Why science and religion are not compatible

[angrysoba]

I think it is quite possible that someone could have religious beliefs and scientific beliefs and so contrive it that the two do not overlap. It is clear that some things cannot be decided by science because they may be unfalsifiable beliefs. At this point you have a choice of saying that there is no fact of the matter to discover one way or another or that you are somehow free to fill in the blanks for yourself. I expect that some religious people do this although it can't make very strong claims such as the ones in the OP without being in breach of the scientific method.

Usually the problem turns out that religion just doesn't want to stay in that little box and seeks, at all times to go gambolling into science's territory. This is something that happens in practice but it doesn't mean it has to be true in principle.

 

[Paulhoff]

Why does religion get a free ticket to not thinking.

But people get to make laws on those thinkings.

Paul

 

[citizenzen]

I think it is quite possible that someone could have religious beliefs and scientific beliefs and so contrive it that the two do not overlap.

Not only is it possible, it is in fact, reality. I hate to break it to all those who think science and religion are incompatible (whatever that means), but this 2009 Pew poll shows that a majority of polled scientists (51%) either believe in God or a "universal spirit" (see graph below).

So yes, somehow scientists are able to reconcile both their desire to conduct science and belief in a higher power.

I don't have a horse in this race. Personally, I'm an atheist. But I am a big believer in reality. And reality shows that both science and religion are compatible ... that they both can coexist, and have coexisted for thousands of years.

Welcome to the real world.

 

[angrysoba]

Not only is it possible, it is in fact, reality. I hate to break it to all those who think science and religion are incompatible (whatever that means), but this 2009 Pew poll shows that a majority of polled scientists (51%) either believe in God or a "universal spirit" (see graph below).

So yes, somehow scientists are able to reconcile both their desire to conduct science and belief in a higher power.

I don't have a horse in this race. Personally, I'm an atheist. But I am a big believer in reality. And reality shows that both science and religion are compatible ... that they both can coexist, and have coexisted for thousands of years.

Welcome to the real world.

I think you misunderstand the question. It is not whether some people are religious scientists or not it is about whether their beliefs are founded on consistent principles.

It is not uncommon at all for people to have two or more beliefs which contradict each other. Probably most people have such beliefs.

 

[Paulhoff]

It is not uncommon at all for people to have two or more beliefs which contradict each other. Probably most people have such beliefs.

But so many on the same subject.

Paul

 

[JoeMorgue]

Science and religion are not compatible.

Science is a method for determing facts with the greatest degree of probability of being correct.

Religion makes factual claims about the universe without using that method.

Ergo if you claim to be doing them both, you're doing one of them wrong.

Yes people do compartmentalize their lives to the point where they can have both, but that's not really the same as them being compatible.

 

[citizenzen]

Yes people do compartmentalize their lives to the point where they can have both, but that's not really the same as them being compatible.

Since the dictionary defines compatibility as coexistence (or as you say, "having both") it seems to me to be the very meaning of the word.

Perhaps you can provide an accepted definition of the term that can clarify your point and help clear up my misunderstanding.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Science is a method, religion is a position that operates counter to that method.

Science isn't something you can turn on and off. You can't use science except when it won't give you the answers you want and then turn to religion and expect science to have any meanings.

It's like saying that lawfulness and lawlessness are compatible because I didn't speed on the way to committing a double murder.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Interesting. So your position is that AIs couldn't generate religions?

There is no evidence god beliefs resulted from alien encounters. There is overwhelming evidence people made the beliefs up to explain and/or deal with the natural terrestrial world. Is there a reason to generate an hypothesis for which no evidence points to it?

There is no proof that science is incompattible with all possible religions. Thus sciece can't know if it is compatible with religion or not.

Again, you fabricate an hypothesis for which there is no supporting evidence. That is not how I view the scientific process.

So is pretty much all of science outside some pretty narrow areas. Our models are no more than fictions (that generaly provide somewhat useful results) and all the models we currently have were created by human beings.

You are using a definition of fiction that is useless. If you cannot distinguish between a work of fiction such as the Harry Potter series or mythical Greek gods and the theory of evolution or plate tectonics, of what use is the term, fiction? For that matter, of what use is the scientific process to you if Harry Potter and Zeus are no more, no less valid than the theory of gravity?

However that only covers a relatively small area of the total potential religion space.

Indeed even within that space it's not particularly useful since don't have a very good idea what science is (see Feyerabend's work) resulting in it being a bit hard to decide is something is compatible with it (it's actually possible to make case that chemistry is incompatible with science).

You can take the conclusion, "gods exist or might exist" and construct all manner of scenarios where that conclusion might be true. Or, you can do what we do in the rest of the fields of scientific inquiry and start with the evidence following where it leads. I find the latter is consistent with the scientific process and the former is an aberrancy used by the scientific and skeptical communities to either apologize for the obvious failure to find evidence when it comes to god beliefs or avoid addressing the god belief elephant in the room when one prefers not to confront the believer.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

--what if one day there is empirical evidence to support the existence of god?

Why should I care now given the current evidence is people fabricate god myths and there is no evidence to the contrary?

 

[angrysoba]

It's like saying that lawfulness and lawlessness are compatible because I didn't speed on the way to committing a double murder.

Well then you would be quite correct in asserting that you broke the law and abided by the law on the same night depending upon which issue you were talking about.

 

[citizenzen]

Science is a method, religion is a position that operates counter to that method.

Science isn't something you can turn on and off. You can't use science except when it won't give you the answers you want and then turn to religion and expect science to have any meanings.

It's like saying that lawfulness and lawlessness are compatible because I didn't speed on the way to committing a double murder.

