Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Androgeos Exeunt on March 22, 2011, 09:27:37 am
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12811197
Seems a bit quick, don't you think?
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in this study we extend trends until they hit one of the axes
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Sounds like a bit of wishful thinking to me. They're looking at religion purely as a social group and comparing it with speaking one language versus another... that doesn't seem realistic. Then again I'm not at all informed of the psychology involved- Behavioral Scientisttuta may be able to clarify.
[EDIT]: ninjad
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I actually agree with it, but I still love the irony of the statement: "SCIENCE predicts the end of religion". hahahah
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Nine countries, not including Russia. Why not? Because in Soviet Russia, religion predicts end of science within a few years.
Sorry, last time.
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Even if it was wiped out in a few years, too often it gets replaced by some other form of superstitious nonsense like new ageism. Not really progress.
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I actually agree with it, but I still love the irony of the statement: "SCIENCE predicts the end of religion". hahahah
Should you try to share the link on Facebook, the headline defaults to "Physics predicts the end of religion." I almost left it that way, even though Physicists weren't conducting the study, just because it made me feel happy about my Bachelor's degree for the first time in a while.
It will be interesting to see how the study changes as the model gets more refined, but I think the conclusion that religion is in decline in certain parts of the world seems reasonable (or obvious) enough.
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I bet they wont, religions will be replaced by other religions or forms of extremist belief we don't know of yet.
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What a load of crap.
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Extinction of religion in Ireland? :wtf:
Um. No.
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Yeah, that would be like alcohol prohibition becoming law over there.
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Someone needs to send the mathematicians and physicists back to their imaginary numbers, because they clearly have a fundamental misunderstanding of demography :P I'll grant you the BBC article is slightly oversimplifying their conclusions, but there are enough quotes in there to make me seriously wonder how this passed peer-review.
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Not again this religious stuff.
They should have defined "religion" in the article to start with.
But on the surface, it looks like someone has had an axe to grind against religion. I wonder why they specifically mentioned they are physicists, even when it is pretty obvious that this has nothing to do with Physics. Anyways this isn't peer-reviewed, nor is there anything that special someone couldn't piece together with Excel, so move along. This, makes me wonder about the IPCC models, though. Hmmmm....
This Physicists Physicist predicts decline in religion in Finland, but also that it will not be extinct any time soon. Source: his own eyes.
EDIT: I have HAD it with these m*********ing plurals in this m*********ing language!
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Religion is gonna disappear in ireland? ROFLMAO
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Seems a lot like cats predicting the end of dogs to me, tbh.
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Sounds like a bit of wishful thinking to me. They're looking at religion purely as a social group and comparing it with speaking one language versus another...
There are, to be fair, religions that have been reduced to this level. Predicting the end of the Church of England in this fashion is entirely believable.
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Predicting the end of religion or supernatural beliefs is like expecting the human race to snap out of stupidity.
Not that I'm poking at the "new athiests" or philsophical materialists, but this sorta stuff is sounds like the "End of the World" bull we get from from a lot of those whacko Christian/Cultists.
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Predicting the end of religion or supernatural beliefs is like expecting the human race to snap out of stupidity.
Not that I'm poking at the "new athiests" or philsophical materialists, but this sorta stuff is sounds like the "End of the World" bull we get from from a lot of those whacko Christian/Cultists.
New atheists don't even see an end to religion in sight, the general consensus is that religion will eventually be marginalized, but will continue to exist.
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It's obvious that this a threat to destroy "At Least Nine Countries." Hopefully SCIENCE will break out the Dinosaur Clone Tanks or Frikkin' Lasers.
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I find it impossible for religion to disappear completely. Regardless of where you are in the world, somebody nearby is bound to practice one form of religion even if it is outlawed.
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I can definitely see it becoming the realm of uneducated people - much like superstition (black cats, etc) is now. I could see a world where people might say a prayer, much the same way a normal person might throw a coin in a fountain. It's not really religion that people worry about, it's faith in them.
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I disagree with the article, also don't some of those countries have the highest suicide rates? (poor Finland)
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I disagree with the article, also don't some of those countries have the highest suicide rates? (poor Finland)
Okay, a couple things:
A) although the topic of this article is controversial, it doesn't make sense to just "disagree" with it; you can certainly disagree with the results of the study, the article itself is just reporting.
B) According to wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate):
Australia is 45th
Austria is 29th
Canada is 34th
Czech Republic is 30th
Finland is 14th
Ireland is 35th
The Netherlands are 52nd
New Zealand is 28th
Switzerland is 23rd
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Can too, and a website that isn't Wikipedia (http://www.google.com/search?q=world+suicide+rates&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a#sclient=psy&hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US%3Aofficial&q=highest+suicide+rates+&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=ff3e2739446bc197) puts Finland in the top 10
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Can too
Okay, would you please be specific with your disagreement?
and a website that isn't Wikipedia (http://www.google.com/search?q=world+suicide+rates&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a#sclient=psy&hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US%3Aofficial&q=highest+suicide+rates+&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=ff3e2739446bc197) puts Finland in the top 10
Finland was already pretty close. . . your point? Your random google search page isn't really helpful. That wikipedia article is well documented, if out of date.
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I bet they wont, religions will be replaced by other religions or forms of extremist belief we don't know of yet.
Before you know it people will start to believe in space aliens..... oh wait.
It's kinda sad how gullible our fellow humans can be if you ask me. And even if one religion does or did find the universal truth... simply going by the number of available religions it's a given that the majority of us picked the wrong one. ;)
As for the current development in industrialized nations... i think it's similar to politics... a lot of people simply stopped to care.
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well if science says so it must be true amirite
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I always like it when Science Itself speaks up. Makes me feel kind of like Moses on the mountain, you know, except scientific.
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Finland's suicide rate has more to do with its climate than with its religiosity, I think this should be ****ing obvious to anyone with half a neuron.
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(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/8b/Repoveden_Kansallispuisto_Kesayonauringossa.jpg/800px-Repoveden_Kansallispuisto_Kesayonauringossa.jpg)
The climate looks fine to me, I'd rather vacation than commit suicide here. :p
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Yeah, cause a picture will tell you exactly how the climate behaves the whole year round, doesn't it.
Bah, whatever. If that's the level of reasoning in this thread, let's just /end it.
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:eek: ?
:drevil:
:lol:
I would like to mention one thing: not all countries are that honest with suicide statistics as Nordic Countries.
But please go on...
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Yeah wtv. The dude is saying that the climate in Finland is unproblematic, perhaps it's as good as say... ahhh... the country I'm living in... Portugal.
Cause the sun's presence, or lack of it, hasn't any bit of influence in your mood.
But I wanted to add another thing. If the best some people can do at pointing how atheism/agnosticism produces depression is to point to a single country's statistics that is in the top ten of suicidal rates (or 14th or wtv), then I would say that's pretty poor for a bloody simple reason:
Most countries in the top ten are incredibly religious.
Am I now to conclude that religiosity produces suicides?
Come on.
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Religious people actually do have lower suicide rates. Places like Japan, South Korea, and the former Soviet bloc countries are largely secular, and also have, comparatively, perfectly good reasons to kill themselves. In the United States atheists killing themselves could easily be a result of persecution, or because the highest demographic of atheists (white males) also has the highest rate of suicide.
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Religious people actually do have lower suicide rates. Places like Japan, South Korea, and the former Soviet bloc countries are largely secular, and also have, comparatively, perfectly good reasons to kill themselves. In the United States atheists killing themselves could easily be a result of persecution, or because the highest demographic of atheists (white males) also has the highest rate of suicide.
So you meant to say, people who merge better in their environment has lower suicide rates.
In wikipedia's list, the first country is flooded by catholics (79%), with only 12% stating otherwise. The third country is 96% religious. I have no numbers on Belarus, 4th, but from the text I would call it over 70%. Number 7 has 3% "non-religious people". Ukraine is heavily religious, Hungary accounts for 14% "non-religious" and Sri Lanka is also heavily religious.
So I haven't the faintest idea of what the hell you are bull****ting about.
And what the hell do you mean by "perfectly good reasons to kill themselves"?
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Religious people actually do have lower suicide rates. Places like Japan, South Korea, and the former Soviet bloc countries are largely secular, and also have, comparatively, perfectly good reasons to kill themselves. In the United States atheists killing themselves could easily be a result of persecution, or because the highest demographic of atheists (white males) also has the highest rate of suicide.
