A Theef of Reason
With the full array of modern scientific medicine at his disposal, it is understandable that Dr. Wieder is confident of winning when all he has pitted against him is a backwoods witchdoctor with a nifty set of pin cushions. But, as no less a figure than Richard Dawkins has noted, when science goes up against superstition in the X Files, well, there’s only ever one winner. It is the kind of outcome that those of a more rational bent might find annoying. It is also indicative of their lack of understanding – both of the X Files, itself, and of human life.
Dr Dana Scully has spent the best part of seven years experiencing the same exasperation; just how can her scientific approach to life, science which has given us such marvels as modern medicine and cell phones, be so wrong case after case? That she has managed to keep herself invested in the X Files without throwing up her arms and demanding a transfer is testament to her stoicism and, no doubt, her love of Mulder – though getting to shoot him at least once must have helped!
Undoubtedly, one of the most interesting aspects of the X Files is Scully’s adaptation to a world that doesn’t fully comply with her science. Which, just as undoubtedly, is likely to piss of those who’d prefer science to be the answer to whatever the question might be. Such thinking would be quick to deride anyone who held the belief that God is the answer, now what’s the question? And you can kind of understand why. Science itself is not an answer, only the method adopted in finding it. What they might not be so willing to accept is the fact that it was the idea of a single God as creator of an ordered universe that gave birth to the very science they now seek to oppose Him with.
Ancient Egypt is the longest surviving culture in human history. Yet, because they believed in a pantheon of gods never did they come close to developing a scientific approach to their world. Only after the gods became an ancestral memory did the Ancient Greeks develop a culture that gave us democracy, philosophy and tragedy. Only because Augustine and Aquinas were able to combine the legacy of the Greeks with the monotheism of the Jews was science made possible. In simple terms, God gave us science.
Scully struggles to reconcile her science with her Catholicism when, in fact, there is no contradiction. If she had just been able to accept that the one flows from the other she would have reached the point she has in ‘Theef’ a lot sooner and with far less angst.
Peattie stands at the other end of the spectrum. He has no use for God or science. He is more like those scientists who believe they have the only way of looking at the world than they would like to think. Atheistic scientists are no different from a backwoods witchdoctor for both believe they have the one true understanding of the world. Both believe that they are able to bend the world and its laws to their own ends. Science without belief is as irrational as belief without science. Ultimately, both result in the destruction of human life.
What the scientists fail to see, why they don’t understand the continuance of belief, is that science isn’t human, it lacks feeling, it lacks compassion. A scientist who has no greater belief than the unending search for objective truth will never understand why a rainbow that hasn’t been unweaved is far more beautiful than one that has.
Unweaving the rainbow may lead to greater knowledge and understanding of our world which, in itself, is no bad thing. It will never compensate for the feeling of the grandeur of life and God’s creation that one experiences upon just seeing the beauty of those arched colours in the sky. Watch a child’s excitement upon seeing a rainbow. No amount of unweaving will ever produce such joy.
The knowledge is invaluable; but without the joy what’s the point?
Dr Dana Scully has spent the best part of seven years experiencing the same exasperation; just how can her scientific approach to life, science which has given us such marvels as modern medicine and cell phones, be so wrong case after case? That she has managed to keep herself invested in the X Files without throwing up her arms and demanding a transfer is testament to her stoicism and, no doubt, her love of Mulder – though getting to shoot him at least once must have helped!
Undoubtedly, one of the most interesting aspects of the X Files is Scully’s adaptation to a world that doesn’t fully comply with her science. Which, just as undoubtedly, is likely to piss of those who’d prefer science to be the answer to whatever the question might be. Such thinking would be quick to deride anyone who held the belief that God is the answer, now what’s the question? And you can kind of understand why. Science itself is not an answer, only the method adopted in finding it. What they might not be so willing to accept is the fact that it was the idea of a single God as creator of an ordered universe that gave birth to the very science they now seek to oppose Him with.
Ancient Egypt is the longest surviving culture in human history. Yet, because they believed in a pantheon of gods never did they come close to developing a scientific approach to their world. Only after the gods became an ancestral memory did the Ancient Greeks develop a culture that gave us democracy, philosophy and tragedy. Only because Augustine and Aquinas were able to combine the legacy of the Greeks with the monotheism of the Jews was science made possible. In simple terms, God gave us science.
Scully struggles to reconcile her science with her Catholicism when, in fact, there is no contradiction. If she had just been able to accept that the one flows from the other she would have reached the point she has in ‘Theef’ a lot sooner and with far less angst.
Peattie stands at the other end of the spectrum. He has no use for God or science. He is more like those scientists who believe they have the only way of looking at the world than they would like to think. Atheistic scientists are no different from a backwoods witchdoctor for both believe they have the one true understanding of the world. Both believe that they are able to bend the world and its laws to their own ends. Science without belief is as irrational as belief without science. Ultimately, both result in the destruction of human life.
What the scientists fail to see, why they don’t understand the continuance of belief, is that science isn’t human, it lacks feeling, it lacks compassion. A scientist who has no greater belief than the unending search for objective truth will never understand why a rainbow that hasn’t been unweaved is far more beautiful than one that has.
Unweaving the rainbow may lead to greater knowledge and understanding of our world which, in itself, is no bad thing. It will never compensate for the feeling of the grandeur of life and God’s creation that one experiences upon just seeing the beauty of those arched colours in the sky. Watch a child’s excitement upon seeing a rainbow. No amount of unweaving will ever produce such joy.
The knowledge is invaluable; but without the joy what’s the point?
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