Scientists on Religion

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David Bohm Physicist

“There is no reason why an extraphysical general principle is necessarily to be avoided, since such principles could conceivably serve as useful working hypotheses. For the history of scientific research is full of examples in which it was very fruitful indeed to assume that certain objects or elements might be real, long before any procedures were known which would permit them to be observed directly.”
 
Francis Bacon Philosopher of Science

“I had rather believe all the Fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a Mind.”
 
Edward Teller Physicist

“I think that intellectuals who end up in hell will have to read page proofs and check indexes there.”
 
**Lise Meitner **Physicist

“I will have nothing to do with a bomb!”

(1943 refusal to join scientists working on the Manhattan Project)
 
**Maurice Wilkins **Molecular Biologist

“It is essential for genetic material to be able to make exact copies of itself; otherwise growth would produce disorder, life could not originate, and favourable forms would not be perpetuated by natural selection.”
 
Stephen Meyer Philosopher of Science

"I don’t think there’s any evolutionary account for how you get from molecules to cells.”
 
Giuseppe Peano Mathematician

“No number before zero. The numbers may go on forever, but like the cosmos, they have a beginning.”
 
Robert Boyle Experimental Scientist (Boyle’s Law)

“As the moon, though darkened with spots, gives us a much greater light than the stars that sewn all-luminous, so do the Scriptures afford more light than the brightest human authors. In them the ignorant may learn all requisite knowledge, and the most knowing may learn to discern their ignorance.”

“The vastness, beauty, orderliness of heavenly bodies; the excellent structure of animals and plants; and other phenomena of nature justly induce an intelligent, unprejudiced observer to conclude a supreme, powerful, just, and good author.”
 
Eugene Wigner Mathematician Nobel Prize

“The great mathematician fully, almost ruthlessly, exploits the domain of permissible reasoning and skirts the impermissible. That his recklessness does not lead him into a morass of contradictions is a miracle in itself: certainly it is hard to believe that our reasoning power was brought, by Darwin’s process of natural selection, to the perfection which it seems to possess.”
 
Dennis Gabor Physicist Nobel Prize

“Till now man has been up against Nature; from now on he will be up against his own nature.”.
 
Ernest Rutherford Physicist Nobel Prize

“When we have found how the nucleus of atoms is built up we shall have found the greatest secret of all — except life. We shall have found the basis of everything — of the earth we walk on, of the air we breathe, of the sunshine, of our physical body itself, of everything in the world, however great or however small — except life.”
 
William Kingdon Clifford Mathematician

“It cannot be doubted that theistic belief is a comfort and a solace to those who hold it, and that the loss of it is a very painful loss. It cannot be doubted, at least, by many of us in this generation, who either profess it now, or received it in our childhood and have parted from it since with such searching trouble as only cradle-faiths can cause. We have seen the spring sun shine out of an empty heaven, to light up a soulless earth; we have felt with utter loneliness that the Great Companion is dead.”
 
Aristotle Scientist, Philosopher

“God and nature create nothing that does not fulfill a purpose.”
 
Rudolf Carnap Logician

“In science there are no ‘depths’; there is surface everywhere.”
 
**Plato **Mathematician, Philosopher

“Man is a being in search of meaning.”
 
Charlemagne_III said:
Please offer your favorite quotes of scientists on religion, and feel free to comment on each other’s quotes. It would also be helpful if you can identify the main contribution of the scientist to scientific thought.

Here are some of my favorite quotes:

Nicolaus Copernicus Heliocentric Theory of the Solar System
“The universe has been wrought for us by a supremely good and orderly Creator.”

Johannes Kepler Kepler’s Laws of Planetary Motions
“[May] God who is most admirable in his works … deign to grant us the grace to bring to light and illuminate the profundity of his wisdom in the visible (and accordingly intelligible) creation of this world.”

Galileo Galilei Laws of Dynamics
“The Holy Bible and the phenomenon of nature proceed alike from the divine Word.”

Isaac Newton Laws of Thermodynamics, Optics, etc.
“This most beautiful system [the solar system] could only proceed from the dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being.” Isaac Newton

Benjamin Franklin Electricity, Bifocals, etc.
”Here is my creed. I believe in one God, the creator of the universe. That he governs by his providence. That he ought to be worshipped.

James Clerk Maxwell Electromagnetism, Maxwell’s Equations
“I have looked into most philosophical systems and I have seen none that will not work without God.”

