Vatican backs Darwin, criticizes Intelligent Design fundamentalists

[Elind]

The previous pope, I assume. Where does Hawking tell this story? I'd be interested to read it.

Interestingly, Hawking is one of the pope's official scientific advisors.

I'd have to research that myself now. This is some years ago. I think he mentions it it in one of his books. As I recall he was at a conference on the origins of the universe, in Rome and addressed by the Pope, where the caution not to question too far was offered. Hawkins said something to the effect that "if he had know that this is what I was here for", chuckle.

Do correct me if my details are skewed. Hey, if the Pope (currently) is big enough to let bygons be bygons, he's big enough to be Pope.

 

[KingMerv00]

Magic Underwear? I just looked it up. How depressing.

http://home.teleport.com/~packham/garment.jpg

Depressing but sexy.

 

[Kerberos]

The previous pope, I assume. Where does Hawking tell this story? I'd be interested to read it.

I think it's in "A brief history of time" but it might be have ebbn "The universe in a nutshell". One of those to though.

 

[Melendwyr]

This isn't new, is it? The Catholics, to their credit, have always (in my lifetime) recognized science as a separate discipline from theology and not incompatible.

Well, of course they would acknowledge that. Any faith seeking to retain its members in the modern world is pretty much forced to - even though it simply isn't true. Especially since it simply isn't true.

 

[ceo_esq]

Well, of course they would acknowledge that. Any faith seeking to retain its members in the modern world is pretty much forced to - even though it simply isn't true. Especially since it simply isn't true.

What, specifically, isn't true, and what's your proof thereof?

Also, why do so many people who are expert in one field and knowledgeable about the other (or even, in many cases, expert in both) agree that science and religion are at least potentially compatible?

 

[Orwell]

What, specifically, isn't true, and what's your proof thereof?

Also, why do so many people who are expert in one field and knowledgeable about the other (or even, in many cases, expert in both) agree that science and religion are at least potentially compatible?

They're compatible up until some new evidence screws up some religious dogma!

So if you wanna make science and religion compatible, you have to turn religion into this formless allegorical mishmash that says nothing concrete about the nature of the world, otherwise you risk some scientists popping-up with some fact that contradicts some dogma, and then bye-bye good intentioned compatibility...

From a sceptical point of view, it's safer and simpler to just drop the whole thing altogether!

 

[Melendwyr]

Also, why do so many people who are expert in one field and knowledgeable about the other (or even, in many cases, expert in both) agree that science and religion are at least potentially compatible?

There's a whole list of 'whys'.

For starters, many of them want to hang on to their religious faith. Others, despite being highly educated in the subject, don't actually understand what science is. Still others know perfectly well that scientific thought is incompatible with religious faith, but don't want to alienate people by pointing out this fact.

 

[ceo_esq]

There's a whole list of 'whys'.

For starters, many of them want to hang on to their religious faith. Others, despite being highly educated in the subject, don't actually understand what science is. Still others know perfectly well that scientific thought is incompatible with religious faith, but don't want to alienate people by pointing out this fact.

All highly speculative. If there's an incompatibility, you ought to be capable of showing it deductively. Still waiting for that proof.

 

[Melendwyr]

Science: uses the scientific method.
Religion: uses faith as a method.

Faith: belief that something is true without being able to prove or even support the belief through evidence or reason. Incompatible with testing, as testing requires acknowledgement of the possibility that the tested principle is incorrect, and doubt, which involves uncertainty as to the truth of a thing.

Sciencific method: doubt is encouraged and even mandated in the approach to all things. Discards untestable statements as meaningless. Profoundly concerned with evidence, reason, and the possibility of error.

Faith is therefore incompatible with the sciencific method.

 

[Orwell]

All highly speculative. If there's an incompatibility, you ought to be capable of showing it deductively. Still waiting for that proof.

Speculative?!? You gotta be kidding me!

 

[ceo_esq]

Speculative?!? You gotta be kidding me!

Yes, speculative. He is speculating as to the unspoken frame of mind of third parties. Granted, I posed a question that practically invited a speculative response. And a speculative response is what I got. What I'm really interested in, however, is a deductive proof of the logical incompatibility of science and religion. In another thread a long while back, a few of us spent weeks trying to elicit such a proof. Never actually saw one that worked, of course.