So you meant to say, people who merge better in their environment has lower suicide rates.
In wikipedia's list, the first country is flooded by catholics (79%), with only 12% stating otherwise. The third country is 96% religious. I have no numbers on Belarus, 4th, but from the text I would call it over 70%. Number 7 has 3% "non-religious people". Ukraine is heavily religious, Hungary accounts for 14% "non-religious" and Sri Lanka is also heavily religious.
So I haven't the faintest idea of what the hell you are bull****ting about.
And what the hell do you mean by "perfectly good reasons to kill themselves"?
calm
down
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itt correlation = causation trololol
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itt correlation = causation trololol
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6FUR_nhGX8
(More evidence of atheistic lack of content/meaning, "sufficient reason" to commit suicide, perhaps?)
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I have no idea where this thread is going now.
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Yeah wtv. The dude is saying that the climate in Finland is unproblematic, perhaps it's as good as say... ahhh... the country I'm living in... Portugal.
Cause the sun's presence, or lack of it, hasn't any bit of influence in your mood.
I never said the climate doesn't affect your mind. But note that how the climate affects you depends also on your point of view and what you are accustomed to - I wouldn't be able to live in Portugal for a long time. I become very sluggish and lazy after +25 degrees and can't get half of the things done at that temperature when compared to what I can do in the slightly colder times. Four completely different seasons are a great plus here! Few know that the city I live in has the largest sand beach in Northern Europe, large enough to be a holiday resort, with relatively nice temperatures of +30 degrees on best of the times and a sun that doesn't set down...
Instead what I said was that Northern European countries are brutally honest in reporting the suicides, something what should really be considered when reading the those statistics.
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Cause the sun's presence, or lack of it, hasn't any bit of influence in your mood.
\
I'm sorry, but this is just flat wrong. Sunlight, in the form of UVB rays, is one of the most efficient sources of Vitamin D, which has an effect on your general mood. People with lower levels of vitamin D are found to be more likely to be depressed (http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/depression.shtml) than people with normal levels.
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Yeah wtv. The dude is saying that the climate in Finland is unproblematic, perhaps it's as good as say... ahhh... the country I'm living in... Portugal.
Cause the sun's presence, or lack of it, hasn't any bit of influence in your mood.
Wait I can't believe someone actually said that. That's not right at all - sunlight has a huge influence on mood. People even buy huge full-spectrum light panels to use during the winter to help fight depression.
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Actually, I thought he was being sarcastic there.
Either way, this thread is like QuantumDelta in one of his Pegasus circle fights: going nowhere, really fast. What are we even arguing at the moment? Causes of suicide or religion or... something about climate?
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Now that I thought of it, I have actually participated in stopping a person of committing a suicide. He was from a very religious family, by the way.
He had got his girlfriend pregnant, and his family wanted him to marry her. Unfortunately, he didn't want to (just turned 18) and came up with the conclusion that instead, he had to end his life. When hearing about this, I was pretty peeveed at the religion and forcing it down on the peoples' throats. Why must it be prohibited to use a condom that would have prevented this so easily? I never got to hear how his family responded when he went to hospital.
By the way, when you stop somebody from committing suicide, be aware that they can get a different kind of shock where the person doesn't fall down and become unconscious. Instead, the person become unresponsive and immobile (might be sitting) with high amount of muscle tension - but otherwise appear to be awake. Had I known this, I would have called ambulance a lot more earlier.
So it is not about religion or the lack of it, but the social surroundings themselves. Religious types can be as bad as the rest of us. Even the darkest time of the winter doesn't feel that bad if the social surroundings are OK.
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Religious people actually do have lower suicide rates. Places like Japan, South Korea, and the former Soviet bloc countries are largely secular, and also have, comparatively, perfectly good reasons to kill themselves. In the United States atheists killing themselves could easily be a result of persecution, or because the highest demographic of atheists (white males) also has the highest rate of suicide.
So you meant to say, people who merge better in their environment has lower suicide rates.
In wikipedia's list, the first country is flooded by catholics (79%), with only 12% stating otherwise. The third country is 96% religious. I have no numbers on Belarus, 4th, but from the text I would call it over 70%. Number 7 has 3% "non-religious people". Ukraine is heavily religious, Hungary accounts for 14% "non-religious" and Sri Lanka is also heavily religious.
So I haven't the faintest idea of what the hell you are bull****ting about.
And what the hell do you mean by "perfectly good reasons to kill themselves"?
Dude, I'm AGREEING with you. The science says that atheists ARE statistically more likely commit suicide, I was saying that that was probably for a variety of other reasons. READ what I say, BEFORE you start freaking out.
As for "COMPARATIVELY" good reasons to kill yourself, the depressed economies of soviet bloc countries, the culture of Japan, and South Korea is under constant threat of attack. Comparatively is compared to being an atheist in this case.
EDIT:
I'm not trying to flame here, I just don't know why you think I'm bull****ting anything. Look it up, at least four separate studies show that secular people have higher suicide rates. I myself don't believe in a god(s) so I think it's pretty shakey myself.
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The climate looks fine to me, I'd rather vacation than commit suicide here. :p
The dude is saying that the climate in Finland is unproblematic
Your logic eludes me.
I was just implying that personal preference of climates is highly subjective, to the point that the comicality of imputing total idiocy to those who don't recognize the overly exaggerated level of importance you've assigned to the climate/suicide connection seemed deserving of an equally comical response. And you got one.
I have no idea where this thread is going now.
Ditto
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Sorry Mars, I did not understand where you were coming from. Apparently, it's kind of a problem in english, since others here also didn't understand the sarcasm in my comment about climate and mood. And Mika, I'm happy for you that you have that kind of beach (if you live there, it looked that way but I may be wrong). Seems pretty nice.
NeoKnight, you seem to think that the trouble of climate is merely psychodrama. It isn't, it's chemical. As others have said so plainly, the lack of sun alters your mood almost inevitably. You'll always find more suicide rates in northern cloudy countries than shiny countries, despite the adaptation of locals. And ooopsidoo, the data agrees with me. How about that.
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I believe the term is Environmental Affective Disorder.
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NeoKnight, you seem to think that the trouble of climate is merely psychodrama. It isn't, it's chemical. As others have said so plainly, the lack of sun alters your mood almost inevitably. You'll always find more suicide rates in northern cloudy countries than shiny countries, despite the adaptation of locals. And ooopsidoo, the data agrees with me. How about that.
How about some elaboration here. From what I've read, said data varies as much as people's subjectivity on the matter. Is there specific set of data you're referring to (as outlined by a particular study or analysis)? If so, please share.
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I believe the term is Environmental Affective Disorder.
I've always preferred Seasonal Affective Disorder cause of the acronym. :p
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"When we look out into space, we are looking into our own origins.
Because we are truly children of the stars.
And written into every atom, and every molecule of our bodies
The entire history of our universe, from the big bang to the present day.
Our story, is the story of the universe.
Every piece of everyone, of everything you love, and everything you hate.
The thing you hold most precious, was assembled by the forces of nature in the first few minutes of the life of the universe.
Transformed in the hearts of stars, or created in their fiery deaths.
And when you die, those pieces will be returned to the universe, and the endless cycle of death and rebirth.
What a wonderful thing it is to be a part of that universe, and what a story, what a majestic story."
What's not to love?
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NeoKnight, you seem to think that the trouble of climate is merely psychodrama. It isn't, it's chemical. As others have said so plainly, the lack of sun alters your mood almost inevitably. You'll always find more suicide rates in northern cloudy countries than shiny countries, despite the adaptation of locals. And ooopsidoo, the data agrees with me. How about that.
How about some elaboration here. From what I've read, said data varies as much as people's subjectivity on the matter. Is there specific set of data you're referring to (as outlined by a particular study or analysis)? If so, please share.
So you think all the studies that show SAD more prevalent in nordic countries due to lack of vitamin D (except for those who are extremely well adapted and /or eat lots of fish) should be scraped because they are "subjective"?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasonal_affective_disorder#Nordic_countries
May I ask you why I should even take your skepticism here more seriously than just a biased position on your part?
