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Your comment is basically the entire point of this article. There is no conflict between science and religion. There is a conflict between science and a fundame

by beojan 9y ago

Your comment is basically the entire point of this article. There is no conflict between science and religion. There is a conflict between science and a fundamentalist straw man of religion (biblical literalism, for instance, or the Graeco-Roman pantheon). I think the conflict idea is spread mostly by those who themselves encountered the idea that science and religion are in conflict before they learned much science or much about religion, so they've internalized the idea that the two are in conflict, and everything new they learn only serves to reinforce this.

humanrebar 9y ago
Agreed except there isn't a problem with biblical literalism. The arguments against biblical literalism generally boil down to metaphysical or theological arguments, which are fine, but they're not scientific. I'd challenge someone to demonstrate a bible passage that cannot be true given an all-powerful God. They generally come down to "Could God make a fossil record and evolution in a 24-hour period?" I don't see why not. You don't have to think it's true, but it's logically consistent assuming an omnipotent God is possible.
- beojan 9y ago
  The theological arguments are really much more important than the scientific ones. Genesis 6 conflicts with the basic monotheistic nature of Christianity, and means there's no real way to take Genesis literally while professing the Nicene creed (which pretty much defines Christianity).
  - oldandtired 9y ago
    In what way? Have you studied the underpinnings of the language used? Is this an interpretation based on you reading an English version of those passages? Pray tell why it undermines the monotheism of Christianity?
    - beojan 9y ago
      We're talking about taking Genesis literally. Genesis 6 uses the phrase "sons of God" which contradicts the Nicene creed which states "We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God".
      - humanrebar 9y ago
        The Nicene Creed was later amended in Constantinople to include the word "begotten" to clarify that Jesus was considered a natural born son of God, not simply an adopted son or someone with a special title. This was not an invention but a clarification since the word "begotten" (monogenēs in Greek) is used in the canonical bible, being one of the main points of John 1, but reaffirmed in Hebrews and John's first epistle. It's pretty clear that the Genesis 6 "sons of God" is an idiom or group title of some sort, but it's not clear precisely what was meant. More reading on the subject: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nephilim#Interpretations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nephilim#Interpretations EDIT: It's important to read the Bible in the genre and context it was written in. Taking the bible literally means taking it seriously, not being overly literal. Often the Bible often talks about people "lying together" when it clearly saying "had sex", for example.
        beojan 9y ago
        This is precisely my point. Why would you take this part metaphorically, but insist that God have literally created the world in 7 days? EDIT: I think you misunderstood slightly. I consider Christianity to be defined by the Nicene creed. You're a Christian if you profess the creed, and you're not if you don't. Ergo a literal reading of the bible is incompatible with Christianity.
        humanrebar 9y ago
