You can disdain something while still being subconsciously influenced by it. Heck, being subconsciously influenced by something can often be a factor in the disdain. No, I’m saying that the fundamental culture and society in which we are born and raised influences the shape of the ideas and concepts we talk about. On that aspect, Einstein wasn’t special. The word “religion” has multiple meanings. It’s impossible to discuss without some form of context. The question isn’t whether Einstein was speaking within context, only what that context was. Well obviously you’re a super special case, magically immune to all of the sociological and psychological influences that apply to the rest of us.
Yes. Yeah, at least one of which you are steadfastly oblivious to. Then one cannot help but wonder why you're so determined to ignore it. No, that's not the question, because the context was provided days ago. Be that as it may, what you say everybody does, I don't do. Deal.
The only claim I'm challenging is that religion is only one singular thing. If you're accepting that it has multiple definitions, doesn't that proves my point regardless of what Einstein may have said?
You modified your words to add "the totality." That was not in the sentence I wrote. I suggest you rethink your tricky writing. How preposterous it would be for anyone to suggest reading much less understanding "the totality of God's thoughts." But you just did that.
Obviously not, as that implies the possibility that in a given context it may very well mean one singular thing.
Possibly, but I feel the OP question (and similar questions in general) actually seek to dismiss that diversity of meaning (if only subconsciously), grossly over-simplifying concepts to build up a singular world-view as a basis. I think that does both science and religion a disservice. I've just never seen any valid or honest proposition based on presenting "science" or "religion" as generic concepts, and certainly when they're presented in contrast.
Then one cannot help but wonder why you fail to expose any invalidity or dishonesty in Einstein's proposition.
That'd be because I'm not challenging what Einstein actually said in its own context, I'm only challenging your interpretation that he was saying religion is one singular thing.
It is nonsense that scientific method and methods of religion may be mixed or that methods of science may be applied to the supernatural (religious or not). Religion and sciencce are based on very different fundamenatl assumptions, have different ideas as to what is evidence or what is appropriate logic. For example, science is based on proving hypotheses to be false - thus excluding false ideas. Religion has a very different approach. In general, science focuses on answering questions concerning how this universe works while religion tends to focus on questions relating to why we are here and our relationship with the supernatural. For a few hundred years our leading scientists have seen this division as critical - regardless of their personal views of the existence of god and/or the supernatural. That is, it is NOT just an atheist view. It is an understanding of the appropriate limits of science.
By implication, you most certainly are... ...because he clearly was, in the context of the quote provided.
There are perhaps 4200 religions in the world...which ones are you stereotyping above? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_religions_and_spiritual_traditions Regarding 'all' religions, they DO NOT possess the same knowledge or beliefs...many are diametrically opposed! Meanwhile in the boring scientific community, there is only one process, one methodology...
Actually there are at least two: one requires testing by experiment and the other does not. The latter is of course favored by proponents of pseudoscience like AGW and anthropic macroevolution.
Ah... Science meets Religion... or a Scientist meets God In 1978, June I think, I traveled to meet a colleague, Dennis Pulleston, at the Maya ruins of Tikal in the Peten of Guatemala. When I got there, I found he’d gone north to meet another colleague, a mentor of mine, Ed Kurjack, at the ruins of Chichen Itza. I went north to meet them and on arriving I got the news that Dennis was dead and Ed had just completed arranging to ship his body back to the US. While Ed told me how he died, a couple days later I got the story from eye witnesses, several Maya, that were with him. It turns, during a few days of rain causing a break in work, Dennis and the Maya workers were doing a bit of drinking at a few of the tourist catering shack/huts along a path at Chichen, behind the great pyramid called El Castillo. Apparently at one point during the drinking bout, Dennis, had become fairly inebriated and a bit belligerent (not uncommon for him when drinking) and engaged the Maya in a discussion about religion. He was lecturing the workers on how despite their belief in Catholicism, how the Church historically managed to convert the Maya to Christianity, in part by equating many of the old Maya rituals including (human sacrifice… Christ), Bible figures with Maya Gods, and Biblical narratives to those found in Maya myth. He apparently chided them for have one foot in both religions, observing the rituals of the Catholic Church while still observing many of the superstitions and rituals handed down from the ancient Maya. At one point…,ostensibly, to prove a point, he started cursing one of the most powerful gods of ancient the Maya belief system, Chaac, the God of rain and lightening. The workers claimed they tried to calm him and warn him, but they said it made him even more belligerent, to the point where he crossed over the path to the Pyramid, ascended the stairs yelling curses at Chaac, challenging the God to strike him dead (presumable this was to demonstrate the God’s non existence). When Dennis reached the top, he was struck and killed by lightning. A true story, his manner of death can be Googled with the key words, Dennis Pulleston, 1978, killed by lightning. While his antics were conducted during a relatively heavy rain storm, and El Castillo is the highest feature in the region, often struck by lightning, the Maya I talked to were convinced of the actual cause of Dennis’s death and belief in their hybrid religion reinforced far beyond the eye witnesses. They, had, after all, claimed to have warned him. A scientist meets God… but which one? Or…
I meant 'science' compared to 'religion'...there is one science and infinite religions most with varying 'beliefs'...
