The Responsibility of Theology to Science by Joan Roughgarden Artists who create icons and sacred music often describe

their activity as a for m of prayer. I think too that if nature is understood, in some sense, as the wor k of God, then seeking to discover the ways of nature through science might also be experienced as a form of prayer. For this reason I felt drawn to applaud one assertion in particular made by Rabbi Arthur Green in Tikkun's March/April 2010 issue: "The evolution of species is the greatest sacred drama of all time." I thank Tikkun for inviting me to join the conversation on God and science that Rabbi Green, Peter Gabel, and others started here this spring. I write as an evo lutionary biologist and will begin by offering my response to Rabbi Green's piec e on "Sacred Evolution." I agree that religious teaching might prosper from reinvesting stories of origin (or creation) with new meaning rather than having religious teachings continue to be, as Rabbi Green puts it, "over-involved with proclaiming the truth of our own particular stories" from the sacred texts of our several denominations. Yet, I demur from his recommendation that we should instead "understand the task of the theologian to be one of reframing, accepting the accounts of origins and natural history offered by the scientific consensus, but helping us to view the m in a different way, one that may guide us toward a more profound appreciation of that same reality." Or, as a later commentary in Tikkun by Bruce Ledewitz put s it, accepting a framework of "science first and religion adapts." This framewo rk places great, even unquestioned, faith in the ability of scientists to offer a correct account of the processes in nature, a faith that will seem misplaced t he more one delves into what scientists actually conclude from the evidence they actually possess. I do not challenge the scientific method, of course, nor doubt scientists' abili ty, in principle, to deliver accurate and correct knowledge of what happens in n ature. Experiments, tests of alternative hypotheses, and new technologically ena bled probes of the microscopic and of outer space do objectively reveal the stat e of nature -- that is, when scientists actually bother to do all the experiment s, bother to entertain alternative hypotheses, bother to use the latest technolo gy, and so forth. And who is to demand that the science informing theological in quiry be the best available science? We will get (eventually) the best available science on matters such as molecular motors and global change because much prof it depends on the results. But who cares about the quality of the science inform ing theological reflection? Hardly anyone. And so those few scientists who do ve nture into offering summaries of what their science means for religious and ethi cal concerns are free to make up nearly any story they want. The problem is not so much a question of personal recklessness by individual scientists, although t hat happens too; the problem is mainly the ideological uniformity of scientific peer groups. The subdiscipline of evolutionary biology that pertains to how family life is or ganized in birds, mammals, and other vertebrates, teaches -- according to Geoff Parker, an evolutionary biologist in the United Kingdom -- that family life is n ow understood as a "cauldron of conflict," featuring sibling-sibling, parent-off spring, and parent-parent conflict. A diagram of all the routes of conflict pres umably present in any family is called a "battleground." But it emerges that the word "conflict" enjoys a special meaning in this area of science. Conflict is a ssumed to remain present, by definition, regardless of whether it has been "reso lved." That is, suppose you buy a car from a dealer. There is an initial conflic t of interest, wherein you (the buyer) want to buy the car on the cheap, and the

