Beyond belief: In place of God - Science, religion, reason and survival

New Scientist reported on the symposium entitled "Beyond belief: Science, religion, reason and survival" hosted by the Science Network, a science-promoting coalition of scientists and media professionals convening at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.

Discussion about the Science Network with Roger Bingham plus Richard Dawkins talking about his book "The God Delusion".

Beyond belief: In place of God

18 November 2006, Magazine issue 2578

Can secular science ever oust religious belief - and should it even try?

IT HAD all the fervour of a revivalist meeting. True, there were no hallelujahs, gospel songs or swooning, but there was plenty of preaching, mostly to the converted, and much spontaneous applause for exhortations to follow the path of righteousness. And right there at the forefront of everyone's thoughts was God.

Yet this was no religious gathering - quite the opposite. Some of the leading practitioners of modern science, many of them vocal atheists, were gathered last week in La Jolla, California, for a symposium entitled "Beyond belief: Science, religion, reason and survival" hosted by the Science Network, a science-promoting coalition of scientists and media professionals convening at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.

They were there to address three questions:-

1. Should science do away with religion?
   
2. What would science put in religion's place?
   
3. can we be good without God? and a forth question ...
   
4. can science take on religion and win?
   

Edge.org also reported on the event.

[From the "Beyond Belief" program:] Just 40 years after a famous TIME magazine cover asked "Is God Dead?" the answer appears to be a resounding "No!" According to a survey by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life in a recent issue of Foreign Policy magazine, "God is Winning". Religions are increasingly a geopolitical force to be reckoned with. Fundamentalist movements-some violent in the extreme-are growing. Science and religion are at odds in the classrooms and courtrooms. And a return to religious values is widely touted as an antidote to the alleged decline in public morality. After two centuries, could this be twilight for the Enlightenment project and the beginning of a new age of unreason? Will faith and dogma trump rational inquiry, or will it be possible to reconcile religious and scientific worldviews? Can evolutionary biology, anthropology and neuroscience help us to better understand how we construct belief, and experience empathy, fear, and awe? Can science help us create a new rational narrative as poetic and powerful as those that have traditionally sustained societies? Can we treat religion as a natural phenomenon? Can we be good without God? And if not God, then what?

This is a critical moment in the human situation, and The Science Network in association with the Crick-Jacobs Center is bringing together an extraordinary group of scientists, philosophers, political commentators and writers to explore answers to these questions.

Q1 - Should science do away with religion?

Nobel prize winner Cosmologist Steven Weinberg of the University of Texas, Austin. His answer was an unequivocal yes. "The world needs to wake up from the long nightmare of religion," Weinberg told the congregation. "Anything we scientists can do to weaken the hold of religion should be done, and may in fact be our greatest contribution to civilisation."

Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York spoke with an evangelist's zeal, and he had the heretics in his sights. Referring to a recent poll of US National Academy of Sciences members which showed 85 per cent do not believe in a personal God, he suggested that the remaining 15 per cent were a problem that needs to be addressed. "How come the number isn't zero?" he asked. "That should be the subject of everybody's investigation. That's something that we can't just sweep under the rug. This single statistic, he said, gave the lie to claims that patiently creating a scientifically literate public would get rid of religion. "How can [the public] do better than the scientists themselves? That's unrealistic."
DeGrasse Tyson clearly found it hard to swallow the idea that a scientist could be satisfied by revelation rather than investigation. "I don't want the religious person in the lab telling me that God is responsible for what it is they cannot discover," he said. "It's like saying no one else will ever discover how something works."

"I am utterly fed up with the respect we have been brainwashed into bestowing upon religion," Richard Dawkins told the assembly.

"It is just as futile to get someone to give up using their ears, or love other children as much as their own... Religion fills very basic human needs." Mel Konner, ecologist, Emory University, Atlanta, Georgia

"Religion is leading us to the edge of something terrible... Half of the American population is eagerly anticipating the end of the world. This kind of thinking provides people with no basis to make the hard decisions we have to make." Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith

"Religion allows billions of people to live a life that makes sense - they can put up with the difficulties of life, hunger and disease. I don't want to take that away from them." Francisco Ayala, biologist and philosopher, University of California, Irvine

"No doubt there are many people who do need religion, and far be it from me to pull the rug from under their feet." Richard Dawkins, biologist, University of Oxford

"Science can't provide a sense of magic about the world, or a community of fellow-believers. There's a religious mentality that yearns for that." Steven Weinberg, physicist, University of Texas, Austin

"Science's success does not mean it encompasses the entirety of human intellectual experience."
Lawrence Krauss, physicist and astronomer, Case Western Reserve University, Ohio

Q2 - What would science put in religion's place?

Carolyn Porco of the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado said "Science could do at least as well as religion. "If anyone has a replacement for God, then scientists do." Porco said. "At the heart of scientific inquiry is a spiritual quest, to come to know the natural world by understanding it... Being a scientist and staring immensity and eternity in the face every day is about as meaningful and awe-inspiring as it gets." Astronomers in particular, she suggested, regularly confront the big questions of wonder. "The answers to these questions have produced the greatest story ever told and there isn't a religion that can offer anything better." Religious people, she claimed, use God to feel connected to something grander than they are, and find meaning and purpose through that connection. So why not show them their place in the universe and give them a sense of connectedness to the cosmos? The answers to why we are here, if they exist at all, will be found in astronomy and evolution, she said. Science provides an aesthetic view of the cosmos that could replace that provided by religion - a view that could even be celebrated by its own iconography, Porco added. Images of the natural world and cosmos, such as the Cassini photograph of Earth taken from beyond Saturn, Apollo 8's historic Earthrise or the Hubble Deep Field image, could offer a similar solace to religious artwork or icons. The big challenge, according to Porco, will be dealing with awareness of our own mortality. The God-concept brings a sense of immortality, something science can't offer. Instead, she suggested highlighting the fact that our atoms came from stardust and would return to the cosmos - as mass or energy - after we die. "We should teach people to find comfort in that thought. We can find comfort in knowing that everyone who has ever lived on the Earth will some day adorn the heavens."

Joan Roughgarden, a professor of geophysics and biology at Stanford University, California, described some of the statements being made as an "exaggerated and highly rose-coloured picture of the capabilities of science" while presenting a caricature of people of faith. Attempts by militant atheists to represent science as a substitute for religion would be a huge mistake, she said, and might even set back science's cause. "They are entitled as atheists to generate more activism within the atheist community," she told New Scientist. "But scientists are portraying themselves as the enlightened white knights while people of faith are portrayed as idiots who can't tell the difference between a [communion] wafer and a piece of meat." People of faith are being antagonised, and this is "a lose-lose proposition", she said.

