The following are talks given by Elder John S Lewis and Sister Peg Lewis on 25 April 2010 at the Second Branch of the Salt Lake Stake of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
Elder Lewis's talk
Sister Lewis's talk
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Monday, April 26, 2010
Faith and the Scientist - a talk given by Dr John S Lewis on April 25, 2010
The Testimony of a Scientist
John S. Lewis
Salt Lake Second Branch, 25 April 2010
The Church has a long tradition of freedom of inquiry and expression on matters with no settled doctrine. Many members and General Authorities have stated a vast range of opinions and supporting arguments on numerous topics. It should come as no surprise that in many cases there have been serious disagreements, some extensively and energetically argued in official Church publications by respected General Authorities. When General Authorities differ profoundly with each other in the pages of the Ensign or other Church publications, what is the average Church member to conclude? Such conflicts afford openings for dissention and divisiveness. What then is doctrine; indeed, how can we know what is truth?
The most durable—and heated--of these public disagreements have been those concerning scientific issues: the creation of Earth, the origin of Adam, the age of the Earth, evolution, and so on. Some Church leaders have received a scientific education: Elders John Widtsoe, James Talmage, Frederick Pack, and Henry J. Eyring serve as examples. But in matters of doctrine it is the President of the Church who alone holds all the keys of revelation for the entire body of the Church. First Presidency messages take precedence over the opinions of individual General Authorities, no matter how strongly expressed.
Suppose we desire knowledge—how do we acquire it? The answer is clear: we study it out using every available relevant and reliable source of information and then form a conclusion. We then can test that conclusion by seeking the guidance of the Holy Ghost. Those who “take no thought except to ask” are like the student who wants a good grade without doing the coursework.
Suppose, specifically, you want to know what time it is. Do you pray for the answer to be given to you? No, you look at a clock. Suppose you want your laundry washed, dried, folded and put away. Do you ask the Lord to do it for you? Suppose you want to learn integral calculus. Do you pray for instant enlightenment? No, you read the textbook, attend class, and do the homework. After all that you can do, you are entitled to assistance in the learning process. Suppose you want to know the age of the Earth. You look at the clocks built into Nature: you collect the available evidence, study the dating methods and their results, and form a conclusion. After all that you can do, you are entitled to consult the Holy Ghost for confirmation.
Most of the supposed conflict between science and religion is caused by a failure to avail ourselves of both study and revelation. I am convinced that there is no meaningful conflict—the apparent disagreements are due to people failing to use one or both of these methods. Primitive misconceptions of non-scientists about what science is, does, and says are as destructive as the interpretation of scriptures by religionists using the intellect alone, without guidance by personal or ecclesiastical revelation.
Two false concepts bedevil this debate. Some hold that the material world was made by God with abundant false evidence of great antiquity to test our faith. But God does not lie and falsify: indeed, he cannot. This idea is heretical. Another argument holds that fossils and other evidence of Earth’s great age were created by Satan to confuse us. This attribution of the creative powers of the priesthood to Satan is the essence of the Gnostic heresy, which has been rejected by all Christian faiths.
Let us consider a few of the most frequently debated points. First, let us consider the duration of the creation of Earth. Genesis talks of six days of creation, but the Hebrew word for “day” is freely used in a figurative sense in the Bible. In the highest and purest version of the creation story revealed to us, we are told of “creative periods” Elder McConkie, who I believe represents the most conservative viewpoint, has also commented that the “days” of creation are figurative, and not to be taken literally. In the June 1982 Ensign he wrote: “What is a day? It is a specified time period; it is an age, an eon, a division of eternity.” We commend this statement to the many Church members who falsely believe that Elder McConkie advocated a one-week duration for the creation.
Secondly, let us inquire into the age of the Earth. Considering that D&C 77:6 refers to “…this earth during the seven thousand years of its continuance, or its temporal existence”, what led Joseph Smith, who wrote that verse, to speak of Earth as 2,555 million years old in the King Follett discourse? The answer appears to be straightforward. Seven thousand Earth years is in conflict with all physical, chemical, genetic, archaeological, and linguistic evidence. But seven thousand years of God is not ruled out. The arithmetic is easy: 7000 years of God, calculated on the basis of one day of God being as a thousand years of man (one year of God therefore being 365,257 years of man) is just 7000x365,257 Earth years. That is 2,556,799,000 Earth years. Clearly Joseph Smith did not intend the “7000 years” to refer to Earth years. But why did Joseph Smith and his amanuensis W. W. Phelps quote 2,555 million years instead of 2,556.8 million? Their calculation simply ignored leap years, and took the average duration of the year as exactly 365 days: thus 7000x365,000 = 2,555 million years.
The same number surfaces again in Elder McConkie’s polemical address, “The Seven Deadly Heresies”, delivered at BYU in 1980. He says that God “has presided in our universe for almost 2,555,000,000 years”, but without any indication of the source or significance of that number, or where the phrase “presided in our universe” comes from. Let us recall that, at a time when scientists scarcely dared speak of tens of millions of years, Joseph Smith firmly spoke of billions.
Thirdly, there is the belief that Church doctrine holds that there was no death on Earth before Adam’s fall. We shall return to this topic later.
Fourthly, there is the question of “pre-Adamites”, man-like beings who lived on Earth before Adam. The first LDS speculations on life before Adam were by Orson Hyde in an 1856 talk published in the Journal of Discourses. Elder Hyde wrote that manlike beings, which he called Pre-Adamites, long predated Adam on Earth. This theme can be traced back at least to the 16th century in European writings, and was treated from a Christian perspective as early as the writings of St. Augustine.
Darwin's On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection first appeared in 1859, three years after Elder Hyde’s suggestion.
