This is 00INTRO.TXT, the preface and introduction to
                    Science Without Bounds
         A Synthesis of Science, Religion and Mysticism
The author invites comments and criticism, 
and may be reached at 72371.1673@compuserve.com. 
"Science Without Bounds" is copyrighted by Arthur J. D'Adamo and
may be freely redistributed.

                           

                           - Preface -


In 1970 I was twenty-two and looking for something to believe in,
something to make sense of the world and my place in it, a world
view. Years of religious elementary and high school had left me
with a dislike of religion, a distaste for it's irrationality,
superstition, and guilt. Science had been much more to my liking;
I had gone to a state university and just received a degree in
electrical engineering. Yet religion had addressed, however
ineptly, however superstitiously, some questions science ignored.
What was my place in the world? Where had I come from? and Where
was I going? Certainly these questions were as important to me as
the voltage and current in an electrical circuit.
  In the following years I attempted to find answers to those
questions. I turned to philosophical, religious and spiritual books
of all kinds. I learned to meditate. I spent years trying to live
a monastic life, both alone and in community. I worked for a while
and then returned to school. I received an M.A. in mathematics and
spent two more years pursuing a Ph.D. but didn't finish. I married
and was divorced.
  Eventually, a body of ideas and concepts, many derived from my
readings, a few perhaps original, coalesced into a world view. This
world view is both simple and profound. It shares the single-minded
dedication to truth of mathematics and science as well as their
rationality, logical methods, and rejection of falsehood and
fantasy. Yet it addresses questions such as Who am I? Where have I
come from? How should I live my life? and What is life's greatest
good?
  Often, I've wanted to communicate this world view to my friends.
But its elements aren't easily presented in short, informal
discussions. Besides, more than an understanding of the individual
ideas is needed. For only when the ideas are placed in proper
relation to each other does the total picture emerge. The world
view results not from a mere summing of its individual elements,
but from their interplay, their fusing into a single, coherent
whole, a logical system.
  A similar fusing of individual truths occurred in geometry many
centuries ago. The Greeks are commonly said to have invented
geometry. For example, William Dampier in A History of Science and
Its Relations with Philosophy and Religion, considered "one of the
outstanding histories of science," ([217],239) writes:
     . . . [T]he first to create science . . . were the Greek
     nature-philosophers of Ionia. The earliest and most
     successful of such attempts was the conversion of the
     empirical rules for land surveying, mostly derived from
     Egypt, into the deductive science of geometry . . .
     ([051],xiii-xiv).
  The Egyptians discovered many geometrical facts before the
Greeks. Why then are the Greeks said to be the creators of
geometry? Because they merged the discoveries of the Egyptians into
a coherent whole, a logical structure, a science.
  For the Egyptians, geometrical assertions were accepted on faith;
for the Greeks, belief naturally followed understanding. Similarly,
the world view presented in this book depends not so much on faith
as on understanding.
  I've never seen a book present this world view. I've seen bits
and pieces expressed, and even large sections. I've seen many of
the elements presented, but not as an harmonious whole.
  For a long time I wished a single book expressing this world view
existed. Yet for years I did nothing.
  This world view isn't original; most of its elements are drawn
from the world's philosophies and religions. So possibly, I
thought, someone has already expressed it with an eloquence and
elegance far exceeding any talent of mine. Or perhaps I simply
didn't possess the intellect or skill to render this work in a
lucid, logical manner. Worse still, when seen in the cold light of
print, the presentation might appear muddled, the ideas confused,
foolish, or unimportant. Thoughts such as these kept this book just
an idea in my mind for many years.
  Eventually, in 1989 my forty-first birthday approached. My
father, who had seen over eighty birthdays, was in the hospital. As
I had at times in the past, I keenly felt the finiteness of life,
particularly my own. (I apologize for the cliche; this is in fact
the situation as it occurred.) I realized when I died I'd regret
never having completed the work I had so often imagined. In August
of 1989, I began writing. (The following June my father passed
away.)