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Suicide rates are much more closely correlated with how you live than where you live (in the geographic sense, that is). Looking at suicide rates across countries for geographic correlations is only a statistically meaningful exercise when suicide rates are comparable across nations (given the wide variance in reporting, a significant difficulty) and the data is controlled for social conditions among its various demographic groups (a near-impossibility, given the variance in suicide within countries). It's a pointless argument - there are countless things that are more accurate predictors than Seasonal Affective Disorder or potential vitamin-D deficiency (considering the direct link to suicidal ideation is pretty tenuous; while there is an undeniable link to depression, the magnitude of that link is up for debate).
Also, under no circumstances is Wikipedia an acceptable sourcing for debate. Ever. Useful for a quick, unverified backgrounder for information, sure. Source - no.
/grump
EDIT: To address the original comment:
Finland's suicide rate has more to do with its climate than with its religiosity, I think this should be ****ing obvious to anyone with half a neuron.
And the suicide rate has a much higher correlation to poverty, social considerations, mental illness rates, and social distribution/stratification than it does to climate. The fact that the assertion that religion relates to suicide rate is relatively meaningless doesn't mean that suicide rate to climate is meaningful.
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It's a good enough source for discussion in these threads.
And the link that exists, tenuous or not, is far more reliable than the other one discussed before. Why does this link get such a beating while the other gets a pass is beyond me.
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And the suicide rate has a much higher correlation to poverty, social considerations, mental illness rates, and social distribution/stratification than it does to climate.
Curious that you flame me for providing a wiki link, but you yourself provide none for your assertions... hmmmm ;).
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And the suicide rate has a much higher correlation to poverty, social considerations, mental illness rates, and social distribution/stratification than it does to climate.
Curious that you flame me for providing a wiki link, but you yourself provide none for your assertions... hmmmm ;).
yeah i really don't think you get who you're talking to
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It's a good enough source for discussion in these threads.
I beg to differ. Bringing up climate overshadows the much more significant (and frequently misunderstood) causes and correlates of suicidal ideation and ultimately behaviour.
And the link that exists, tenuous or not, is far more reliable than the other one discussed before. Why does this link get such a beating while the other gets a pass is beyond me.
The link to religion did not get a pass; you rightly debunked it, but erred in providing one nearly as tenuous in its stead.
Curious that you flame me for providing a wiki link, but you yourself provide none for your assertions... hmmmm ;).
That's not a flame, that's a chastening for committing cardinal sins around fact. A flame would be a personal attack. As for my sources, I'm not generally in the habit of quoting excerpts from the several Abnormal Psychology textbooks gathering dust in my basement or lecture notes saved on my home computer, although I can gather several citations from PubMed later this evening if you really want data for conclusions discussed in 100-level psychology courses. Generally, I source material when asked (as you were, above, and foolishly provided Wikipedia).
And Battuta, while I appreciate the sentiment he does have the right to ask... even if it may not go well for him ;)
EDIT: Oh hell, here's some good reading from just a few minutes spent on PubMed. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21356041 (This one is actually Finnish, in an odd coincidence)
Here are the PubMed search results, since the titles give a really good indication of the available research on the subject: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=predictors%20of%20suicidal%20ideation
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yeah i really don't think you get who you're talking to
Who the hell do you think Battuta is?!!
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Who the hell do you think Battuta is?!!
Screw Batts. This is MPRyan.
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..That so went over your head :<
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..That so went over your head :<
Tell it to the giant drill.
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MP-Ryan, I've yet to see you provide a single source yourself. If you insist that wikipedia is an invalid source, perhaps you should provide sources yourself?
Also, the link THAT I MYSELF BELIEVE IS TENUOUS between religion and suicide http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Religion+suicide+rates&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart (http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Religion+suicide+rates&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart)
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Read his post again, he linked to PubMed. And I think he can be reasonably considered an authority on the subject as well.
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Read his post again, he linked to PubMed. And I think he can be reasonably considered an authority on the subject as well.
Oy, you're right. Sorry.
EDIT: Sorry, I only read up onto your first post. I really do apologize.
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NeoKnight, you seem to think that the trouble of climate is merely psychodrama. It isn't, it's chemical. As others have said so plainly, the lack of sun alters your mood almost inevitably. You'll always find more suicide rates in northern cloudy countries than shiny countries, despite the adaptation of locals. And ooopsidoo, the data agrees with me. How about that.
How about some elaboration here. From what I've read, said data varies as much as people's subjectivity on the matter. Is there specific set of data you're referring to (as outlined by a particular study or analysis)? If so, please share.
So you think all the studies that show SAD more prevalent in nordic countries due to lack of vitamin D (except for those who are extremely well adapted and /or eat lots of fish) should be scraped because they are "subjective"?
I never said that the studies were subjective, nor do I believe this. My only reference to subjectivity was in a simile:
From what I've read, said data varies as much as people's subjectivity on the matter.
What I actually said was that the data from these studies seems to vary. That is, the different results I've seen appear inconsistent. This prompted me to ask you for a definitive analysis from a reliable source that could perhaps put one side of the issue on firm ground. The wikipedia article, though interesting, did not accomplish this. I believe other community members have sufficiently elaborated on this point.
May I ask you why I should even take your skepticism here more seriously than just a biased position on your part?
Because it's not skepticism, it's a refusal to give the issue the benefit of the doubt. I've found this to be a good policy for internet discussions. And remember, the original issue in question was the link between climates and suicide rates. The information you provided merely addressed the connection between climates and depression (mostly in the form of SAD). Now, I acknowledge that climate has a strong influence on human behavior and mood. What I don't acknowledge, and what lies at the heart of the controversy, is the hypothesis that climate is a significant contributing factor in suicides.
Suicide rates are much more closely correlated with how you live than where you live (in the geographic sense, that is). Looking at suicide rates across countries for geographic correlations is only a statistically meaningful exercise when suicide rates are comparable across nations (given the wide variance in reporting, a significant difficulty) and the data is controlled for social conditions among its various demographic groups (a near-impossibility, given the variance in suicide within countries). It's a pointless argument - there are countless things that are more accurate predictors than Seasonal Affective Disorder or potential vitamin-D deficiency (considering the direct link to suicidal ideation is pretty tenuous; while there is an undeniable link to depression, the magnitude of that link is up for debate).
MP-Ryan actually summed up my viewpoint very nicely, and with far more rhetorical grace than I was capable of displaying.
Yes, climates have a profound effect on human mood.
No, climates do not have a profound effect on suicide rates (though I'd still be open to reading any analysis which makes a conclusion to the contrary)
Enough said.
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Well if you put it that way, it kinda makes sense.... :)
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Most religions have some kind of ruleset that prohibits all sorts of things... some forbid you to drink that others forbid you to eat this ... and most of them prohibit suicide without a glorious reason (in which case some will call it martyrdom and promote it... or did so in the past).
Taking suicide statistics as some kind of basis for an argument of pro or contra religion is in my eyes simply arbitrary populism.
Being religious could indeed correlate with being more happy... which would explain lesser suicide rates... and it could just as well correlate with being dumb and ignorant.
Does anyone have conclusive proof readily available either way?
Correlation does indeed not imply causation... there might be a correlation of being religious and ignoring that fact. Would be worth a study. ;)
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The claim that science is predicting the end of religion is like religion predicting the end of science. It's like the two of them are just slapping each other back and forth because they can't get along, IMO.
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Or doing the strange sport of shin-kicking...
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Well if you put it that way, it kinda makes sense.... :)
MP-Ryan, you've once again lived up to your title. :nod:
The claim that science is predicting the end of religion is like religion predicting the end of science. It's like the two of them are just slapping each other back and forth because they can't get along, IMO.
Science and religion are not intrinsically incompatible disciplines. It's a real pity they can't get along better, a positive relationship would be mutually beneficial.
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MP-Ryan, you've once again lived up to your title. :nod:
I try my best :D
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The claim that science is predicting the end of religion is like religion predicting the end of science. It's like the two of them are just slapping each other back and forth because they can't get along, IMO.
To be fair, science could, with the tools it has, predict the end of religion if such a thing were to occur. The reverse is not true.
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Science and religion are not intrinsically incompatible disciplines. It's a real pity they can't get along better, a positive relationship would be mutually beneficial.
Reason and religion are in many ways. Some people have internally resolved it by compartmentalizing them, but if you live your life trying to reason through it, eventually you hit a conundrum reconciling the two.
EDIT:
To be fair, science could, with the tools it has, predict the end of religion if such a thing were to occur. The reverse is not true.
Religion could well predict the end of science. It's like predicting the end of the world. It's probably going to happen eventually.
