Tapestry@25: geneticist Francis Collins
Originally published in 2007.
Dr. Francis Collins is one of American's leading scientists. A physician and geneticist, he led the Human Genome project to identify and map human DNA.
He has been the director of the National Institutes of Health since 2009, making him the longest serving director in the institute's history. Collins and his team are currently hard at work trying to develop a vaccine for COVID-19.
Just as a single gene can determine the course of a human life, Collins' life took a profound turn one day when an elderly patient asked him a simple question.
"I've told you about my beliefs and you never say anything. Doctor, what do you believe?"
As an atheist, Collins found himself intensely uncomfortable and quickly answered "I'm not sure," before leaving.
His fumbled reaction surprised him. Collins thought he should have easily been able to articulate his atheism. He then realized he had simply accepted atheism without considering if there was any evidence for something else.
"For a scientist to have arrived at a conclusion about perhaps the most important question we humans ever ask - is there a God? - and to have done so without having considered the evidence," Collins explained, "that seemed pretty shocking and unfortunate and I better do something about it!"
Collins looked for reasons to substantiate atheism, assuming that was where the facts would lead him.
But after reading the first three pages of Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis, all of his arguments were dispelled.
"Lewis went through the argument about how it is that one of the most unique aspects of humanity, perhaps its most defining characteristic, is our knowledge of right and wrong: the so-called 'moral law'. The sense that we have that there are things that are good and things that are evil, and that we should strive to do the ones that are good," Collins explained.
"I found that to be a very compelling and thought-provoking idea because that not only suggests that there's something outside of ourselves that has somehow instilled this desire for good behaviour… but it does say that whatever that is — let's call it God — cares about human beings."
Collins is now an evangelical Christian who sees no conflict between science and religion. He believes science is the way God works in the world.
"That was profound for me… The plausibility of a supernatural force that stood for what is good and holy, and that had an interest in me. Goodness!"
Dr. Francis Collins is the 2020 Templeton prize winner. Former winners include Mother Teresa, the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Rabbi Jonathan Sacks.
Collins is the author of The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief.
Produced by Susan Mahoney and Marieke Mayer. Written by Rosie Fernandez.