Sorry it took me a while to respond.
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Originally Posted by Walter Sobchak
Its not my intention from taking anything away from your quote. I agree that given moderation, religion may coexist with science...if the believer chooses to ignore certain truths. But most religions that I have studied all champion one book or another that they claim is the unfailing word of God and that it is not open to any interpretation. In otherwords, they do not allow moderation/moral progress and are not open to academic discourse. To question their legitimacy is heresy.
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I don't disagree. Though it should be mentioned that many progressive religious folk take a broader view, in that they recognize that there is more than one path to heaven.
It should also be noted that anyone who claims to both follow the words in the bible and that the words aren't open to interpretation is full of shit. The act of reading is inherently an act of interpretation.
When these folks say the bible isn't open to interpretation what they are really doing is admitting that they aren't necessarily all that thoughtful when it comes to their personal religious beliefs. Given the dogmatic nature with which a lot of religion is passed down, who can really blame them?
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As science progresses, we learn more about the world and our biological capacity for morality/spirituality. As we learn more, we find that these holy books are intellectually bankrupt. Conflict then arrises: if these books are, infact, the word of God and they are fallible, then God is fallible (and therefore not God).
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I wouldn't say that they're intellectually bankrupt-- science isn't the only intellectual pursuit.
There are religious folk who don't look at the holy books as the infallible word of god.
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I say that religion is incompatible with tolerance and respect for two reasons (I will focus on Christianity and Islam for examples):
1) While both the Koran and the Bible offer beautiful tales of human compassion and morality, they also demand that non-believers be put to death, condone slavery, fratricide, genocide, etc. (Koran Sura 4:74-78, 9:73, 9:123)(Deuteronomy 13:7-11).
The tens of millions of people that have died in the last decade that I refered to in my last post? All were killed for religious motives. For those taking part in the slaughter, they were simply carrying out their beliefs to the letter. An example:
Palestine (Jews v. Muslims) the Balkans (Orthodox Serbians v. Catholic Croations; Orthodox Serbians v. Bosnian and Albanian Muslims), Northern Ireland (Protestants v. Catholics), Kashmir (Muslims v. Hindus), Sudan-Darfur (Muslims v. Christians and animists) Nigeria (Muslims v. Christians), Ethiopia/Eritrea (Muslims v. Christians), Sri Lanka (Sinhalese Buddhists v. Tamil Hindus), Indonesia (Muslims v. Timorese Christians), the Caucasus (Orthodox Russians v. Chechen Muslims; Muslim Azerbaijanis v. Catholic and Orthodox Armenians), Mumbai (Muslims v. Hindus)
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These conflicts might be partly attributable to religious motives, but there were also other reasons. The struggle between Israel and Palestine could just as easily be thought of in the contexts of real estate and nationalism. So could the conflict in Northern Ireland. I think the attempt to attribute the origins of all of these conflicts to religion necessarily ignores other factors, like history and economics.
Religion plays a part, but one could just as easily raise a big stink about capitalism's role in each of these conflicts. What either explanation ignores is the fact that people are actually sentient beings, i.e. religion can't make someone do something.
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2) Islam and Christianity (and all major religions for that matter) believe that their religion is the correct one: they are Gods chosen people. If their faith is a path to salvation, they must concede that people with other beliefs are destined for eternal torment and hellfire. How can you truly respect someone when you know that their incorrect beliefs are going to be punished by an eternity in Hell?
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I'm not sure about Islam, but I know that there are over 1500 different denominations of Christianity currently in play. While there is probably a lot of overlap in their particular beliefs, it isn't entirely accurate to say that all Christians believe that they are all god's chosen people. Some of them don't even believe in hell.
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Religion/God cannot hope to compete with science in explaining the physical world around us. Religion remains only partly relevant in questions of ethics and morality...and religion gives less than perfect answers for these.
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I won't argue with that. Though I would like to point out that science has absolutely zero to say with respect to morality, and that there aren't any perfect answers when it comes to ethics and morality.
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Biological and anthropological science (particularly neuroscience) is beginning to give us insight into our inherent morality and our sense of "spirituality". In doing so, it is reminicient of chemistry destroying alchemy with scientific truth...I believe the same will true for religion in the near future.
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Except that along with every scientific discovery comes more questions. Religion will always have room to occupy that space between what we think we know and what we don't yet think we know.