Humanity and the Natural World

I got the gist of what you were saying, as you said we've had several conversations about this before but this thread is not really about what or how people believe, its more about how any non-evidential claims regardless of how vague can truly benefit humanity and specifically society where ideas are of the utmost importance, where multiple ideas and perspectives must interact. I would like to add that philosophy IMO cannot be thrown in with the types of claims I am talking about because they are open-ended and meant more as thought exercises that could lead to knowledge rather than a non-evidential claimed knowledge leading to wisdom.

For example how can we improve our morality, which exists as a construct of nature (i.e. humans) with something we cannot have any knowledge of because it exists outside of nature? If we say that we are creating it ourselves through a sort of philosophical query than it may give the appearance that religion serves to do just that but this idea that it validates religion or the claim that we can gain knowledge from something outside of nature is false on its face because religion is also born of nature and only exists within it. I submit that religion is a clumsy and ineffective way of seeing the natural world and in many ways asks one to ignore it for the sake of something grander and ultimately beyond our reach.

 

This is a well thought out stance and I respect it.

People are motivated towards the good and the bad by all sorts of crazy things though, and some peoples view is so myopic that for them reality just consist of the place and moment they are in.

I may be wandering into philosophy to say this but most of us learn from things we know, things we assume, and things we hope. For most people the things they hope for are just as important as the things they know.

 

This universe doesn't give proof but evidence for God. Whether you find this evidence compelling is another question.

If - as I believe – what caused the laws of physics wants to be in a relationship with us, it matters hugely why they are what they are. And if humankind had shied away from questions only because they seem unanswerable or only because their answer doesn’t seem to have much of an influence on our life, we’d still be sitting on the proverbial trees rather than having sent spacecraft to Mars.

 

You’ll be hard pressed to find any mono-causalities in history, but quite often you’ll find that, if one of many causes had been left out, a thing would not have started off. And for Western science the Church was a massive cause: According to Roman Catholic teaching both scripture and nature tell us about God. That’s why it set up the first universities and sponsors science to this day. The problem is that a lot of the atheists on this board never bothered to study the history of science. Otherwise they’d know that the supposed conflict between science and religion is a big myth (in the sense that you would use the word in).

Your notion that one is greater than the other is highly subjective. In the world I live in they complement each other. Then again – apparently contrary to most posters here - I’m aware of the fact that evangelical creationists aren’t representative for religion as such, just as Richard Dawkins is not representative for science as such.

 

If there IS evidence of your particular god available, then I have trouble imagining any atheist or agnostic ignoring it. Remember that most are where they are due to a willingness to go where evidence takes them.

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Once again, we have no way of separating this thing out, since EVERYONE was religious up until very recently. I would concur with Vicariously in that religion (in the form you know it) was probably just a stop along the way to greater understanding.

 

They're in a constant relationship with you, your every move and thought is governed by them. You ARE physics.

There also no evidence at all for God. You can interpret a fact as such, but in every case it will either be a complete guess, or the scientific explanation will be superior.

 

Of course I am physics. The question is whether I’m just physics and nothing else.

Science restricts itself to examining the physical world, it doesn’t make metaphysical claims, neither about God’s existence or non-existence. Which is why Richard Dawkins and Francis Collins can agree when it comes to genetics and disagree when it comes to God and to whether they see nature as evidence for his existence or the contrary.

 

Take science and religion back to the beginning and erase everything we have learned. Change certain circumstances throughout history, different outcomes to wars, political decisions, certain people never being born or rising to power.

The discoveries of science will not magically change, the laws of physics will not alter, mathematics will work just as they do now. Can you honestly say the same for your religion?

Ideas, perspectives, knowledge should change and grow spawning greater ideas, perspectives and knowledge...wisdom. If science came out of religion but is not superior to religion what does that say about religion?

 

The laws of physics would not change, the history of science would have looked very different and I dare say we'd be not as far now had it not been for religion.

