[00:00:00] Speaker A: Sometimes it's a little bit hard to distinguish between a story that's merely compelling or one that's accurately describing reality. And we need discernment because, honestly, the world is full of storytellers.
So to complement the story, scientific evidence is essential. And I think that's what the film the Story of Everything excels at.
[00:00:27] Speaker B: ID the Future, a podcast about evolution and intelligence in design.
[00:00:34] Speaker C: Why are we here? Does life or the universe mean anything? And if it does, what does it mean? Welcome to Add to the Future. I'm your host, Andrew McDermott. Today I'm exploring those questions and more with physicist and author Dr. Eric Hedin. Dr. Hedin is professor emeritus of physics and astronomy at Ball State University in Indiana. He is author of the book Canceled Science what Some Atheists don't want you to See. He speaks at universities around the country and writes regularly on the evidence for intelligent
[email protected] Eric, it's great to have you back.
[00:01:11] Speaker A: Thank you so much for the invitation, Andrew. Good to be here.
[00:01:15] Speaker C: Absolutely. Well, Eric, you've had a chance to see the recent documentary film the Story of Everything, and you've reflected on it in a couple of Recent
[email protected] As a physicist, what struck you the most about the film and the case that it makes?
[00:01:33] Speaker A: I think that what was most impressive is the fact that the film used science, but to tell us a different story, different from what many of us were taught the story of materialism and ultimately meaninglessness. But the Story of Everything powerfully connects us to a history of discovery in science that culminates in our lives having significance and a central role in the universe.
[00:02:06] Speaker C: Yeah, that's a good way to put it. And as you say, it's loaded with science, but you have that end result, that implication that lingers right after the credits are gone and stuff, and you're left wondering, okay, what? What then? You know, what now how does that impact me and my life? Now, the Story of Everything has three chapters unpacking the three major discoveries of modern science that reveal a mind behind the universe. And of course, if that sounds familiar, the movie is based on Dr. Stephen Meyer's latest book, Return of the God Hypothesis.
So lots of lines of evidence are presented, but I like your comment that as a whole, the film provides a now this is what you said in your articles, a meaningful meta narrative of human existence. Can you tell us what you mean by that?
[00:02:56] Speaker A: Yes, I believe that it's that the Story of Everything, the film is impactful, mostly not just because of the scientific evidence that's presented, but that the cumulative weight of the evidence that it presents comprises this meaningful metanarrative of our existence. It argues from the scientific evidence that our lives in the universe actually have significance and value, that we are centrally connected to the grand story, that it's not just that we exist here as an accident of nature.
[00:03:36] Speaker C: Yeah. And so when we say meta narrative, that's fancy language for, as you say, grand story, right? The big story.
[00:03:44] Speaker A: Yes, sort of the what it all means, if you would just put it in those terms.
[00:03:49] Speaker C: Right.
And, you know, materialism has a story as well. The story of everything starts out actually with Stephen Meyer saying that for 2500 years, there have been two great competing stories about reality in western culture. That's how the show begins. You know, one story is that life and the universe are the products of a pre existing intelligence, a purposeful mind or creator. The other is that everything we see around us is the product of a mindless process that evolved over time.
So how important has that story been to the cultural power of materialism?
[00:04:25] Speaker A: Well, I think that evolutionism has had an impact on our culture, not just from the scientific evidence, but from the false narrative, I would call it a false narrative that it has insinuated into culture. It's a narrative that has actually stunningly impacted humanity.
People who are not scientists, people in different countries, have all been impacted by the narrative from evolutionism.
It's a debilitating story that has actually generated a pandemic of meaninglessness.
[00:05:06] Speaker C: Well, yeah, I mean, we were well aware of the COVID 19 pandemic, but this pandemic of meaninglessness is equally devastating. And you can see its results in pretty much every facet of life.
Now, you make an important point about story that I wanted to tease out here. You know, that belief precedes reason.
Now, story, you say, can capture our imagination and plant seeds that become belief.
So we get caught up in a story even before we can engage with it, with our reason. Why is that important to bear in mind?
[00:05:43] Speaker A: Well, I think that if we're trying to communicate a difference narrative, to ask people to consider new evidence, a story, a good story, is extremely important because otherwise people tend to see what they already believe.
They tend to hear what agrees with what they already believe.
But a good story can affect a person's belief in a way that facts and evidence, if contrary to their presuppositions, may fail to engage with them.
So I think there's almost like our minds, our reason at times acts like a filter. It filters out what we don't agree with deep down. And so we, we tend to ignore things that don't agree with what we've already been taught. But a story can kind of bypass that filter and allow us to engage with a new idea, a new narrative.
[00:06:47] Speaker C: Yeah. And, you know, we, we grow up reading stories or being read to as a child.
