Slate is a much more science-friendly venue than Salon, thanks largely to Slate’s rational editors and its avoidance of Salon-style clickbait. But its science section did publish an accommodationist piece in late October, “Do science and religion conflict?”, by Rachel Gross, that I think needs a bit of critique. I’ve sat on this for a while due to the press of work.
The piece’s main problem is that it sees science and religion as non-conflicting because most religious people (actually, only about half) feel that science and religion don’t conflict, though nonbelievers do see more conflict. In other words, Gross mistakes perceptions for reality. If you’ve read Faith Versus Fact (available in fine bookstores everywhere), you’ll know that my concern is less with perception than with reality. Does faith lead religious people to perceive as “true” some things that would be rejected or doubted by the application of a scientific approach?
In my view, the real conflict acts on three levels. First, the methods used to judge propositions as true differs radically and irreconcilably between science and religion. The former uses scripture, revelation, and dogma; the latter all the armamentarium of science: empirical observation, prediction, testing, doubt, peer review, blinded methods, statistics, etc.
Second, the outcomes of religious versus scientific approaches to understanding differ: the “truths” arrived at by religion (and I’m talking here about factual truths, like the Resurrection, Muhammed’s reception of the Qur’an from God, the existence of an afterlife, and so on) are not accepted scientifically, though most believers (see below) see them as factual. The inability of religious people to find genuine truth is amply shown by the conflicting factual claims of different faiths (one example: if you’re a Christian, you probably think that the only way to heaven is through accepting Jesus as Savior, while Muslims feel that such a belief will send you straight to Hell).
Finally, the inability of religion to give convincing evidence for its claims leads to a philosophical incompatibility: since empirical study of the universe has historically advanced our understanding by completely ignoring the divine and supernatural, we see, like Laplace, no need for that hypothesis. In other words, the practice of science is explicitly atheistic, leading, if you’re consistent, to a philosophical view that there’s no evidence for gods.
But, looking at a Pew study published in October, Gross finds comity between science and faith, using the data shown below. Several other places have also trumpeted these results as showing a harmony between the two “magisteria”:
Note that the top figure shows that nearly 60% of all Americans see science and religion as often in conflict although, as one might expect from an elementary knowledge of psychology, a lot more people don’t think that science conflicts with their own beliefs. That’s no surprise. And the less religious you are, at least judged by church attendance, the more conflict you see.
But here’s Gross’s take on the data:
After all, don’t religion and science represent two opposing worldviews, as fundamentally incompatible as oil and water? Isn’t it true that the more committed you are to the one, the more likely you are to reject the other?
Well, no. And if you believe that, you’re probably not religious. That’s the takeaway of a newly released Pew Research Center survey on religion and science, which asked more than 2,000 respondents whether they believed that science and religion were in conflict. Those who subscribe to the idea that science and religion exist in tense, perpetual opposition are largely those without a religion themselves, the survey found.
Gross, however, argues that the negative correlation between faith and perception of conflict simply means that nonbelievers don’t understand the views of the religious:
You’d think the religious would know what contradicts their own beliefs, right? In fact, the findings say more about the assumptions of nonreligious Americans than they do about religious ones, says Robert P. Jones, a religion scholar and CEO of the nonprofit Public Religion Research Institute.
“The people who are farther away from religion themselves tend to see stronger conflict, because they’re not as close to actual religious people,” says Jones. “They aren’t seeing all those people who don’t have a conflict.” Instead, what they see of the religious community is generally what’s depicted in the media: all-out warfare. The media tends to focus on those rare flashpoints of controversy, such as fights over evolution and the content of science textbooks, and to highlight the most outspoken conservative fundamentalists. For the nonreligious, these strong voices become the faces of religion, and these flashpoints become evidence that religion and science are in conflict.
Well, no, I’m not willing to buy that religious people, as opposed to nonbelievers—many of whom are former believers—know best what contradicts their own beliefs. Because most Americans are supportive of science in general, it’s only natural that their desire to avoid cognitive dissonance makes them feel that their own religious beliefs don’t conflict with science.
Many of these accommodatiions, for instance, subscribe to some version Steve Gould’s misguided notion of “Nonoverlapping Magisteria” (NOMA), whereby science’s domain is finding out truth about the cosmos, and religion’s bailiwick is that of meaning, morals, and values. That’s bogus because many believers actually see their religion as asserting factual truths about the cosmos (see the many testimonies to that effect in FvF), while, on the other side plenty of secularists base their philosophies, ethics, and values, on purely secular considerations (viz., Kant, Hume, Mill, Spinoza, Singer, Rawls, Grayling, ad infinitum). In fact, the biggest opponents of the NOMA solution aren’t nonbelievers but believers and theologians! Here are two; the first is by Christian physicist Ian Hutchinson:
But the religion [Gould] is making room for is empty of any claims to historical or scientific fact, doctrinal authority, and supernatural experience. Such a religion, whatever be its attractions to the liberal scientistic mind, could never be Christianity, or for that matter, Judaism or Islam.
