Religion vs Science

I dont see them as mutually exclusive.

 

OK... so it sounds as if you believe in the scientific method. Using observation, hypothesis, testing, etc. Taking your knowledge and forming conclusions.

Here you are saying that you are given the answer first and want to adjust your personal knowledge to align with that answer.

So why does you lack of satisfaction with science in these regards lead you to religion for an explanation? Since you believe in the value of the scientific method, then why wouldn't you continue on that path? It might lead you where your brain wants you to go anyway.

 

Krosfyah, thank you for your response.

Your belief that sometimes wrong is right is flawed for many reasons. Let me give you a better illustration and then I will give you something more logical to help understand why moral laws are universal.

First a hypothetical illustration: It could be argued and it has been asserted by the government that millions of lives are safer from terrorism because of the attacks on the world trade center towers. In fact Pres. Bush all but said that just like Pearl Harbor Osama Bin Laden has awakened our war on terrorism by this hineous attack. So Osama Bin Laden was not the only one who believed that what he did was good. In fact some have asserted that the attack was a good thing and the response to these attacks has prevented millions from becoming targets due to the necessity of the response our government has taken.

Now we can see that over 3000 Americans had to die so that our country would wake up and do what is necessary to enter the war on terrorism.

However if you start thinking this way. You will soon realize that bringing good from evil does not make evil good.

It is still wrong (absolutely) to murder over 3000 people. But good still can come from such tragedy. The issue is not under what circumstances is it right to murder over 3000 people while they work in their offices. It is never right.

Even Hitler could justify murdering people because greater good could be acheived.

You are trying to tell me that sometimes doing evil is good.
You are trying to prove it by describing circumstances that seem to justify horrible evils. Choosing a lesser evil does not change what is right or what is wrong. Choosing a lesser evil demonstrates that small evils are more hideous than we give them credit for. It could well be argued that the evil rape that was perpetrated in Rwanda was more evil than any other rape because it was brought about with the most evil of intentions, the murder of 1000 people. I believe that kind of thinking on the part of those who perpetrated this act is far more evil because of this position. So really, anytime you use a greater evil to perpetrate a lesser evil you have committed a far worse sin.

As long as your rights and wrongs are situational evil will go unchecked. One man's genocide is another man's spiritual cleansing.

So now you are on the airplane and the highjackers tell you to shoot yourself in the head or we blow up the plane. You want to save everyone on board so you......

Wait a minute what they are doing to you is wrong. You may pull the trigger to save others but it doesn't make what they are asking you to do right. Nope. It is still wrong, it is evil and it absolutely always will be.

You see bringing good out of evil is a lot different than calling evil good.

I said it was dishonest because honestly I think you know that women shouldn't be raped. I don't think that is your message. I don't believe you that you are trying to give women a message that under certain situations rape is right for women. (If I'm wrong about this then go ahead and start the let's rape women under the right situation club)

No, I think you are really trying to say that you want there to be a way out for certain sins or wrongs that men commit. You want there to be justification for some sins. (Like our own favorites.)

Now which wrongs are you defending? And which ones do you enjoy and would rather not be judged for?

BTW you don't approve of date rape do you?

 

Why must science (reason) and faith (religion) be at odds?

In fact they can't be at odds if they are to be some sort of truth claim. Now, to say that religious folk say that there is no reason would be incorrect. To say they see no faith would also be incorrect. As Aquinas points out in the divisions and methods of the sciences, human reason ultimately sees the finitude of what it has i.e. the brain; as well as the infinitude of what it searches for, i.e. God, truth, nothingness, what have you. Aquinas would say that-- therefore, we have faith in something outside of ourselves because of the our recognition of something infinite that we cannot understand. This is not to say that what we cannot understand is somehow unintelligble or irrational, but simply it is outside of our natural capacities as humans to understand. Therefore, we are led to the first precepts by faith of whatever it is we believe in from the very fact that we recognize something outside of ourselves. This could be God, the Bible, Christ, Buddha, Nothingness. The other choice is to deny this outsideness from ourselves and think everything takes place within the realm of our own thought.

Once again however, we are led to the first precepts from faith but it is there that the first precepts are given in some sort of intelligble manner, i.e. the Bible is in words because we think in words. Christ lays out the precepts as a human because we are human. From there reason is able (after a period of developement) to begin to form the doctrines of the faith.

I hope that was clear, although I know it wasn't.

 

No I was saying that in those three questions the answer was found in religion and not in science.

