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Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 14:24:27 +0100

I'm bemused but sadly not surprised by the contradictory points Dalia makes in this video. For example; "My deeply held faith teaches me to intellectual inquiry [sic]".

Is there anything LESS intellectually truthful than blind religious faith in the Abrahamic God? May I reasonably ask what intellectual inquiry she has made of some of the claims of the Koran or the hadith? By what method has she ascertained the truth or reasonableness of her faith? The answer can only be that she hasn't.

Again: "It teaches integrity and honesty.. I have to be true to the rigour of the data."

But there are no data! What possible data can there be regarding words written in a book centuries ago which does nothing but make unfalsifiable claims?

Science is based on rigour and reason. Faith is claiming to know the unknowable in the face of nothing but evidence to the contrary. They're not compatible, they're diametrically opposed.

Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 21:56:25 +0100

Compatible?

We are not talking about a tangible relationship or one's proximity to it's parts let alone that a specific reaction from such a pairing may be what was intended. I love fireworks!

Faith and reason are intellectual activities, fundamentally intangible. In their purest definition and understanding they appear precisely intertwined on a greater palet of knowledge, each a process in degrees of understanding toward an enlightenment (some may say revealing) of what is being reasoned toward or believed in. Awareness has much to do with it.

Any sense or perception of incompatibility may more accurately be a cognitively dissonant experience encountered upon a juncture with inadequate data/knowledge/understanding. In a way, can you really not get there from here in a purely intellectual exercise? It's the first exercise in which one should be able to succeed in this respect.

Compatible? I think they're inseparably dependent upon one another for a full understanding of each.

Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 17:57:55 +0100

Faith is a willingness to believe in things for which there is no supporting evidence (at best) and contradictory evidence (at worst).

Faith is not the same as belief. I don't have "faith" that all organisms on this planet are desended from a single common ancestor; I believe it. Evidence dictates the distinction between faith and reason.

Therefore, faith is incompatilbe with reason.

Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 00:42:26 +0100

Quantum Physics is the answer to your question.

Its funny how Materialism is proving Spirituality. All opposites meet at both ends ;-)

Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 04:13:45 +0100

Faith and reason are in different highths, reason follows the path of the initial suppositions from where it beggins and in accordance to them is the end result, different from thinking for it belongs to the essential, and faith is closer to the intuition of Being, thus its strength.

Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 07:20:40 +0100

Buddhism is considered the religion of science. Buddhism is quite spiritual as well. I myself am not a buddhist but I have read books. In fact the Dalai Lama himself has said that if Science prooves something in Buddhism wrong by physical evidence then he will change the teachings of Buddhism to better suit the scientific findings. Neuroscience and Buddhism are probably the greatest meldings of science and religion ever. Check out the book "Train Your Mind Change Your Brain" by Sharon Begley for more information.

Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 05:50:58 +0100

In Ken Wilber's "The Marriage of Sense and Soul" he states that science needs to give up its ideas that it knows everything and religion needs to give up its more outlandish mythological claims...Only then can they meet. I think theistic traditions will have a harder time with this than non-theistic philosophical/empirical traditions.

Comment on: Are science and religion compatible?

Bigthink — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 17:54:19 +0100

Not in any deep sense. They probably can co-exist happily enough in the right cultural setting, but the core paradigm of science...the testable hypothesis...seems so well grounded in the natural world, that religion can't be ever 'equal' to the task of understanding reality. Tradition, values, an ethics based on good stories maybe...but never an equal