An indictment of certainty

by Nicholas Klassen

Photo: Darryl Brown, Janelle Townsend, Geez 10, order info here.

WERE WE CREATED OUT OF THIN AIR by an omniscient deity – the finishing touch of a weeklong project to build the universe? Or did we evolve over billions of years from self-reproducing RNA molecules that got their start in a nebulous primordial goo?

Better yet, does it even matter?

Personally, I don’t give a rat’s ass whether I’m descended from Adam or an amoeba. It has absolutely no bearing on my day-to-day life. And I’m genuinely baffled by people on both sides of the debate who invest so much energy in making their case.

It’s safe to say the Biblical version of how we came to be is a fairy tale. It doesn’t seem terribly likely that the Earth is only 6000 years old. But Genesis is a great story. Lots of familial intrigue, a cameo appearance by a race of giants, a tower built to scrape the sky and a massive ark constructed by a wacko . . . err, I mean, faithful servant of God.

Please tell me
It sure beats the scientific materialist version of how we came to be. Please tell me how I’m supposed to get excited about this storyline: the earth was formed by accident, and that set in motion a bunch of random events that by sheer fluke resulted in the world’s civilizations. According to that storyline, Herman Daly has wryly noted, everything around us is “just a pile of instrumental accidental stuff to be used up on the arbitrary projects of one purposeless species.” Awesome.

So, on the one hand you have the Genesis story, a fascinating Near Eastern cosmology rooted in stories people have been telling each other for millennia. But it seems to have gotten some key details wrong. On the other hand, you have evolutionary theory – the logical extrapolation of evidence gathered and analyzed according to the rigours of the scientific method. But it’s uninspiring, and don’t kid yourself, it too is undergirded by assumptions and conjecture.

Neither leaves me with any sense of certainty about how I came to be here, now. And I’m perfectly fine with that.

Of course, some would like us to think that questions of the creation versus evolution type are highly relevant. The battle over the Kansas Board of Education to determine Creationism’s place in school curriculum is one of many examples. But that fight is less about the issue itself and more about the culture wars being waged for control of the American soul. The whole thing reinforces my point: the fact that control of a state’s education board is won and lost over a debate over our origins is sheer insanity.

Should argue
Obviously if people feel strongly about something, they should argue for it as steadfastly as they feel is warranted. And we do need to guard against willful ignorance shaping public policy. But as a general rule, those of us who are perfectly content with unknowns and ambiguity shouldn’t feel obligated to desire certainty.

Sure, it’s good to wrestle with religious questions. And I’m up for a good intellectual exercise as much as the next person. But ultimately, I don’t expect any concrete answers when it comes to my faith. Which, of course, should go without saying, given the definition of faith. But that hasn’t stopped religious types of all stripes from beaking off about how sure they are that they’re right. To them I say, tone down the conviction and certitude. While I firmly believe there’s a capital ‘T’ truth out there somewhere, the simple reality is that none of us enjoy anything more than fleeting glimpses of it.

So let’s save our energy for figuring out how to eliminate homelessness or something.

Nicholas Klassen lives in Vancouver, B.C. He is a former senior editor at Adbusters magazine and a principal at “Biro Creative”:http://birocreative.com communications firm.

[From Geez 10, Summer 2008. Subscription info here. ]

Comment

1. Mr. Klassen seems very certain about uncertainty, and is willing to speak with certainty about it. I may be missing something, but this article is either silliness or hypocrisy.

   — Bob · Jul 25, 05:06 PM · #

2. From my perspective, the creation stories of most religions don’t hold a candle to the awesome history of the cosmos as we presently understand it through the tools of science. Nothing makes me feel more connected to the universe than pondering how every molecule in my body was forged deep inside the core of a star billions of years ago. Nothing makes me feel more connected to all life on earth than to realize that those same molecules have cycled countless times through the ever changing bodies of organisms in the history of this planet’s life, and to know that when I’m dead and gone they will be taken up and recombined in the bodies of future animals and humans. To be bored by this story of “sheer flukes” as this author puts it, is like yawning at the prospect of having won the lottery. How is it anything but astounding that these molecules, created by the natural processes of star formation have survived and combined in ways that allow thinking and feeling organisms such as us to now look back and marvel at their existence. I would contend that when one has seen past the caricature of this story as described by those opposed to science, and truly understood how awesome it is, they can’t help but feel it’s effect on their day-to-day life. They can’t help but care deeply about what they do to all the other lottery winners they share this world with. They can’t help but worry about how recklessly we treat the planet through our technology. While the stories of religious texts teach us to feel connected to the crimes and passions of our human ancestors and to look forward to some other existence after we die, the stories revealed by science help us realise our connectedness to every speck of life here and now, and convince us to do all we can to care for this oasis of life in the emptiness of space because it’s the only lottery we’ve won and are likely to win any time soon!

   — David · Oct 27, 06:06 AM · #

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