Both creationists and evolutionists begin with the answer to the question of origins:
The evolutionist assumes evolution and then tries to use the scientific method to validate the theory.
The creationist assumes creation and then tries to use the scientific method to validate the theory.

Have you ever taken a watermelon into a lab and tried to tell what it tastes like by running chemical analysis? It's easier to take a bite and swallow. In other words some things are learned from experimentation and some things are learned from observation.

Where evolution fails is in the scientific method. It is not validated by either experimentation or observation. It starts with a belief that God did not create. That there is not scientific evidence of intelligent design but instead there is conclusive evidence of random chance doing all the designing.

There is not a question of whether there is design, intelligence and complexity in DNA. The question is whether it happened by random chance or by intelligent intervention.

I would rather hear someone argue that aliens created the complexity of the universe than the arguement that it was fashioned by random chance. That makes my brain hurt.

No the path that science takes me does not lead me to think that a tornado could hit a junk yard and by chance a stealth fighter is built. In fact I can't even look at a tree understanding the biology of the tree and feel comfortable that an incredible act of mutation, chance or randomness got everything that perfect.

 

There are certain animals who do posess the traits of awareness with their kin. Elephants are a popular example. They notice piles of elephant bones and they automatically feel its tusks to see if its anyone they know. They react accordingly. Mother elephants also stay behind the pack when their young dies. Whether that's grieving or mourning is outside our comprehension.

Many mammals exhibit the trait of 4 yr old children. Strip away any emotional personification, and there is still the question of whether they perceive the passage of their time and their past memories. It is an issue that we choose not to delve into because our domination of animals affords us great advantages. We push these ideas to the fringe and consequently it limits our perception of morality.

 

It depends on your interpretation to what God is. I don't believe Macroevolution allows itself to deny an outside Creator. Science manifests itself through a process with the data we have in hand. The Evolutionary theory is evolving with the more knowledge we gather. I think what you mean by Evolution attempting to refute Intelligent Design is when evolutionists disprove Fundamental Christians who literally believe 60+% of what the Bible says, such as explainations of why serpents don't have legs, vestigial wings, and whatnot. Based on facts and observations I've seen, I believe that that literal interpretation of Intelligent Design is false, but I don't flat out disprove the possibility of Intelligent Design itself. It would reflect bias from a scientist if he did.

If you've had classes in biology, I think you'll find this Discover article very interesting. It's about the impact of Artificial Intelligence and how Evolutionists can observe generations by the thousands in mere hours and days. It's also interesting for those who seek intelligent life outside our own planet.

Discovering Darwin

 

actually you've got that totallty backward. Darwin didn't presume evolution before hand but formulated it from direct observation. Darwin was also a strong believer in Christianity too.

That's not true at all. Read the IMAX evolution thread where most of this is covered. There's been tons of observation and even experimentation supporting evolution while there's been none proving the exisitng of a supreme being.

 

That link I provided needs registration.

Here is a mirror.
http://www.carlzimmer.com/articles/2005/articles_2005_Avida.html

My apologies.

 

The scientific method has nothing to do with Creationism. Creationism is a strict and literal interpretation of the book of Genesis from the Bible. There is no scientific support for Creationism.

Intelligent design is not a scientific theory. It is being pushed politically as an alternative to Evolution in the heated forum of public schools, but nowhere in the scientific community is it even discussed. Philisophical arguments are made, but no scientific arguments are even discussed. It is basically the little brother of Creationism because there is only one possible designer. I would reference the Evolution of Species by Charles Darwin and the 145 years of scientific research and writings since it was originally published as support of evolution. Also, it actually has nothing to do with the existence of God... it is about the origin of species.

Genetics is one of the fastest growing bodies of knowledge of all scientific disciplines at this time, so it would be tragic to abandon that faith in the scientific method. The Catholic Church hasn't.

Well, preventing headaches is really the best support of Creationism I have seen. If you start with the answer and then just adjust everything you know to fit that answer... can you really in all honesty convince yourself that you are getting somewhere?

Obviously we don't have time to discuss evolution here, but if it is hard to imagine how small incremental changes and mutations could have taken proteins and turned them into bacteria, taken bacteria and turned them into cells, taken cells and turned them into multi-cell organisms, turned multi-cell organisms... blah, blah, blah... then look at the Grand Canyon. That was dug by a river over the course of 2,000,000,000 years. Think that Morocco used to border New York. Lots of things are easy to dismiss as impossible because they are difficuly to fathom. Those examples you used are not representative of anything, and no one is saying those things happened.

