| Despite the fact that I'm an atheist, I recognise that some sort of faith or belief, however non-religious, offers something that science does not.
Science, it is about stating things with a certain degree of certainty The convention in most scientific papers is that you don't report something until you're nearly 100% percent certain. Science is not a purely subjective process but something of objective truths. There are facts and observations which need to be explained with a concluding truth and there are visible truth and scientific knowledge produces points of solid ground in pursuit of them. An observation must have predictive power and be capable of independent replication by others. And scientists must be willing to abandon the explanation when a completely different one arises
To me it doesn't even make a lot of sense to frame a science/religion fight as to who has the better truth, until I am clear that science is about confirm-able observation and religion about mere speculation, non-confirm-able, to be precise. When stated this way, science wins evidently and clearly. There's no question that when faced with, say, a sick child, it's better to prescribe medication than to invoke some ceremonial and magic chants or to employ a prayer or a fetish. Even in a country as throttled by religion as USA or Pakistan, the courts have consistently ruled that a parent cannot deny medical care to a sick child and instead substitute attempts at religious cures.
The next logical arena in the culture wars is the issue of whether religion or science is better for society. On this front, there's no question which approach has produced more historical (and contemporary) harm. Sure, science, under Jesuit Christian influence has come up with Lysenko-ism (the repressive political and social campaigns undertaken in science); eugenics (a social philosophy which advocates the improvement of human hereditary), lobotomies, (A lobotomy is a form of brain surgery or psychosurgery, consisting of cutting a portion of the frontal brain), the Zyklon B (the trade-name of a cyanide-based insecticide used by Nazi Germany against Jews and liberal European civilians). However, these products of science were abused by very Christian Nazis, a fault of religion rather than science.
And the argument that the likes of Torquemada, (Tomás de Torquemada (1420–1498) a fifteenth century Spanish Dominican, first Inquisitor General of Spain prominent leader of the Spanish Inquisition, called "The hammer of heretics";he is known for his campaign of persecution, torture and mass-murders against the crypto-Jews and crypto-Muslims of Spain. He was one of the chief supporters of the Alhambra Decree which expelled the Jews from Spain in 1492.) ; are aberrations of religiosity is nonsense; they are the only logical consequences of religiosity. The blood on the hands of religion drips enough to darken the sea.
It might be argued that religious belief remains relevant because of the comfort it can provide. But this one doesn't do much for me. Solace is not justifiable and benign when reality proves the solace to have been misplaced, nor are beliefs that reduce anxiety really justified when the belief system is so often the cause that generated the anxiety in the first place.
So why is belief still relevant? To this I'd offer a very a-scientific answer. It is for the sense of elation. I mean those instances where the indoctrinated believers are suffused with gratitude for life and the so-called spiritual experience, where every part of the brain is flooded with the delusions. A scientist or a follower of science may feel elated about a finding—that it will cure a disease, save a species : science, as a system is good at producing responsible and justifiable elation. By contrast, the potential for delusional elation is deeply intertwined with religiosity, where the mere possibility of belief and faith in the absence of proof is where it can be a wild moving idea, a non-truth.
Science at its core, is an emotional and rational contract, an agreement to only derive comfort from rationality and reason ; it is the best explanatory system that we have, whereas religiosity as an alternative, has a spectacular potential for harm that permeates and distorts every domain of decision-making and attribution, as well as the social order of our world. But just because science can explain so many unknowns doesn't mean that, at the moment, it can explain everything, or that it can vanquish the unknowable. That is why faith or belief is not obsolete, though religion is. The world would be a better place without supernatural religious delusion, but it would not be one if there wasn't a belief or a faith in an ethical value system. But don't expect science to fill the hole that would be left behind, il has to be filled in by philosophy of rationality, Humanism, common sense and reason. ................... In the greater interest of civilization, all articles in this series may be reproduced or published in any language.
Article 1: Does science make belief in Allah/God obsolete ? Necessarily, it does - speaks a physicist
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/humanist_international/message/114> Articlw 2: Yes, of course - speaks a psychologist
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/humanist_international/message/115> Article 3 : Does science make belief in Allah/God obsolete ? No, and yes - speaks a Christian Priest… !<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/humanist_international/message/116> Article 4 : Does science make belief in Allah/God obsolete ? Absolutely - says an eminent scientist <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/humanist_international/message/117> Article 5 : Does science make belief in Allah/God obsolete? Of course –responds a philosopher <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/humanist_international/message/118> |