Fifthly, we come to evolution. John A. Widtsoe, in his book Joseph Smith as Scientist, (General Board of the YMMIA, Salt Lake City, 1908), was strongly supportive of a geologically ancient Earth and anti-evolutionary only in the sense that the origin of man was left out of the general evolutionary progression of nature and life. Elder Widtsoe wrote (page 105):
…it has been found that under normal conditions all things undergo a process of evolution; that is, become more complex, or advance. This, in essence, is the law of evolution, about which so much has been said in the last fifty years. Undoubtedly, this law is correct, and in harmony with the known facts of the universe. It certainly throws a flood of light upon the phenomena of nature; though of itself, it tells little of the force behind it, in obedience to which it operates.
Several other articles around that time advocated conflicting points of view. Evidently the doctrine needed clarification.
In response to this flurry of interest, a First Presidency message, mild and conciliatory in tone, entitled The Origin of Man, appeared in Improvement Era 13, 75-81 (Nov., 1909). The President at the time was Joseph F. Smith: Whether the mortal bodies of man evolved in natural processes to present perfection, through the direction and power of God; whether the first parents of our generations, Adam and Eve, were transplanted from another sphere, with immortal tabernacles, which became corrupted through sin and the partaking of natural foods, in the process of time; whether they were born here in mortality, as other mortals have been, are questions not fully answered in the revealed word of God.
Elder Frederick Pack wrote a series of three articles entitled The Creation of the Earth, Improvement Era 13, 1023-1027 (Sept., 1910); 1121-1127 (Oct., 1910); 14, 220-230 (Jan., 1911). Elder Pack, like Elders Widtsoe and Talmage, was a trained geologist who accepted the antiquity of Earth. He discussed the geological record in detail and was frankly positively disposed toward evolution. He also later served as Chairman of the Church’s Gospel Doctrine Committee. Clearly the Brethren did not suspect him of doctrinal error. He speculated, indeed, but did so wholly within the range explicitly allowed by the First Presidency.
In 1927, two General Authorities, Brigham H. Roberts and Joseph Fielding Smith, took diametrically opposite views, Roberts defending the fossil evidence and Smith denying it as a Satanic fraud. Both Elder Roberts and Elder Smith argued their cases before the Quorum and its President, Elder Rudger Clawson. The Quorum, hung, sent the matter back to the First Presidency. They wrote, and announced in an assembly on April 7, 1931, that "The statement made by Elder Smith that the existence of pre-Adamites is not a doctrine of the Church is true. It is just as true that the statement 'there were not pre-Adamites upon the Earth' is not a doctrine of the church. Neither side of the controversy has been accepted as doctrine at all."
As of 2010, the most recent First Presidency message regarding the origin of man is still that 1931 address. It concluded:
Upon the fundamental doctrines of the Church we are all agreed. Our mission is to bear the message of the restored gospel to the world. Leave geology, biology, archaeology, and anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the souls of mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church… Upon one thing we should all be able to agree, namely, that Presidents Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, and Anthon H. Lund were right when they said: "Adam is the primal parent of our race." Presidents Heber J. Grant, Anthony W. Ivins, & Charles W. Nibley, the First Presidency
The First Presidency next expressed a desire to see a moderate, authoritative treatment of the main issues: that General Authorities not invent "new doctrine"; that evolution be treated as an open question; that the idea of no death before Adam be abandoned; that the antiquity of the Earth and the authenticity of geological evidence be defended; that both sides of the issue of pre-Adamites be set aside as "no doctrine".
The logical Apostle to author this overview, Elder Widtsoe, was in Europe. That left Elder Talmage as the mediator. The First Presidency gave him this assignment, and on the same day Elder Talmage wrote in his journal:
Involved in this question (Roberts) is that of the beginning of life upon the Earth and as to whether there was death either of animal or plant before the fall of Adam, on which proposition Elder Smith was very pronounced in denial and Elder Roberts equally forceful in the affirmative. As to whether pre-Adamite races existed upon the Earth there has been much discussion among some of our people of late. The decision reached by the First Presidency and announced to this morning's assembly was in answer to a specific question that obviously the doctrine of the existence of races of human beings upon the Earth prior to the fall of Adam was not a doctrine of the Church; and further, that the conception embodied in the belief of many to the effect that there were no pre-Adamite races and that there was no death upon the Earth prior to Adam's fall is likewise no doctrine of the Church. I think the decision of the First Presidency is a wise one on the premises. This is one of the many things on which we cannot speak with assurance, and dogmatic assertions on either side are likely to do harm rather than good.
Elder Talmage presented his talk on this subject in the Tabernacle on August 9, 1931, in which he was very cautious about the descent of Adam, supportive of the geologically sanctioned great age of Earth, generally negative on human evolutionary change, but also positive on the presence of death on Earth before Adam's fall. It was a conciliatory, statesmanlike position, doctrinally secure, and consistent with his knowledge as a professional geologist. He explicitly upheld the authenticity of the geological record, and he left the pre-Adamites a completely open issue. Realizing that he had contradicted Elder Smith in several important ways, Talmage sent the manuscript of his talk to Elder Widtsoe for approval, knowing that Elder Widtsoe did not accept Pre-Adamites. He then met privately with the First Presidency on November 17, 1931 to review every detail of the manuscript of his talk. They approved it, and it was published in the Church News of November 21, and later as a pamphlet authorized by the First Presidency.
Interestingly, Elder Widtsoe later adopted and advocated the existence of pre-Adamites in his article Were there Pre-Adamites?, Improvement Era 51, 205 (May, 1948). Gary J. Begera and Ronald Priddis, in their 1985 book Brigham Young University: A House of Faith quote Elder Widtsoe as saying, in a letter to Albert R. Lyman on 14 June 1948, “If (the Lord) chose to place manlike beings upon the earth before the days of Adam, I really have no right to find fault with that”.