And this by Catholic theologian John Haught, one of his faith’s more liberal thinkers:
A closer look at Gould’s writings about science and religion will show that he could reconcile them only by understanding religion in a way that most religious people themselves cannot countenance. Contrary to the nearly universal religious sense that religion puts us in touch with the true depths of the real, Gould denied by implication that religion can ever give us anything like reliable knowledge of what is. at is the job of science alone. . . . Still, Gould could not espouse the idea that religion in any sense gives us truth.
I’ve taken the liberty of reproducing some of the text from FvF below as an “e-appendix”, so you can see some of the claims about reality made by the faithful. It is those and related claims supposedly giving “reliable knowledge of what is” that raised the hackles of Hutchinson and Haught.
Near the end, Gross reprises her claim that the main lesson from the Pew data is that nonbelievers don’t have an accurate idea of how many religious people see no conflict; ergo there is no conflict. As she notes:
That’s not to say conflict doesn’t exist; it does. But most religious people don’t view science in general as the enemy. Instead, they bristle at a few specific issues: Of those who said science conflicted with their own personal beliefs, most cited the specific example of Darwinian evolution, followed by abortion and the Big Bang.
. . . All this is to say that we may know less than we think about those who are different than us.
I wish Gross had considered this proposition: “Believers tend to see less conflict between science and religion because they want to feel that they can be down with science but keep their faith.” It’s a way of avoiding mental conflict. What’s manifestly true is that nearly all believers make some claims about reality that do conflict with science. For liberal Christians, it’s usually the divinity and resurrection of Jesus: the “non-negotiable” of Christianity. And those claims, no matter what their adherents assert, are in palpable conflict with science.
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Appendix: From Faith versus Fact (text from the book indented):
The most recent survey of Americans, a Harris poll of representative citizens taken in 2013, shows a surprisingly large number of people who accept supernatural claims. Besides the 54 percent who are “absolutely certain there is a God” (an additional 14 percent are “somewhat certain”), belief in things like the divinity of Jesus, miracles, the existence of heaven, hell, Satan, angels, and the survival of the soul after death, are all above 56 percent. In contrast, only 47 percent believed in Darwin’s theory of evolution (we scientists prefer to use “accept” rather than “believe” when we speak of scientific theories). Further, 39 percent of American conceive of God as male, but only 1 percent as female (38 percent see God as “neither”), supporting the idea that if people see God as a bodiless person, it often has genitalia. As for the veracity of scripture, 33 percent accepted the Old Testament as being “completely the Word of God,” while 31 percent gave the same answer for the New Testament. Remember, these statistics were from a sample of all Americans, not just believers. Scriptural literalism is certainly widespread in the United States—in fact, depending on the claim, it’s often a majority view.
I then describe a poll that atheist Julian Baggini did—granted, not a systematic poll—of English churchgoers, expecting to find that they went to church for the social amenities and communality rather than to buttress specific beliefs. But that’s not quite what he found:
. . . Baggini was astonished at the literalism of those who answered. Asked why they went to church, for instance, 66 percent responded that they did so “to worship God,” while only 20 percent went for the “feeling of community” (so much for claims that the social aspects of religion far outweigh its dogma!). There was also widespread agreement that the stories in Genesis, such as Adam and Eve, really happened (29 percent), that Jesus performed miracles such as that of the loaves and fishes (76 percent), that Jesus’s death on the cross was necessary for forgiveness of human sin (75 percent), that Jesus was bodily resurrected (81 percent), and that eternal life required accepting Jesus as lord and savior (44 percent). Chastened, Baggini retracted his previous views:
“So what is the headline finding? It is that whatever some might say about religion being more about practice than belief, more praxis than dogma, more about the moral insight of mythos than the factual claims of logos, the vast majority of churchgoing Christians appear to believe orthodox doctrine at pretty much face value. . . . it is, I think, a firm riposte to those who dismiss atheists, especially the “new” variety, as being fixated on the literal beliefs associated with religion rather than ethos or practice. It suggests that they are not attacking straw men when they criticise religion for promoting superstitious and supernatural beliefs.”
