The myth of the learn'd astronomer

Stephen Hawking's latest foray into the public eye has sparked a good deal of healthy conversation, most of it negative, much of it ignorant. (Not that this is anyone's fault - when it comes to the subject of cosmology we're all ignorant compared to Hawking.)

The reaction is expected, though in reality all he has said is no different from a person saying god is not necessary to explain disease, or lightning, or where babies come from. We know the forces behind these phenomena, and while people are free to believe God plays a role, a deity is not a requirement for the theory to work. As Laplace said, we have no need for that hypothesis.

Out of the hundreds of comments this topic garnered around the web, one caught my eye as worthy of more attention. Expressing her disappointment with Hawking's choice of words, a reader of Anderson Coopers CNN blog argued that

"By making such a statement, this brilliant scientist is excluding the wonder and inspiration which motivates humanity, reflected in all regligions worldwide. Even if, as he claims, matter can spontaneously generate life under certain conditions, he is missing the point of being alive."

Let's ignore that Hawking was talking about the spontaneous creation of matter, not life and focus instead on this strange claim that by explaining something (such as the possible origins of the universe), you exclude "wonder and inspiration". That's a strange idea, don't you think? To myself and many, understanding is the source of wonder and inspiration.

Yet hang around long enough and you'll find this argument being made often enough. By explaining the origin of our species, we somehow debase our existence. Arguments against "reductionism" often follow this line, arguing that be reducing (say) memory to a complex interaction of chemicals, we deny the warmth you feel when you remember your first kiss.

Why is this so? What is it about knowledge that leads so many to believe it darkens the world, rather than illuminate? There are often those who turn toward the arts in defense of this position, citing poems such as Whitman's When I Heard The Learn'd Astronomer as examples of professorship removing the majesty of life. Gibran Khalil's The Scholar and the Poet plays upon a similar theme, arguing from the apparent premise that the scholar, despite as learned as can be, is still limited in understanding by his very nature, and thus cannot experience the fully beauty of the world.

We mentioned earlier that no god is necessary to explain pregnancy, and I've never heard of one who would argue that knowing how their sexual organs work, with the full interplay of fertilization and implantation that goes into the creation of a child somehow diminishes the gift that infant is.

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To those who argue that knowledge undermines the beauty in the universe I have but one simple question: What makes Mona Lisa's smile so brilliant?

Can you explain the beauty of this work of art, without resorting evidence based reasoning? Or is the masterpiece all the more beautiful when understanding sets in?