Besides... since when is nature perfect? I have asthma. Family members of mine have died from tumors that were growing inside their bodies. Half of the United States is obese.

Also, I don't have any problem whatsoever with teaching philosophy in schools. They do it in France. Intelligent design could be taught in the appropriate context... the way you are talking about it is really a bastardized version of an argument for the existence of God, not a scientific theory. I don't really understand why there is a need to argue the existence of God side by side with the origin of species. Like I said before, it isn't a problem for the Catholic Church. Not for 50 years.

 

Sorry, I'll shut up... I haven't been hanging out here, so I didn't know this was recently covered.

 

Dr Raymond V. Damadian - Inventor of the MRI (magnetic resonance imaging)
Dr Raymond V. Damadian would probably be too humble to accept the title 'super-scientist' but the many people whose lives have been saved by the MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scanning technology he developed might think otherwise. Hailed as one of the greatest diagnostic breakthroughs ever, this technique, using advanced principles of physics and computing, lets doctors visualize many organs and their diseased parts without the risks of exploratory surgery or the radiation associated with traditional scanning methods. See http://answersingenesis.org/home/area/magazines/docs/v16n3_MRI.asp.



Dr. John R. Baumgardner (Geophysicist)
U.S. News & World Report (June 16, 1997) devoted a respectful four-page article to the work of Dr John Baumgardner, calling him "the world's pre-eminent expert in the design of computer models for geophysical convection." Dr. Baumgardner earned degrees from Texas Tech University (B.S., electrical engineering), and Princeton University (M.S., electrical engineering), and earned a Ph.D. in geophysics and space physics from UCLA. Since 1984 he has been employed as a technical staff member at Los Alamos (New Mexico) National Laboratory. Also see Scientists Who Believe: An Interview with Dr. John Baumgardner, and Probing the Earth's Deep Places.


Dr Ian Macreadie (Molecular Biologist and Microbiologist)
Author of more than 60 research papers, he is a Principal Research Scientist at the Biomolecular Research Institute of Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), and national secretary of the Australian Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. In 1997 he was part of a team which won the CSIRO’s top prize, the Chairman’s Medal. In 1995 he won the Australian Society for Microbiology’s top award, for outstanding contributions to research. See Interview with Dr Ian Macreadie.


Dr. Raymond Jones (Agricultural Scientist)
This, combined with Dr Jones' other achievements in improving the productivity of the tropical grazing industries, caused CSIRO chief Dr Elizabeth Heij to describe him as ‘one of the top few CSIRO scientists in Australia’. Among the awards he has received are the CSIRO Gold Medal for Research Excellence, and the Urrbrae Award, the latter in recognition of the practical significance of his work for the grazing industry. See Interview with Dr. Raymond Jones.


Dr. A.E. Wilder-Smith (3 Doctorates and a 3-star NATO General)
The late Dr. Arthur E.Wilder-Smith, an honored scientist with an amazing three earned doctorates. He held many distinguished positions. A former Evolutionist, Dr. Wilder-Smith debated various leading scientists on the subject throughout the world. In his opinion, the Evolution model did not fit as well with the established facts of science as did the Creation model of intelligent design. His background is referenced in footnote #4 at Do real scientists believe in Creation? - ChristianAnswers.Net.


Dr. Robert Gentry (nuclear physicist)
Dr. Robert V. Gentry is a nuclear physicist who worked 13 years for the Oakridge National Laboratory as a guest scientist. During the time he worked there, he was recognized as the world's leading authority in his area of research. It is interesting to note that when he began his research, he was an evolutionist. Today, Dr. Gentry is a fully convinced young earth creation scientist.

Just a short list of some of the world's most renowned and recongnized scientists who stand firm on creationism or intelligent design on scientific principle not political activism. And I can provide a larger list also. Not to mention a list of scientists who were once considered the leaders in evolutionary science, even text book authors who have switched in just the last 20 years.

I have no problem with believing in evolution. As long as we treat it as a belief or even as a theory. I have no problem with treating creationism as a theory. In fact I think it would better serve science to treat them both as theories and present them as alternative models for origins in our schools. I don't fear the teaching of evolution. I think it should be presented. If creationism has a place then evolution should have a place. That would encourage critical thinking for students. I do have a problem having creationism blackballed in a society that should encourage freedom of thought. I will provide a larger reference base of scientists (esp. former textbook authors) who now favor the creationist model of origins. I like to list the textbook authors because some of their textbooks are still used even though they've changed their positions.

