Reality is matter and energy interacting in time and space, quantum fluctuations, particles, fields and waves, forces and probabilities, and overlapping layers of influences, relationships, patterns and complexity. This is what science studies.

But that is like saying a book is just a sheet of paper with little black squiggles on it (the same 26 letters and a handful of punctuation marks in different combinations). Reality is also what you get when you read that book, or the subjective universe our consciousness experiences and is immersed in, what it perceives and affects. This is what humanity is.

We study science because it is so remarkable that so much meaning is contained in those simple initial physical phenomena. Just as language and the alphabet, paper and ink, can contain so much more. But the meaning is our own, it belongs to and is created by us.

This is why one of the overriding themes of my writing and thought is to reject that hidden meaning is somehow injected into that physical reality by some spiritual or supernatural agency. That is to deny the role we play in fashioning those basic physical laws into the rich and textured environment our minds inhabit. The glory and beauty of the universe comes not from an external supernatural being, it comes entirely from within our own consciousness, to require a supernatural personality somehow cheapens and dismisses our own humanity. It is like calling a great writer "just a copyist", or a great musician "just a recording".

We have created the universe in our own minds, the physical substrate is just the building blocks, like the paper and ink (atoms and the void) in my analogy. We are indeed like gods, not because of our power, but because of our capacity for love, truth, and beauty.

I guess you could call me a secular humanist.