Question: Is there anything that scientists cannot see, that they can still believe in?

Scientists are trained to look for conclusive evidence. But our five senses have very little range. So we have developed instruments that can extend that range considerably. But given the size of the universe that we can observe, so far, we realize that our view is still quite minuscule. The other limiting factor, of course, is our feeble intellect and our inadequate ability to comprehend and understand beyond that which we can see, measure and compute with our five limited senses and our crude instrumentation.

For the things that we cannot scientifically prove, but in try to understand, we tend to construct theories. That way, until our understanding becomes clearer, we can say that we believe in this or that theory.

Good research scientists realize that there are some things in life that we cannot see, but that we do believe in.

For example: Wind is something we can’t see. We can physically feel it, so we know it is material in nature. We know that it consists of air molecules in motion, because we can measure it and know that it is there. So even though we can’t see air, we can believe in it.

Take gravity, though. We cannot see gravity and it seems to be non-material. But we can measure its effects on material things. We can feel its force on our bodies. It manifests physical consequences. However, what little we understand about the real nature of gravity, we can’t see it, we can’t touch it, but we still know that it exists. It is there ---and we believe in it.

What about love? Love is something that is even more intangible, and non-material. Yet, is love not one of the most potent forces in life? Our fundamental human need is to love and to be loved. Love fosters happiness and promotes longevity. Many people believe it is the most powerful force in the universe. It evokes powerful responses in people. It causes physical changes to happen. It creates. It can be magnified, multiplied and shared. It transforms lives. Even though love has no measurable shape or mass, it can 'move mountains'.  Everyone believes love exists.

Does that mean that we can, or should, believe in other non-material things, as well? Thought, which you are engaged in --right now-- is a non-material "realm" that is essential to the very existence and survival of every sentient living organism. Thought, more and more, is controlling our physical/material world, (for better or for worse), and even though we cannot see it, touch it or weigh it, we must believe thought exists, because "belief" itself is a manifestation of thought!

We know of the dimensions of length, width, height (the classic three), and time, (the fourth, -- a seemingly non-material one.) Yet time itself varies with mass, acceleration and gravity. Consider Albert Einstein's formula. He describes E=MC² as follows, ..."the equation E is equal to m c-squared, in which energy is put equal to mass, multiplied by the square of the velocity of light, showed that very small amounts of mass may be converted into a very large amount of energy and vice versa".)

Are there other dimensions? Maybe there are multiple dimensions. Maybe there are non-material dimensions that operate behind --even control?-- the material dimensions, but are far more sophisticated, and completely unknowable to our physical brains!  (That last part about other dimensions, if they exist, being “unknowable to our physical brains” is certainly not hard to believe!

Perhaps there is a non-material dimension of “Pure Love”. Maybe a “Pure Love Dimension” rules over all the others, or is attempting to?  “Attempting” being the operative word, because even though we tend to believe in 'certain realities', such as the “Universal Laws” of physics, which we have come to accept as controlling matter and its properties, maybe “Pure Love” is trying to bring order out of (apparent) chaos through another non-material reality: of “Free Will”.

WOW! Tough job ahead!

Back to our scientist: Any rational, analytical logically-thinking scientist will realize that humans, with such limited perception and understanding, can still believe that there are many things that can operate beyond our ken, that are not yet discovered, but, would be no less real simply because they are undiscovered and unknown.

Thus, any rational scientist should logically be able to deduce, and safely state, the following: “With our extremely restricted range of perception and our limited understanding of existence, reality, time and space… I believe that there very well could be other realms or dimensions of the Universe that we will (or would) not recognize, understand, or even know the existence of, in this lifetime. But our ignorance of such does not lessen the probability of their potential existence.”

Such belief should not make a scientist any less rational, or less "scientific", but perhaps ...a better human being.