Pantheism: The Religion of Science
by Olilver L. Reiser
The religious tradition of the Western World (Europe and the Americas) has for many centuries been based on the belief in a personal god. The prevailing Hebrew - Christian tradition and the pagan religions of the Greeks and the Romans share this common personalistic conception.
But ever since the days of the ancient Stoic formulation, pantheism has occasionally emerged as a rational sublimate from the boiling ferment of personalistic religions. And when one compares the values of these two conceptions of the nature of deity, it becomes clear that pantheism has incontestable advantages over all personalistic rivals. The greatest virtue of pantheism is that it is (at the present time) the only conception of Deity consistent with the spirit and achievements of science: that is what Giordano Bruno, Spinoza, Emerson, and Albert Einstein can teach mankind.
Belief in a personal god who confers favors on men is based on the doctrine of miracles and revealed truth; it has its origin in superstition and its culmination in a corrupt ecclesiasticism which preys upon the credulity of the ignorant; such a religion is pre-scientific in origin and anti-rational in outcome. In order to show why this is so, and to bring out as sharply as possible the contrasts between the two types of religion, let us set down the oppositions which characterize the two attitudes:
Assumptions of Orthodox Religion, Based on the Belief in a Personal GodI. God is a personality outside of (distinct from) nature. He is an Infinite, Perfect Being, the all-wise author of love, justice, and so forth.
II. God is the Creator of the Universe and all that is in it, animate or inanimate.
III. God can reach down into the Universe He created and work miracles and special providences, as He sees fit.
IV. If the world is destroyed by an "act of God," He will still continue to exist throughout all eternity.
Assumptions of Pantheistic Religion, Based on the Belief in an Impersonal GodI. God is not a personality distinct from nature. Deity refers to an indwelling spirit or field of influence inter-woven with the visible physical universe. Behind the phenomena of nature which man investigates by way of his senses there lies a universal, real substratum which is open to human intelligence. This substratum, as it is termed in A. E. Miln's cosmology, I shall designate as the Harmonic Base - borrowing a term from Mr. F. L. Kunz.
II. The universe - the space-time-energy world in its totality - is eternal and uncreated. But within the cosmic continuum we find creation still taking place in local areas and on all levels of "matter," "life," and "mind. Miracles and special providences, however, do not occur. There are no uniquely "revealed" religions, and the belief in the "verbal inspiration" of the Bible is false.
III. The universe is one, interrelated and dependable. Nature works according to uniform, predictable patterns which make possible the discovery of what man calls "laws of nature."
The fundamental assumption of scientific method and of pantheism is that the universe can be understood: nature will not put us to permanent intellectual confusion.* The abundant success of science confirms this faith - a "faith" which is expectation based on experience.
IV. The universe cannot be destroyed by an "act of God." Einstein's principle of the equivalence of matter and energy is a statement of nature's equilibrium between the manifest world in the space and time of perception and the unmanifest world, the field plenum of an invisible cosmic guiding genius which extends outside (but not independent of) the four-dimensional space-time universe of physics. This cosmic energy continuum is what is called the substratum or harmonic base of reality.
In Pantheism, Deity is conceived to be a guiding field of influence, giving form to that which was formless. This guiding field operates on all levels: at the lowest level in the transition from undifferentiated cosmic energy to "particles" and their subsequent control by the "ghost waves" which show the particles where to go; on the biological level through the individuation fields which control embryogenesis; on the psychological level through the cortical fields which produce mental synthesis; and on the human level through the integrative fields which produce social synthesis.
If the quality of deity is connected with the guiding fields which impress the forms of unity upon the structures of emergent evolution, then "evil" is associated with the forces of disorganization (chaos) which oppose such integration. Of course, these two forces are correlative and complementary. "Good" and "evil," therefore, have no moral significance until cosmic energy reaches up into human consciousness as an integrated human personality. The energy of evolution thunders up into human consciousness as the vehicle of moral choice the growing tip of freedom and creativity.
Evil in man is the enemy of the unification of experience, just as evil in society is that which obstructs social synthesis. A world organized around the concept of man-at his best as the being of supreme value in the universe and man-at his-worst as the most ignoble thing in nature would be a significant social experiment. In such a world, man's endless capacity for self-evolution would be directed toward the achievement of new freedoms. The divinity in man would no longer be crushed by organized churchianity. And the god-in-man would be recognized as nothing other than the endless striving toward the future goal of wholeness which, in the visible world, is the space-time-energy unity of nature. This highest (most inclusive) unity is the pantheistic substitute for the mystical trinity of religion, and the "worship" of this trinity is simply the feeling of awe and reverence which man experiences in the presence of what Mary Everest Boole called the As-Yet-Unknown.
* Editor's Note: Most pantheists, like most scientists, no longer believe the universe will ultimately be completely understood. In fact, the ultimate Mystery of the universe is a valid source of our reverential feelings for it. However, Oliver Reiser was writing during a historical period where the limitations of science and the vastness of the Universe were not understood, and some scientists believed we were on the verge of "understanding everything there is." - HWW
Oliver L. Reiser was a Professor of the History of Science at the University of Pittsburgh.