  I write this book for myself, for my family, and for my friends,
although I hope it eventually sees a wider circulation. For myself,
I hope to finally record my ideas and insights, logically and
coherently. Like a builder, I hope to draw the elements into a
structure, a integral whole, which possesses a beauty, a truth, and
a power that exceeds the sum of its parts. For my family and
friends, I offer this simply as a record of ideas that are
important to me. And for those I've never met, I offer this as a
gift. I hope those who hold a traditional, orthodox faith find much
food for thought; no doubt, not all of it to taste but all of it,
I trust, wholesome and true, ultimately serving to strengthen
understanding and deepen faith. I hope the believer in heterodox
faiths also finds much that is rewarding, although there's little
or nothing about astrology, numerology, channelling, crystal or
psychic healing, magic or the occult. And finally, I hope the
person who holds a rational, skeptical, scientific world view -
especially someone with little or no interest in ultimate
questions, who considers metaphysics and theology meaningless, who
accepts no philosophy which treats ultimate questions - comes to
see those ancient questions in a new light.

                         - Introduction -


     For a long time we have been accustomed to the
     compartmentalization of religion and science as if they
     were two quite different and basically unrelated ways of
     seeing the world. I do not believe that this state of
     doublethink can last. It must eventually be replaced by
     a view of the world which is neither religious nor
     scientific but simply our view of the world. More
     exactly, it must become a view of the world in which the
     reports of science and religion are as concordant as
     those of the eyes and the ears. ([227],xviii)

  I remember as a little boy learning of God from my mother, a
religious woman with a life-long devotion to Mary, the mother of
Jesus. The idea of God thrilled me but I soon grew to dislike some
of my religion's ideas. One of the first occurred in second grade,
in a Roman Catholic religion class, where I was taught that only
people who were baptized and believed in Jesus could get into
heaven. I remember thinking "What about Chinese who lived five
thousand years ago? They had no chance of being baptized or
believing in Jesus. Is it fair to keep them out of heaven for no
fault of their own?" I began to suspect that my religious teachers
were wrong about who could or couldn't get into heaven, that they
didn't know what they were talking about.
  As I grew up, I was taught other things I didn't believe. I found
some of the ideas very odd, and wondered how anyone in their right
mind could believe them. For example, I was taught that anyone who
dies with an unforgiven serious sin spends the rest of eternity in
Hell. In those days, intentionally eating meat on Friday or missing
Mass on Sunday was a serious sin. So, a child who knowing ate a hot
dog on Friday, or skipped Mass and went fishing on Sunday, might
die and spend the rest of eternity in hell, horribly tortured, in
the company of murderers and devils. Strange.
  But even stranger was the behavior of people who, supposedly,
believed those ideas. Their words said the ideas were true but
their actions said otherwise. They acted as if they themselves
suspected they didn't know what they were talking about. In third
or fourth grade, a classmate died of appendicitis. Though some
fellow classmates worried if he was in heaven, no adult seemed
concerned in the least. Of course, the adults were sorry for the
little boy and his family. But none showed any real worry about the
fate of his eternal soul. They all assured us (glibly, I thought)
that our deceased classmate was in heaven with God and the angels.
Since then, I've never attended a funeral where anyone, clergy
included, seem the slightest bit worried about the eternal fate of
the deceased. They act as if no one goes to hell, as if hell really
doesn't exist.
  Science is different, scientists seem to believe what they say.
You won't find a scientist who says plutonium is deadly with
plutonium in his pockets. And scientists seem to know what they are
talking about. When astronomers say an eclipse will happen, it
does. But when some religious group predicts the world will end by
September fifteenth or April tenth, it doesn't. It seems science is
truer than religion, more to be taken seriously, more real.
  But why compare science and religion? Why not leave science to
scientist and religion to religious people? What's to be gained?
  Well, a person might reasonably have a more than passing interest
in what really happens after death. They might wonder Where do I
come from? How should I live my life? and What really happens when
I die? Religion discusses those questions but it's answers are not
entirely believable. Science intentionally ignores such questions,
it has nothing to say about them.
  It's as if science has food of all kinds, wholesome, true,
healthy food, but no water. And as if religion has water, brackish
water, polluted with confusion, fantasy, contradiction and lies.
Seeing the quality of religion's water, some people decide to eat
only the healthy, clean food of science - until their thirst drives
them back to religion. Religion fulfills a deep need so they
eventually participate, sometimes in spite of themselves, sometimes
with the excuse "Well, our children need something to believe. It's
better for them to grow up with religion than without."