My text goes on, discussing the widespread Qur’anic literalism of Muslims (among the world’s strongest deniers of evolution), as well as the religious dogma of Christians in the rest of the world, but you get the point.
““The people who are farther away from religion themselves tend to see stronger conflict, because they’re not as close to actual religious people,” says Jones.”
This type of claim – that nonbelievers don’t really understand believers – always baffles me. Many (most?) of us nonbelievers were raised in a religion and were religious at some point in our lives, and still have family and friends who are religious. I’m quite familiar with religious belief, thank you very much.
I think that when believers make the claim that nonbelievers don’t understand, they are doing so in regards to their personal interpretation of the bible, whereas nonbelievers tend to look at the big picture without focusing on specific teachings of an isolated branch of the religion. An example that I see happen all the time is when the nonbeliever points to some horrid verse in the OT perhaps about stoning children in Deuteronomy and then they might claim “if you actually followed your Bible 100% literally, you’d be out stoning children instead of cherry picking the verses you like versus those you don’t like”. Then, the Christian might claim that it’s “Old Testament and it’s not meant or intended for us.. That was an old law for people back then”. Frankly, if that’s how they get around it without having dissonance, then fine, but it doesn’t make it any better whether it is for today or yesterday. It doesn’t change the level of cruelty no matter the period or people it was intended for. But anyway, I think that’s why they often claim that we take things out of context or that we read it but don’t bother to learn it’s intention. Problem is, everyone has a different opinion about the intention or what was “meant” by the context.
The excuse that “those were different times” is one that particularly bugs me. Even if it was true that people were different (it’s not – it’s about the ability to get away with stuff), it’s still the same god. If he’s always right, why has he changed his mind?
Perhaps it was the realization that denying his followers bacon butties was just too onerous. 🙂
Yes and the Christian God is supposed to be forever so why would he be a dick in the past but nic now? He’s either not the god he was cracked up to be or he doesn’t exist.
Careful now. I think calling someone a nic could be viewed a racist. BTW, wasn’t God kind of brown back then?
https://jonathanturley.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/jesus-real.jpg
Ha! That was supposed to be “not”.
Actually ‘nice’ would have worked too. 😉
It’s as if we’re seeing God mature – he was young and foolish then… In The NEW testament he gets it right.
Yeah, although I think we now need the new, New Testament, where the saviour is a woman of colour with a wife who spends her time campaigning for environmental causes and animal rights.
I recall being warned, by a well-read Baptist minister all the way back in the 80s, not to be seduced by ‘process theology’.
The claim that “nonbelievers don’t really understand believers” is often intended to shift the debate away from the important underlying issue (which deals with truth and how we know it) and move the “controversy” into a territory where the religious feel more secure.
“Atheists think all Christians are Young Earth Creationists. But all Christians AREN’T Young Earth Creationists! If only atheists would look around and talk to more kinds of religious people, they would agree that there’s no necessary conflict between science and religion at all. Alas, alas, for the ignorant atheist!”
Our protests that no, that’s not what we mean fall on deaf ears. It’s just too convenient a misinterpretation for them.
I think the advocates of religious and scientific harmony are missing the ocean for the raindrops. This isn’t about comity of specific beliefs; it’s about the responsibility and integrity invoked when dealing with truth and untruth.
Science and religion cannot be reconciled because they stem from two completely different starting points: the former from strict reason, the latter from faith-based thinking. Science and religion are simply the most obvious examples of the much wider phenomenon of rationality against faith. Other conflicts between the two can be found in various pseudosciences, conspiracy theories, and pretty much anywhere a shoddy technique or system is kept alive in spite of its weaknesses.
For example, wishful thinking is a dead end in science because it runs roughshod over the needs for impartiality, evidence, and logical consistency. If your pet belief turns out to be true, that’s an irrelevant coincidence: it’ll be by other means that you actually validate it. If anything, wishful thinking is a recognized hazard because it motivates biases and short-sighted investigations, which cannot be reconciled with the demands for rigorous weeding out of such things.
In faith-based thinking, wishful thinking is able to run rampant. It’s what’ll keep an idea going for much longer than a skeptic would allow, because it softens normal standards enough to admit an exception that is dear to a person’s heart. Faith as a whole is someone wanting the privileges of being correct without having to meet any risky standards. It is, in a word, cheating.
That’s why most religious advocates don’t see a conflict between their beliefs and science. In their one-sided, rose-tinted view of the world, their beliefs are up there with the big boys in the same league. It’s just ignorant or outright deluded fanboyism.
