Collins attempts to meld God and science

Francis Collins, former head of the National Human Genome Research Institute and seminal player in sequencing the human genome, has launched a foundation that seeks to reconcile Christian faith with science.

The Washington-based foundation, BioLogos, is funded by the John Templeton Foundation and aims to promote "the search for truth in both the natural and spiritual realms, and seeks to harmonize these different perspectives," according to its website. The BioLogos website also lists several questions (eg. "How does the harshness of evolution align with the idea of a loving God?" and "Can scientific and scriptural truth be reconciled?" and "What role could God have in evolution?") that try to guide Christians through the science behind evolution while interweaving science and religious dogma.

Collins, an evangelical Christian, made waves in the scientific community with his 2006 bestselling book, The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief, and the science blog community has already started to weigh in on the geneticist's latest venture. Early reactions from the blogoshpere? Horror. Shock. And veiled disgust.

Now, Collins's name has been bandied about with regard to the upcoming appointment of a new National Institutes of Health director.

My question is this: Does Collins's role in this foundation (and more generally his efforts to marry science and religion) compromise his ability to lead NIH? Would you pick him as the next head of NIH?

Bob Grant--Associate Editor, The Scientist

Francis Collins isa world class scientist and the NIH would be fortunate to have such a qualified leader with a proven track record of inspired leadership!

BobTS1007522 wrote:
My question is this: Does Collins's role in this foundation (and more generally his efforts to marry science and religion) compromise his ability to lead NIH?

Which incorporates the insulting framing given Collins' views by the "new atheist" contingent. Obviously, nobody has suggested "marrying" science and religion, and the word "reconcile" is ambiguous enough that Collins critics have insisted on misrepresenting not just him, but all attempts at removing the question of anti-religious bias from science education. I seriously doubt that any scientist working to quell fears that science has a hidden anti-religion agenda is either trying to meld science and religion, or replace science with religion. Instead, they're trying to interject into the confused conflict the idea that the two are very different processes that do not necessarily have to conflict no matter how much extreme fundamentalists and extreme atheists want them to. The new atheists don't seem able to wrap their heads around this.

I am deeply conflicted by scientists such as Collins. On the one hand I want to judge people by their work, and on that level I am not sure there is much to complain about although in truth I cannot say I have much to go on (which is obviously a problem if my opinion were more important).

On the other hand I am always troubled by scientists that have any religious faith as it seems obvious that there is no data upon which to base a belief or faith and therefore they cannot be acting as true scientists when they profess faith in a god for which absolutely no data can be shown to exist and in a universe where such a god cannot be shown to be necessary in any way. This is usually addressed by such folk by using human characteristics such as love, morality and so on as the basis for their faith, but simple research will demonstrate that one not need to invoke a god to explain this things or for that matter anything else.

So what we end up with is a person that may exhibit a very human compartmentalization. The risk comes in when we consider that religion has a tendency to require that the believer believe things that are clearly false and then refuse to make much of an effort to understand that they are false.

My experience with a fundamentalist christain engineer left me with very little hope that people that profess to be deeply religious are capable of objectively observing Reality in any effective manner especially when the data conflicts with their belief system. In my experience religion teaches that you must reject any data that conflicts with your personal belief system and that is not something which can be considered to be good for a scientist much less the head of the NIH.

So I have very strong reservations about such a posting for such a clearly religious person. Let us see how this might play out. The posting would be for the head of the NIH and I can envision several serious conflicts that would compromise Collins' ability to lead effectively and may very well result in bad policy choices. For example, how would he deal with issues relating to contraception, teenage sex, AIDs, Embryonic Stem Cell research and so on?

I have to conclude that anyone choosing to have a strong religious belief has chosen to disqualify themselves from holding such a post. We need people that can be absolutely objective, and by definition this is not possible for an evangelical christian.

I don't think it's appropriate to blame "atheists" for problems people may have with the Templeton Foundation being associated with a potential future NIH head. With the bashing science has taken from fundamental Christian groups the past 8 years, it's no wonder people are worried. We're finally getting a funding bump and respect and it may all be for naught if a religious apologist ends up at the helm.

