Following on this, Dawkins wondered whether there were any deep, important questions that science was incapable of answering. He supposed that there might be, citing as an example the question of what determined the fundamental constants of physics.
Science and the practice of science depend on multiple assumptions. The assumption that there are fundamental regularities and principles that govern what reality is and how it unfolds. The assumption that these fundamental principles are knowable by human beings and are discoverable through what is given us by our human senses and by use of things like mathematics and logic (whatever they are).
But as Dawkins kind of suggests that he grudgingly acknowledges, science seems to be incapable of pulling itself up into the sky by its own bootstraps, providing us with all the explanations of where the fundamental principles of reality come from, from the laws of nature to the principles of mathematics and logic.
But, he claimed, such gaps in scientific explanation should provide no comfort to theologians who wished to claim a distinctive sphere of competence for religion. For if any area of study were to deliver answers to these questions – questions Dawkins labeled "the deep questions of existence" – it would be science, not religion.
Well, if the deepest secrets of reality are still unknown to humans, then that would seem to point us towards agnosticism, not towards theological doctrines per-se. So I agree with Dawkins about that.
But there's natural theology. The natural theologians from Aristotle onwards have traditionally defined 'God' as first-cause, source of cosmic order, ultimate ground of being and ideas like that. Whatever the unknown answers are to those fundamental metaphysical questions.
I expect that Dawkins and I would agree that it's probably inappropriate to personify the answers as if the answers were a giant man in the sky. Again, the best way to approach these issues seems to be through agnosticism.
But that being said, it does justify belief in a deep and fundamental
transcendant dimension to the reality that surrounds us and the reality that
is us. It's all mysterious at its core. That idea certainly speaks to a certain kind of religious intuition in a way that the doctrines of textbook science where everything finds an explanation seemingly can't. One is reminded of the neoplatonists, the Christian mystical traditions and to concepts like the Hindu Brahman.
Or do you think religion holds some meaningful answers for humanity?
It seems to me that religion isn't really about satisfying curiosity about ultimate things. It's about somehow tuning one's self to what is deepest and most real. That might be conceptualzed as living in accordance with God's will, as realizing Brahman or one's Buddha-nature. Perhaps even science could be described as a religious path for somebody like Dawkins.