This essay originally appeared in Manas , Vol. 2, No. 38 (September 21, 1949), was reprinted by permission in Pantheist Vision Vol. 7, No. 1, March, 1986.
But ever since the days of the ancient Stoic formulation, pantheism has occasionally emerged as a rational sublimate from the boiling ferment of personalistic religions. And when one compares the values of these two conceptions of the nature of deity, it becomes clear that pantheism has incontestable advantages over all personalistic rivals. The greatest virtue of pantheism is that it is (at the present time) the only conception of Deity consistent with the spirit and achievements of science: that is what Giordano Bruno, Spinoza, Emerson, and Albert Einstein can teach mankind.
Belief in a personal god who confers favors on men is based on the doctrine of miracles and revealed truth; it has its origin in superstition and its culmination in a corrupt ecclesiasticism which preys upon the credulity of the ignorant; such a religion is pre-scientific in origin and anti-rational in outcome. In order to show why this is so, and to bring out as sharply as possible the contrasts between the two types of religion, let us set down the oppositions which characterize the two attitudes:
Assumptions of Orthodox Religion, Based on the Belief in a Personal GodI. God is a personality outside of (distinct from) nature. He is an Infinite, Perfect Being, the all-wise author of love, justice, and so forth.
II. God is the Creator of the Universe and all that is in it, animate or inanimate.
III. God can reach down into the Universe He created and work miracles and special providences, as He sees fit.
IV. If the world is destroyed by an "act of God," He will still continue to exist throughout all eternity.
Assumptions of Pantheistic Religion, Based on the Belief in an Impersonal GodI. God is not a personality distinct from nature. Deity refers to an indwelling spirit or field of influence inter-woven with the visible physical universe. Behind the phenomena of nature which man investigates by way of his senses there lies a universal, real substratum which is open to human intelligence. This substratum, as it is termed in A. E. Miln's cosmology, I shall designate as the Harmonic Base - borrowing a term from Mr. F. L. Kunz.
II. The universe - the space-time-energy world in its totality - is eternal and uncreated. But within the cosmic continuum we find creation still taking place in local areas and on all levels of "matter," "life," and "mind. Miracles and special providences, however, do not occur. There are no uniquely "revealed" religions, and the belief in the "verbal inspiration" of the Bible is false.
III. The universe is one, interrelated and dependable. Nature works according to uniform, predictable patterns which make possible the discovery of what man calls "laws of nature."
The fundamental assumption of scientific method and of pantheism is that the universe can be understood: nature will not put us to permanent intellectual confusion.* The abundant success of science confirms this faith - a "faith" which is expectation based on experience.
IV. The universe cannot be destroyed by an "act of God." Einstein's principle of the equivalence of matter and energy is a statement of nature's equilibrium between the manifest world in the space and time of perception and the unmanifest world, the field plenum of an invisible cosmic guiding genius which extends outside (but not independent of) the four-dimensional space-time universe of physics. This cosmic energy continuum is what is called the substratum or harmonic base of reality.
In Pantheism, Deity is conceived to be a guiding field of influence, giving form to that which was formless. This guiding field operates on all levels: at the lowest level in the transition from undifferentiated cosmic energy to "particles" and their subsequent control by the "ghost waves" which show the particles where to go; on the biological level through the individuation fields which control embryogenesis; on the psychological level through the cortical fields which produce mental synthesis; and on the human level through the integrative fields which produce social synthesis.
If the quality of deity is connected with the guiding fields which impress the forms of unity upon the structures of emergent evolution, then "evil" is associated with the forces of disorganization (chaos) which oppose such integration. Of course, these two forces are correlative and complementary. "Good" and "evil," therefore, have no moral significance until cosmic energy reaches up into human consciousness as an integrated human personality. The energy of evolution thunders up into human consciousness as the vehicle of moral choice the growing tip of freedom and creativity.
Evil in man is the enemy of the unification of experience, just as evil in society is that which obstructs social synthesis. A world organized around the concept of man-at his best as the being of supreme value in the universe and man-at his-worst as the most ignoble thing in nature would be a significant social experiment. In such a world, man's endless capacity for self-evolution would be directed toward the achievement of new freedoms. The divinity in man would no longer be crushed by organized churchianity. And the god-in-man would be recognized as nothing other than the endless striving toward the future goal of wholeness which, in the visible world, is the space-time-energy unity of nature. This highest (most inclusive) unity is the pantheistic substitute for the mystical trinity of religion, and the "worship" of this trinity is simply the feeling of awe and reverence which man experiences in the presence of what Mary Everest Boole called the As-Yet-Unknown.
* Editor's Note: Most pantheists, like most scientists, no longer believe the universe will ultimately be completely understood. In fact, the ultimate Mystery of the universe is a valid source of our reverential feelings for it. However, Oliver Reiser was writing during a historical period where the limitations of science and the vastness of the Universe were not understood, and some scientists believed we were on the verge of "understanding everything there is." - HWW
Oliver L. Reiser was a Professor of the History of Science at the University of Pittsburgh.
This essay originally appeared in Manas , Vol. 2, No. 38 (September 21, 1949), was reprinted by permission in Pantheist Vision Vol. 7, No. 1, March, 1986.