[00:00:00] Speaker A: And materialism, you know, is a belief, people. It's funny because sometimes materialists are called unbelievers, but it's not true at all, as we shall see. Because materialists, they believe in plenty of very funny things, very weird things, strange things.
ID the Future, a podcast about evolution and intelligent design.
[00:00:30] Speaker B: Well, does God exist or not? It's a simple, compelling question. And what can science tell us that would help us get an answer? Well, for the last 150 years, many have assumed science has ejected God from the picture, a quaint relic of a less enlightened past. But what if that view has become a relic itself?
Scientific discoveries of the last hundred years suggest there is bountiful evidence of intelligent design in nature. For from the simplest living cells to the distant galaxies. Welcome to Idea of the Future, the podcast that explores the case for intelligent design and the debate over evolution. I'm your host, Andrew McDermott. Well, today my guest is computer engineer and businessman Michel Bolore, who is co author with Olivier Bonassi of the book God the Science the Evidence. Published in French in 2021, the book is a number one bestseller in France, Spain and Italy and has sold so far 400,000 copies. It's now making its debut in English.
The Science the Evidence presents a wide ranging case for the existence of God by drawing on discoveries across physics, cosmology, biology and human consciousness. Michel, welcome to the podcast.
[00:01:46] Speaker A: Thank you, Andrew. Very happy to join.
[00:01:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Now this is your debut on ID the Future. So I wondered if we could start by telling our audience a little bit about your education and your career background.
[00:01:58] Speaker A: Yes, of course, I have a scientific education.
I am an engineer.
I have been trained in computer engineer and after that I was at that time 25.
I have started also business and administration doctorate in France and after, for professional reason, I have been becoming in entering a company which was a family company and I have been an entrepreneur all my life.
So I have been mostly in the industry and I have always been very interested with science.
But it is mostly when I have decreased my implication in the industry at the beginning of the 2000, 2006, perhaps something like that, that I have really increased my interest and started to think to do perhaps this book.
[00:02:59] Speaker B: Okay, but you've had a strong interest in science since you were a kid. What do you think sparked that?
[00:03:07] Speaker A: Well, I have always been very interested by the beauty of mathematic of physics.
It was just striking for me that simple equations and beautiful calculation could describe everything, could describe what is around us. So I thought it was really Fantastic. So my whole way, and it was simple and it was clear and there was no dispute, like there could be, for example, in philosophy or in other, on other topics, you know, in mathematics and physics, it's, it's good or bad. Well, especially mathematics. So it was really always a satisfaction, you know, in this, in this kind of science, really.
[00:04:00] Speaker B: And did you do well in school when it came to science and mathematics?
[00:04:04] Speaker A: Reasonably well, not extremely well because I was like any normal young guy and I loved many other things and studying, of course.
So when I was between 15 and 25, I love, I love many things, including sports and friends and of course, everything normal. I've been married, I am married since 54 years today with my wife. We have three children and four grandchildren. We live in London today since.
Since a long time, since 15 years.
And I have one daughter in London, one daughter in New York and one son in Paris.
[00:04:46] Speaker B: Okay, well, congratulations on all of that great success.
And yes, I understand what you mean about just tapping into the elegance of mathematics. You know, there's a certain beauty there. And then it begs the question, well, why, why is there order? Why is there beauty in the, the way that we can understand the universe?
Mathematics is definitely a big clue there. Well, your book is the culmination of almost four years of research in partnership with over 20 scientists and, and experts. I'd like to know where the idea for the book came from and what brought you to work with your co author, Olivier.
[00:05:26] Speaker A: Well, we met with Olivier at the beginning of the 2000 and we discovered that we had both exactly the same kind of interest for science, religion, faith and God.
We had been reading both a lot of books and there was one book we could not find which. And we were very surprised. It was a book for the evidence of the existence of God, which would be for the general public, which is easy to read by everybody, yet very exact and addressing not only science, which is very good, but of course probably the most important path for knowledge, but it's not the only one, but also philosophy, history and morality and some thrilling enigmas.
So we had in mind to have a full book, a book, you know, for the kind of an ordinary person who would like to know if there is a creator God or not.
This person could find in one volume everything that can, that science and reason can say today.
So something to help people to make a decision.
So our book is really the aim of our book is that ordinary people can read this book, find so many arguments and make their decision at the end.
[00:07:00] Speaker B: Yeah, and that's quite a resource and quite an achievement to be able to put all that together. You do start with the science. It's a large section of the book. But by no means do you end there. And we'll allude to some of that later on in our discussion.
Now, before we look at some of the evidence in your book, let's set the stage a little bit by talking about materialism and how that view came about. I think your book does a great job of laying that out and presenting sort of a big picture of that. Your book talks about scientific materialism becoming the dominant worldview by the beginning of the 20th century, but that's a view that can really be traced back quite a while. And I don't know if everybody grasps that. Even I haven't fully grasped that. You know, we all know that Darwin made. Made a big splash when he released his theory, but we don't realize that this scientific materialism goes much further back. And I love the way that your book sets that up, you know, and, and, and the thing about scientific materialism is that it's, it involves these discoveries that seemed to, keyword, seemed to challenge the foundations of belief in God. But given hindsight now we can look back and say, well, no, that, that didn't really get rid of the idea or the existence of God, you know, because we understand that better now.
