21–30 of 103 posts
What if the evidence is deemed offensive by a mob because they don’t like the scientific findings? Or what if the scientist has personal beliefs or opinions that are disagreeable to some? And what if the evidence is politically toxic?
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
If you're just saying that people can use religions to make themselves feel better by believing in things that are false, then yes, that's evidently true, but I don't think it's a good thing.
I have serious problems with this sentiment that there's some other way of knowing things besides studying reality. To me, it is not apparent at all that there even can be such a thing as "religious truth" as opposed to "scientific truth". I have never seen a definition of the former, so I don't know how to even discuss it meaningfully.
Also, to claim that science has nothing to do with how a person views the world etc. is patently false. It is perfectly possible for example to derive a workable moral systems without involving religion. You just need an axiom to start with, and then you can do science to examine whether your actions lead to morally acceptable outcomes given that axiom. A common axiom for morality seems to be something like "maximal suffering for everyone is bad", which I personally would agree with. Similarly, neither is the "pursuit of contented life" in any way a concept outside science.
I acknowledge that I may hold beliefs that are not true, but I will state with certainty that there is nothing religious about how I view the world. I understand religion as a social phenomenon, I am not convinced that it is, or can ever be, a tool for understanding "truths".
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
This seems quite ahistorical and dismissive of a few hundred years of recent history. The domains overlap and this was a fight, both intellectual and sometimes literal that lasted centuries and for real stakes. It has now mostly settled into a sort of polite truce but calling this all a result of some sort of trick is reductive to the point of not-even-wrongness.
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
I think religion's job is not to explain things, as the very non-religious (and even now, most religious!) seem to think, but to leave you in wonder, to fill you with the mystery of the world.
Demanding such an explanation from your religion seems like asking for the wrong thing. Like asking your cat to sub in as a human baby. You will be disappointed, and scratched.
> Corollary to this is that everybody is Religious and everybody is Scientific, and plays the card when its needed.
I think you are right. And yet, I wish people were more religious, and filled with wonder, open to mystery. I also wish people were more scientific too, and took their life seriously enough to practice, experiment, measure their health, wealth, etc.
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
I'm not quite sure what it is exactly that you're trying to say, so apologies if I misinterpreted it, but to me you seem to suggest that science and religion are somehow complimentary; two different ways of seeing "truth". Two different "domains" of truthiness, in essence. If you're just saying that people can use religions to make themselves feel better by believing in things that are false, then yes, that's evident…
What is truth?
Something that is the same for everyone at the same time? How could you ever prove something is true if you are not omniscient? (ie. you can only experience reality from your own point of view, but can never experience it from someone else's).
To complicate things further, we are trying to use words and spoken language as a way to communicate meaning about something else (reality). How can you know for certain that the words you use have the same meaning for you and me? We can't even agree on the meaning of words for one language.
Every time you say something, you are essentially translating what you feel/understand "in your head" to words, which you hope the receiver/listener will decode to mean the same thing you understand. But we can never be certain of the effectiveness of that. And we can only find relief in apparent agreement (ie. When the other person(s) ascents to what we say)
In other words, what for you might not be true is your own perspective of reality, and it doesn't imply that the same thing is not true for someone else. Reality is subjective. If you can't force me to agree with you, then our realities will just be different, even if we can still share some aspects of it. And that's ok.
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
Agree very much. It's a terrible state to be in. I think religion's job is not to explain things, as the very non-religious (and even now, most religious!) seem to think, but to leave you in wonder, to fill you with the mystery of the world. Demanding such an explanation from your religion seems like asking for the wrong thing. Like asking your cat to sub in as a human baby. You will be disappointed, and scratched. >…
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
In doing so he also makes the mistake of confusing his practical methodological assumptions for something more fundamental than they are, so his proof ends up begging the question.
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
Very good point. Adding to it, there are things in life which are ineffable. This means they are (by definition), impossible to model or explain with words. Thus, these things will forever evade scientific scrutiny as science cannot deal with the ineffable. Despite the above, we (and science) are continuously trying to reduce the immensity, inconmensurability and ineffability of reality into something that can easily…
What are ineffable things in life?
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
I'm not quite sure what it is exactly that you're trying to say, so apologies if I misinterpreted it, but to me you seem to suggest that science and religion are somehow complimentary; two different ways of seeing "truth". Two different "domains" of truthiness, in essence. If you're just saying that people can use religions to make themselves feel better by believing in things that are false, then yes, that's evident…
E.g. here:
> If you're just saying that people can use religions to make themselves feel better by believing in things that are false,
I assume you're using science's rhetoric of false here. Which is really just can it be observed using the tools & vocabulary of science.
> I have serious problems with this sentiment that there's some other way of knowing things besides studying reality
What is reality? Is science reality? Science has models. We are mistaken to think that "particle" is somehow a brutally real thing. "Particle" is a word used to model observations.
> It is perfectly possible for example to derive a workable moral systems without involving religion.
This is a contentious statement. There are intense debates about this. The Peterson/Harris Vancouver debates are famous (infamous?) vigorous but futile attempts at trying to sort this out.
Actually -- just to make sure I'm clear. You can't derive a workable moral system from scientific axioms/observations.
Now someone may report to be an atheist and report that they have a moral outlook that involves respect for fellow man. I guess I won't insist that its Religion; I simply insist its not Science that is giving them their moral outlook.
> There are major aspects of our life that remain unexplained, leaving professional scientists with the choice of whether to accept the general notion that they will also be resolved one day by the scientific method. ... This ambiguous state of affairs explains why some of the best scientists are religious. This to me reflects huge deficit in the author's thinking and perception. It also reflects a common sentiment a…
both got tricked into thinking that their propositions somehow exist in the same domain when they do not. This seems quite ahistorical and dismissive of a few hundred years of recent history. The domains overlap and this was a fight, both intellectual and sometimes literal that lasted centuries and for real stakes. It has now mostly settled into a sort of polite truce but calling this all a result of some sort of tri…
Either they are having a fair debate and they are talking in the same domain or they are not.
I say they are not.
Yet they are still having the debate.
Ergo, I say they are "tricked".
What better word to use for two people fervently engaging in debate based on a senseless equivalency?
I also point to history b/c it seems pretty clear to me that this wasn't always a dichotomy.