 

[Orwell]

Yes, speculative. He is speculating as to the unspoken frame of mind of third parties. Granted, I posed a question that practically invited a speculative response. And a speculative response is what I got. What I'm really interested in, however, is a deductive proof of the logical incompatibility of science and religion. In another thread a long while back, a few of us spent weeks trying to elicit such a proof. Never actually saw one that worked, of course.

Yeah, tell that to the nutbars who are trying to shove "intelligent design" crap down kids throats!

Galileo must be spinning in his grave!

You know, maybe in theory there wouldn't be an incompatibility... Maybe, if the zealots had the habit of minding their own business... But the zealots don't mind their own business, and that's why, in practice, religion and science end up being incompatible.

 

[Melendwyr]

Galileo must be spinning in his grave!

Ceo_esq believes Galileo was justly prosecuted because his acceptance of the Copernican Hypothesis wasn't sufficiently supported by evidence. The RCC called him before the Inquisition not because he had stated the obvious truth that the interpretation of parts of the Bible would have to be changed, but because he wasn't following stringent science.

You might as well tell a Holocaust denier about the ten and a half million people slaughtered.

 

[ceo_esq]

Ceo_esq believes Galileo was justly prosecuted because his acceptance of the Copernican Hypothesis wasn't sufficiently supported by evidence. The RCC called him before the Inquisition not because he had stated the obvious truth that the interpretation of parts of the Bible would have to be changed, but because he wasn't following stringent science.

You might as well tell a Holocaust denier about the ten and a half million people slaughtered.

If the needs of a discussion dictate that my views be expounded, Melendwyr, I'll be sure to do it. You are hardly the right person for the job.

And please refrain from assimilating my views (even putative ones) to those of a Holocaust denier. You might think that such ludicrous suggestions hold a certain amusement value for the rest of us, but in fact they simply come across as offensive.

 

[ceo_esq]

Science: uses the scientific method.
Religion: uses faith as a method.

Faith: belief that something is true without being able to prove or even support the belief through evidence or reason. Incompatible with testing, as testing requires acknowledgement of the possibility that the tested principle is incorrect, and doubt, which involves uncertainty as to the truth of a thing.

Sciencific method: doubt is encouraged and even mandated in the approach to all things. Discards untestable statements as meaningless. Profoundly concerned with evidence, reason, and the possibility of error.

Faith is therefore incompatible with the sciencific method.

Even if all this were true, the task was to demonstrate a general incompatibility between religion and science. There is no property of religion as such which dictates that faith be applied to those things which are properly the object of the scientific method. This, of course, is precisely why a milieu of faith was able to give birth to the scientific method.

Arguments along the lines of yours are addressed in many posts in the "Is religion slowing us down?" thread. None of them provides the basis for a real deductive demonstration of incompatibility between science and religion.

If you are open to reading suggestions, let me recommend Stephen Jay Gould's Rocks of Ages, by the way. It offers a fairly cogent argument for why there is no intrinsic incompatibility.

 

[Melendwyr]

Even if all this were true

Even if? (raises eyebrow)

the task was to demonstrate a general incompatibility between religion and science. There is no property of religion as such which dictates that faith be applied to those things which are properly the object of the scientific method.

A "religion" that doesn't make any statements about reality isn't much of a religion, is it?

This, of course, is precisely why a milieu of faith was able to give birth to the scientific method.

No. The scientific method became possible because certain religious systems' dogmas made it permissable for people to inquire into naturalistic mechanisms for the behavior of the world. They accepted on faith that while an all-powerful deity could do anything, that deity did not intervene in certain things.

Thus the God-of-the-gaps was born. Once we began finding rational explanations for phenomena, we started to notice that there weren't actually any phenomena that clearly indicated the existence of a deity except the ones we didn't understand, and phenomena that we once didn't understand could be comprehended.

 

[ceo_esq]

Even if? (raises eyebrow)

Yes. I was assuming arguendo the accuracy of your statements about faith and scientific method. Saves time, in this case, because regardless of their accuracy, they don't support the larger point we surmise you to be making.

A "religion" that doesn't make any statements about reality isn't much of a religion, is it?

As long as a "religion" constitutes a system of belief in and reverence for a higher unseen power or powers regarded as governing and/or having created the universe, it's as much of a religion, broadly speaking, as any other religion. It is abundantly clear that such articles of belief need not constitute or always give rise to testable statements about empirical reality. Suppose someone believes that after his bodily death, his immortal and immaterial soul will go to paradise. This belief makes a statement about reality, inasmuch as it is objectively either true or false. However, such statement is not experimentally falsifiable in the scientific sense.

