(chapter summary from God and Science by Richard L. Thompson)
In the Vaisnava tradition God takes the form of Brahman, Paramatma and Bhagavan. In Christianity there are the similar ideas of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Both emphasis a personal supreme being. This is in contrast to the scientists such as the biologist Julian Huxley who said: ??oeI am an atheist, in the only correct sense, that I don??(TM)t believe in a supernatural being who influences natural events.??
Thompson poses the argument that both there are a lot of things that both science and religion does not know. This grey area in between the two fields should be investigated. Here are some of the issues:
God and the Laws of Physics
Isaac Newton believed that God influenced the physical reality by making small adjustments. Indeed, modern chaos theory shows that arbitrarily small changes can be used to systematically control a large, complex system.
Special Theory of Relativity
Albert Einstein??(TM)s special theory of relativity shows how time and space interact at very high speeds. They are actually just different manifestations of the same thing. Time, i.e. past, present and future, is just an illusion. Question: how and why do we consciously perceive the jumbled space and time continuum linearly?
Quantum Physics
The famous collapse of the wave function in quantum mechanism occurs completely by chance. Some people like William Pollard see this as a chance to introduce a matter-spirit interface. God could influence events by subtly adjusting the random quantum fluctuations without us noticing. However, John Polkinghorne, a physicist and priest, calls this idea far-fetched.
The Brain and Consciousness
Francis Crick has stated that all joys, sorrows, memories, ambitions, sense of identity and free will are no more physiochemical brain processes. However, thus far no one has been able to even suggest a way in which the brain??(TM)s processes can be linked to conscious experience: the redness of red.
Life after Death
John Polkinhorne, attempting to give a scientific view of the Christian doctrine of resurrection, sees the body as a machine and resurrection as the recreation of the exact pattern of physical atoms of the dead person in a different place. Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita explains that the body is a machine occupied by the soul. It transmigrates between bodies via reincarnation. Researches such as Ian Stevenson have documented a great deal of empirical evidence for such transmigration.
NDEs
Near death experiences point towards the survival of consciousness after the death of the physical body. The dying person usually sees his or her own body from above and then enters some other world with bright light, beautiful scenery, etc. However, the particular experience a person has is very dependent his or her particular religious beliefs. This suggests that the near death experience might be fabricated or imagined, although the people experiencing them attest that they are real.
UFOs
The phenomenon of alien abductions can be somewhat linked to religious texts. Powerful alien life forms might, for example, correspond to Christian angels and demons. Aliens are also remarkably similar to the Vedic demigods. These have the power to levitate, pass through solid matter, appear and disappear suddenly and mysteriously and display halos of light.
The Fossil Record
Modern Geology asserts that the earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago and that the first humans evolved no more than 100,000 years ago. Some Christian traditions deny these numbers based on Biblical stories. Hinduism??(TM)s scriptures roughly correspond to modern figures. Carl Sagan said: ??oeThe Hindu religion is the only one of the world??(TM)s great faiths in which the time scales correspond, no doubt by accident, to those of modern scientific cosmology.??
Darwin??(TM)s Theory
Life, according to neo-Darwin theories, manifest entirely by chance. It origins of life is like a ??oeblind watchmaker??. The Roman Catholic church agrees somewhat, but proposes a guided evolution, where God gently nudges the process every once and a while. Darwin??(TM)s theory has never been able to explain how complex organs come into existence. Michael Behe has, for example, published a book explaining how the findings of biochemistry are extremely difficult to explain using Darwin??(TM)s theory. Bio-molecular evolution is not understood by modern science. Could there be some intelligent design, or has science just not yet found the mechanistic explanation?
Conclusion
Our ignorance is overwhelming. Both scientists and religionists have much to learn. We must avoid imposing a final conclusion, either from scientific rationalism or from religious dogmatism.