Is There A War Between Science And Religion? Examining Jerry Coyne’s recent case arguments

Last month, The Conversation published biologist Jerry Coyne’s article, lovingly served up for audiences at Christmastime, “Yes, There is a War Between Science and Religion.” Coyne fancies himself a participant in a perceived war between faith and reason, science and religion. His mission: To show people they can’t believe the account of Christ’s birth—as depicted, for example, in the Book of Luke, Chapter 2—while simultaneously believing there’s crackers in the pantry. You use your eyeballs for the latter, but not the former, and it’s simply irrational to go through life with a bifurcated mind!

It is of course odd to enlist Coyne to write on such a decidedly philosophical issue, seeing as he once lamented that,

Is this, from Coyne, a refreshing measure of intellectual humility? Actually, quite the opposite. Rather than signaling a respect for specialization (e.g., “Let’s defer to the economists on this question”), Coyne’s words are part of a larger project of dismissing philosophy as irrelevant or useless in these debates. As the philosopher William Vallicella noted,

Nevertheless, Coyne is the one to bring the fight for the Brights army; and in war, to paraphrase Rumsfeld, you fight the army in front of you, not the army you might want or wish to fight at a later time.

Coyne’s thesis is: “Science and religion are not only in conflict…but also represent incompatible ways of viewing the world.”

How does Coyne propose to argue for this idea? First, he insists on some definitions. “Science” he tells us, is “a set of tools we use to find truth about the universe.” Tools like the scientific method. According to Coyne, they include:

Of course, if this definition is meant to provide necessary and sufficient conditions for something to count as “science,” it will rule out some research programs we might not want ruled out. It would also complicate our acceptance of certain theses. What would it mean to use the above tools to come to a true belief about the uniformity of nature? Indeed, the tools presuppose that nature is uniform. If Coyne’s method is meant to be the method for discovering any truth, then surely we would lead impoverished lives! What happens to our true belief that the world is more than five minutes old? Or our true belief in the existence of other minds? None of these truths are found by using Coyne’s scientific method.

His second definition is of “religion.” Coyne defines religion as does philosopher Daniel Dennett: “Social systems whose participants avow belief in a supernatural agent or agents whose approval is to be sought.” To his credit, Coyne recognizes this is a bad definition, noting that it rules out certain religions from being religions. In The Believing Primate, Charles Taliaferro goes further than Coyne, arguing that Dennett’s definition is “problematic, even question-begging.”

More problematic is Coyne’s discussion of the “methods” that religions — he now specifically focuses on the major Western traditions: Judaism, Islam, and Christianity — use to find truth. This is where the conflict really lies. Says Coyne: “The conflict between science and faith, then, rests on the methods they use to decide what is true, and what truths result: These are conflicts of both methodology and outcome.” What are the so-called “methods” religion uses to “decide what is true?” Coyne writes: “In contrast to the methods of science, religion adjudicates truth not empirically, but via dogma, scripture and authority — in other words, through faith.” So, science adjudicates truth-claims empirically whereas religion uses “faith” to “decide what is true.”

To show that science and religion have conflicting “methods,” Coyne conveniently defines practitioners of the former as having evidence for their beliefs and adherents of the latter as believing without evidence. He writes: “In science, faith without evidence is a vice, while in religion it’s a virtue.”

This, of course, is a New Atheist canard, rejected by almost every serious philosopher of religion. For a rigorous and informed discussion, consider the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s entry on “Faith.” Coyne simply ignores this longstanding discussion. Is it because he’s unaware of it? Because he doesn’t understand it — like “epistemology” and “ontology”? Because he can’t refute the arguments? We can’t be sure.

Coyne leaves it an open question whether he chose his hackneyed definition because it made his task easier. As Bertrand Russell once quipped, “The method of ‘postulating’ what we want has many advantages; they are the same as the advantages of theft over honest toil.” For example, it allows Coyne to claim that,

The problem, according to Coyne, is that the religious believe these claims sans evidence, whereas “men of science” believe only on the evidence.

But it’s simply false to claim that all believers hold their religious beliefs without evidence. To take one example, consider the recent book, Two Dozen (or so) Arguments for God. Regarding the divinity of Christ, consider the case marshaled by Richard Swinburne. The point here isn’t to claim that these arguments succeed, but to put the lie to the claim that religious believers are believing without supporting evidence.

Of course, Coyne may wave his hand at all this and tell us he didn’t have academics in mind but rather the folks in the pews. Yet even if we grant that Coyne is failing to do his scholarly best by attacking low-hanging fruit, it’s still simply false that the average Christian takes herself to be believing without evidence. An ordinary believer might say that he has a strong-seeming belief that God exists. Another might claim that she believes Jesus rose from the dead because of the testimony of people who claimed to see the risen Christ.

