Dave, of Dave's Mormon Inquiry has started up a new group blog, The Bloggernacle Times. It is blog with updates once a week and is far less "casual" than most blogs. That is we have William Morris, who has his own blog on literature and related issues, who posts something on entertainment in LDS circles. Dave asked me to do something on science once a week. He told me it could include just links to blogs that have been discussing some issue (including my own). However he wants it aimed at the average reader. i.e. less technical than most of the posts here are. Well I went to make my post and found I'd lost the email telling me how to post there. So I've sent Dave an email and will post, for the time being, my comments here. Hopefully I can have them up at The Bloggernacle Times tomorrow.
For my initial discussion for the Bloggernacle Times I thought I'd start by asking just what the issues in science and religion that are of interest to Mormons. Now I should start by mentioning that I've been discussing science and religion issues for years now. At least since I was an undergraduate in physics and mathematics and BYU in the early 90's. I've been a member of the mailing list Eyring-L since it was first created in the early 90's to discuss issues of science and Mormonism. After all those discussions, debate, and inquiry I've come to the conclusion that there are few real significant issues in science that directly concern our religion. That may come to a shock to some, but overall I think there is relatively little overlap.
Now there are a few big topics of course. The most obvious one is evolution. That's a topic that pops up in blogs fairly frequently. The other group blog I contribute to, The Millennial Star, had a thread on it just last week. Times and Seasons had a long thread on it a few months before. I've written about it quite a bit on my blog, with a few of the comments being summarized on one page. Other blogs, such as LDS Science Review have discussed it frequently as well. However outside of evolution, I suspect people might have a harder time coming up with issues.
Over on Eyring-L Lorin Hansen recently posted a list of important issues of science and religion for Mormons. I think that for my first post I'll list some of these issues, perhaps adding a few to his list. Then over the coming weeks I'll go through each of the issues with an introduction to the topic. Hopefully I can do this without even needing to mention evolution.
(1) The Nature of Spiritual Reality: Mormons obviously believe in spirits and that we existed as thinking beings in some sense before our birth. What is the nature of this spiritual "stuff"? I don't just mean the nature of our existing as spirits, but the nature of spirit stuff in general from a scientific point of view. Is this problematic scientifically? Do spirits as mass? Can they be detected upon death? Lots of questions here.
(2) The Nature of the Soul: Fairly closely related to (1), but with a focus on what makes a person a person. Clearly this is a contentious issue as one can see by all the blog activity on abortion and stem cell research. What is it that makes us who we are?
(3) Religious Ways of Knowing vs. Scientific Ways of Knowing: When scientific claims and religious claims conflict, how do we resolve them? What is the scientific way of knowing and does it innately conflict with religion? Is religious knowing unreliable?
(4) The Origin of the Universe: A topic actually very similar to the evolutionary one, only taking place in physics rather than biology. Strangely a topic far less controversial than evolution yet a place where I think there are more problems for LDS theology than evolution ever could have. Why cosmology is so overlooked as a matter of controversy in place of evolution never ceases to amaze me. Perhaps physicists are simply have a better reputation than biologists?
(5) Scientific Evidence and Book of Mormon Historicity: Not just the recent debate over Nephite DNA. There are also issues of swords, horses, and other such matters.
(6) Scientific Evidence and the Old Testament: Some critics like to apply a double standard to Mormons. But there are many issues in the Old Testament as well. Probably more, truth be told.
(7) God and Time: What is the nature of time? Is God within time or outside it? What does it mean when the scriptures say "time is no longer?" What about higher dimensions?
(8) Religion and Quantum Mechanics: Is there an issue? Is there any relation? Why do people bring them up together? (You can probably tell my bias here)
(9) God and Physical Law: What are miracles? Are miracles problematic scientifically? How do you tell whether something is a miracle or something natural? What does it mean to speak of the natural versus the supernatural?
(10) History of the Relationship Between Science and Religion: Science and religion have often been seen at odds ever since the days of Galileo. What is the real history? Have they always been in conflict? Is there a fundamental conflict today?
There are a few others that don't fit easily into the above categories. Things like whether there is life on other planets and how to handle that theologically. Issues about whether apes and dolphins are sufficiently intelligent enough so as to pose theological issues. I'm sure I'll come up with a few others by the time I'm finished with the first ten.
I've closed comments in order to avoid spam since I don't check this older blog as much anymore.
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