- THE scientist who led the team that cracked
the human genome is to publish a book explaining why he now believes in
the existence of God and is convinced that miracles are real.
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- Francis Collins, the director of the
US National Human Genome Research Institute, claims there is a rational
basis for a creator and that scientific discoveries bring man "closer
to God".
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- His book, The Language of God, to be
published in September, will reopen the age-old debate about the relationship
between science and faith. "One of the great tragedies of our time
is this impression that has been created that science and religion have
to be at war," said Collins, 56.
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- "I don't see that as necessary at
all and I think it is deeply disappointing that the shrill voices that
occupy the extremes of this spectrum have dominated the stage for the past
20 years."
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- For Collins, unravelling the human genome
did not create a conflict in his mind. Instead, it allowed him to "glimpse
at the workings of God".
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- "When you make a breakthrough it
is a moment of scientific exhilaration because you have been on this search
and seem to have found it," he said. "But it is also a moment
where I at least feel closeness to the creator in the sense of having now
perceived something that no human knew before but God knew all along.
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- "When you have for the first time
in front of you this 3.1 billion-letter instruction book that conveys all
kinds of information and all kinds of mystery about humankind, you can't
survey that going through page after page without a sense of awe. I can't
help but look at those pages and have a vague sense that this is giving
me a glimpse of God's mind."
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- Collins joins a line of scientists whose
research deepened their belief in God. Isaac Newton, whose discovery of
the laws of gravity reshaped our understanding of the universe, said: "This
most beautiful system could only proceed from the dominion of an intelligent
and powerful being."
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- Although Einstein revolutionised our
thinking about time, gravity and the conversion of matter to energy, he
believed the universe had a creator. "I want to know His thoughts;
the rest are details," he said. However Galileo was famously questioned
by the inquisition and put on trial in 1633 for the "heresy"
of claiming that the earth moved around the sun.
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- Among Collins's most controversial beliefs
is that of "theistic evolution", which claims natural selection
is the tool that God chose to create man. In his version of the theory,
he argues that man will not evolve further.
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- "I see God's hand at work through
the mechanism of evolution. If God chose to create human beings in his
image and decided that the mechanism of evolution was an elegant way to
accomplish that goal, who are we to say that is not the way," he says.
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- "Scientifically, the forces of evolution
by natural selection have been profoundly affected for humankind by the
changes in culture and environment and the expansion of the human species
to 6 billion members. So what you see is pretty much what you get."
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- Collins was an atheist until the age
of 27, when as a young doctor he was impressed by the strength that faith
gave to some of his most critical patients.
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- "They had terrible diseases from
which they were probably not going to escape, and yet instead of railing
at God they seemed to lean on their faith as a source of great comfort
and reassurance," he said. "That was interesting, puzzling and
unsettling."
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- He decided to visit a Methodist minister
and was given a copy of C S Lewis's Mere Christianity, which argues that
God is a rational possibility. The book transformed his life. "It
was an argument I was not prepared to hear," he said. "I was
very happy with the idea that God didn't exist, and had no interest in
me. And yet at the same time, I could not turn away."
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- His epiphany came when he went hiking
through the Cascade Mountains in Washington state. He said: "It was
a beautiful afternoon and suddenly the remarkable beauty of creation around
me was so overwhelming, I felt, 'I cannot resist this another moment'."
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- Collins believes that science cannot
be used to refute the existence of God because it is confined to the "natural"
world. In this light he believes miracles are a real possibility. "If
one is willing to accept the existence of God or some supernatural force
outside nature then it is not a logical problem to admit that, occasionally,
a supernatural force might stage an invasion," he says.
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