ver a year after being reported in the media, a study measuring the attitudes of leading scientists on the question of the existence of a god has found its way into the pages of Scientific American magazine. The September issue of the prestigious publication featured a piece, "Scientists and Religion in America" by Edward J. Larson and Larry Witham, which includes findings reported last year in the journal Nature. That article stimulated another round of debate within scientific, religious and philosophical circles over the implications of scientific findings for theology, and was even denounced by U.S. Congressman James Traficant (D-Ohio) who charged that "super smart" scientists not believing in God "cannot find the toilet."

    Larson is the Richard B. Russell Professor of History and Law at the University of Georgia, and won the 1998 Pulitzer Prize in history for book "Summer for the Gods" (Basic Books, Harper Collins, 1997), an account of the infamous Scopes evolution trial. Witham is an author and religion reporter for the Washington Times newspaper.

    Last year, the pair announced results of a study which replicated surveys made in 1913 and 1933 by sociologist James H. Leuba that measured attitudes within the scientific community concerning the existence of a deity. Leuba had reported a decline in personal belief among scientists in a "God in intellectual and affective communication with humankind" from 27.7% in the 1913 study to only 15% by 1933. "Disbelief" rose from 52.7% to 68%, and "doubt or agnosticism" fell slightly from 20.9% to 17%. The 1998 Larson-Witham study which replicated Leuba's work found "Personal belief" in a deity at only 7%, while "Personal disbelief" had risen to 72.2%, and "Doubt or Agnosticism" to 20.8%.

    The survey measured attitudes among members of the prestigious National Academy of Sciences. Witham and Larson noted:

"Disbelief in God and immortality among NAS biological scientists was 65.2% and 69.0% respectively, and among NAS physical scientists it was 79.0% and 76.3%. Most of the rest were agnostics on both issues, with few believers. We found the highest percentage of belief among NAS mathematicians (14.3% in God, 15.0% in immortality). Biological scientists had the lowest rate of belief (5.5% in God, 7.1% in immortality), with physicists and astronomers slightly higher (7.5% in God, 7.5% in immortality)."

    But this profound disbelief doesn't appear to reflect the pop-culture sense that, somehow, science and religion are moving toward a convergence or reconciliation of some sort. Writing in Astronomy magazine, for instance, Dr. Victor Stenger of the University of Hawaii explored the volley of claims being made in support of such a view, such as the July 20, 1998 Newsweek issue which announced: "SCIENCE FINDS GOD." Indeed, participants at a conference "Science and the Spiritual Quest" organized by the Center for Theology and Science (which also included theologians) expressed the view that, as Stenger observed, "science and religion are now converging, and what they are converging on is God."

   And the Newsweek essay advanced the dubious claim that while "The achievements of modern science seem to contradict religion and undermine faith ... for a growing number of scientists, the same discoveries offer support for spirituality and hints at the very nature of God."

    Is this really accurate?

    George Johnson noted in the New York Times that "religious believers seem more eager than ever to step over the line, trying to interpret scientific data to support the revealed truths of their own theology." Examples can be found in augments claiming that the cosmos is "custom made" or "designed" for consciousness, or that the Big Bang "proves" that a creator initiated a sequence of titanic cosmic events. One incentive for this is the lucrative Templeton Prize for Progress in religion, established in 1972 by mutual funds wizard John Templeton. Under the terms governing the Foundation awarding the cash prize, it must always be in excess of any other annual prize for strictly scientific achievements. In 1999, Minnesota physicist and theologian Ian Barbour -- a former pupil of Enrico Fermi and a graduate of the Yale Divinity School -- won the $1.24 million award. "There is a new interest in religion," Barbour told the Ottawa Citizen newspaper, "because scientists who have been looking at the Big Bang find it raises questions that cannot be fully answered within science."