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Religion could well predict the end of science. It's like predicting the end of the world. It's probably going to happen eventually.
A stopped clock is not the same thing as a correct prediction.
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The claim that science is predicting the end of religion is like religion predicting the end of science. It's like the two of them are just slapping each other back and forth because they can't get along, IMO.
To be fair, science could, with the tools it has, predict the end of religion if such a thing were to occur. The reverse is not true.
So a religious leader isn't allowed to look into a history book, find the trends where a country's science education is going down/getting worse and it's religious affiliation is going up, and then say "religion says science will end in 10 years".
Or do you consider it "science" to look in a book, read supposedly true statements, and draw a conclusion?
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So a religious leader isn't allowed to look into a history book, find the trends where a country's science education is going down/getting worse and it's religious affiliation is going up, and then say "religion says science will end in 10 years".
Or do you consider it "science" to look in a book, read supposedly true statements, and draw a conclusion?
Religion is a broad thing, and can encompass some aspects of science, but religion is fundamentally a terrible platform for science. So yes, that would be a scientific endeavor by the religious leader, finding patterns in history. Whether it's done in a scientific way is quite another matter.
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So a religious leader isn't allowed to look into a history book, find the trends where a country's science education is going down/getting worse and it's religious affiliation is going up, and then say "religion says science will end in 10 years".
Or do you consider it "science" to look in a book, read supposedly true statements, and draw a conclusion?
There are a number of problems with this statement.
First: looking at trends that way is not in itself anything more than the most basic level predictive. You must also consider whether these trends will continue for your predictions to be of much practical use.
Second: you are directly equating science education with science itself, which makes no sense.
Third: what does religion going up have to do with a death of science? Granted it might help one way or another but to pretend it's absolutely causative like that is at best ridiculous. (At worst it's actually rather revealing of your opinions.)
Fourth: In simplest terms, yes. Science is the analysis of evidence, usually using mathematical tools. You are equating it with a source. I am, as I stated in my first post, equating it with a methodology. Source is not relevant.
Or are you implying that the Vatican Observatory's contributions to the field of astronomy are religious?
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To be honest I don't know what opinions you could draw from my statement, other than me thinking that it's silly for scientists to make these predictions.
To answer your question, I guess I would say those contributes could be both/and/or scientific/religious. In ancient times, readings of the stars and planets was considered a religious act (judging destinies by the stars, or a god's whim with the stars, etc - maybe not the Vatican Observatory specifically, I don't know any specific contributions they've made). That doesn't mean those religious records of the movements of the stars and planets in reference to each other aren't scientifically useful records.
Beyond that I really don't have much else to say on the issue - I don't even want to debate the validity of religion vs. science because frankly, I don't care. All I wanted to put into this thread was the idea that it was silly for this study to come out.
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Science and religion are not intrinsically incompatible disciplines. It's a real pity they can't get along better, a positive relationship would be mutually beneficial.
I would say that the scientific method is quite incompatible with rigid belief. Pretty much by definition (lol).
The scientific method requires conclusive testing as a means to search for the truth.
Belief requires that you accept a truth without proof or verification.
You can't subscribe to one without at least compromising the other.
Furthermore religion almost always already found all its truths in the past, while science continually uncovers new truths through research.
It's where all of the problems between religion and faith come from... and always came from historically... i.e.: "The Earth circles the Sun"... "Nono the Earth is the center of the universe, DIE HERETIC." :p
Today the biggest point of aggravation is Evolution (amazing actually that it is "still"... how long ago was Darwin again?) ... and I'm sure in 50 or 100 years there will be other issues when old faith yet again clashes with newly discovered verifiable facts.
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Religious fundamentalism may be incompatible with rationality, but not all of religion is. People can accept verified, testable facts about the universe and still look to religion for the philosophical questions that observation can't answer. The problem arises when people start looking to religion for answers to things that can be verified, like evolution.
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Religious fundamentalism may be incompatible with rationality, but not all of religion is. People can accept verified, testable facts about the universe and still look to religion for the philosophical questions that observation can't answer. The problem arises when people start looking to religion for answers to things that can be verified, like evolution.
Very much this.
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So religion is philosophy?
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Umm, yes? Parts of it, anyway?
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Thing is, it's been under a decade that being pro-science seems to imply that you are 'anti-religion', mostly with the advent of people like Richard Dawkins. There's been more and more of a push lately to 'take sides' in the matter, it's almost as though people want a return to more fundamental positions.
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So religion is philosophy?
The way I see it, religion is a possible source of answers to things we can't verify. Morality, for instance, for those who can't be bothered to figure it out for themselves. Religion used to be very much a part of explaining the world- gods caused weather patterns, seasons, crops to grow etc. Now that we have the scientific method, a way of observing reality and holding our beliefs up to experiment, we don't need many of these explanations.
The problem comes out of people desperately clinging onto these explanations when verifiable answers exist. No one today would accept that the Earth is the center of the universe- well, OK, there may be a few nutjobs who think that- but quite a few people still believe evolution doesn't occur, when adaptation and speciation have been confirmed to exist.
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Oddly enough, the arguing isn't so much about if God made the Universe, the jury is still very much out on that one, the argument is over how and when God made the Universe. We are smart enough to look at Evidence and make a pretty educated guess at the when, though the how is a little more cloudy, and this is all being held back not by faith, but by arrogance in a lot of cases, the assumption that God is like a kind of Kids' Party magician, bringning the Universe into existence with an Abracadabra and a snap of fingers.
The real irony at the core of this is that a lot of the trouble is based on the fact that one Christian Scientist completely misunderstood the word 'begat' many years ago and assumed it meant 'was the parent of', rather than 'is the lineage of', and came up with this 6000 year figure in the Bible. It never at any point in the Bible actually says this was 6000 years ago.
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The bible is known for these little translation problems.
The "virgin" issue is another can of worms.
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The real irony at the core of this is that a lot of the trouble is based on the fact that one Christian Scientist completely misunderstood the word 'begat' many years ago and assumed it meant 'was the parent of', rather than 'is the lineage of', and came up with this 6000 year figure in the Bible. It never at any point in the Bible actually says this was 6000 years ago.
Yep, one of the fun tidbits of history. Then you've got the problem of literalists v.s. intepretists and the wheel keeps on turning.
The problem with a number of these science v.s. religion issues is they're left best to philosophy - as the latter fields can't devolve into "meta" like the philosophers.
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Metaphysics is bull**** too. Just saying.
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Metaphysics is bull**** too. Just saying.
Depends on the level of woo and meta, sometimes it's hard to tell the line between the two. However, the quest for "truth" often jumps to the meta level, and for the rest of us, we just get a beer and chill.
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I'm quite minimalistic at meta discussions. Anything that goes beyond verifiable propositions I label them as "fiction". Some fictions are good, some are useful too. But they are still nothing more than tales we tell each other.
Of course, the most interesting tales are the ones craving for verification.
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The "Religion and Science answer different questions" argument doesn't hold water either though. It means instead of actually finding the various conditions in which people are healthy, happy, and content; we too often look for a metaphysical answer.
'Moderate' Christians largely believe in, or at least don't speak out against circumcision, or US support of Isreal, 'moderate' Musilims believe in FGM.Moderate religious people in general lend believability to the major religions. And every religion (aka, unprovable metaphysical answers for every day phenomenon) is absurd at its core.
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As a 'moderate' religious person, this thread fills me with all sorts of warm fuzzies. HLP is truly an excellent and wonderful place.
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The problem with religion is people don't know how to separate the myths and legends from the moral teachings and guidelines. This is especially true in the Abrahamic faiths, and specifically Christianity. Here-in lies the problem:
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness...
2 Timothy 3:16
Lots of Christians take this passage to mean that God dictated to the writers, and that every last word in the Bible is meant to be taken literally, as if God had written it. They leave no room for argument that the writers were simply human beings that were religiously-inspired to write these books, which would leave the Bible open to interpretation.
Thus, despite overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary, we have a large number of people convinced that the world is no older than six thousand years, that Homo sapiens sapiens just popped up one day, that in the space of a month Egypt was afflicted with several-years worth of catastrophes, and that a human being rose from the dead. They get so hung up on taking every word literally that even when scientific findings can be reconciled with a less strict interpretation, they refuse to accept. Science provides evolution as the answer to how, and allows religion to be the answer to why.