You know, the latest data, I mean, I study technology when I'm not promoting intelligent design, and the latest data out there says that we are reading less on the whole, you know, because we're so caught up with our, you know, video entertainment and, and other things. And so less people are reading. Less people are.
Are reading stories. But we're certainly getting stories in the culture too. Right. So would you say the power of story is sometimes even more, even stronger than just facts and figures? Sometimes?
[00:07:33] Speaker A: Well, yes, for the culture at large, perhaps. You know, hard scientists who are very tuned into scientific evidence might of course consider the facts and the evidence as the main priority.
But I think that the vast majority of people in, in the culture aren't really maybe able to discern the facts and evidence or to for themselves sort through what is true, what's false. But everyone is able to be engaged with a good story.
And, you know, if it's a, if it's a good story or if it's a story that is detrimental.
Sometimes it's a little bit hard to distinguish between a story that's merely compelling or one that's accurately describing reality. And we need discernment because honestly, the world is full of storytellers. So to complement the story, scientific evidence is essential. And I think that's what the film, the Story of Everything excels at. It's not just trying to say something and say it louder and say it often to get people to agree with it. It's basing the story on actual scientific evidence.
[00:09:06] Speaker C: Yeah, I don't think they could have picked a better title for the movie.
[00:09:10] Speaker A: I agree.
[00:09:11] Speaker C: It's not that it's trying to be overly grandiose. It literally is the story of everything. And that was a stroke of genius to call it that.
You might say that our culture, our society sinks or swims on its stories, on its storytelling, you know, and, and in many ways the storytellers too. And so that becomes very important, you know, who's at the helm of telling the stories that reach the most people, and do those stories match up with reality or not? And part of the, you know, the, the articles that you're writing, you're sort of looking at the Reality. And you're looking at which story best fits that. You know, is it the story of materialism or is it the story of purpose, design and meaning?
And so it's, it's really fun to explore that. Now you, you did let me touch on something. You mentioned discernment.
In order to distinguish between a story that's merely compelling and one that accurate accurately describes reality. Can you tell us what, like, what does discernment look like when you're applying it to story?
Does it require critical thinking skills?
Do you have to have studied the evidence exhaustively related to those stories? What does discernment look like there?
[00:10:33] Speaker A: Well, I think it involves being open to hearing more than one side of the story. We might say there's a proverb that says, he who states his case first seems right until the other comes and examines him.
And it has often happened, you know, just because of how these evolutionary storyline has become part of the package of education that almost everybody has been exposed to.
And oftentimes then that's the first story that people might hear say if they weren't acquainted with the biblical narrative. And so it seems right, because honestly, the theory of evolution is very compelling.
The idea of natural selection and survival of the fittest and all of that, it just has a certain appeal to stats. It, it seems like, yeah, that must be right. And so in this case, discernment, an awareness of the evidence is important to be able to examine that story of evolution and to begin to show where it has kind of departed from the plumb line of truth.
Because the scientific evidence shows that evolution actually lacks a mechanism for generating novel of body parts that require vast amounts of biological information, for example, or the generation of many new genes to be able to produce a new function or a new organ or something like that. And so this isn't readily apparent to just the average learner in school.
It may be only becomes apparent if one has taken some advanced courses in biochemistry, for example, or information theory. Definitely not topics that are kind of frontline for most people in our society. But that's where it's important for someone like Steve Meyer or others within the center for Science and Culture to examine the storyline of evidence that evolution presents and to present a different look at it.
[00:13:13] Speaker C: Yeah, I think that is a great point to be applied to Darwinian theory. You know, it's, it's beautiful, it's elegant, it's, it seems simple, you know, and those are qualities that attract us to an explanation to a narrative of life.
And so I really like your point about you know, we have to. Even though it looks appealing, even though it looks grand and compelling and even airtight, that's just the beginning. Right? Looks can be deceiving. So we've got to ask what is the other side of the story? And we've got to be willing to hear it, to, to lean into it. And once we have both sides of the story, you say examine each. Right. And then decide whether it's aligning with the truth.
Of course that takes work, doesn't it? But, but in the long run, it gives you the upper hand, so to speak.
[00:14:14] Speaker A: Yes. I mean, you said it takes work, and that's a very serious statement. It seriously takes work.
It takes work in biochemical research, in diagnostic techniques, in understanding how living mechanisms reproduce and developmental biology and all of this. And a lot of that was just absolutely unavailable, say, 100 years ago.
And people could only guess one way or the other.
Maybe it didn't seem right, or maybe it seemed right, but now we actually have scientific evidence that shows that the workings of nature, unassisted by any sort of an intelligent lab researcher, are insufficient to produce all of the biological complexity and diversity of form that we see today.
Now we know that there's an edge of evolution, to use Michael Behe's book title, there's only so much that can be expected to happen on its own within the time frame of the history of life on Earth.