  If only science had water of its own, pure, clean water. Or,
dropping the analogy, if only science had answers to questions like
Where do I come from? How should I live my life? and What really
happens when I die? If it had such answers, science would have a
religion of its own, a religion as true, as powerful, and as
accurate as the rest of science. Science would finally have a
comprehensive world view.

Science Without Bounds
What is a world view? It's our explanation of ourselves and the
world around us. It's what we believe to be true. It's our view of
"what is what."
  Most people have some explanation of themselves and the world
around them. They have some idea of who they are and how they fit
into their world. But ask them "ultimate" questions such as Where
were you before you were born? Where do you go after you die? Is
there an overall purpose for your life and, if so, what it is? and
either they'll give a standard religious answer or say "I don't
know." That it, their world view is either religious and non-scientific, 
or it's incomplete.
  Does anyone have a scientific world view that's comprehensive,
that answers ultimate questions? Probably not, since science itself
doesn't have a comprehensive world view. Science's world view is
incomplete. Science is very good at explaining part of ourselves -
our liver and heart function, for example - and part of the world
around us - the behavior of electricity. But science has little to
say about really important questions, about ultimate questions.
What the great physicist Erwin Schrodinger wrote in 1948 is just as
true today.
     . . . [T]he scientific picture of the real world around
     me is very deficient. It gives a lot of factual
     information, puts all our experience in a magnificently
     consistent order, but it is . . . silent about all . . .
     that is really near to our heart, that really matters to
     us. . . . [T]he scientific world-view contains of itself
     no ethical values, no aesthetical values, not a word
     about our own ultimate scope or destination, and no God
     . . . Science is reticent too when it is a question of
     the great Unity . . . of which we all somehow form part,
     to which we belong. . . . Whence come I and whither go I?
     That is the great unfathomable question, the same for
     every one of us. Science has no answer to it.
     ([190],93,95,96)
  Schrodinger says science hasn't investigated ultimate questions.
Other writers believe science can't investigate them. For example,
M.I.T. philosophy professor Huston Smith believes:
     Strictly speaking, a scientific world view is impossible;
     it is a contradiction in terms. The reason is that
     science does not treat of the world; it treats of a part
     of it only. ([199],7).
He continues:
     Values, life meanings, purposes, and qualities slip
     through science like sea slips through the nets of
     fishermen. Yet man swims in this sea, so he cannot
     exclude it from his purview. This is what was meant . .
     . that a scientific world view is in principle
     impossible. ([199],16).
  But is it? Is a comprehensive world view forever beyond science's
grasp? Or can science somehow develop a comprehensive world view,
a world view that explains our place in the universe, our origin
and destiny? Can science investigate the questions it has ignored
for centuries? Or has it ignored them all these years for good
reason? Certainly, some early scientists ignored ultimate questions
for a good reason - their own survival. The most famous is,
perhaps, Galileo, who had to answer to the Inquisition for teaching
the earth revolved around the sun. Galileo escaped with his life;
other early scientists were not so fortunate. 
  In its struggle to be born in the 16th and 17th century, science
wisely decided not to investigate religious, philosophical, and
metaphysical questions. It confined its search for truth to the
natural world, within bounds set by religion. Today, certainly no
longer out of necessity and perhaps only out of habit, science
still lies within these boundaries. Einstein describes such science
as
     . . . the century-old endeavor to bring together by means
     of systematic thought the perceptible phenomena of this
     world into as thorough-going an association as possible.
     ([063],44).
"This world" seems to limit science's domain to the natural world
we see around us. It seems to exclude science from investigating
where we came from and were we are going. It sets up the
"perceptible phenomena of this world" as a boundary which science
shouldn't cross.
  But did Einstein really believe that science should forever
remain within that boundary? Perhaps not, for in the very next
sentence he offers a broader description of science's scope.
     To put it boldly, it is the attempt at the posterior
     reconstruction of existence by the process of
     conceptualization. ([063],44).
  "Existence" includes any and all worlds - whatever exists. It
suggests that even if our life's origin, meaning and ultimate
destiny is "supernatural" in any way, it's still a part of
existence and could therefore be a valid object of scientific
inquiry.
  Is Einstein's wider definition appropriate for science? Is it
reasonable? I believe it is. Moreover, it better agrees with
science's original goal as established by the ancient Greeks: the
making of
     . . . a mental model of the whole working of the
     universe. ([212],21).