Lord William Kelvin Laws of Thermodynamics, absolute temperature scale
“I believe that the more thoroughly science is studied, the further does it take us from anything comparable to atheism.”

Charles Darwin Theory of Evolution
“There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.” Origin of the Species, 1872 (last edition before Darwin’s death).

Louis Pasteur Germ Theory
“The more I study nature, the more I stand amazed at the work of the Creator.”

Max Planck Father of Quantum Physics
“There can never be any real opposition between religion and science; for the one is the complement of the other.”

J.J. Thompson Discoverer of the Electron
“In the distance tower still higher peaks which will yield to those who ascend them still wider prospects and deepen the feeling whose truth is emphasized by every advance in science, that great are the works of the Lord.”

Werner Heisenberg Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle
“In the course of my life I have been repeatedly compelled to ponder the relationship of these two regions of thought (science and religion), for I have never been able to doubt the reality of that to which they point.”

Arthur Compton Compton Effect, Quantum Physicist
“For myself, faith begins with the realization that a supreme intelligence brought the universe into being and created man.”

Max Born Quantum Physicist
“Those who say that the study of science makes a man an atheist must be rather silly.”

Paul A.M. Dirac Quantum Physicist, Matter-Anti-Matter
“God is a mathematician of a very high order and He used advanced mathematics in constructing the universe.”

George LeMaitre Father of the Big Bang Theory,
“There is no conflict between religion and science.” Reported by Duncan Aikman, New York Times, 1933

Albert Einstein Special and General Theories of Relativity
“The fanatical atheists are like slaves who are still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard struggle. They are creatures who—in their grudge against traditional religion as the ‘opium of the masses’—cannot hear the music of the spheres.”
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There are scientists in many religions. Some are Christian, some are Hindu, some are Muslim, and so on and so on.

Most scientists are non-religious, though.

Some of your quotes are suspicious. I’ve read letters from Einstein where he brutally disparages theism. Ditto on Darwin. Franklin was a deist, so I also suspect that the Franklin quote is at least partially fabricated.

Can you provide sources for these quotes?

The deeper question is why do some Christians feel the need to appeal to scientists’ opinions? Especially ones who’ve been dead for a while? No offense, but it seems like a psychological defense on the Christian’s part; quoting respected scientists creates a superficial veneer of credibility for Christianity, and maybe it’s a catharsis for your subconscious doubt.

I feel no need to quote atheistic scientists to validate atheism.
 
An_Atheist said:
I feel no need to quote atheistic scientists to validate atheism.
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You seem to be new at this. Let me help you out. There is an old tradition that there are inherent animosities between science and religion. Some people, like Richard Dawkins, even seem to think that science (evolution, for example) disposes of the need for God.and makes atheism respectable.

This may help you out, as it documents all the quarrels between science and religion.

The focus of this thread is to explore whether the view that scientists are generally opposed to the idea of God holds any water. To do that, you can’t just count on phony statistics. It’s better to take the scientist’s views straight from their pens and see what happens. 🤷

If you believe that most scientists are non-religious, why not prove that with a lot of quotes instead of questioning whether my quotes are authentic.

Now, as to whether your remarks are authentic.

For your information, Einstein was not brutal toward the idea of a theistic God, but rather toward the idea of the Christian God. You can find out more about his religion by reading Max Jammer’s Einstein and Religion, from which my Einstein quotes are taken.

Also, for your information, Ben Franklin is well documented as supporting prayers in public assembly for the good of the nation. He even backed a bill to hire a Congressional chaplain.

You seem to resent hearing what many great scientists have said about religion or aspects of their thought that have religious implications.

I urge you as an atheist to have an open and generous mind about this. You are welcome to participate or not by commenting on anything these scientists have said or by introducing quotes from atheist scientists that you think might be worth discussing, though it seems from your last sentence that the exercise would be an exercise in futility.
 
Kurt Gödel Mathematician, Logician

“I am convinced of the afterlife, independent of theology. If the world is rationally constructed, there must be an afterlife.”
 
Abdus Salam Physicist

“This sense of wonder leads most scientists to a Superior Being - der Alte, the Old One, as Einstein affectionately called the Deity - a Superior Intelligence, the Lord of all Creation and Natural Law.”
 
Augustus De Morgan Mathematician

“I am perfectly convinced that I have both seen, and heard in a manner which should make unbelief impossible, things called spiritual which cannot be taken by a rational being to be capable of explanation by imposture, coincidence, or mistake.”
 
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