Faith under a microscope

Can religion and science find a common language?

Yakov Krotov: Today's release of the program is devoted to the relationship between faith, religion and science. Can they find a common language?

Our guests are Alexei Kondrashov , a biologist, a professor at the University of Michigan, the head of the laboratory of evolutionary genomes of the faculty of bioenginery and bioinformatics of Moscow State University, a famous personality, a scientist to the brain of bones.

Alexey Simonovich, you are an agnostic, an atheist, a believer, a communist?

Calling yourself believers awkward me: I don't move the mountains

Alexey Kondrashov: I, of course, are not an atheist and not a communist. It’s embarrassed to call myself believers: I do not move the mountains. From an intellectual point of view, I would say that I am an atheist.

Yakov Krotov: Almost every six months in the media, which I would call "yellow", another article is emerging that science has discovered the cause of religiosity. Sometimes this is some kind of special structure of the brain, sometimes some part of the DNA when the decryption of the genome went ...

Alexey Kondrashov: This is the same, since the structure of the brain is determined by DNA. There is a great science on this topic, but the problem is that we cannot put an experiment, we cannot deduce another humanity that does not have this gene or this piece of brain, and see what it will believe in. That is, it is always built on some correlations, on some believable considerations.

There is such a science - evolutionary psychology. People made their way to such a thought for a long time that if other signs of a person are a product of evolution, then psychology, probably, too, and in some matters this, of course, is true. And there is, in particular, the evolutionary psychology of religion. Well, such work for various cultures, where people believe that there is a Lord God on top of which you are interested in whether you behave well, and there some dormitory norms are observed in a more altruistic version.

Such a large cross -cultural analysis has recently been released. From this, it is concluded that faith in the gods evolved, because the societies in which it were more stable. This is the idea of group selection, which such inveterate evolutionary theorists, like me, generally consider it deeply wrong.

Every six months in the "yellow" media, another article pops up that science has opened the reason for religiosity

Yakov Krotov: Only I was going to fall on this theory ...

Alexei Kondrashov: Vladimir Pavlovich Efroimson was a very large supporter of group selection, and when the group selection over the world has gone out of fashion, he published a huge article in the New World magazine called the Pedistering of Altruism. The idea is that societies in which there will be a lot of altruism will win everyone. But for this to work, it is necessary that the unit of selection is not individuals, but some groups. And here, speaking in English, "Love Hate Relations" between evolutionary biology and group selection, that is, "either spit or kiss."

But, in general, when something has to be explained by a group selection, this is considered a bad sign - it means that another does not work, and we have to talk about group selection. There were four or five different works on the evolutionary origin of religion, and this is all very curious, because certain religious beliefs are indeed a universal thing.

Yakov Krotov: But one of the new books, as it were, according to religious studies, written by biologist Pascal Buaye, has just come out in Russian. Moreover, it is referred to as a scientific book, and there is a definition of religion as a cultural meme, which, in my opinion, is generally a certain sealing of the problem, because one unknown is determined through another unknown.

Alexey Kondrashov: I think that the education of an atheist can lead to the opposite result, however, there is a Muslim country - why is it a Muslim? Because children are brought up in Islam. There is a Christian country - why is it Christian? For the same reason.

Yakov Krotov: I can reveal you one secret. There are no Islamic and Christian countries. There are separate Christians and individual Muslims, and on them, like parasites - pseudo -Islamic states, cultures and so on.

There are uncertain concepts

Alexey Kondrashov: In order not to argue about the definitions, let's call the Christian country in which Christianity professes more than a certain share of the population. And why does it work? Because they were all flocked there on Fridays and drove into them the appropriate religion.

Yakov Krotov: Here I have an article by three Russian authors - these are Panchin, Panchin and Tuzhikov. I discussed with one of the authors what a scientific approach to the problem of God is in general, to the problem of faith, and Alexander Panchin told me that the main thing is to give a definition. There is no clear definition in this article.