"It is the job of science to present a fully positive account of how we can be happy in this world and reconciled to our circumstances." Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith

"Let me offer the universe to people. We are in the universe and the universe is in us. I don't know any deeper spiritual feeling that those thoughts." Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist, Hayden Planetarium, New York

"Let's teach our children about the story of the universe and its incredible richness and beauty. It is so much more glorious and awesome and even comforting than anything offered by any scripture or God-concept that I know of." Carolyn Porco, planetary scientist, Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colorado

"I'm not one of those who would rhapsodically say all we need to do is understand the world, look at pictures of the Eagle nebula and it'll fill us with such joy we won't miss religion. We will miss religion." Steven Weinberg, cosmologist, University of Texas, Austin

For others, the idea that it is somehow unacceptable for scientists to maintain a religious belief was going too far. "They're doing science, they're not a problem," Lawrence Krauss, a physicist at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. Scientists are not a special class of humanity, he pointed out, so it is hardly surprising that a small number of academy members are also believers. "It would be amazing if that figure were zero," he said. "Scientists are people, and we all make up inventions so we can rationalise about who we are."

Question 3: Can we be good without God?

Patricia Churchland of the University of California, San Diego said "Values are set by what we care about, and as social animals we care about mates, kin and insider-outsider relationships. Every human social value and moral, she said, can be traced back to group dynamics and biochemistry; there is no need for a scriptural mandate. Thus the answer to the third question of the meeting became an overwhelming yes."

"The axiom that values come from reason or religion is wrong... There are better ways of ensuring moral motivation than scaring the crap out of people."

Patricia Churchland, philosopher, University of California, San Diego

"What about the hundreds of millions of dollars raised just for Katrina by religions? Religions did way more than the government did, and there were no scientific groups rushing to help the victims of Katrina - that's not what science does."

Michael Shermer, editor-in-chief, Skeptic magazine

"It doesn't take away from love that we understand the biochemical basis of love."

Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith

Q4 - Can Science take on religion and win?

With three positive verdicts in the bag, the mood was clear: science can take on religion and win. "We've got to come out," urged chemist Harry Kroto of Florida State University, Tallahassee. Dawkins also used the same phrase, and compared the secular scientists' position to that of gay men in the late 1960s. If everyone was willing to stand up and be counted, they could change things, he said. "Yes I'm preaching to the choir," Dawkins admitted. "But it's a big choir and it's an enthusiastic choir."

Kroto certainly declared himself ready to fight the good fight. "We're in a McCarthy era against people who don't accept Christianity," he said. "We've got to do something about it." His answer is to launch a coordinated global effort at education, media outreach and campaigning on behalf of science. Such an effort worked against apartheid, he said, and the internet now provided a platform that could take science education programmes into every home without being subject to the ideological and commercial whims of network broadcasters. He has schools run by religious groups firmly in his sights too. "We must try to work against faith schooling," he said.

For all the evangelical fervour, some attendees suggested that a little more humility might be in order. "This is Alice in Wonderland, it's just a neo-Christian cult," Scott Atran of the CNRS in Paris told New Scientist. "The arguments being put forward here are extraordinarily blind and simplistic. The Soviets taught kids in schools about science - religiously - and it didn't work out too well. I just don't think scientists, when they step out of science, have any better insight than the ordinary schmuck on the street. It makes me embarrassed to be an atheist."

Krauss was similarly critical. "The presumption here was that any effort to respect the existence of faith is a bad thing," he told New Scientist. "Philosophically I'm in complete agreement, but it's not a scientific statement, and I've seen how offensive it is when scientists say 'I can tell you what you have to think'. They make people more afraid of science. It's inappropriate, and it's certainly not effective."

Dawkins, though, is ready to mobilise. The meeting, he says, achieved "probably a little" - but every little helps. "There's a certain sort of negativity you get from people who say 'I don't like religion or I'm an Atheist ... but you can't do anything about it'. That's a real counsel of defeatism. We should roll our sleeves up and get on with it."

From issue 2578 of New Scientist magazine, 18 November 2006, page 8-11

Relationship between religion and science

The relationship between religion and science

The relationship between religion and science takes many forms as the two fields are both extremely broad. They employ different methods and address different questions. The scientific method relies on an objective approach to measure, calculate, and describe the natural/physical/material universe. Religious methods are more subjective (or intersubjective in community), relying on varying notions of authority, ideas believed to have been revealed, intuition, belief in the supernatural, individual experience, "reasoned" (in a dogmatic sense) observations about life or the universe or a combination of these to understand the universe. Science attempts to answer the "how" and "what" questions of observable and verifiable phenomena; religion attempts to answer the "why" questions of value, morals and spirituality. However, some science also attempts to explain such "why" questions^{[citation needed]}, and some religious authority also extends to "how" and "what" questions regarding the natural world, creating the potential for conflict.

The Scientific Method is one way we can understand the world. Religion or Faith or a Belief System is another.

Scientific Method
The Scientific Method as defined in Wikipedia:-

Scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating phenomena and acquiring new knowledge, as well as for correcting and integrating previous knowledge. It is based on gathering observable, empirical, measurable evidence, subject to the principles of reasoning^[1].

Although procedures vary from one field of inquiry to another, there are identifiable features that distinguish scientific inquiry from other methods of developing knowledge. Scientific researchers propose specific hypotheses as explanations of natural phenomena, and design experimental studies that test these predictions for accuracy. These steps are repeated in order to make increasingly dependable predictions of future results. Theories that encompass wider domains of inquiry serve to bind more specific hypotheses together in a coherent structure. This in turn aids in the formation of new hypotheses, as well as in placing groups of specific hypotheses into a broader context of understanding.

Among other facets shared by the various fields of inquiry is the conviction that the process must be objective so that the scientist does not bias the interpretation of the results or change the results outright. Another basic expectation is that of making complete documentation of data and methodology available for careful scrutiny by other scientists and researchers, thereby allowing other researchers the opportunity to verify results by attempted reproduction of them. This also allows statistical measures of the reliability of the results to be established. The scientific method also may involve attempts, if possible and appropriate, to achieve control over the factors involved in the area of inquiry, which may in turn be manipulated to test new hypotheses in order to gain further knowledge.

Religion

as defined in Wiki:-

Religion is a system of social coherence based on a common group of beliefs or attitudes concerning an object, person, unseen being, or system of thought considered to be supernatural, sacred, divine or highest truth, and the moral codes, practices, values, institutions, traditions, and rituals associated with such belief or system of thought. It is sometimes used interchangeably with "faith" or "belief system"^[1], but is more socially defined than that of personal convictions. The development of religion has taken many forms in various cultures. "Organized religion" generally refers to an organization of people supporting the exercise of some religion with a prescribed set of beliefs, often taking the form of a legal entity (see religion-supporting organization). Other religions believe in personal revelation and responsibility.

Major Religious groups (source: wiki)

1. Christianity 2.1 billion
2. Islam 1.3 billion
3. Secular/Atheist/Irreligious/Agnostic/Nontheist 1.1 billion
4. Hinduism 900 million
5. Chinese folk religion 394 million
6. Buddhism 376 million
7. Primal indigenous ("Pagan") 300 million
8. African traditional and diasporic 100 million
9. Sikhism 23 million
10. Juche 19 million

Why study Chemistry at University?

As a graduate Biochemist I'm proud to have studied Chemistry at Bristol University. And I'm proud that my grandfather, who was a member of the Royal Society of Chemistry and a working chemist at BDH all his life, got me interested in the subject when I was 10 years old. If money was not an issue for me, I might go back to work in a Chemistry lab.