Don’t misunderstand me! I have not here claimed that any of these things are good evidences. Maybe they are; maybe they aren’t. My point is simply that it is clear these ordinary people do not take themselves to believe without any evidence whatsoever.

Coyne might reply that this evidence isn’t good evidence, and that we shouldn’t believe propositions on the basis of these sorts of evidences. But we can grant him this response, for argument’s sake, since my point was simply to move him away from the idea that the religious believe without evidence. Notice the shift Coyne must now accept: Rather than maintain that the religious believe without evidence, the idea would be that they don’t believe on the right kind of evidence.

But what would Coyne take to be the “right kind” of evidence on which to base your beliefs? He declares,

Unfortunately, this sort of philosophical philistinism is ill-suited to accomplish Coyne’s mission. I grant that wishful-thinking isn’t good evidence. But is it true that believers are merely “wishing” that their religious tenets were true? Surely this is just a snarky pot shot, not a serious attempt at finding truth. And even if it were true of a religious believer here and there, such a thing wouldn’t demonstrate there’s some in principle “war” between science and religion.

However, notice that Coyne’s notion of right evidence is insufficient to serve as evidence for all the things we believe are true. First, the concept of evidence is quite a bit more complicated than Coyne supposes. Second, on Coyne’s conception of evidence, it’s hard to see how he can adjudicate the very debate about faith and reason he’s engaged in. What empirical evidence does he use to decide between his view on the one hand, and Richard Swinburne’s or Paul Helm’s on the other? Third, above I listed a few things which we don’t believe on empirical evidence, such as the uniformity of nature, the existence of a past, and the existence of other minds. We could add the truths of mathematics, moral truths, the nature of the laws of logic, and philosophical claims, like the nature of causation, to the list. Fourth, what empirical evidence does Coyne have for his claim that only empirical evidence matters?

In response to this fourth point, Coyne may well admit there are other sources of evidence beyond what is given by the empirical sciences. In a previous book he claimed, “science is but one form of rationality (philosophy and mathematics are others).” If philosophical arguments can reveal some truths about the world which science cannot, then it looks like Coyne needs to do the hard work of showing that philosophical arguments for God fail. But he doesn’t. So where’s the conflict?

If Coyne believes some (alleged) truths on the basis of philosophical argument, and maintains his rationality, then why can’t the religious adherent do the same? Are the religious arguments bad? Roll up your sleeves and show us. Does he really not believe anything on the basis of philosophical argument, despite his claim above (as Ed Feser suggests in his savaging of Coyne’s book)? Then why does he believe that nature is uniform, and that induction is a reliable method for arriving at true beliefs? Because he’s empirically confirmed that it’s been reliable in the past? There are serious concerns Coyne has tried to simply side-step, but they need to be addressed. These aren’t demands religious philosophers or theologians have made; this is stuff straight out of David Hume, a thinker fundamentally committed to an unflinching and thoroughgoing empiricism.

So it looks like Coyne’s “man of science” can hold true beliefs delivered by means other than hypothesizing and testing hypotheses in the lab. But once we open the door to other cognitive faculties besides, say, perception, as able to deliver truths about the world, what is his argument that there’s no “religious” faculty which can deliver truths about the world? Not surprisingly, Coyne fails to provide one. Yes, he claims that wish fulfillment is what delivers theistic belief, but he doesn’t argue for this claim — he merely engages in schoolyard mockery. Strange tactic from our sober-minded, uber rationalist.

Philosophers have argued for just such a faculty, or set of faculties. No doubt, if God doesn’t exist, then something like Freud’s wish fulfillment faculty may well be responsible for theistic belief. But if God does exist and if, say, Christianity is true, then why think God could not have designed us with cognitive faculties whose aim is to produce true theistic beliefs in the right sort of cognitive environment? Call this “the proper functionalist” account (described and defended in more detail by Tyler McNabb in his recent book for Cambridge University Press).

Just as I find myself believing there’s an apple on the tree when in the right sort of environment (e.g., I’m in an apple orchard, it’s daytime, and I have normal vision, etc.), I might find myself believing there’s a being who created all of this when appeared-to by the starry heavens above. Surely God, if he exists, could have created me to reliably form true theistic beliefs in the proper environment. If God exists, then Christian belief can be rational and warranted. Coyne can, of course, offer arguments against God’s existence, and in so doing potentially defeat this sort of story. But he can’t just assume that God doesn’t exist, and so assume there’s no such faculty. He’s supposed to argue for that de facto claim.

Coyne may protest, “Even if there is a God-designed faculty which reliably produces true theistic belief in the right environment, and even if I can’t show that the arguments for God fail, that doesn’t mean the theist is rational in her beliefs. A rational belief needs to have supporting evidence!”