But at the time, you know, these definitely seem to be pushing God further and further out of the picture. But your book does a good job of explaining this, and I think that's pretty valuable. I mean, we've got Copernicus, you know, all the way back in the 16th century, his mathematical model of heliocentric systems where the Earth revolved around the sun, not the other way around. You had those in the 18th and 19th centuries working to demonstrate Earth's extremely old age, like Buffon, Lyell and Kelvin. Now, what other theories and discoveries contributed to that rise of scientific materialism?
[00:08:59] Speaker A: I think it's very important to have in mind a panoramic view of what has happened between Renaissance and 1900.
As you mentioned, there has been several shocks to the European people who were almost 100% Christian at that time, at the time of Renaissance. And there have been several shocks which has been shaking people.
And the first one we know very well is that the Earth was not at the center of universe. It was Copernicus and Galileo. And then after there has been a second shock which is different, the one of Newton and Laplace, which means that it was possible to explain all the Stars and the planet with equations with simple mathematic models.
And the story, very important story, which is quite well known, but I will tell it again, is that the mathematician, French mathematician Laplace, came and visited Napoleon and he showed him all the equation of the solar system. And Napoleon would have said, well, we don't know exactly if it's true, but it's important, would have said, okay, mister, The French mathematician, but where is God in your equations? And last place would have replied, sire, I don't need God to explain the universe. So what is very important is that this argument has been very much used because it was a surprise that everything could be explained and especially with systems which were finally rather simple. So that was a second shock.
And the third shock, as you mentioned, was Buffon.
And so the philosopher came during the 18th century and they said, well, you know, if we can explain the world without the creator God, there is a good reason for that. And, and the reason is that God does not exist. That is as simple as that.
So that was really the very beginning of Bayism first and materialism. Then after this shock, there has been a further shock with Lamarck and Darwin, because they were explaining again how it was possible probably to explain life and the evolution of life. And there has been a few other with Karl Marx and Freud.
And they said, not only God does not exist, but in addition, God or the idea of God is toxic for the people. This is why people are poor and this is why they are not free.
So let's get rid of, of the idea of God, let's get rid of that and the life of people will be much better and freedom will be greater. So this is really Marx and Freud. And in 1900, I think that probably among the scientists and philosopher, probably 90% of scientists and philosophers were atheist. And this is why it's very important here to understand that, because in fact science has been leading to a change in philosophy, a change in philosophy has been leading to a change in political ideas, and political ideas have been leading to revolutions.
And it's not hazard that after this materialism, this wave in 1917 you have a revolution in Russia.
In 1920s it's Mussolini, they are all atheist.
In 1930s it's Hitler, another atheist.
In 96 it's Spain, of course, a terrible civil war.
And in the 1940s, Mao Zedong in China.
So the first half of the 20th century is really a long story of revolution. And all this revolution, at least revolution, but also with hard socialism, take its roots in the fact that people have interpreted the scientific discoveries as a fact or the demonstration that God did not exist, it was not true at all. Of course, it was demonstrating nothing, but they were employing that for it. And this is what, the stage where we are in the middle, probably of the 20th century.
[00:13:57] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, It's a great, A great arc of thought. And Darwin was right in the middle of it. You know, we tend to pin a lot of this on Darwin, but he was just responding to the milieu, to use one of my favorite French words, the milieu of the day. You know, the. It was all in vogue to be thinking along these lines. And I think that's part of why he strenuously worked to fit natural selection into the picture of biological reality.
We don't think he. He succeeded with that, but he thought he did. And he just worked so hard to. To provide people with a scientifically sound explanation for the materialism that was already very much in vogue. So I really appreciated that, how you start your book with that, because it's so important to see that wave of materialism coming. And of course, as you're saying, it explains everything about our modern age, including, I might add, critical theory. I just was discussing that with. With another interviewee. And, you know, critical theory is basically the application of materialism to the affairs of man, you know, and.
And so it's really important to see. To see all that coming about.
Now, the thrust of your book, you and Olivier, the main idea is that the pendulum of science has. Has now swung away from materialism, driven by a rapid succession of groundbreaking discoveries. You say that old certainties have been completely overturned, so much so that it's now materialism that looks increasingly like the irrational belief.
So we're going to touch on some of the evidence you review in the book. But first, early on in the volume, you clarify the terms evidence and proof. And I'm very glad that you do this. This is a great way to get started. Evidence is often divided into two categories. You have the absolute proofs and the relative proofs.
Absolute proofs, of course, live in the theoretical or formal domains, mathematics, games, logic. But the scientific pursuit is mainly concerned with the second category, and that's relative proofs, because they exist in the real world.