Alexey Kondrashov: There is such a concept - a "primitive concept", which is no longer determined by anything. Give a definition of the concept of "number" ... there are uncertain concepts. No matter how you feel about the Lord God, it is clear that this is a primitive concept that to determine through something else ... it is inconvenient. In my opinion, this is called apophatic theology.

Yakov Krotov: Apophatic or negative, negative: God is not that, is not that, it’s not that ... but I will reveal you a little secret. Believers, in principle, are divided into two groups-into those who really want something to be definitely said about God, and those who strongly object to this. Their religious experience, I think, is the same, but due to the difference in temperament, features and so on, these are different behavioral attitudes.

Alexey Kondrashov: But even if it is said, this still does not mean a definition.

Yakov Krotov: In this article there is a definition of religion from Pascal Buay as a cultural meme, which, in my opinion, does not define anything, but simply disguises the lack of definition, but the authors are quite conscientious because they raise the question, rather, about religious rituals. There are no questions here: religious ceremony, behaviorism , behavior (a person kisses the icon) - this is external, it is easy to determine.

Walking in the church is now honorable, prestigious, it contributes to a career

But then we get into another problem. Russia is considered an Orthodox country, and all the reference books indicate 140 million Orthodox (at the same time forget that of them 20 million are Muslims). Five million people really go to the church, and go only because it is not forbidden, the government allocates money for churches, walking in the church now honorable, prestigious, it contributes to a career and still gives some kind of psychological comfort. Government subsidies will be removed-and we know what will happen: the 60-70s will return, when an insignificant number of people went to church.

Alexey Kondrashov: I am not a supporter of organized religions, and I'm not sure that it would have happened.

Yakov Krotov: But the experiment was already staged by history.

Alexey Kondrashov: But then there were all sorts of persecution and so on. Today is the aroligative post -Christian power. Don't know…

Yakov Krotov: In March 1917, as soon as after the revolution they canceled the obligatory communion, 80% of the soldiers stopped going to worship. And it was a shock, no one expected this.

Alexey Kondrashov: Wasn't that in 1905?

Yakov Krotov: No, in 1905 the manifesto introduced only the freedom of the change of religion. Then most of the Western Ukraine returned to Greek Catholicism, the Old Believers were legalized in the massive order. But not to walk - this was considered a criminal offense, and, in principle, a person could have thundered to the monastery. And in March 1917 there was the same shock as Nicholas II, who discovered that all his beloved Cossack guards fiercely hate him, that the uncle, who joyfully dragged the baby and then the teenager with hemophilia, the prince, hated him all these years, but this did not manifest he did not manifest.

As soon as after the revolution was canceled the obligatory communion, 80% of the soldiers stopped going to services

So, the question arises: and if a person is a believer, but not committing religious rites? Believers go through different stages of faith. Most believers in Russia do not participate in religious rites, the state treasury church has been inhabited, and the other is prohibited, but people still believe. They turn out to be the subject of study, or then there are no these biologists?

Alexey Kondrashov: On the surface lies the answer that no. I looked at one composition in a living magazine, and it is good for what is said there: if I am a bacterium that can be transmitted from person to person ...

Yakov Krotov: There is such a hypothesis ...

Alexey Kondrashov: Suppose I am a bacterium ...

Yakov Krotov: Yes, you settled in me, and you need me to feed you, help you multiply, and you push me to the icon so that I, the bacterium, transferred to the icon ...

Alexey Kondrashov: Well, like rabies. Why does a frenzied fox bit everyone? Because if she does not bite anyone, then her rage will remain in her.

Yakov Krotov: That is, the virus bites.