Article (with a few minor & bold edits by Chris Street) from New Scientist, From issue 2568 of New Scientist magazine, 09 September 2006, page 54-55

Something to be proud of

If you had to pick one area of modern chemistry to inspire the next generation to take up the discipline, what would you choose? Anna Gosline asked some of the field's leading lights.

IT IS all too easy to paint a grim picture of chemistry in the UK. Undergraduate enrolment in chemistry courses began to plummet in the late 1990s, bottoming out in 2003 with barely 3000 students. These dwindling numbers, coupled with the high cost of teaching the subject, have led some universities to shut down their departments. Chemists graduating from the University of Exeter, King's College London and Queen Mary, University of London, have all seen windows boarded up behind them.

Countless papers, talks and initiatives have been spawned in an effort to entice students back into the field. Working chemists should venture into classrooms, they say, armed with demonstrations of the big, loud and dangerous reactions of past schooldays. Chemistry teachers should have chemistry degrees to impart their enthusiasm to students, reckons the UK government.

But maybe there is a simpler way to turn the tide: good old-fashioned PR. One way to do this is by demonstrating how chemistry can step up to the challenges of the modern world, be it answering energy needs, addressing climate change or improving our health. So New Scientist polled a selection of leading chemists and asked them what we should be celebrating in today's chemistry, and how this research will answer the future demands of life, just as it has done for the past 200 years.

At the forefront of modern chemistry are new energy technologies. It is up to chemists to sort out an alternative to burning fossil fuels, says Nobel laureate and former president of the Royal Society of Chemistry Harry Kroto. One of the most promising avenues is cheap photovoltaic cells. Solar cells are currently made with silicon, which although abundant on Earth, occurs as silicon dioxide. Refining it to make pure silicon is a costly endeavour, requiring temperatures of up to 1900 °C, meaning that manufacturing a solar cell can consume more energy than the cell eventually produces. Now chemistry is offering the possibility of making photovoltaics from cheap organic polymers, or plastics, such as those developed by Richard Friend at the University of Cambridge. What's more, these thin, flexible materials can essentially be printed out by an ink-jet printer. "The possibility of producing large areas of solar cells by printing them on a printing press sounds like a major breakthrough to me," says Kroto. "At some point we need to design technologies that produce and store energy from the sun at the same rate as we consume it." For Kroto, the ultimate goal would be to take photovoltaics and use them to break apart the highly energetic bond between oxygen and hydrogen in water molecules - producing pure hydrogen fuel.

It will also be chemistry that is ultimately behind technologies to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, says Gerry Lawless, head of the recently reprieved chemistry department at the University of Sussex in Brighton. "Chemists are the only ones who can provide those answers. Our atmosphere is a giant chemical solution." For example, researchers in the US and Canada are working on ways to scrub the atmosphere of excess CO₂, based on hydroxides that absorb the gas.

For Martyn Poliakoff who specialises in green chemistry at the University of Nottingham, one of chemistry's most vital frontiers is finding environmentally responsible ways to manufacture chemicals and products. For example, he has collaborated with chemists in Ethiopia and at Procter & Gamble to create plastic bags made from local sugar cane. "If you can do this, then Ethiopia doesn't have to import oil to make petroleum-based plastics, and when the bags are thrown on the ground the cows can just eat them."

Of course, chemistry's future lies not only in energy and materials but also at the molecular level of biology, says Lawless. "Our understanding of biology is deep enough now that we can apply chemical techniques to its study." Take the report in Nature last year by Stephen Fesik at Abbott Laboratories in Chicago. By interfering with the proteins that help cancer cells avoid programmed cell death, or apoptosis, they were able to kill tumours and also improve the efficacy of radiation treatment and chemotherapy. It is thinking like this - at a chemical level - that will advance the next generation of antibiotics, which are desperately needed to fight the growing plague of resistant infections such as MRSA, says Lawless.

For David Lathbury, director of process chemistry at AstraZeneca R&D, the real excitement lies in our new ability to create commercial-scale quantities of medically important natural chemicals. He points to the work of Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis with discodermolide, a potent anti-cancer drug isolated from sea sponges,. "They made around 600 grams of that material. Ten or 15 years ago we couldn't have made 6 grams. It was a Herculean effort but it did show how the field has moved on."

The next challenge, says Lathbury, is to use chemistry's powers to create whole tissues, such as synthetic skin that could be used to treat burns. "We know how the protein keratin is made. We know how to make membranes. We know a lot of the basic building blocks of cells. But what sort of completely different molecules could you make that would surpass nature? There is nothing to say that nature has arrived at the ultimate solution."

According to Richard Pike, CEO of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the most exciting prospect for tissue generation lies with nanotechnology. He cites the work of people like Samuel Stupp at Northwestern University in Illinois, who are developing tissue scaffolding from nanofibres that encourages spinal cord regeneration. Stupp injected the spinal cords of paralysed rodents with peptides that then self-assemble to form nanoscale scaffolding, giving new tissue a framework to grow on. What's more, these tiny tubes send chemical signals to neural stem cells to promote neuron development. Within two months, the mice could walk again. "You could do the exact same thing to grow blood vessels or grow bone," says Pike. "To me, that is incredible."

Hopes for nanotech extend well beyond tissue repair. From molecule-sized motors to super-strong nanomaterials, and Kroto's own discovery of C₆₀ carbon "buckyballs", the science of small has been hailed as the next big thing across a range of fields, including medicine, electronics, materials science and computing. No matter what discipline the application ultimately falls in, the science will continue to require precise chemical control. "I don't think we fully appreciate the complexity of bottom-up molecular assembly that is necessary to achieve many of the goals of nanoscience," says Kroto. Chemists have often pointed out that nanotech is chemistry by another name.

This identity crisis pervades the entire field of chemistry. Photovoltaic cells can sound more like engineering. Anti-cancer drugs are seen as medicine or biology. Carbon capture could be atmospheric research, while new plastics might be considered materials science. The breadth of the discipline, coupled with its myriad industrial applications, means that while chemistry really is all around us, few can delineate where the field starts and ends, and that is the crux of the PR problem hastening chemistry's seeming demise. If the public does not see solar cells or tissue regeneration as chemistry, then students and even universities are apt to follow.

The need to demonstrate chemistry's ownership of exciting science has never been greater, and affects more than just this discipline, says Kroto, because even as other fields chip away at what is by rights chemistry's territory, the science of molecular interaction has become more important.

"Many of the major areas of advancement are the now at the molecular level," he says. "In physics, nanotechnology is on the molecular scale. In biology, we have gone into the genome, but understanding the DNA molecule requires an understanding of the chemical bond. If we are not careful, people will be working in these areas without an understanding of chemistry, which is the overarching science. We are going to breed a whole generation of people who don't have a good enough understanding of chemistry to make the technologies for a sustainable future."

From issue 2568 of New Scientist magazine, 09 September 2006, page 54-55

Job market snapshot

Growth has been slow in the chemical industries over the past few years, with not only fewer jobs but also fewer graduates applying for entry-level positions. Overall there is still a shortage of qualified technicians, meaning that those with a good degree are well positioned. Pharmaceutical companies continue to offer the best packages for graduates. The UK's chemical industry is also becoming more specialised and entrepreneurial. As a result, the largest jobs boom has been in leadership positions in smaller companies, says Simon Marsh, director of employment relations at the Chemical Industries Association. A new wave of younger leaders also makes for a more flexible, parent-friendly working environment.