    Another Templeton winner is Paul Davies, Professor of Theoretical Physics at the University of Newcastle, and author of numerous works such as "God and the New Physics" and "The Cosmic Blueprint." Davies is one of a small but vocal group of scientists who claim that findings in astrophysics, cosmology and related areas allow them to get beyond the thicket of traditional theological arguments, and produce direct evidence for some kind of intelligent design -- and a designer -- in the universe. "The very fact that the universe is creative," insists Davies, "and that the laws have permitted complex structures to emerge and develop to the point of consciousness -- in other words, that the universe has organized its own self awareness -- is for me powerful evidence that there is 'something going on' behind it all. The impression of design is overwhelming..."

    If Davies is right, though, and if the "impression" of intelligent design -- in other words, God -- is "overwhelming," more scientists should be reaching the same kind of conclusion. They aren't, at least according to Leuba and, more recently, the survey taken by Larson and Witham. The latter went to considerable length to precisely duplicate Leuba's earlier techniques, and their Scientific American piece gropes for answers to explain what clearly is a trend away from God belief and toward atheism within the highest echelons of America's scientific community.

    The Larson-Witham study presents a somewhat different picture, though, when one examines the broader scientific community, not just the National Academy of Science. The pair, following Leuba method and earlier work, surveyed "a random sample of biological and physical scientists (the latter included mathematicians) listed in the standard reference work American Men and Women of Science..." Four in 10 of those responding to Leuba's original survey believed in a God, and today the figure hovers around the 40% mark. In Leuba's time, about 50% of that cohort believed in an afterlife, but in the Larson-Witham survey, that figure declined to about 40%. Indeed, disbelief seems more pronounced among what Leuba defined as the "greater" scientists, reaching the 90% mark in the new study. "NAS biologists are the most skeptical," notes Larson and Witham, "with 95% of our respondents (NAS) evincing atheism and agnosticism." Similarly, as intellectual historian Paul K. Conkin observes, "Today the higher the educational attainment, or the higher the scores earned on intelligence or achievement tests, the less likely are individuals to be Christians."

"Religious believers seem more eager than ever to step over the line, trying to interpret scientific data to support the revealed truths of their own theology."

    Musing about the implications of black holes or dark matter may be intellectually safe, but Larson and Witham note that with the ongoing debate over evolution, the biological sciences are more of a political minefield. Noting that "Disbelief and belief have often become a major public relations issue for science in religious America," the pair attempt to explore the touchy subject of human origins, and how scientists respond. Dr. William B. Provine, an outspoken evolutionist and atheist, recalls, "I asked some people at the NAS why they don't have a section on evolution... Too controversial." The recent decision by the Kansas Board of Education to not require that evolution be presented to students as factual, and to allow discussion of Christian creationism or even new age accounts on how life and the universe began, suggests that the subject remains controversial and volatile.

    If there is a downside to the Witham-Larson study as presented in Scientific American, though, it is the suggestion that maybe, just maybe, this disbelief among the "greater" cohort of scientific intellectuals is due a process of subtle selection. "Are the deepest contemporary scientific minds drawn to atheism, or do the higher echelons of academia select for the trait of disbelief?" they ask. Matthew Cartmill, president of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists is quoted: "Many scientists are atheists or agnostics who want to believe that the natural world they study is all there is, and being only human, they try to persuade themselves that science gives them the grounds for that belief..."

    "It's an honest belief," he told Discover magazine, "but it isn't a research finding." Larson and Witham then go on to discuss the 1997 symposium of the Society for Neuroscience where the so-called "God module" was the hot topic of discussion, "a spot in the brain that apparently produces religious feelings."

    So, Larson and Witham -- and those like Cartmill who make similar statements -- thus buy into a kind of one-sided postmodernism. The claims of the Templeton winners, scientists like Paul Davies, are provocative enough to be taken seriously -- maybe, just maybe there is indeed this grand reconciliation between the frontiers of science and theological doctrine. Those who "believe" in atheism -- a system of thought that is actually more of a lack of belief in the supernatural -- are thus presented as "cobelievers" of a sort. Unlike Leuba, or even Larson and Witham when confining themselves to replicating the earlier surveys, there is no statistical evidence to profile these alleged scientists so enthralled by their disbelief that they, presumably, filter and selectively distort any experimental evidence.

