Arthur Compton Quotes
It is not difficult for me to have this faith, for it is incontrovertible that where there is a plan there is intelligence - an orderly, unfolding universe testifies to the truth of the most majestic statement ever uttered - 'In the beginning, God.'
Compton, Arthur Holly. The Freedom of Man. Yale University Press, 1935, p. 73.
This quotation is very interesting in the light of the so called “intelligent design” opponents of evolution. Darwin himself was by no means an atheist but he did not see the “hand of God in everything about him”. He did not maintain that a God could not have a hand in setting the laws of evolution which then produced all the species. However, the modern proponents of “intelligent design” insist that the evolutionary mechanism is so complex that God must have a role in the processes themselves. There are atheist evolutionists and evolutionists who believe that there was a God or prime mover setting the laws of science in motion, but all so called intelligent design enthusiasts are religious and believe that God is involved in the process. They reject the scientific method and their assertions are not subject to scientific proof or falsification. They are not scientists in contrast to the scientists who believe there was a God or prime mover initiating the process.
Arthur Holly Compton was an American physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1927 for his 1923 discovery of the Compton effect, which demonstrated the particle nature of electromagnetic radiation. It was a sensational discovery at the time: the wave nature of light had been well-demonstrated, but the idea that light had both wave and particle properties was not easily accepted. He is also known for his leadership over the Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago during the Manhattan Project, and served as Chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis from 1945 to 1953.
