or religious movement” is certainly right. So, need exists to consider the whole spectrum before a trial of synthesis.
It may of course be made thoughts about an ideal creator who is not a semi infinite part of the observed and supposedly infinite vacuum (our Universe being the other half) like a Creator from 5. dimension etc. but we here want to eliminate such imaginative thoughts. Treating the Creator, or the Order Provider and the created or ordered as objects occupying piecewise continuous volumes in the probably infinite vacuum we may consider;
• The two are non intersecting sets
• The two are identical overlapping sets i.e. the same set
• One is a subset of another
As for intervention we may take into account the followings:
1. interaction at the very beginning, wholly or dominantly in one direction from the creator to the created
2. continuing interaction, dominantly from the creator to the created
3. interactive case i.e. interactivity in both directions
And depending upon our assumptions we may have any one of the beliefs from cited groups in the following paragraphs as well as a mixture.
a. Theism (View that all observable phenomena are dependent on but distinct from one supreme being. The view usually entails the idea that God is beyond human comprehension, perfect and self-sustained, but also peculiarly involved in the world and its events [2].)
b. Deism (Belief in God based on reason rather than revelation or the teaching of any specific religion. Deists asserted that reason could find evidence of God in nature and that God had created the world and then left it to operate under the natural laws he had devised [2].)
c. Panentheism holds that the universe is a part of God or Goddess , but that it is not the whole of God's being. Nature is thus an aspect of divinity. Unlike pantheism, however, it does not say that the universe is identical to God; it maintains that there is more to God than just the universe [3]
d. Pantheism (Doctrine that the universe is God and, conversely, that there is no god apart from the substance, forces, and laws manifested in the universe [2].)
e. Atheism (Critique and denial of metaphysical beliefs in God or divine beings. Unlike agnosticism, which leaves open the question of whether there is a God, atheism is a positive denial.) and
f. Agnosticism
We do not want to consider the subgroups, the religious movements, in detail because there exists excellent sites covering them almost perfectly [4].
3. The Synthesis
• Matter is made up of tiny particles continuously moving in space as predicted by Democritus
• Matter is conserved, it is not possible to create and destroy these particles, as claimed by Lavoisier.
• So they exist overall in the whole infinite vacuum and they will continue to exist
• There at least in our Galaxy exists a first intelligent Object formed on the way from chaos to order whom we may call God, Great Architect of the Universe, Great Soul, etc. who has been very active on the initiation of the life on Earth.
• Very probably local, in the neighborhood of Orion, possibly eternal (implying that He has infinite energy, since even limited power gives end to infinite energy in infinite time), and with weakened omnipresence, omnipotence etc.
4. Flow Chart of the Synthesis
The flow chart of this synthesis is given below in Figure 1.
* See Notes at the end.
Figure 1. The flow chart of the given synthesis.
5. Supplementary Notes
Note 1: Some probabilities
(The formation probability of an intelligent system in finite time t) t/ = 0
(The formation probability of an intelligent system in infinite time) / = c (a finite real number, in case the orders of infinities match)
The formation probability of two intelligent systems in finite time, in near vicinity etc. is also zero, since the numerator is then finite. Man and woman are such.
Note 2 (Some scientifically unacceptable, with the God associated, properties):
• Omnipresence, in the strong sense of the word, is impossible because it is not possible to identify any constant, valid down to every -diameter as approaches to zero, density. There can not be any identifiable differentiable event in such a medium independent of the absolute value of the density be it zero or be it infinite. So we at the least need density differences and movements of these different regions. Our assumption is that it is a Digital Universe we live in.
• Omnipotence it the strong sense, may be self contradictory as it is seen in example of young German scientist saying to his father “Pa, God can not be omnipotent, if he were omnipotent he could make a stone so heavy that he can not lift; if he can, he cannot lift, if he can not, he can not.” We may at most claim that God, being probably eternal, is able to conduct any scientifically permitted action at any part of the Universe.
• Omni intelligence is also not possible if knowledge is somewhat to be associated with matter. If it is possible to know something via presence or absence of some material particles at some definite place, then it is not possible to know all about the present particles because the series does not converge (i.e. infinite no. of iterations are needed as locally available particles can not be infinitely many).
Note 3: The world is full of trickery, injustice, savageness and all these are not , at least for some very sensitive ones among us, to be associated with an ideal God. Here we can only say that God should be emotional, otherwise He would be indifferent and would not create at all. Any creation requires distributions and margins. If it is for the purpose of examining, it should by its definition contain events in both directions.
Note 4: The author is not an academician whose area of interest is religion, so he is not an expert. Though he has read the holy books, the one which is really totally read by the author is the holy Qur-an. The Qur-an is a collection of revelations and not a formal book. It is really interesting because it contains scientifically valid information not known at it’s time of gathering
A long citation of Ayats (signs of God) is not here given. There exist some parts which seem peculiar at the first and maybe second look but some like Al-Baqarah 26 make the whole consistent.
Note 5: As-Sajda 4-5: It is Allah who has created the heavens and the earth, and all between them, in six days, ( a note not given here). Then He established Himself on the Throne. Ye have none besides Him to protect or intercede; Will you not then receive admonition?
He directs the affairs from the heavens to the Earth; then it ascends unto Him, on a day the measure of which is a thousand years of your reckoning (considering the theory of the special relativity and our observations, the Orion is the most probable candidate).
Note 6: Al-Maarij 4: The angels and the spirit ascends unto Him in a day the measure wherof is fifty thousand years (so it is possible to consider them to be electromagnetic solitons having velocities one fiftieth of speed of light. Our proposed theory of Digital Universe is essentially nonlinear and permits solitons [6 ]).
Note that both Ayats, as well as many others, refer to a local Creator.
Note7: Ya-Sin 12: We shall give life to the dead, and We record that which they send before and that which they leave behind, and of all things have We taken account in a clear book.
Note that the book here implied is the Qur-an and It surely at most contain all things relevant (to the human life). So we may deduce that we may replace “all” with “all relevant” overall.
Note 8: Al-Jinn 27: Except a messenger whom He has chosen; and then He makes a band of watchers march before him and behind him.
Some other Ayats mentioning other more important local servants : ???
Note 9: Al-Baqarah 26: Allah disdains not to use the similitude of things, even of a gnat as well as anything above it. Those who belive know that it is the truth from their Lord; But those who reject faith say: “What means Allah by this similitude?” By it He causes many to stray, and many He leads into the right path; But He causes not to stray, except those who forsake (the path).
6. References
[1] A search in Internet under “genetic tendncy for religion”
[2]The Britannica Concise, Yahoo Search
[3] Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia
[4] religiousmovements.lib.virginia.edu/[/url]
[5] The Holy Qur-an, English Translation of the Meanings and Commentary,the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Fahd complex, P.O. Box 3561, Al-Madinah
[6] Ismail German, A Digital Universe Model, submitted to BJPS for publication (preprint available from the author)
[7] A search in Internet under “Orion the source of earthly life” There is much material there, used in writing this article and an explicit citation is almost impossible.
(Preprint is submitted to CJP for publication.)
