Sermon 30 - How do you know that?
Recently a friend and I were at a Science World display and event. One of the activities made available involved toys, which you have possibly seen, involving flexible tubes that kids can swing around. The tubes will make a whirring sound as you whirl them around. She was quite taken with these tubes and the kids playing with them. I noted that, if you swung the tubes fast enough, the sound that was produced would suddenly jump from a specific pitch, to a pitch an octave higher. She was intrigued by this idea and, when the current set of kids seemed to be done playing with the tubes, she went and grabbed one and whirled it for all that she was worth. Which was considerable: she not only made the sound jump one octave, but thereupon whirled it fast enough that it jumped a *second* octave. She was delighted, and exclaimed, "You were right!"
My response was possibly a little bit odd, even from my perspective. I said, "Of course I'm right!" And I said it in a tone that hinted at a bit of pique.
Why should this annoy me?
Gloria, fairly often, said something similar. When I would express a certain fact, she, particularly if she recognized the truth of what I said, would say in a tone of surprise, "How did you know that?" I must admit that I frequently found this question annoying. In the first place, I was always surprised at the question. It never occurs to me to question how somebody knows something. I am used to the fact that other people know things that I don't. I am not surprised that they know something that I don't. I don't find it in any way strange, and it wouldn't occur to me to wonder how it was that they learned this fact or principle. When Gloria's question *particularly* annoyed me, on occasion my response tended to be, "How do you not?" How is it that you *don't* know this? Often I respond that way because what I know that Gloria found so strange that I knew, I had known for so long that I simply considered it part of what everyone knew. Part of the facts of life. Part of what everyone knows. Or should know.
And, of course, it's not just Gloria who is sometimes surprised by things that I know, and the fact that I know them. And very often what people are surprised about, and what surprises me that they don't know, is about science. I have always enjoyed science. I would say that I love science! Part of the reason that I love science is because science is so consistent. When something is a scientific fact, the answer is the same every time: it's like mathematics. There are an awful lot of things that people try to educate us about, which are not consistent in the same way. If you are asked questions about art, or English literature, or sometimes even history, the answer is not the same every time. The answer is very often subjective, and seemingly arbitrary. (At least the answer according to this particular instructor, who may have a different opinion from some other, previous, instructor.) So I always loved science, because science was consistent. Science was the same, every time. Science was faithful.
And this is one of the reasons that I find our society's insistence that there is some opposition between science and religion so odd. God created our universe. God created our universe with certain principles in mind. We are told in the Bible that God created man in His own image, but there is also an implication that God created *all* of creation in, somehow, His own image. God created certain classes of things, and looked at them, and said that they were good. God approved of how they were made, and their nature. And, I assume, that approval; that following of an image; applies to the rules under which the universe operates. God didn't have to follow any rules. God didn't have any rules imposed on him: God created the rules. God could have created a different universe following different principles. So the fact that science works; the fact that science is useful to us; the fact that science tells us things that we can trust about the universe; must tell us something about God. The fact that God created the universe in such a way that science can tell us things about the universe tells us something about God.
Why am I annoyed about this question about "how do you know that?" Well, I suppose that partly this is trust in God's faithfulness. Science is dependable. Science is predictable. The answer is always going to be the same. (At least if it's a fairly simple question. Ask a complex question, and you have to expect a complex answer.) The answer is a fact. Science is built on facts. We can be wrong. But that's because we are human. It isn't the fault of science. It's a limitation on us. Not a limitation on the universe. Again, science tells us something about God. God is faithful. God is dependable. God is, in some senses, predictable. God's faithfulness is predictable. God's love and mercy is predictable. We can depend on it. We can rely on it. We can predict that this is what will happen, and the way it will happen. What happens is because of God's faithfulness, love, and mercy. So, when someone is surprised that some scientific fact is known, and will happen, when we see that it *does* happen, it shouldn't be surprising. If you are surprised, you are, in a sense, saying that you are surprised that God is faithful.
Science tells us something about God. And God tells us something about science. God is telling us that his universe, the universe that he created, is like us, to a certain extent. It is created in His image. Because God is faithful and dependable, He built a universe that is dependable and predictable. This is why science works: not because science is *greater* than God, but because God created a universe where science works. Where we can predict; where we can depend on it; where we can rely on it. To object to science betrays a lack of faith in God.
How did I know that this would happen? Because God is faithful. Because God created a universe which, like Him, is faithful and dependable and reliable, and, because of that, is predictable. So, in a sense, if you had paid attention in science class, you would have learned something about God.
You would also have learned something about us. That part of science is realising that it is our flawed attempt to understand God's world, to understand God's nature as expressed in the world, that when something *doesn't* work out the way we think it's supposed to work out; when something that we predict *doesn't* happen, it is not the fault of science. It is *our* fault, for making a mistake in figuring out how God's world works. And when we make a mistake, and something doesn't work, that is our opportunity to correct what we know (or *think* we know) about the world. Because if it doesn't work, that means that we made a mistake in our original thought about how the world works.
(You didn't expect me to get through a sermon without mentioning grief, did you? I've already mentioned Gloria. There is a very interesting book, called "The Grieving Brain." It talks about the fact that we construct a mental model, or map, of the world around us. When we are in a relationship with someone, our mental model of the world has that person in it. How that person will react if we do something. How, if something happens to us, we can expect that person to help us. Or not. When that person dies, our mental model still has that person in it. Part of our pain, and confusion, in grief, is the disconnect between the new reality, and our old mental model. To us, it seems as if the world is no longer faithful, because it has changed. Part of grief work is the *unlearning* of this old model of the world, and the creation of a *new* model that does not have our person in it. In a sense, we have made a mistake, and have to correct it.)
Now God does not restrict himself to the way the world works. God is greater than his creation. God allows himself to do miracles. But God does miracles for a specific purpose and for a specific reason. God has his reasons, and his reasons are good, and his reasons are to our benefit. It does not invalidate the fact that science is, for the most part, reliable and dependable and predictable. Because most of the time that is the way God's universe works. God has allowed us to determine this, and to see that the universe is reliable and predictable and dependable. This teaches us that the God who created the universe is reliable and dependable and faithful.
I must admit that part of my pique over "How did you know that?" is simply that I have spent my life doing this kind of observation of God's universe. I learned these things. I remember these things. And people who do *not* look around themselves, and do not pay attention to the universe, and do not see the wonders of God's creation, do not put any work into understanding the wonders of God's creation, well, it's annoying that they don't. And then our surprise that God's universe is reliable, and dependable, and predictable, well, it's annoying.
But that's maybe just me, personally.
cf Sermon 20 - Science vs Faith
https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/01/sermon-20-science-vs-faith.html
cf Sermon 31 - I believe because I am a physicist, part 3
https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/06/sermon-31-i-believe-because-i-am.html
Sermons: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/09/sermons.html
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