From a doctrinal point of view, the two most important facts are the Who and Why of creation. They both have clear relevance to the principals of salvation. The When, Where, and How of creation are matters for scientists to clarify. As President Grant and his Counselors said, Leave geology, biology, archaeology, and anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the souls of mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church…
The relationship between evolution and the principle of eternal progression is also deserving of careful discussion, but we have too little time to attempt it. Just reflect that “eternal” encompasses all time.
We are told to beware the wisdom of men. Science is non-dogmatic and non-authoritarian. It places observation of nature supreme over hypotheses and theories. The sociology of science rewards most generously those who overturn orthodoxy and improve our ability to explain and predict nature. Science is not perfect; it is self-correcting. It is personal and idiosyncratic interpretations of scripture, uninformed by revelation, and in conflict with established facts, that most clearly represent the wisdom of men. Brigham Young warned us of the destructive influence of such uninspired and intellectually dishonest ideas, which lead to faithlessness (“infidelity”):
I am not astonished that infidelity prevails to a great extent among the inhabitants of the earth, for the religious teachers of the people advance many ideas and notions for truth which are in opposition to and contradict facts demonstrated by science, and which are generally understood.
I bear testimony that
1. The greatest strength of the Church is that it is governed by revelation through prophets chosen by God. Their word is superior to all written scripture in matters of both doctrine and practice. This is a Church of both order and revelation. If we hearken to the words of the First Presidency we are following the proper order of God. If we shun doctrines rejected by the First Presidency, we will never be led astray and will not fall into contention, schism, and apostasy
2. Respect for truth demands that we study out these issued diligently, formulate our conclusions, and seek confirmation from the Holy Ghost. It is through the testimony of two independent witnesses that the truth can be known. Those witnesses are revelation and science. The two witnesses of truth, science and revelation (intellect and spirit) do not conflict in any way. The supposed conflict of science and religion is a myth that is dear to Satan and serves his purposes.
It is my hope and prayer that when, in the due course of eternal evolutionary progression, we are called upon to assist in the building of new worlds, we will be both spiritually and intellectually prepared to go and do the things which we are commanded.
John S. Lewis
Salt Lake Second Branch, 25 April 2010
The Church has a long tradition of freedom of inquiry and expression on matters with no settled doctrine. Many members and General Authorities have stated a vast range of opinions and supporting arguments on numerous topics. It should come as no surprise that in many cases there have been serious disagreements, some extensively and energetically argued in official Church publications by respected General Authorities. When General Authorities differ profoundly with each other in the pages of the Ensign or other Church publications, what is the average Church member to conclude? Such conflicts afford openings for dissention and divisiveness. What then is doctrine; indeed, how can we know what is truth?
The most durable—and heated--of these public disagreements have been those concerning scientific issues: the creation of Earth, the origin of Adam, the age of the Earth, evolution, and so on. Some Church leaders have received a scientific education: Elders John Widtsoe, James Talmage, Frederick Pack, and Henry J. Eyring serve as examples. But in matters of doctrine it is the President of the Church who alone holds all the keys of revelation for the entire body of the Church. First Presidency messages take precedence over the opinions of individual General Authorities, no matter how strongly expressed.
Suppose we desire knowledge—how do we acquire it? The answer is clear: we study it out using every available relevant and reliable source of information and then form a conclusion. We then can test that conclusion by seeking the guidance of the Holy Ghost. Those who “take no thought except to ask” are like the student who wants a good grade without doing the coursework.
Suppose, specifically, you want to know what time it is. Do you pray for the answer to be given to you? No, you look at a clock. Suppose you want your laundry washed, dried, folded and put away. Do you ask the Lord to do it for you? Suppose you want to learn integral calculus. Do you pray for instant enlightenment? No, you read the textbook, attend class, and do the homework. After all that you can do, you are entitled to assistance in the learning process. Suppose you want to know the age of the Earth. You look at the clocks built into Nature: you collect the available evidence, study the dating methods and their results, and form a conclusion. After all that you can do, you are entitled to consult the Holy Ghost for confirmation.
Most of the supposed conflict between science and religion is caused by a failure to avail ourselves of both study and revelation. I am convinced that there is no meaningful conflict—the apparent disagreements are due to people failing to use one or both of these methods. Primitive misconceptions of non-scientists about what science is, does, and says are as destructive as the interpretation of scriptures by religionists using the intellect alone, without guidance by personal or ecclesiastical revelation.
Two false concepts bedevil this debate. Some hold that the material world was made by God with abundant false evidence of great antiquity to test our faith. But God does not lie and falsify: indeed, he cannot. This idea is heretical. Another argument holds that fossils and other evidence of Earth’s great age were created by Satan to confuse us. This attribution of the creative powers of the priesthood to Satan is the essence of the Gnostic heresy, which has been rejected by all Christian faiths.
Let us consider a few of the most frequently debated points. First, let us consider the duration of the creation of Earth. Genesis talks of six days of creation, but the Hebrew word for “day” is freely used in a figurative sense in the Bible. In the highest and purest version of the creation story revealed to us, we are told of “creative periods” Elder McConkie, who I believe represents the most conservative viewpoint, has also commented that the “days” of creation are figurative, and not to be taken literally. In the June 1982 Ensign he wrote: “What is a day? It is a specified time period; it is an age, an eon, a division of eternity.” We commend this statement to the many Church members who falsely believe that Elder McConkie advocated a one-week duration for the creation.
