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Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

Read this in the latest issue of the Free Inquiry magazine and thought it might be good to stir up a bit of controversy here. I'm only quoting a small section of the article here, but the rest of it is available from the link at the bottom if you want to read the whole thing:

quote:

There is a conflict between science and religion, and it is zero-sum. Surely it is time that scientists and other intellectuals stopped disguising this fact. Indeed, the incompatibility of reason and faith has been a self-evident feature of human cognition and public discourse for centuries. Either one has good reasons for what one strongly believes, or one does not. People of all creeds naturally recognize the primacy of reasons and resort to reasoning and evidence wherever they can. When rational inquiry supports the creed, it is always championed; when it poses a threat, it is derided. It is only when the evidence for a religious doctrine is thin or nonexistent, or there is compelling evidence against it, that its adherents invoke �faith.� [...] If there were good reasons to believe in a God, belief in him would be perfectly reasonable�and would, perforce, be part of the magisterium of scientific rationality. As every religious dogmatist knows, there is only one magisterium. Religion and science are in perfect agreement on this core point of epistemology: there is nothing more sacred than the facts.

http://www.secularhumanism.org/inde...age=harris_26_1

I think the article makes an important point here, and it's one that many in this conciliatory age seem reluctant to make. Both science and religion address issues of epistemology (how we "know" what we "know"), ontology (the nature of being and beings) and human nature (our fundamental facticity, our reasons for certain behaviour, our origins etc.) and, as such, I believe, they should be held to similar logical and empirical constraints. The existence of an interventionalist God (that is, a God that is actively engaged in the workings of the world), for instance, should produce quantifiable phenomena. If we do identify quantifiable phenomena that could have only come from a being as powerful as a God, then these phenomena should be as readily addressed by science as by religion. The manifested God, under these circumstances, immediately becomes a scientific issue and the tennets of science would have to change to accomodate his existence. If God could be proven, it would change the nature of science as drastically - if not more so - as it would the nature of religion.

So if science and religion - at their most fundamental levels - are asking similar questions, searching for similar truths and examining the same phenomena (or lack thereof) along the way, then they are either compatible or they are not. The notion of "faith" - which, as the article states, is merely an indefensible retreat for theists whose rational and empiricial inquiries have yielded answers that are unsatisfactory to them - doesn't change this reality and I don't think that the other traditional fallback position of "the mutual exclusivity of religion and science" has much merit either given that, as I've said, religion and science have many fields of inquiry which overlap.

So, the question is, how can we reconcile science and religion in this day and age? Is there room for both or are they incompatible enough to make the "belief" in both simultaneously completely irrational?

Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Renegade I think the article makes an important point here, and it's one that many in this conciliatory age seem reluctant to make. Both science and religion address issues of epistemology (how we "know" what we "know"), ontology (the nature of being and beings) and human nature (our fundamental facticity, our reasons for certain behaviour, our origins etc.) and, as such, I believe, they should be held to similar logical and empirical constraints.

I partially disagree with you here. While it is obvious that science and religion are and were at odds regarding "lower-level" puzzles like human behaviour or the behaviour of the universe, and while science regularly won on these issues, the ultimate questions like "why anything exists" still cannot, and maybe will not, be answered using scientific means. Although, to be fair, such questions may not be answered through religious means either. Additionally, however, all of science is based on approximations and observations. All of those approximations and observations seem to work, so we seem to know how and why some things happen. On a basic level like the question of evolution or the roundness of the earth, such suggestions are sort of silly. But on the essential level, they are not. Like, can you prove to me with 100% certainty that you really exis? We both know you can't. You can only establish relations between processes that already seem to happen around you, so you can say you exist because I see you and I see you because you exist. Such an implication, though, requires that my perception is fundamentally flawless and omniscient. But why they are happening the way they are happening, or why anything is happening at all, is a different question entirely, and so far I haven't seen anyone come close to answering it.

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The existence of an interventionalist God (that is, a God that is actively engaged in the workings of the world), for instance, should produce quantifiable phenomena. If we do identify quantifiable phenomena that could have only come from a being as powerful as a God, then these phenomena should be as readily addressed by science as by religion. The manifested God, under these circumstances, immediately becomes a scientific issue and the tennets of science would have to change to accomodate his existence. If God could be proven, it would change the nature of science as drastically - if not more so - as it would the nature of religion.

