Sentinel Watch May 9, 2011 Issue

Spiritual support for scientific advancements

Colleen Douglass

Last year’s Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to two scientists from England, who pioneered the discovery of a game-changer substance called graphene. According to a description from Wired.com, graphene is “a one-atom-thick film of carbon whose strength, flexibility, and electrical conductivity have opened up new horizons for pure physics research as well as high-tech applications” (http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/10/graphene).

No one will argue with the merit of this award. First produced in 2004 by Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov from The University of Manchester, graphene provides infinite possibilities for development across many branches of knowledge. Why? As Novoselov says, “It’s about the smallest you can get” (ibid.). Imagine a computer no thicker than a piece of paper, but with battery life and memory that has greater capacity and is more stable than anything we’ve known to date.

This discovery, however, hints at an even more profound idea, observed by astrophysicist Laurance Doyle: “Every true advancement in science brings about a reduction of matter.” Discoveries, such as graphene, that advance humanity out of a dependence on matter bless the world, but only to the extent that spirituality undergirds such discoveries.