RELIGION AND SCIENCE

Modern nuclear physics is based entirely on inferential argument. If the inferential method were to be subtracted from scientific procedure, the science of nuclear physics would cease to exist. Another point, or rather, supposition, made by Mr Salwi, which it is even more urgent to expose as baseless, is that ‘the culture of doubting things is the crux of science’, while religion implies unquestioning faith. If this were really so, science and religion would be at opposite poles. But the ‘doubting’ method is only the starting point of scientific thinking. That is certainly not its final destination. Beginning from the doubting stage, the scientist proceeds on his journey, ultimately coming to the point of belief. Science, at its final stage, is just as much a matter of belief as religion is. When a scientist begins to follow a particular line of thought, he uses observation and experiment to direct, develop and verify his original thinking. But it has also come to be accepted that as a scientist progresses with his investigations, he eventually reaches a stage where observation and experiment no longer bear fruit, and this in spite of a whole universe of facts lying unexplored before him. He must now face the fact that his own human limitation bars any further progress, so that he must either give up his research, or change his methods. Stopping his research is out of the question because he would then never be able to discover anything truly meaningful. He must proceed at all costs from doubt to conviction. This is why all modern scientists have altered their methodology. That is to say that they have had to accept the indirect along with the direct method of research. Without this, too many facets of our physical existence would remain unexplored. This is why inferential argument has been accepted in modern times as being as valid as direct argument. For instance, modern nuclear physics is based entirely on inferential argument. If the inferential method were to be subtracted from scientific procedure, the science of nuclear physics would cease to exist. The same is true of organic evolution. The notion of the gradual evolution of species, which progressed from being regarded as a hypothesis to being accepted as a scientific fact, is based on events which have never been even partially observed. This notwithstanding, this theory is considered to be ‘scientific’. This became possible only because the indirect method came to be accepted in science along with the direct method.