Science and Faith

3 verses to lay the foundation and direciton of science and faith:

1 Peter 3:15: always be ready to give an answer to every man that asks about the reason of the hope in you.

Colossians 4:6: that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man

Titus 1:9: he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers

Wrote The God Delusion

actively sought to persuade people of atheism

“Faith is belief without evidence and reason: coincidentally, that’s also the definition of delusion.”

“Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is the belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence.”

Richard Dawkins

Faith Defined by Christians

• “Any faith that must be supported by evidence of the senses is not real faith.”- Tozer

• “Faith never knows where it is being led, but it loves and knows the One who is leading.”- Chambers

• “Seeing is not believing. Seeing is Seeing. Believing is being confident without seeing.”-Morgan

• “Faith sees the invisible, believes the unbelievable, and receives the impossible.”- Corrie ten Boom

Faith defined by the Bible

• “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”- Hebrews 11:1

• Substance + evidence–something tangible, clear, objective

• Hoped for + not seen–not complete, absolute, etc.

• We might not have dogmatic proof for every detail, but we are building on and operating with evidence.

faith that is independent of reason ( faith is all that is needed)

Fideism

reason that is independent of any faith

Rationalism

Said “Faith is understanding’s step.”

Augustine

Why not just believe God at His Word?

• Which God are we talking about?

• Which word?

• What does His word mean?

Types of statements to avoid:

• “I don’t believe in dinosaurs, because that’s what evolution believes in.”

• This does not correspond to reality. We live in the real world, and need to defend our faith to others in a reasonable way.

• “I don’t really care about origins, what matters now is how we live today.”

• If the Bible speaks to origins, however, than so should we. “All scripture is given by inspiration and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction…”

• “I don’t think science really matters anyway, we should just focus on serving God.”

• God’s creation was made for HIS glory, and learning and understanding it is glorifying to Him.

What kind of faith should we have?

• Our faith is not against the evidence.

• Our faith aligns with the evidence.

• Our faith goes beyond the evidence

Why do we need reason in addition to faith?

We can and should understand what we believe.

What are some reasons for Christians to study science?

1. appreciating the wonder and beauty of God’s Creation

2. Answer the questions of the critics

3. Improve society and the lives of those around us

Definition of Science

knowledge

Steps of the scientific method

1. Define a question

2. Make observations

3. Form a hypothesis (an educated guess)

4. Test the Hypothesis (if true, this. If not true, that)

5. Analyze the data from the test (experiment)

6. Draw conclusions

7. If necessary, retest

The two kinds of reasoning

Inductive and deductive reasoningW

Which reasoning does science use?

Inductive

What are some things that science cannot tell us about?

cannot make value judgments

cannot make definitive statements about origins

Two different kinds of science:

Origin Science: limited

Operational Science

Origin science is done by…

Look at and interpreting the evidence

Which theory has the least amount of gaps?

In what three aresa did we consider hte consequences of scientific ideas?

Darwinian Evolution

Big Bang Theory

Gender Theory

Consequences of Darwinism

Planned Parenthood

Holocaust

Eugenics: good genes; genes improve vove rtime, harnessing of evolution to maximize good genes

Consequences of an atheistic universe:

Multiverse

Niihilism: nothing matters

Absurdism: nothing matters, and I can do whatevr I want

No true purpose to our existence

Nothing we can do can have any real effect on the world

we may not be the only world, universe, or timeline

Life becomes depressing or absurd because nothing matters

Consequences of gender theory

LGBTQ

Transgenderism

“My body is mine to define”

Subjective truth

Any form of sexual activity can be considered acceptable

Anyone can transition or identify however they would like to

You are not created with intention; you are a result of a long chain of accidents, so nothing you do matters—Be whatever you want to be

What do we mean by the fine-tuning of the universe?

the universe is perfectly calibrated to support human life; ex: the sun, gravity, etc.

What are some of the “fine-tuned” forces?

Gravity

Strong and weak secular forces

Carbon based life

Anthropic principle

Human understanding is limited because we can only observe a universe than can support humansT

wo passages that speak to God maintaining the universe

Hebrews 1:1-3

Colossians 1:16-17

What were the four areas that make Earth perfect for life in the cosmos?

Sun

moon

solar system

galaxy

What kind of galaxy is the milky way?

Spiral

Which planet functions as the “vaccuum cleaner” of our solar system?

Jupiter

What elements of the sun make it fit for life

More dense than most stars its size

Has a healthy amount radiation

What role does the moon play in life on earth

Brings the tides in and out

Keep our eath held at the angle it is

Slows rotation of the earth allowing for a 24-hour day

What are the main ideas of the Big Bang Theory?

Happened 13.8 billion years ago

singularity: all of the matter and energy of the universe confined to a single point. It went bang!!!!

Space expanding

Inflation

What two pieces of evidence are poiknt to in suuport of the Big Bang?

CMDR- heat from the inflation, tremendous amount of energy that is still traceable

the universe is also ecpanding and increasikng speed over itme

What are some of the problems with Big Bang Theory?

Where did the singularity come from?

Why did the singularity go bang/
Violates the first law of thermodynamics and the law of entropy

• thermo: energy and matter cannot be created or destroyed

• Entropy: the universe we observe only gets more chaotic, not more structure

What three items did NASA identiy as necessary for life on a planet?

Water, energy, chemistry

What is the term for the emergence of life from non-living matter?

Abiogenesis

evidences for an old earth

Starlight from lightyears away

tree rings

radiometric dating results

Evidence for a young eatrth

Erosion of continents

Carbon 14 equilibrium

Magnetic field

apparent age

Created fully mature (Adam and Eve)

Radiometric dating

Measuring the presence of different isotopes within a known half-life to determine the age of a particular rock

Isotopes

unstable atoms, radioactive

uniformitarianism

the belief that natural processes have always continued at their current rate without any changes

Catastrophism

the belief that natural processes have standard, uniform rates that can be accelerated or decelerated by extreme, violent single events (catastrophes)

made by scientists to make the big bang theory work

Radiometric dating operates under three assumptions:

1. Known amount of the parent element

2. A constant rate of decay

3. A closed system with no contamination

• Nothing has interfered with the process taking place