Did you see the eclipse this week? The part of it that we got here in Sacramento wasn’t all that exciting. They said it was about 80%, but the effect was little more than making a bright summer day seem slightly overcast. What we saw on TV of the total eclipse, however, looked most impressive. It would have presumably been awesome to actually experience the day turning to night for two or three minutes and then returning to day again. And the shots of the fully covered sun, with just the corona showing, were spectacular. I can only imagine what the sensation would have been for those who trekked to a spot in the direct path of the eclipse.
In Biblical times, a total eclipse, like the one we had this week, was considered a miracle, or an “Act of God.” That term – act of God – has taken on a different meaning in modern times. Now it is most often used to describe some horrific event that wreaks death and destruction (things like tornadoes or massive floods). Back then, things like an eclipse were believed to be acts of God, as when Joshua used the stopping of the sun to avenge the enemies of Israel in battle (Joshua 10:13).
Of course, today the occurrence of a total eclipse is entirely predictable, right down to the absolute minute its effect will be evident in every spot on the planet. Scientific knowledge has enhanced our ability to plan for events like an eclipse – or, to a lesser extent, a tornado or a flood – in ways that take all of the miracle out of them. Instead of acts of God, they should now more properly be referred to as acts of nature or, to be even more precise, naturally occurring events.
I know that the argument can be – and is – made that eclipses are evidence of the master plan that had to have devised the existence of the universe. How else, the argument goes, can the perfection of the location and size of the sun and the moon and our little planet be explained? It can’t just be pure chance that places the moon at exactly the prescribed distance from the sun with exactly the dimensions that both have to cause an eclipse to be visited upon the very planet where all of us can observe it and be inspired by it.
Yes, the argument goes, the occurrence of the eclipse may be wholly predictable and explicable, but the fact that it happens precisely as it does is either a miracle or proof of a master designer. And I will confess that it is exactly that kind of argument that makes me an agnostic, because I truly do not have an answer for it.
Of course, I don’t have an answer for a lot of things, which is kind of the essence of being an agnostic. But I do respect science, which is one way to deal with the unknown.
Al Gore also respects science, and in his current film, “An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power,” he reasserts the clear import of the vast body of scientific knowledge on the issue of climate change. The film picks up where the original 2006 film, “An Inconvenient Truth,” left off, showing the large swaths of Greenland glaciers that are melting, quite literally, right before our eyes. And there is nothing miraculous about the degradation of the planet that is occurring through the warmer temperatures that are placing the very existence of cities like Miami in jeopardy.
In his sequel, Gore is again preaching about the risks to life on the planet that human activity is creating. The science is pretty clear-cut, despite what certain people in positions of power (hence the sub-title of the film) may claim. The use of carbon-based energy (the burning of fossil fuels) and the raising of animals for food consumption, resulting in the release of excessive amounts of carbon dioxide and methane gas, coupled with the loss of forested land and arable soil that can absorb those gases, are the principal causes of global warming. And the statistics bear out the science. Every year in this century has posted higher average temperatures world-wide than the year before, successive record breakers, each of them.
The results are also self-evident. More severe storms are occurring more frequently. The hotter air increases ocean water evaporation, and the warmer atmosphere holds more water, which is then released in larger storms (rainfall in the warmer climates; blizzards in the colder ones). Heatwaves are also stronger and longer lasting, making arable land even less available. Planet Earth is becoming, to state the fact simply but accurately, largely inhospitable.
So now, just as we know that solar eclipses are not Biblical miracles, we must also acknowledge that those horrific storms and heat waves and blizzards aren’t acts of God either. More to the point, they are the result of acts of humans, of us.
The degradation of the planet is ongoing and accelerating. We are losing more species of living organisms now than we ever have before. And when parts of food chains are lost, the ultimate negative impact on human life can’t be denied.
The good news in Gore’s film is that he claims time is still on our side, at least to the point that we can save what is left of a habitable planet. The Paris Climate Accord, signed by over 190 nations, is a great source of hope, inasmuch as it represents a commitment by the worlds’ civilized nations to seek to reverse the causes of climate change. To date, all but one of the signatories to the agreement have stayed on board with it. And Gore thinks that the decision by the current U.S. administration to withdraw from the agreement can be overcome by the efforts of private companies and individuals.
Solar eclipses aren’t viewed as miracles anymore. Scientific knowledge now explains how, why and when they will occur. Those cosmic events are still wonders to behold, and they will continue to occur for as long as the sun, the moon, and our planet continue to orbit in the universe as they do now. But whether human beings will be on the planet to observe “the wonder of God’s creation” is very much in our hands, which, depending on how we handle the knowledge science has provided, is our inconvenient truth.