Essay #10:
Reconciling Science and Religion

by Gerard P. Downey

"Therefore, when the development of the inward spiritual civilization can keep pace with the outward material civilization, perfect peace and tranquility will be brought forth in this world." (i)

It is the greatest of honors to have been asked to address this group with ideas about the relationship of Won Buddhism and Science and of Buddhism itself and science and thus more generally the proper relation between science and religion.

I will argue in this brief paper that Sot'aesan in comments like the above recommends a conciliation between science and his Buddhism. My knowledge of Sot'aesan's position is limited by my inability to read Korean and my relative newcomer's status to Won Buddhism. However I think that even if Sot'aesan does not endorse the view that I will recommend the view is the one that all men and women of reason and religion should adopt when dealing with this question of the relation of science and religion. If the view that I present is not the doctrinal position of Won Buddhism then I recommend that it becomes so. 

In my brief discourse I will present what I see as three possible positions concerning the relation of Buddhism and Science and to recommend one of these three positions as both objectively correct and the position which Sot'aesan espoused himself. In discussing these three positions I will ask you to consider a most strange question and one seldom asked by Buddhists. This question is, "What did The Buddha not know?" 

The Three Positions 

Religionists and scientists have understood their enterprises in a myriad of ways. However I think that three particular ways of understanding the relation between science and religion emerge. These three possible relations between science and religion and more particularly science and Won Buddhism are the relation of anticipation, rejection and neutrality or conciliation. 

Anticipation 

Some authors have written popular books arguing in effect that Asian metaphysics anticipates European science. These books, for instance, Gary Zukav's, The Dancing Wu Li Masters (ii), argue that the metaphysical principles enunciated in classical Buddhism, or Taoism, foretold the scientific discoveries and world-view of contemporary science. Even more common than books which attempt to fuse Asian metaphysics with Western physics are the books of "new age" thinkers who sprinkle physical terms, like energy, relativity and quantum into their mystical musings. These books in effect assert that Gotama Buddha and other Asian ancients knew the implications, if not the results, of contemporary science over two thousand years in advance. 

Some take metaphysical ideas in Buddhism like dependent coorigination as being an anticipation of the Principle of Relativity. Others see the Buddhist doctrine of anatta, or not a soul, as supported by quantum mechanics, or scientific theories of chaos. Usually the net result is a fuzzy religionism that attempts to blend science and religion, either seeing scientific support for religious opinion or religious anticipation of scientific theory. Certainly everyone is entitled to their religious opinions in these regards and such opinions should not be said to be wrong or right. However I believe that a person can have a more consistent understanding of science and religion that does not make any such assumptions. Sot'aesan's comments seem to imply such a position. 

One can thoroughly enjoy analogies and discussions of Buddhism and science but it is important to draw a distinction between the two. Analogies tell us that some things are like others not that they are identical. Mahayana Buddhism is like a great raft but it is not a great raft. A person's hair, if one were to have hair, can be described as golden but one should not try to spend it. 

Ordinarily people do not mistake analogies for identities but when matters are very abstract, as here, when a metaphysical system, such as Buddhism, is being compared to an implied metaphysical implication of a physical theory it is easy to misstep and to fail to notice that similarities are not identities. I might look like my brother but I am not my brother, except perhaps in some metaphorical way, or in way of a moral recommendation. 

I will give you a clear argument for rejecting the view that Buddhism, either in its classical form or in its contemporary expression with Sot'aesan, anticipates or is identical to the truths found in science. In order to fully appreciate my argument it is necessary to know a small amount of the history of science. So in order to complete the argument I will just share with you a bit of this history in a very simplified way. I do this on the possibility that some listeners will not be completely familiar with this history. This history of science is a necessary condition for understanding the argument I wish to give to you concerning the non-relation of Buddhism and Science. 

Modern science has its origin in the astronomical discoveries of Galileo, in the Keplerian theories of elliptical planetary motions and the eventual deduction of these motions and all gravitational phenomena in the more general laws discovered, created, or founded by Newton. Newton's view of the universe ruled for centuries as the ultimate scientific view. Here and there a bit or piece of his picture was disputed but to the greatest regard Newton's view of the material universe was considered correct. 

Before giving the conclusion to this fairly well known history lesson let us consider for an instant or two the tremendous power associated with the implications of this scientific view. I believe that this world-view and its apparati, techniques and consequences have conquered the world and continue to vanquish the world every moment. This view, the scientific, results in what Sot'aesan calls advancing material civilization. Material civilization vanquishes the world in an ever more compounding ways. So technology seems to ever advance. We can look back at the world of our parents and it seems quaint. Of course, we understand the grace of our parents and the worth in their effect on us, still their world, although equal to ours morally is somehow unequal to ours materially. This is because science harnesses the future. Science moves us ever forward. Some people despair this advance of material civilization and argue that with the advance will come ruin, which is possible, but it seems from what Sot'aesan says that he feels that when material civilization comes to its hoped for conclusion and when the world itself advances to the same extent spiritually as it has materially then all peoples will be Buddhas. 