BMW Series 7 car runs on Hydrogen

1. Fuel tank, holds approx 8kg of liquid hydrogen at -253C

2. Petrol tank, with 74 litre capacity

3. Pressure control valve

4. Internal combustion engine, uses petrol or liquid hydrogen

Source: BMW

BMW's hydrogen car: Beauty or beast? from BBC News (edited by Chris Street)

As one of the first journalists to drive the world's first series-produced car powered by zero-emission hydrogen, BBC News business reporter Jorn Madslien assesses whether it is a truly green initiative or merely a cynical marketing ploy.

Racing to save the world?

Heading north out of Berlin, towards miles and miles of German autobahn, the roaring six-litre engine belies the top-of-the-range BMW's true potential: to save the world.

Powered by liquid hydrogen that is stored in a vacuum-sealed tank, the engine delivers a whopping 300bhp, yet the emission escaping through the exhaust pipe is mainly pure water vapour.

Unlike rival hydrogen models in the making, which use fuel cells, the BMW Hydrogen 7 is kitted out with a conventional combustion engine that can also run on petrol.

This makes it possible to use it as an everyday car, which is why BMW has announced plans to put hydrogen powered cars into production, months or years ahead of its competitors.

Having stolen a march on its rivals, BMW is far from shy about milking it for all it is worth.

Finding a place to refuel remains a major problem

Wealthy endorsement

BMW has already received plenty of offers from politicians and executives, scientists and athletes, rock stars and TV personalities, all eager to help "create visibility for hydrogen".

Madonna, David Suzuki, Al Gore and Arnold Schwarzenegger are said to be among a long line of celebrities queuing up to endorse the car, and perhaps further enhance their own green images in the process.

But they will have to pay for the privilege.

The H2 button switches between green and gas guzzler mode

The risk of explosion if the car is parked inside a garage and the lack of luggage space caused by the massive hydrogen tank taking up half the boot.

With no more than five hydrogen fuelling stations in the world supporting BMW's technology, early adopters will have to rely on mobile fuelling vehicles that are set to arrive, complete with support crews.

Or they can press a little button on the steering wheel that switches to petrol and extends the car's range by a further 500 gas-guzzling km.

BMW says it wants to lead the way to encourage governments and investors to provide a regulatory framework and an infrastructure that can make a hydrogen economy a reality.

Even more important than getting the fuelling stations up and running is the need to find ways to create enough cheap and clean hydrogen.

"Hydrogen is an energy carrier," points out Wolfgang Leder of Total Deutschland's new energy team.

"There are several ways to produce it. Wind power would be the best, or solar."

The problem is that currently most hydrogen is generated from fossil fuels, since the cost of generating it from, say, solar energy can be up to four times higher.

And when hydrogen is produced this way, well-to-tank and tank-to-wheel analysis shows the overall carbon dioxide emissions from hydrogen powered cars can be higher than that from petrol or diesel powered vehicles.

What is required is large scale investment in technology, BMW insists, and the carmaker - along with many of its rivals - is prepared to do its bit.

"One day, even petrol and diesel will have to compete with hydrogen," predicts BMW's marketing and brand manager, Torsten Muller-Otvos.

The company declines to divulge exactly how much money it has sunk into the project, though it says 300 of its 7,500 engineers work on it full time.

James Martin 21st Century School at Oxford University

New Scientist 13 September 2006, James Martin, Magazine issue 2568

James Martin believes that by using logic, and by understanding history, technology and the behaviour of complex organisms we can explore the future properly and find solutions.

The complete article is 1492 words long. To continue reading this article, subscribe to New Scientist. Get 4 issues of New Scientist magazine and instant access to all online content for only £2.95

James Martin founded the 21st Century School at Oxford University which is concerned with the most urgent problems that humanity faces. It has 10 institutes covering science and civilisation, the future of the mind, ageing, information and communication technology, emergent infections in humans, migration, future of humanity, bioscience ethics, environmental change and world education.

Markets and capitalism are the solution to some very big problems requiring complex, expensive solutions and the only safe bet is to do this through corporations. You can set up corporations motivated by profit to deal with these big problems such as global warming. General Electric has set out to transform 12 product lines into the kind of ecologically inventive products they think customers will want five years from now.

I have this idea of a World Upper House, rather like the UK's House of Lords, which oversees the elected House of Commons. It would be populated by statesmen who have been through the political mill and know how to get action, as well as scientists who can talk to and trust the statesmen. This world upper house would make decisions about the new energy sources or forms of transport etc.

And they would choose anything other than carbon. Right now there seems to be a strong motivation not to have non-carbon solutions because of the subsidies. The total subsidy for the car and petroleum industries is around a trillion dollars. Huge profits are being made out of huge subsidies and these profits are going to destroy the planet.

I think James Lovelock's view of runaway global warming is going to be proved right. The ice in the Arctic - which is the size of the US - is melting, and if it disappears, the Earth will absorb massive amounts of extra heat. If we took action right now, we could slow it down, though it's not clear whether we could stop all the self-perpetuating processes that have already begun.

Mass Human Extinction

Writing in the British newspaper The Independent in January 2006, James Lovelock argues that, as a result of global warming, "billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable" by the end of the Twenty First century.

James Lovelock claims that by the end of the century, the average temperature in temperate regions will increase by as much as 8°C and by up to 5°C in the tropics, leaving much of the world's land uninhabitable and unsuitable for farming. He suggests that "we have to keep in mind the awesome pace of change and realise how little time is left to act, and then each community and nation must find the best use of the resources they have to sustain civilisation for as long as they can."

We may not have time to solve the real problems of humanity because there is a lot of apathy. If everyone was excited about solving the problems, it would work fine, but that's not the case. It will take a catastrophe to get most people interested - this is how things happen. For example, the US Food and Drug Administration tightened up its regulations after the thalidomide scandal, and the UN Declaration of Human Rights & Preamble with 30 Articles was drafted after the Holocaust.

We're almost certainly going to get some kind of catastrophe in the next 20 years or so, such as a bird flu pandemic.

Right now it isn't poor people who are damaging the planet, it's the rich. What if you could turn them to eco-affluence, with a high standard of living which doesn't harm the planet? This will involve a huge transition away from a consumer society. And a lot of ideas to solve global warming will be politically controversial. If you put shades up in space to shield our planet from the sun, for example, this would affect countries around the world differently, so would cause controversy.

James Martin Quotes

“It isn't the poor people who are damaging the planet, it's the rich”

"Now people are driven to develop specific skills to make money."

"There's a wisdom deficit in our world."

"I feel like I'm at the beginning of my life aged 73. When I was 18, I remember Bertrand Russell saying that the key to being 90 is to keep learning."

"A lot of apathetic people are as happy as pigs, watching reality TV shows and getting drunk on a Friday night."

"The biggest problem in solving the urgent problems that face humanity is apathy: the public is not putting pressure on the politicians."

