God and Nature Spring 2019
Cosmic Energy First, then Matter: A Spiritual Ethic
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By Paul H. Carr
The biblical creation stories in Genesis 1 and John 1 both anticipated modern cosmology. There was a
beginning, and God created light energy. Genesis 1:3 tells us, “And God said, let there be light.” The Gospel of John Chapter 1 states in verses 1, 4, and 5: “In the beginning was the Word (Logos) and the Word was God and with God…. In him (Jesus) was life; and the life was the light of humankind… And light shines in the darkness.” The Word or Logos is the rational structure of the cosmos, which includes such laws as the equivalence of energy and mass.
In the beginning, there was energy, according to the modern big bang, “hot-to-cool” cosmology. Matter condensed out from this hot energy as the universe cooled and expanded. This is analogous to misty water droplets condensing from a cooling steam. Mass m comes from energy E according to Albert Einstein’s equation E = mc^2, where c is the velocity of light.
The biblical creation stories in Genesis 1 and John 1 both anticipated modern cosmology. There was a
beginning, and God created light energy. Genesis 1:3 tells us, “And God said, let there be light.” The Gospel of John Chapter 1 states in verses 1, 4, and 5: “In the beginning was the Word (Logos) and the Word was God and with God…. In him (Jesus) was life; and the life was the light of humankind… And light shines in the darkness.” The Word or Logos is the rational structure of the cosmos, which includes such laws as the equivalence of energy and mass.
In the beginning, there was energy, according to the modern big bang, “hot-to-cool” cosmology. Matter condensed out from this hot energy as the universe cooled and expanded. This is analogous to misty water droplets condensing from a cooling steam. Mass m comes from energy E according to Albert Einstein’s equation E = mc^2, where c is the velocity of light.
"Energy is analogous to God’s Spirit. We can’t see either, but we can observe their interactions and affects..." |
Einstein’s theory of general relativity led priest Georges Lemaître to predict in 1927 that the cosmos expanded from a hot big bang or “cosmic egg.” In 1965, radio astronomers Penzias and Wilson discovered the remnant fossil microwave radiation energy that had expanded from the big bang. This microwave radiation “static noise” energy fills the entire universe, which I have called the whispering cosmos (1).
Astrophysicists have determined that the pre-matter “beginning” was 13.8 billion years ago. Recent cosmological discoveries indicate that the matter we experience every day is only four percent of the universe, which is composed mostly of dark energy. There may be forms of energy that we do not yet recognize.
Before Einstein, James Clerk Maxwell had formulated the properties of electricity and of magnetism as coupled equations. From these he concluded that electromagnetic energy, from high-frequency light to low-frequency radio waves, propagate through space with the velocity of light (c). Energy is primary. Our cell phones use intermediate-frequency microwave electromagnetic radiation to communicate, and electrical energy powers our computers and other devices
We, as creatures with souls, are more than matter. This true nature/energy is recognized historically and its primacy is expressed in the metaphor of light, a form of energy we experience every day.
In the 4.5 billion-year history of life on earth, sunlight gave cells the energy to convert the dense carbon dioxide in the early earth’s atmosphere into oxygen by photosynthesis. Animal life then metabolizes this oxygen with the sugar in food-matter to get the energy that sustains its existence. Without this energy, there would be no life as we know it. Again, energy is the primal source and sustainer of material life.
Energy is analogous to God’s Spirit. We can’t see either, but we can observe their interactions and affects. Our physical bodies are dependent on food-energy to continue living. Our souls are nourished by God’s spirit by whom and in whom we have eternal life. To be physically born, we must leave the warm, nourishing womb. In dying, we are born to eternal life.
For science, fire is a form of chemical energy. Religion uses fire metaphorically to express the energizing power of God’s spirit.
How is God immanent, present, and acting in the world? In Exodus 3:2, we read: “The angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up.” This experience energized Moses to lead the Hebrew people out of slavery in Egypt.
Fast-forwarding to the Nineteenth Century, Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote:
…Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes,
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries…
Johann Sebastian Bach’s cantata O Eternal Fire is a musical expression of the spiritual power that energized Jesus’ disciples on the day of Pentecost. Theologian Paul Tillich described the Divine Spiritual Presence as “The power in us but not of us.”
Cosmologists like the late Stephen Hawking have been searching for the “Theory of Everything,” which would unite nuclear, electromagnetic, and gravitational forces. Hawking predicted that this new theory would be formulated as a set of coupled equations. He then asked, “What would breathe fire into these equations?”
