Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Evangelical
The Mystery of Math

The Mystery of Math

Last updated on: February 16, 2024 at 4:17 pm by Richard E. Simmons III

The Mystery of Math 2024-02-16T16:17:52-06:00 Richard E. Simmons III

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Bob Corker served as a United States Senator from 2007 to 2016, after which he chose not to run for re-election. While in office he served as the prestigious Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Bob recently called our office raving about Richard’s book, Reflections on the Existence of God. He said, “This is one of the best books on God and spiritual reality I have ever read. It is very well-written, clear and understandable.”

Reflections on the Existence of God is made up of 57 short, easy-to-read essays and covers a wide range of topics from evil to evolution. Richard presents in this blog, one of his favorite essays from the book.

The mystery of Math

As I have been performing the research on this book, I have noticed the profound sense of order in our universe as discovered by science. What is so amazing is that the laws of nature have specific mathematical numbers attached to them.

In her wonderful book Total Truth, Nancy Pearcey makes this observation:

“Science offers mathematical formulas to express the cause-and-effect relationships in nature, but that only intensifies the dilemma. For if the universe evolved by blind, material forces acting randomly, why should it fit so neatly into mathematical formulas we invent in our minds? In short, why does math work? In a famous essay titled ‘The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences,’ Eugene Wigner says the fact that math works so well in describing the world ‘is something bordering on the mysterious.’ Indeed, ‘there is no rational explanation for it. No explanation within scientific materialism, that is. But within the Christian worldview, there is a perfectly rational explanation – namely, that a reasonable God created the world to operate as an orderly progression of events. This was the conviction that inspired the early modern scientists, says math historian Morris Kline: ‘The early mathematicians were sure of the existence of mathematical laws underlying natural phenomena and persisted in the search for them because they were convinced a priori that God had incorporated them in the construction of the universe.’”

Dr. Francis Collins is considered to be one of the greatest scientists of our time. When Collins was a student, he said that Wigner, a Nobel laureate in physics, caught his eye because of the fact that mathematics depicts matter and energy in a very simple and natural way. He then asks:

“But why should this be? Why should mathematics be so unreasonably effective in describing nature?”

This was such a mystery that the physical world could be described so well mathematically.

It is quite apparent that all of the laws of the universe that have been discovered by science seem to be written in the language of mathematics. It is all so orderly. The world of science finds this to be strange and mysterious. Physicist Steven Weinberg writes:

“All my experience as a physicist leads me to believe that there is order in the universe…As we have been going to higher and higher energies and as we have studied structures that are smaller and smaller, we have found that the laws, the physical principles that describe what we learn become simpler and simpler…The rules we have discovered become increasingly coherent and universal…There is a simplicity, a beauty, that we are finding in the rules that govern matter that mirrors something that is built into the logical structure of the universe at a very deep level.”

The role of mathematics, which is seamlessly woven into the laws of nature, seems to have been done by deliberate design. It does not seem to be possible that this is a result of blind forces. The popular English physicist Paul Davies, who is a religious agnostic, is deeply impressed by this. He says:

“It is hard to resist the impression that the present structure of the universe, apparently so sensitive to minor alterations in the numbers, has been rather carefully thought out. The seemingly miraculous concurrence of numerical values that nature has assigned to her fundamental constants must remain the most compelling evidence for an element of cosmic design.”

From conception to birth

Alexander Tsiaras, an adjunct professor at the Yale Department of Medicine, did a twenty-minute TED Talk presentation with a video on the fetal stages from conception to birth. The video compresses nine months of growth and development into a nine-minute film, and it can be watched on YouTube or on the TED Talk site here:

Life Purpose

Seeking God

Spiritual Truth

Previous Post

July 27, 2021

Answering Life's Big Questions

Next Post

August 15, 2021 The Mystery of the Human Eye

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Character Development Inspiration Leadership Life Purpose Personal Growth Relationships Seeking God Spiritual Truth The Bible True Masculinity Uncategorized Wisdom

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Which mountain did Jesus ascend from at His ascension?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Mount Zion Mount of Olives Mount Sinai Mount Carmel

The Mystery of Math

The mystery of Math

This was such a mystery that the physical world could be de­scribed so well mathematically.

From conception to birth

Which mountain did Jesus ascend from at His ascension?

This was such a mystery that the physical world could be described so well mathematically.