From issue 2568 of New Scientist magazine, 13 September 2006, page 46-47 (with other links added by Chris Street)

Profile

After reading physics at the University of Oxford in the 1950s, James Martin worked as a rocket scientist before joining IBM. In 1981 he set up a management consultancy, Headstrong, which holds seminars for politicians and business leaders. His latest book is called The Meaning of the 21st Century.

Cancer - The Basics

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One in three of us will get cancer at some point in our lives. Once so feared its name was whispered, the disease is no longer an inevitable death sentence. Today, almost two-thirds of those who develop cancer will still be alive five years later, compared with just half in the 1970s....

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Imagine a world where microscopic medical implants patrol our arteries, diagnosing ailments and fighting disease; where military battle-suits deflect explosions; where computer chips are no bigger than specks of dust; and where clouds of miniature space probes transmit data from the atmospheres of Mars or Titan....

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Cosmology - Keep up with the latest ideas in New Scientist special report.

Cosmologists study the universe as a whole: its birth, growth, shape, size and eventual fate. The vast scale of the universe became clear in the 1920s when Edwin Hubble proved that "spiral nebulae" are actually other galaxies like ours, millions to billions of light years away....

Quantum World - The Basics

Quantum World - Learn more about a weird world in our comprehensive special report.

If successful scientific theories can be thought of as cures for stubborn problems, quantum physics was the wonder drug of the 20^th century. It successfully explained phenomena such as radioactivity and antimatter, and no other theory can match its description of how light and particles behave on small scales....

Evolution - The Basics

Evolution - Learn more about the struggle to survive in New Scientist comprehensive special report.

In 1859 Charles Darwin published his theory of natural selection amid an explosion of controversy. Like the work of Copernicus in the 16^th century revealing the movement of the Earth, Darwin's idea shook the foundations of the establishment and profoundly altered humanity's view of its place in the universe....

Stem Cells - The Basics

Stem Cells - Learn more about the promise and the controversy in New Scientist cutting edge special report .

Fast-forward to the end of the 21^st Century: surgeons can create new organs to order, regrow crippled spines and hearts and reverse the damage of Parkinson's disease or diabetes with ease. Immune rejection and waiting lists for replacement organs are consigned to history.....

More from New Scientist ... or from Wikipedia or from the BBC

Chris Street 's - Blood Pressure & Cholesterol levels

Today i booked myself to see the local nurse at my GP. This was prompted by my Boots cholesterol test. I wanted to know my HDL ratio.

My blood pressure is 130/70 mmHg.

I am overweight: 12st 13lbs, height 5'7.5" hence BMI 28.3 (BMI calculator). I'm more at risk from high blood pressure, high cholesterol or diabetes.

A blood sample test:

• Total Cholesterol (TC): 5.1
• HDL ratio (TC/HDL): 5.0
• LDL: 3.0
  

By my calculation HDL = 5.1/5.0 = 1.02 mmole / Litre (40 mg/dL). From the table below I have (borderline) low HDL levels with a heightened risk of heart disease.

Recommended HDL range

HDL levels and risk for heart disease are:-

Level mg/dL	Level mmol/L	Interpretation
<40	<1.03	Low HDL cholesterol, heightened risk for heart disease, <50>
40-59	1.03-1.52	Medium HDL level
>60	>1.55	High HDL level, optimal condition considered protective against heart disease

More sophisticated laboratory methods measure not just the total HDL but also the range of HDL particles, e.g. "lipoprotein subclass analysis", typically divided into several groups by size, instead of just the total HDL concentration as listed above. The largest groups (most functional) of HDL particles have the most protective effects. The groups of smallest particles reflect HDL particles which are not actively transporting cholesterol, thus not protective.

Certain changes in lifestyle can have a positive impact on raising HDL levels:

• Aerobic exercise
• Weight loss
• Smoking cessation
• Removing trans fatty acids from the diet
• Adding monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats to the diet
• Drinking 1-2 servings of alcoholic beverages per day
• Adding soluble fiber to diet
• Limiting intake of dietary fat to 30-35% of total calories
• Consumption of Niacin (immediate release crystallin form of Vitamin B3) can increase HDL levels by 15-30%

Recommended LDL range

The American Heart Association, NIH and NCEP provide a set of guidelines for fasting LDL-Cholesterol levels, estimated or measured, and risk for heart disease. As of 2003, these guidelines were:

Level mg/dL	Level mmol/L	Interpretation
<100	<2.6	Optimal LDL cholesterol, corresponding to reduced, but not zero, risk for heart disease
100 to 129	2.6 to 3.3	Near optimal LDL level
130 to 159	3.3 to 4.1	Borderline high LDL level
160 to 189	4.1 to 4.9	High LDL level
>190	>4.9	Very high LDL level, corresponding to highest increased risk of heart disease

At 3.0 mmoles/ Litre (~ 115mg/dL) test result for LDL I have near optimal LDL level.

NB. My total cholesterol analysed by Boots last month was 5.2mmoles/L.


My LDL-C is 115 mg/dL (3.0 mmole/l)
My HDL-C is 40 mg/dL (1.02 mmole/l)

Diagram source Postgraduate Medicine online.

Although statin therapy has revolutionized management of coronary heart disease (CHD), the lowering of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) levels is not the whole story. Increased plasma concentrations of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) have a cardioprotective effect that is just as important for reducing risk of heart attack and stroke.

Blood Pressure

Blood pressure values are stated in millimetres of mercury (mmHg). The systolic pressure is defined as the peak pressure in the arteries during the cardiac cycle; the diastolic pressure is the lowest pressure (at the resting phase of the cardiac cycle).

Typical values for a resting, healthy adult human are approximately 120 mmHg systolic and 80 mmHg diastolic (written as 120/80 mmHg), with large individual variations. These measures of blood pressure are not static, but undergo natural variations from one heartbeat to another or throughout the day (in a circadian rhythm); they also change in response to stress, nutritional factors, drugs, or disease.

Normal values of blood pressure

Normal ranges for blood pressure in adult humans are:

• Systolic between 90 and 135 mmHg
• Diastolic between 50 and 90 mmHg
  

Clinical trials demonstrate that people who maintain blood pressures at the low end of these pressure ranges have much better long term cardiovascular health and are considered optimal. The principal medical debate is the aggressiveness and relative value of methods used to lower pressures into this range for those who don't maintain such pressure on their own. Elevations, more commonly seen in older people, though often considered normal, are associated with increased morbidity and mortality. The clear trend from double blind clinical trials is that lower Blood Pressure is found to result in less disease.

My Results
With these results (TC/HDL ratio = 5.0, Systolic Blood Pressure = 130, Age 50, Non Smoker) I calculate my risk of CHD (Coronary Heart Disease) - see diagram below as " less than 15% risk of CHD over next 10 years". Or from the European Study the risk of a fatal CardioVascular Event is 1%-2% over the next 10 years.

Climate Change - The Basics

Climate Change - Learn more in New Scientist continually updated special report.

Climate change is with us. A decade ago, it was conjecture. Now the future is unfolding before our eyes. Canada's Inuit see it in disappearing Arctic ice and permafrost. The shantytown dwellers of Latin America and Southern Asia see it in lethal storms and floods. Europeans see it in disappearing glaciers, forest fires and fatal heat waves.

Scientists see it in tree rings, ancient coral and bubbles trapped in ice cores....