God created and sustains the world with its physical laws. God’s spirit, like energy, is primal, immanent, and pervasive. Hence, Spirit alone is worthy of our ultimate concern. We should store up “spiritual treasures in heaven.” We must “Seek first the Kingdom of Heaven, and all these things will be added unto [us].”
REFERENCE
Paul H. Carr, BS MIT, PhD Brandeis U, and IEEE Life Fellow. He led the Component Technology Branch of the AF Research Laboratory, Bedford, MA that developed the surface acoustic wave (SAW) technology used in compact, signal-processing filters for radar, cell phones, and TV. After his lab retirement, the Templeton Foundation awarded him grants for the religion and science courses he taught in the philosophy department at U Mass Lowell. This inspired his book, Beauty in Science & Spirit (2006). Paul also gives science and religion talks at the Academy of Senior Professionals at Eckerd College, St. Petersburg, FL, and Rivier University, NH. His web page is: www.MirrorOfNature.org.
Astrophysicists have determined that the pre-matter “beginning” was 13.8 billion years ago. Recent cosmological discoveries indicate that the matter we experience every day is only four percent of the universe, which is composed mostly of dark energy. There may be forms of energy that we do not yet recognize.
Before Einstein, James Clerk Maxwell had formulated the properties of electricity and of magnetism as coupled equations. From these he concluded that electromagnetic energy, from high-frequency light to low-frequency radio waves, propagate through space with the velocity of light (c). Energy is primary. Our cell phones use intermediate-frequency microwave electromagnetic radiation to communicate, and electrical energy powers our computers and other devices
We, as creatures with souls, are more than matter. This true nature/energy is recognized historically and its primacy is expressed in the metaphor of light, a form of energy we experience every day.
In the 4.5 billion-year history of life on earth, sunlight gave cells the energy to convert the dense carbon dioxide in the early earth’s atmosphere into oxygen by photosynthesis. Animal life then metabolizes this oxygen with the sugar in food-matter to get the energy that sustains its existence. Without this energy, there would be no life as we know it. Again, energy is the primal source and sustainer of material life.
Energy is analogous to God’s Spirit. We can’t see either, but we can observe their interactions and affects. Our physical bodies are dependent on food-energy to continue living. Our souls are nourished by God’s spirit by whom and in whom we have eternal life. To be physically born, we must leave the warm, nourishing womb. In dying, we are born to eternal life.
For science, fire is a form of chemical energy. Religion uses fire metaphorically to express the energizing power of God’s spirit.
How is God immanent, present, and acting in the world? In Exodus 3:2, we read: “The angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up.” This experience energized Moses to lead the Hebrew people out of slavery in Egypt.
Fast-forwarding to the Nineteenth Century, Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote:
…Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes,
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries…
Johann Sebastian Bach’s cantata O Eternal Fire is a musical expression of the spiritual power that energized Jesus’ disciples on the day of Pentecost. Theologian Paul Tillich described the Divine Spiritual Presence as “The power in us but not of us.”
Cosmologists like the late Stephen Hawking have been searching for the “Theory of Everything,” which would unite nuclear, electromagnetic, and gravitational forces. Hawking predicted that this new theory would be formulated as a set of coupled equations. He then asked, “What would breathe fire into these equations?”
God created and sustains the world with its physical laws. God’s spirit, like energy, is primal, immanent, and pervasive. Hence, Spirit alone is worthy of our ultimate concern. We should store up “spiritual treasures in heaven.” We must “Seek first the Kingdom of Heaven, and all these things will be added unto [us].”
REFERENCE
- Carr, Paul H. 2006. “From the ‘Music of the Spheres’ to the Big Bang’s Whispers.” Chapter 3 of Beauty in Science and Spirit, Beech River Books, Center Ossippee, NH.
Paul H. Carr, BS MIT, PhD Brandeis U, and IEEE Life Fellow. He led the Component Technology Branch of the AF Research Laboratory, Bedford, MA that developed the surface acoustic wave (SAW) technology used in compact, signal-processing filters for radar, cell phones, and TV. After his lab retirement, the Templeton Foundation awarded him grants for the religion and science courses he taught in the philosophy department at U Mass Lowell. This inspired his book, Beauty in Science & Spirit (2006). Paul also gives science and religion talks at the Academy of Senior Professionals at Eckerd College, St. Petersburg, FL, and Rivier University, NH. His web page is: www.MirrorOfNature.org.