Science vs. Religion

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There is a growing disparity that we see, at least in the U.S. today, between those who support a religious world view compared to those who support a scientific world view. The two sides are not likely to meet because if you ask an ardent supporter from either side, it looks more like a debate between religious fanatics and secular heathens.

However, it wasn't always this way, and it doesn't have to be this way. Some of the greatest scientific minds in history were also devoutly religious. The most obvious person in this regard is Sir Isaac Newton, the man who developed calculus as a mathematical discipline, who also mathematically proved laws in physics that still form the basis of introductory phsysics courses to this day, was an extremely devout Christian.

I have personal experience from the other side as well. I attended a Jesuit university for both my graduate and undergraduate education. Many of the instructors were Catholic priests. They even taught science courses including biology and physics (although there were no faculty priests in the chemistry department). I even had my first biology class taught by a Catholic priest. He even instructed us regarding the basics of *gasp* evolution. And he didn't regard it as a heretical concept, nor were we forced to learn about intelligent design. While this priest was not the best instructor I had during my university years, he wasn't the worst either.

I don't want to start a discussion (read arguement) between who is right and who is wrong in this debate, but rather discuss what has happened, in a movement that started during the Clinton administration and has swelled in popularity during the Bush administration to cause this great divide. When and more importantly why did Americans decide we must be religious or scientific, and never the twain shall meet?

 

Hmm... sounds like a Doctor Who plot -- WAIT, it IS ... the evolution of the Daleks.

This goes back far longer than the Clinton administration. We see roots of this back in the Scopes trial and the fanatical debunking of Darwin (which started the day he released his findings).

The real problem is not that the two are incompatible, many people have found no problems as both students of science and God. The problem lies in the ignorant masses on both sides who blindly follow their own beliefs and deal with other beliefs using extreme prejudice.

Having attended the University of Utah, I know there are/were many devout Mormons teaching in the science departments (most notably was Henry Eyring -- although he was a little before my time). One of his sons is a professor at Utah (who I did study under), while another son is one of the Apostles for the Mormon church (major bigwig). These men have no problems reconciling faith and knowledge. I think that's the key -- accepting knowledge while maintaining faith. Too many just can't do that -- either they refuse to believe the facts or their faith wavers (I fall in the later).

 

Nerd alert!

 

Having grown up in an Anglo Catholic/Christian Scientist home in which the adults were intelligent and well educated I have never had a problem with Science vs. Religion.

The problem is an ancient one but why is it getting so much publicity now?

Communication which equals publicity is much better now. Opinions get aired all over the place which was not possible even 50 years ago.

Now this is strictly a guess on my part but maybe it also has something to do with Blacks deciding they were tired of being second class citizens. The primary justification was based on the Bible from when one of Noah's sons, Ham, did a no-no and Noah cursed his children to be slaves to his brothers children.

Since the civil-rights movement began about 40 years ago many on these boards don't know what it was like except from here-say. People were very upset both for and against. The so called Biblical justification was questioned. The world turned upside down.

I agree with this.

 

This a website with D&D based games at the core of its appeal. Every single post could be followed by a nerd alert.

 

Isn't this science vs religion thing a bit overstated? Isn't it more just the Creation vs Evolution aspect of things that is causing all the problems in the USA? Surely no religious people are debating whether there are atoms, or whether force=mass x acceleration, or anything like that? It's just the evolution thing, right?

 

I still fail to see why this ever had to be an either/or concept. "Science" is a system of rational experimentation as a means to learn more about how our universe works. It's about the mechanics of existence, as I see it. "Religion" is typically a system of providing meaning to the universe as we know and experience it. To fall into a false contest over which is the superior approach is to ignore the entirely complementary aspects of both.

Religion can show one how to live better. Science can show us ways to improve life and its quality. I don't think the march of science has given many people peace of mind (well, not directly), just as I'm certain that religion had very little to do with electricity or irrigation. Most people I know would contend that it's not worth having prosperity without happiness, nor that it'd be desirable to still be living at a Stone Age level of technology.

