Dr. Sanjay Gupta: Truth, Science, Faith, and Trust
From WWSG exclusive speaker, Dr. Sanjay Gupta:
Recently, I had a chance to catch up with Dr. Francis Collins, on my podcast, Chasing Life. Dr. Collins was my genetics professor at the University of Michigan Medical School three decades ago. He is also one of the world’s preeminent geneticists, former director of the National Institutes of Health and an evangelical Christian.
He hadn’t considered religion until he was in medical school and had a chance encounter with a patient who shared her faith with him and asked him, ‘‘What do you believe, doctor?”
“I realized I hadn’t given it any thought at all,” he told me. “I’m a scientist, you know. I’m supposed to have reasons for making decisions about something that’s really important, and I hadn’t done any of that.”
It started him on a two-year journey of taking the questioning and understanding he had in science and applying it to faith which, for him, ultimately led to Christianity.
In recent years, he told me he’s become “increasingly concerned about ways in which truth, science, faith and trust — traditional anchors for all of us — seem to be getting a little dislodged, and no more so than during Covid when the most dramatic example, of course, being people’s distrust of the vaccines.”
He’s written a book, “The Road to Wisdom: On Truth, Science, Faith, and Trust,” on how we can restore faith in science.
First, he notes not to confuse knowledge for wisdom. “Knowledge is the facts, the evidence, the information, the best you can put together, but it’s often insufficient to help you make a decision,” he said. “For that you need experience, you need some sense about insights and, oh, maybe some common sense and a moral compass — what’s the right thing to do?”
But coming up with that wisdom requires trust – and he believes that relies on four factors.
- Integrity: Is this a source that I believe is honest and forthcoming
- Competence: Do they really know what they’re talking about? Have they done the work to look at the complexities of the issue?
- Humility: Is this a source that actually admits there are things they’re not sure about and doesn’t try to extend their expertise in one area into all areas?
- Who is the source?: Is this source part of my bubble, is this part of my tribe? Am I going to let my guard down and accept what they say?
Dr. Collins said the last factor is key in our politicized environment. “Facts don’t care how you feel. And a fact that comes at you from somebody who’s not in your tribe, that happens to be true, is still something you need to take on board and not reject just because of its source.”
He said that it’s imperative that we regain that trust in science because it “is a critical part of how we make progress, and to the extent that people are less and less likely to trust it to help them flourish, then we’re going to have more trouble flourishing.”
Listen to more of our conversation here.