If the frenzy fox does not bite anyone, then its rabies in it will remain

Alexey Kondrashov: Of course! And there are a lot of such examples. And if the bacterium is so humane, then it does not force everyone to bite, but makes you kiss the icon. This explanation of the kissing of icons is good in that it can be checked. You can compare the bacteria of those who kiss the icons, and those who do not kiss them. Suppose we will see from those who kiss the icons, some of their bacteria that are transmitted, but it is not known where the egg is, and where the chicken is. Maybe kissing icons has nothing to do with bacteria, but simply they transmit bacteria to each other. This is a hypothesis, and it would be very interesting to catch this bacillo

Yakov Krotov: This is methodologically impossible! And if in front of you is a person who does not kiss the icon and does not participate in the rites at all, but he is a believer, then he falls out of the circle of research?

Alexey Kondrashov: No, here we are talking about kissing the icons.

Yakov Krotov: About swimming in the gang, about pilgrimage ...

Alexei Kondrashov: But Bacilla doesn’t care whether you swim in the gang and whether you go ...

Yakov Krotov: Are these different bacilli? Or not?

Bacille does not care if you are swimming in the gang

Alexey Kondrashov: Maybe different. My hypothesis: such bacilli will not be found. If it is discovered, then it will be the usual bacillus, which is called the "virus". If everyone goes somewhere at the same time, then they pass the influenza virus to each other. Maybe this flu is to blame for everything? (laugh)

Yakov Krotov: Let's get back to Pascal Buay. He refutes the story that religion is a way of explaining the world and so on, and switches to a cultural meme, to some idea. Moreover, his initial message that religion is extremely diverse, one can understand (modern religious studies began with the book of William James about the diversity of religious experience) but is it possible to approve? And in what sense. Imagine that I want to determine science. And I start by telling you: that you, Alexey, consider alchemy pseudoscience, you consider the torsion fields pseudoscience ...

Alexei Kondrashov: I just heard such an expression, but since all respected people consider them pseudoscience, then, probably, it is. Science is generally very largely built on trust, because I cannot know the whole science.

Yakov Krotov: And astrology? ..

Alexey Kondrashov: For the same reason ...

Yakov Krotov: And did biology have some of his own pseudoscientific prebiology, protobiology? At Aristotle, she is still quite scientific.

The Bible is the only actual thing is noev ark

Alexei Kondrashov: What can pseudoscientific biology look like?

Yakov Krotov: At least in the form of a story of the Bible about creation. If we consider the six -day , the famous story about creation, as an explanation of evolution, as has been done for centuries, then this is a pseudoscience. If this is considered as a narrative not about how a person evolved, but about the meaning of life, then it is a religion.

Alexey Kondrashov: No, six -day is a very abstract thing. In the Bible, the only actual thing is noev ark. It is described in detail-from such and such a tree, so many floors, and there were so many holes in it ...

Yakov Krotov: Well, this is poetry. If I begin to unite astrology and alchemy with chemistry and biology, and I will say that you are in vain narrowing the concept of science, then you will not understand what science is, this will be an intellectual mistake. Why then a person who says to me: “You, Jacob, imagine yourself to believe, but in order to determine what faith is, you need to analyze with Castaneda or with Vladimir Lenin, who was a believer in communism, let's find a common denominator with you,” will be scientifically or non -scientific?

Alexey Kondrashov: No, it will be nonsense!

Yakov Krotov: It seems to me that biologists are quite convenient ... When all these articles in the "yellow" press determine religion, they are built according to this principle: take ten nuns, put on their sensors and ask them to pray ...

Alexey Kondrashov: And we sequen their genotypes, and then we sequen the ten nuns, and we look at what genes they have ... And not even the nuns, but simply believers and unbelievers ...

I usually thank God just for the fact that the world is incomprehensible, contradictory

Yakov Krotov: There is one small detail here. For example, I was born an atheist, and named me in honor of Gorky Maxim. I believed, turned and baptized at 18. And now the question is: what, my genome determined the appeal? I was a real atheist!