It is not necessarry that an interventionist god produces immediately quantifiable phenomena. For example, quantum effects are completely random and although you can statistically determine the general behavior of particles, there's no way you can predict what will happen to a single particle. Parralel to that is a butterfly effect which basically says that small disturbances in the beginning can cause large disturbances in the end. Ultimately the position of few electrons may end up causing a storm killing thousands of people. Let alone what can be done by manipulating the position of every subatomic particle in the universe. And the funny thing is that with a same statistical distribution of particle behaviours you can achieve dramatically different large-scale effects. So such actions are both interventionist and unobservable.

most definatly compatible.

Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Renegade

You have summed up Science's position on Itself and Faith perfectly.

Faith certainly looks impotent from that perspective


I will sum up Faith's position on Itself and Science.

Faith believes that reality is equivalent to the World of Warcraft. Imagine in WOW an Empiricist and a Faithful who are both studying a rubic's cube.

The empircists thinks "If I study the cube then I will understand the World of Warcraft better".

The faithful thinks "If I study the cube then I will understand Blizzard better".

Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Subey You have summed up Science's position on Itself and Faith perfectly. Faith certainly looks impotent from that perspective I will sum up Faith's position on Itself and Science. Faith believes that reality is equivalent to the World of Warcraft. Imagine in WOW an Empiricist and a Faithful who are both studying a rubic's cube. The empircists thinks "If I study the cube then I will understand the World of Warcraft better". The faithful thinks "If I study the cube then I will understand Blizzard better".

That's so confusing. Could you explain that analogy

Re: Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Sunsnail That's so confusing. Could you explain that analogy

I'll try! but my track record isn't so good :P

First some Borges to confuse you even more...

"It is venturesome to think that a coordination of words (philosophies are nothing more than that) can resemble the universe very much. It is also venturesome to think that of all these illustrious coordinations, one of them -- at least in an infinitesimal way -- does not resemble the universe a bit more than the others."

***
2 Notes of Emphasis:
1)The analogy represent's Faith's perspecitve
2)I have NEVER experienced faith personally

The World of Warcraft exists in 2 distinct places simultaneously. In one place it is filled with people "living" in it, and in the other there are people outside of it who are "designing" it.

If you are *in* WoW where would you go to find the designers? (aka if you are in the universe where would you go to find God?)

You could climb the highest mountains. Nope not there. Explore the deepest caves, no designers there. Examine the tiniest particles, still can't find any conclusive evidence of the designers.

So after an exhaustive search for designers the hard science people conclude "There are no designers to be found".

What this analogy illustrates is two thing's from Faith's perspective:

1) Science isn't going to find the designer's this way

and

2) Even though there is no direct evidence of the designers *IN* WoW (aka the universe) the entire place is in fact direct evidence (hence statement's from people with faith like "God is in a flower")

Re: Re: Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Subey If you are *in* WoW where would you go to find the designers? (aka if you are in the universe where would you go to find God?)

Hm, my guess would by writing a note to a GM.

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2) Even though there is no direct evidence of the designers *IN* WoW (aka the universe) the entire place is in fact direct evidence (hence statement's from people with faith like "God is in a flower")

Agreed, although in the beta version there was an island between Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms on which GMs were stationed. Now you can only get there if you exploit a bug and you find a bottle with a note saying something like "you shouldn't be here". Still, though, a message from gods in a way...

But yeah, generally I do agree with your viewpoint on this issue.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by DrUg_Tit0 Agreed, although in the beta version there was an island between Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms on which GMs were stationed. Now you can only get there if you exploit a bug and you find a bottle with a note saying something like "you shouldn't be here". Still, though, a message from gods in a way...

Haha, well my analogy may not appear elegant, but it is! Because it gives people a working conceptual framework of how a "subordinate reality" can exist within and interface with our own.

From there its not so big a conceptual leap to apply the same logic to ourselves.