But the theist does have evidence (see above), and Coyne should do the spade work of refuting that evidence. So the problem isn’t with the having of evidence, it’s with the needing to have evidence. The issues here will turn on how we understand this “evidentialist” demand. For example, if you construe the evidentialist claim to be that a belief is rational if and only if you have arguments for that belief, then this might do the trick of showing that the above proper functionalist account doesn’t secure rationality, but the cost is that it wreaks havoc in our epistemic lives. Think of all the things you take yourself to rationally believe that would be ruled out by the austere evidentialist demand. Indeed, the demand itself would need an argument if you’re to rationally maintain it. I don’t know what this argument would look like, but even if you produced one, then your belief in the success of that second argument would need another argument, ad infinitum.

So the austere evidentialist demand seems problematic. In a recent paper, epistemologists Trent Dougherty and Chris Tweedt argue that on a more liberal view of “evidence,” there is nothing inconsistent with evidentialism and the proper functionalist account. Moreover, the “liberal” view has been defended by atheists like Michael Huemer, so it doesn’t seem likely that such an account is “at war” with science. Needless to say, Coyne doesn’t even so much as lightly touch on these important issues. Instead, he simply hacks away with his cleaver like a clumsy butcher, determined to own the fundies.

Contra Coyne, I’ve argued, first, that it is wrong to describe “faith” as belief without evidence. That’s just engaging in burlesque and ridicule. I pointed out that theists have produced many arguments for their beliefs. I then argued that if Coyne allows his “man of science” to be rational in holding beliefs derived from philosophical argument, then the theist can do the same and there’s no conflict between holding beliefs delivered by science and also by other sources. I also argued that the demand that all our beliefs have empirical evidence or arguments leads to nasty philosophical problems. I briefly introduced one way religious beliefs could have positive epistemic status without having to meet the austere evidentialist demand, and there’s nothing in the sciences that seems to conflict with this. To be sure, philosophical naturalism would conflict with it. But Coyne didn’t argue for the entirely trivial claim that religion is at odds with philosophical naturalism! If he had, this would have been a much shorter piece: “Amen.”

All of this can be, and has been, debated. But Coyne’s not a participant in the debate, judging by what he ignores and fails to interact with. To stick with his war analogy, Coyne is like a man standing on top of a mountain waving his sword in victory. But the sword he waves is paper, and the real battle is going on in the valley below him. As Montague wrote, “War hath no fury like a noncombatant.”

Decades ago, it was suggested that there are three things that a scientist believes but cannot prove.

1. The universe is real.
2. The universe is organized.
3. Our logic is good logic.

As an example of number 1, he related a story about a fellow who was having a vivid dream. He dreamed that he was a butterfly furiously flitting this way and that to avoid a net that was coming closer and closer. Just as the butterfly was to be caught in the net, the man awakened. He sighed and exclaimed, “I am so glad I am not a butterfly about to be caught in a net; I am so glad that I am a man, safe in this bed, safe in this house, safe in this world!” Then, the thought hit him, maybe, in reality, I actually am a butterfly about to be caught in a net and I am dreaming that I am a man, safe in a bed, safe in a house...” Today’s Western culture and science lean very heavily to the position that matter, etc., are real.

With regard to number 2. The job of science types is to discover that organization. So far, so good.

Number 3. We would have to be able to get outside logic to determine whether it is good logic. So far, it seems to be.

With regard to evidence for God, Scripture suggests that the evidence is very plain, right in front of us. Look at the heavens! Since that was written, we can now look into the atom, as well. Both aspects are amazing.

Where did life come from? Love, hate, envy, pride, caring, helping... From DNA????

There is no war between "faith" and "reason." What most people call "reason" isn't reason at all but scientific naturalism. Somehow this view has become identified with "reason," yet curiously enough "reason" never seems to object to the "miracles" in the "new testament."

"Reason" refers to clearness and consistency of thought. As I just proved above, the singling out of Genesis as somehow more "against reason" than the "virgin birth" or medieval miracles is most irrational.

The war is between Scientism and anything that disputes its tenets, e.g., Macro-Evolution or Global Warming.

As someone with a background in both the physical sciences and orthodox theology, I have never been excessive!y interested in these supposed wars.

I have no problem with admitting that my faith is faith. My problem is with the scientismists who refuse to acknowledge the same.

Macro-Evolution is neither observable nor replicable. It is thus not a truly testable theory, but is exempted from that because it is an article of faith.

As my first-year Biology (for Majors) professor used to say on any perceived contradiction to Evolution dogma: “Given time and chance, we are confident that...”

Those are the words of faith, not science.

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