| purkjr said: Unfortunately, there is a lot of religion-based terrorism and other problematic behaviour. We have had religion wars, crusades and in modern times shootings and self-bombings.That hurts! However, there were some really problematic periods in history when the damage was done from a strictly atheistic world-view. I just name Pol Pot (Cambodia) and Mao Zedong (China) for example. Both made millions of victims. I don't think the problem is religion (or atheism, for that matter) Both can be used in a damaging way. I've read some people saying they 'belief' in science or 'follow the path of reason' as opposed to religion. That intrigues me in two ways. First of all, this paints a picture of reason vs religion (or faith) But I don't see a opposition between those two. For example, I'm a religious man and also an academic with a cum laude degree. In fact, the most brilliant scientist can be religious people (just google on Francis Collins, for example) Why should religion be opposed to reason? Second, I'm wondering which science or reason do you mean when you claim something like that? I think science is very important, but I'm not believing in it. In fact, science proved that 40% of the scientifical claims made today, will be outdated in the next 20 years. So again: how can I 'believe' in science? Just to be clear: I'm not saying science is not important, I'm just wondering how I can 'believe' in it. |
I don't believe that Science and Religion are necessarily in opposition.
A lot of religious people are motivated to disagree with science, and I think that's concerning. There have historically been plenty of scientific religious people - a couple of easy examples Isaac Newton, Lemaître. For some religious people, science was about understanding God's creation - they didn't let their beliefs get in the way of what they discovered. I think some people may have to compartmentalize the two to a greater extent.
But I think it's very problematic, similar to flat earthers, if you have to ignore or build the evidence around your beliefs rather than looking at what the evidence actually says. I think that is a big source of harm in the world.
Like if you believe guns are very safe, it can cause you to act more recklessly - which puts people in danger. Not all beliefs are dangerous if they're wrong, but plenty of beliefs are.
On the issue of believing science if some of it ends up being wrong, let me build a hypothetical.
Let's say you have been messaging back and forth with 10 friends, every day this year. You find out that one of those friends actually passed away 6 months ago - you were actually texting a bot trying to learn about you.
Does this mean that the other 9 friends must also be bots? (Say this is like finding 10% of your scientific findings are false.)
What conclusion is the most rational outcome here? I don't think the rational conclusion here is to be like "science was wrong here, so it must always be wrong."
The great thing about scientific principles is that they're intentionally correctable - it gives us a process to gather better evidence, and come to better conclusions. So I'm going to approach my other 9 friends, I'm going to ask them some questions and see if I can give them a test to see if they're a real person or a bot.
I think the rational response isn't to assume that the other 9 must also be bots, but rather look at the best evidence that we currently for each of them.