And you are forgetting (or never knew) that the Ideas, perspectives, knowledge of religion changed too. It's not a question of superiority. I can have the greatest of respect for the insights of Augustine and still think Moltmanns views are more up to date.

 

I never suggested or meant to suggest that religion hasn't changed but I disagree with your assertion that we would not be as far as we are not had it not been for religion. I would say that religion itself has been very damaging to the progress of science, that it was only when individuals relinquished the theocratic ideals religion spawned and took a more philosophical approach to it that it had greater value. If this is true than religion isn't a foundation for any of our progress, philosophy was.

 

You would not even know any of the great philosophers of antiquity had it not been for Muslim and Christian scribes and scholars carefully preserving their work and incorporating it into their faith.
And the two examples that usually spring to mind when it comes to religion hindering science (Galileo and Darwin) are judged very differently by actual historians than by common pejudice. The conflict between science and religion that some atheists are eager to promote is a modern myth.

 

Precisely my point. Physics is limited to the physical because that is the only thigns we can measure and prove the properties of. The Metaphysical is a product of our brain, we can't prove or work with that to come up with universals, so it's rejected as science.

 

You see, I come from a country which distinguishes between two kinds of science: “Naturwissenschaften” (natural science) and “Geisteswissenschaften” (equivalent to the humanities, with subjects such as social sciences, history, philology, philosophy and theology). Metaphysics would be treated within the latter as part of philosophy and theology.

Philosophers and theologians alike don’t only think about “thigns (sic) we can measure and prove the properties of”. They like to dwell a bit deeper in the hope that they can arrive at some level of insight by the mere power of their brain/reason. Such deep thinking led some of them to doubt that there are such things as ‘proof’ (except maybe in mathematics) or ‘universals’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_universals).

Of course philosophers (and theologians) disagree with each other all the time. So it is entirely up to your own reasoning whose reasoning you deem to be the most reasonable.

 

I find the very root of the issue is attempting to assign Science in different forms or values.

Science is simply a METHOD....which we use to understand reality to the best of our ability.

It really can't have any other meaning.

AboveAlpha

 

Again you mistake the cognitive prevalence of religion as an ultimate cause rather than the only tools we had to work with. Just look at what the western world has accomplished after pushing religion to the side. I give credit to the religious people who helped advance humanity through secularism and science but not because they were religious. I believe there is plenty of evidence between the backwards people in the world today and throughout history and those who have climbed out of that kind of fundamentalist credulity or managed to avoid it to make a strong case for religion being a hindrance rather than a efficient tool for progress.

 

So what did we accomplish? Wonderful values such as the "freedom of conscience" for example? That you must obey your conscience above any other authority including that of the Church was Saint Thomas Aquinas’ idea. It gained prominence after the Reformation. But somehow girls/guys like Manning and Snowden probably feel that freedom of conscience is a value that’s no more respected in 21th century secular USA than it was in the Holy Roman Empire, 1521 AD, at the Diet of Worms. Our technical abilities to spy and kill may have increased since then though. Great!

Don’t you think talking of “backwards people” conveys colonial-style patterns of thought, that ought long have been overcome by such gloriously bright enlightened people such as yourself?
I’m still waiting for that strong case for “religion being a hindrance” to progress to be made. As of yet I got nothing but empty platitudes.
Care to get another example for the opposite suggestion? When Islam came up it actually bettered the legal and social situation of women in 7th century Arabia. In our Western arrogance we may proclaim that Islam does the opposite now, but actually quite a lot of Muslim women beg to differ.

 

It's no secret that the most socially advanced and environmentally responsible countries on earth are the least religious. It's patently clear that whatever comes along with the falling away of superstition, it's good for us. It may well be our salvation. I'm inclined to think it will be.

 

So, I'm curious. Why do you differentiate "theistic" Gods from ordinary Gods?

What do you mean by that?