Alexey Kondrashov: You can take people with different life stories ... No, most likely, nothing will work out. Now there was a job - in my opinion, two thousand British with the highest IQ - above 170, secured them full of the genome - and, in general, did not see anything.

Yakov Krotov: Do you believe in IQ as a biologist?

Alexey Kondrashov: Yes, of course!

Yakov Krotov: But this table is not indicative. This is a concept from the point of view of a culturalist and historian ...

Alexey Kondrashov: You can make very different intelligence tests, and a very high correlation is obtained. IQ is a generally accepted assessment.

Yakov Krotov: At the first stage of religious life, a person considers a manifestation of God, the manifestation of the highest rationality, the harmony of the world (well, all the biblical psalms: how reasonably you arranged everything that Leo is sleeping at a time when a person works, and when I fall asleep, the lion goes hunting).

At the first stage of religious life, a person considers the manifestation of God reasonableness, the harmony of the world

A modern believer - after Auschwitz, Calvary, after Montaeny, Pascal and Descartes ... I usually thank God just for the fact that the world is incomprehensible, contradictory that his beauty is not the beauty of harmony, but the beauty of creative disorder. That is, rather, I will thank God not for the fact that I am healthy, but for the fact that I am sick, because health, rather, reassures, relaxes.

Alexey Kondrashov: It depends on what illness.

Alexey Kondrashov

Yakov Krotov: There are challenges that do not kill, but help to advance.

Alexey Kondrashov: I understand what you are talking about, but now here is the favorite entertainment of physicists - about the subtle setting of the universe. In physics there are a bunch of parameters that take nowhere, and physicists promise to us that someday they will lead them out of one general theory, but so far there is no this general theory. So, if any of these parameters to change a little, then there will be no reasonable life. And now they are very actively doing this, because I can’t change, say, the ratio of the electron charge to the speed of light in life, and I can very easily easily in the computer. And over the past year, several works on the subtle setting have been published in the technical, physical magazines: there will be a slightly less constant subtle structure-and there will be no atomic nuclei at all, and a little more-and all the nuclei will be very heavy and there will be no carbon.

Yakov Krotov: But does it follow that there will be no reason?

Life and even more so reason are possible only on carbon

Alexei Kondrashov: Life and even more so the mind that we can have at least some idea of are possible only on carbon, in good conditions, when the temperature is about zero degrees, and so on. Of course, you can imagine that instead of atoms, the same ...

Yakov Krotov: etheric bodies.

Alexei Kondrashov: But this is completely beyond the scope of dialectical materialism. And what we can imagine is a carbon life. And it is reasonable to imagine that if I take a list of random fundamental physical constants, then nothing good will work there. And on this subject there is a huge amount of all philosophy and pseudo -philosophy, because there is an anthropic principle: everything is suitable for us because we are here.

Yakov Krotov: These are the remains of medieval Christian theology. I don't like it.

God is a primitive concept, and it is impossible to determine it

Alexey Kondrashov: I also don’t like anything else ... Here is either a god who built Constant, or an anthropic principle. Both that and the other does not look very beautiful.

Yakov Krotov: No, it looks beautiful, but that god who once stopped me at an atheistic gallop, and who is present every day ... More precisely, I am present because he is the essence, and I - at ... I don’t know if they built these strings, he made this cosmic holographic schematic or not, I am not interested in it. And in the same way I am not interested in that my beloved woman is doing with the process of cell division. I am not even very interested in the level of her education. My relationship with her cannot be described by behaviorism. This is the favorite "lotion" of modern scientists. Подразумевается, что любовь – это поведение. А любовь – это не поведение.

Здесь либо Боженька, который построил константу, либо антропный принцип

Алексей Кондрашов: Нет, любовь тоже вызывает некое поведение.

Яков Кротов: Любовь является любовью не тогда, когда дарят букет цветов, а когда двое кричат друг на друга, до слез обижаются и все-таки любят друг друга.