Yes! Exactly! I wish I’d written that. 🙂
Well put. That’s why faith-based thinking blurs distinctions between facts and values.
When and where is “wishful thinking” legitimately considered a virtue? When we’re talking about an ideal goal, one which involves striving or hoping for improvement. We can only work to end war, promote peace, eliminate poverty, or ensure justice if we WISH for a better world and BELIEVE that it’s at least possible for things to get better. See? “Wishful thinking.”
Now let’s pretend that religious claims about God, an afterlife, and the supernatural all fit into the same category! Having faith that God exists is now like having “faith” that good is better than evil and we ought to work at that. It’s all “wishful thinking” and it’s all equally ennobling. Faith is wanting the privileges we grant to shared values to bleed over into controversial facts.
Yup. They’re cheating. The rascals.
Worse: simply wishing for a better world in some respect or other won’t do anything, just like wishing for an afterlife. But in the first case, presumably one can do something to help build the new, whereas one has no control over whether or not there’s an afterlife (F. Tipler notwithstanding.).
Great comment. Thanks.
Well put!
Always an interesting diversion. Science is fairly well characterized, but religion is not. Conflict or not, take your pick. Mox dix.
I am not sure why the religious would have a conflict over the Big Bang, except in the stated time in which it occurred and in the sequence of events. But those seem like minor issues that religious people could easily distort to comport with the Bible. They do as much when they see flood geology laid out for them in the Grand Canyon.
The Big Bang isn’t a problem for religionists who allow for the time frame to be OK (hence Young Earth creationists reject the science becauise it conflicts with their a priori doctrines, while Intelligent Design advocates burble over the event as it does not conflict with their a prioro doctrines).
On the other hand, some religionists do have another sort of problem with the big bang – they distort and misrepresent it as the divine fiat or the like.
“Gross, however, argues that the negative correlation between faith and perception of conflict simply means that nonbelievers don’t understand the views of the religious”
I immediately read that survey result entirely differently than Gross. I suspect non-believers are more scientifically literate, and therefor recognize conflicts, and the import of them that believers don’t.
*Not non-believers, but people who take religion less seriously rather.
I also suspect that’s a possibility that Gross wouldn’t consider since it’s essentially saying the more religious you are the more ignorant you are.
Scientific literacy (best grade and level of qualification in science?) would be an interesting aspect for Pew to have explored, as a counterpart to frequency of worship.
But I suspect few “nones” really understand how devastatingly science (specifically the Standard Model of physics and the LHC) undermines many claims of religion (e.g., “God speaks to me”, the afterlife). See Sean Carroll’s talk at Skepticon 5.
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The reason why religious claims should carry little weight has little to do with the LHC or any physics, its because the texts the believer holds dear do not stand up to scrutiny (and this was as true for Tom Paine in 1794 as today, long before particle physics). Attempts to jujitsu faith convictions relate more to cognitive science work, not physics, so best leave the anti-Natural Theology arguments Sean Carroll is fond of over on the sideline as amusing but largely irrelevant.
Well, yes, but that doesn’t speak to the conflict between science and religion.
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I see a heirarchy to how religions bump into empirical reality (where science is the applicable investigative tool). Any religion that makes claims about the physical universe that turn out to be wrong are in my view “falsified.” The Aztecs’ belief in ripping peoples’ hearts out to keep the sun rising was empirically falsified both by our scientific understanding of the earth’s rotation, but by the continuing appearance of the sun long after the heart ripping thing was ended.
You can see the similar problem the Abrahamic religions face, insofar as they hold to the Genesis model of the universe’s origin (where stars are younger than plant life). Empirically falsified.
Modern non-literalist Christianity would be an example of goalpost-moving and metaphorizing of awkward texts, and defenders of those positions are trying to evade the impact of scientific discovery by those dodges.
Now there are aspects of religious beliefs that are not refutable in this way, relating to normative philosophy (shoulds and oughts) and many a religious apologist tries to pin their faith on those hooks while downplaying the empirical speedbump side of things.
So long as you realize the shift in domains though, you can still apply analytical reasoning by focusing on the evasion of the core presumptive texts, but that actually relates to logical and source methods criteria rather than scientific techniques per se.
To the extent that a religious faith walls itself off from any refutation of the belief based on external scientific or historical evidence, then that religion is in conflict with the “chips fall where they may” method science and historical scholarship embodies and requires to function honestly.
To the extent that the faith tries to waffle around the bumps (and this is where the accommodationism debate generally fights their battles) they may be rightly accused of evasion, even as they try to have their cake & eat it (while depending on science to bake it).
