Intelligent Design is a phrase that can explode my mind, but I have two, so the other says, "bring on the mystery."
There are those that look at life on this planet and say that it could only be this way if there was an Intelligent Designer behind it. This phrase is somehow supposed to be scientific. Yet, they mean God.
There are those who say it is all rational and can be explained by science. They then claim that that is proof that God does not exist.
I disagree with both. You cannot prove an existence out of confusion (and it is not science) and you cannot disclaim something out of certainty of something else.
Recently when a student raised his hand and asked if we were going to talk about how life started, I said, "No." Then we talked about it. Briefly.
I told him it will always be a mystery. It goes against thermodynamics to go from simple to complex, to go from dead to alive. Energy had to be involved.
It mystifies me. I like that there are mysteries. It does not prove God exists. But it opens up a place to believe. To imagine that spirit blowing across the waters...
I did not say that last part. I did say, "The more certain someone is about how life started, the more you might want to doubt them." You can't prove anything by certainty either.
I am glad that I am writing about the joy of being uncertain, because it shows I am feeling less overwhelmed and more comfortable with the mystery.
back to grades.... 1/4 of the year has passed by.
I find no criticism with what you say, Wayne. Whom I call God remains a mystery in the sense that never do I gain explanation of Him other than in whatever way He has revealed Himself to me; and, even in that, I do not begin to contain Him. My only "clause" to attach to your words concerns that I have found, in Christ, that place where the Mystery and I can meet, that moment where I can step into the Mystery and enjoy the experience without having to capture it and nail it down...
ReplyDeleteJim--- if I had written another sentence before getting back to my grades, it may have been very similar to your clause.
ReplyDeleteWhat a cool way of summing up the controversy. You gave a good answer to the student but it made me glad that I won't be teaching biology - well not certified to teach it anyway.
ReplyDeleteKathryn---in my first months of teaching (back in the day) a student asked, "how do we know what your teaching about science is any more true than what the Catholic church taught 300 years ago?"
ReplyDeleteI said, "you don't"
expect questions, lots of them.
great questions, some you will know, some you can look up, some you will never know for certain.