Secondly, let us inquire into the age of the Earth. Considering that D&C 77:6 refers to “…this earth during the seven thousand years of its continuance, or its temporal existence”, what led Joseph Smith, who wrote that verse, to speak of Earth as 2,555 million years old in the King Follett discourse? The answer appears to be straightforward. Seven thousand Earth years is in conflict with all physical, chemical, genetic, archaeological, and linguistic evidence. But seven thousand years of God is not ruled out. The arithmetic is easy: 7000 years of God, calculated on the basis of one day of God being as a thousand years of man (one year of God therefore being 365,257 years of man) is just 7000x365,257 Earth years. That is 2,556,799,000 Earth years. Clearly Joseph Smith did not intend the “7000 years” to refer to Earth years. But why did Joseph Smith and his amanuensis W. W. Phelps quote 2,555 million years instead of 2,556.8 million? Their calculation simply ignored leap years, and took the average duration of the year as exactly 365 days: thus 7000x365,000 = 2,555 million years.
The same number surfaces again in Elder McConkie’s polemical address, “The Seven Deadly Heresies”, delivered at BYU in 1980. He says that God “has presided in our universe for almost 2,555,000,000 years”, but without any indication of the source or significance of that number, or where the phrase “presided in our universe” comes from. Let us recall that, at a time when scientists scarcely dared speak of tens of millions of years, Joseph Smith firmly spoke of billions.
Thirdly, there is the belief that Church doctrine holds that there was no death on Earth before Adam’s fall. We shall return to this topic later.
Fourthly, there is the question of “pre-Adamites”, man-like beings who lived on Earth before Adam. The first LDS speculations on life before Adam were by Orson Hyde in an 1856 talk published in the Journal of Discourses. Elder Hyde wrote that manlike beings, which he called Pre-Adamites, long predated Adam on Earth. This theme can be traced back at least to the 16th century in European writings, and was treated from a Christian perspective as early as the writings of St. Augustine.
Darwin's On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection first appeared in 1859, three years after Elder Hyde’s suggestion.
Fifthly, we come to evolution. John A. Widtsoe, in his book Joseph Smith as Scientist, (General Board of the YMMIA, Salt Lake City, 1908), was strongly supportive of a geologically ancient Earth and anti-evolutionary only in the sense that the origin of man was left out of the general evolutionary progression of nature and life. Elder Widtsoe wrote (page 105):
…it has been found that under normal conditions all things undergo a process of evolution; that is, become more complex, or advance. This, in essence, is the law of evolution, about which so much has been said in the last fifty years. Undoubtedly, this law is correct, and in harmony with the known facts of the universe. It certainly throws a flood of light upon the phenomena of nature; though of itself, it tells little of the force behind it, in obedience to which it operates.
Several other articles around that time advocated conflicting points of view. Evidently the doctrine needed clarification.
In response to this flurry of interest, a First Presidency message, mild and conciliatory in tone, entitled The Origin of Man, appeared in Improvement Era 13, 75-81 (Nov., 1909). The President at the time was Joseph F. Smith: Whether the mortal bodies of man evolved in natural processes to present perfection, through the direction and power of God; whether the first parents of our generations, Adam and Eve, were transplanted from another sphere, with immortal tabernacles, which became corrupted through sin and the partaking of natural foods, in the process of time; whether they were born here in mortality, as other mortals have been, are questions not fully answered in the revealed word of God.
Elder Frederick Pack wrote a series of three articles entitled The Creation of the Earth, Improvement Era 13, 1023-1027 (Sept., 1910); 1121-1127 (Oct., 1910); 14, 220-230 (Jan., 1911). Elder Pack, like Elders Widtsoe and Talmage, was a trained geologist who accepted the antiquity of Earth. He discussed the geological record in detail and was frankly positively disposed toward evolution. He also later served as Chairman of the Church’s Gospel Doctrine Committee. Clearly the Brethren did not suspect him of doctrinal error. He speculated, indeed, but did so wholly within the range explicitly allowed by the First Presidency.
In 1927, two General Authorities, Brigham H. Roberts and Joseph Fielding Smith, took diametrically opposite views, Roberts defending the fossil evidence and Smith denying it as a Satanic fraud. Both Elder Roberts and Elder Smith argued their cases before the Quorum and its President, Elder Rudger Clawson. The Quorum, hung, sent the matter back to the First Presidency. They wrote, and announced in an assembly on April 7, 1931, that "The statement made by Elder Smith that the existence of pre-Adamites is not a doctrine of the Church is true. It is just as true that the statement 'there were not pre-Adamites upon the Earth' is not a doctrine of the church. Neither side of the controversy has been accepted as doctrine at all."
As of 2010, the most recent First Presidency message regarding the origin of man is still that 1931 address. It concluded:
Upon the fundamental doctrines of the Church we are all agreed. Our mission is to bear the message of the restored gospel to the world. Leave geology, biology, archaeology, and anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the souls of mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church… Upon one thing we should all be able to agree, namely, that Presidents Joseph F. Smith, John R. Winder, and Anthon H. Lund were right when they said: "Adam is the primal parent of our race." Presidents Heber J. Grant, Anthony W. Ivins, & Charles W. Nibley, the First Presidency
The First Presidency next expressed a desire to see a moderate, authoritative treatment of the main issues: that General Authorities not invent "new doctrine"; that evolution be treated as an open question; that the idea of no death before Adam be abandoned; that the antiquity of the Earth and the authenticity of geological evidence be defended; that both sides of the issue of pre-Adamites be set aside as "no doctrine".