        > Why would you take this part metaphorically, but insist that God have literally created the world in 7 days? There are a few schools of thought about this, but three popular ones are: 1. The creation story is a different genre. It's a poem, not a historical account, so you can think the Bible is absolutely true while allowing for poetic license in these chapters. The genre shifts back to history later in Genesis (with various opinions on where that is, some saying one creation passage of Genesis is poetic, the other historical). 2. The word "day" is mistranslated. It's better translated as "era". As in "back in the day". So Genesis is describing seven prehistoric eras. 3. Since the passage also refers to sunsets and sunrises, it's literally a rotation of the Earth. But God is omnipotent, so it's fine. ...and there are a few other competing thoughts. Do you have a scientific problem with any of the ones I listed? Other objections are fine, too, but I'm mostly trying to show how science and biblical literalism are fine together. The usual objections to #3 involve carbon dating, fossil records, etc., but none of them really refute the creation story as much as describe the world that already exists. Why couldn't God have created pre-decayed isotopes and a fossil record? That's a metaphysical and/or theological question, not a scientific one. So we don't really have a scientific conflict here. In my mind, God could have easily tweaked input parameters (to, say, make sure Earth has oceans and continents) and "JIT recompiled" the universe like so much source code. Why didn't Genesis describe the creation process more specifically? That's, again, a theological question, not a scientific one. But, practically, how would you describe, say, writing software, to a literate ancient Egyptian Jew (i.e, Moses)?
- api 9y ago
  There are infinitely many arbitrary statements. Prove the entire universe wasn't created as is (including all your memories) five minutes ago. These are neither true nor false in a factual sense. They are untestable.
  - beojan 9y ago
    > These are neither true nor false in a factual sense. They are untestable. Being untestable puts a statement outside the scope of science. It does not, however, mean the statement is neither true nor false (only that we cannot, through experiment, seek to improve our knowledge of whether it is true), nor does it mean the question is uninteresting or irrelevant.
d_theorist 9y ago
Of course, there is a conflict between religion and science. They are based on competing and inconsistent methods of acquiring knowledge. On one hand, the empirical scientific method, and on the other revelation, authority, and faith. Whether you're a Biblical literalist or a Church of England progressive, your religion makes some truth claims that are not supportable on scientific grounds. But this doesn't mean that science and religion necessarily have to be at war, or that one has to lose for the other to win. Human beings aren't perfectly logically consistent. We're quite adept at compartmentalising our minds so that we can apply one set of standards here and another there. A single human being can be a biblical literalist and a coldly-logical scientist at the same time.
- beojan 9y ago
  > your religion makes some truth claims that are not supportable on scientific grounds. We just have to accept that science isn't the sole arbiter of truth (in fact, science can't tell us what is true and what isn't, it can only tell us what is more likely to be true and what is less likely) and there are some matters outside the scope of science.
  - humanrebar 9y ago
    In particular, inductive reasoning starts reaching its limits when observability, reproducibility, and complexity are issues. Sometimes we invent things to push those boundaries (calculus, computers, drug trials on animals), but some complexity can be proven to be incalculable. And some results (The Milgram Experiment) are too terrible to reproduce to be worth the scientific knowledge they could offer. I think there's plenty we should be eager to learn, but I think it's realistic to think there are areas where "less incomplete understanding" is the best we can hope for.
  - krapp 9y ago
    >We just have to accept that science isn't the sole arbiter of truth (...) For the sake of argument, accepting that as true, why should religion then be accepted as the arbiter of truth for those matters outside the scope of science?