[edit: It should be noted that this is an old theory. Most of the early work was done in D house. As an acknowledgement of that the "look and feel" of the Oracle in The Matrix is loosely based on Sara Momoh.]

to be honest ive never experienced religion on a level to be comparable with a \"field of inquiry\" as you state. maybe im cynical in this regard?

if the existance of god could be proven, and religion could become more than just faith, then i dont see why two, *rational*, methods of inquiry would be mutually exclusive or incompatible.

could it be argued that religion would need science to understand the universe, and science would need religion to understand god & the soul?

i dunno.

the one thing i am sure of though is that subey\'s analogies SUCK the big one

Merge science, spirituality, and philosophy, and you will find your answers.

if science = how, and
religion = why,
then compatible

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Originally posted by Spacey Orange if science = how, and religion = why, then compatible

and if the why is just an inevitable coincidence among many others, who needs religion?

Science is a method of inquiry, and religion is the absence of inquiry. They are somewhat incompatible insofar as someone using any method of inquiry, science included, has already abandoned a fundamental principle of religion (faith.) In a more general sense, though, I would have to say it's a bit of an apples and oranges comparison.

Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by DrUg_Tit0 I partially disagree with you here. While it is obvious that science and religion are and were at odds regarding "lower-level" puzzles like human behaviour or the behaviour of the universe, and while science regularly won on these issues, the ultimate questions like "why anything exists" still cannot, and maybe will not, be answered using scientific means. Although, to be fair, such questions may not be answered through religious means either.

I'm not saying that the scientific method is infallible or that it is necessarily the best method by which to understand the universe we live in (although, having said that, try finding me a better one), so the fact that science may not currently be able to answer the "ultimate questions" doesn't change the fact that - as you said - on the "lower-level puzzles" it has found itself competing with religious theories (yet again, there's the overlap of inquiry between the two methods) and it has generally won the day on every single issue. The meticulous, scrupulous nature of science lends itself perfectly to understanding - with a degree of certainty - the objects of its inquiry. The religious method, which seeks to filter the objects of its inquiries through a pre-conceived dogma about the nature of the universe, can never reach a degree of objectivity in its inquiries for this very reason. While science starts with the presumption that we know nothing and slowly constructs an understanding of the universe from this beginning of almost Cartesian doubt, religion begins with the presumption that it already understands the way the universe operates and works backwards, trying to fit all the evidence it encounters into this narrow paradigm.

In this regard, as I have said, science and religion both often ask similar questions and science - as it is not hindered by having to arrive at the same, specific conclusion, regardless of what the evidence states or what questions are being asked - is the more reliable window into the workings of the universe. As you say, it may be fallible, but that's not the point I was trying to make.

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Additionally, however, all of science is based on approximations and observations. All of those approximations and observations seem to work, so we seem to know how and why some things happen. On a basic level like the question of evolution or the roundness of the earth, such suggestions are sort of silly. But on the essential level, they are not. Like, can you prove to me with 100% certainty that you really exis? We both know you can't. You can only establish relations between processes that already seem to happen around you, so you can say you exist because I see you and I see you because you exist. Such an implication, though, requires that my perception is fundamentally flawless and omniscient.

Hmmm... we're delving into almost solipsistic territory here. In any case, regardless of the degree of epistemological skepticism you want to apply to your own existence here, you're forgetting that both the religious outlook and the scientific outlook are bound by the same constraints of human subjectivity. Whatever philosophical objections that you can raise about the uncertainty of the scientific method can also be raised about the religious method - the religious man, afterall, is as much a slave to his own senses and his own anthropocentric thinking as the scientific man is. That science cannot provide us reliably with absolutes - or even adequately demonstrate the certainty of our own existence - does not change the fact that the world, as it appears to us through our fallible senses, is more congruous with the descriptive theories of science than with the prescriptive theories of religion.

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But why they are happening the way they are happening, or why anything is happening at all, is a different question entirely, and so far I haven't seen anyone come close to answering it.

The question of "why", with regards to knowledge, is a dangerous one and usually loaded with a hidden agenda. By asking "why" something happened, we are immediately begging the question in presuming that there had to have been some pre-ordained, rational purpose behind what happened. Asking "why does the universe exist?" is as senseless a question as asking "why did the volcano have to erupt and engulf all those villiagers?". We can run through the mechanics - the how of what happened, referring to the big bang and magma chambers etc. - but unless you can identify an reason to believe that there might be a rational force behind these events, then the question of "why" these events occurred is to falsely attribute a sentient purpose to events that are only conforming to the mechanical order of the universe. The universe doesn't know it exists. The volcano doesn't know why it erupted and killed lots of people. Apart from deterministic necessity, there is no reason why these events had to happen at all.