Just as one example of the advance in material civilization consider our means of communication. All of us gathered here take for granted that we should be able to speak to anyone else on the planet we should choose at almost any time we should want. Just one hundred years ago such relatively constant communication would not be possible, two hundred years ago talk of such communication would seem magical, a hundred years hence, our means of communication might seem as dated and antiquated as the telegraph or signal lamp. Moreover I submit to you if one were simply to study Buddhistic metaphysics one would never get around to inventing the means for such global communication. Of course, perhaps, if one were to master all of Buddhistic metaphysics, one might not need to speak to anyone else anyway. 

Before my aside about the triumph of the scientific world view, and I mean by this what I think Sot'aesan calls "the advance of material civilization" I was recounting the familiar history of science, which many of you know but perhaps a few of you have forgotten or have had no occasion to know. I had recounted the triumph of Newton. I should say in passing that one of the most fascinating features of science's advance is to see the continual religious convictions of its main architects and then also to see, and perhaps to understand, why their religious convictions are either unknown or dismissed, as being irrelevant to their discoveries. 

Newton was triumphant from 1687, the date of the publishing of his monumental, Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (iv) until 1905, when Einstein laid his theory of light to rest in his famous paper on the photoelectric effect. The Newtonian view of the world, which is close enough and probably had enough impetus to create our present state of material civilization generated a problem. The problem was that of light moving through the Newtonian "ether." The famous Michelson-Morley experiment performed in the later part of the nineteenth century produced results that showed that the Newtonian theory could not be completely correct. Even before the experiment there was a sense of the problem as the wave theory of light makes testament. Einstein's theory of special relativity explained the apparent paradox in such an elegant way that he wrested from Newton the crown of the man with the most dominant world view, at least as regards the material plane. 

My history lesson complete I return to the problem with Buddhism being identified with the Einsteinian or contemporary physical theory view. The problem lays in the history, or the implication or lesson from that history. Science has had its revolutions, Newton's view was succeeded by Einstein's view. Perhaps Einstein's view will be supplanted. 

Those familiar with science know that the story of science is incomplete. Einstein spent the latter part of his life attempting to enunciate a Unified Field Theory, an ultimate explanation of all material phenomena. I think that the consensus view is that he failed in this endeavor. Science at present is an incomplete story. Richard Feynman writes that our time in history will be remembered as the time that we worked together to complete this story but before the final chapter is written the whole world-view might shift again. And, the view might shift again radically. 

If Buddhism is seen as predicting Einstein and if Einstein's view is eventually superseded as Newton's view was, then will Buddhism have been shown to be false? Such a notion is of course anathematic, horrifying, mistaken, and impossible to anyone who pledges allegiance to Buddhism. No experiment, no elegant physical theory, no clever explanation could prove our Buddhistic convictions false. Nothing that could be seen in a telescope or a microscope could shake our faith. I recommend to you that fairness demands that also no experiment nor elegant physical theory confirms Buddhism either. It is for this reason that I believe that it is to mistake an analogy for an identity to think that Buddhism anticipates relativity or contemporary physics. The position that I call acceptance, anticipation or identification is therefore false. 

Answering the background question that I mentioned at the outset, concerning what Buddha did not know. I think that it is consistent with Buddhism to hold that Buddha, or any other enlightened being, need not know the truths of science. It is possible to hold that Buddha was enlightened and he did not predict and could not anticipate the findings of modern science. Complete study of all and every Buddhist text would not lead a person to scientific invention. Just as Buddha or Sot'aesan is not to be faulted for not having known some particular fact about the world, such as my address or yours, so the Masters are not to be faulted for not knowing that light travels at a certain speed or that matter is made up of things called quarks. The nature of Enlightenment is complete knowledge of moral truth not necessarily physical theory. 

If an Enlightened being did not know Physics we would have no reason to doubt the being's enlightenment, yet if that same person did an act that we felt was unconscionable, mean or savage then we should doubt their attainment. The wisdom of the saints, the Bodhisattvas, the masters, the patriarchs does not lie in knowledge of the physical world but certitude in moral matters. 

Rejection 

The Great Master said,

''The perfect world, in which the spiritual and physical life are well-integrated, will be constructed when, inwardly, moral study develops through the progress of spiritual civilization, and when, outwardly, the philosophy of science develops through the progress of material civilizations."(v.) 

I think such a statement shows that Sot'aesan felt that there had to be some sort of conciliation between Buddhism and science but many other consider Buddhism, or any form of religion, as antithetical to science. Although this is a view that I reject and I believe Sot'aesan rejects, I think that the view is generated by two proposed aspects of Buddhism, and two possible aspects of religion in general. 