/me nudges DR

"Hey pal, did you get a load of the nerd?"

(j/k, Bruno - I'm a worse offender than most, I suspect)

 

Harbourboy and NonSequitur are right. Theoretically, there should be no divide between science and religion (or philosophy, for that matter), because both aim at the same thing: discovering, understanding, and making use of Truth.

But as the old saying goes: The only difference between theory and practice is, in theory there is no difference, but in practice there is. If there's a fight between science and religion, there are three possibilities...the science is flawed, or the religion is flawed, or (most likely) both are flawed.

I think Harbourboy hits on it when he says that the only real sticking point is evolution. And the problem there isn't between science and religion, but between a particular theory (evolution) and the general humanism underpinning most religions and philosophies. I don't want to get into the evolution debate here, but the reason we have these vicious religion vs. evolution debates is that evolution is deeply corrosive of almost all systems of thought that give ultimate meaning and purpose to humans (I'm trying to think of an exception and failing). That includes Christianity (which gets attention because it's proposed an alternative) but it's not so much a matter of Christianity vs. evolution as humanism vs. evolution.

 

Well said, GM.

 

I think it goes beyond the evolution debate although that certainly is the biggest. Science is closely linked to technology (heck, that's what applied science is), and there are areas where this is at odds with religion as well. What about the abortion debate? Here we're talking about medical technology, but the debate still has roots in religious belief. Or what about stem cell research? Or the use of birth control pills? All of these things are relatively modern techniques that are at odds with religion. I won't argue that evolution definitely gets the most publicity, but it's certainly not alone. And I'm sure there are others that people can come up with as this is just off the top of my head.

 

Don't brothers always have the worst fights? Religious folks, and those inclined towards critical thinking, are both cut from the same cloth: They both tend towards reflection rather than just drift through life upon the currents of instinct. And neither can prove the other wrong, because they both rely upon faith. Take the scientist: Although gravity has operated permanently since the moment the scientist was born, and it can be inferred to have been operating since before the scientist was born, the scientist can still not know that the plate dropped will crash upon the kitchen floor, at least not in the way that a triangle has three sides is known. Rather, the permanency of gravity is inferred. And a lot of our understanding of nature is inferred.

Religious folks take this necessity, that humans must rely upon faith and infer, and just go willy-nilly, believing whatever it takes to make them happy. And why not? Isn't the point of life to be happy?

I think that I am better off not relying upon faith except when absolutely necessary, i.e. the whole gravity thing, because I don't think that asking silent rooms for happiness is going to alter my life in any way. It may alter me, making me more accepting of bad situations, but for the situations of my life to change, I am better off relying upon myself.


Edit...

What about the fact that the universe creates loving beings out of dust and light? Isn't the appreciation of beauty a meaning and purpose unto itself? What more can there be than ineffable beauty?

[ April 13, 2006, 17:03: Message edited by: Late-Night Thinker ]

 

Science is about reality, about figuring out what is and how things work. Religion is about dreams and about what people want reality to be.

When science then comes and show that the dreams and illusions religion have supplied to people to keep them in check and happy may have had very little to do with reality it is no wonder they get upset.

 

Joacqin, you are such a flugbragnd (not really sure what that is, but it can't be good). The science vs religion debate goes back at least as far as Galileo and others of his time who claimed the Earth revolved around the Sun. The problem then was religious officials who had made up a bunch of stuff that made no sense and got into power. Their power was threatened by science, so they challenged it on religious bases (of which there were none).
Being a hardcore christian engineer, raised by a hardcore christian psychologist and geologist, I have never seen a real problem between science and religion. Apparently, neither did Einstein. The problem is between people who cling to beliefs they can't support and other people who cling to beliefs they can't support (I'm talking about the irrational of both groups here). They have no interest in facts (either) and only want to convince everyone that they are right.