Алексей Кондрашов: Ну, это тоже не обязательно.

Яков Кротов: Но это экстремум. Как говорит народная мудрость, «милые бранятся - только тешатся». И именно этим экстремумом проверяется любовь. И вера проверяется не тогда, когда я захвачен благодатью, и весь мир в алмазах, и все ясно. Вера проверяется, когда иногда устанешь и думаешь: а где же Бог, Господи, ты где? И вдруг он все-таки есть! Вот момент, когда его нет на субъективном, эмоциональном уровне, это и есть то, что называется богооставленностью, с точки зрения позитивиста. Я в этот момент перестаю быть религиозным, но на самом деле именно это тот момент, когда я утверждаю себя как верующего - момент сомнения, отсутствия.

А как вы определите верующего?

Алексей Кондрашов: Как принимающего участие в ритуалах, помогающих бактериям переноситься.

Яков Кротов: А любящий – это человек, у которого в кармашке презерватив? Отличное определение!

Алексей Кондрашов: Я совершенно не защищаю это определение, с точки зрения внутренней жизни. Это годится еще меньше, чем история с презервативом - обе никуда не годятся.

Меня не интересует, что у моей любимой женщины обстоят дела с процессом клеточного деления

Яков Кротов: Вот мы говорим – «жизнь», «человек»… Еще 40 лет назад при моем диалоге с атеистами-учеными и биологами это, прежде всего, был диалог о Творце, о Боге. Но уже лет 10-15 разговор в основном выстраивается уже по линии – а существует ли человек? И это то новое, что принесло третье тысячелетие. Как мы определим человека?

Ну, вот сейчас опять троллинг религии, если угодно - статья на атеистическом сайте, что вот путем эксперимента выяснилось, что у собак есть краткосрочная память, то есть собака запоминает некоторые события, которые ей не нужно запоминать. Она их может хранить и пять минут, и час, хотя ей это и не требуется. И вывод: значит, человек от собаки…

Алексей Кондрашов: А откуда мы знаем, что требуется собаке? Почему это не требуется? Я думаю, дикому зверю полезна кратковременная память.

Яков Кротов: Ну, там пафос такой, что «вы, люди, думаете, что вы сильно качественно лучше животных, так вот, осадите назад».

Алексей Кондрашов: Сейчас на эту тему очень много всяких работ, тем не менее, есть отличающиеся математические способности. Даже самая умная новокаледонская ворона умеет считать до шести, но гипотезу Пуанкаре она ни за что не докажет и даже не поймет, то есть тут действительно пропасть.

Любящий – это человек, у которого в кармашке презерватив? Отличное определение!

Яков Кротов: А если человек с дефектом и не умеет считать до шести? Где у нас эталон человека?

Алексей Кондрашов: Нет, я совершенно не настаиваю, что человек, чтобы называться человеком, должен считать до шести. Но любого человека, которого кормили, не били по голове, у которого нет менделевской генетики , можно в пятом классе научить определенным вещам из области математики. И это нормальное свойство человека.

Яков Кротов: Я благодарю Бога не за то, что я рационален, а за то, что я иррационален! Я способен любить и творить. А машина – нет.

Алексей Кондрашов: Я согласен.

Яков Кротов: Ворона и обезьяна, наверное, способны любить и творить.

Алексей Кондрашов: В 1974-м году вышла знаменитая статья под названием "Что такое быть летучей мышью?" И сейчас мы не можем залезть в летучую мышь, но считается, что субъективный опыт у любого уважающего себя млекопитающего, безусловно, есть. А у компьютера нет субъективного опыта, и в этом смысле он радикально от нас отличается.

Яков Кротов: Когда я ставлю вопрос о разрыве между человеком и животным, об опыте, о человечности, вы сразу говорите о генах. Мне кажется, это у вас уже профессиональный рефлекс. Для вас аксиома, что все, что есть в человеке, определено на уровне генома?

