Academic CentreLatvia has now enjoyed more than 30 years as a free, independent country, but certain ways of thinking remain stuck in old ruts. Such is the case of the worlds of science and religion. There is little interaction between these two worlds, and, more worryingly, there are internal walls running inside the very persons who might bridge the gap: practicing scientists who are also believers. The project "Bridging Worlds" aims to overcome internal and external barriers that hinder mutual understanding and, more importantly, self-understanding of scientists who are also religious believers. Theology had been banned as an academic discipline during the Soviet occupation, and the communist regime had weaponized science as an anti-faith ideology. Intellectual scars still persist, and an open and modern outlook on compatibility and integrity of science and faith is lacking both within the academic community and in the public discourse. The project seeks to first validate this hypothesis by identifying stakeholders, audiences and their needs, and then prototyping solutions (public lectures of qualified academics, study manuals, and interviews). The goal is to identify and connect interested parties and stakeholders from existing institutions of learning who would carry on bridging after the completion of this gap filling project.
In an initial phase, we will assess attitudes towards religion among students and practitioners of science and attitudes towards science among religious believers using surveys and some in-depth interviews. We will then craft resources that address common misunderstandings between these two groups. In particular, we believe that there is no inherent contradiction between rigorous science and religious faith. We will develop some resources that can help members of both communities to understand the other better. A particular goal is to help believing scientists to be able to better integrate their professional and personal lives.
As believing scientists, the applicants have frequently encountered surprise or even disbelief from members of the public who learned that they are scientists and believers. The idea that science and religion are inherently in conflict is widespread among the general public. Among religious believers there is often suspicion of science, often perceived to be a tool used to discredit belief. Among scientists, religious believers are often stereotyped as superstitious and resistant to evidence-based reasoning. These views may arise from certain moral principles, viewed as archaic, as well as from frustration with creationist views or opposition to vaccination, which can be found among more fervent believers of certain communities. The number of believing scientists may or may not be smaller than the number of believers in the general population, but it is not insignificant. Still, they can suffer from a sense of isolation since they hail from different faith communities, which increases their sense of being a minority among scientists. Among their faith communities, they tend to have difficulty finding people who understand their concerns. The difficulties in communicating are a general concern, as many of the key policy issues of today must be addressed using scientific expertise, which is finding itself being challenged more and more recently. The direction towards a solution may be found in the shared interest for truth, which should, in principle, motivate both scientists and believers.
The first activity will be to attempt to gain a clearer understanding of the attitudes of scientists about religion and of religious believers about science. A simple survey will be developed and distributed among students and staff of the scientific and technical faculties of the main universities in Riga. An analogous survey will be distributed among believers from various religious communities, as well as students preparing for ministry in the educational institutions of these communities. A smaller number of in-depth interviews will be conducted with representatives from the two communities with a particular focus on believing scientists and how they fit into believers and scientists at the same time. The results will be summarized in an article for a local journal and a publication of general interest.
A further aspect of the project will consist of outreach activities meant to bridge the gap between the worlds of faith and science. There will be communication activities targeted at the scientific community and activities targeted towards faith communities. The activities will aim to provide interesting information in their own right as well as identifying audiences who are open to this form of dialogue and might be interested in fostering it in the future or participating in a more detailed exposition of the topics involved. The scientific community might be interested by the following topics:
- A reading of the creation account of Genesis compatible with modern theories of cosmology and evolution.
- Commonalities and differences in the goals and motivations of science and religion.
- A personal approach to doing science as a believer.
For faith communities and students of religion, a different set of topics will be most relevant:
- Quantum Mechanics: what it is and what it isn’t.
- Big Bang cosmology: what does physics say about the origin of the Universe and what are the limits?
- The scientific method: what goals do scientists set themselves and how do they go about reaching them?
- Evolution and microbiology: what do we know about the nature and origin of life?
The panel discussion should focus directly on the question of the compatibility of faith and science using a provocative title, such as, for example: Has Modern Science Made Religion Superfluous? Members of the panel should include a scientist who is a believer, a scientist who is not a believer, and one or two religious ministers.
The goal of the public lectures will be to explain fundamental scientific principles in a way that is understandable for non-scientists and relevant to religious people. The applicants have expertise on quantum mechanics and cosmology. We will engage a speaker with expertise on evolution and/or microbiology to provide similar insight into questions of biology.
There is not a lot of public discussion in Latvia about questions of faith and science. However, there is great interest. A few years ago, a debate billed as between a believer and a non-believer and featuring the well-known apologist John Lennox filled the great auditorium of the University of Latvia’s main building. We believe that constructive dialogue between the two communities has never been more urgent. The practice of religious faith has declined in Latvia as in other places in Europe for some time. More recently, the authority of science is being questioned more and more by conspiracy theories. A new dialogue between faith and science based on the common interest in truth could be very fruitful for the two communities as well as for society as a whole.