科學家對宗教不再客氣 Scientists Put an End To Polite Talk of Religion 陳宜君譯 當諾貝爾物理學獎得主史蒂芬．溫柏格發出「世界須從宗教信仰的長期夢 魘中醒來」的警告，或是諾貝爾化學獎得主哈洛德．柯洛托爵士呼籲約翰．坦 伯頓基金會，將下一筆表揚「心靈發現方面進展」的150萬美元獎金頒給著有 全國暢銷書「神的錯覺」的無神論者、牛津大學進化生物學家里察．道金斯時 ，這個關鍵性時刻或許已然來臨。 Maybe the pivotal moment came when Steven Weinberg, a Nobel laureate in physics, warned that “the world needs to wake up from its long nightmare of religious belief,” or when a Nobelist in chemistry, Sir Harold Kroto, called for the John Templeton Foundation to give its next $1.5 million prize for “progress in spiritual discoveries” to an atheist － Richard Dawkins, the Oxford evolutionary biologist whose book “The God Delusion” is a national best-seller. 或者，轉捩點出現在紐約市海登天文館館長兼布希政府太空探索顧問尼爾 ．狄葛拉斯．泰森以令人心碎的先天性畸形新生兒照片讓觀眾鴉雀無聲的時刻 。他指出，這證明主宰一切的是人力無法控制的大自然，而非一個睿智的監督 者。 Or perhaps the turning point occurred when Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York City and an adviser to the Bush administration on space exploration, hushed the audience with heartbreaking photographs of newborns misshapen by birth defects － testimony, he suggested, that blind nature, not an intelligent overseer, is in control. 在這個過程當中，加州拉賀亞「沙克生物研究中心」上月舉行一場研討會 ，會議原可作為科學與宗教以禮相待的又一個對話平台，不料卻變得猶如某個 單一政綱政黨的成立大會，而這個政綱就是：在意識形態充斥到危險程度的世 界裡，科學須扮演傳播福音的角色，與宗教爭奪歷來最偉大故事的講述人地位。 Somewhere along the way, a forum last month at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California, which might have been one more polite － dialogue between science and religion, began to resemble the founding convention for a political party built on a single plank: in a world dangerously charged with ideology, science needs to take on an evangelical role, vying with religion as teller of the greatest story ever told. 科羅拉多州波爾德「太空科學研究所」資深研究科學家卡洛琳．波爾柯半 開玩笑地呼籲創立另類教會，由泰森博士出任首任牧師。她並非全然開玩笑。 波爾柯博士說：「我們應該以宗教的成功之道為師。」 Carolyn Porco, a senior research scientist at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado, called, half joking, for the establishment of an alternative church, with Dr. Tyson as its first minister. She was not entirely kidding. “We should let the success of the religious formula guide us,” Dr. Porco said. 近年來旨在消弭科學與宗教間歧見的會議不可謂少，通常是由坦伯頓基金 會主辦，結果卻總是在形而上的層次搞得難分難解。改由總部位於加州的教育 組織「科學網絡」贊助，並獲得聖地牙哥投資家羅伯．濟波斯（他承認其角色 有點「反坦伯頓」）資助，名為「超越信仰：科學、宗教、理性與生存」的拉 賀亞會議，迅速提升為活力充沛的自由知識論壇。不斷有演說者請求同行放膽 挑戰只以經文和信仰為基礎的自然學說。 There has been no shortage of conferences in recent years, commonly organized by the Templeton Foundation, seeking to smooth over the differences between science and religion and ending in a metaphysical tie. Sponsored instead by the Science Network, an educational organization based in California, and underwritten by a San Diego investor, Robert Zeps (who acknowledged his role as a kind of “anti-Templeton”), the La Jolla meeting, “Beyond Belief: Science, Religion, Reason and Survival,” rapidly escalated into an invigorating intellectual free-for-all. One speaker after another called on their colleagues to be less timid in challenging teachings about nature based only on scripture and belief. 以堅決反對教導創造論聞名的凱斯西儲大學物理學家勞倫斯．Ｍ．克勞斯 ，這回倒成了溫和派。克勞斯博士堅稱：「科學不會讓人無法信仰上帝，我們 應認清與接受事實，別再夜郎自大。」 Lawrence M. Krauss, a physicist at Case Western Reserve University known for his staunch opposition to teaching creationism, found himself in the unfamiliar role of playing the moderate. “Science does not make it impossible to believe in God,” Dr. Krauss insisted. “We should recognize that fact and live with it and stop being so pompous about it.” 就是這種通融的態度激怒了道金斯博士。他說：「我實在受夠了我們每個 人，包括沒有信仰的人，被洗腦而賦予宗教的尊重」，「小孩被有系統地灌輸 ，有一種出自信仰、啟示、經文、傳統的更高等知識，而且這種知識即使不比 基於真憑實據的知識優越，至少也可等量齊觀」。 That was just the kind of accommodating attitude that angered Dr. Dawkins. “I am utterly fed up with the respect that we － all of us, including the secular among us － are brainwashed into bestowing on religion,” he said. “Children are systematically taught that there is a higher kind of knowledge which comes from faith, which comes from revelation, which comes from scripture, which comes from tradition, and that it is the equal if not the superior of knowledge that comes from real evidence.” 溫伯格博士離開前，似乎暫且軟化了態度，以略顯天真的語氣把宗教比作 古怪的老女人。 Before he left, Dr. Weinberg seemed to soften for a moment, describing religion a bit fondly as a crazy old aunt. 道金斯博士卻不同意。他說：「我一點也不會懷念她。」絲毫不會。「門 兒都沒有。」 Dr. Dawkins wasn’t agreeing. “I won’t miss her at all,’ ‘he said. Not a scrap. “Not a smidgen.” Richard Dawkins, center, urged the scientific community to be less timid in challenging teachings based only on religious belief and not on science. By GEORGE JOHNSON -- 趙客縵胡纓 吳鉤霜雪明 銀鞍照白馬 颯沓如流星 十步殺一人 千里不留行 事了拂衣去 深藏身與名 閒過信陵飲 脫劍膝前橫 將炙啖朱亥 持觴勸侯贏 三盃吐然諾 五嶽倒為輕 眼花耳熱後 意氣素霓生 救趙揮金槌 邯鄲先震驚 千秋二壯士 烜赫大梁城 縱使俠骨香 不慚世上英 誰能書閤下 白首太玄經 李白 俠客行 --

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