No. The scientific method became possible because certain religious systems' dogmas made it permissable for people to inquire into naturalistic mechanisms for the behavior of the world. They accepted on faith that while an all-powerful deity could do anything, that deity did not intervene in certain things.

In other words, their religion did not require that faith provide the method of understanding things which are susceptible to understanding via the scientific method. What you've just said is an illustration and consequence of what I was talking about. I can't fathom why you prefaced it with "No".

Thus the God-of-the-gaps was born.

Yet the God of the Scholastics and their successors was not a God-of-the-gaps. While they lacked scientific understanding of many natural phenomena, they emphatically did not assume that a "science gap" indicated a "nature gap".

 

[Melendwyr]

Saves time, in this case, because regardless of their accuracy, they don't support the larger point we surmise you to be making.

Wrong.

As long as a "religion" constitutes a system of belief in and reverence for a higher unseen power or powers regarded as governing and/or having created the universe, it's as much of a religion, broadly speaking, as any other religion. It is abundantly clear that such articles of belief need not constitute or always give rise to testable statements about empirical reality.

Wrong. "a higher unseen power or powers regarded as governing and/or having created the universe"

Suppose someone believes that after his bodily death, his immortal and immaterial soul will go to paradise. This belief makes a statement about reality, inasmuch as it is objectively either true or false. However, such statement is not experimentally falsifiable in the scientific sense.

Wrong.

Yet the God of the Scholastics and their successors was not a God-of-the-gaps.

Yes, it was.

While they lacked scientific understanding of many natural phenomena, they emphatically did not assume that a "science gap" indicated a "nature gap".

But they believed there was a nature gap.

 

[ceo_esq]

Wrong.

As Monty Python famously pointed out, there's more to an argument than just the automatic gainsaying of anything the other person says.

Your points about faith and scientific method do not dictate a necessary incompatibility between religion and science. If you could show that religion must derive truths about empirical phenomena through faith, or that science somehow requires that religions not take spiritual or moral (rather than empirical) truths on faith, then you would have a meaningful point. Right now, you have nothing.

Wrong. "a higher unseen power or powers regarded as governing and/or having created the universe"

Okay, Melendwyr. If you can show us how "belief in and reverence for a higher unseen power or powers regarded as governing and/or having created the universe" must necessarily (not can) lead to a hypothesis that could be unambiguously falsified by an appropriately designed experiment, then I will concede your specific point here.

Wrong.

Once again, Melendwyr, rather than saying "Wrong" again (everyone knows that three "Wrongs" don't make you right), why don't you tell us how it might be possible to design and carry out a scientific experiment theoretically capable of unambiguously falsifying the proposition in question: namely, that a given person's immortal and immaterial soul will go to paradise following his bodily death.

Yes, it was.

In what sense was that view of God - the God of Roger Bacon, Copernicus, Kepler et al. - a "God of the gaps"?

But they believed there was a nature gap.

They believed in the possibility of nature gaps, as I daresay all theists do, but supernatural activity was never the de facto replacement for a natural explanation.

 

[Melendwyr]

Your points about faith and scientific method do not dictate a necessary incompatibility between religion and science. If you could show that religion must derive truths about empirical phenomena through faith

Religion

Some groups commonly referred to as 'religions' might only apply under def. 4 - certain kinds of Buddhists, for example.

or that science somehow requires that religions not take spiritual or moral (rather than empirical) truths

Science does not recognize "truth" other than the kind involving accurate statements about reality.

Okay, Melendwyr. If you can show us how "belief in and reverence for a higher unseen power or powers regarded as governing and/or having created the universe" must necessarily (not can) lead to a hypothesis that could be unambiguously falsified by an appropriately designed experiment, then I will concede your specific point here.

Unfalsiable claims are rejected in the scientific method. If the specific religious claims can be falsified (even if only in theory and not in practice), then your condition can be satisfied. If they can't, then they're not compatible with science. I win either way.

scientific experiment theoretically capable of unambiguously falsifying the proposition in question: namely, that a given person's immortal and immaterial soul will go to paradise following his bodily death.

"Immaterial" is a meaningless concept. "Immortal", when used in the sense of "eternal and indestructable", is logically incompatible with the property of being affected by external forces and events.

In what sense was that view of God - the God of Roger Bacon, Copernicus, Kepler et al. - a "God of the gaps"?

Easy - God's activities were always confined outside of the observable and understandable causes that they accepted.