I'm sorry. But none of that makes a bit of sense to me.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

It takes a closed mind to assert what is in the OP. It takes an open mind to try and discern where the two domains may, or may not, be incompatible within X frame of reference.

Hok, I don't think there is 58 pages worth of anything in this thread.

So we can apply the scientific process to everything else, but when it comes to god beliefs we have to make an exception lest we be closed minded?

When I apply the scientific process to god beliefs, the evidence is that there are no real gods, only human generated fiction.

Applying your position, one would be closed minded to say gravity, evolution and plate tectonic theories were not compatible with magic and Young Earth Creationism.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Not only is it possible, it is in fact, reality. I hate to break it to all those who think science and religion are incompatible (whatever that means), but this 2009 Pew poll shows that a majority of polled scientists (51%) either believe in God or a "universal spirit" (see graph below).

So yes, somehow scientists are able to reconcile both their desire to conduct science and belief in a higher power.

I don't have a horse in this race. Personally, I'm an atheist. But I am a big believer in reality. And reality shows that both science and religion are compatible ... that they both can coexist, and have coexisted for thousands of years.

Welcome to the real world.

Cognitive dissonance and compartmentalization explains the data. If that is how you define compatible, oil and water can go into the same glass and the fact they don't mix doesn't make them incompatible.

 

[JoeMorgue]

I'm sorry. But none of that makes a bit of sense to me.

It's simple. If you think science is just something you do sometimes and not others, what you are doing is not science. Science is an concept you can't just turn on and off.

The second you decide "Well with this one thing, I'm not going to use science. I'm going to use something else." then you are no longer using science.

To clarify my earlier comparison it's like saying you are law abiding because you follow the law... except when you don't want to.

 

[angrysoba]

It's simple. If you think science is just something you do sometimes and not others, what you are doing is not science. Science is an concept you can't just turn on and off.

Even when you go to sleep?

The second you decide "Well with this one thing, I'm not going to use science. I'm going to use something else." then you are no longer using science.

Even if you're selecting a CD to listen to or a birthday present for someone?

If that's the case then I think your notion of using science must be rather broad.

 

[citizenzen]

To clarify my earlier comparison it's like saying you are law abiding because you follow the law... except when you don't want to.

I think I see your point now. And here's why I don't think it applies.

In your example of following the law vs. breaking the law, I can see the direct connection. If I am not following the law, I am breaking the law. If I am not breaking the law, I am following the law.

But I don't see that same connection to science and religion.

If I am not conducting science, that doesn't mean I am therefore practicing religion. If I am not practicing religion, that doesn't mean I am therefore conducting science.

I could both not practice a religion and not conduct science. Likewise I could both practice a religion and conduct science. They are not mutually exclusive as is your example of the law. Once you are breaking the law, you cannot say you are following the law.

 

[Patrick1000]

I am am Atheist that sides with the Creationists in the Evolution in schools debate.

In another thread, some people apparently believe that science and religion are compatible, or at least science and liberal religion. So let's settle this. They are not. Sean Carroll explains why.

In short, the incompability is not because they are different (science relies on evidence, religion on faith), but because they reach different conclusions. I'll quote:



And before you start to mention religious scientists, read the linked post, as it deals with that. Likewise, NOMA is rightly dismissed as redefining religion to mean "moral philosophy". But that's not how most religius people view their religions, the religions' claims about how the world works tend to be pretty important to them.

I am am Atheist that sides with the Creationists in the Evolution in schools debate for that very reason.l Religion and science as we know them, are incompatible.

If teachers present the subject of evolution to high school students and college students such that evolution is understood as a process without intention, without purposeful direction, and this is indeed the case, then there is no room for religion. By it's very nature, we understand the religious perspective to be one in which there is very much intention, purpose. If nothing else, the religious view argues that we are made with the intention of being able to appreciate we were/are created with "some purpose in mind", at the very least that purpose being one in which we know ourselves to be in some type of "personal relation" with our creator.

So it does bug me when science people rail against the religious types. I have no objection to evolution being taught in schools. Though I am an atheist, I don't buy in to "evolution" as conventionally presented however. It seems to me to be a reach. Just because a hot air balloon floats, doesn't mean one can take it to the moon. Likewise, just because bacteria become penicillin resistant, doesn't mean small mammals became people through the process of natural selection as conventionally presented. I suspect there is common ancestry among all living things, but I do not believe we have a clue as to how this came about, and it probably is well beyond the ken of our understanding.

Regardless, when evolution is taught in school, it needs to be acknowledged that it is indeed an atheistic view for the reason mentioned, a process which is unintentional and a "world view" which when accepted, excludes the conventional religious view of intention being at the root of the biologic creative processes which we owe the nature of ourselves to. Science/evolution teaches atheism, teaches a view that life developed by a process without purpose, without intention. Natural selection is the process whereby living systems respond to environmental pressure by virtue of the good fortune of a beneficial chance adaptation. There is no purpose, no intention with natural selection, and so, there is no room for religion. The two are most certainly incompatible.

 

[jimtron]

Why should I care now given the current evidence is people fabricate god myths and there is no evidence to the contrary?

You shouldn't. I only said that as an example of how science and religion could be compatible.

 

[citizenzen]

If teachers present the subject of evolution to high school students and college students such that evolution is understood as a process without intention, without purposeful direction, and this is indeed the case, then there is no room for religion.

I believe I can find plenty of room right here ...

God created the universe, and then left it to run itself.​

There you have it. A religious belief that allows for both a deity and evolution.

Who knew it could be so easy?