The Difference Between Faith and Science, we are told…

is that Science (the capital letter is essential) studies cold hard fact while religion is all about airy fairy speculation about things nobody has ever seen.

I always think of these dogmatic pronouncement when I run across things the International Journal of Astrobiology.

Astrobiology. For those of you who don’t know: that’s a science that has less actual data to work with than the Medical Bureau at Lourdes.

In fact, it has no actual data whatever. But that doesn’t stop people who are confident that, any day now, the atheism of the gaps will confirm the deathless faith of some materialists which declares that this earth (and indeed this universe) is a dime a dozen and we can stop marveling at the glory of creation and the strong suggestion of You Know Who.

That’s not to say there are no earthlike worlds. There may well be billions of them. I don’t see why there couldn’t be. But that doesn’t change the fact that “sciences” without data are acts of faith. Nor does it change the fact that theology is the Queen of the Sciences.