dealer wants to take you for a ride. But after haggling, you drive away with th e car and the dealer pockets the cash -- conflict resolved; matter settled. In e volutionary biology, however, the conflict is assumed to remain present even onc e the deal has been struck. Because of their peculiar understanding of "conflict ," evolutionary biologists -- mostly those at Oxford, Cambridge, Bristol, and Im perial College, who talk primarily with one another and review each other's manu scripts -- can confidently declare in a private language that conflict in family life is universal and unceasing. And Rabbi Green can then accept this narrative , writing: We will not understand our own human nature without taking into account the fierce struggle we underwent to arrive and to achieve the dominance we have over this planet ... [we need a] reformulation by a new and powerful harmonistic vis ion, one that will allow even the weakest and most threatened of creatures a leg itimate place in this world and will call upon us not to wipe it out by careless whim. This is the role of today's religion. Clearly, the project of reformulation will be quite different, perhaps even unne cessary, if the scientific account of the universality of conflict is incorrect. So, I do not agree with Rabbi Green that science is first, and religion adapts. I do not agree that the task of the theologian should now be one of reframing wh at science says in order to guide us to a more profound appreciation of science' s reality. I do not agree that the task of theologians is to provide a reformula tion of contemporary science featuring a new harmonistic vision. Indeed, I think that Rabbi Green's plans for a future theology abdicates the humanistic respons ibility to critique science. Instead, I think the task of theologians (and ethic ists, more generally) should be to hold scientists' feet to the fire, to insist again and again that the scientific account of nature supplied by scientists be true and accurate. This will require a new generation of theologians trained and experienced in the ways and content of science, and a new generation of scienti sts drawn from different backgrounds from those that have traditionally supplied the exclusionary corridors of academia. Rabbi Green reveals a progressional view of evolutionary history and emphasizes the distinctness of humans from other animals with a focus on the mind. He refer s to "the entire course of evolution, from the simplest life-forms millions of y ears ago, to the great complexity of the human brain" and adds: It would also be disingenuous of me as a human to say that the emergence of human consciousness, even the ability to be thinking and writing about these ver y matters, is nothing more than a small series in the unfolding linear process w rought by natural selection. Yes, that is indeed how we came about. But there is a different meaning to human existence that cannot be denied. The self-reflecti ve consciousness of humans, combined with our ability to take a long bio-histori cal view of the whole unfolding that lies behind (and ahead of) us, makes a diff erence. Yes, all creatures are doing the "work of God" by existing, feeding, rep roducing, and moving the evolutionary process forward. But we humans, especially in our age, are called upon to do that work in a different way. I see no grounds for a progressional view of evolutionary history. I see no just ification for singling out any species-specific character such as the brain in h umans, echolocation in bats, and the wingspan of the wandering albatross. I deny there is any different meaning to human existence compared with that of other s pecies. To the contrary, our sense of emotion has a much longer evolutionary history tha n our brain, and is more tried, true, and refined. We have less risk of error wh en listening to our body and feelings than to our minds, and I suggest the most reliable route to God is through sensation rather than thought. Indeed, I suspec

t that most, perhaps all, people of faith are drawn to companionship with God by a shared feeling of community rather than by theological reflection. Turning now to the March/April 2010 essay by Peter Gabel, I find I'm at once ins pired, yet puzzled, by his call for "sacred evolutionary biologists." Mr. Gabel writes: To understand the sacred drama of the evolutionary process, we need the help of evolutionary biologists who are not neutral observers in the classically lib eral sense, but who connect the sacred within themselves to the sacred dimension of what they observe in the natural world. I would like to think that I could help answer this call. Yet, I wonder what thi s call might mean in practical terms. After all, whatever is in nature, simply i s. My own sense of the sacred cannot change what is actually happening in nature . A sacred perspective might supply a disposition to propose hypotheses during t he course of scientific research that might not occur to, say, an atheist scient ist, especially hypotheses that pertain to a ubiquity of sharing, cooperation, a nd negotiation. Widening the variety of hypotheses for evolutionary phenomena be yond those that typically occur in a strictly secular perspective would surely i mprove the chance that scientific investigations yield an accurate and reliable account of nature. And the picture of nature that emerges might be more appealin g than a purely secular account provides. I hope this assessment of what the cal l for sacred evolutionary biologists will produce is consistent with what Mr. Ga bel has in mind. Joan Roughgarden, an evolutionary ecologist and biology professor at Stanford Un iversity, is the author of The Genial Gene: Deconstructing Darwinian Selfishness and Evolution and Christian Faith: Reflections of an Evolutionary Biologist.

Source Citation: Roughgarden, Joan. 2010. The Responsibility of Theology to Scie nce. Tikkun 25(6): 37