In this section of my talk I should like to do two things. First, I will deal briefly with a way that I believe that Buddhism is presented in the West and why if this view of Buddhism is correct then Science and Buddhism would conflict. Secondly I would like to share with you again a short history lesson. This time the history concerns the conflict between religion and science in the West. 

In the West Buddhism has been presented as asserting an anti-scientific spiritualism that is coupled with an irrationalism. If this view of Buddhism is correct then an individual must make a hard choice between science and religion. If religion is seen as asserting the proposition that immaterial things exist then there is a conflict. It seems to me possible that this first conflict can be overcome. One could be what is called a neutral monist, that is, the metaphysical position that reality can sometimes be seen as mind, sometimes seen as matter and that these two interpretations need only be consistent within their explanatory schemes. 

I believe the second presentation of Buddhism, that is, as an irrationalist philosophy is more detrimental to any possible reconciliation between traditional science and Buddhism. By traditional science I mean the organized whole of structured information with Physics at its heart, mathematics as its formulae and logic as its method. If Buddhism is fundamentally illogical then no reconciliation can be made between science and Buddhism. 

Many people speak as though Buddhism is irrationalistic. The most common assumption made by my non-Buddhistic friends concerning my religious conviction is that for some unknown reason, I guess, formally unknown, I have decided to live my life based on guess, chance, and no good reason at all. I think Buddhism has been presented in this way, especially in the West, and especially by some adherents of Zen, who attempt to pawn off profound confusion for enlightenment. 

If I feel that my views about science are those of the majority, I confess that I believe that my views about a rationalistic Buddhism are those of a minority. Buddhism, at least from my reading of the popularizers of Buddhism in the West, is for the most part presented as part of a general flight from reason that seems to be a reaction to the complexity of contemporary civilization. Sot'aesan's comments in their practicality and simple clarity give comfort to my view that Buddhism can be rationalistic. That is, that enlightenment means fully understanding matters, being more awake, having the ultimate reason and that enlightenment does not mean ultimately having no reason at all. Again, my view on this might be that of a minority. People of pure faith often demean reason as though it were faith's ugly sibling. By training, proclivity and conviction I feel closer to the rationalistic mystic tradition in the West as embodied by St. Anselm and Thomas Aquinas, who felt reason was a raft to Enlightenment. Not many people who call themselves religious, either in the so-called East or West take this view but I think that it is the best view to take. 

The conflict between science and religion in the West has been long-standing, perhaps continual, but I would like to focus upon two particular instances of the conflict. I think these conflicts are illustrative of the sort of problems that have led people to feel that one must make a fatal choice between science and religion. 

The first historical incident is the conflict between Galileo and the Roman Catholic Church. I characterize this conflict as a metaphysical conflict. Since the 19th century and into our present time there has been another conflict between science and religion, over evolution. The evolutionary conflict is a textual conflict, that is, a case where sacred text, The Bible, presents a world-view that seemingly reports in an opposite fashion than the findings, or theories of science. In both cases there are elements of fight and flight and both cases show the possible irreconcilability of science and religion. 

The conflict between the Church and Galileo concerned his astronomical work. The issue was whether the earth rotated around the sun or whether the sun rotated around the earth. (In the Scriptures Sot'aesan is asked this very question and he replies that there is a way of reconciling the two views, although he does not set it out.) The bare facts of the story is that Galileo eventually recanted the truth out of fear of death. The church had already killed another astronomer for holding to Galileo's truth. Many understand the story as a political struggle, that the Church was in the throes of the Reformation and needed to assure the laity of the immutable truth of the Church's teaching. Some even have noted recently that Galileo was not a man without sin. He was in many ways quite mean spirited and vain and selfish so he perhaps brought the harsh judgment on himself. 

From the perspective of the relation between religion and science, the problem was that the Catholic Church had taken an Aristotelian metaphysical view and bled it over into Church teaching. The Church supported the geocentric theory first with Aristotle and then secondarily with the Bible. When Galileo offered to show his accusers the vision of the moon through his telescope some refused to look because they were certain, because of Aristotle's pronouncements, that the moon could be not be other than a perfect body. The view that I ultimately recommend would result in the Buddhist brushing Galileo aside in fervor to discover the truth rather than fleeing from something that might cause reconsideration. The Church took the position, not unfamiliar to religionists, that revelation trumped reason. 

Time has vindicated Galileo's view. The lesson learned was important and the lesson was that science provided a more accurate picture of the world than theorizing without rigorous testing, observation and communal confirmation. 