 

Whoaaaa!

Just read my own post and I want to apologize.

It reeks of pride and arrogance on my part.

I was not honest either because the truth is I would hold my views on creationism purely on religious grounds without regard to science. I falsely made it sound like I hold my beliefs on scientific grounds.

In fact I see my whole line of discussion being arrogant. I apoligize.

I would rather respect the difference of views than try to establish my own. And I see that I have posted with the primary motive of establishing my own opinion.

That is like playing God.

I would like to thank you for explaining your positions. I need to realize I don't have all the answers.

 

Man now I have seen everything. Someone in D&D forum actually admitting he doesn't have all the answers. I guess we humsans do have hope after all.

 

Not true. Read my sig. http://www.discovery.org/csc/

"My conclusion can be summed up in a single word: design. I say that based on science. I believe that irreducibly complex systems are strong evidence of a purposeful, intentional design by an intelligent agent." -- Biochemist Michael Behe, Lehigh Univ.

Science is interfacing with faith in ways that it hasn't in centuries. There is very real discussion here that hasn't occurred in a long, long time.

"The best data we have concerning the origin of the universe are exactly what I would have predicted had I nothing to go on but the five books of Moses, the Psalms and the Bible as a whole." -- Nobel-winning physicist Arno Penzias

"The exquisite order displayed by our scientific understanding of the physical world calls for the divine." -- MIT physicist Vera Kistiakowski, former president of Association of Women in Science

 

Rhester;

No need to apologize. You're posts are already much pleasenter and humbler to read than most here.

This applies to Mad Max too.

As I said in the other evolution related threads evolution and belief in a higher power need not be contradictory at all since there is nothing about evolution that would deny the existence of a higher power. Evolution is formed by a process of continuous skepticism which is the opposite of faith which at some point requires abandonment of skepticism.

Paraphrasing some previous comments, Science requires that logically things can be disproven based on empircal data as much as proven. Faith is inherently cannot be disproven. In the example of evolution, evolution could logically be overthrown if someone where to find a human skeleton contemporaneous with dinosaurs. Creationism / Intelligent Design can never be subject to skepticism or logical overthrow because it starts from a point that has no logical test that using emprical data can disprove it so conversely there is no test using emprical data to prove it.

Its not science because it isn't testable.

Even so nothing about the science of evolution contradicts a general belief in God. Its just as rational to presume this all was decreed by God with evolution as the mechanism as much as it is do presume its all random chance. The only difference is that if we are to scientifically prove Creationism / Intelligent design the obvious test has to be to scientifically prove the existence of God.

 

MadMax;

You've cited these quotes several times and while modern physics have shown interesting parallels between the creation myths of various religions and the latest cosmological theories I would be careful reading too much into that, especially from a Christian viewpoint.

First in terms of time and concepts Hindu and Buddhist creation myths seem to match much closer to what are the latest scientific theories than Judeo-Christian views. If one were to take the Bible even remotely litterally the Universe and Earth wouldn't be anywhere near the observable age by several orders of magnitude.

Second all creation myths are meant to be read allegorically. Depending on how loosely you interpret the allegory you could say any creation myth is supported by modern science. For instance the Hopi origin myth of people arising from a hole in the ground is the same as some of the latest evolutionary belief that life might've formed and risen from fissures deep underground when the surface of the Earth was still inhospitable.

Finally while many scientists are people of faith and find comfort in the parallels no scientist worth his/her salt are going to base scientific findings upon religious beliefs. As I said in the posts on evolution, science requires skepticism and a logical method for squaring empiracal observation with logical inference and subjecting it to further testing. Faith requires belief. Faith isn't science and science isn't faith and its a mistake to mix the two up.

 

Sishir --

i hear you. but theory is about inferences. what i'm hearing some, not all, scientists say is that the complexity of even the simplest life forms like single cells..the complexity of the universe...implies a designer. you're right...that can't ultimately be tested. but i've seen that sort of logic applied in science as well. at the very least, the inference is the first step. macroevolution, without further fossil discovery among other things, is an inference made from microevolution. as i've pointed out..it still has some holes, as well. it is not entirely truthful to present macroevolution as FACT and then step back and shake your head disapprovingly at anyone who would question it. in many circles, that's where we are, today. but i would say it's a good thing that discussions like the ones we've had here are happening amongst much smarter people than me in various scientific disciplines, today.