Enough with the "faith" funding and coddling - Science stands on its own without having to interject one's religion or try to reconcile any belief system with scientific findings. These things should be left to the individual to incorporate into their life as it works for them. If Collins wants to be a philosopher, that's fine, but not on the NIH's time. If he does go up for the NIH position, he'll have to drop BioLogos in order to eliminate conflicts of interest. One cannot serve both science (representing a great proportion of scientists) and purposes who have been historically opposed to science.

AliciaTS1012093 wrote:
Enough with the "faith" funding and coddling - Science stands on its own without having to interject one's religion or try to reconcile any belief system with scientific findings.

There's a fundamental misunderstanding here. In the US right now, we are losing to a very well funded and effective anti-science education campaign. The situation is much worse than most seem to realize, and the courts aren't going to be able to turn it back by themselves. The majority of the population, as well as the majority of the scientific community, are members of one or another religious tradition. The anti-science campaign is very good at making the average American believe that scientists are biased atheists, and therefore a small amount of "balance" with "alternatives" is only fair. There are very few institutions with sufficient motivation to speak out in favor of the concept that science is not a threat to religion, and therefore does not require "balancing". Its pure insanity to complain about efforts to remove misconceptions about science attacking religion in a time when good science education is essential and lacking.

JimTS666633 wrote:I have to conclude that anyone choosing to have a strong religious belief has chosen to disqualify themselves from holding such a post. We need people that can be absolutely objective, and by definition this is not possible for an evangelical christian.

In Collins' case that is objectively wrong. He's as "absoltuely objective" as anyone, with one of the best track records of achievement at science and scientific leadership ever. That's The Reality.

Collins has proven himself to be an excellent scientist and scientific leader, and his personal religious beliefs have not compromised his professional performance. If his beliefs or his own, outside-of-work-personal time spent on this foundation are factors in considering him for an NIH position, then that is a straightforward violation of his religious freedom. I hope nobody is seriously concerned about the prospect of having a world renowned scientist who is also a Christian as a leader of the NIH. If they do, and they think this a legitimate reason for ignoring a candidate for this job, then they have little understanding of the diversity of Christian thought, of Collins' personal beliefs or the beliefs of many of their fellow scientists, and of the constitution of the United States.
It seems to me that many non-christian scientists accept the simple view that a certain type of loud-mouthed, closed-minded, fundamentalist Christian is representative of all Christian thought. This is far from the truth. And, a quick scan of the BioLogos website suggests to me that Collins' goal with the foundation is as much directed at opening up the minds of fundamentalist Christians to science and evolution as it is to opening up the minds of scientists to faith. Scientists should be ecstatic to have such an advocate who might be capable of communicating with the small subset of Christians who consider science to be their enemy.

MichaelTS366435 wrote:
In Collins' case that is objectively wrong. He's as "absoltuely objective" as anyone, with one of the best track records of achievement at science and scientific leadership ever. That's The Reality.

I do not doubt your statement for a moment, however, I from personal experience know for a fact that there always comes a point where data arises that conflicts with the faith of the devoutly religious person and they must make a choice. The very tenets of the religion in question (christianity) require that at such a juncture the faithful must cling to their faith and reject the data.

While Collins may very well have managed to avoid this trap in the past, as the head of the NIH he may not be able to avoid it any longer and we cannot have such a person in such a position. By choosing his faith he, in my mind, has chosen to disqualify himself for such a position. Remember, he made the choice to believe without evidence and I have seen some of his writings which make it clear he has not done due diligence. He has made fundamental errors in judgement which, while preserving his faith, do disqualify him from holding such positions. His comments on subjects well covered in psychology and neurology are excellent examples; he attributes love, morality, and such human behaviors to his god when we have a very large body of data that support entirely natural conclusions. Put simply, he arrived at a conclusion for which no data can be shown to support that conclusion and in the face of a large body of data that strongly supports a conclusion that he may very well find distasteful on account of his faith.

He may very well manage somehow to complete his tenure as head of NIH without ever facing a situation where the data conflicts with his beliefs but we cannot risk this. There are plenty of other qualified candidates that have not chosen to hold such a strong faith, and they by definition are better candidates.

I did not invent the religion (that was done by profoundly ignorant men thousands of years ago) but I can observe what it does to the faithful and I cannot feel comfortable with those of strong faith being in such positions where their faith can potentially introduce a dangerous bias with far-reaching implications for our society. Kudos to Collins for having managed to navigate this well in the past, however, I do not want to find out the hard way that he still may fail when presented with such an issue as, say, embryonic stem cell research.

