The Implications of Information

The Director of the U.S. National Human Genome Research Institute, Francis Collins, has become a theist as a consequence of his studies of human DNA:

[He] claims there is a rational basis for a creator and that scientific discoveries bring man “closer to God”.

His book, The Language of God, to be published in September, will reopen the age-old debate about the relationship between science and faith. “One of the great tragedies of our time is this impression that has been created that science and religion have to be at war,” said Collins, 56.

“I don’t see that as necessary at all and I think it is deeply disappointing that the shrill voices that occupy the extremes of this spectrum have dominated the stage for the past 20 years.”

For Collins, unravelling the human genome did not create a conflict in his mind. Instead, it allowed him to “glimpse at the workings of God”.

“When you make a breakthrough it is a moment of scientific exhilaration because you have been on this search and seem to have found it,” he said. “But it is also a moment where I at least feel closeness to the creator in the sense of having now perceived something that no human knew before but God knew all along.

“When you have for the first time in front of you this 3.1 billion-letter instruction book that conveys all kinds of information and all kinds of mystery about humankind, you can’t survey that going through page after page without a sense of awe. I can’t help but look at those pages and have a vague sense that this is giving me a glimpse of God’s mind.”

Collins joins a line of scientists whose research deepened their belief in God. Isaac Newton, whose discovery of the laws of gravity reshaped our understanding of the universe, said: “This most beautiful system could only proceed from the dominion of an intelligent and powerful being.”

Note especially his reference to the information in human DNA.  This is a key point.  Information must have an intelligent source.  It's the difference between random accidental patterns, scattered Scrabble tiles, and actual information, Scrabble tiles arranged in a message. 

Every human being carries within him evidence for God's existence. Imbedded within the DNA double helix is a code we're just beginning to crack,  an incredibly complex blueprint. It's filled with tens of thousands of pages of information. This is no accident, but a detailed plan carefully laid out by an intelligent and deeply benevolent Mind.

(HT:  Hugh Hewitt)

Comments

[Stamford Young]

The Times Online Article is a great source of perspective on apologetics. Collins was influenced by the witness of creation (in the visible creation as well as the sequencing of the genome), and the witness of faithful Christians. He was also influenced by a pastor friend and the writings of C.S. Lewis. His "testimony" is an example of how God uses many different elements ("stones in the shoe" as Greg sometimes calls them) cummulatively over time to make an impact.

[Ed Darrell]

First, I think its important to know that Collins was Christian long before he came to head the Human Genome Project. His faith is not as a result of the study of the genome, but neither does it interfere or conflict with that quest for important, beneficial knowledge.

Second, if you're thinking that Collins is making a case that what is sometimes analogized to information in DNA really is information exactly equivalent to the information in an electronic signal, and therefore from an intelligent source, you're adding a lot of misinformation that is not in Collins' claim.

Chance in this universe can produce information. Our faith tells us that there is a God behind the entire enterprise, but we must not mistake that faith for fact, nor should we let the faith mislead us into thinking we see things that are not evidenced in God's creation.