"The scientific world-view is surely a good deal less intelligible now than it was during the century or two following Newton. ...[A]lthough the Newtonian picture was that of a universe unfolding mechanically, it was underpinned by the theological concept of a Deity who had set the world in motion at the beginning. The two concepts went together and provided a satisfactory ontology for as long as the basic assumptions were acceptable. Modern science, by contrast, has no comprehensive metaphysical foundation. Indeed the paradox of modern science is this: it is a system of thought which amply displays man’s creative powers and which yet makes him appear as a 'thing'—that is, as an object which science believes can have no such powers."