11Tu1

For information on past papers look here.

There are also some “Examiners Reports” on that page, which work through some past papers and explain the kinds of things examiners are looking for.

Today we considered the big bang theory of the development of the universe. Using modelling clay we saw how all the material in the universe exploded outwards and then cooled down and came together over time. We thought about how the Doppler Effect (eg. the change in sound when a police car goes past) shows that the stars are moving away from each other.

Intelligent design theorists say that the fact that there is something rather than nothing suggests that there is an intelligent designer putting everything together. Also, the force of gravity is very precise - any stronger and the universe would collapse, any weaker and the universe would expand forever without ever forming planets.

We looked at evolution today, and how it is a combination of random mutations and natural selection. We also looked briefly at intelligent design and its arguments against evolution.

Notebook presentation

We looked at a video of Richard Dawkins, which help explain the intelligent design idea of “irreducible complexity”:

For a fun version of evolution in reverse:

Today we started some revision on science and religion, looking at the relationship between the two. We explored three different ways to understand the relationship: conflict, independence and dialogue:

Conflict:

This model of the relationship between science and religion assumes that there is a battle going on. Science and religion both make claims about the nature of the world and only one can be right. They are both fighting over the same ground and eventually one will be victorious and other will die out.
Scientists who support this model say that modern science can explain everything to do with the world and its origins and so religion is no longer required. For them, religion is a set of fairy-tales once used to explain certain things but now science can do that and so the fairy-tales can be abandoned. They don’t necessarily think religious people are bad, but they think that they are deluded and aren’t looking at the facts seriously.

Christians who support this model say that modern science has it all wrong. They would prefer to trust the version of events given by God over the human efforts of scientists. If the Bible says the earth was created in 6 days about 4,000 years ago then it must be so. They often dispute scientific theories, particularly evolution by natural selection, and may say that things like this are a test of faith. They believe that perhaps one day they might be proven right, but in the mean time it is their job to uphold their religious truth and show that science isn’t as reliable as it claims to be.

Dialogue:

People accepting the dialogue model argue that all knowledge is part of a whole. You cannot separate science from religion from philosophy from art. To get a full view of reality you need to look at it from every angle and so scientists can learn from religious people and religious people can learn from science. Both ask different kinds of questions of the world and so co-exist peacefully, but it is still important that science and religion learn from each other.

Scientists who go for this model follow their science but accept that religious ideas might make a difference to what they do. For example, some scientists might know that they could potentially clone a human being, but would listen to what religious people say about the relationship between humans and God before doing it. Religious ethics can be used to make scientific decisions.

Similarly, Christians who accept this model accept that science can shed light on their own problems. When scientists say that humanity developed through a process of evolution they might go back to the Bible and re-consider what they think it is saying. Scientific ideas can be used to provoke thinking about the Bible and what it might be saying about humanity.

Independence:

Many people hold that religion and science are two completely different fields of study. Just as you wouldn’t say that English is right and Maths is wrong it is silly to argue that science is right and religion is wrong. Such people say that science asks quite different kinds of questions to religion and they can both ask these questions without coming into conflict with each other.

Scientists who hold this model would acknowledge that they ask questions about the natural laws of the universe. They can ask about how gravity works or how species develop. However, they accept that some questions are beyond the boundaries of science, such as “Why does the universe exist?” and “What is the meaning of life?”. This they are happy to leave to religion and philosophy.

Christians who accept this version of events think similar things to scientists. When they read the creation stories in the Bible they accept that it is not a science book and so don’t think it right to ask scientific questions of it. They say that the Bible tells them about the relationship between human beings and God, not about how the planets came to be formed.
While both sides accept that the other is real and good, people working on this model don’t think that science and religion have much to say to each other. A scientist won’t learn much about science by talking to a religious person, nor will a religious person learn about religion in a science class.

You summarised this information into bullet points, drew out some pros and cons, and then made models to represent the information. Your work is here:

• Conflict
• Independence
• Dialogue