And it agrees with contemporary physicist Stephen Hawking's
description of science's purpose.
     [O]ur goal is a complete understanding of the events
     around us, and of our own existence. ([083],169).
  Certainly, our understanding is incomplete if we don't know who
we are, where we came from, and where we are going!
  Today, science is no longer struggling to be born. It's an
established, growing culture, the only world-wide culture, and the
greatest intellectual achievement of the last four centuries. If it
wished, it certainly could investigate ultimate questions.
Moreover, Schrodinger believed it should.
     . . . I consider science an integrating part of our
     endeavour to answer the one great philosophical question
     which embraces all others . . . who are we? And more than
     that: I consider this not only one of the tasks, but the
     task, of science, the only one that really counts.
     ([191],51).
Certainly many people - especially those unconvinced by religion's
answers - would welcome any light science could offer.
  Carl Sagan has observed ([106],37) there are in the United States
15,000 astrologers but only 1,500 astronomers. Many newspapers that
don't have any sort of daily popular science column carry a daily
horoscope. Irrational, superstitious beliefs are easy to criticize.
But what does science offer in their place? What is our place in
the universe? Why are we here? How should we live our lives? Must
science forever ignore these questions? Or can it break its
centuries-old bounds and investigate questions of ultimate
importance?

Ways of Knowing
But how can science investigate ultimate issues? How can it find
answers as true, accurate, and reliable as science itself? How can
it create a scientific religion?
  Suppose all the world's scientists decided that Jesus (or
Mohammed or Krishna or Buddha) is right. Suppose they unanimously
voted to adopt Christianity (or Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism) as
science's official religion. That would certainly provide science
with a religion, but would the religion be scientific? Would its
answers be as true, accurate, and reliable, as open to question,
criticism, revision, and improvement, as the rest of science? No.
  Why not? What makes something a science? Something is a science
when it uses science's way of knowing. Chemistry uses science's way
of knowing so chemistry is a science. Palmistry doesn't, so
palmistry isn't a science. No existing religion uses science's way
of knowing, so no existing religion is a science. So, even if all
the world's scientist accepted a particular religion, that religion
would still not be scientific.
  But what is a way of knowing? It's a way of discovering and
testing truth, a way of understanding what is what, a way of
creating a world view. An illustration may be helpful.
  Astrology teaches that a Cancer is sensitive and reserved, and a
Gemini is communicative and witty. Are they? How are we to know if
astrology is true? One way would be anecdotal evidence - my Aunt
Alice is a Cancer and she's sensitive, my friend Tom is a Gemini
and he's witty, so astrology must be true. Another way is authority
or faith. Someone I respect believes in astrology and says it's
true, so I believe in it, too. Yet another way is tradition - it's
been around for thousands of years and millions of people have
believed in it. So it must be true.
  Judging from personal experience, judging from authority or
faith, judging from tradition - each is a way of knowing, a way of
deciding what is true and what is not. But none of those ways are
scientific way of knowing, of deciding what's true. How can we
decide scientifically if astrology is true? Here's one method.
  Imagine giving a hundred people three horoscopes, their own and
two others. Ask them which horoscope describes them best. Ask their
family, their friends, their co-workers. Do they pick their "true"
horoscope more than one-third of the time? Do their family and
friends? If so then we've just found some scientific evidence that
astrology is true. But if the "true" horoscope is picked about
thirty-three times in a hundred, if no one can pick the "true"
horoscope from the "false" ones, then we have scientific evidence
that astrology doesn't describe personality any better than
flipping a coin. Heads you're sensitive, tails you're witty.
  Of course, deciding scientifically takes a lot of work. Deciding
by faith, authority, tradition, or what other people believe is
easier. But is it as good? Each way of knowing has its advantages
and disadvantages. For a person eager to be accepted by some group
of people, accepting what those people think may be the best way of
knowing. Faith, authority, or tradition may be the best way for
someone who wants to practice some religion. Science's way of
knowing has proven extremely useful for understanding and
controlling the natural world.
  Though each way of knowing has its own advantages and
disadvantages, all ways of knowing aren't equally good. Some are
better than others. Therefore, picking the best way can be
important. In fact, it can be a life-and-death decision. The
history of medicine offers an example. Western medicine once used
a way of knowing remarkably similar science's.
