Remember the TV show NUMB3RS? Don is an FBI agent. His brother Charlie, a math genius, uses math to help the FBI solve crimes. He loves math because, as he often says, “The math doesn’t lie.” In one episode, Charlie believes he has figured out who the culprit is. Don asks, “Can you prove it?” And Charlie says, “No. But I have a theory. And it’s far too elegant not to be true.”
Of course, Charlie’s theories are not just imagination, wishful thinking, blind faith, or random in any way. They are the result of serious calculations, high probabilities, and proven results. Latching on to Charlie’s quote, I thought of God the creator and of all the evidence for his existence. The vast, complicated universe and the “mathematical” impossibility of there being no mind behind it all. So the next time someone says “But it can’t be 100 percent proven that God exists,” Charlie’s quote is sure to surface: “No. But I have a theory. And it’s far too elegant not to be true.”
