Editor:
I’d like to take a moment to reply to Matt Kartchner’s letter to the editor printed in The Daily Utah Chronicle April 18. In it, he questions the usefulness of scientific wonder as compared to moral teachings. The truth is, what we are all looking at is part of something bigger than the whole of its parts.
We are like blind men who are each touching a different part of an elephant and then trying to describe the entire elephant based on our limited experience.
The ability to see the whole comes from first recognizing that there is an evolutionary reason for the occurrence of wonder and then deliberately putting ourselves in situations in which it can occur.
Wonder comes about in only two situations. First, it is possible for one to feel wonder when he or she is confronted with some kind of experience that he or she cannot account for mentally.
This may lead to a feeling of confusion, but it is important to note that confusion leads to integration of learning and, thus, progress. If a child gave up trying to learn the alphabet because he found it confusing, he would never learn to write words much less advance toward further education.
The apparent conflict between science and morality is this type of confusion. Different individuals are so convinced that they see the whole elephant and that nobody else sees even a part. This absolute certainty that they have it all is what prevents such people from developing further.
It is a narcissistic cling to one way of life because of the ridiculous but convincing belief that experiencing something bigger will cause you to lose the good you have achieved through doing it your way.
The second occasion on which one may feel wonder is when experiences and learnings suddenly consolidate into something larger than the sum of the parts.
This is the wonder that Carlos Ponce is describing when he relates his experience of looking through a microscope and seeing the beauty of life from that level. As he observes the nature of cells, he may realize that, at one level, he himself is merely a collection of cells.
From one perspective, this is absolutely correct. Such an experience is very likely to shape the way in which he looks at the rest of his world.
The truth is that even though his experience may seem to conflict with others’ experiences of spirituality, that conflict is the result of close-mindedness. The conflict itself is artificial. We create the conflict because we don’t want to lose what we already feel we have.
Ironically enough, this notion that such a thing could be ?lost? is, at best, laughable.
These concepts are reflected in the words we use to describe experience.
Ponce may describe his experience as being “wonderful” (full of wonder), which means that it has allowed him to see life from a new angle and capture one more piece of the puzzle. Likewise, an individual confronted with experience that he doesn’t understand may say, “I wonder how it works.”
The key to the whole game is to keep wondering and stop assuming that you’ve grown as far as you can. If something appears confusing, that is not a reflection of its validity. It simply means that you have not grown to the point where you can understand how it connects to everything else.
There is nothing inherently wrong with this position just as there is nothing wrong with a child who doesn’t understand letters being unable to read. However, it is something to move beyond.
This is the real strength of science. Although some theorists cling narcissistically to a current scientific perspective, the underlying assumption of science is that we don’t know everything. It allows individuals to continually question (and wonder or feel confused about) its assumptions which allows them to grow to understand the larger context which influences what they previously thought to be true. This is the nature of intellectual growth.
It is also the nature of spiritual growth. If there is anything bigger than that (such as god or a heaven) it will only be achieved through consolidating the learning and experience of these apparently contradictory modalities into something better.
Let’s not stand in the way of this progress with our childish attempts to invalidate the experience of others.
Daniel J. Gorrell
Junior, Psychology