Editor’s Note: Atheists attempt to suggest that scientists are intelligent people who have rejected faith and do not believe in God. The fact is that some of the most productive scientists who have ever lived were profound believers in God. We share some of those with you in this column.
Joseph Engelberger was educated at Columbia University and along with inventor George Devol produced the first industrial robot arm called the “Unimate.” He once said, “When you're a roboticist, you end up having an awful lot of respect for what God created.” This statement to the Business Times of Singapore in 1995 was a reference to the complexity of the human arm and the robotic arm created by his company, Unimation. Later he did much of his work in building robots with the hope that his invention would be used to “act as a servant for the elderly or the disabled, providing services such as fetching, cleaning, cooking and calling for assistance in the event of an emergency.” His statement to his peers was that God had called him to build a backup to what God had created.
Engelberger recognized the complexity of God's design in nature, and our responsibility to take care of what God has given us. His observation was, “we're doing [a] … lot of abuse to the world in which we live. Maybe we'll become obsolete.”
We have pointed out in the design features of this journal that many great inventors created their ideas from what they observed in nature. From velcro to a robotic arm, God's wisdom and design are seen in the world around us. Many times a great scientist is simply one who sees what God has done and copies it. Source: Washington Post, December 6, 2015, page C8.
Picture credits:
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Unimate_500_PUMA_Deutsches_Museum.jpg