On Faith

Younger generations have fled the formal authority of churches in favor of a buffet style approach to their relation with higher powers, or embraced outright atheism and rejected the notion of higher powers altogether.

For many, science now provides answers to the mysteries of life.  This has placed science at odds with various religious authorities who feel threatened by the encroachment of science into their domain.  The word "faith" has become synonymous with religion and has come to mean something akin to belief without evidence.  The root of science is to establish a system that will reveal universal facts supported by evidence, or at least facts as they are understood by a scientist and his or her contemporaries.  Given what I have previously written about the ineffectiveness of labels, facts are fluid and subject to new evidence--as the demotion of Pluto from planet to plutoid can attest.

It is the rigid assurances of religion which had served mankind so well that have fallen in the face of new evidence, and driven young people toward the assurances of science with its facts.  I count myself among those who turn to science rather than religion for answers to life's mysteries.  I am not ignorant of the degree to which faith plays a role in the pursuit of those answers, however.

I have not performed the experiments that have provided those answers myself.  I have not unearthed a fossil, detected the wobble of a star to infer the presence of planets, or classified a new species of insect.  Other people have done these things, then written about them.  To simply have faith that these people are telling the truth, or have not misunderstood the results of their work is not enough; their discoveries must be duplicated or verified by their peers to establish a consensus of opinion surrounding the discovery.  Those peers write supporting or rejecting papers about the initial discovery.  This is the heart of the scientific method.

Having done none of this work, and reading few of the results of the work of a scientist and their peers, I receive news of the discovery in roundabout ways typically.  This is where faith comes in.

I have to have faith in the process of science and subsequent reporting.  I cannot know that biases have been injected at any step of the reporting, and must take what is said as accurate.  If a source has a track record of inaccurately reporting on discoveries, I will lose faith in the source of information.  Where the reporting is accurate, biases may have crept into the science, but my faith in the system of science tells me that peer review will uncover it.  To maintain my faith, I have to believe in the integrity of the process, but I cannot ever really be certain.  However, since I have accepted the fluidity of facts in science, I also have faith that what I know through this process is incomplete or even wrong (given more evidence).

The difference between religion and science is less one of evidence and facts than one of certainty.  Faith plays a large role in both, but one is certain while the other embraces uncertainty and doubt.  I have little faith in anyone who uses either to make assurances or final conclusions.