16: Science and the Supernatural

Science likes to distinguish the world it works in, the natural world, from the world it cannot work in, the supernatural. The natural world is also the material world — composed of atoms, atomic particles, radiations, and laws that describe how all of these are organized, work, and produce the phenomena we call the universe from quarks to quasars, from the incredibly small to the incredibly large beyond our imaginations. Outside this immense realm in which much remains to be learned, is a world closed to scientists. It is the realm of spirits, souls, and gods; a world that requires faith for its acceptance because, however much we might infer about the existence of a supernatural process or thing, we cannot demonstrate it by the tools of science. The supernatural is, by definition, beyond the natural or material world accessible to science.