[00:15:34] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. And we now know what's inside Darwin's black box because we can see the molecular machines. We can understand what it takes to build a protein, you know, and to build animals. You know, this is a great time to actually be studying science because there are so many answers. Not that we know everything, but we certainly know more than Charles Darwin did in his day.
[00:16:02] Speaker A: Yes, I think that we have enough accumulated evidence and understanding of the science that is allowing us to make firm statements about what nature can do, and more importantly, at times, what it can't do.
[00:16:19] Speaker C: Well, in your coverage of the Story of Everything, you write that the movie points to a paradigm shift in science. And to help us see why, you paint a picture of what the old paradigm is and the story that goes right along with it. Some of the chapter titles of such a story might be well worn and well known phrases like a warm little pond and descended from apes.
When do paradigm shifts occur and why do you think the Story of Everything points to one?
[00:16:48] Speaker A: Well, I would say that a paradigm shift in our understanding of the nature of reality or the reality of nature comes from recognizing that the materialistic Worldview has become outmoded.
And this is based not just on opinion, but actually on accumulating evidence from science that shows that materialism is insufficient to explain everything that we have in front of us.
The evidence actually points more and more, I believe, to intelligent design in a transcendent, immaterial mind as the source of the universe and of life.
So I think that because the evidence has been increasing and it's becoming more publicly available, accessible, people are in general becoming more aware of it.
I believe that this all points to a paradigm shift from materialism to being aware that there is a transcendent designer behind life, behind consciousness, behind the conscious mind, and many other aspects of reality that we. We could speak of as well.
[00:18:25] Speaker C: Well, there's an interesting tension in science that you touch on in your writing. Scientists are supposed to follow the evidence and abandon explanations that don't adequately account for it. But they're also frequently told that science must restrict itself to natural causes. So what happens when those two things come into conflict?
[00:18:45] Speaker A: Yes, and what you just mentioned is pervasive in, in the teaching of science, basic rules of science, or the scientific method. You know, first of all, only consider naturalistic explanations for anything and, you know, then do tests and see if it agrees and so on. But as you said, at times these can come into conflict because informed science actually can discern whether or not something could have formed naturally or only through intelligent agency.
And to deny that some things like life could not have formed naturally is, you know, if I say life, it looks like, could not have formed naturally.
That's not a statement of faith, that's a statement of science.
The more I understand about science, the more I understand that inanimate chemicals in a warm little pond could not have come together on their own, unassisted by any intelligent synthetic chemist.
They could not have come together on their own to form a living, functional cell.
And so this is a scientific conclusion based on our understanding of the limitations of nature.
[00:20:18] Speaker C: Yeah, and then sometimes materialists will say, well, just give us time. Eventually we'll find something. But that's almost a materialism of the gaps, isn't it? Where you, you say, just wait, we'll get there eventually. We'll be able to explain all that. But science is provisional, right? And you have to take what you know now and, and give a provisional response to the evidence. You can't wait for the future, can you?
[00:20:43] Speaker A: Yes, and there's a greater restriction against that. Oh, well, we'll just wait and see. Maybe something will turn up later that explains how life could arise on its own.
That's the problem with that, is that any new theory of science has to fit smoothly into what we already know.
For example, as a physicist, you know, I would teach the theory of special relativity in a second year physics course.
This is Einstein's theory where it's extending Newtonian ideas of motion and acceleration and kinetic energy. It's extending those to a very extreme case of moving close to the speed of light. Of course that's a realm that Newton never had any experience with, but now we have particle accelerators and so on, we actually are accelerating matter to nearly the speed of light. And so Einstein's theory is what you have to use in the special case. But if you're describing slow moving things like maybe the motion of a train on a train track or the motion of a football thrown, you could use relativity theory still, because at the lower velocities, far from the speed of light, relativity theory smoothly reproduces Newtonian theory. It has to, because we know Newtonian theory is correct.
So any new theory, say, of biology, has to reproduce what we already know. What we already know is that natural processes degrade complex functional systems with the passage of time. They do not generate them, they don't improve them, they don't cause them to go from lower information and complexity to a higher level of information and complexity. So we already know that.
So anything of the future has to agree with that.
And there's no room for magic that can overturn what we already know in the field of science.
[00:23:09] Speaker C: Yeah, very good point. Well, in your book Canceled Science, you describe the universe as a seemingly inexhaustible fund of creativity.
And in your articles you say the world contains extraordinary potential that minds like ours can discover and use.
In my study of technology and human flourishing, I've come across that idea in the work of Russian philosopher Nikolai Berdiev. He argued that we can tap into a fathomless well of creative power and actually be collaborators with God.
So what does this idea tell us about the relationship between the human mind and, and the universe were inhabiting?
[00:23:46] Speaker A: Well, I really like that idea that you mentioned from Bertiev and I think it points out that this world and humans in the world are placed here with intention.
