When we don’t understand something, what do we do?
For millennia, the answer was simple: God did it.
Thunder? The gods are angry. Disease? A divine punishment. Consciousness? A soul gifted from above.
Richard Dawkins coined the phrase:
“The God of the gaps is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance.”
It’s a trap. And it still ensnares minds today.
Rather than admit uncertainty, religious explanations rush to fill the void with deities, demons, and doctrine. But as science advances, the divine shrinks. No longer needed to explain rain, we moved on to life’s origin. Then to consciousness. Then to the universe itself.
But each time the evidence arrives, God retreats.
Douglas Adams joked:
“Isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?”
Our curiosity shouldn’t be a weakness. It’s a strength. Yet religions often discourage it—preferring submission to questions.
Why is this dangerous?
Because when we sanctify ignorance, we stop seeking truth.
If every unanswered question is sealed with a divine label, discovery dies. Wonder becomes worship. Questions become heresy.
Hitchens warned:
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
Instead of fearing the unknown, secular minds welcome it. We say: “We don’t know—yet.” And then we investigate. We learn. We adapt. We change.
Science is humble. It admits mistakes. Religion rarely does.
As the gaps grow narrower, the urge to deify mystery grows stronger. But we must resist. Ignorance is not sacred—it is a call to action.
The day we stop saying “God did it” is the day we start discovering what really happened.