Albert Einstein believed in a static universe. On a grand scale, the universe looked essentially the same 14 billion years ago, and would look essentially the same for the next 14 billion years. Then Einstein’s very own theory of general relativity led physicists to hypothesize a beginning — the Big Bang. The result proved the universe was not static, but very much dynamic. It was “an instance of creation in the equations of a hard-core scientist,” Prof. Sylvester James Gates, professor of physics at the University of Maryland, said.

Gates said instances like the Big Bang and human evolution tend to affirm matters spiritual — an origin of the universe, and the common link of all humans, no matter their race. But in most instances, Gates believes science is mute on matters spiritual — science neither affirms nor denies spirituality. This was the central topic of his speech last Sunday evening in Sage Chapel entitled “Maxwell’s Equations and Darwin’s Finches,” the Second Annual Beggs Lecture on Science, Spirituality and Society.

Gates’ lecture focused on four giants of theoretical science and their relationship with religion: Isaac Newton, father of physics and the theory of classical mechanics; James Clerk Maxwell, who packaged the four equations that fully describe the theory of Electromagnetism, worked on the kinetic theory of gasses and developed principles of color analysis; Charles Darwin, who is credited with creating the modern theory of evolution and Albert Einstein, who developed both special and general relativity, explained the photoelectric effect and contributed to the theory of quantum mechanics.

Newton, Gates said, was certainly not a traditional Christian. He was anti-Trinitarian, dabbled in Aryanism and searched for hidden codes in the Bible. Nevertheless the father of physics was not anti-religious, and his mechanized universe, Gates said, had huge implications on religious thought. Gates noted how many believed Newton’s elegant equations governing the universe were affirmation of a divine creator, while many others believed they eliminated the need for such a creator.

Gates described how Darwin’s life involved a complicated spiritual journey from a traditional Christian to an agnostic. Regardless of his formal position on religion, Gates said, Darwin was a spiritual man. He quoted Darwin saying “… there is more in man than the mere breath in his body.”

Maxwell is a hero to Gates — both being theoretical physicists with a firm faith in God. Gates expressed disappointment in how few people know of the man.

“Most people have never heard of James Clerk Maxwell, which is rather odd,” Gates said, “since many fields would not exist in the form they do today without him.”

Gates described how Maxwell, in addition to being devoted to theoretical physics, memorized verses from the Bible. “This is one of the three greatest physicists who ever lived, and he was a devout, traditional Christian,” Gates said. “He did not see a wall between the two.”

Finally, Gates spoke of Albert Einstein, whose spiritual beliefs Gates mused were “at least as complicated as his theory of general relativity.”

One conclusion of his lecture was that out of the three (arguably) most important physicists — Newton, Maxwell and Einstein — none was anti-religious, and so if one believed physics was the foundation science, science itself could not be at odds with spirituality.

Another conclusion of the lecture was that science, which Gates said is defined as the study of reproducible observations, has no laboratory experiment that can deal with spiritual matters. As such, science was “mute” on religion, and thus had no ability to refute spirituality or the existence of God.

Evolution, Gates reminded the audience, points toward a common origin of all humans on the African continent. Evolution thus displaced racist theories of multiple human origins, and thus affirmed the notion of genesis and common humanity. Evolution, Gates said, was also integral to all of biology and science, and to attack this successful theory born from observations was to attack all of science.

The lecture was the start of a week of lectures and events in honor of Charles Darwin entitled Darwin Days. Darwin Days is celebrated nationwide. This year is especially monumental, since it marks the bicentennial of Darwin’s birth, and the sesquicentennial (150th year) of Darwin’s seminal paper “On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.”