     Looking nature full in the face, without being blinded by
     either the divine or the customary, Greek intellectuals
     sought rational explanations of all within man's ken. In
     the medical field perhaps this was exemplified best by
     the followers of Hippocrates (born ca. 460 B.C. on Cos).
     Their best writings and practices showed the fundamentals
     of the scientific method - observations and
     classification, rejection of unsupported theory and
     superstition, and a cautious generalization and induction
     that remained open to critical discussion and revision.
     . . . ([178],8).
  Medicine was on the road to understanding and curing disease. It
took a detour in the sixth century when the bubonic plague hit the
Roman empire. The plague - which would ravage Europe again in the
14th century - struck about 540 C.E., during the reign of
Justinian, and raged until about 590 C.E. At its height it claimed
over 10,000 victims a day. Its total toll is estimated at one
hundred million. Because contemporary physicians couldn't
understand or stop the disease, many people turned to religion.
     The effect of the plague of Justinian on the field of
     medicine is unarguable, and was unfortunate. The
     Christian Church rushed in to fill the medical void,
     becoming doctor to the soul and the body. Progressive
     Greek and Roman physicians had taught that disease was
     caused by pathogenic agents; they were slowly, but
     correctly, creating the discipline of medical science.
     The church, however, in its new role as healer, equated
     disease with vice and sin, the punishment for leading an
     errant life . . . The brilliant ideas of Galen and
     Hippocrates became heresies. This repressive attitude
     lasted until the fourteenth century and vastly altered
     what would have been a very different course of medicine
     had it not fallen under the domination of dogma and
     miracles. ([161],225).
  Medicine rejected a scientific way of knowing and understanding
disease, and turned to a way based on faith and divine revelation.
No longer need it laboriously search for the cause of disease;
divine and unerring scripture had the answers.
  The "answers," however, aren't very good. Medicine based on
scripture doesn't work. Medicine based on science does. So, it's
fortunate that medicine eventually returned to the "heresies" of
Galen and Hippocrates. It eventually abandoned its faith-based way
of knowing and understanding disease, and returned to a scientific
way. Quite probably, you, your parents or children, or at least
some one you know, is alive today because medicine uses a better
way of knowing.

Science's and Religion's Ways of Knowing
Ways of knowing are the subject of the first two chapters. The
first chapter explores religion's way of knowing. The second
explores science's. We'll see how the two ways differ in
fundamental ways. In religion, something is true because some
authority said so, or because it's written in a book. The religious
way of knowing demands blind acceptance. Its beliefs are "set in
stone," fixed, not open to criticism, revision and improvement. On
the other hand, we'll see how science's way of knowing - often
called the scientific method -  discourages blind acceptance, and
welcomes discussion, criticism and improvement. When a scientist
says that atoms behave one way, or electromagnetic fields behave
another, other scientists don't blindly accept the theory. Rather,
they test it with the scientific way of knowing. Once the theory is
proven, engineers exploit it by making useful devices based on the
theory. In doing so they further test and prove the theory. A
radio, an automobile, and a computer aren't merely useful tools;
they're also living proof of the accuracy of the scientific
theories and engineering principles they're based on. Scientific
beliefs work, they prove themselves in daily life.
  In general, science's way of discovering and testing truth - it's
way of knowing - has shown itself to be better than religion's way.
In medicine, in astronomy, in history, and in numerous other
fields, science's way has yielded more and better knowledge than
religion's way. Yet some questions seem to demand religion's way of
knowing. Are Jews God's chosen people? Is Jesus the Son of God? Is
Krishna God? Is Mohammed God's messenger? Could science ever answer
such questions? I doubt it. But science could investigate and
answer other important, and perhaps more relevant, questions, such
as Who am I? Why am I here? How should I live my life? and What
happens when I die?
  How could science investigate and answer such questions? That
will take a few chapters to explain, but in a nutshell it's this:
it could apply its way of knowing to them. Describing how it might
do so is the task of chapters three, four, five and six. Chapter
three discusses science's present domain of study, with emphasis on
an area that science's shares with religion. Chapter four discusses
religion's domain of study, with emphasis on the same area viewed
from a religious perspective. Chapter five discusses types of
knowledge and people who claim direct knowledge of God.