Unless the usage of the question of "why" is synonymous with the question of "how", then the use of "why" in coming to understand the universe will reveal nothing, other than the anthropic tendency to impose our own worldview (that of a cogent, autonomous being) onto the universe (which is neither) in an effort to understand how things work. And this, as I said earlier, is the religious method: it begins with an a priori assumption (that the universe must be somehow rationally guided) and attempts to fit all its observations into this fixed paradigm. Science infers, relgion confers.

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It is not necessarry that an interventionist god produces immediately quantifiable phenomena.

There are two alternatives: if a God produces quantifiable phenomena, then he can be examined under the scientific method (as that, afterall, is what the scientific method studies). If he does not produce quantifiable phenomena then he is forever inaccessible to us and any theological musings are - for all intents and purposes - useless. What is the value - or rationale behind - believing in a God who has the same (non-)manifest qualities of something that does not exist at all?

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For example, quantum effects are completely random and although you can statistically determine the general behavior of particles, there's no way you can predict what will happen to a single particle.

Doesn't the scientific method allow for randomness though? If the randomness is observable, how does this necessarily contravene the fundamental tennets of science? Wouldn't the reality of randomness, at least, be as much an argument against the legitimacy of religion (can we attribute genuine randomness to a rational, omniscient being?) as an much as it is an argument against the legitimacy of science?

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Parralel to that is a butterfly effect which basically says that small disturbances in the beginning can cause large disturbances in the end. Ultimately the position of few electrons may end up causing a storm killing thousands of people. Let alone what can be done by manipulating the position of every subatomic particle in the universe. And the funny thing is that with a same statistical distribution of particle behaviours you can achieve dramatically different large-scale effects. So such actions are both interventionist and unobservable.

Again, these theories in no way invalidate the doctrine of science. Though these forces may be difficult to detect or fully quantify, the laws of deterministic mechanics would tell us to expect - under the right conditions - small forces to snowball into bigger ones. Just me sitting here, typing and breathing, is irrevocably changing the nature of the universe for instance. Now it's impossible to measure exactly what sort of an impact my existence is making on the universe, due to the small scale of my actions (the movement of my fingers and the operation of my lungs affecting the airflow around me, for instance) and the massive scale of the universe, but it doesn't change the fact that in 20 billion years (or however long there is until the universe contracts / expands into nothingness) the universe will be different than it would have been had I never existed.

The fact that this is impossible to quantify (the scale would prevent us from measuring how every action I have made during my life might have impacted on the world around me and how these small impacts may have affected the future of the universe) does not mean that it is "unquantifiable". I'm sure, if we had the power to do so, the impact that I have made on the universe could be quantified scientifically and that this impact would conform to our fundamental scientific principles. These effects may also be impossible to observe due to the tiny scale of my actions and the massive spatial and temporal nature of the future of the universe, but this does not mean that it is, as you put it, "unobservable". If we had the power to observe the movement of atoms as my fingers hit the keyboard and we had the power to monitor the moverment of those atoms over the next 20 billion years, then effects would most definitely be "observable" and would, again I'm sure, conform to our scientific understanding of the universe.

This is difficult to adequately put into words, but I hope that made sense.

Re: Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Renegade Again, these theories in no way invalidate the doctrine of science. Though these forces may be difficult to detect or fully quantify, the laws of deterministic mechanics would tell us to expect - under the right conditions - small forces to snowball into bigger ones. Just me sitting here, typing and breathing, is irrevocably changing the nature of the universe for instance. Now it's impossible to measure exactly what sort of an impact my existence is making on the universe, due to the small scale of my actions (the movement of my fingers and the operation of my lungs affecting the airflow around me, for instance) and the massive scale of the universe, but it doesn't change the fact that in 20 billion years (or however long there is until the universe contracts / expands into nothingness) the universe will be different than it would have been had I never existed.

not to forget your existence's impact on the past, there has to be a different chain of circumstances and events leading to a world where in that particular date you werent born on.

Renegade, I agree with most of what you're saying in the first part. My basic point was not that religion is better at explaining anything than science is, but that science itself isn't necessarrily capable of explaining everything either. So although religion doesn't offer reasonable answers, we shouldn't necessarrily stick to the scientific dogma and focus only on those things we can measure, because by using that approach our knowledge may be severely limited, although seemingly flawless. Kind of like subey's world of warcraft example. Although, admittedly, I agree that at the moment I can't think of any better method of cognition either.

