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How best might we relate cosmology and theology? Many today
urge that we take the beginning of the universe at "t=0"
as direct support of the creation of the world as described in
the Bible. This sort of position has surfaced to a varying degree
by groups otherwise differing widely: evangelical and conservative
Christians, religiously open scientists and educators, various
denominational leaders and church spokespersons, main-line theologians,
and so on. It is similar to the "conflict" model
in that it assumes there can be a direct link between a specific
scientific theory, like cosmology or evolution, and a specific
theological view, such as belief or unbelief in God the Creator.
Unlike the conflict model, the direct support model has some
attractive features. Clearly there is something religiously evocative
about the idea that the universe may have had a beginning according
to science. If we start with faith in God as the Creator of the
universe, we can greet the beginning of the universe with a profound
sense of recognition: the universe, like, us, had a beginning,
and it too may have an end.
My concern, however, is not with the way in which science can
give language to piety but with the way in which scientific results
might be taken as the basis for faith. This concern is fed from
a number of sources. First of all the doctrine of creation should
not be truncated to a single claim, namely that creation had a
beginning. Instead creation ex nihilo includes the continuing
existence of the universe and the laws of nature, as we have already
seen. Hence it is fair to search for new meaning for theology
in the context of science, but we should not reduce theology to
a single scientific argument.
I am also concerned about theology being vulnerable to the
changing fortunes of scientific theories. We must recognize that
the meaning of "t=0" is highly contextualized by the
assumptions and limitations of Big Bang theory. Many of these
are changing as we learn more about the physical evolution of
the universe and as we move beyond the theory of general relativity
into quantum gravity. So, given that all scientific theories eventually
get replaced, which features of the current theory should we take
as telling us something of lasting truth about the universe, and
which features will be abandoned by future theories? In particular,
will the "t=0" feature of Big Bang models recur in successor
cosmological theories, such as those of quantum gravity? But a
more serious concern is for the proper basis for faith. I would
be very cautious about making science the starting point (i.e.,
the foundation) for theology, as the history of deism underscores.
Instead results from cosmology can count as a form of theological
evidence, but only with a much more complex and carefully delineated
understanding of what evidence means and how it helps articulate
and apply, but not prove, a theory. Of course, some scholars,
with these or other concerns, have taken more of a "two worlds"
approach, seeing little substantive relation between cosmology
and theology on the issue of t=0. As I have indicated above,
I think this approach, though valuable in its refusal to opt for
conflict, may keep these fields far more separated than is warranted
- or helpful - today. Instead I would opt for the interaction
model.
Applying the Interaction Model to the "t=0" Problem
in Cosmology
Instead of the direct support approach, I suggest we try out
the interaction model to the question of "t=0" in cosmology.The interaction model will depend on our finding an appropriate
way to relate results between theology and science without tying
them too closely together. This can be done in a number of ways.
Here I will suggest we use the philosophical idea of contingency,
namely that the universe need not exist as such, the laws of nature
need not be what they are, and so on.
In cosmology a particularly lucid example of the contingency
of the universe is its temporal finitude — the age of the
universe— as depicted by the Big Bang model. We also interpret
contingency as finitude theologically. In the doctrine of creation
"out of nothing" (creatio ex nihilo) it is held
that all created being is finite; only God is infinite.
One form of creaturely finitude - though not the only form - is
the finite age of the world. In this way we can relate the theological
doctrine of creatio ex nihilo via the philosophical
bridge of contingency as finitude to empirical claims about
the universe having a finite age, marked with the limit condition
"t=0" in standard Big Bang models. In this sense, the
theological claim about divine creation as entailing the contingency
of the world is apparently confirmed by the empirical evidence
for the beginning of the universe in the Big Bang model. Hence,
if we believe, for theological reasons, that God created the universe,
then t=0 in Big Bang cosmology gives strong confirmation of that
belief. If we were to use a legal metaphor for the evidence given
to theology by cosmology, we could say that t=0 functions as a
‘character witness,’ but not as an ‘eyewitness’,
to belief in divine creation.
We also want to explore the lessons for creation theology as
science changes. Big Bang cosmology is currently being modified
by the introduction of quantum physics, as we have already seen.
Though highly speculative, the Hawking/Hartle model of the "quantum
creation of the universe" is an example of the kind of challenge
presented by quantum cosmology to the relation between theology
and cosmology. If there is not "t=0" in the Hawking/Hartle
model, does this ‘disprove’ the theological claim that
the universe is created? Actually the interaction method produces
a more nuanced result than this. Recall that, according the Hawking,
the universe has a finite past but no past singularity
at "t=0;" the universe is temporally past finite but
unbounded. If we had too narrowly reduced the theological meaning
of creation to the occurrence of "t=0" in standard cosmology
we might well have a problem here! (Certainly not the problem
Carl Sagan tries to raise in his Preface to Hawking's book - namely
that there is nothing left for God to do. Deism like this is not
even remotely presupposed by those theologians who do take t=0
as direct evidence for God. For them, as for all contemporary
theology in one way or another, God acts everywhere in the universe,
and not just at its beginning.) Yet if we kept the two worlds
separate, we would have nothing to learn either.
But the interaction model provides a surprising new result:
The move from the Big Bang to Hawking's model changes the empirical
meaning of the philosophical category of finitude; it does
not render it meaningless. With Hawking/Hartle the universe is
still temporally finite (in the past) but it does not have
an initial singularity. Hence the shift in models changes the
form of consonance between theology and science from one
of bounded temporal past finitude (found with the Big Bang
model) to one of unbounded temporal past finitude (found
in the Hawking proposal). Thus, as we theologize about creatio
ex nihilo we should separate out the element of past temporal
finitude from the additional issue of the boundedness
of the past. What the Hawking proposal teaches us is that in
principle one need not have a bounded finite
past to have a finite past. This result stands whether or not
Hawking's proposal lasts scientifically.
Hence we have learned something of great value theologically:
creaturely finitude, a fundamental category of the ex
nihilo tradition, need not entail boundedness. What
we have learned from quantum cosmology is that we can claim that
creation is temporally finite without necessarily claiming
that creation had a beginning. Thus our theological claim can
entail more than merely ontological finitude (the limitation
that a "two worlds" approach would defend) since it
also includes temporal finitude; yet it need not go so
far as to identify temporal finitude with a cosmic beginning,
let alone look to such a cosmic beginning as the foundation for
faith in God. I believe this is a tremendously important point
for a Christian doctrine of creation, a point won only by our
willingness to interact with research science and let it challenge
our earlier theological views.
What might the scientist find of value in the interaction with
theology about t=0 and the creation of the universe? For one thing,
support for the recognition that questions about the beginning
of the universe are truly profound and transcend a narrow technical
response, such as shifting from Big Bang to quantum gravity. Instead
every response proffered, whether by Einstein, Hawking, or others,
will involve not only mathematical formulae and empirical data
but subtle philosophical ideas about space, time, matter and causality.
When questions like t=0 arise in theories like Big Bang cosmology
drive scientists to seek alternative theories like quantum cosmology,
they may well address them but the underlying philosophical ideas,
far from being eradicated, will reemerge in new and distinctive
patterns and which will lead to further questions. The responses
brought to the table by research scientists will reflect, either
explicitly or implicitly, their own philosophical and theological
views, and this is both healthy and inevitable in the process
of research science. What may prove additionally useful in the
process is the possibility that recognizing these ideas for what
they are and discussing them openly might actually facilitate
the process of scientific discovery.
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| Contributed by: Dr. Robert Russell
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