The logical Apostle to author this overview, Elder Widtsoe, was in Europe. That left Elder Talmage as the mediator. The First Presidency gave him this assignment, and on the same day Elder Talmage wrote in his journal:
Involved in this question (Roberts) is that of the beginning of life upon the Earth and as to whether there was death either of animal or plant before the fall of Adam, on which proposition Elder Smith was very pronounced in denial and Elder Roberts equally forceful in the affirmative. As to whether pre-Adamite races existed upon the Earth there has been much discussion among some of our people of late. The decision reached by the First Presidency and announced to this morning's assembly was in answer to a specific question that obviously the doctrine of the existence of races of human beings upon the Earth prior to the fall of Adam was not a doctrine of the Church; and further, that the conception embodied in the belief of many to the effect that there were no pre-Adamite races and that there was no death upon the Earth prior to Adam's fall is likewise no doctrine of the Church. I think the decision of the First Presidency is a wise one on the premises. This is one of the many things on which we cannot speak with assurance, and dogmatic assertions on either side are likely to do harm rather than good.
Elder Talmage presented his talk on this subject in the Tabernacle on August 9, 1931, in which he was very cautious about the descent of Adam, supportive of the geologically sanctioned great age of Earth, generally negative on human evolutionary change, but also positive on the presence of death on Earth before Adam's fall. It was a conciliatory, statesmanlike position, doctrinally secure, and consistent with his knowledge as a professional geologist. He explicitly upheld the authenticity of the geological record, and he left the pre-Adamites a completely open issue. Realizing that he had contradicted Elder Smith in several important ways, Talmage sent the manuscript of his talk to Elder Widtsoe for approval, knowing that Elder Widtsoe did not accept Pre-Adamites. He then met privately with the First Presidency on November 17, 1931 to review every detail of the manuscript of his talk. They approved it, and it was published in the Church News of November 21, and later as a pamphlet authorized by the First Presidency.
Interestingly, Elder Widtsoe later adopted and advocated the existence of pre-Adamites in his article Were there Pre-Adamites?, Improvement Era 51, 205 (May, 1948). Gary J. Begera and Ronald Priddis, in their 1985 book Brigham Young University: A House of Faith quote Elder Widtsoe as saying, in a letter to Albert R. Lyman on 14 June 1948, “If (the Lord) chose to place manlike beings upon the earth before the days of Adam, I really have no right to find fault with that”.
From a doctrinal point of view, the two most important facts are the Who and Why of creation. They both have clear relevance to the principals of salvation. The When, Where, and How of creation are matters for scientists to clarify. As President Grant and his Counselors said, Leave geology, biology, archaeology, and anthropology, no one of which has to do with the salvation of the souls of mankind, to scientific research, while we magnify our calling in the realm of the Church…
The relationship between evolution and the principle of eternal progression is also deserving of careful discussion, but we have too little time to attempt it. Just reflect that “eternal” encompasses all time.
We are told to beware the wisdom of men. Science is non-dogmatic and non-authoritarian. It places observation of nature supreme over hypotheses and theories. The sociology of science rewards most generously those who overturn orthodoxy and improve our ability to explain and predict nature. Science is not perfect; it is self-correcting. It is personal and idiosyncratic interpretations of scripture, uninformed by revelation, and in conflict with established facts, that most clearly represent the wisdom of men. Brigham Young warned us of the destructive influence of such uninspired and intellectually dishonest ideas, which lead to faithlessness (“infidelity”):
I am not astonished that infidelity prevails to a great extent among the inhabitants of the earth, for the religious teachers of the people advance many ideas and notions for truth which are in opposition to and contradict facts demonstrated by science, and which are generally understood.
I bear testimony that
1. The greatest strength of the Church is that it is governed by revelation through prophets chosen by God. Their word is superior to all written scripture in matters of both doctrine and practice. This is a Church of both order and revelation. If we hearken to the words of the First Presidency we are following the proper order of God. If we shun doctrines rejected by the First Presidency, we will never be led astray and will not fall into contention, schism, and apostasy
2. Respect for truth demands that we study out these issued diligently, formulate our conclusions, and seek confirmation from the Holy Ghost. It is through the testimony of two independent witnesses that the truth can be known. Those witnesses are revelation and science. The two witnesses of truth, science and revelation (intellect and spirit) do not conflict in any way. The supposed conflict of science and religion is a myth that is dear to Satan and serves his purposes.
It is my hope and prayer that when, in the due course of eternal evolutionary progression, we are called upon to assist in the building of new worlds, we will be both spiritually and intellectually prepared to go and do the things which we are commanded.
Faith and the Scientist - a talk given by Peg Lewis on April 25, 2010
Years ago we were on a long trip with some church members we didn’t know very well. As the miles went by, the brother described a new business venture he and some friends had undertaken. They had invented a new way to heat houses that would save a great deal on energy costs. As he described it, my husband, an expert in thermodynamics – the science of heat – grew more and more aghast. It became evident that the new ‘invention’ would break a fundamental law of physics. Finally he told the excited brother that it wouldn’t work. The brother shrugged his shoulders and said that there are naysayers in every crowd and they had the faith that it would work (and make them all a fortune).
My point is: The best of intentions without adequate knowledge of the laws of the universe often leads to failure. My purpose today is to show that that good science supports faith, and that faith is essential to good science.
Before I begin, I would like to establish my authority to speak on the subject of faith and the scientist. I was a scientist from birth, as all babies are. I experimented with dropping things and squishing bananas. And I kept at it through childhood. When I was 7, I looked at a glass of water that I had stirred salt into and honestly had a hard time believing the salt was still in there, even though I knew it had to be. I couldn’t see it. I had read that if you have a glass of salt water and evaporate away the water, the salt would return. I wanted to try it. My mother wasn’t so sure we should waste the gas to try the experiment, but my father was game, so we did it. We boiled the water in the pan and when it was all gone, salt covered the bottom of the pan.
Later I became fascinated by the Solar System, and wanted to know about the planets. I wanted to build rockets. I wanted to know how disease worked, and cars. I collected snakes, turtles, and frogs. I read about these things. I wanted to know this world and understand it.