In your post #61, you said there are "4200 religions." Now you state that there are "infinite religions." Is this your "science" at work?
New religions can be created as fast as someone can obtain a 501C-3 tax status and/or business license. There remains only one scientific process...
"Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts." - Richard Feynman "Science advances one funeral at a time." - Max Planck "Nature laughs at us until we can make one blade of grass." - Thomas Edison Read David Berlinski's book, The Devil's Delusion. "Religion," he (Steven Weinberg) affirmed, "is an insult to human dignity." In speaking thus, Weinberg was warmly applauded, not one member of his audience asking the question one might have thought pertinent: Just who has imposed on the suffering human race poison gas, barbed wire, high explosives, experiments in eugenics, the formula for Zyklon B, heavy artillery, pseudo-scientific justification for mass murder, cluster bombs, attack submarines, napalm, intercontinental ballistic missiles, military space platforms, and nuclear weapons? If memory serves, it was not the Vatican. - Page 21
Philosophy and anecdotal comments have nothing to do with science. To answer your Weinberg question; people! Your comments are like a murderer blaming the gun...gimme a break! IMO there is nothing wrong with religions until religions become righteous and TRY to force their 'beliefs' on others...
Exactly what are you proposing in your last comment?? Are you suggesting science is responsible for wars, for barbarism, for slavery, etc., etc.? I certainly hope not. And besides, you seem to miss the Spannish inquisition - just one of the many papal inquisitions as well as the wars inspired by religious differences that have gone on throughout the world. We have to do better on this board than what you propose in that last paragraph. We've had people of all stripes who have ended up adocating for human atrocity both in the past and at present. Why did Billy Graham advocate so strongly for continuing the slaughter of Vietnamese? Was that from his RELIGION? I certainly hope not. Why do we so strongly advocate for ethnic cleansing in Palestine? Is THAT from religion? Again, I hope not.
No way in heaven can religion ever claim to be a source of knowledge. Science and religion like reason and faith are antithetical and contradictory. For example: Science: I know this is true because of these reasons. Religion: I know it’s true because I believe.
Although I am an Atheist, and don't really have any use for religions, I do believe 'some' religious writings can contain historical events. Of course, each person needs to apply their validation test to this information/knowledge, And, we must question how historical information is interpreted for modern-day distribution. I might say that science is like a religion in the sense that science is in pursuit of critical (supreme) information. Conversely, religions are not science...
"Only a rookie who knows nothing about science would say science takes away from faith. If you really study science, it will bring you closer to God." - James Tour, Professor of Biochemistry, Rice University “There is no doubt that a parallel exists between the big bang as an event and the Christian notion of creation from nothing.” - Nobel Prize winner George Smoot “To me it is clear that we exist in a plan which is governed by rules that were created, shaped by a universal intelligence and not by chance.” - Michio Kaku, theoretical physicist There is a kind of religion in science; it is the religion of a person who believes there is order and harmony in the Universe…This religious faith of the scientist is violated by the discovery that the world had a beginning under conditions in which the known laws of physics are not valid, and as a product of forces or circumstances we cannot discover. When that happens, the scientist has lost control. If he really examined the implications, he would be traumatized. - Robert Jastrow “Has anyone provided proof of God’s inexistence? Not even close. Has quantum cosmology explained the emergence of the universe or why it is here? Not even close. Have our sciences explained why our universe seems to be fine-tuned to allow for the existence of life? Not even close. Are physicists and biologists willing to believe in anything so long as it is not religious thought? Close enough. Has rationalism and moral thought provided us with an understanding of what is good, what is right, and what is moral? Not close enough. Has secularism in the terrible 20th century been a force for good? Not even close, to being close. Is there a narrow and oppressive orthodoxy in the sciences? Close enough. Does anything in the sciences or their philosophy justify the claim that religious belief is irrational? Not even in the ball park. Is scientific atheism a frivolous exercise in intellectual contempt? Dead on.” ― David Berlinski, The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions Berlinski does not dismiss the achievements of western science. The great physical theories, he observes, are among the treasures of the human race. But they do nothing to answer the questions that religion asks, and they fail to offer a coherent description of the cosmos or the methods by which it might be investigated.
Not even ONE of those you post uses religion when they carry out science. Anyone can have a religion. There is no objection to that. The objections start coming when people mix their religion into the science that they do - something you do not show as happening. Also, not having an answer based in observational evidence does NOT support the existence of a god. I agree with Berlinski that the achievements of science are among the treasures of the human race. The fact that science does not address religion comes from the fact that science is not constructed to even ATTEMPT to do that. So, anyone who thinks science proves or disproves anything about the supernatural just doesn't know SQUAT about science.
