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Originally Posted by Tophat665
Nevertheless, so long as someone suggests that there may be something out there that cannot be measured and has some impact upon humanity, there will be an atheist there to say, "Be serious."
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I don't understand this kind of reasoning. Almost by definition, if something has some "impact," it can be measured. So, how can anyone suggest such a thing?
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Originally Posted by levite
I also am at a loss to explain what anyone hopes to gain by trying to explain religion scientifically. We don't take anyone seriously who tries to explain nuclear physics by using arguments from religious texts, and for damn good reason. What I don't understand is why the reverse should not also be true. Science and religion are two completely separate phenomenological paradigms for dealing with our experience in the universe, and they can both have their place. As long as one does not interpret religion with a fundamentalist literalism, they are not even incompatible paradigms. But in any case, they are still different, and they address different questions, and look for different answers. Saying that science proves or disproves religion is like saying that a certain painting is excellent, because it was silky-soft when you had sex with it; or deciding that the cigar you just like is terrible, because it is not a well-written allegorical poem in Middle English; or deciding that you really don't like the bottle of Veuve Clicqot you just opened, because it doesn't sound like John Coltrane's "A Love Supreme."
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I don't think your analogies are apt.
We agree that trying to explain science with religion is stupid. However, that religion exists is a reality and science is the study of reality. So, why couldn't science examine religion? You don't think
sociology and
neurology are sciences? What are you saying, specifically?
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Naturally, the reverse is also true. But I have to say-- having spent quite a lot of time around very religious people-- that most do not try to prove or disprove anything about science using religion. It is only fundamentalists who try to merge paradigms, and the majority of people who practice religions are not fundamentalists. It just seems like that, sometimes, because the nuts get all the press.
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If it were just press, then there would be far fewer concerned atheists. It's the incessant subversion of science by fundamentalists that has caused a backlash from nonbelievers to quell religion. If religion has caused you lot to go mad and rebuke science, something that has allowed my life to be as enjoyable as it is, then your religion has got to go!