In his book ‘The Phenomenon of Man’, the great evolutionary scientist and theologian Pierre Teilhard de Chardin wrote that, ‘The time has come to realise that an interpretation of the universe … remains unsatisfying unless it covers the interior as well as the exterior of things; mind as well as matter. The true physics is that which will, one day, achieve the inclusion of man in his wholeness in a coherent picture of the world.’

Many have pondered whether science has anything to offer the human spirit, so Teilhard’s insight is apt and profound. It recognises that as long as science concerns itself only with exteriors (‘stuff out there’), it cannot speak to our yearning for meaning and belonging. In Western culture, exterior-focussed science traces back to the Enlightenment. It was powerful. It uncovered the laws of gravity, Newton’s laws of motion and the laws of thermodynamics. It enabled us to probe the depth of the atom, predict the passage of a comet and understand the structure of a crystal.