I think you’ve obfuscated your point here, James.
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Obfuscated in what way? I’m offering concrete examples (Aztecs & Christianity, though others could be employed along the same spectrum) on what I regard as falsification criteria insofar as science is concerned, and went on to specify areas (and the analytical reasons for them) where science is not actually the issue where the religion may be gumming up.
Then you’ve missed my point.
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Apparently so. Try restating your point so I may see what it is.
Seeing that your religion has no overall conflict with science, except for, oh, some of its central theories like evolution, eternal inflation, the lack of free will and so on… reminds me of how people frequently just Photoshop over how things are with how things should be. The instinct to avoid cognitive dissonance seems a likely culprit.
In our student evaluations one question asks students to tell their expected grade. It is funny that they pretty much all think that they are above average.
I suppose it’s possible to still support the idea of NOMA and be a scientist, if you circumscribe the religious domain to things like the appropriate hat to wear.
NOMA works because it is so easy to do. You can believe anything and know that the world is opposite of that thing. From my perspective, delusions require no effect, only desire.
The religious-science types sometimes think a heap of faith is needed to maintain their beliefs, but I insist it is the desire alone, the selfish need to want to go to heaven that makes all of their longing for delusion an easy obstacle to overcome.
Beginning of rant; I apologize for the length.
I would argue that science and religion conflict. Simply, science relies on being able to change with new evidence, while religion relies on revelation which by definition cannot change. Therefore, they conflict in terms of being able to understand the naturalistic universe. As shown with the case of Adam and Eve and modern population genetics, they also can conflict factually.
However, it is annoying (at least to me) when those who argue that science and religion are in conflict claim that accommodationists must have some form of cognitive dissonance over their opinion of the relationship between religion and science. As if the concept of science and religion being in conflict is so obvious that naturally anyone who disagrees does not disagree simply because they have opposing arguments or have differing beginning assumptions but because they are forcing themselves not to understand the so obvious fact that science and religion conflict. The arrogance that they are able to understand the psychological workings of others just by a few statements or arguments is, in my opinion, ridiculous. It is similar but not akin to those Christians who claim that all atheists do actually believe in God but they are repressing such belief due to wanting to sin.
On that line, it is doubly annoying when the person tries to make some claim that religious scientists are being immoral or selfish by being both religious and scientists. Just because some holds a different view does mean that that person is being immoral or selfish unless you have other information to back up the claim that that person is being immoral or selfish. Mistakes in logic and reasoning are not immoral or selfish in themselves. Granted, you could argue that to be religious is to be immoral, but at least in my opinion, that seems to be a stretch.
In conclusion, unless we know the person quite well and therefore do understand at least part of their personality, on what basis can we decide why they hold a certain position?
End of rant: I apologize if I offended anyone. That was not my intention.
And there’s no ONE appropriate hat to wear! They’re all okay! To each their own, live and let live, I don’t care what you wear and in return you don’t care what *I* wear.
Those silly atheists, acting like there’s only one kind of hat. Just like fundamentalists. They’re creating discord where none exists.
Nothing smooths over disagreement like shallow thinking and conflict avoidance.
They will say that all hats are equally wonderful until they’re blue in the face, but of course, deep down, they’re certain their hat is the most appropriate, most true, best hat.
(Where “they” = proglib theists)
Ah, but their hat is the culmination of all the other hats, which are sweet but child-like attempts to grope their way to haberdashery perfection.
And then they’ll try to tell you the story about the blind men and the elephant.
“We’re all right, but I’m righter.” Sounds like “more equal”.
I’d challenge an ecumenicism-monger to convert to a different religion every month. It’s all just one big elephant, right? Why not? Put your money where your mouth is. Sure, they’d rationalize away their reluctance, but the point would be they’d be reluctant. Why? What’s wrong with those other parts of the elephant?
I know some many-parts-of-the-same-elephant ecumenicists who have attended and worshiped and adapted to several different religions, tellinbg the rosary one week and bowing towards Mecca another, all while blissfully following the Buddha. They skate on the surface of religion and for the most part the more sincere and committed followers of different faiths seem to have been happy to accommodate them. Even atheists would be welcome to come in and pray along with most congregations. If we were to also insist that faith and God were of paramount importance in every life, the welcome would be extended.
Where the ecumenicism breaks down is when the I-embrace-it-all types are asked if those who think there is only one way to God are WRONG. They’re not allowed to say or think anyone’s religious views are “wrong.” Time to change the subject!