Humphrys in Search of God with Professor Tariq Ramadan

: download mp3 interview :broadcast interview 29m : extended interview 48m

http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/

Unedited broadcast interview (my highlights in blue)

Humphrys in Search of God

Professor Tariq Ramadan - broadcast interview

7 November 2006

John Humphrys: Last week at this time I talked to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams. His job was to try to persuade an old sceptic like me that God exists, to convert me if you like. In a way it was the easiest of the three interviews in this series because I was brought up in his church, believing in Christianity. This interview's a bit trickier, I've had to do a bit of a crash course in Islam to get any sort of a grip on it and it hasn't been easy. How to reconcile the Muslim's merciful God with the fanatics that kill in his name. And there's something else: when you raise doubts about Christ with a Christian leader like Dr Williams you can expect a gentle, reasoned, entirely civilised argument. There seem to be plenty of Muslims out there who take a rather more militant view of any sort of challenge to their faith. And that was the first point I raised with Professor Tariq Ramadan who is a leading Muslim academic.

Tariq Ramadan: I think you have to be er careful not to confuse all the reactions you can get. Of course if we just look at what happened during the last months with the cartoon issues and now with the Pope statement. In the Islamic majority countries you can be scared about the fact that er you know the reaction are very very harsh and I I think...

John Humphrys: Threatening.

Tariq Ramadan: Threatening yes. I think that many Muslims, er you know and and I am among these Muslims, think that this not the the right way. We're not used by the way to laugh at religion, it's not something which is part of the culture among Muslims.

John Humphrys: But it goes rather beyond not used to having a religion laughed at, it's as though your religion looks for offence.

Tariq Ramadan: It's not true, what we are expecting from ourselves and from the people who are we talk to is really mutual respect, out of mutual knowledge. Now in fact today because of er the perception that Islam is under pressure and stigmatised, the reaction is really emotional and the Muslims are very often overreacting. But I don't think that you can say you know you are looking for that.

John Humphrys: If I were, and I have absolutely no wish to be, disrespectful to Mohammed during the course of conversation, some of your co-religion, some of your fellow Muslims will be not just offended, of course they are perfectly entitled to be offended, but they will be angry with me, some of them may even threaten me violence.

Tariq Ramadan: It could happen, I cannot deny this, and this is why having a kind of discussion with you, if it happen, it's really important for me also to turn towards my own community and say look we need to take an critical intellectual critical distance because it's a debate and the people want to know. And sometimes they are critical and they can ridicule the religion of their counterpart of their er fellow citizens.

John Humphrys: Mmm, some of the things they say about Jews and about Christians, it's hugely offensive.

Tariq Ramadan: Exactly, and so. But it's really you know when during the cartoons issues, what I said to the Muslims and I was in Denmark and then here, it it was really take an intellectual critical distance. Don't over react, it's not an emotional discussion that we have. So, I think that you also have to put things into context, you know I am in a situation where I am in a democrative society, I can speak and listen to me, I can listen to you, we can take a distance. I know this culture, I know the western culture, I know in which we are dealing with such issues, and it helps me to react in the right way. I can understand that the people who are not used to that, who are under political pressure, or sometimes they have even nothing to survive with.

John Humphrys: But some of these people that you refer to are not under pressure are they?

Tariq Ramadan: I'm not saying that this dogmatic approach is only coming from the people that are, you know, marginalised or socially er facing difficulties. You are right some are nurturing this mind set and they have this mind set "if you touch my religion, if you insult or if you laugh at it or say something which is wrong according to me, I can just be violent with you and insult you and I can threaten your own life".

John Humphrys: They claim to find plenty of justification for that in the Qur'an, they will quote you plenty of chunks from the Qur'an which entirely in their eyes justify them doing it.

Tariq Ramadan: Yes er this is right, and this is why we have to respond that the quotations they are er making are wrong and they are not put in the global message of Islam, so we need this intra community debate among Muslims. But it's also very important for me and for the Muslims, for you not only to be obsessed by the few who are vocal and visible and forget the many who are nurturing this understanding of the Islamic teachings open to the other, referring to verses of the Qur'an, at the end of the day they are the great great great majority. You have to listen to this silent majority of people telling you look for example myself, I will not accept just to promote tolerance between you and me, it's much more than that, tolerance is not enough. There is something which is a kind of a superiority relationship when you tolerate me because you cannot just remove me from you know your own society. Tolerance is something which is not enough. In Islam if we go to the deep teaching of this religion is respect, and the difference between tolerance and respect is that you can tolerate me without knowing me, but you can't respect me without knowing me, so it's knowledge and respect. And this is the message that the great majority of the Muslims are promoting and are faithful to, so you also have to listen to this.

John Humphrys: And yet most Muslims, many Muslims,

Tariq Ramadan: It's not the same, it's very important.

John Humphrys: Yes, of course it's very important. Many, let's say many Muslims, er you yourself obviously accept that the Qur'an is literally the word of God. It was not what Mohammed interpreted God as saying and wrote it down, because he was illiterate wasn't he, he was reciting the literally over a period of twenty three years the word of God. So what you read in the Qur'an you believe to be quite literally the word of God.

Tariq Ramadan: Yes but you have to be very very precise. The fact that it's literally the word of God doesn't mean that I have to read it literally, it's not the same. It's the word of God sent to a human being, a prophet, in a specific historical context.

John Humphrys: But how am I as somebody... let's remember that this series is Humphrys in search of God. I mean, I turn to the Qur'an because I am told by your Imams, by the leaders of your religion, that this is the word of God. So I read it and I read things that strike me as being not just extraordinary but rather dismaying. And I see things that calls for you know the dissertation of death for non believers, uh yeah and I'm appalled by that.

Tariq Ramadan: No no but yes, you can be appalled by that.

John Humphrys: But that's the word of God.

Tariq Ramadan: No, the word of God is something which is exactly this, it's God revealing a text. At the end what we have as a word in the Qur'an is that this is a kitab, it's a book, a book to be read.

John Humphrys: Written by God.

Tariq Ramadan: Writ yes.

John Humphrys: I keep coming back to this.

Tariq Ramadan: Exactly but but be careful. From the very beginning this was understood by the Muslims as the eternal word of God revealed in the specific history. And from the very beginning you have some verses of the Qur'an that you cannot understand if you don't put them into context. For example some of the principles er revealed in the Qur'an are immutable, not going to change. The first one is the oneness of God, the second is all what are the pillars of the Islamic faith, and then the practices we pray as they are praying. But we have in the Qur'an many many verses dealing with specific historical situation. You cannot take these and read them in an absolute way.

John Humphrys: You are a moderate Muslim. There are plenty of people who can turn to exactly those words and take from them the justification for the most appalling behaviour.

Tariq Ramadan: Exactly but let me tell you, let me tell you something, if you are an atavist, are you for example?

John Humphrys: I don't think so.

Tariq Ramadan: You can be an atavist or you can be a Marxist, how many people were reading the words of Marx literally.

John Humphrys: It's different, Marx wasn't God.

