Sunday, December 16, 2007

Todd, which is it, NOMA or POMA?

A month ago, Todd put up a post addressing the interplay between science and scripture. He included a quote from McGrath discussing Stephen Jay Gould’s idea of the NOMA (nonoverlapping magisteria). Basically, Gould says the magesteria (i.e. the domain of teaching authority) of science and religion do not overlap. Religion has no say about the things investigated by science, and science has no say about ultimate meaning. To quote Gould:

The net of science covers the empirical universe: what is it made of (fact) and why does it work this way (theory). The net of religion extends over questions of moral meaning and value. These two magisteria do not overlap, nor do they encompass all inquiry (consider, for starters, the magisterium of art and the meaning of beauty). To cite the arch cliches, we get the age of rocks, and religion retains the rock of ages; we study how the heavens go, and they determine how to go to heaven.
Gould goes on to talk at length about how the NOMA principle permits Catholics to believe in evolution so long as they accept the divine infusion of the soul. In other words, the NOMA principle (according to Gould) tells religion that scientific theories are none of its business and to keep its big mouth shut about them.

McGrath, to his credit, rejects this NOMA nonsense and suggests the POMA (partially overlapping magisterial) principle, “reflecting a realization that science and religion offer possibilities of cross-fertilization on account of the interpretation of their subjects and methods.”

Todd makes two comments in his post which raise big questions for me. First, he wonders if “McGrath, Beckwith, and Ostler all believe in POMA, whereas some conservative evangelicals and Christian fundamentalists believe in nonoverlapping magisteria of Scripture.” Really? Christian fundamentalists believe in NOMA?!? I asked a question about this in the comments at Todd’s blog, but it went unanswered. Reading more closely, I decided my confusion here may be cleared up by a final statement by Todd in which he says that:

I believe that God uses Scripture as the final magisteria for evangelicals.
This leads me to wonder if what Todd really means is that science and religion do overlap (POMA) but the Bible has the final say on everything. This would be the opposite of the Dawkins position, which is that science and religion overlap, but that science has the final say on everything. If I’m correct, then what Todd means by NOMA is not what Gould means by NOMA. Of course, rather than debating overlapping vs. non-overlapping, perhaps the critical question is about what the magisterium of science really is. If you argue that science never has teaching authority, that is another way to get to a non-overlapping model, but a very different non-overlapping model than the one suggested by Gould.

So, Todd, I have lots of follow up questions about your views on the interplay between science and religion, but let’s start by answering this simple bedrock question about NOMA and POMA. Have I understood you correctly? When you say evangelicals believe in NOMA, do you mean that they believe the Bible trumps science in all matters in which they may overlap? When we talk about an issue like, say, the age of the Earth, is science subordinate to the Bible which says the Earth is only a few thousand years old?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yep, and here is where I am the conservative or fundamentalist evangelical, Jacob.

You have pegged me pretty well.

Here would be an interesting evangelical University blurb from Cedarville:

"Because our rational abilities are finite and we are affected by sin, we must be careful that our interpretation of natural revelation is consistent with [God's] inspired and written revelation, the Scriptures. Having taken this position on God's revelation we believe that the universe, solar system, earth, and life were all created recently by an omnipotent, omniscient God during six literal 24 hour days, as described in Genesis Chapters 1 and 2, and as referred to in other Biblical passages.

"Our approach to science and origins is based on the presupposition that our highest and ultimate authority is the unchanging Word of God. We do not base our position of origins on our current understanding of the theories of science and mathematics which are subject to change."

I suppose McGrath would reject this as a Darwinian evolutionist.

Jacob J said...

Todd,

Ok, I'm glad I understood your position correctly, thanks for verifying that. I didn't want to go forward with other questions if I had the wrong understanding on this. That was what I was hoping to accomplish with this post.

As a less important follow-up: When that quote talks about "six literal 24 hour days, as described in Genesis Chapters 1 and 2," does Genesis actually say something about it being a 24 hour day? Isn't that just something you are adding to the text, rather than getting from the text? I didn't remember it saying anything about 24 hours.

Anonymous said...

Jacob, are you thinking that anytime I translate the Hebrew word, yom, as a normal day with hours, I am just reading into the Hebrew text?