Plantinga gives a great response to the interviewers question: “Is there not a big part of your own personal, religious doctrine that depends on faith, taking a leap of faith, philosophically, and believing in certain things that can’t be scientifically proven?”

“… It’s not as if whatever is true, or sensible to believe has to be provable by virtue of science.  Science is absolutely wonderful, but it’s a limited endeavor.  It doesn’t cover the whole of the knowledge enterprise you might say.”

Cyber-fist-bump to Prof. Plantinga for not buying into the interviewer’s premise that having faith puts him in an untenable position.  Science’s job is to chase down mystery and hogtie it with a lasso of understanding…or whatever.  Science is useful when it’s applied to help understand and describe our world, but it becomes oppressive when it seeks to define our world.  There is a subtle, but critical difference there old chums…just like the difference between wisdom and knowledge, confidence and arrogance, chapstick and glue stick.  Confuse them at your peril.

Science, like art, or any subject, is just one lens on the world.  But science is a lens directly limited by our senses and technology (which could be considered an extension of our senses).  Should we allow technology to govern of our beliefs?  Art can easily be seen as useless, but I think it often serves a purpose of filling in where language, science, and even our senses fall short.  There’s plenty of debate about what is and is not art, and what is and is not good art.  I think good art makes a direct, jumper-cable-like connection between the author’s spirit, and the viewer’s spirit.  It’s an unintelligible grunt from the soul of the author that is heard and processed as an intelligible statement by the viewer.  It can bypass language and the need for language to communicate it’s message.  I think good art also has some mystery to it.  It is everything that science is not.  I think that’s why I like the view through the lenses of science and art.  It makes for good contrast.

To think that something should only be believed until it can be proven seems short- sighted, even arrogant. What about headaches and emotions?  If we can’t prove their existence does that mean others’ shouldn’t believe we have them? And U.V. light?  Would scientists scoff at the belief that there is U.V. light that we cannot directly observe if technology didn’t exist that could not yet confirm it?  That would be like claiming, “The universe ends at the horizon, because I cant see beyond it.”  The notion that something isn’t to be believed until it’s been vetted by science is bogus.  So keep your (other) eye open.   Also, while we’re on the subject, store your chapstick and glue sticks in different drawers.

Regardless, one reason I think Mere Christianity is such a compelling book is that Lewis took a fairly scientific approach to a spiritual subject.  The reader can test his claims because the reader is an intrinsic expert on the subject being examined; he is the subject:

There is one thing, and only one, in the whole universe which we know more about than we could learn from external observation. That one thing is Man. We do not merely observe men, we are men. In this case we have, so to speak, inside information; we are in the know.  - C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

From this intrinsic point of departure, Brother Clive sets out to step the reader through a series of logical paces.  Granted, there are critics of these paces who argue that they aren’t logical and would likely say that they’re far from scientific.  In the academic sense, they may be right.  Who knows; I’m no academic.  I suppose some would argue that “academic sense” is an oxymoron.  Anyway, back to what’s important: logic, science, and how to impress the ladies…

This brings me to the next logical subject: Goodwill.  Not good will. Goodwill.  Where I source all of my yellow-armpitted Reebok t-shirts with stretched-out necks and that patina of use that the ladies cannot resist, and unfortunately takes at least a decade to achieve.  Goodwill is where I invested in a priceless piece of literature for $1.99 plus taxation.  It’s a crusty physics book from the late ’80s.  As I was thumbing through it, I came across the curious paragraph pictured here, which I’m using as a springboard for my next painting.

I say it’s curious because this approach is equally scientific as what Brother Clive asks of his readers in Mere Christianity.

As it turns out, the definition (and the resulting boundary) of Science is regularly up for debate (as is the definition of art).  This editorial and proposed definition from J.P. Siepmann, whose brain wad is probably bigger and more agile than yours and mine combined, lays out a simple solution.  Here’s his schtick:

I would like to propose that we define Science as the “the field of study which attempts to describe and understand the nature of the universe in whole or part.”

Sounds good to me.  Anyway, here’s my point:  Even the most skeptical among us have faith.  I believe what we choose to place that faith in has more to do with how honest we choose to be with ourselves than it does our intellect.  At the end of the day, it is our nature as wayward humans to want to do what we want to do, regardless of Right and Wrong.  Some of us find ways to rationalize it and stay in our nature.  Some of grow weary of the effort required to swim against the current of Truth, and allow it to overpower us.

My hope is that, through exposure to Lewis’ writing, and the Good Book it leads to, more folks will find that there is great rest available in what seem to be turbulent waters.