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David Brill and Helen Morant met Professor Lord Robert Winston to discuss science, religion and his new book, The Story of God.
It's lucky that the reception area of Hammersmith Hospital has very comfortable sofas. We were kept waiting there for an hour. We then found out that the hour we had been promised could only be half that due to a later engagement with the BBC. Our opening question was described as "very bad", and a later one dismissed as something every journalist asks. It is a testament to the charm and reassuring manner of Lord Robert Winston that not one of these offences registered any damage. The ease with which he spoke left us feeling that we could have covered virtually any subject and not run out of interesting material. We concentrated on the relationship between science and religion, beginning with the existence of God.
"Each of us will have a different notion of what we mean by God, even if we're atheists. I do believe that humans have a divine spirit which is not explicable in purely evolutionary terms, although I do think that there is possibly a genetic basis for much religiosity and spirituality … I think that if you're asking me if I believe in something irrational and inexplicable that may contribute to us then yes, I do. But if you're asking me whether I believe that there's a white coated, bearded figure, up there in the clouds who dictates what's going to happen to me when I walk out of this building and will stop a brick falling from the scaffolding, I don't believe that, no."
Lord Winston does not shy away from discussing some deep ideas about science and the world around us: "It seems to me that as we discover more and more about the universe we understand less and less about the universe. And I think that what's interesting about biologists is that they tend to be so narrow that they arrogantly think that they can explain the world - but it's only their world. As physics develops, on the other hand, it uncovers more and more irrational, inexplicable and unbelievable things which make up the universe we're in. And I find it interesting that for that reason, "belief" is probably more common amongst physicists than it is amongst biologists. And I think that physicists are actually a bit more humble, to see the moment we look at the universe and realise that we probably will never explain it. I think biology will become like that too. I think that biology, far from getting more and more explicable, will become less explicable."
"I've always thought science isn't that objective, a lot of the time. It should be objective but it isn't. Religion isn't objective either, of course." But should religion be objective? "No. Because they're different systems, they're different ways of looking at the natural world. Science, of course, has to test by experiment. Theologians on the whole do not test things. They try to but generally their tests are inadequate and by our standards they are very imperfect. The fallacy of some clerics, Muslim and Catholic for example, explaining the tsunami in terms of God destroying something which was evil or wrong, or trying to give a message to the world (or indeed the same for the earthquake in Pakistan) is to my mind completely irrational. I don't think you explain the irrationalities of nature by the irrationalities of providence."
When asked whether religion is ever misused, Lord Winston is remarkably frank with his answer: "I think that's something I say in great detail in the book. I'm interested in fundamentalism and I argue that both religion and science are, to my mind, essentially about uncertainty. We do science because we are uncertain about what we are going to find. We don't really understand the natural world, but our genetic imperative is inquisitive, so we want to try and understand it. I think that what we do in science is try to underpin our uncertainties, and that's exactly what religion does. It's also essentially about uncertainty, and humans are very bad at dealing with uncertainty. So, consequently, religions often offer certainty, and so does science. And I think that science and religion, when they become certain are at their most dangerous."
"I take issue with the fundamentalist Christians (and there are a few fundamentalist Jews who are admittedly of the same thought proces) who take the literal word of the Bible as absolute truth and nothing can be changed. What's bizarre about those people living in Kentucky is that they think the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon were formed at the time of Noah's flood, and that God put the fossils there to confuse men. They claim that this is what they get from the absolute literal word of the text. Why that is so inconsistent with any kind of rationalist behaviour is of course that they read the text, which is imperfectly translated from Greek, which in turn was imperfectly translated from the Hebrew. At least they should read the original Hebrew manuscript. Now unless you go back to the original texts you cannot understand them. It isn't actually possible to do it - you get completely the wrong view of what the phrase is about … I think fundamentalism of that sort is flawed and dangerous."
The religious aspect of Lord Winston's life also affects his work on a practical level: "Whatever I believe - I certainly don't believe I'm going to be punished if I don't keep to the Robert Winston's book "The Story of God" is reviewed on page 28. Sabbath for example - I don't generally work on religious festivals, so-called holidays, and I don't work on Saturdays. I think actually that frees me up for work because having one day of the week when you don't do any work is a hugely healthy thing. I think it's been a saving grace - it's a great institution, actually."
Writing this book has taken Lord Winston on something of a personal journey. "I think it changed my views about both science and religion. I think I became somewhat more sceptical of both and about my own religion too." Some critics have suggested that in writing this book he is dealing with an area outside his expertise. But he strongly refutes this idea: "I think that is such a conceit, actually. It's a really arrogant thing to say that of somebody else, because of course we all have the ability to look at the whole world, not just narrow bits of it. I don't set myself up as an expert in the book - I say that I'm coming at it from a fairly particular perspective."
As well as tackling his critics, he showed a willingness to make bold predictions: "I think that we will find out that we can't always predict how genes are going to express, and we may even find out that genes aren't the only unit of inheritance." Our interview concluded with a walk to BBC Television Centre for another interview with Radio Five Live. Ignoring the occasional glances from passers-by, we spoke at length about a wide range of subjects from Jewish ethics and teachings to the atheism of Richard Dawkins. Whatever the critics may have to say about Lord Winston, it doesn't take long in his company to realise the immense depth of his knowledge on religion, science and, well, just about everything. An hour in reception was a small price to pay. And they were damn comfy sofas.
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