The second historical conflict that I wish to make use of arises over the issue of evolution. Here Christian fundamentalists have felt threatened by the Darwinian theory of evolution. They have gone to various extremes to controvert Darwin, even attempting to subvert science itself by attempting to claim that creationism is a theory of the same epistemic rank as evolution. Most people of Science take the position that creationism is mistaken, and is not an alternate scientific view. The conflict though shows a second kind of dispute between religion and science. Here the dispute is textual rather than metaphysical. The sacred words of the Bible seem to imply that the scientific theory is mistaken. The religionists feel that the authoritative texts are a better guide to reality than science. 

Here truths of religion are seen as conflicting with truths of science. If the conflict is real then an individual must decide which camp he or she wishes to abide in. Many people who are religious feel opposed to science and many scientists feel opposed to religion. This second position shows the partisans as openly hostile. I think that it would answer the strange question that I asked at the outset concerning a Buddha's knowledge as saying that there really is nothing that the Buddha does not know and in so far as any proposed knowledge system conflicts with either the metaphysical system enunciated or implied by a Buddha then this other proposed knowledge system is mistaken. Science and religion never shall meet. 

Conciliation 

The Great Master said,

"Not all of scientific studies are constantly in use. On the other hand, however, the study of how to use the mind is constantly used. Therefore, the study of how to use the mind is basic to all scientific studies." (vi)  

If Buddhism does not entail science and if science does not refute Buddhism then what is the best way to describe and prescribe their relation. As I mentioned before I think that one could engage in Buddhistic metaphysics for centuries and never discover electricity, nor the computer, nor technology, nor the atomic bomb. Only as a result of a peculiar germination of ideas did the flower of science emerge. For a time Western culture considered itself superior to Eastern culture as a result of the happenstance of being the first scientific civilization. Now perhaps the scales are tilting. But as Sot'aesan saw there is an inevitable advance to material civilization. This advance is neither Eastern nor Western. It is collective and universal, each day it enables new relations and it severs old. Witness, ourselves, how diverse a group we are and how we have all come to be here today. Only scientific technology, airplanes, computers, telephones, fax machines could enable us to accomplish this task but if there were only this technology would we really have anything much of interest to talk about? I do not think so. 

Although I do not think that any principle of Buddhism would lead one to the discovery of the atomic bomb it is also the case that there is no equation in physics that leads one to know whether it is right or wrong to use such a device. 

Science is like a vehicle, it can take us to various places but it can go nowhere alone. The truths that we derive from our religious insight give us direction in our lives and then we as citizens of the world must give direction to science's advance and to the direction of material civilization. I take Sot'aesan to be saying that the ideal state will be when both spiritual and material civilization are perfected. 

I think that such a view is obviously correct and tells us to pull science towards the goals of making every person's life free from misery. Others would use science for awful ends, the mass destruction of human life or their selfish accretion of personal wealth. To be a Buddhist and a scientist is to always stand against the wicked use of scientific technique, to always urge that science be used for the eradication of misery and to take on the study of science to aid in that eradication. 

There is nothing in Physics that contradicts nor affirms Buddhism and there is nothing in Buddhism that contradicts nor affirms physics. Science is an enormous project, like the building of a Temple or a Cathedral. Civilization somehow or other through chance or design began this project. The process and the progress of this project seems inevitable but it could rampage and the Buddhist should be standing there, along with all other people of good intent, to prevent the rampage and to direct science towards its proper end, the providing to the individual the satisfaction of every need, but not every want. 

I have sketched here three views of the relation of Science and Won Buddhism. I have shown the implications of each and have recommended the third. As to the question concerning a Buddha's knowledge I come to a strange sounding position. A Buddha could not know and still be Enlightened. 

In conclusion, if the third view that I have presented were adopted we would maintain that a Buddha does not know everything but that it is the place of humans acting in the world to eventually accomplish this full knowledge. The accomplishment of this full knowledge is the enterprise of Science. This enterprise is most important for it holds out as its ultimate goal the eradication of misery and ignorance. When that eradication is complete then it will be easier to enlighten everyone. The enterprises of science and promulgation of Won Buddhism can go hand in hand. Sot'aesan's comments appear to show he felt this way and as always he provides us with the best of all possible guidance. (vii) 

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(i) The Scriptures of Won Buddhism, P. 121. 

(ii) Gary Zukav, The Dancing Wu Li Master: An Overview of the New Physics, Bantam Publishing 1980. 

(iii) I take the traditional approach that the context of justification is the proper subject of science and that the context of discovery is the proper subject of the history or sociology of science. I still feel that this is either the majoritarian or correct view of the matter. Certainly others take the other side, most notably, Thomas Kuhn in his notable work, The Structure of Scientific Discovery. 

(iv)The Concise Columbia Encyclopedia is licensed from Columbia University Press. Copyright 1995 by Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. 

(v) The Scriptures of Won Buddhism, p. 121. 

(vi) The Scriptures of Won Buddhism, p. 307. 

(vii) Many of the ideas in this paper come from lengthy dispute with my friend, Larry DeWitt