P.S. Doctor Who ROCKS! We jsut got it in America on the Sci-Fi channel and its a smash hit!

 

Don't you think that there is the same problem now as well? Neither side seems capable of articulating their viwepoints in a way that makes any sense to the other side.

 

I don't think articulation is the problem. I think listening is. I can understand what both sides are saying just fine, and most of it is bunk. Bad science and bad theology litter both sides, and even worse logic, to boot. Saying what they believe isn't the problem, its refusing to admit when they're wrong.

 

I dont understand what all this "both sides are unreasonable" is all about. The only conflicts I have seen between science and religion is when religion wants to have faith seen as fact which science refuses to do. The conflict stems wholly from one side and one side only and it is about reality clashing with the dreamworld. Many are able to reconcile the two (how they do that is beyond me but they do) but it is the dreamers who refuse to even accept the slightest threat to their illusions who make conflicts. The only part "science" plays in any conflict is by not giving in to views based on superstition and that for the simple reason that doing it would not be science. It is not like we are seeing rabid scientists going to temples of various kinds shouting about how everything the worshippers believe in is mumbojumbo or writing petitions about how evolutionary biology should be taught in Sunday school.

 

While I don't want to get in on this, really, I would have to agree with joacquin: The conflict has to do with religious people wanting what their ancestors made up to become reality/fact, and scientists aren't willing to do that without hard proof, or something that is damn near close.

 

Where my trouble with Evolution is specifically, is that while there is something to base it on, I do not accept all the extrapolations made in the theory. Science seeks more details than can be given in a few chapters of scripture, but when they have to fill in blanks, that's where the errors creep in.

On issues like homosexuality, stem cell research, abortion and birth control, it's a matter of ethics. As religious ethics are seen as less binding, the more becomes socially acceptable. Those that believe in Religious ethics become offended when what they believe is reduced to nothing. Again, Science seeks more information than included in the Bible, start making their best guesses to fill in the blanks, and may be less accurate.

Humanism, as opposed to religion, is a third side in this story. Humanism places the ultimate concern on the human, not on God (whichever one is relevent to the religion in question). Humanism looks at human desires, and not at God's laws. Humanism often cares little about science either until it impacts human interests.

But Science has backed up parts of my religious beliefs. Science has proven that abstaining from Tobacco reduces the risk for certain painful and lethal diseases. Science has shown the harmful effects of alcohol (I'm not talking about moderation, that is in dispute yet, I'm talking about over indulging). Science has explained Sexually transmitted diseases (and that abstaining from sexual promiscuity virtually eliminates the risk for these diseases).

 

So you reject evolution not because of lack of evidence, but because it makes life meaningless?

This, ultimately, is the difference between science and religion. Science simply seeks the truth warts and all. The truth may be that life is meaningless; that we are but carbon molecules bouncing around in a chaotic, harsh, uncaring universe ever-ready to snuff out our meaningless existence with a random meteorite.

But deep down, most folks -- and certainly most religious folks -- don't want this to be true. So despite all the evidence that leads us to this conclusion, you reject it and cling to ancient myths so you can sleep at night and have hope for your children's future.

Thus, religion really isn't about a quest for the truth, but a quest for what we want the truth to be.

 

I'm in the camp of there being a conflict between Christianity (that is - *Christianity* - as stated by the Bible, not the modern versions which often reconcile it by claiming metaphor, ignorance of the writers, etc.) and science. I won't make claims for religion as a whole - because some mesch fine with science.

That's incorrect. In Genesis the layout of the universe is very clearly described including - as I remember - the Earth being flat with a dome around it with a second ocean on the outside of the dome. Also I think Paul (or someone New Testamenty like that) states that the Earth is flat. The priests weren't just making that one up. So, as you can see - this stuff is incompatable...

Edit: Here, have a link: http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/febible.htm