I also agree that there does not have to be a reason why anything exists, and you can just say that things happen the way they happen simply because they do, but that approach is rather constrained. It may ultimately be correct, but there's absolutely no reason why it should be.

The thing where you're wrong, though, is the matter of quantifiability and interventionism, mainly because of Planck's constant and the Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. You see, when you home in on particle's position, you're getting less and less precise on that particle's speed and direction, and vice versa. That's why things like Bose-Einstein condensate can form. Basically all the atoms' movement is so reduced that their position in space starts to overlap with the positon of other atoms, and you get a large uniform blob. If you would reduce the speed of an atom to exactly 0, that atom would span entire universe, and when you'd heat it up, it could materialize anywhere in it. Another thing is that particles subjected to EM radiation pop in and out of existance. You can only have a statistical distribution of where they'll pop in and out, but on individual particle level, it is impossible to tell where or whether it will appear. There are also the vacuum fluctuations, which allow for a particle and its opposite to appear from nothingness. In that way an electron and a positron can form and disappear without any external stimuli. Those things can be measured only when they happen, but there is absolutely no way they can be predicted, unless we discover a new and radical approach to physics that would bring down the whole theory of quantum mechanics.

Re: Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Renegade Unless the usage of the question of "why" is synonymous with the question of "how", then the use of "why" in coming to understand the universe will reveal nothing, other than the anthropic tendency to impose our own worldview (that of a cogent, autonomous being) onto the universe (which is neither) in an effort to understand how things work. And this, as I said earlier, is the religious method: it begins with an a priori assumption (that the universe must be somehow rationally guided) and attempts to fit all its observations into this fixed paradigm. Science infers, relgion confers.

I'll move to an arena which isn't contentious, and to which my knowledge is somewhat limited as well, however.

When the Wright brothers started working on airplane were they operating under the assumption that "manned flight" had a positive answer?

In this case as an example, was this assumption of a "positive" answer not in fact the most important piece of the airplane?

Re: Re: Re: Re: Are Science and Religion Incompatible?

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Originally posted by Subey I'll move to an arena which isn't contentious, and to which my knowledge is somewhat limited as well, however. When the Wright brothers started working on airplane were they operating under the assumption that "manned flight" had a positive answer? In this case as an example, was this assumption of a "positive" answer not in fact the most important piece of the airplane?

the wright brothers' a priori was based on logic to every extent, the search for meaning via religion (and other methods) is not.

Wow this article is kind of an oxymoron. What I think it's saying is that if God's existence were to be proven (by the scientific method or other means) then scientists would accept the mixture between religion and science and probably consider more of the stories told by the Bible such as the creation of the earth and so forth. I guess the only conflict here is if the reverse were to happen. Let's say a certain faith were to browse through its history and try to find any scientist that made an impact on their religion.

EDIT: You read my mind! - "If God could be proven, it would change the nature of science as drastically - if not more so - as it would the nature of religion" Quote from Renegade

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Originally posted by stevieboy32808 EDIT: You read my mind! - "If God could be proven, it would change the nature of science as drastically - if not more so - as it would the nature of religion" Quote from Renegade

Everyone has limited time, and the world is a big place, so at the outset of any inquiry we try to eliminate as many different areas as we can to narrow our focus.

So say for example that the easiest place to prove the existence of the Divine is by looking into Astrology how many scientists do you think are looking there?

None, for the simple reason that before they look they can't conceive of any system where Astrology would work (i.e. the idea that the position of Mars could actually influence how my day will play out seems patently riddiculous (Sagan's The Demon Haunted World has a nice attack on Astrology that's a good read).

***

The irony is that it is one of the easiest routes to proving the Divine's existence. I will only provide a wiff of smoke from the astrological smoking gun...

Everyone's heard of the Age of Aquarius (and instantly dismissed it as new age mumbo jumbo of course). It's based on a clock no more arbitrary than the solar year. In this case based on the movement of the constelations (procession of the equinoxes).

What age is it right now? I'll give you a hint, the bumper on the car in front of you is displaying the current time.

From those two data points you can start reconstructing the clock, and with it you can understand how the divine changes with each age.

The next data point that is the easiest to find is here built during the Age of Aries.

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