 

The fact that Christianity or Islam happened to coincide with a recession in patriarchy can hardly be automatically attributed to those religious beliefs. It may very well be that causation was in the opposite direction, and that a reduction in patriarchate oppression precipitated changes in religious dogma.

 

More empty platitudes that just reveal that some people’s atheism has taken on a rather religious character including its own set of new myths and misguided notions of cultural superiority. Here’s just one of them debunked:

“The portrayal of environmentalists as "anti-Christian" or "anti-religious" is not unique to Australia. Internationally, it has been promoted by a group called the Cornwall Alliance, whose backers are closely aligned with fossil fuel interests (…) Christians, like other Australians, hold different opinions about the appropriate response to environmental problems. Despite occasional references to a supposed "Christian vote," Australian Christians have never voted as a bloc. Nevertheless, some church and political leaders have portrayed one party, the Greens, as "anti-Christian," "pagan," "atheist" or "anti-religious." Prima facie, this claim seems challenged by the numbers of Christians who have represented the Greens as candidates, including the first Greens to sit in each chamber of the federal Parliament. Interviews with Greens candidates who identified as practising Christians, exploring the connections they drew between their theological and political commitments, found that they understood their choice of party as being not in spite of, but as an expression of, their religious beliefs. In addition to environmental concerns, human rights was a paramount motivation, especially Australia's treatment of asylum seekers.” http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2013/08/27/3834302.htm

Similar things could be said about the German Green Party. And the environment and good treatment of asylum seekers certainly isn’t higher on the list of priorities of voters in the least religious part of my country: Eastern Germany. If anything the contrary is the case: Right wing parties get their best election results over there and asylum seekers live in constant fear. So much for the supposed blessings of atheism.

 

IMHO you are almost right, but probably not concerning the given example, where orientalists will tell you that there was no a reduction in patriarchate oppression that precipitated changes in religious dogma. Quite the contrary seems to have been the case:

“It appears that in some parts of Arabia, notably in Mecca, a matrilineal system was in the process of being replaced by a patrilineal one at the time of Muhammad. Growing prosperity caused by a shifting of trade routes was accompanied by a growth in individualism. Men were amassing considerable personal wealth and wanted to be sure that this would be inherited by their own actual sons, and not simply by an extended family of their sisters’ sons. This led to a deterioration in the rights of women. At the time Islam began, the conditions of women were terrible - they had no right to own property, were supposed to be the property of the man, and if the man died everything went to his sons. Muhammad improved things quite a lot. By instituting rights of property ownership, inheritance, education and divorce, he gave women certain basic safeguards. Set in such historical context the Prophet can be seen as a figure who testified on behalf of women’s rights.” http://www.alastairmcintosh.com/articles/2000_watt.htm

I’d agree though that mostly you can’t separate religious beliefs from the society they move in, they are entangled and influence each other. Societal and religious ideas mostly change gradually and interdependently. Even when new thoughts came up – be they revelatory or just accidental - it usually took some time for them to take root.
The question is whether human history would necessarily change for the better without the element of core religious convictions that so far helped shaping our societal conscience. Having a look at history and at younger history in particular I somehow doubt that. IMHO more likely than not we’d end up in a dystopia rather than an utopia.

 

Perhaps belief in magic has done more good than harm for human society in the past, but the days of dragons and wizards are now behind us.

 

So are the days in which scientists believed light travels through aether. That doesn’t mean we have to discard science altogether, does it?

 

Science is not a belief system. What's your point?

 

Science is not, scientism is.

The question is more: what’s your point?
In this day and age you’ll be just as hard pressed to find anybody in my town’s universities’ theology faculties who believes in wizards and dragons, as you’ll be hard pressed to find anybody in its physics faculty who still clings to medieval/Newtonian suggestions of aether. Whether you want to criticize todays theology or physics: if you want to be intellectually honest, you ought to go for the state of the art statements of either discipline.