Perhaps I’m overly cynical or maybe even projecting, but I still wouldn’t be surprised to learn, if it was somehow possible, that there was a little ecumenicist-ego inside that ecumenicist’s brain congratulating itself for doing everything The Correct Way, which might be a melange of religious practices, and which implies that others are doing it The Incorrect Way (whether the ecumenicist would admit as much or not), even as the ecumenicist’s mouth waxes ecstatic about the validity of all the Many Paths.
(Is that a run-on?)
Surely millinery, not haberdashery, perfection. 😁
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A bit of slapdashery on my part, gentle sir. I stand corrected.
lol
Very true, few religions will concede the independent discovery of fundamemental truths to their competition (or worse, truths not embraced in their own conception). They can permit other faiths to operate as benighted subsets of their own, though (“No matter which god you pray to, it’s Vishnu who answers the prayer” sort of thing).
Isn’t a good part of the reason that believers see less conflict because they simply ignore the science. Their faith tells them the science is bogus and that is good enough for them. They don’t believe in evolution because they don’t look at it, study it – it’s wrong. Just to sit down and read WEIT would be a bad idea and a waste of my time.
On the other hand, the science minded most certainly sees the conflict because they took the time to learn. They know it is true and can not imagine how anyone cannot. Not having any religion in this person has nothing to do with learning the science but then, there is nothing in the way either.
And the science minded person is also affected by the annoying things believers do like trying to alter the science curriculum or sneaking prayer in everywhere. Religion is much harder to escape in a secular society given the furor of Christians and to a lesser degree, Muslims. So, we see the conflict much more clearly because we are constantly bombarded with this stuff. Believers only here their own side and they are used to banging on about things.
Here=hear. Homophonia phobia strikes again!
Yes, and we have to continue to support the Freedom From Religion folks who fight to keep these maniacs out of the schools and out of politics at every level. The faith loving folks are like sand at the beach, they get into everything.
There is a notable difference between the squishy religious apologetics of otherwise science-minded folk of the BioLogos stripe (Francis Collins comes readily to mind) and the Kulturkampf ideology of Answers in Genesis (YEC) and the Discovery Institute (ID).
The latter groups carry a methods baggage which would target much of modern science if only given a whack at it. Distinguishing the two camps (their demographics and mythological baggage) is of considerable importance when it comes to defending science education and funding thereof, especially when it comes to maintaining workable science defense alliances.
Part of the success of Kulturkampf antievolutionism has been finding common cause with religious believers that wouldn’t but into all the YEC baggage if they stopped to look. And if too many non-Kulturkampf religious believers come to feel that science is inevitably a stalking horse for atheism, it won’t make defending science education in the public realm one bit easier.
Personally I regard the camps (with regards to science *only*) as a matter of degree. After all something immaterial and somehow outside of all spacetimes is not very scientific. Ditto miracles, faith based reasoning, etc.
“Isn’t a good part of the reason that believers see less conflict because they simply ignore the science.”
That’s similar to a point I made in another comment. My point being that the less religious would be more scientifically literate, but yeah part of that gap is likely due to the fact that the more religious are simply ignoring science.
In my experience, the ‘faiths’ that claim science is wrong are those that have a direct conflict between what they believe and accepted scientific theory. Plenty of people believe in both evolution and Christ and experience no conflict in doing so.
The second part of the first question could skew things because if you have no religion, of course science would not contradict it. I looked briefly at the methodology for collecting the information from those surveyed and didn’t notice if this question were only asked if someone said they were religious.
Quite right: I was going to make this very point until I saw your comment.
Yes, I think I get the point. Accommodationists fail. The reason, perhaps, is a form of confirmation bias. The feeling that society needs to feel good about itself for it to function effectively and to be empirically truthful risks a morbid sense of loss and ultimate disintegration. Keep the faith baby.
Gross beheads herself with minutia of poll re-affirmation, perspectives endorsement, and feel good, need-the-truth-to-be-butterflies-and-rainbows harmony.
Consider asking my iPhone to be run off Angel Power. This is the equivalent of contemplating that science and religion are the same. It is about considering what religion purports to be and it is wholly incompatible with the observable world; which is why we use science as the tool for discriminating the understanding from the natural world and not religion.
Rachel Gross *did* write a fairly good article November 19 in Slate that belief in Evolution was beating Creationism.
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2015/11/polls_americans_believe_in_evolution_less_in_creationism.html
A few months ago, I had a conversation with a Catholic who was adamant his worldview didn’t contradict in science. When I brought up all the miracles he believed in, he claimed there was no conflict because God can suspend how nature works and that it doesn’t overturn any science to believe in it.
