Pascal's Wager

[Darwinian]

Do you know much about why so many scientists believe in God? Have you looked into it at all or read anything about it? There is a question that physicists are struggeling with now regarding the fine tuning of the constants of nature. Are you familiar with it?

Whilst I agree with much that you say I feel I must tackle this one.

To start with this depends upon how you define a scientist. There are many different fields and dare I say different levels but if we just take studies that deal with eminent scientists then the figures are as follows..

In 1998, a study by Larson and Witham appeared on the leading journal Nature ("Leading scientists still reject God"), showing that of the American scientists who had been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, only about 7 percent believe in a personal god. Religious believers form about 40 percent of the less eminent scientists in America.

A study in Britain, undertaken by R. Elisabeth Cornwell and Michael Stirrat, involved sending a questionnaire to all 1,074 Fellows of the Royal Society who possessed an email address, offering several propositions and asking the scientists to rank their beliefs on that point from 1 to 7. About 23 percent responded and preliminary results indicate that, of these, 3.3 percent agreed strongly (chose 7) and 78.8 percent disagreed strongly (chose 1) that a personal god exists. A total of 12 Fellows chose 6 or 7 to indicate that they were believers, while 213 Fellows chose 1 or 2 to indicate that they were nonbelievers.

So, in the United States, 7 percent of eminent scientists believe in God, while 40 percent of less eminent scientists believe in God. In Britain, the survey indicated that just under 5 percent of eminent scientists believe in God. A lesser proportion would believe in creation.