I'm a scientist, not a theologian. I don't know if there is a God

Host: The evening fog rolled across the cliffs, swallowing the last traces of the sun. Below, the ocean heaved — a slow, breathing creature of salt and darkness. The wind howled, carrying the taste of iron and rain. Two silhouettes stood on the edge: Jack, with his coat collar turned up against the cold, and Jeeny, her hair whipped by the gusts, her eyes locked on the horizon where light and void met.

Between them, a small campfire burned, its flames flickering like thoughts struggling to stay alive in the storm.

Jeeny: “Lovelock once said, ‘I’m a scientist, not a theologian. I don’t know if there is a God or not. Religion requires certainty. Revere and respect Gaia. Have trust in Gaia. But not faith.’”

Jack: “Lovelock was a realist. He understood that reverence doesn’t need worship. You can respect the Earth without inventing a God behind it.”

Host: The firelight caught in Jack’s eyes, making them seem like steel with a faint glow — a man who had seen too much data and too little divinity.

Jeeny: “But isn’t that still a kind of faith, Jack? To trust in something you can’t fully understand — to believe that Gaia will endure, even after what we’ve done to her?”

Jack: “No. That’s observation, not belief. The planet doesn’t care about our forgiveness or our sins. It reacts. Like any living system, it corrects itself. If we push too far, she’ll push back — not out of anger, but physics.”

Jeeny: “You talk as if Gaia is a machine. But Lovelock didn’t mean that. He saw her as a self-regulating organism — alive, in her own way. Doesn’t that require some humility? Maybe even awe?”

Jack: “Awe, yes. But not faith. Faith is what blinds people to evidence. It’s what made men burn Galileo for looking through a telescope. Science is the opposite — it’s the courage to admit we don’t know.”

Host: The waves crashed below, sending up spray that kissed their faces. The fire shuddered, its flames bending in the wind, a fragile mirror of their argument — heat and cold, forever colliding.

Jeeny: “And yet even science, Jack, has its faith — faith in reason, faith in repeatability, faith that the universe isn’t chaos but order. Don’t tell me you’ve never believed in something you couldn’t prove.”

Jack: “Belief and hypothesis are not the same. I can test one, falsify it, discard it if it fails. You can’t do that with God.”

Jeeny: “But maybe that’s not the point of God. Maybe the divine isn’t meant to be proven — only felt. Like love, or mercy. Or grief.”

Jack: “Feelings are biochemical storms, Jeeny. They come and go. The universe doesn’t run on emotion — it runs on entropy and balance. Lovelock saw that — Gaia isn’t divine, she’s mathematical.”

Jeeny: “And yet he said, ‘Revere and respect Gaia.’ That’s not mathematics, Jack. That’s reverence. You can’t revere an equation. Reverence is emotional. It’s sacred.”

Host: The flames flared, painting their faces in shades of orange and shadow. A gull screamed somewhere in the dark, its cry lost in the wind.

Jack: “Reverence is practical. You revere fire because it can kill you. You revere the sea because it can drown you. You respect Gaia because she holds your lungs in her hands. That’s not worship — that’s survival instinct.”

Jeeny: “But that’s not enough, Jack. If all we feel is fear, we’ll never change. You can’t save what you only respect. You must love it — even if you don’t understand it. Faith isn’t blindness; it’s the courage to trust without control.”

Jack: “Love doesn’t stop carbon emissions. Faith doesn’t stabilize ecosystems. The ice caps won’t melt slower because you prayed harder.”

Jeeny: “No, but maybe people would harm less if they felt sacredness again. We treat the Earth like an object because we stopped calling her holy. Lovelock gave us Gaia to remind us — we are part of her, not her owners.”

Host: Jeeny’s voice rose, fragile yet fierce, like a bird singing against a storm. Jack watched her, silent, the flames reflecting in his grey eyes, their fury and sadness mingling with the sea’s rhythm.

Jack: “You want holiness back in science — but that’s how dogma begins. The minute you call something sacred, you stop questioning it.”

Jeeny: “Maybe not. Maybe sacredness doesn’t silence questions — it deepens them. When I say the Earth is sacred, I don’t mean untouchable. I mean worthy. Worthy of our wonder. Worthy of our care.”

Jack: “Wonder is useful. It leads to curiosity. But faith… faith replaces curiosity. You have to choose.”

Jeeny: “Why choose? Maybe they need each other. Lovelock himself balanced them — logic and awe. He didn’t deny Gaia’s mystery; he just refused to call it divine. But even he knew: without reverence, science becomes cruelty.”

Host: The fire crackled, a shower of sparks rose into the night, drifting upward like lost souls. The sky was a vault of endless black, punctured by cold, indifferent stars.

Jack: “Cruelty isn’t born from science — it’s born from misuse. Science is a mirror. The monster is the reflection.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe faith is the part that stops us from becoming the monster.”

Jack: “Or the part that made monsters believe they were holy.”

Host: The wind howled, and for a moment, neither spoke. The fire sputtered, the waves roared louder. It felt as though the Earth herself were listening — or maybe laughing.

Jeeny: “Jack… do you ever look at the night sky and feel small?”

Jack: “Every time. But that smallness doesn’t scare me. It humbles me. That’s what Lovelock meant — humility without theology. Reverence without illusion.”

Jeeny: “Then we agree — except I think humility is faith. The kind that doesn’t need God, just gratitude. To me, that’s enough.”

Jack: “Gratitude, yes. Faith, no. Faith demands certainty. Gratitude accepts mystery.”

Host: A pause — deep, trembling, filled with the sound of the sea and the crackle of flame. Jeeny reached into her pocket, pulled out a small stone, smooth and grey, and placed it by the fire.

Jeeny: “Then maybe that’s our offering — not to a god, but to the ground that carries us. To Gaia. To everything that breathes and breaks.”

Jack: “An offering to the equation that keeps us alive.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack — to the life that keeps us questioning.”

Host: The wind softened. The fire burned lower, its flames now gentle, like memory. Above them, the clouds parted, revealing a single star, bright and lonely in the void.

Jack looked up, his face lit by both fire and starlight, and for a moment, something almost like faith — or maybe gratitude — moved behind his eyes.

Jack: “Maybe you’re right, Jeeny. Maybe faith isn’t the enemy — as long as it doesn’t stop us from asking.”

Jeeny: “And maybe science isn’t cold — as long as it remembers to wonder.”

Host: The flames faded, the sea breathed, and the stars watched in their ancient, indifferent silence. Between logic and faith, between data and devotion, two small souls stood, caught in the vast, eternal conversation — humanity, forever seeking to both know and believe.

The fire died, but the light remained.