Даже самая умная новокаледонская ворона умеет считать до шести, но гипотезу Пуанкаре она ни за что не докажет

Алексей Кондрашов: Нет, не все. Если яйцеклетку вложить в геном шимпанзе, то, как вы ни старайтесь, вырастет шимпанзе, человека все равно не получится.

Яков Кротов: Но из того, что без генома человека не я буду человеком, не следует, что человек определяется только исключительно геномом.

Алексей Кондрашов: Нет, никто этого не говорит…

Яков Кротов: Да ну? Вон сколько авторов! Ну, еще «вирус религиозного бешенства»…

Алексей Кондрашов: Вот живут питекантропы, они уже человекообразные, но, в соответствии с учением папы рисского, в них еще нет души. А потом у этих бездушных питекантропов рождается уже… В общем, произошел бытийственный разрыв.

Все эти битвы насчет абортов: в какой момент развивающий плод делается человеческой личностью… Называли момент зачатия, рождения, еще какой-то момент… Или - когда дети поступают в университет? Есть такой американский анекдот: спорят пастор, священник и раввин – когда начинается жизнь? Священник говорит: "Жизнь начинается в момент зачатия. Пастор говорит: "Нет, она начинается с момента рождения". Раввин говорит: "Вы ничего не понимаете! Жизнь начинается, когда дети уходят в колледж".

Яков Кротов: Если не считать метафоры любви (Бог как любимый или любимая), вторая мощная метафора, единственная, способная выразить невыразимое и неопределимое: Бог как отец. В этом смысле для меня загадка, как может быть в одной из самых религиозных стран в мире, в Америке, где уход из семьи – это не «блудный сын», а обретение себя, такое, что, судя по фильмам, над отцом надо похихикивать, посмеиваться... Какой-то странный скачок…

Жизнь начинается, когда дети уходят в колледж

Алексей Кондрашов: Как сказал Марк Твен "когда мне было 16 лет, у меня родители были очень глупые, а потом они очень быстро поумнели".

Яков Кротов: В статье Панчина, Тужикова и Панчина есть ссылка на статью, где на американском материале исследовали религиозные сообщества типа амишей и пришли к в выводу, что в такого рода сообществах какие-то микробы и паразитарная флора имеют повышенную интенсивность.

Алексей Кондрашов: Подождите, это совсем разные вещи. Амиши – это все-таки совсем дикие люди, они не используют электричества, отвергают цивилизацию и ездят на лошадях.

Яков Кротов: Это не дикость!

Алексей Кондрашов: Ну, первобытная общинность. Они доцивилизованные. И естественно, у них будут свои бациллы.

Яков Кротов: Америка – страна с очень высоким уровнем религиозности, но какие там могут быть микробы? Я был в американской церкви, где причащали пять тысяч человек – у каждого отдельный стаканчик, никто ничего не целует... Уж такая гигиена… То есть оказывается, что гипотеза-то на глиняных ногах.

Я не настолько глуп, чтобы допускать возможность познания Бога

Алексей Кондрашов: Я совершенно не отстаиваю эту гипотезу.

Яков Кротов: А почему вы все-таки говорите, что вы - атеист, а не агностик? Вы допускаете возможность познания Бога?

Алексей Кондрашов: Нет, я не настолько глуп, чтобы допускать возможность познания Бога, но я отношусь к людям, которым даже онтологический аргумент в пользу бытия Божия очень нравится. Я понимаю, что цена всех этих аргументов невелика, но для меня он убедителен. И тупой космологический аргумент, что у материального мира должна быть первопричина, мне в этом смысле тоже нравится.

Яков Кротов: И вы не требуете сразу определить Бога, сразу определить любовь? Вы готовы съесть это без определения?

Алексей Кондрашов: Какие глупости я здесь говорил, что вы стали такого низкого мнения о моем интеллекте? Бог – это примитивное понятие, и определить его невозможно.