  Chapter six builds on ideas of previous chapters to describe how
science can apply its way of knowing to ultimate questions, how it
can create a scientific explanation of our place in the universe,
an explanation that's as verifiable, as open to question,
disagreement and improvement, as true, and perhaps as useful as
science's explanation of physical, mechanical and electrical
phenomena. Like any other knowledge produced and tested with the
scientific method, a scientific religion would be an extension of
science, an integral addition. Science's world view would finally
include a religion of it's own, a religion not merely compatible
with science, but thoroughly scientific, a branch of science in its
own right, a scientific religion and religious science. Science
would finally have answers to questions such as Why are we here?
What is the purpose of our life? Where did we come from? and What
happens when we die? answers as thoroughly tested, true, and
accurate as science itself.

A Scientific/Religious Comprehensive World View
After we understand how to apply the scientific way of knowing to
ultimate questions - that is, to certain religious, philosophical,
and metaphysical questions - we can go ahead and actually apply it;
we can develop a comprehensive world view that's deeply religious,
yet deeply scientific, that answers ultimate questions. Describing
one such world view - there could be others - is the work of the
second part, of chapters seven, eight, nine and ten. Those chapters
develop a comprehensive world view based on the insights of the
mystics, a world view that's scientific, philosophical,
metaphysical, mystical, and religious. Our world view discusses the
external world we live in, our individual internal world of
thoughts and feelings, and the world of the "supernatural." In
addition, various ideas which apply to all three worlds are
discussed.
  The world view we'll develop won't agree with all religions; it
couldn't since religions themselves don't agree. And it won't agree
with any single religion. It will, however, substantially agree
with the so-called "perennial philosophy," the philosophy that
Aldous Huxley considered the "Highest Common Factor" ([203],12) of
the world's religions, and that Huston Smith called ([199],x) "the
primordial tradition." And our world view isn't a dogmatic, fixed,
answer-for-all-time. Rather it's provisional and open to
improvement, a starting point for deeper inquiry. Just as other
sciences grow, develop, and refine, the world view presented here
would, too. And it's certainly not the only one that could be
derived by applying the scientific way of knowing to spiritual and
mystical insights. Different world views also based on the
scientific way of knowing are possible.
  In the first and second part - that is, in the first ten chapters
- we'll meet ideas of great richness and beauty, a few perhaps
truly difficult, others more unfamiliar than difficult. In the
third and final part - chapters eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen,
and fifteen - we'll apply those ideas. We'll attempt to answer the
questions "So what? How does all this affect me and my daily life?"
by deriving practical consequences of our world view.
  A short chapter concludes the book, followed by a lengthy
bibliography.

Odds and Ends
We'll end the introduction with a few miscellaneous points.
  First, a brief point. I've chosen to follow what seems common
usage and label years C.E. Years C.E. correspond to years A.D.
Therefore, 1234 C.E. and 1234 A.D. are the same year. Why not A.D.?
Because A.D. is Anno Domini, Year of Our Lord, and is therefore
appropriate only for Christians. C.E., however, can mean either
Christian Era or Common Era and so is appropriate for Christians
and non-Christians alike.
  Now, a more extended point. As you read this book you'll see many
bits and pieces of other books; that is, you'll see a lot of
quotations. Quotes have full references, including page numbers,
and they're exact: any italics shown are also in the original. I
do, however, occasionally correct punctuation, change an uppercase
letter to lower or vice versa. These changes are indicated in the
usual way, with square brackets. I also use square brackets at the
end of the quote to indicate its source. For example ([fifty],nine)
indicates page nine of book fifty in the bibliography.
  Why all the quotations?
  First, since this book is an exposition and synthesis of mostly
non-original material, it seems appropriate to include the original
sources, to present direct evidence. Rather than being told what
someone thinks, you see for yourself what they wrote.
  Second, quotations sometimes make the point vividly and
forcefully.
  Third, they introduce you to authors and books with whom you may
want to become more acquainted.
  Fourth, translations differ. So it's wrong to say the Bible says
this, or the Tao Te Ching says that. For a book which wasn't
originally written in English, it's more accurate to say this
translation of the Bible says this, and that translation of the Tao
Te Ching says that. In such cases I present a direct quotation.