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As a 'moderate' religious person, this thread fills me with all sorts of warm fuzzies. HLP is truly an excellent and wonderful place.
As a moderate, what significance does your scripture hold for you? (serious question, and not meant as "it doesn't.")
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Why should I qualify my belief when you didn't qualify your statement above?
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The "Religion and Science answer different questions" argument doesn't hold water either though. It means instead of actually finding the various conditions in which people are healthy, happy, and content; we too often look for a metaphysical answer.
This I defend. There is no question I know of posed that that is answered by religion that science is incapable of answering. EDIT: It may not have reached a point of answering them yet, and some things, for now, are best answered with "I don't know"
'Moderate' Christians largely believe in, or at least don't speak out against circumcision, or US support of Isreal, 'moderate' Musilims believe in FGM.Moderate religious people in general lend believability to the major religions.
You're right, this is unfounded. All I have is a bias and weak correlation argument within the US, which could well be due to other factors.
And every religion (aka, unprovable metaphysical answers for every day phenomenon) is absurd at its core.
I stand by this, Bertrand Russell's teapot demonstrates this excellently.
EDIT:
Why should I qualify my belief when you didn't qualify your statement above?
And if the debate offends you, it's best to make an argument or counter assertion directly, rather than bemoaning: Hard Light being a 'wonderful' place." To do so makes your argument appear weaker.
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So religion is philosophy?
Is science a philosophy?
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I feel like saying that moderate Muslims support female circumcision is a bit of a stretch.
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The problem with science/religion debates is it descends to attacking personal beliefs, which gets really personal and people get offended when core ideas/identity get attacked.
My opinion firmly remains that really both groups are foolishly fighting over the totem poll of "truth maker," the problem is how the hell you define or make truth? Then it goes into the philosophical problems, and you get nowhere because you run into paradoxes. Then reality doesn't make sense anymore and everyone starts hitting their heads against walls.
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So religion is philosophy?
Is science a philosophy?
Dunno Webster (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/philosophy) probably knows. It's looking like both fall under the category.
I feel like saying that moderate Muslims support female circumcision is a bit of a stretch.
Yeah, it was a bad argument from the get-go. I have conceded it.
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'Moderate' Christians largely believe in, or at least don't speak out against circumcision
I'm not entirely clear on why having a snipped willy is so bad, anyways, although that may have been Kazan's failure to communicate.
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'Moderate' Christians largely believe in, or at least don't speak out against circumcision
I'm not entirely clear on why having a snipped willy is so bad, anyways, although that may have been Kazan's failure to communicate.
Lol.
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'Moderate' Christians largely believe in, or at least don't speak out against circumcision
I'm not entirely clear on why having a snipped willy is so bad, anyways, although that may have been Kazan's failure to communicate.
Some people need as much as they can get down there.
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That is a separate discussion for a separate time.
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I don't know, I think it's just as deathly serious as the original topic.
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That is a separate discussion for a separate time thread.
Fixed
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That is a separate discussion for a separate time thread.
Fixed
Modify button, top right.
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Such as saying that God created man, when science says that man evolved from the ape?
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The problem with science/religion debates is it descends to attacking personal beliefs, which gets really personal and people get offended when core ideas/identity get attacked.
My opinion firmly remains that really both groups are foolishly fighting over the totem poll of "truth maker," the problem is how the hell you define or make truth? Then it goes into the philosophical problems, and you get nowhere because you run into paradoxes. Then reality doesn't make sense anymore and everyone starts hitting their heads against walls.
The fundamental difference is that science has no inherent problems if one truth turns out to be "wrong" - the contrary... the whole point is to question everything and only accept as truth what can be rationally explained and verified. (Which in no way rules out the possibility that one theory gets replaced by an even better and more complete explanation as our understanding of the universe grows.)
If a religious truth turns out to be proven wrong... all the fundamentalists got their panties in their bunch again and wish they could still burn people on a stake.
And while one can certainly argue that science in no way contradicts the belief in a higher power as such... the use of the scientific method certainly already uncovered several rational explanations that do not only contradict, but outright prove wrong several of the "truths" that can be found in some books that some men wrote down a few thousand years ago. (Big surprise lol)
What science can not do... is tell us how to become better persons or build better societies. More efficient ones? Yes... but "better" ones? Once you discuss what is "better or worse" for human societies you quickly reach the limits of science.
That is I believe where a lot of the misunderstanding comes from... science is "NOT" a philosophy as such. Science can't tell you what "good or evil" is.
Religion has no problems with clear definition of "good and evil"... yet decreeing what is "good and evil" and telling people what to do from a position of absolute divine authority - as it has so often been done in the past - is itself rather questionable - or even "evil itself - when seen through the lens of philosophy and ethics.
In summary... we can't disregard the scientific method if we don t want to go back to the dark ages.
We can't do without some kind of moral system to glue our societies together either...
... but we sure could do without religion if philosophy and ethics were there to pick up the slack.
My prediction? The harder a religion tries to fight against verifiable facts the quicker that religion will find itself become irrelevant in the eyes of any educated person.
(... and the more it will have to depend on fundamentalism and fanatism if it doesn't want to simply cease to exist.)
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Such as saying that God created man, when science says that man evolved from the ape?
Both can be true. The Bible says that God created man in one day. However, Christians believe that God transcends space and time; therefore, one day from God's perspective (the only entity existing at the the inception of the universe according to the Genesis account) might not have any correlation to an actual 24-hour period; one "day" from an infinite spirit's frame of reference could very well be millions of years from ours. Thus, it's very well possible that God created Man over the course of millions or even billions of years, using evolution as his tool.
In the narrative account outlined in the first chapter of Genesis, God creates organisms in order of ascending biological complexity; first plants, then sea creatures and birds, then mammals, and finally man himself. This follows the basic pattern of the macroevolution theory proposed by the modern scientific community. Because some basic theological inspection reveals that the time-frame of Biblical creation is not (necessarily) restricted to a mere week, Christians can be fully reconciled with both scientific and religious beliefs by rejecting the notion that God utilizes the human definition of a day in working his miracles.
I know many Christians who believe that God made the universe by creating a dense mass of matter and energy that rapidly expanded and cooled, as conjectured by the Big Bang Theory (first proposed by a Catholic Priest and approved by the synchronal Pope btw). Evolution then took its course until the Earth had formed and life had evolved to the state of an intelligent primate. Then God selected the most evolved, intelligent, and advanced individual and gave it a soul, naming it "man." When a female primate reached a similar state, he gave it a soul and named it "woman."
I find this theory very interesting because it contradicts neither science nor religion. Like I said, the two are not mutually incompatible.
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Eh, religion - to be honest even if they're right on something they've still got all of the other baggage that I just don't agree with.
Science, well, science allows for the possibility of religion - after all, you are never 100% sure in science.
The mods are people's choices.
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Such as saying that God created man, when science says that man evolved from the ape?
Both can be true. The Bible says that God created man in one day. However, Christians believe that God transcends space and time; therefore, one day from God's perspective (the only entity existing at the the inception of the universe according to the Genesis account) might not have any correlation to an actual 24-hour period; one "day" from an infinite spirit's frame of reference could very well be millions of years from ours. Thus, it's very well possible that God created Man over the course of millions or even billions of years, using evolution as his tool.
In the narrative account outlined in the first chapter of Genesis, God creates organisms in order of ascending biological complexity; first plants, then sea creatures and birds, then mammals, and finally man himself. This follows the basic pattern of the macroevolution theory proposed by the modern scientific community. Because some basic theological inspection reveals that the time-frame of Biblical creation is not (necessarily) restricted to a mere week, Christians can be fully reconciled with both scientific and religious beliefs by rejecting the notion that God utilizes the human definition of a day in working his miracles.
I know many Christians who believe that God made the universe by creating a dense mass of matter and energy that rapidly expanded and cooled, as conjectured by the Big Bang Theory (first proposed by a Catholic Priest and approved by the synchronal Pope btw). Evolution then took its course until the Earth had formed and life had evolved to the state of an intelligent primate. Then God selected the most evolved, intelligent, and advanced individual and gave it a soul, naming it "man." When a female primate reached a similar state, he gave it a soul and named it "woman."
I find this theory very interesting because it contradicts neither science nor religion. Like I said, the two are not mutually incompatible.
Indeed, in fact, there is a passage in the Bible that states that trying to apply Human time to God is a futile thing to do:
‘But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.’