Self-proclamations of compatibility are vastly overrated.
The explanation your acquaintance gave for how religion and science are compatible is his way to reconcile cognitive dissonance. He wants the best of both worlds: the benefits of science and the psychological comforts that the dogma of his religion brings to him. I know an arch Catholic whose views are similar. He seems to easily accept science while spouting religious nonsense. A few days ago he was going on about the existence of angels. Every Saturday he gets up at 3:00 A.M. to go to his church for an adoration of the Virgin Mary. And, of course, he goes to Mass every day with virtually no exceptions. Such is the power of delusion.
I really wouldn’t care so much, except in the same breath he dismissed Creationism as irrational for its incompatibility of science and religion, and derides the “new atheists” for prioritising science over metaphysics. There’s really not anywhere one can go from there.
Yes, that’s like saying homeopathy isn’t in conflict with modern chemistry because homeopathy works using DIFFERENT laws of chemistry. Everywhere else, the laws work fine.
Compartmentalism: always a good choice.
A piano teacher I know indulges in homeopathy. He is amazing at the keyboard. But, he seems a bit Asperger’s. Totally non-skeptical. When his parents died the will stated that all the estate should remain under the control of an aunt. I can understand why. Also, BTW, he is evangelical.
I’ve heard quite a lot of apologists of all sorts of pseudoscientists (and proponents on pseudoscience) use this option. I’ve never really understood why it’s an appealing option, unless the goal is the pyrrhic victory of being not even wrong. Like the dualist who says that mind cannot be brain, they eventually have to get back to how we as biochemical organisms can be affected by such non-physical things. There’s a reason the mind-body problem is the prime argument levelled against dualism, and it’s been levelled against it for nearly 400 years. Same thing applies with these pseudosciences.
I think that part of this fallacy’s appeal is its superficial resemblance to situations where the fallacy isn’t a fallacy, but true (that probably drives all fallacies, when you get right down to it.) For example, when we measure phenomena or events at the subatomic level, we use quantum physics or mechanics. We apply a different standard to questions of legality than we do to questions of civility. The rules for catching a fish aren’t the same rules we use when cooking a fish. And so on.
To the discontinuous mind, this all looks like compartmentalization. They then go on to include ‘subtle distinctions’ of classification like remedies which get stronger when you dilute them or Jesus walking on water and the rest of science works the same. You’re in a different area, see? Like with quantum and classical physics. No contradiction!
Their idea of what constitutes harmony and disharmony is way off.
Good observation. The fishing examples slides from the empirical side (fish as evolved live forms with properties) to the ethical issues involved in the disturbance of their life for our dining (though the scientist could weigh in even here by reminded us of our omnivorous evolutionary heritage and biology attuned to that).
Amazing that people can say “suspend how nature works” in the same breath as “no conflict” and not use an appropriate negation.
And amazing that they are the same people who claim scientism is a problem.
There are two main ways for religious people to reconcile themselves to the tidal wave of science that was never anticipated in their religion’s history of things.
The conservatives among them will simply deny the science is science. Kulturkampf antievolutionists are examplars in this, with Young Earth creationists flushing more of the science down the drain than their squishier Intelligent Design cousins, but all have dogmatic claims that are non-negotiable and no science or history is ever allowed to conflict with them.
More liberal religionists still have dogmatic trenches to defend, but are able to metaphorize any older texts so as to remove the seeming (but actually quite real) conflicts. Hence Genesis’ details become mere textual oddity and not the way people actually imagined reality to be.
Both camps can imagine they adore science, they differ in how finicky they are about the details (which the Kulturkampfers largely do not study in detail, the subject of my #TIP project at http://www.tortucan.wordpress.com on the methodology of creationism.
As for Gould’s NOMA, its problematic feature is falsely drawing a line where there wasn’t one, but as I proposed in http://www.twowordculture.com/tip/files/NOMA-Revisited-2014.pdf Gould erred in trying to divide science and religion, sliding past a more useful distinction: empirical scientific knowledge vs normative philosophical beliefs. There we do have a divide (and in reading Jerry’s writings over the years I think in practical terms he recognizes exactly that separation), and many a debater on both sides of the religion/science fence stumbles by not appreciating when thy have jumped from decidable to undecidable issues while trying to keep the same tool kit.
Logical analysis and scholarly method do allow commentary on good or bad methods in both domains, btw, though cannot of themselves resolve questions without diving down to the data floor, where once more you have to pay attention to whether the issue is a scientific evidential or philosophical assumtive one.