  Lastly, quotations allow me to steer a middle course between two
unsatisfactory extremes. On one hand, if I present an idea but
neglect to mention some religious analogue, I could be justly
criticized for presenting an idea of Jesus or Buddha as my own. On
the other hand, if I say that Jesus or Buddha taught a certain
idea, I could again be criticized for overstepping myself and
acting as an official religious spokesman. To avoid these two
extremes, I present my ideas as simply and clearly as possible,
along with quotations from the world's religious, philosophical,
scientific, and mystical writings. I'll let the experts decide
whether any of my ideas are actually identical to, similar to, or
entirely different from someone else's.
  Now let's discuss one purpose quotations aren't meant to serve.
When I quote the religious or philosophical opinions of a world
famous scientist, I don't mean to imply their achievement in
science somehow guarantees they're right. So, suppose Einstein
thought religions should give up belief in Gods who are Persons. Or
suppose Schrodinger decided mystics of different cultures and times
had essentially similar experiences. And suppose Einstein and
Schrodinger were great scientists. They might still be wrong. In
fact, there may be equally great scientist who disagreed with them.
  So why present the quotations at all? Because the quotes do
demonstrate that the beliefs aren't inherently absurd to the
scientific mind. It would probably be hard to find a reputable,
much less accomplished, scientist who believes in leprechauns,
elves, or unicorns. But if some scientists believe the idea of God
as a Person should be abandoned, or that mystics often experience
the same thing, then perhaps these ideas are worth examining
further.
  In addition to quotations, you'll also meet a definition now and
then. Words and concepts are often defined before they're used. The
definitions are probably a result of my years in mathematics. In
higher mathematics, ideas and concepts are almost always defined
when they are introduced, before they're used.
  There's two other reasons for definitions. First, they're often
essential for clarity and understanding. Many words have multiple
meanings or an unfamiliar meaning. Or I may use it in an unfamiliar
way. In these cases, definitions aid understanding.
  Clear definitions also help avoid useless misunderstandings.
Consider the following illustration.
  You agree to participate in an experiment. You are asked to hold
out your hand. A heavy weight is placed in it. You are also asked
to keep your hand absolutely still for 10 minutes. By a great
effort you manage to do so. Your back, shoulder, and arm ache.
Finally, the weight is removed.
  Have you just done any work? The answer depends entirely on the
definition of "work." One definition of work is "effort, labor,
toil." Using this definition, you've just done work. The physicist,
however, defines "work" in an entirely different way: work equals
force multiplied by distance. Using this definition, you have done
no work at all since the distance you moved the weight was zero -
and zero multiplied by any force you exerted still gives zero work.
  So there are two answers; you've done a fair amount of "everyday
work" and exactly zero "physicist's work."
  We could waste a lot of time and energy arguing if any "real"
work has been done. I intend to waste none - there are two
different ideas, everyday work and physicist's work.
  Substitute an emotionally charged word such as "God" for "work"
and even more time and energy - and even blood - could be wasted.
  Definitions help avoid such futile arguments. If you understand
my meaning, then we have a basis for discussion. If, on the other
hand, you just don't like my definitions and insist, for instance,
real work has been done no matter what the physicists say, or God
is only as you conceive God to be and no one has the right to use
the word "God" in any other way, then we have no basis for
discussion.
  Even with definitions, of course, you may not agree with what I
say, but at least you'll understand it. If I've done my job, the
following chapters will be lucid; if you as a reader have done
yours, you'll have a clear idea of what I said. From that point,
comments will be appreciated; I welcome any insights and
criticisms.
  Aside from the use of definitions and quotations with references,
you'll find the discussions informal, not highly technical or
scholarly. Two things force an informal level of presentation.
First, necessity - I don't have the education needed to discuss
science, philosophy, metaphysics, religion, and theology on the
professional level. Second, readability - this work may already be
too obscure and pedantic for some people. A book that demanded the
learning of a professional scientist, philosopher, metaphysician,
and theologian would be, for almost everyone, an incomprehensible
book.
  Instead, I've tried to write the clearest book I could.
Nonetheless, you'll may find some ideas unfamiliar and a few
difficult. When you do, feel free to skim ahead, at least on first
reading. After you've seen the overall picture, things may fall
into place.
  Enjoy.














                       Part I: Fundamentals