Peter 3: 8-9
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And when you add in the fact that, from a literary perspective, the Genesis creation story was written in a very allegorical-myth style, there's no real reason for anyone to be seeing contradictions between it and basic scientific knowledge. Not that that doesn't stop the fundie-types from doing so, much to my chagrin...
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So religion is philosophy?
Is science a philosophy?
No. It's better.
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So religion is philosophy?
Is science a philosophy?
Dunno Webster (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/philosophy) probably knows. It's looking like both fall under the category.
I feel like saying that moderate Muslims support female circumcision is a bit of a stretch.
Yeah, it was a bad argument from the get-go. I have conceded it.
We need more people as sane and reasonable as you.
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And when you add in the fact that, from a literary perspective, the Genesis creation story was written in a very allegorical-myth style, there's no real reason for anyone to be seeing contradictions between it and basic scientific knowledge. Not that that doesn't stop the fundie-types from doing so, much to my chagrin...
Which Genesis creation story? The first one or the second one?
'Cause they aren't even compatible between themselves, let alone with the "universe" at large.
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Yeah, it was a bad argument from the get-go. I have conceded it.
We need more people as sane and reasonable as you.
Thank you!
I actually feel bad for making such an unfounded and inflammatory argument in the first place. I aspire to rational beliefs, and I suppose catching myself late is better than never.
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It's the best you can do. Humans are ineptly wired for any sort of rational discourse (it's actually pretty much impossible), and after spending a few years mucking around in the scientific quantifications of our many flaws and departures from the cognitive ideal I've mostly given up on it.
We're all wired for belief, and we're blind to our own blindnesses - ignorance is invisible, conviction is self-perpetuating. The best we can do is patch up our mistakes in this respect after the fact.
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But if we're aware of these flaws, we can watch out for them and compensate for them!
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In the narrative account outlined in the first chapter of Genesis, God creates organisms in order of ascending biological complexity; first plants, then sea creatures and birds, then mammals, and finally man himself. This follows the basic pattern of the macroevolution theory proposed by the modern scientific community.
Wanna explain Him creating plants (upto and including trees and herbs) first and then the sun and moon? :p
The simple fact is that you shouldn't see the story of Genesis as anything other than symbolic. Even trying to claim it fits with current scientific theories like the Big Bang and Evolution is mistake as the Bible contradicts them in many places.
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So religion is philosophy?
Is science a philosophy?
No. It's better.
How so? I consider philosophy to be more practical for the common man, whereas science is more theoretical for the intellectual crowd. However I really don't hold one to be superior to the other. I think they're equally noble pursuits.
Which Genesis creation story? The first one or the second one?
“The technique of recapitulation was widely practiced in ancient Semitic literature. The author would first introduce his account with a short statement summarizing the whole transaction, and then he would follow it up with a more detailed and circumstantial account when dealing with matters of special importance” - Gleason Archer, Harvard University, Ph.D.
To my immediate knowledge there is no direct contradiction between the two accounts in Genesis, but merely an elaboration of certain details. However I do not have a Bible on hand at the moment, so if there are any specific examples you'd like to address, please feel free to do so.
In the narrative account outlined in the first chapter of Genesis, God creates organisms in order of ascending biological complexity; first plants, then sea creatures and birds, then mammals, and finally man himself. This follows the basic pattern of the macroevolution theory proposed by the modern scientific community.
Wanna explain Him creating plants (upto and including trees and herbs) first and then the sun and moon? :p
Well, to be honest, I wasn't actually there. However, Genesis states that God created light on the first day. It's possible this independent light, held in existence by an omnipotent God that is at the center of this model, could've sustained plant life until the sun was created. Also, the creation of the sun and plants could have been instantaneous (Genesis claims their inception occurred on the same "day"); again, we have no frame of reference to gauge the timing of events that transpire on a spiritual plane. Though to be honest, I was wondering about this myself.
The simple fact is that you shouldn't see the story of Genesis as anything other than symbolic. Even trying to claim it fits with current scientific theories like the Big Bang and Evolution is mistake as the Bible contradicts them in many places.
It's true that the Bible is imbued with symbolism on almost every level. However, I honestly don't believe its creation account contradicts modern science. Many fundamentalist interpretations are diametrically opposed to the theories you mentioned, but there are also interpretations that appear both sound and consistent.
EDIT: Accidentally hit the post button. Come back in half an hour and this will make a lot more sense. :P
EDIT 2: Post completed. Apologies for premature delivery.
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So religion is philosophy?
Is science a philosophy?
No. It's better.
How so? I consider philosophy to be more practical for the common man, whereas science is more theoretical for the intellectual crowd. However I really don't hold one to be superior to the other. I think they're eq
From a utilitarian standpoint, science makes testable predictions which can be iterated, producing models which both make predictions about unknown aspects of the natural world with great reliability, and generating practical applications which philosophy cannot.
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The simple fact is that you shouldn't see the story of Genesis as anything other than symbolic. Even trying to claim it fits with current scientific theories like the Big Bang and Evolution is mistake as the Bible contradicts them in many places.
I'd say the simple fact is that texts that were written some thousands years ago poorly match up to what we know about the universe today.
I also think that we need to differentiate between personal faith and organized religion.
From a systemic viewpoint the very issue is the manner of inclusion/exclusion of religious systems. You either believe and belong to the system or you do not believe and therefore are technically outside of the system.
As a system defining itself through belief, religion is inherently vulnerable to anything that contradicts or compromises whatever that belief is. Religion can't afford to be proven "wrong" where belief is concerned as doing so steadily erodes the very fabric the system is made of until it ultimately ceases to exist when proven wrong completely. - In theory... because what we didn't take into account yet is our enormous capacity for self delusion which not only keeps old religions alive, but also offers fertile ground for several new religions - sometimes based on outright hilarious premises like the belief of being haunted by space alien ghosts...
Now imagine some devastating world war - or two - and go some thousand years into the future and tell me it is not entirely possible to imagine entirely new "mainstream religions" that have all their members believing in whatever they believe in just as much as everyone else believes in their own religion today.
Which brings us to the crux of the issue: While we may not yet understand what makes the universe tick... we certainly do have a working model of how organized religions can evolve... and it does not necessarily require any kind of higher being at all.
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So religion is philosophy?
Is science a philosophy?
No. It's better.
How so? I consider philosophy to be more practical for the common man, whereas science is more theoretical for the intellectual crowd. However I really don't hold one to be superior to the other. I think they're eq
From a utilitarian standpoint, science makes testable predictions which can be iterated, producing models which both make predictions about unknown aspects of the natural world with great reliability, and generating practical applications which philosophy cannot.
I'll just say that science is not a belief system, but a tool for observation and study, but as I remember hearing it from a scientist during a bioethics conference (don't remember all of it, but I'll simplify it): "Science produces results and generate models, but we use philosophy to interpret that data and make rational decisions based on those interpretations." Science itself makes discoveries and produces verifiable data, but the philosophy aspect kicks in when we're left to deal with the application of it.
What I've been referring to is the philosophical problems associated with ontology: you have Idealists, Dualists, and Materialsts. Idealists believe the world is the mind, Dualists believe in both the mind and body, and Materialists only believe in the body. To a good extent, it seems most people are fine with dualism, but a growing movement towards Materialism, specifically Physicalism, has sprung up amongst many athiests, like Richard Dawkins for example. When I refer to concepts as mind and body, mind implies that the world is in our heads - like Plato's perfect forms, while Materialists hold that all we can rely is what our senses tell us (the body). Often times the arguement goes with "Occam's Razor cut Plato's beard" with the clash between these differing ontological positions.
However, I retort with Hempel's Dilemma http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hempel%27s_Dilemma (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hempel%27s_Dilemma). This is where I warble about the problem between physics and meta-physics - where do we draw the line?
The only problem I have with people like Dawkins and other "New Athiests" is that they quickly assign truth value to scientific evidence without fully questioning the validity of their own "truth" as truth is a fickle and definitively, relative, term. Often the best answer I recieve from the Physicalist p.o.v is that we can only base physics off of our current scientific knowledge. The other apsect is immediately assigning of negative aspects without a firm contextual background on all of the bad things that religion has done and continues to do. This would require us to actually delve into cultural anthropology, history and economics at the time, but that is not within the part of this thread.