We need to keep the faith out of science given what science is facing in this country. We need to show that science is not what the faithful believe it to be, and one of the best ways to do this is to make sure it remains as objective as can be. Faith is the very antithesis of objectivity and by choosing faith one makes a very clear statement as to where one stands.

JimTS666633 wrote:I do not want to find out the hard way that he still may fail when presented with such an issue as, say, embryonic stem cell research.

Jim,
For the record, I have heard Collins give a talk in which he supported embryonic stem cell research.
Nevertheless, I would, first, be interested to hear your suggestions on how Collins might go about using his religious faith to dispute the scientific "data" on embryonic stem cell research. And second, I would like to know how that scientific data dictates the moral or national interest types of decisions that an NIH director might need to make.

ScottTS1054716 wrote:

JimTS666633 wrote:I do not want to find out the hard way that he still may fail when presented with such an issue as, say, embryonic stem cell research.

Jim,
For the record, I have heard Collins give a talk in which he supported embryonic stem cell research.
Nevertheless, I would, first, be interested to hear your suggestions on how Collins might go about using his religious faith to dispute the scientific "data" on embryonic stem cell research. And second, I would like to know how that scientific data dictates the moral or national interest types of decisions that an NIH director might need to make.

I can't give you much of an answer right now but I can for sure say that I am deeply uncomfortable with the use of religious belief to make moral decisions that affect national interest. That is how we got into the ESC mess in the first place...

As one of the people quoted as not liking Biologos from the blogosphere I would like to post some comments here.

1) I think Collins has shown that his religious beliefs do not negatively impact his scientific research in any detectible way. This is not my concern at all with Biologos

2) I think attempts to build bridges between science and religion are good things. And in this sense Collins and Biologos are doing a good thing

3) The problem I have with Collins and Biologos is their actual descriptions of their ideas. In Collins' book and on the Biologos website they have conflicting statements about the role(s) science and religion can play in understanding the natural world. They say in some places that science is the ONLY way to study and understand the natural world and that faith is a way to ask bigger questions. Sounds OK to me. But then they contradict this statement by saying and/or implying that since science cannot explain certain forms of altruism therefore certain religious explanations must be correct. First, this is scientifically misleading as there are in fact scientific explanations for the "radical altruism" that they think is only explained by a Christian God. This type of argument does an injustice both to science and to faith from my point of view and in fact muddies the water more than attempts to truly keep science and religion as separate areas. This is not an atheistic critique of their argument - it is a critique that this type of argument is bad for both science and religion. And most strangely, it is exactly the type of "God in the gaps" argument that Collins and Biologos eloquently critique elsewhere in their material.

So - I am not actually trying to say Collins faith is a bad thing for his role in science. And I think that some of the time he has helped science by attempting to reach out to religious groups. However, I think his argument is fundamentally unsound and risky and in the long run could be bad both for science and religion.

Like many scientists who were brought up in a religious environment, Collins is searching for a reconciliation between scientific reality and religious faith. That is his choice; but he is doing it publicly. In a secular society, people who want to hold a highly visible public office should keep their faith to themselves, and not let their faith influence their decisions at a scientific level. When appeal to "God" or supposedly "talking to God" has brought us 8 years of the Bush disaster, it is inappropriate for someone like Collins to direct NIH.

There are thousands of highly qualified scientists who can lead NIH, especially those who are highly creative and who think out of the box. We need a new era of change at NIH, not old-style thinking.

The NIH conducts medical research to improve the health of Americans, many of whom find religious and/or spiritual practice to enhance the quality of their lives. A quick search of CRISP will reveal that the NIH currently funds numerous research projects assessing the impact of religious and spiritual practices/beliefs on human health.

The NIH director must be able to lead the nations medical and scientific researchers. Francis Collins research experience is excellent. Given the portfolio of NIH research, Collins experience considering issues of faith, religion, and spirituality may even be a strength not shared by other candidates.

At this link

http://metrostateatheists.wordpress.com/2009/02/04/lightgod/

MSA wellcome to discuss relation math with religion. Please visit to the link and leaving some comments on the article.

You know like Mr.Einstein, Rohedi always celebrated Pi Day every years although didn't know the primary message of the celebration. But after finding simple general form of the Pi exact formula in form sum of two arcsine functions that posted at

http://eqworld.ipmnet.ru/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=148,

Rohedi can create the Pi Number 3.141592653589793... easily and know that the essential of the Pi Day celebration is that for remembering us to keep studying as symbolized by the three dots after decimal places behind the pi number that we can write.