by beojan 9y ago

humanrebar 9y ago

Agreed except there isn't a problem with biblical literalism. The arguments against biblical literalism generally boil down to metaphysical or theological arguments, which are fine, but they're not scientific. I'd challenge someone to demonstrate a bible passage that cannot be true given an all-powerful God. They generally come down to "Could God make a fossil record and evolution in a 24-hour period?" I don't see why not. You don't have to think it's true, but it's logically consistent assuming an omnipotent God is possible.

beojan 9y ago
The theological arguments are really much more important than the scientific ones. Genesis 6 conflicts with the basic monotheistic nature of Christianity, and means there's no real way to take Genesis literally while professing the Nicene creed (which pretty much defines Christianity).
- oldandtired 9y ago
  In what way? Have you studied the underpinnings of the language used? Is this an interpretation based on you reading an English version of those passages? Pray tell why it undermines the monotheism of Christianity?
  - beojan 9y ago
    We're talking about taking Genesis literally. Genesis 6 uses the phrase "sons of God" which contradicts the Nicene creed which states "We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God".
    - humanrebar 9y ago
      The Nicene Creed was later amended in Constantinople to include the word "begotten" to clarify that Jesus was considered a natural born son of God, not simply an adopted son or someone with a special title. This was not an invention but a clarification since the word "begotten" (monogenēs in Greek) is used in the canonical bible, being one of the main points of John 1, but reaffirmed in Hebrews and John's first epistle. It's pretty clear that the Genesis 6 "sons of God" is an idiom or group title of some sort, but it's not clear precisely what was meant. More reading on the subject: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nephilim#Interpretations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nephilim#Interpretations EDIT: It's important to read the Bible in the genre and context it was written in. Taking the bible literally means taking it seriously, not being overly literal. Often the Bible often talks about people "lying together" when it clearly saying "had sex", for example.
      - beojan 9y ago
        This is precisely my point. Why would you take this part metaphorically, but insist that God have literally created the world in 7 days? EDIT: I think you misunderstood slightly. I consider Christianity to be defined by the Nicene creed. You're a Christian if you profess the creed, and you're not if you don't. Ergo a literal reading of the bible is incompatible with Christianity.
        humanrebar 9y ago
        > Why would you take this part metaphorically, but insist that God have literally created the world in 7 days? There are a few schools of thought about this, but three popular ones are: 1. The creation story is a different genre. It's a poem, not a historical account, so you can think the Bible is absolutely true while allowing for poetic license in these chapters. The genre shifts back to history later in Genesis (with various opinions on where that is, some saying one creation passage of Genesis is poetic, the other historical). 2. The word "day" is mistranslated. It's better translated as "era". As in "back in the day". So Genesis is describing seven prehistoric eras. 3. Since the passage also refers to sunsets and sunrises, it's literally a rotation of the Earth. But God is omnipotent, so it's fine. ...and there are a few other competing thoughts. Do you have a scientific problem with any of the ones I listed? Other objections are fine, too, but I'm mostly trying to show how science and biblical literalism are fine together. The usual objections to #3 involve carbon dating, fossil records, etc., but none of them really refute the creation story as much as describe the world that already exists. Why couldn't God have created pre-decayed isotopes and a fossil record? That's a metaphysical and/or theological question, not a scientific one. So we don't really have a scientific conflict here. In my mind, God could have easily tweaked input parameters (to, say, make sure Earth has oceans and continents) and "JIT recompiled" the universe like so much source code. Why didn't Genesis describe the creation process more specifically? That's, again, a theological question, not a scientific one. But, practically, how would you describe, say, writing software, to a literate ancient Egyptian Jew (i.e, Moses)?
api 9y ago
There are infinitely many arbitrary statements. Prove the entire universe wasn't created as is (including all your memories) five minutes ago. These are neither true nor false in a factual sense. They are untestable.
- beojan 9y ago
  > These are neither true nor false in a factual sense. They are untestable. Being untestable puts a statement outside the scope of science. It does not, however, mean the statement is neither true nor false (only that we cannot, through experiment, seek to improve our knowledge of whether it is true), nor does it mean the question is uninteresting or irrelevant.

d_theorist 9y ago

Of course, there is a conflict between religion and science. They are based on competing and inconsistent methods of acquiring knowledge. On one hand, the empirical scientific method, and on the other revelation, authority, and faith. Whether you're a Biblical literalist or a Church of England progressive, your religion makes some truth claims that are not supportable on scientific grounds. But this doesn't mean that science and religion necessarily have to be at war, or that one has to lose for the other to win. Human beings aren't perfectly logically consistent. We're quite adept at compartmentalising our minds so that we can apply one set of standards here and another there. A single human being can be a biblical literalist and a coldly-logical scientist at the same time.

beojan 9y ago
> your religion makes some truth claims that are not supportable on scientific grounds. We just have to accept that science isn't the sole arbiter of truth (in fact, science can't tell us what is true and what isn't, it can only tell us what is more likely to be true and what is less likely) and there are some matters outside the scope of science.
- humanrebar 9y ago
  In particular, inductive reasoning starts reaching its limits when observability, reproducibility, and complexity are issues. Sometimes we invent things to push those boundaries (calculus, computers, drug trials on animals), but some complexity can be proven to be incalculable. And some results (The Milgram Experiment) are too terrible to reproduce to be worth the scientific knowledge they could offer. I think there's plenty we should be eager to learn, but I think it's realistic to think there are areas where "less incomplete understanding" is the best we can hope for.
- krapp 9y ago
  >We just have to accept that science isn't the sole arbiter of truth (...) For the sake of argument, accepting that as true, why should religion then be accepted as the arbiter of truth for those matters outside the scope of science?