Deep inside me, I knew there were rules, and I was trying to uncover them. It’s the same for all children, I believe.
I loved numbers. They work in predictable ways, and I loved the way they provided answers. I did my 9th grade project on electronics, a relatively new field back then, and taught my science class how a computer works, including doing arithmetic using the binary number system. I majored in chemistry in college because I thought it would provide me with ultimate answers about creation (and met Elder Lewis because I was the only person who would go out with a chemistry grad student). Later I got a graduate degree in linguistics, the science of language. I also translated science books and edited medical books, and I wrote space articles for Technology Review. Today I love math and computers, languages, the Solar System, the outdoors, all growing things, the mountains and other formations around us. I have never stopped being a scientist.
Now to the topic of our talks, faith and the scientist. First, a bit about science
The word science comes from sciere, a Latin word that means ‘to know’. Science is a way to know things. Science is a way to investigate truths.
Science is a way to eliminate he prejudices and agendas of scientists and those who hire them and pay their way and politicians who might use their discoveries for their own ends. It is a method for achieving objectivity and eliminating influence. It is friendly only to those seeking truth, and nothing but the truth.
In fact, the ultimate purpose of science is to discover the laws that underlie, and also give rise to, all of creation.
Likewise, the ultimate purpose of faith is to discover the will of God for us and understand his creation (so we can return to him).
The biggest difference between science and religion is in a few details of the method used to gain knowledge. We will look at this more closely in a moment.
But first, let’s look at the scientific method. We learned it in school, but that’s a long time ago, so let’s look at it again. Here are the steps a scientist takes to gain knowledge.
a. He becomes aware of a problem, or has a question he would like to answer.
b. He studies what others have done and finds out all he can about the problem.
c. He comes up with a possible solution, which is his hypothesis – an untested idea.
f. He designs an experiment to test his hypothesis, to find out whether this solution his correct OR NOT. (Rules have been laid down for the proper design of experiments to eliminate the possibility that the scientist will get only the results he is looking for.)
g. He runs the experiment and analyzes the data, and from the results draws a conclusion whether his hypothesis is correct or needs to be abandoned or adjusted. And he needs to replicate his results so that he can eliminate chance.
h. He publishes his results so that others can check them. If his results are flawless, he has now come up with a new theory. Otherwise he must repeat one or more steps.
Now, how does a person of faith solve a problem or answer a question? In a way that is strikingly parallel:
a. He ponders the question.
b. He studies it out through scriptures and conference talks, counsel, prayer, etch.
c. He forms a hypothesis, an idea of a possible solution.
d. He does an experiment by praying about the solution he has come up with.
e. He gets an answer through the power of the Holy Ghost and analyzes it in the clear light of day.
f. He may repeat the process of praying about it several times until he has a clear answer.
The greatest point of difference between science and a faithful approach to a problem is the nature of the experiment. Everything else is the remarkably similar: the question, the study of the issues, the conclusion about a possible solution, the analysis of the answer, and the verification or replication of the answer.
Importantly, in both science and faith it is necessary to ask a question and study it out. We have this important instruction in D&C 9:7-8: “Behold, you have not understood; you have supposed I would give it unto you, when you took no thought, save it was to ask me. But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right. And if it is right, I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore you shall feel that it is right.” This is the scientific method using the Holy Ghost instead of a lab experiment.
In fact, we are urged to experiment. The following scripture is astounding to a scientist, because here is an essential piece of science found in a scripture, the need to experiment, to test the idea. It is:
Alma 32: 33. And now behold, because ye have tried the experiment and planted the seed and it swelleth and sprouteth and beginneth to grow, ye must needs know that the seed is good.”
We have just talked about how a good Latter-Day Saint essentially uses the scientific method but how about the scientist using faith? While some scientists are proud of not having faith in a personal God, including Albert Einstein, they are denying the very forces that give them their scientific interest and pursuit.
In fact the very essence of science is the elucidation and understanding of the laws that underlie creation. The fact that there are laws for them to study is a testimony of a Creator. The creation IS the handiwork of a creator, and Einstein admits this.
“A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, of the manifestations of the profoundest reason and the most radiant beauty - it is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute the truly religious attitude; in this sense, and in this alone, I am a deeply religious man.
While he investigated throughout his life the most fundamental laws of creation, nonetheless he is saying that there is an existence of something we cannot penetrate. Not that we haven’t penetrated it yet, but that we can’t. It is not a law – it underlies law.
So the fact that there are laws to investigate testifies to an orderly creation and a creator who brought it about.
D&C 130:20 “There is a law irrevocably decreed in Heaven before the foundations of this world upon which all blessings are predicated.”
So when a scientist looks for a law, he is using faith that there is a law and an orderly creation, and he has a testimony whether he wants one or not.
I love the following scripture; to me it unifies science and faith.
Moses 6:63: “And behold, all things have their likeness, and all things are created and made to bear record of me, both things which are temporal, and things which are spiritual; things which are in the heavens above, and things which are on the earth, and things which are in the earth, and things which are under the earth, both above and beneath: all things bear record of me”.
A second way in which scientists rely on faith is in the hypothesis step of the scientific method. Hypotheses are ideas that spring into the mind. Scientists talk freely about inspiration, or a hunch, or the lightbulb going on. Their hypotheses come from outside the realm of experimentation and logical thinking. A scientist may feel he is very clever to come up with such an idea. Of course we know where they really come from: They come from the Holy Ghost.
In case I sound as though I am mocking scientists because some deny God when they are essentially studying him, , let me testify as a scientist that others know and seek to know God through understanding his laws and mulling over and investigating his handiwork; that they openly use faith and inspiration as important tools; that inspiration is a key element of the scientific method, as are honesty and diligence and intelligence.