Tariq Ramadan: It's... no he was not God, but the question is not the source of the text, the question is the way to you read it. So for example we have Marxists saying like you are saying, as you are saying now, it was, he was not God but they were reading his text in a dogmatic way. So with God or without God you can have a dogmatic mind, meaning by that when you read a text you take it literally. Now what we have to say is that the text has been revealed and there is a global message, and then they are verses. What we are asked to do is to come with our intelligence, our mind, to try to understand their meaning.

John Humphrys: All right.

Tariq Ramadan: So there are things that we have to put into context, and things that we cannot put into context. But if someone is coming to me and he's reading the text literally, and telling me for example because of these verse I can kill a Jew, a Christian, a non Muslim, only because he or she is Jew, Christian and non Muslims. I will say look this is not an accepted reading because in you...

John Humphrys: In your view.

Tariq Ramadan: No not only in my view, in the way you read this specific verse is a betrayal of the global message. The text is what, at the end of the day, it's a pedagogy. It's the divine, pedagogy yes pedagogy, helping the Muslims in a specific period of time to understand what are the objectives of the religion. Helping us to use our mind, to read the sources, the scripture sources, to understand the context and then to try to implement our principles in a specific context.

John Humphrys: Alright, I thought er the Qur'an was rather more than that.

Tariq Ramadan: It's this when we speak about rules, of course it's more than that when it comes to morality, ethics, and to remind us of the presence of God.

John Humphrys: Right well I want to come onto that. But first of all what is God, there is no God but Allah, Mohammad is the messenger of Allah, that that is absolutely clear. And if I say that twice in the presence of two witnesses I am a Muslim, that's right isn't it.

Tariq Ramadan: Depending on on the state of your heart.

John Humphrys: Right, er, alright.

Tariq Ramadan: It's not something you say. So the way you are now is not enough.

John Humphrys: Oh what what what do you mean the way I am now, I am being denied this access?

Tariq Ramadan: No you are not denied this, that it's sure out of our discussion that you are not saying this from the bottom of your heart. It's something...

John Humphrys: How do you know?

Tariq Ramadan: I don't know, it's out of your questions.

John Humphrys: But if having talked to you at the end of it I am persuaded that you are right, and I have a faith now. If I come to believe in God, upon the recitation of those two sentences, in the presence of witnesses, I am a Muslim, that is all it takes.

Tariq Ramadan: Yes exactly.

John Humphrys: And what do I then believe in. What sort of God do I then believe in. What am I required to believe, because as you say I have to come to it with my heart and not just with my lips.

Tariq Ramadan: First there is something which is the essential point, the oneness of God, he is only one, this is something which is the unity of God. The second point which is really important is that you cannot imagine how he is and you cannot define him. The only thing you can say about him is what he's saying about himself, so no image, no representation, his name everything. You know there is a Chinese proverb saying when er the wise man show you the moon the foolish is looking at the finger. And this is why we avoid representing any prophet because they were just men, messengers coming to show us the road towards the one.

John Humphrys: But if I say to a devout Muslim oh Mohammad was just a messenger, doesn't he say no no he was more than that, else why should we treat him with such reverence.

Tariq Ramadan: No no he was a messenger, he would not say anything else, and this is the right way to speak about him, he was a messenger. Now the relationship between me as a believer and him, it's a relationship of love, and this is the way he was speaking about himself. Your faith is complete the very moment you love me more than yourself, meaning by that there is something which is a relationship to the prophet which is based on not only knowing what he did, knowing what he said, but loving who he was. So there is something which is a deep relationship, so this is why you know we pray on him every time his name is mentioned. We have a relationship of someone we love, and this is why we have to be very very respectful towards who he was and what we came with.

John Humphrys: If I become a Christian, if I am a Christian, I observe broadly speaking the pieties. In the case of Islam you surrender your life to Islam, Islam directs determines the way you live in every respect.

Tariq Ramadan: Yes, you know, my life belongs to him, you know, we have a verse telling us to say when someone passes away is, er in the (name) we belong to him and to we to him we are going back, that there is something which is belonging to him. Now it means that in which way am I belonging to him. There is something which are the pillars of Islam, so the fact that we are praying, the fact that we are fasting, these are you know the practices showing that we are with him in in our daily life. So it's not something which is a blind you know submission. When the people are translating Islam by submission that is wrong, so there is something which you know what we seek, what we are trying to get at the end of the day is what, is peace, to be in peace with ourselves and with him. So to get that peace there are conditions, one of these conditions is to be at peace with yourself, and to be at peace with yourself is to use everything that we have in the right way. So it's doesn't mean a blind completely submission with no use of what you have, no.

John Humphrys: But again that is your interpretation, if if you speak to many devote Muslims they will tell you, and I have a little list in front of me, that Islam is a complete way of life, and let me give you the list. Governing dress, economics, business ethics, rates of taxation, justice and punishment, weights and measures, politics, war and peace, marriage and inheritance, family and domestic life, care of animals and livestock, sexual relations within marriage, education, diet, cookery, social behaviour, forms of greeting, rules of hospitality, even I am told the way in which a glass of water is to be drunk, and, which fascinated me I have to say, and on and on and on. Islam is a complete way of life.

Tariq Ramadan: Yes but be careful, once again it's not wrong to say it's a complete way of life. Now in your way of life not everything is at the same level. For example you have ethics, you have some convictions, you have rules in your life, these rules are...

John Humphrys: Self imposed.

Tariq Ramadan: Self imposed, it's not the problem. The problem is: where do they lie in your life? Are they on the margin of your life? For example, when for yourself you are trying not to lie, it will direct your whole life.

John Humphrys: Slightly different from telling me how to drink a glass of water.

Tariq Ramadan: Yes once again, you have some details here for example, you know, why is it, is it so it's just when you drink to remember when you take it with your right hand to remember him. It's a question of remembrance.

John Humphrys: Do you do that, as a matter of interest?

Tariq Ramadan: Yes of course, for me it's really important to understand the secret er dimension of my life, it's really to put my ethics into action in motion in my life, and this is consistency. But once again if you whatever is your belief, you try to be constant with your values and your ethics, it mean that your values and your ethics are everywhere in your life.

John Humphrys: If I were to talk to you er about Islamic punishment, the death penalty, corporal punishment, stoning to death, removing of limbs, amputation of limbs, you would call as I have read you've done, for a moratorium on Islamic punishment. Now if even you cannot say there must be an end to it then one wonders how great the zeal for reform is.

Tariq Ramadan: Look I'm a believer, and I really think that the the Qur'an is the the very word of God as we said. So in the Qur'an we have reference to you know corporal punishment and er death penalty, and in the prophetic tradition we have something about stoning. These are the texts and as I've told you my understanding and the understanding of the great majority of the Muslims throughout the the Islamic history is that we have to put things into context, and we have to come with conditions, and to understand the context within which this could be implemented. So I'm talking to Muslims okay look it's in the text, but the way you read the text and you want to implement this literally is betraying the very objective of the text.

John Humphrys: But you don't call for an end to it.

Tariq Ramadan: My point is to talk to Muslims, say okay look come to the meaning of this text, come to the reality of this text, and open a debate on which way and how we can integrate the text.

John Humphrys: Why can you not say it is wrong, it is wrong to stone people to death, full stop.