    Larson and Witham also argue that "Concern for the environment has provided common ground for nonbelievers, humanist scientists and liberal religionists," and note Carl Sagan's 1990 open letter "welcoming and challenging the religious community to get on board the movement to save the planet."

If Davies is right, though, and if the 'impression' of intelligent design -- in other words, God -- is 'overwhelming,' more scientists should be reaching the same kind of conclusion. They aren't...

    "The next year Sagan stood beside a robed Episcopal bishop in Manhattan Cathedral of St. John the Divine as they co-chaired the joint appeal by science and religion for the environment."

    There may be a convergence of common interests here, but it is not clear that "welcoming and challenging the religious community" to add their voice to the complex debate over environmental issues is either practical or can result in greater understanding. Sagan was taken to task for some of the conclusions he advanced; and any scientist steps into precarious territory when trying to use academic expertise from one area to argue facts -- and social policy -- in another. William Shockley helped to invent the transistor, but advanced bogus arguments about ethnicity and intelligence. Linus Pauling became a torchbearer on behalf of hyperbolic claims touting the ubiquitous benefits of vitamin C. Indeed, though Sagan remains a hero to many skeptics and atheists, he may well have succumbed to the old "argument from authority" pitfall when using his credentials and status as a public celebrity to opine beyond his areas of competence and expertise.

    Finally, building on the earlier work by Leuba, Witham and Larson construct a hierarchy or spectrum which describes the gradations of attitudes scientists appear to have in respect to religious belief. There are those who embrace intelligent design and 'theistic science," and those who agree with Provine, that the universe is, essentially, all there is and lacks transcendent purpose. There are also those who see Darwinian evolution as "a rich resource for seeking a theistic presence in their lives," by accepting a "young earth" or even "old earth" scenario, the latter obviously more at home with the vast body of evidence in support of a Darwinian model. "A few flood geologists with secular doctorates in science" populate one corner of this creationist universe, while "the old-earth camp wants to convert such people to ancient time, to work together on poking holes in orthodox, neo-Darwinian evolution, which they find implicitly atheistic." Witham and Larson should have cited both "camps" for their attempt to impose a theological construct on a body of physical evidence -- something they seem to accuse the "atheistic" scientists of the NAS of doing.

    Following this segue into the various nuances and positions which constitute the continuum of opinion scientists have on the question of god, Witham and Larson then launch into their own questionable summation. Thanks to the influence of Templeton and the rise of what they term" postmodern relativism," they insist that "many on both sides now sound willing to admit limits to their way of knowing." That may be true of those leaning toward atheism, for even scientists (and nonscientists) who stop short of the "hard atheism" of Provine often admit that they do not have and may never possess those answers to the "ultimate questions" once considered only the province of eschatology and theology. Can Davies, or Barbour or the other champions of "intelligent design" say the same?

    Concluding, the Scientific American authors do reveal, however, a poignant fact of intellectual life in the midst of the divisive and heated culture wars. They observe that "some politically savvy scientists recognize the value in downplaying the negative implications for the supernatural that arise from their study of the natural." Even coming from Witham and Larson, the statement is prescient in light of another study being released this month which shows that Americans have a significantly stronger belief in supernatural teachings, including the existence of a deity, than our European counterparts. Dr. George Bishop of the University of Cincinnati noted astonishing high percentages of respondents in the United States who believed in "theistic evolution," or rejected any form of evolutionary mechanism in order to explain the origins of life. Groping for explanations, Bishop suggested the existence of a vigorous belief-bazaar where a slew of different religions compete for followers, and a "spiral of silence," a climate where people with atheist or agnostic viewpoints are reluctant to state their views in public."

    The new Scientific American article is sure to spark more debate and controversy in a debate which has raged for decades. It could, for good or bad, suggest that intellectual elites are far more skeptical of religious belief than the average person. Indeed, Americans reflect a marked ambivalence about science, trusting and indeed even enthusiastically embracing its practical uses, while still clinging to doctrines which many scientists argue have little or any basis in fact.

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