The Informavore

Religion and science have oft been likened to a pair of polarized and combative siblings in the family known as “Human Understanding”. While both are very distinct and definitive ways of understanding the big hot mess around us known as the world – neither of the two seem all too quick to embrace the other side, let alone shake hands with some shaky assertions. Evolution, shmevolution – the stereotype held by many is that religious folk are superstitious and oblivious to facts while scientists love carrying on godless works of arrogance in their laboratories. It’s like West Side Story but with crucifixes and lab coats – frankincense and mercury.

However – for those in the middle that cannot deny the existence of either – the blogs at Psychology Today point out that we’re not alone. While many of us understand the scientific reasons behind how things occur – we simultaneously believe that a higher power influences why those events initiated.  As Dr. Jesse Bering points out:

University of Michigan psychologist Susan Gelman and her colleagues have been exploring people’s causal reasoning about illness. These researchers have found that, at least when it comes to what goes on in our own heads, there’s not much of a conflict between religion and science. Sure, that bad case of strep throat your kid got right before your scheduled vacation to Barbados was caused by her chewing on a virus-laden pencil she’d borrowed in math class. And of course, waking up to that enormous zit at the end of your nose on the day of your big interview was caused by that new moisturiser you took a chance on. You’re not delusional: you know your basic science. But that doesn’t mean God’s not trying to tell you something by—what’s the best word here—‘authoring’ these events. Perhaps He didn’t want you lounging on that sundrenched beach because you’d have stepped on an HIV-infected needle half-buried in the sand. Or maybe God didn’t like the fact that you’d been so boastful about landing that job interview and thought you could do with a bit of humbling, so he turned you into Rudolph for a few days.

Gelman refers to this way of thinking as “co-existence reasoning,” where natural, scientific forces are viewed as directly causing a certain event, but supernatural forces are perceived simultaneously as somehow blowing life into this science. Another way to say this is that science and God often co-exist harmoniously in the same mindset, with science acting ‘proximally’ and God acting ‘distally.’ Working out the mechanical intricacies of precisely how they’re related to one another is another matter. In the case of the blemish that ruined your career prospects, did God whisper in your ear to pick up that particular brand of moisturiser while you were standing in the store aisle, perhaps seducing you to try something new by making just the right soundtrack come over the store’s speakers as you stood there deliberating between products? did He cause the manufacturing technician in Singapore to glance down at her wristwatch and put one grain too many of a certain chemical in that particular jar of moisturiser, a grain that subsequently lodged into an unfortunately placed pore?

The post does mention that while co-existence reasoning can exist – the extent to which an individual prescribes more causal power in a higher power than in science is a whole ‘nother can of intelligently designed worms. So – should you be privy to any cocktail parties that break out into a religion vs. science melee – assure folks that the rationales have been shown to co-exist without anyone spontaneously bursting into flames. Easy as that.