The other problem is that I see science as the wrong tool to measure religion: that should fall within the realm of philosophy, especially when many aspects of religion are grounded firmly in meta. People like to immediately assign it the value of woo (however, there's a lot stuff in religion I would definitely assign woo without a blink) and the problem is that woo and meta don't have a defined separation. The problem is that science cannot define or measure what we could assign meta values - such as the "truth" or a concept like the color of green independent of the physical wavelengths we can see with eyes and the signals the neurons in our brains use to interpret it.
That being said, I'm quite fine with athiesm and science, but it disturbs me when people are rushing to support Physicalism without drawing a good response to Hempel's Dilemma (or is it even possible to give a satisfactory answer in the first place?) and quick to cast philosophy off the bus, though I will agree, a lot of it is mind boggling, but it's there for a reason.
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How so? I consider philosophy to be more practical for the common man, whereas science is more theoretical for the intellectual crowd. However I really don't hold one to be superior to the other. I think they're equally noble pursuits.
They aren't that different from each other. The biggest difference between them is that the former is still speculating about the things it is talking about, since there is so little maturity in its strict epistemology. IOW, philosophy deals with what is still too difficult for science to make sense of. However, when philosophy has been thorough on the subject, many "right" questions have been asked, and perhaps sufficiently specific enough so that science can test them in a more appropriate manner.
So it's not exactly the case that "science" is "better" than philosophy. It's more like when things reach the level of testable science, they are more mature as knowledge than the things that are still discussed in philosophy fora.
It's no wonder that people like Hawking that believe that the only thing that matters in the universe is its laws and its origins, etc., profoundly believe that philosophy is dead. But there is still these complex things we call "life", "society" and "intelligence" that still require some thought before going berserk on the labs.
Which Genesis creation story? The first one or the second one?
“The technique of recapitulation was widely practiced in ancient Semitic literature. The author would first introduce his account with a short statement summarizing the whole transaction, and then he would follow it up with a more detailed and circumstantial account when dealing with matters of special importance” - Gleason Archer, Harvard University, Ph.D.
To my immediate knowledge there is no direct contradiction between the two accounts in Genesis, but merely an elaboration of certain details. However I do not have a Bible on hand at the moment, so if there are any specific examples you'd like to address, please feel free to do so.
There is clear contradiction in the terms used and the chronology of events. I googled it to confirm it, and yes it's that easy to do. This is not controversial, it's widely known as a fact, and the reason for it to be so also widely known. Look it up.
Well, to be honest, I wasn't actually there. However, Genesis states that God created light on the first day. It's possible this independent light, held in existence by an omnipotent God that is at the center of this model, could've sustained plant life until the sun was created. Also, the creation of the sun and plants could have been instantaneous (Genesis claims their inception occurred on the same "day"); again, we have no frame of reference to gauge the timing of events that transpire on a spiritual plane. Though to be honest, I was wondering about this myself.
Come on, this is ridiculous. Just stick with the "symbolic" aspect of it, and try not to make a literal sense of it for the audience will just shriek. With "god", "everything" is possible. Just say "Goddidit" it's more honest.
It's true that the Bible is imbued with symbolism on almost every level. However, I honestly don't believe its creation account contradicts modern science. Many fundamentalist interpretations are diametrically opposed to the theories you mentioned, but there are also interpretations that appear both sound and consistent.
Ahhh, you *should* read it again, then. Read both genesis accounts with more attention.
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I'll just say that science is not a belief system, but a tool for observation and study, but as I remember hearing it from a scientist during a bioethics conference (don't remember all of it, but I'll simplify it): "Science produces results and generate models, but we use philosophy to interpret that data and make rational decisions based on those interpretations." Science itself makes discoveries and produces verifiable data, but the philosophy aspect kicks in when we're left to deal with the application of it.
I have no problems with this definition, albeit lacking in scope. What I mean by "better" is that whatever is studied by science it's already in a more mature state as "knowledge" than philosophy subjects are. It doesn't mean that science should be seen as a more worthy an effort than science is. Problem is, because philosophy deals with undefined terminologies and hard-problems, it's way more difficult to separate the good stuff from mumbo jumbo. And that reflects poorly on philosophy's image in general. But it's a human problem.
What I've been referring to is the philosophical problems associated with ontology: you have Idealists, Dualists, and Materialsts. Idealists believe the world is the mind, Dualists believe in both the mind and body, and Materialists only believe in the body. To a good extent, it seems most people are fine with dualism, but a growing movement towards Materialism, specifically Physicalism, has sprung up amongst many athiests, like Richard Dawkins for example. When I refer to concepts as mind and body, mind implies that the world is in our heads - like Plato's perfect forms, while Materialists hold that all we can rely is what our senses tell us (the body). Often times the arguement goes with "Occam's Razor cut Plato's beard" with the clash between these differing ontological positions.
Most people are "dualists"? Where the hell did you come up with these statistics? Most academics that I know of have a derision towards dualism, and since Damasio's work, it's even seen as an errand's fool, an anachronic thinking.
However, I retort with Hempel's Dilemma http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hempel%27s_Dilemma (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hempel%27s_Dilemma). This is where I warble about the problem between physics and meta-physics - where do we draw the line?
The contradiction within physicalism is that it is an empiricalism trying to be metaphysics, which is inconsistent by itself. IOW, it's a self-correcting process pretending to be an absolute truth. Physicalists are people that state that "whatever exists it is physical", which is obviously just a tautological statement and ridiulous by itself. What they *try* to mean is that we should distrust any mythologies and trust our empirical processes as conveyours of truth, not Truth.
Mostly, I see "physicalists" as people who are slightly confused about categories and terminologies.
The only problem I have with people like Dawkins and other "New Athiests" is that they quickly assign truth value to scientific evidence without fully questioning the validity of their own "truth" as truth is a fickle and definitively, relative, term.
This is false. Dawkins usually proclaims that "his" truth is truth with a "small t", not with a "capital T". This is the perfect summary of a relativistic take on matters of truth. Don't confuse assertiveness with absolutism.
Often the best answer I recieve from the Physicalist p.o.v is that we can only base physics off of our current scientific knowledge. The other apsect is immediately assigning of negative aspects without a firm contextual background on all of the bad things that religion has done and continues to do. This would require us to actually delve into cultural anthropology, history and economics at the time, but that is not within the part of this thread.
Well, that's anyone's prerrogative. I think people have the right to be pissed off of what some religion has done to their particular field of interest.
The other problem is that I see science as the wrong tool to measure religion: that should fall within the realm of philosophy, especially when many aspects of religion are grounded firmly in meta. People like to immediately assign it the value of woo (however, there's a lot stuff in religion I would definitely assign woo without a blink) and the problem is that woo and meta don't have a defined separation.
They are inseparable. And that's because "meta" is "woo still in vogue". This becomes specially obvious when you learn past "metas" for historical perspective and see how much "woo" was simply taken as granted. I see no problem with philosophy taking on religion, as I see no problem with science taking on religion. As long as the science is rigorous and unambiguous, there should be no problem. Of course, studies such as the ones in the OP are anything but unambiguous and rigorous, they are hand-waving "big tendencies" plot in a chart with standard deviations calculated and stuff, i.e., "piece of ****".
The problem is that science cannot define or measure what we could assign meta values - such as the "truth" or a concept like the color of green independent of the physical wavelengths we can see with eyes and the signals the neurons in our brains use to interpret it.
Truth is a proposition issue, dealt with in logic. The "color" issue is the conscience issue. Surely the last bastion of people that still profit in telling tales to their fellowmen, without any concern for scientific rigor.
That being said, I'm quite fine with athiesm and science, but it disturbs me when people are rushing to support Physicalism without drawing a good response to Hempel's Dilemma (or is it even possible to give a satisfactory answer in the first place?) and quick to cast philosophy off the bus, though I will agree, a lot of it is mind boggling, but it's there for a reason.
Is reality teleological?
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Heh, maybe God created plant life on other planets, and then created the Solar System, after all, the Sun is a second generation star ;)
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Heh, maybe God created plant life on other planets, and then created the Solar System, after all, the Sun is a second generation star ;)
I thought it was at least a third generation star....
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Well, I'm not gonna start looking up if all of these are correct... but i did google "contradictions in the bible" as suggested above and I found this link quite amusing:
http://www.skeptictank.org/hs/berror3.htm
A sample:
[...]
Should one seek wisdom?
Yes. PRO 4:7
No. ECC 1:18
Will the sins of the father be visited upon his children?