“armamentarium” — Thanks for the new word added to my idiolect. (Then again, I only realized I had an idiolect upon recently adding “idiolect” to my idiolect.)
And thanks for adding “idiolect” to mine. 🙂
“armamentarium”…“idiolect”…got it!
While I believe Nonoverlapping Magisteria to be one of the stupidest propositions ever advanced by an intelligent person (since all human experience overlaps in its shared accessibility to humans, it is fair game to all disciplines that deal with the human condition) you fail to give fair consideration to the divergence between scientific and philosophical-religious enquiry. For example, you write: “if you’re a Christian, you probably think that the only way to heaven is through accepting Jesus as Savior, while Muslims feel that such a belief will send you straight to Hell.” Since there is no scientifically rigorous definition of “heaven,” “savior,” or “hell,” there is no way to evaluate those claims scientifically. As Bart Ehrman has explained about his scholarly work, the claim that Jesus is the risen son of God is a theological claim which he, as a historian, cannot evaluate. What he can do is assess the historical likelihood that Jesus claimed to be the son of God or that he emerged living (i.e. walking, talking, eating, breathing) from his tomb. So it is possible for science and religion to coexist, as long as their practitioners recognize the differences between the things they do. They can also provide a healthy check upon the excesses of one another’s claims. Regards, Arnold Karr Columbia, SC
Originally Islam Is Not Straight Deny About Evolution,But Islam Thought Supporting “Evolution Illahiyah” (God’s Evolution-God Way Evolution). Islam Thought Deny to Darwin Evolution,Because Tend ATHEIS. For More Clear You Can Goggling About Mr Jurnalis Uddin And His Paper With Title “Adam Bukan Manusia Pertama” (Adam Is Not First Human).
Eh?
I think they mean that while atheists think that Islam denies Darwinian evolution, there is a kind of Islamic theistic evolution. Which we know, of course, *does* contradict Darwinian evolution.
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I can second that “Eh?” There is a growing Islamic antievolutionism, largely online stuff, and often cribbing western creationist apologetics (eg wealthy pseudonymous Turkish nutball “Haryun Yahya” starting out nicking from YEC but quickly retooling to largely ID tropes in a pile of repetitive volumes and websites).
Ironically, regular evolution is still taught in Iranian schools (never revised even after the Revolution), but since Islamism extremism is as Kulturkampf as all get out, one can expect more antievolution info to circulate, even as some attempt to downplay it or try to operate in a normal international science community.
Fasten seat belts, in for a bumpy ride.
@ James I think Mr Harun Yahya Has Promoted About PSEUDO SCIENCE Too Much!Because It’s STUPIDITY,If There Person Who Thinking That Our Earth Just 6000 Years! 🙂
The relevance of Yahya is that he has retooled his argument in a design direction. Only his very first book had a YEC cast, all the vast pile since (much presumably compiled by his staffers) has been consistent with the current generalied Intelligent Design approach. Strict Young Earth creationists don’t usually link to his info because he is not within their Christian context.
(no web links to my work included, just answering his point, Jerry)
Roughly, I think: “Islam does not totally deny evolution; it teaches ‘Evolution, God’s Way.’ Islam does deny Darwinian evolution because that tends toward atheism.”
Well, that solves that.
Thanks for the translation, Diane.
There seems to be a subtle shift in assumptions but with severe consequences: the people who claim compatibility tend to argue on a subjective level, where it’s well known that the human mind is equipped to convince itself there was no (or little) conflict.
These subjective views can then be taken as representative and thus, in a sense, become intrasubjectively “objective”. In other words, if all religious people agreed there was no conflict, then — objectively — there is none. Faith would be like water that is moving out of the way when “hard facts” ship through the mind. But note that we still look at human minds, not at “what is true”. This is view is an implicit postmodernist stance (nonsense but not always of the trivial type).
The other approach would be the directly objective view where religious “facts” are taken as information about reality, and which of course are inconsistent with what we know, i.e. people, generally speaking, don’t raise from the dead and ascend for they can’t fly up with a non-euclidean conception of space; there’s no true “up” and “down” where souls or Jesus could move towards etcetera.
In conclusion, these disagreements with religious people have a lot to do with the objective/subjective divide which is complicated even more since scientists themselves (I believe) tend to not be naïve realists, either. Maybe religious people first struggle to “get” what truth claims are, or don’t quite see in which ways the myriads of models describing what we know are interconnected like a giant crossword puzzle. And the more sophisticated ones are perhaps something like religious postmodernists, who can’t get out of the subjective.
Now that I think about it, it could be true for them… slate rooves (19th century) are virtually impenetrable. 😉