• Question: As Einstein stated "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind," therefore do you believe in the Big Bang Theory (being a scientist) or that God created the world???

    Asked by anon-175280 to Thomas, hayleypincott, Ella, David, Alison, Alex on 19 Jun 2018.
    • Photo: David Mills

      David Mills answered on 19 Jun 2018:

      The evidence from cosmology and astronomy is that the universe has been expanding for about 13.7 billion years from an initial very hot state (this is the big bang). The solar system (sun, earth, other planets) then firmed about 4.5 billions years ago from a giant collapsing dust cloud.

      Science has nothing to say about what happened before the big bang, in fact that question doesn’t even make sense if you believe that time started at the instant of the big bang.

      The way the science works is to measure something and make a theory, then see if that theory can predict something else you can measure. If it can, great – the theory is good. If not, we need to change the theory to include the new measurements.

      So far, cosmology seems to work without the need to include god in the theory.

    • Photo: Ella Mercer

      Ella Mercer answered on 20 Jun 2018:

      That’s a great quote – where did you find that? 🙂 I remember coming home from school when I was 6 years old and telling my mum that I didn’t believe in God and based upon the evidence I do believe in the big bang theory. However, you can be a scientist and also be religious; they can definitely work together. I work with a girl that is Catholic and an amazing scientist. I’m actually going to ask what she thinks about this because I’m very interested to hear her views. Thanks for a great question!!

    • Photo: Alison Hughes

      Alison Hughes answered on 20 Jun 2018:

      I believe there is a lot of scientific evidence for the big bang theory (of which i understand very very little) and I am not a religious person myself. I had a Catholic nun teach me science in school and I asked her about how she could be a scientist and a religious person. She answered that she believed God created the Big Bang and that evolution is the product of his intricate design of the world and that by studying science and understanding these things, she was paying homage to God. That may not be an answer you were looking for, but I found her perspective really insightful.

    • Photo: Hayley Pincott

      Hayley Pincott answered on 20 Jun 2018:

      I believe the Big Bang Theory as this is what evidence suggests and I’m not religious and don’t believe in God.

    • Photo: Thomas Perriment

      Thomas Perriment answered on 20 Jun 2018:

      So I think one of the take homes from that quote, considering that Einstein wasn’t religious himself, is that without a theory with sufficient supporting evidence, you are blind in trying to guess how something happens/happened, or why something works they way it does. I think that compared to the general public, scientists tend to place more value in evidence based logic, rather than faith based logic. So whilst the vast vast majority of scientists agree that the big bang theory is the best explanation we currently have, it’s not necessarily something that they believe in as much as something they agree makes the most sense. It’s entirely possible to believe in both, I have friends who I know for a fact thing that the big bang theory is correct (as correct as it can be) and also think that god made it happen (or allowed it do). A lot of the time humans change their mind and that’s perfectly ok to do, theories develop or are confirmed/disregarded, and religious beliefs change in the light of new evidence. So whilst I don’t believe that there is a god of any kind, it doesn’t mean to say that I’m right! Scientists don’t know everything (yet!).

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