It turns out that the level of ability that we have with our minds to comprehend the natural world, to make use of the raw materials, a seemingly inexhaustible fund of creativity is unleashed because the universe, with all of its elementary elements, particles, forces, everything, provides a broad, extensive palette for us to be able to Be creative.
You just think about all the things that humans have created over the millennia. You know, everything from simple things like maybe utensils, to little more complicated things like a bridge, to locomotives to laptop computers. They're all built from the raw ingredients.
They're held together by the forces of nature.
And this universe is remarkable in this way.
I like the insight from physicist Paul Davies in studying universes, he says it turns out that randomly selected laws of nature lead almost inevitably either to unrelieved chaos or to boring and uneventful simplicity.
And he says our own universe is poised exquisitely between these two alternatives and allowing us a sort of restrained creativity. You know, it's just right for us to be able to engage with the powers of thought, of manipulation that we have been given to be extensively creative for everything that, that we could imagine, that we need.
And I think again, this is a gift from the intelligent designer, from God who made the universe and us.
[00:26:15] Speaker C: You could almost say that, that our ability to create, our ability to take the raw elements that we, that we have available to us and create something with them is suggestive that that might be going on at a cosmic scale.
And it's not, it's not proof perhaps, but it's, it's suggestive. Right. And then you add that to the fine tuning evidence and the complexity inside the cell and you, you really are left wondering, you know, is there a grand designer here as I'm able to design things with, with my hands? Now you mentioned British physicist Paul Davies and you actually quote him. I just wanted to share that with, with our audience today.
Davies says this to me, the contrived nature of physical existence is just too fantastic for me to take on board as simply given. It points forcefully to a deeper underlying meaning to existence. Some call it purpose, some design. Some, these loaded words which derive from human categories capture only imperfectly what it is that the universe is about.
But that it is about something, I have absolutely no doubt that was Paul Davies. I like the way he puts that. We can all sense that the universe is about something. Some would point to an intelligent designer. Others may say, oh, that's just an illusion. But would you say it's getting harder to take that seemingly neutral middle ground and say, no, there's no meaning in the universe, the universe isn't about anything. Is that, is that getting harder to stand on?
[00:27:53] Speaker A: Yes, I, I believe that if we look throughout, at least recorded human history, if we, we can read works dating back a couple of millennia from Greek and Roman writers, we, we find that People have pretty consistently felt that the universe was about something. And I, I very much agree with you. I like the way Davies said this, that the universe is about something. I have no doubt.
And I believe, again, where we are, especially in the last, say, 50, 60 years, with the rapid advance of technology used in science, that the accumulated evidence encourages us to perceive a different story, to hear what may be, I guess, divergent from what we were taught in school, that of materialism, to see something new, to take a step of faith in the direction that the evidence is pointing.
And what I would say is significant about the scientific exploration of nature is that it reveals that who we are transcends the mindless reach of nature, that there is intention and purpose to us because we are not an accident, that we were designed.
We're in the world, but we're. We're not of it. We're not products of nature.
[00:29:35] Speaker C: That is very interesting. And, you know, we're. We're out of time for this episode, but I do want to come back with you and explore what you know at a deeper level what meaning is and what it might suggest as we're looking at the scientific evidence for life in the universe. You know, the. You did say in your writing the impact of a story is measured by its meaning.
So I think it's important to look at the meaning we're getting when we analyze the evidence for life in the universe and see evidence of design.
So we're going to get into that a lot more in the next episode.
So, Eric, thank you very much for your time and will you come back and continue talking?
[00:30:22] Speaker A: Thank you so much for this opportunity to review the importance of the Story of Everything.
[00:30:29] Speaker C: Yeah, very much. Well, if you'd like to dive deeper, there are two resources relevant to today's discussion. First, watch the movie. If you haven't seen the Story of Everything yet, it's available to stream on Amazon prime and you can order it now on blu ray and DVD. To get the details, go to discovery.org story discovery.org story and. And of course, the other resource available is Dr. Hedin's book Cancelled. What some atheists don't want you to see. Eric tells his own story of being canceled by militant atheists. And then he shares some of the evidence those dedicated atheists don't want you to know. Because as we've learned today, story drives belief even before reason can engage. So those who believe in a world without design, meaning or purpose are busy convincing others that that evidence to the contrary is illusion and that those who promote such notions should be cancelled and barred from the scientific establishment or the halls of learning or the public square.
But truth has a funny way of making itself known.
You can get a copy of Cancelled Signs online at places like Amazon.com or anywhere you can order a book.
Well, for idea of the Future, I'm Andrew McDermott. Thanks for joining us.
[00:31:44] Speaker B: Visit
[email protected] and intelligentdesign.org this program is copyright Discovery Institute and recorded by its center for Science and Culture.
