About Science and rationality

1. Science, Rationality and Faith
Mubashir Hassan
The advancements in field of science & technology and corresponding stress on
the concept of rationalism & empiricism has apparently widened the gulf
between science and religion. In reality this gulf is only artificial and it is being
propagated that the advancement of science and various discoveries have made
religion redundant, notwithstanding the fact that many great scientists have been
and are believers in the existence of God. Actually there is no controversy
between science and religion. The apparent controversy is faked and not real,
projected with the purpose of denigrating religion. The science is equated with
atheism and it is being put across that you, as a student of science, can’t scale
the heights till you are an atheist. Being a theist is regarded as the mark of
idiocy.
Doubts about the Creator have deliberately been instilled in the minds of
people through wrong presentation of knowledge. Anything purporting to
support belief in God is dismissed merely as being unscientific. Wherever
science fails to explain any matter, chance is furnished as the cause. The
contemporary atheists like Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett etc. are
expending their energies to suggest that the belief in God is a delusion, wastage
of time and impediment in the human progress. That this is an age of reason
where you need to support every assertion with reason and reason is what
conforms to their ideas. Certainly these people have their impacts on the minds
of general populace.
Rationality is thought of as a way of thinking which is based on reasoning
and on one’s thinking, as opposed to heresy and superstitions. It is a
philosophical concept which means reliance only on what a person can perceive

2. through sense organs and application of mind and beyond that there is no
knowledge.
Ayn Rand a Russian-born American philosopher, describes it as “The
virtue of Rationality means the recognition and acceptance of reason as one's
only source of knowledge, one's only judge of values and one's only guide to
action.” This type of rationality is even being integrated with our thinking and
we are being asked to question everything and to doubt even the sublime
teachings. Whatever we can’t understand is not acceptable to “Rationality”.
Man has the power of reasoning and rational thinking. He can think over
various matters and weigh alternative prepositions. Through the use of his
reasoning he can reach certain conclusions. It is because of this faculty that we
have been able to discover various secrets of nature and invent new things but
the intellect of Man has a limit within which it can fathom and beyond that limit
it fails.
The science has led us to understanding that whole of the universe is
ordered. The laws of physics governing the universe, the distances between the
heavenly bodies, various constants and the various elements found in the nature
have a perfect symmetry or are in perfect proportion and the rate of expansion
post big bang are perfect. But it does not tell us as to why these things are so
ordered instead a challenge is posed to the intellect: “No want of proportion wilt
thou see in the Creation of (Allah) Most Gracious. So turn thy vision again:
seest thou any flaw?” (Al Quran 67: 3)
Our intellect provides us various theories for various processes or
physical phenomenon, but it never provides us any explanation as to why these
things should be there. Even those people who put forth these theories, do not
believe them to be true, they just put them forward with the hope that they
might be true. Our reasoning and intellect can’t account for the origin of life.

3. The theory of evolution fails to explain as to how life originally began. Biology
tells us how the cells replicate and how information is stored in DNA and how
the same is passed on from one generation to another. But all the biological
sciences fail to explain as to what is the origin of this information contained in
the DNA. How the information came to be developed in the first place?
When we contemplate on the mysteries and the complexities of the
universe, our intellect points to the Creator. That all this can’t be a pure chance.
That there is a power, a designer behind all this. That all this is not purposeless.
The creator is beyond His creation. He created universe out of nothing
and when He says “Be”, it is; it comes into existence instantly. He is not bound
by Time and Space and He created both these entities. He is not bound by the
laws of Physics. It is we who think in terms of time and space because we have
been conditioned to think so, as we have grown up and seen others grow up
within the confines of time and space. These entities have been set up for the
creation and they are bound by it. The creator can change these Laws if He so
chooses.
Science tells us about cloning, nuclear engineering, space travel. These
branches of knowledge have their own utility and we do not need to dispute
them. Science can explain to us the manner these things happen. It explains
various processes that are going on in the universe or within our body, but it is
beyond the domain of science to tell us as to why should so happen? We are
taught the laws of physics, that gravitational waves have been discovered, we
are told that the radiations from the beginning of the big bang have been
detected; so big bang is proved. We are told that the elementary particle, Higgs
Boson, has been discovered at LHC. Science can conclusively know its mass,
charge and other properties, but it can’t explain why it exists at all. It does not
matter, it is all same.

4. Science does tell us that the universe exists, that we exist in this vast
universe. But it fails to answer our basic question: why should there be the
universe at all. Why do we exist and what is the source of our consciousness. It
fails to answer these questions.
Whether string theory, corpuscular theory, quantum theory or the theory
of relativity are right or not, is all the same to a believer. Whether there are
many universes (as multi-verse theory suggests) or just one, it does not matter.
Whether life exists on other planets or not, is of no concern. He Who created
life on this planet can create it anywhere else too. It doesn’t matter as to in what
manner He created different species. As He willed, so happened. Let those who
are interested let them explore. In the end they would come to the same
conclusion which we have already learned. Anyway it is ultimately the creator
who created all this and the various theories do not make a difference.
Anyway we can’t rely too much on our intellect, our sense organs, our
wisdom and perceived knowledge can deceive us, there is a point beyond which
reason and rationality just cease to function. When it ventures beyond that it
makes blunders. Through the use of reason, Man reached upto the event of big
bang, but it fails to go beyond that. It can’t provide a satisfactory reason behind
its causes. Certainly intellect can’t peep deeper as it is beyond its ability. To
understand the cause of big bang, we have to depend upon the divine guidance.
In these when efforts are on to deprive us of our E’maan, we have to be
cautious. There is deliberate misrepresentation of knowledge and things are
presented in such a way as to impact our in such a way that we get disillusioned
with reality. Who knows which of the scientific theories may turn out to be
mere assumptions, without any basis and would be discarded? There is much
more mystery than can be expressed. There are many things which escape the
inquisitive mind of a person. The domain of science is just creation, when it
tries to fathom the creator, it errs. It is better for science to remain confined to

5. its own domain and not to make mistakes by delving into something which is
beyond its reach.
The highest level of the irrationality and stupidity is when you admit that
everything in this universe has a cause. But when you discuss the universe and
life therein, you simply glide over as if these were the simplest matters, needing
no cause. As for as a believer is concerned, the grandeur of the universe is
always convincing, “Behold! in the creation of the heavens and the earth, and
the alternation of night and day, there are indeed Signs for men of
understanding.”(Ale Imran: 190)
Email: mubashir_07@rediffmail.com
Mubashir Hassan Dar
S/o Manzoor Ahmad Dar
R/o Zirpora Bijbehara
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