This is the third in a series of articles that examine nine “scientific facts” that require a new theological response.

Read First Article: What we can Know about the Universe
Read Second Article: Homo Sapiens, God, and the Evolving Universe
 
From the Very Big to the Very Small

It’s hard to imagine how big the universe is, but at least I can understand the immensity. The very small is a different matter. Back in the old days, let’s say high school, we all knew that the atom was like a little solar system. The protons and neutrons made up the center, and all the electrons flew in orbits around the so-called nucleus. I was shocked to learn one day how much of that atom was actually empty space. As an analogy, pretend that there is a speck of dust in the spatial center of Notre Dame cathedral. That speck would represent the nucleus, and the floor, walls and roof would be the orbiting electrons. The rest is empty space. Of course, this space is filled with force fields, otherwise you would fall right through the chair that you hoped to sit on. So it’s not really empty.

Then it was discovered that the electrons could orbit only in certain energy levels. They could get on an elevator and go to the 1st, 2nd, 3rd….floors, but no 1.5 floor, etc. The energy of orbiting electrons was digital, not analog. They could jump from one level to another, but couldn’t stop somewhere in between. Those levels are called quanta, hence “quantum mechanics”.

So far so good. Then it becomes strange. The famous double slit experiment showed that reality was not what it seemed. Set up a “gun” that shoots particles at a piece of cardboard that has two slits in it, and place a wall behind that cardboard. As you start shooting, the sensible expectation is that the particles would go through the slits and make two vertical lines on the wall, corresponding to the two slits. Guess what? That’s not what happens. Instead, as you shoot, something goes through those slits that appears on the wall as a wave pattern, looking something like a bar code that appears these days on everything you buy. What we thought was a particle, is also a wave, a wave that goes through both slits at the same time!

So instead of a nucleus with electrons in orderly orbit, the solar system in miniature, we have a bunch of waves. The question now becomes, how do we get from these waves to concrete objects? As I look out the window at my truck, I do not see indefinite waves moving about; I see a device that I can drive down the road. How do we get from the atomic waves to the macro world of things?

One answer relies on observation. Everything at the atomic level is flying around and then, bam!, I look at it. Suddenly, the very fact of my observing stops the wave in its tracks, and particles now appear that have direction and velocity that can be measured. This theory is called the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. Not everyone was happy with this view. Einstein, for one, did not like the uncertainty that the bunch of waves portrayed. How could one be a physicist and measure and predict if nature had no given order? “God does not play dice”, as he famously said. He also wanted the moon to be there whether someone was looking at it or not. Can’t blame him for that. If one were speaking to someone of the Copenhagen persuasion, one could ask if the observation of a mouse counts. Can a mouse “collapse” the “wave function” (we’re using the fancy language now)? Could a camera? Or how about an observer from another universe? Or- I actually saw a video wherein Deepak Chopra claimed that god was this observer. The wave function collapses into the ordinary world because god sees it. Thank god!

Perhaps the most challenging of the quantum phenomena is what’s called particle entanglement. Start with a particle and smash it into two particles. Now change a characteristic of one of the particles and automatically and instantaneously and without causality the other particle is affected, even though it may be on the other side of the universe. Whoa! Wait a minute. Something happens far, far away, with no cause? Einstein referred to that as ‘spooky action at a distance”, and did not like it one bit. A few recent experiments, however, seem to prove it to be the case. With most other laymen, I ask: “Does this not necessitate something moving faster than the speed of light, which is impossible according to relativity? To date, I have not found a convincing answer to that question. Probably because I didn’t understand the answer.

I remember when I first learned about the bizarre implications of special relativity. As one approaches the speed of light, mass increases, approaching infinite mass. And the faster one goes, the more time slows. Well, I thought, a perfect description of god, moving at the speed of light, so time stops for her while it plods along for the rest of us, so she knows everything that did happen and will happen, and she has infinite mass that includes everything. Uninformed thoughts, of course, but it illustrates our desire to find an explanation for god, a place where god can be.

Folks are still looking for that place. Perhaps god hangs out in one of those extra dimensions postulated by string theory. Perhaps god is the Copenhagen theory’s measurer/observer who creates the macro world by collapsing the wave function. Perhaps god is the cosmic consciousness that enables the entanglement of particles separated by cosmic scale distances. Perhaps god created the Big Bang. Medieval theologians thought of god as the First Cause, that which started everything. Quantum theory has laid causality to rest, much to Einstein’s chagrin, and replaced it with…what? The random acts of measurement and observation?

For my feeble mind, whether god is a Cosmic Person or Being-Itself is a question beyond my ability to think. And I can’t even understand quantum theory, much less see how god fits into it. It’s a reality almost impossible to conceive, and particle physicists themselves have no consensus. Finally, it seems, theology shares incomprehensibility with another discipline! Both god and science transcend our ability to comprehend. Stay tuned for further developments in this breaking story. Maybe the quantum physicists will have an answer. In the meanwhile, I’ll listen to the heavenly chorus of the mockingbird.
 
Read Fourth Article: Undeserved Suffering
Read Fifth Article: The World We Create
Read Sixth Article: A Zone by Any Other Name
Read Seventh Article: How Other Persons Affect Us
Read Eighth Article: Who am I?