Soon-to-be NIH director Francis Collins believes in souls and miracles
President Obama has nominated Francis Collins to be the next director of the NIH. Since the NIH is by far the largest funder of biomedical research in the US, (and the world), this will make Collins the leading voice and leading policymaker in this area of research and in medicine generally. Collins is an excellent researcher, and a top-notch administrator and politician. He will do well at the NIH, and 97.2% of his decisions will be good for the agency and the country.
However, there are a few looming problems. Collins holds the philosophical position (which I will refer to as compatibilism; also related to Stephen Gould's NOMA) that science and religion do not (or at least do not have to) conflict. He has been loudly vocal in his faith in Jesus, and in the compatibility of miracles, resurrections, and other articles of faith with the scientific corpus. A staunch defender of evolutionary theory, Collins sees no problem with the idea that human moral traits were specially implanted by god, rather than a product of the rough-and-tumble of .. well, evolution. Well versed in physics, he also believes that the total lack of contemporary miracles fails to impeach the fundamental violation of physical law that Biblical miracles represent. For, if one leads by faith, then all things are possible and god would, a priori, have no difficulty suspending physical law for the resurrection of his son or the multiplication of fishes and loaves.
The Stanford review put it this way, after a talk Collins gave on campus: "After evolution had “prepared a sufficiently advanced ‘house’” in the human being (the human brain), God gifted humanity with the knowledge of free will, good and evil, and a soul. God used DNA as an information molecule; thus DNA is the language of God."
Collins is not alone in this position, of course. The National Academy of Science takes an official compatibilist position as well- that while evolution (among other theories) is absolutely, categorically, true, there are many scientists who find a way to have faith and think scientifically as well. Perhaps not at the same time, but definitely in the same brain. This is politically astute, even imperative, though it involves the Academy in adjudicating between more or less literal faiths, a position of some delicacy, not to say incoherence.
However incoherent, it would be harmless enough if it were not passed off as the promising reconciliation of faith and reason the West has been awaiting for a millenium. But so it is, and with the funding of one of leading religious philanthropies in the US- the Templeton foundation- Collins has founded a website and organization called Biologos to spread this gospel of compatibilism. As an effort against biblical literalism and fundamentalism, it is certainly positive. But quite a bit of Biblical literalism remains behind in a cherry-picked mix of the holy and the profane.
The Templeton foundation is based on a pile of money left by the mutual fund pioneer John Templeton, in order to strengthen religion in the US and worldwide. Their current motto is "Supporting science, investing in the big questions". How do they support science? They fund an annual prize given to the scientist they believe best supports religion (which they term "spiritual reality"), or to the most long-winded philosopher who works to denigrate science (e.g. Charles Taylor).
The foundation funds conferences devoted to bordeline science and religion ("Water of Life"- a two-day symposium to explore the gap between the investigation of fine-tuning in physics and cosmology with the investigation of fine-tuning in chemistry and biochemistry; "Spirit in the World"- The Dynamics of Pentecostal Growth and Experience; "Evolvability" The Evolution Of Evolution Conference , which dealt with limitations of evolutionary theory).
The foundation also grants money to people and organizations far and wide susceptible to compatibilist theology (Princeton Theological Seminary awarded "Science for Ministry" grant; Forgiveness Illuminated: Forgiveness, Resiliency and Survivorship Among Holocaust Survivors; "Science of Virtue" University of Chicago scholars will use two-fold definition of science to better understand human virtue; "Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health" Duke University Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development.)
Templeton's project seems basically one of giving megaphones to the small slice of the scientific community that is willing to mix religion with science, and with their money subborn scientists, journalists, and scientific institutions to propagate a compatibilist theology that does not bear close examination on either theological or scientific grounds. Its work is far more subtle than that of the Discovery Institute, which explicitly declares science to be the enemy of religion, to be denegrated through a "wedge" strategy of politicization, sophistry, and culture war.
The Templeton fundation does good work in many fields. It even does some honest science funding, like of a study of intercessionary prayer that found (and published) zero effect from such prayer on the health of heart patients. It exhibits strong internal tensions between supporting what its staff knows to be theologically true, and supporting science that finds what is actually true. Their internal tension is reflected in their public face and effects, muddying the boundaries between rigorous intellect and faith. To me it seems somewhat dangerous for one of the nation's leading scientists to be in bed with such an organization, entangled both financially and philosophically with its questionable methods and aims.
Collins has promised to be "minimally involved" with Biologos- to step down from its board and not speak on its behalf when he is director of the NIH. But his wife is and will remain on the board. And Collins himself is clearly in the running for one of those rich Templeton prizes for the reconciliation of religion and science. His voice in science policy and ethics will be weakened by this association and by his conflicting attitudes in general, as onlookers suspect firstly that his thought process is not entirely sound, and secondly that ulterior motives may be at play in some kinds of decisions. In his book, Collins declared that the origin of his belief lay in a mystical experience of seeing three waterfalls in a frozen state. He puts it in an interview:
"I turned the corner and saw in front of me this frozen waterfall, a couple of hundred feet high. Actually, a waterfall that had three parts to it -- also the symbolic three in one. At that moment, I felt my resistance leave me. And it was a great sense of relief. The next morning, in the dewy grass in the shadow of the Cascades, I fell on my knees and accepted this truth -- that God is God, that Christ is his son and that I am giving my life to that belief."
On the other hand, with most of the nation sharing his faith, he may have greater influence than otherwise on societal ethical and medical issues. The quality of his influence, however, depends on his positions being well thought-out and based on knowledge and reason, which is undermined by this underlying philosophy.
The science of the NIH is largely well-insulated from the whims of the director, except for some pet projects/initiatives (the NIH even hosts a congressionally-mandated institute of alternative and complementary medicine). Extensive layers of peer review will continue to direct money to the best research, judged on social and scientific merit. The current time is a golden age of biomedical research in many fields, including genetics, evolution, social science, and neuroscience.
One of the ironies of this appointment is that neuroscience is steadily chipping away at the idea that the mind is due to anything other than the brain- that supernatural entities such as "souls" are needed to explain the wonder of consciousness. Likewise, our moral senses are being ever more firmly situated in inborn traits and quantitative evolutionary origins that belie a special qualitative status for humans, let alone require the intervention of dieties for their implantation. Perhaps Collins will preside over a research enterprise that will do away for good with some of his most cherished, if wrong-headed, sentiments.
- An alternate view of the Templeton foundation's work, from the inside.
- Outstanding set of podcasts on Beethoven's symphonies
- Cash for clunkers- obviously, the government could have gained far more environmental benefit for its (our) money.
- Health care status quo, anyone?
