Robert Kaita, Plasma Physics
Princeton
[Sept 13, 2009]–
There’s an old joke that goes like this. Milk production at a dairy farm was low, so the dairyman wrote to a local university, asking for help from academia. A multidisciplinary team of professors was assembled, headed by a theoretical physicist, and two weeks of intensive on-site investigation took place. The scholars then returned to the university, notebooks crammed with data, where the task of writing the report was left to the team leader.
Shortly thereafter, the farmer received the write-up, and opened it to read the first line:
“Consider a spherical cow…” (1)
The story is funny to us in academic research, because it carries to the absurd extreme a principle that is quite valuable in our work. It is based on what we call heuristic models, and at face value, they may be as wholly inaccurate as “spherical cows.” The simplifications they introduce, nonetheless, can show us how to approach the problems we really want to solve. It’s ridiculous to think of the earth and the sun as point masses at first blush. This is the critical insight we have, however, from Isaac Newton’s theory of gravitation, and it eventually enabled us to put people on the moon.
Raising The Spiritual Issues
The heuristic approach is also useful when it comes to sharing our faith. Consider the recent debate over whether or not “Intelligent Design,” or ID, is science. Instead of focusing solely on ID if our colleagues bring up such an issue, why not broaden the discussion to the implications of theory of evolution? Without getting bogged down as to who is correct, we can raise a host of interesting and difficult spiritual issues behind the controversy that have made it so prominent.
For example, a young friend of ours died from terminal cancer not too long ago. Since he never had children, should we be glad that the defects that caused his disease are eliminated from our gene pool? Questions like this are what reveal the limits of science most effectively. If recognized, they can open the way to accepting the answers we find in Christ.
Such tactics are anathema to some Christians, who see them as smacking of compromise. To any who feel that way, I point to the example of the Apostle Paul. In Acts 17, he proclaims the following on Mars Hill.
Sensitive To Their Culture
“Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription, ‘To an Unknown God.’ Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you.” – Acts 17:22 and 23
Was Paul affirming pagan worship? Certainly not. Rather, he wanted the Athenians to hear his message by being sensitive to their culture. Let us follow Paul’s lead, then, on the “Mars Hills” where we have been uniquely placed to serve our Lord.
(1)Recounted by John Harte in his book, Consider a Spherical Cow: A Course in Environmental Problem Solving (Sausalito: University Science Books, 1988)
© 2009 Robert Kaita