Tariq Ramadan: Look look look. No, it is not the way, it's not the way you are dealing with belief, you are dealing with people believing in the text. Islam is a simple religion, my life is complicated, and you cannot just ask simple question dealing with your complicated life.

John Humphrys: What is complicated about stoning somebody to death?

Tariq Ramadan: No no, about text, the relationship with the text. It was revealed like this. We are believing in the text, how are we dealing with this. Is it an immutable, non disputable text that we have to implement or is there something we have to understand out of our reading.

John Humphrys: Stoning to death. This for me you see, in my search for faith, this would be an absolute stumbling block. If I were persuaded that Islam was the path for me to follow and somebody...

Tariq Ramadan: You want also that yes...

John Humphrys: I want to know that my fellow Muslims do not believe that it is right to stone somebody to death, I want absolute assurance on that.

Tariq Ramadan: Look when it happened in Nigeria, when it's happening now in Saudi Arabia, I condemn that, it's not, it's not implementable, it's not...

John Humphrys: So it is wrong to stone people to death.

Tariq Ramadan: I said that.

John Humphrys: Right.

Tariq Ramadan: My position as a believer, I want to open a debate, I'm not alone, we have, this is my personal conviction, but I I'm dealing with Muslims. I want to open a debate, and to open a debate I have to do something which is really important. Stop using intrumentalising Islam to kill poor people and woman because they are the victims of what we're doing now. So stop to do that and open a debate. You know what am Amnesty International is doing in the States, they are against this penalty. But in some States they cannot say that, it's not possible, it's not going to be accepted. So what's the first step of the discussion, moratorium. Do you understand that.

John Humphrys: Alright, I'll accept that.

Tariq Ramadan: This is the point.

John Humphrys: Let me turn in the last stages of this conversation to another huge stumbling block that I have, and this may be the biggest, and it is the notion of the merciful God. You describe Allah as all merciful, and this is an entirely predictable question, forgive me for asking it, and it's crucial, and it may even be simplistic but there we are. Why does Allah allow suffering in the way that he does?

Tariq Ramadan: There are limits between what we understand and what he wants. And then here what we are asked to do is to deal with our reality as much as possible to the limit of what is possible.

John Humphrys: God created the reality.

Tariq Ramadan: Yes, it he created the reality. So we were born, this is the difference between the Jewish, the Christian and the Muslim tradition. We were born innocent, and we became responsible and we have to deal with our own responsibility, so we are responsible at a certain age. You know, all the kids, all the children are going to paradise according to the Islamic tradition because they are innocent.

John Humphrys: So it's all right if they suffer on this earth in the knowledge, in your knowledge, that they will go to paradise.

Tariq Ramadan: No, to my intelligence, to my understanding it's difficult to accept it as something which is intellectually understandable. But this is life, we are going to suffer because at the end of the day life is suffering.

John Humphrys: But why did God want that to happen, why did Allah want that to happen?

Tariq Ramadan: I don't know you, I don't know why even he wanted me to be here, or you to be here. I don't know why sometimes he makes me happy or sad, but this is life. The only thing which I know is that I have responsibility trying to do your best with what you do and what you are facing, that's it. We have a verse in the Qur'an - he creates death and life in order to put you in a test, it's to test you, this is test. You are a test for me, because you are not me, you are different from me. So our encounter is full of happiness, potential happiness, and a possible threat, a possible sadness and possible difficulties, because diversity is a gift and a problem at the same time. Suffering is a gift and a problem, is very often of course for us a problem, we we live with this with great difficulty. And sometimes out of our suffering we become better, we become wiser, we become more knowledgeable about life.

John Humphrys: We might, you and I, but our children?

Tariq Ramadan: Maybe not, and this is this is you know when I'm I'm travelling in these southern countries and I see what I see and you know, these children and these kids dying, it's very difficult. But at one point I am not dealing with it on an exclusively rational way. Not everything is rational, I can don't worry you can like you or love someone, it's not everything should be put in our logic, sometimes we have to be. This is why humility means exactly this, you don't know everything, you don't understand everything, but deal the best way you can with what you know, what you understand.

John Humphrys: So it is blind faith in the end.

Tariq Ramadan: Sometimes sometimes people are saying you have double talk. And the problem I have with some is the double hearing. I said exactly the opposite of what you heard. I said...

John Humphrys: You said you look at the suffering child and you do not know why that child, paraphrasing, you don't know why that child is being allowed to suffer, but in the end you have to accept it. But if that is not blind faith I don't know what is.

Tariq Ramadan: No it's not blind faith. I said something else which you didn't quote right now. I said you have to do your best with what you know and what you can. This is exactly the opposite, it is not blind faith.

John Humphrys: Is it?

Tariq Ramadan: You are dealing, we are dealing with people who are suffering. What you can do when are a doctor, when you are a social worker, do your best to make them suffer less. You know you are comparing what I am saying with passivity, it's exactly the opposite. And I refuse passivity and fatalism in order to say you have to do what you can do to change the morality of this world for the better. And in the end every human being is a reformer, you reform your own self, you reform you family, you reform your society, you reform around you. Whatever you can do do it, this is the least you can expect from you. But at one point remain humble, because at the end you cannot change everything and you have to accept the reality of life.

John Humphrys: If I as a non Muslim fail to find a faith, fail to believe in god, if I fail to achieve that blessed state, what happens to me? You will go to paradise.

Tariq Ramadan: I'm not sure.

John Humphrys: You may.

Tariq Ramadan: I may, I may not.

John Humphrys: You've got a pretty good chance if you're a decent bloke and you do the right things and you pray and all that there's a fairly good chance that you will. Can I as a non believer according to your religion go to paradise, go to heaven?

Tariq Ramadan: To someone who at the end of his quest or her quest say there is no god, what isn't in the text and what was revealed in all the religion is that here there is a rapture between he or she and God. Now at the end the only thing that I can say to this - it's in Arabic or in English.

John Humphrys: I'd prefer the English.

Tariq Ramadan: "Allah, God knows best." I don't know. I don't know where you're going to be because I cannot assess your sincerity. If out of your sincere quest you have an answer that is yours, that you are sincere in getting it, what I know in my text that he's very close to the sincere people, so I don't know where you are going to be. But more than that, even if I I just spend my time to do the best that I can in the end, I'm trying but I don't know where I'm going to be. So, to this at that level humility among human being is to say I don't know, he knows, I don't. What does it mean at the end of our discussion here is that I have to respect your quest, respect your sincerity, and never judge you in a different because I don't know.

John Humphrys: And what about some of your fellow Muslims who behave in ways that you personally deplore, calling for the death of the Pope, bombing the world trade centre, flying the planes into the World Trade Centre - will they go to heaven?

Tariq Ramadan: I don't know.

John Humphrys: They might.

Tariq Ramadan: I don't know, I don't know if er two minutes before dying something happened. I don't know what could happen to any one of us, the only which can say, and this is the limit of what I can say - I condemn what they are doing. And at the end it's really important in our life sometimes to understand that we can be very harsh, and we must be very harsh on some actions done by people, but sometimes we have to be very humble not to confuse the actions with the being of the people. So you may do things that are very very bad and still there is something which is light in you. The final judgement is not in my hand.

John Humphrys: Tariq Ramadan thank you very much.

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