Presenting a Qualitative God to a Quantitative World

This substantive theory study sought to understand the journey from atheism to faith among credentialed scientists. Ten former atheist scientists, all holding advanced degrees and the majority holding doctorates in various scientific disciplines, were interviewed to the point of data saturation. Data sources included these video interviews, relevant documents, and scientific literature. A core finding was the scientists' unanimous conclusion that an independent analysis of the natural world revealed compelling evidence for a transcendent designer. Several consistent themes emerged: initial disbelief in God, scientific inquiry leading them to evidence of God's existence, the world's fine-tuning and precision negating chance, and the realization that God is the rational explanation for life. These themes were corroborated by a statistical analysis, conducted by two mathematicians and a scientist/researcher that concluded the accidental arising of life from nonlife is statistically impossible. Further corroboration was found in an analysis of three scientific studies on Proximal Intercessory Prayer (PIP), which reported statistically significant healing outcomes inexplicable by known natural laws. This unintentional corroboration across multiple scholarly disciplines strongly suggests the substantive theory that for those examined: "An objective analysis of the natural world and life, even when fully accepting the reality of established physical laws, suggests that an intelligent creator offers the most rational and coherent explanation for the universe's fine-tuning and the origin of life."