15. Let me tell you a story. Four hundred years ago, a great scientist, Isaac Newton, devoted a portion of his life to investigating the laws of motion that he observed around him. He came up with what are now called the 3 laws of motion. Later when he investigated the gravitation, he tested his hypothesis of gravity and found that his formulation was correct on Earth. By way of further experimentation he applied his new theory to the moon, based on what was known about the position and motion of the moon at that time. His theory failed: the motion of the moon could not be accounted for by his theory. He tucked his papers away in a drawer, where they remained for years. Later, though, when man’s ability to measure the distance to the moon became more accurate, large errors were found in the previous results. Newton then took out his papers and found that his theory of gravitation was correct. The theory was correct, though the original calculations on the moon’s distance from Earth were too crude to validate it.
From the time it was validated, we could find the mass of the sun and explain and predict the motions of the planets.
And this is how accurate these laws were: when the Voyager spacecraft was sent to Neptune in 1977, taking 7 years to get there, the moment when it was closest to Neptune as predicted by Newton’s laws to be within 1 second of the actual moment of arrival : 1 second out of 7 years and 3 billion miles! His theory is now a law for good reason.
Both scientists and the faithful as they strive to understand creation experience these things:
a. Joy in the discovery, and in creation. The more we know it, the more we love it and the more awe we experience.
b. Avoidance of mistakes (as our friends dreaming of a new type of heating system made )
c. Focus on what is important, true, and good
d. Improvement of life in practical ways.
e. The uncovering of the handiwork of God, to his glory.
In conclusion I would like to say, most earnestly: don’t be afraid of science. It is the systematic study of the works of the Creator. We ignore this knowledge at our peril. We give up our agency when we choose not to learn all we can on issues because they’re scientific, as if that were a dirty word. Learn all you can about God’s creation. That’s why he gave us the 13th article of faith. Read about DNA, about global warming, about pollution. Don’t take someone else’s word for them – knowledge and choiceyou’re your birthrights. Remember that science is a great tool for removing prejudice and agendas from fact-gathering and rule-making. It helps remove us from the clutches of ignorance and error and political and financial manipulation. We are asked to seek out the truth, as is laid out in scripture. As a scientist, I testify that this is true, that all truth can be known by the power of the Holy Ghost and the study of creation, and that all testify of the Creator. To this I bear personal and solemn witness.
My point is: The best of intentions without adequate knowledge of the laws of the universe often leads to failure. My purpose today is to show that that good science supports faith, and that faith is essential to good science.
Before I begin, I would like to establish my authority to speak on the subject of faith and the scientist. I was a scientist from birth, as all babies are. I experimented with dropping things and squishing bananas. And I kept at it through childhood. When I was 7, I looked at a glass of water that I had stirred salt into and honestly had a hard time believing the salt was still in there, even though I knew it had to be. I couldn’t see it. I had read that if you have a glass of salt water and evaporate away the water, the salt would return. I wanted to try it. My mother wasn’t so sure we should waste the gas to try the experiment, but my father was game, so we did it. We boiled the water in the pan and when it was all gone, salt covered the bottom of the pan.
Later I became fascinated by the Solar System, and wanted to know about the planets. I wanted to build rockets. I wanted to know how disease worked, and cars. I collected snakes, turtles, and frogs. I read about these things. I wanted to know this world and understand it.
Deep inside me, I knew there were rules, and I was trying to uncover them. It’s the same for all children, I believe.
I loved numbers. They work in predictable ways, and I loved the way they provided answers. I did my 9th grade project on electronics, a relatively new field back then, and taught my science class how a computer works, including doing arithmetic using the binary number system. I majored in chemistry in college because I thought it would provide me with ultimate answers about creation (and met Elder Lewis because I was the only person who would go out with a chemistry grad student). Later I got a graduate degree in linguistics, the science of language. I also translated science books and edited medical books, and I wrote space articles for Technology Review. Today I love math and computers, languages, the Solar System, the outdoors, all growing things, the mountains and other formations around us. I have never stopped being a scientist.
Now to the topic of our talks, faith and the scientist. First, a bit about science
The word science comes from sciere, a Latin word that means ‘to know’. Science is a way to know things. Science is a way to investigate truths.
Science is a way to eliminate he prejudices and agendas of scientists and those who hire them and pay their way and politicians who might use their discoveries for their own ends. It is a method for achieving objectivity and eliminating influence. It is friendly only to those seeking truth, and nothing but the truth.
In fact, the ultimate purpose of science is to discover the laws that underlie, and also give rise to, all of creation.
Likewise, the ultimate purpose of faith is to discover the will of God for us and understand his creation (so we can return to him).
The biggest difference between science and religion is in a few details of the method used to gain knowledge. We will look at this more closely in a moment.
But first, let’s look at the scientific method. We learned it in school, but that’s a long time ago, so let’s look at it again. Here are the steps a scientist takes to gain knowledge.
a. He becomes aware of a problem, or has a question he would like to answer.
b. He studies what others have done and finds out all he can about the problem.
c. He comes up with a possible solution, which is his hypothesis – an untested idea.
f. He designs an experiment to test his hypothesis, to find out whether this solution his correct OR NOT. (Rules have been laid down for the proper design of experiments to eliminate the possibility that the scientist will get only the results he is looking for.)
g. He runs the experiment and analyzes the data, and from the results draws a conclusion whether his hypothesis is correct or needs to be abandoned or adjusted. And he needs to replicate his results so that he can eliminate chance.
h. He publishes his results so that others can check them. If his results are flawless, he has now come up with a new theory. Otherwise he must repeat one or more steps.