So how do you and Olivier classify relative proofs? And how do we use this type of evidence to build a case?
[00:16:19] Speaker A: Yes, it's a part which is a little more complicated, which is a little bit less general public. However, it's a very important question because. Because it should be clear that absolute proof, absolute evidence, if you prefer do not exist in the real world.
It would be complicated to explain that. But the main reason for that is that we don't know, we never know everything around us.
So in fact, the only way science can go forward is to observe the real world, to make theories, to see what are the implications resulting from their theories, and to compare the implication to the reality, what can be observed. And if the implications do not fit with the reality, it means that the theory is false. And this is how it works. And when we are talking of evidence, we are talking of this kind of evidence. So they are not absolute.
And it is not possible to say I have the absolute proof that there is a creator God from science. But when we have evidence, a series of evidence, a set of several evidence coming, which is very important, coming from independent fields of knowledge. That is a quick question.
When we have several evidence coming from different fields of knowledge and which are independent together, and when there is nothing else on the other side of the scale, it's clear that the rational mind should consider the good theory and forget the other one. And today we will come back probably on that. Today it appears at the surprise of everybody that the side of the scale in favor of the theory that there is a creator God is extremely important number evidence, a lot of evidence, very strong. And on the other side there is nothing. And this is why we can say today that materialism and materialism, you know, is a belief people. It's funny because sometimes materialists are called unbelievers, but it's not true at all, as we shall see. Because materialists, they believe in plenty of very funny things, very weird things, strange things. They believe, for example, in multiverse. So in fact, materialism is a belief. And today we can say really that materialism has become an irrational belief.
This is where we are still, of course, many scientists and many people can keep the materialism as their philosophy frequently for other reason. It's because they want to be free from anyone, from any moral rule, from any lack of freedom, etc. But it's not very rational. So this is where we are today.
We have come to this point at the surprise of all the scientists, because at the middle of the 20th century, when all these discoveries have been starting, the scientists thought just a little bit before that science would always go in the same direction, which was in the direction of materialism.
And some scientists said, we have almost achieved.
We have almost achieved science. We have discovered not everything, but almost everything. A few more years and science is finished and complete.
So of course they were Completely wrong. But the discoveries came and they were so shocked that they reacted in a terrible way. And we have in our book something which has never been told.
Nowhere is that the scientists who have discovered the expansion of the universe in Russia, in Germany, mostly it was Russia and Germany. All these scientists have been killed, they have been shot, they have been put in jail or in camp.
A few have been able to escape, but this is completely unknown.
We are the first one to tell this story.
It would be interesting to know why we are the first one to tell this story. Probably first few people know it and perhaps the one who knows it didn't want to tell that. But we are frequently telling about the story of Galileo, but it was really nothing compared to what has happened to the Russian mathematician and physicist of the 30s and 40s.
We have been killed by Stalin and in Germany by Hitler.
So materialism has received several shocks.
Perhaps we are going to tell a little bit of all this shock thermodynamic was 1, expansion of universe, etc. Ideology, but that was a little bit. So now the pendulum has exactly swung back in the other direction. And it is a big surprise. But it is not yet well known of the general public. And we would like through our book that people realize where we are today.
It will take time for the general public to be aware and to be conscious of that and that the consequence probably on the face of people will increase, but it will take time. And well, we have necessities that people buy the books, read this book or some others and go in this direction. But I'm hopeful we have a survey in the book which is very interesting from the Pew Research center, which shows that top young scientists believe a little more in God than all top scientists. So it is very interesting.
[00:22:41] Speaker B: Yeah, interesting indeed. And I do appreciate your sentiment about materialism, you know, and, and it waning and the pendulum swinging, but not enough people know about it. And that makes sense because we've had 300 years of, of this buildup of scientific materialism. It's going to take a while to, to seep into the, the, the popular consciousness, as it were. And, but books like yours, and of course Return of the God Hypothesis, Stephen Meyer, you know, and the more we can get the word out, you know, to where people are, videos, podcasts, you know, conferences, we've got to get the word out about, about the pendulum swinging back, as well as share all the, the wonderful evidence that has been amassed. That was engineer Michel Balori, co author with Olivier Bonassi of the book God, the Science the Evidence, now available in a new English translation.
In a separate episode, my conversation with Michel continues as we get into the scientific evidence the two authors review in the book, including the inescapable evidence that the universe had a beginning, is finely tuned to allow for life, and that the origin of life itself from inert matter is beyond the reach of Chan's processes.
So look for the concluding half of this conversation in an additional episode. Don't forget to subscribe to our new channel on YouTube, where you can watch many of these conversations, share clips with family and friends. You can
[email protected] d the future. That's YouTube.com d the future. Thanks for your help.
Until next time, I'm Andrew McDermott. Thanks for joining us.
[00:24:24] Speaker A: Visit us at ID the Future and intelligentdesign.org this program is Copyright Discovery Institute and recorded by its center for Science and Culture.
