As a layman, I understand “entropy” to represent the eventual failure of the sun to generate light and heat because its critical mass of exploding gases has been exhausted. Of course, just plain old pollution on earth could cut choke out life even before the cataclysmic effects of entropy. In any case, the end of the world is scientifically predictable.

“Apocalypse,” however, is another issue.

This word adds ciphers to the description of physical events, requiring an understanding of such symbols to grasp a multi-layered reality. To use a non-religious example, the handshake between Yasser Arafat of the PLO and Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin was a symbol of the event of signing a multiple page agreement about a peace plan at Oslo in 1993. The treaty was effective without the handshake, but the handshake created an iconic image for a long and (sadly) still incomplete process.

Symbols are valuable tools for communicating a complex reality. Beyond a merely rational evaluation based on learning, the symbol has emotional content and can be understood by people divorced from the details of the negotiations. Apocalypse in this sense has been an indispensable tool in human evolution because it cultivates wonder, amazement, and mystery that feed the scientific and artistic curiosities of our species. We would not have knowledge of biology, chemistry or astronomy on the one hand or of written language, poetry, or art on the other without the ability to create symbols or to decipher them.

But just as there are good symbols, there are bad symbols. The handshake of Arafat and Rabin represented a process that stalled and has run aground. It would be a mistake to transfer truth away from physical reality to an eviscerated symbol. In the politics of the USA there are all kinds of phony symbols: Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” banner in 2003 comes to mind – but there are many more and from all sides of the political spectrum. Precisely because they are complex, symbols need to be treated with care.

Although entropy is a physical inevitability, it may not be enough to rationally understand that our planet will eventually be destroyed: we may need to mobilize people to act on that knowledge by appeal to emotions encouraging altruism and framing the sting of mortality with the trimmings of teleology. Most of the world’s religions have done that throughout the ages by providing a symbolic meaning to human finitude. “Happy Hunting Ground,” “Paradise,” “Heaven and Hell,” “Pearly Gates” are all metaphors derived from religion that provide iconic images for the last things. They both comfort and cajole the collective human psyche.

In my book, it would be a good thing, for instance, to provide symbols and images in describing global warming. You might even win an Oscar if you described this inconvenient truth through film. While an apocalyptic view is not the same as the scientific fact and often is vulnerable to manipulation, its value consists in spurring people to collective action.

The Early Christian Church adopted a writing filled with images of the end of the world. Known to some as “The Book of Revelations” and to others as “The Apocalypse,” this part of the Christian scriptures encouraged those being persecuted by Imperial Rome to persevere in their faith. The positive images of eternal reward were intended to counteract the frightful prospect of being devoured by wild beasts to cheering hordes of bloodthirsty pagans in a Roman arena. Understood in the context provided by the teaching of the church, this scripture provided a “good” symbol. It continues to have relevance to the faithful, even if the historical context has changed.

Unfortunately, not all believers rely on the community of the church when they interpret such symbols. Relying on subjective and individualistic conclusions, some have made the Book of Revelation into a political primer for the right-wing political causes. (It would be just as bad if it were a political primer for the left wing!) In a word, just as in secular events there are both good and bad uses of symbols, we find the same pattern in religion. I reject these overwrought descriptions of the end of the world as bad theology.

Nonetheless, the apocalypse described by people of faith is not much different from how humanity creates a symbolic field of understanding for empirically experienced events. To people of faith, these symbols carry more weight than others because of their linkage to a heritage with special origins.

Believers in the Abrahamic faiths read that God gave the human race “stewardship over the earth” in the Book of Genesis: If that argumentation motivates more people to environmental concern, I see no harm in adding a touch of religious imagery to science. Thus, I will accept the scientific inevitability of the end of the world, but I will not find fault with those who use apocalyptic religious symbols to raise awareness of how the human race can better encounter this moment.