Now, how does a person of faith solve a problem or answer a question? In a way that is strikingly parallel:
a. He ponders the question.
b. He studies it out through scriptures and conference talks, counsel, prayer, etch.
c. He forms a hypothesis, an idea of a possible solution.
d. He does an experiment by praying about the solution he has come up with.
e. He gets an answer through the power of the Holy Ghost and analyzes it in the clear light of day.
f. He may repeat the process of praying about it several times until he has a clear answer.
The greatest point of difference between science and a faithful approach to a problem is the nature of the experiment. Everything else is the remarkably similar: the question, the study of the issues, the conclusion about a possible solution, the analysis of the answer, and the verification or replication of the answer.
Importantly, in both science and faith it is necessary to ask a question and study it out. We have this important instruction in D&C 9:7-8: “Behold, you have not understood; you have supposed I would give it unto you, when you took no thought, save it was to ask me. But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right. And if it is right, I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore you shall feel that it is right.” This is the scientific method using the Holy Ghost instead of a lab experiment.
In fact, we are urged to experiment. The following scripture is astounding to a scientist, because here is an essential piece of science found in a scripture, the need to experiment, to test the idea. It is:
Alma 32: 33. And now behold, because ye have tried the experiment and planted the seed and it swelleth and sprouteth and beginneth to grow, ye must needs know that the seed is good.”
We have just talked about how a good Latter-Day Saint essentially uses the scientific method but how about the scientist using faith? While some scientists are proud of not having faith in a personal God, including Albert Einstein, they are denying the very forces that give them their scientific interest and pursuit.
In fact the very essence of science is the elucidation and understanding of the laws that underlie creation. The fact that there are laws for them to study is a testimony of a Creator. The creation IS the handiwork of a creator, and Einstein admits this.
“A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, of the manifestations of the profoundest reason and the most radiant beauty - it is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute the truly religious attitude; in this sense, and in this alone, I am a deeply religious man.
While he investigated throughout his life the most fundamental laws of creation, nonetheless he is saying that there is an existence of something we cannot penetrate. Not that we haven’t penetrated it yet, but that we can’t. It is not a law – it underlies law.
So the fact that there are laws to investigate testifies to an orderly creation and a creator who brought it about.
D&C 130:20 “There is a law irrevocably decreed in Heaven before the foundations of this world upon which all blessings are predicated.”
So when a scientist looks for a law, he is using faith that there is a law and an orderly creation, and he has a testimony whether he wants one or not.
I love the following scripture; to me it unifies science and faith.
Moses 6:63: “And behold, all things have their likeness, and all things are created and made to bear record of me, both things which are temporal, and things which are spiritual; things which are in the heavens above, and things which are on the earth, and things which are in the earth, and things which are under the earth, both above and beneath: all things bear record of me”.
A second way in which scientists rely on faith is in the hypothesis step of the scientific method. Hypotheses are ideas that spring into the mind. Scientists talk freely about inspiration, or a hunch, or the lightbulb going on. Their hypotheses come from outside the realm of experimentation and logical thinking. A scientist may feel he is very clever to come up with such an idea. Of course we know where they really come from: They come from the Holy Ghost.
In case I sound as though I am mocking scientists because some deny God when they are essentially studying him, , let me testify as a scientist that others know and seek to know God through understanding his laws and mulling over and investigating his handiwork; that they openly use faith and inspiration as important tools; that inspiration is a key element of the scientific method, as are honesty and diligence and intelligence.
15. Let me tell you a story. Four hundred years ago, a great scientist, Isaac Newton, devoted a portion of his life to investigating the laws of motion that he observed around him. He came up with what are now called the 3 laws of motion. Later when he investigated the gravitation, he tested his hypothesis of gravity and found that his formulation was correct on Earth. By way of further experimentation he applied his new theory to the moon, based on what was known about the position and motion of the moon at that time. His theory failed: the motion of the moon could not be accounted for by his theory. He tucked his papers away in a drawer, where they remained for years. Later, though, when man’s ability to measure the distance to the moon became more accurate, large errors were found in the previous results. Newton then took out his papers and found that his theory of gravitation was correct. The theory was correct, though the original calculations on the moon’s distance from Earth were too crude to validate it.
From the time it was validated, we could find the mass of the sun and explain and predict the motions of the planets.
And this is how accurate these laws were: when the Voyager spacecraft was sent to Neptune in 1977, taking 7 years to get there, the moment when it was closest to Neptune as predicted by Newton’s laws to be within 1 second of the actual moment of arrival : 1 second out of 7 years and 3 billion miles! His theory is now a law for good reason.
Both scientists and the faithful as they strive to understand creation experience these things:
a. Joy in the discovery, and in creation. The more we know it, the more we love it and the more awe we experience.
b. Avoidance of mistakes (as our friends dreaming of a new type of heating system made )
c. Focus on what is important, true, and good
d. Improvement of life in practical ways.
e. The uncovering of the handiwork of God, to his glory.
In conclusion I would like to say, most earnestly: don’t be afraid of science. It is the systematic study of the works of the Creator. We ignore this knowledge at our peril. We give up our agency when we choose not to learn all we can on issues because they’re scientific, as if that were a dirty word. Learn all you can about God’s creation. That’s why he gave us the 13th article of faith. Read about DNA, about global warming, about pollution. Don’t take someone else’s word for them – knowledge and choiceyou’re your birthrights. Remember that science is a great tool for removing prejudice and agendas from fact-gathering and rule-making. It helps remove us from the clutches of ignorance and error and political and financial manipulation. We are asked to seek out the truth, as is laid out in scripture. As a scientist, I testify that this is true, that all truth can be known by the power of the Holy Ghost and the study of creation, and that all testify of the Creator. To this I bear personal and solemn witness.
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