Andrea Byl, in her recent attempt to merge science and faith, "Christianity, belief in God based on rational thinking, evidence" (SN 10/31), missed the difference between religious and scientific beliefs.

Religious "truths" are predetermined, believed with certainty and accepted without reliable supporting evidence. They're faith-based. In contrast, scientific "truths" are tentative, based on the best evidence and subject to continued refinement.

The stronger the evidence is for a particular belief, the stronger our confidence in its accuracy; the weaker the evidence the weaker our belief. It's a sliding scale of certainty based on strength and quality of evidence. No faith is required.

In religion, this relationship is reversed; the strongest beliefs are granted to claims with the least evidence. Most Christians believe that Jesus is literally present in the Eucharist, was born of a virgin and resurrected.

They believe God is a three-in-one multipurpose deity: part son, part father and part "holy ghost." There is no objective evidence for any of these beliefs, yet most Americans believe with certainty. That's their prerogative, but it's not rational.

Byl also erroneously asserted the evolutionary process is just random chance. It's true that mutation is a chance event, but natural selection is decidedly nonrandom.

Beneficial mutations, which enhance the reproductive fitness of an organism, are favored and increase in the gene pool. That's how antibiotic resistant bacteria evolve so quickly and adapt to our medications. Evolution is not random, it is fully evidence-based and requires no religious faith.

Regarding Byl's reference to Fred Hoyle's estimation of the probability of DNA forming, this is known as "Hoyle's fallacy" (see Wikipedia). It's been refuted many times (see TalkOrigins.org or Richard Dawkins' "The Blind Watchmaker"), but creationists and evolution deniers still love to bring it up.

John Bice
MSU staff member