Extraterrestrial Civilizations - Isaac Asimov [2]
We are used to thinking of all the gods and demons of mythology as “supernatural,” but that is not really a proper use of the term. Any culture in its myth-making stage does not yet have the concept of natural law in the modern sense, so that nothing is really supernatural. The gods and demons are merely superhuman. They can do things that human beings cannot.
It is only modern science that introduced the concept of natural laws that cannot be broken under any circumstances—the various laws of conservation, the laws of thermodynamics, Maxwell’s laws, quantum theory, relativity, the uncertainty principle, causal relationships.
To be superhuman is perfectly permissible, for cases of it are common. The horse is superhuman in speed; the elephant in strength; the tortoise in longevity; the camel in endurance; the dolphin in swimming. It is even conceivable that some nonhuman entity might be of superhuman intelligence.
To transcend the laws of nature, be “supernatural” is, however, impermissible in the Universe as interpreted by science, in the “Scientific Universe,” which is the only one dealt with in this book.
It might easily be argued that human beings have no right to say that this or that is “impermissible”; that something that is called supernatural receives its name by arbitrary definition out of knowledge that is finite and incomplete. Every scientist must admit that we do not know all the laws of nature that may exist, and that we do not thoroughly understand all the implications and limitations of the laws of nature that we think do exist. Beyond what little we know there may be much that seems “supernatural” to our puny understanding, but that nevertheless exists.
Quite right, but consider this—
When we lead from ignorance, we can come to no conclusions. When we say, “Anything can happen, and anything can be, because we know so little that we have no right to say ‘This is’ or ‘This isn’t,’ ” then all reasoning comes to a halt right there. We can eliminate nothing; we can assert nothing. All we can do is put words and thoughts together on the basis of intuition or faith or revelation and, unfortunately, no two people seem to share the same intuition or faith or revelation.
What we must do is set rules and place limits, however arbitrary these may seem to be. We then discover what we can say within these rules and limits.
The scientific view of the Universe is such as to admit only those phenomena that can, in one way or another, be observed in a fashion accessible to all, and to admit those generalizations (which we call laws of nature) that can be induced from those observations.
Thus, there are exactly four force fields that control all the interactions of subatomic particles and therefore, in the long run, all phenomena. These are, in order of discovery, the gravitational, the electromagnetic, the strong nuclear, and the weak nuclear interactions. No phenomenon that has been observed fails to be explained by one or another of these forces. No phenomenon is as yet so puzzling that scientists must conclude that some fifth force other than the four I’ve listed must exist.
It is perfectly possible to say that there is a fifth type of interaction that exists, but cannot be observed, or a sixth, or any number. If it cannot be observed, if it cannot make itself evident in any way, nothing is gained by talking about it—except, perhaps, for the amusement of inventing a fantasy.* It is also perfectly possible to say that there is a fifth interaction (or a sixth or any number) that can indeed be observed, but only by certain people