Yes, but only provide:

1. He has the required scientific qualifications.

And:

2. He excludes God from all scientific issues!

ScottTS1054716 wrote:

JimTS666633 wrote:I do not want to find out the hard way that he still may fail when presented with such an issue as, say, embryonic stem cell research.

Jim,
For the record, I have heard Collins give a talk in which he supported embryonic stem cell research.
Nevertheless, I would, first, be interested to hear your suggestions on how Collins might go about using his religious faith to dispute the scientific "data" on embryonic stem cell research. And second, I would like to know how that scientific data dictates the moral or national interest types of decisions that an NIH director might need to make.

The problem is that Collins has publicly stated that there are certain things (typically issues such as morality and love) which can only be explained through his god (when we actually have a large body of data to the contrary). While this is fine for a personal belief, it is not something that is healthy for a scientist to believe. Given his publicly stated and strongly held christian beliefs I feel very much that he has disqualified himself from public service in such a critical position as the head of NIH represents.

He may or may not be biased. However, given his publicly stated beliefs we simply cannot take the chance that he may at some point allow his bias to affect his work. Past history in such a situation does not guarantee future performance. My experience with christians is that at some point they insist their belief dictates how Reality must be and they are rarely willing to allow Reality to correct them. That is bad enough in a scientist, it is intolerable in the head of the NIH.

He chose to hold beliefs that disqualify him. That was his choice. Like all of our choices his have consequences.

Jim puts forth a very good argument regarding his reservations about giving an important scientific post to someone who believes something despite evidence to the contrary. That, however, rests upon the assumption that the evidence is against the existence of God, which it is not. The historical record, well-documented miracles even in modern times, and the irreducible complexity of living things provide plenty of evidence. What holds many scientists back is their a priori acceptance of philosophical materialism, which holds that everything is nothing but bits of matter interacting with other bits of matter. If I recall correctly, Dr. Collins came to his Christian faith as an adult; this was not something that he held without thinking from his youth. It takes a real thinker to overcome the dominant philosophical culture and prejudices of his peers, which Dr. Collins obviously did. I would also remind everyone that the 20th century provided a bloody and tragic witness of the consequences of putting atheists in charge of nations.

Interesting. I greatly appreciate your comment regarding the strength of my argument.

However... you continue on to make the assumption I am of the position that there is evidence against god. Not true. What my position is best stated as is that there is no evidence either way.

You put forth a common line of reasoning I have run into time and again and which is as deeply flawed as ever. For one thing the irreducible complexity argument has yet to stand up to scrutiny by qualified professionals that do not have the mindblock shared by many christians; your presentation of that argument actually bolsters my argument nicely.

Furthermore, objective inspection of the historical record fails to provide any useful evidence regarding the existence of god. What it amounts to are historical claims made by sources that lack the crediblity to be useful. I know of no miracle of any kind that can be show to be the work of god using any credible process of proof. Again, your bias shows through. The simple fact is that there are no adequately documented supernatural miracles to be found in any reliable literature. The bible is in no way such a source.

Finally you commit another error which I find common among christians; you trot out the tired and worn claim that athiests in charge of nations commit atrocities while ignoring the fact that there is actually a larger number of such authorities that did worse things in the name of their religion.

The simple truth is that any form of religious belief is automatically a bias against Reality for the simple reason that one cannot show that Reality has any identifiable religious trait outside of the human mind and commensurate belief system. I cannot start with principles based upon Natural data and arrive at any kind of meaningful religious statement without introducing some form of data synthesized by humans.

I came up with a distinction that demonstrates this very nicely; if we group data into two forms, Natural and Synthetic, with Natural being that which stands apart from man and has no human source - the set of layers in a sedimentary system and the ecological remnants therein - and Synthetic being data derived in some way from a human source - historical claims, anecdotes of personal experience etc. - we quickly see that the data pertaining to any god is Synthetic in form. Every time I have heard a christian claim otherwise they can be shown to make the sort of errors you make above. Until this test fails and we find Natural data irrefutably and unequivocally attributable and leading to god I stand by my position.

Show me data pertaining to god that is not sourced from human experience in some way and you will have my attention.