True Believer
Author : David Nutt
“Not just a thousand millennia ago, you sat in that chair and told me point blank that the only way to prove it to you was through mathematics.”
“You are correct Dane, but this isn’t really proof at all.”
“Lyle, you are such an intellectual fraud of the worst degree. We have plumbed the depths of space, engineered our lives so that our species life span is, for all intents and purposes, immortal by the standards of our ancestors. We have mastered physics and have catalogued every single galaxy that ever existed and have defined the limits of the entire universe. Yet you still cling to your ancient belief.”
“You have yet to prove me wrong. We may have missed a few universes.”
“Hogwash and you know it.”
“No, because we are still human and we are still fallible.”
“But the mathematics-“
“It’s more than that.”
“How ironic that you now fall back upon faith.”
“Don’t be insulting.”
“I’m not trying to be. All I know is when I came to you so long ago, (even by our standards), when we began the search for intelligent life, you said the mathematics was irrefutable.”
“I know what I said.”
“And I said ‘what if we do not find any intelligent life, and it’s only us?’ Do you recall what you said?”
“It was hyperbole.”
“No it wasn’t. You said, and I quote: ‘Given the constancy of mathematics in the universe and that this constancy has been proven by all proof text, logic, and reason, if there is no intelligent life other than ourselves in the vastness of space, no alien race advanced or developing, and we are truly a lone intelligence, unique and alone in this vastness….”
“Go on finish it.”
“I want to hear it from you.”
“Will that shut you up?”
“Yes.”
“….then this is the mathematical proof God exists and we are God’s creation.”
“That’s all I wanted to hear. Come to temple with me this week end?”
“Go to Hell.”
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