The Higgs Boson "God Particle": Of All Things Visible and Invisible
. . . The short answer is "no." Imagine for a moment that you're on an archeological dig on the outskirts of Rome. Standing in your carefully excavated hole, your spade strikes a metal box. Inside you discover a small, worn chisel, and a note written in 16th Century Italian: "Herein lies my favorite chisel." The note is signed, "Michelangelo Buonarroti." Well, if you're an art historian, what you now hold might be priceless. If you're also a person of faith who has viewed the magnificence of Michelangelo's Pieta, you may treasure this forever as one of the tools used to create a work of artistic genius. Your discovery might land on a shelf with your name on it in the Vatican Museum. There will be no doubt that what you discovered is a tool used to create an inspired work of art, but it is not itself the art's creator. . . .
E.T. and The Fermi Paradox: Are We Alone in the Cosmos?
. . . For Father Georges Lemaitre, for me, and now for my friend, Joseph, there comes a point when "a profoundly improbable sequence" of events crosses a border into the profoundly impossible. Science has promised a better explanation for centuries, but it hasn't ever delivered one. Creation and our Creator become the sole rational explanation for what seems otherwise irrational and impossible: life itself, and not just life, us! - the impossible mathematical odds against the very existence with which we ponder Him. And thus far, at least, we ponder Him alone. "I want to know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know God's thoughts; the rest are details." Albert Einstein . . .
Inherit the Wind: Pentecost and the Breath of God
. . . Most people don't know that "Inherit the Wind," - both the play and the classic 1960 Spencer Tracy film - first borrowed the title from the Book of Proverbs: "He who troubles his household will inherit the wind, and the fool will be servant to the wise." (Proverbs 11:29). It's just possible that the Book of Proverbs itself borrowed the phrase from an even more ancient source: the followers of Pazuzu, the Assyrian god of wind and pestilence. In some ancient Mesopotamian religions, "an ill wind" carried the spirits of demons, and so to inherit the wind could mean generations of suffering for one person's sin. . . .
"Phasers on Stun, Mr. Spock!" Captain Kirk's Star Trek Epiphany
. . . Back in 1966, to make matters worse (for Debbie, at least) our family had the only color television on our block. We were by no means privileged. Our father brought it home that year as a Christmas bonus from his boss. I remember the day we first plugged it in. We quickly became the popular kids in the neighborhood! "This means," my 12-year-old sister tactlessly proclaimed, "that every nerd in the neighborhood will be in our living room for Star Trek." Debbie had to admit, at least, that Star Trek was far better in color. We discovered, for example, that only the crew members wearing red shirts were done in by aliens each week, and the slightly green tinge of Mr. Spock's skin made us wonder if perhaps Leonard Nimoy might really be Vulcan. . . .
Does Stephen Hawking Sacrifice God on the Altar of Science?
. . . I do not count Stephen Hawking among them. Contrary to what the news media is lifting out of his latest book - and out of context - Stephen Hawking does not denounce God, nor does he claim to have proven that God does not exist. The exact quote that so many in the media now read into from his WSJ article cited above, and from his book is this: "The discovery recently of extreme fine tuning of so many laws of nature could lead some back to the idea that the grand design is the work of some grand Designer. Yet the latest advances in cosmology explain why the laws of the universe seem tailor-made for humans, without the need for a benevolent creator." . . .