Yes. ISA 14:21
No. DEU 24:16
Is the bat a bird?
Yes. LEV 11:19
No. Encyclopeda Britanica
How many legs do grasshoppers have?
Four. LEV 11:23
Six. Go look.
Is Earth shaped as a dinner plate, or as a sphereoid?
Dinner plate. ISA 40:22, MAT 4:8
Sphereoid. Aristarchus (c. 310 - 230 B.C.)
Do snakes eat dirt?
Yes. GEN 3:14
No. Ask one.
Was Moses meek?
Yes, very. Num.12:3
No: a butcher. Num.31:14, 17, 18
Will the righteous live or die?
Live. Ps.92:12
Die. Isa.57:1
[...]
and especially ... umm ...
Is God Yahweh a God of War, or a God of peace?
War. EXO 15:3
Peace. ROM 15:33
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Heh, maybe God created plant life on other planets, and then created the Solar System, after all, the Sun is a second generation star ;)
I thought it was at least a third generation star....
I think the general consensus is 'at least second generation' to be honest, so it could well be third :)
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I know you are being honest, I just think you are also wrong ;). But it's slightly OT
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Yahweh was a god of war in at least a trinity of gods that the hebreus had. Later, there was a theological turmoil (a long after moses, according to bible experts) that turned yahweh, a wargod, to the only god of the jews. The moses chapter was rewritten to make sure this version stuck. However, many other inconsistencies remained, and the smell of polytheism still reigns in many parts of the older texts.
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Heh, maybe God created plant life on other planets, and then created the Solar System, after all, the Sun is a second generation star ;)
What planets? The other stars were only created on the 4th day too! Pretty poor excuse isn't though to suddenly jump to another planet for that and then never mention it again. The plants are merely part of the issue. A bigger one is the direct contradiction to the theory that the entire Solar System formed at the same time. Unless you're going to start claiming that the entire Genesis story refers to another planet (in which case we're straight back to it being symbolic).
Well, to be honest, I wasn't actually there. However, Genesis states that God created light on the first day. It's possible this independent light, held in existence by an omnipotent God that is at the center of this model, could've sustained plant life until the sun was created. Also, the creation of the sun and plants could have been instantaneous (Genesis claims their inception occurred on the same "day"); again, we have no frame of reference to gauge the timing of events that transpire on a spiritual plane. Though to be honest, I was wondering about this myself.
It's really a sad day when an atheist knows the Bible better than someone who is trying to claim that Genesis is anything other than symbolic. :rolleyes:
Plants and trees were not created on the same day as the sun and moon according to Genesis. Plants came about on day 3 whereas the sun and moon were on day 4.
It's true that the Bible is imbued with symbolism on almost every level. However, I honestly don't believe its creation account contradicts modern science. Many fundamentalist interpretations are diametrically opposed to the theories you mentioned, but there are also interpretations that appear both sound and consistent.
The plants vs sun thing is only one of a number of things wrong with the story in Genesis if you compare it to current scientific theories. Seriously just admit it's symbolic rather than trying to shoehorn in excuses that do neither you nor the Bible any justice. :p
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Maybe day 4 came before day 3. :nervous: To a God existing outside space and time, the order of events could have little meaning.
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I would like to point out at this juncture that the winky smiley at the end of my post was intended to show light-heartedness about my comment...
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I know but given that we're on a topic that many people are completely ignorant about it's best to stamp out even humorous answers before they become the next "Evolution is against the 2nd law of thermodynamics!" :p
Maybe day 4 came before day 3. :nervous: To a God existing outside space and time, the order of events could have little meaning.
In which case we're back to it being symbolic from our frame of reference then aren't we?
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This is false. Dawkins usually proclaims that "his" truth is truth with a "small t", not with a "capital T". This is the perfect summary of a relativistic take on matters of truth. Don't confuse assertiveness with absolutism.
He still attempts to establish a truth value based off of evidential inquiry, but truth by any means is still relative. That includes the little and large letters.
Most people are "dualists"? Where the hell did you come up with these statistics? Most academics that I know of have a derision towards dualism, and since Damasio's work, it's even seen as an errand's fool, an anachronic thinking.
I probably should go in detail with "watered down versions of dualisms in its thousand forms," but I will concede it goes on a train to "what the hell am I talking about?" as dualism turns into a giant ocean of what do we define as dualism. So for the sake of avoiding mumbo jumbo then I'm actually not going to undertake this part.
Truth is a proposition issue, dealt with in logic. The "color" issue is the conscience issue. Surely the last bastion of people that still profit in telling tales to their fellowmen, without any concern for scientific rigor.
The problem of conciousness remains a ***** of a question and deals with a number of things that makes any academic head spin, hence forth why it's called the hard problem. My few attempts at studying it are like being strapped to a Shivan Dragon with Quantum Delta flying in circles.
Well, that's anyone's prerrogative. I think people have the right to be pissed off of what some religion has done to their particular field of interest.
But also a lot of it was poltics as well - a funny example is the persecution of Cantor by Kronecker. I'm not saying this is giving religion a mulligan - but a lot of stuff is intrinsically linked with politics.
Is reality teleological?
I'm not sure. However, reality doesn't make sense, especially when we face paradoxical situations.
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I know but given that we're on a topic that many people are completely ignorant about it's best to stamp out even humorous answers before they become the next "Evolution is against the 2nd law of thermodynamics!" :p
To be honest, just try telling anyone who believes that strongly in Genesis that God created life on another planet first and they'd throw a complete wobbly anyway ;)
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I know but given that we're on a topic that many people are completely ignorant about it's best to stamp out even humorous answers before they become the next "Evolution is against the 2nd law of thermodynamics!" :p
To be honest, just try telling anyone who believes that strongly in Genesis that God created life on another planet first and they'd throw a complete wobbly anyway ;)
Then again, there are people who believe in outlandish theories that we dub them conspiracy theorists. And even the most ardent Creatiionist can't hold a candle to some of the crazy woomesiters on the PrisonPlanet forums (ran across that during a research project dealing data collection on consumers, I actually recommend avoiding it).
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It's really a sad day when an atheist knows the Bible better than someone who is trying to claim that Genesis is anything other than symbolic. :rolleyes:
No, it isn't (a sad day), I'd venture to say that to "know" the bible is a prerequesite for many people to become atheists.
This is false. Dawkins usually proclaims that "his" truth is truth with a "small t", not with a "capital T". This is the perfect summary of a relativistic take on matters of truth. Don't confuse assertiveness with absolutism.
He still attempts to establish a truth value based off of evidential inquiry, but truth by any means is still relative. That includes the little and large letters.
Of course he does. He and any sane person. Or are you impying that the evidence that the earth orbits the sun is not to be trusted? The relativism of truth is something quickly misunderstood by many people, and many good people think it refers to "moral relativism", which in turn they misunderstand as the attitude of "everyone has the right to believe in their own ethics" and bull**** like that. "Relativism" has a bad rap as a word. But by the words of Dawkins one knows a true relativist. And he is one ;).
Most people are "dualists"? Where the hell did you come up with these statistics? Most academics that I know of have a derision towards dualism, and since Damasio's work, it's even seen as an errand's fool, an anachronic thinking.
I probably should go in detail with "watered down versions of dualisms in its thousand forms," but I will concede it goes on a train to "what the hell am I talking about?" as dualism turns into a giant ocean of what do we define as dualism. So for the sake of avoiding mumbo jumbo then I'm actually not going to undertake this part.
I think that you really believe there is some truth to what you are saying, while I don't. The fact that you choose to ignore this part of the conversation doesn't win you any points... but then again I don't think conversations should be about points ;). Let's just agree to disagree then.
Truth is a proposition issue, dealt with in logic. The "color" issue is the conscience issue. Surely the last bastion of people that still profit in telling tales to their fellowmen, without any concern for scientific rigor.
The problem of conciousness remains a ***** of a question and deals with a number of things that makes any academic head spin, hence forth why it's called the hard problem. My few attempts at studying it are like being strapped to a Shivan Dragon with Quantum Delta flying in circles.
Mostly because people think "big". It's like building a giant FS campaign. People always start off like "I'm gonna build FS3, with giant perfect ships, rape beams, shivan towns, massive missions, it's gonna be HUGE". And then they start to see what that means in terms of actual work. To work out the "hard" problem, you have to learn so many things about the brain and the rest of the body, and psychology and philosophy and etc.,etc., that you probably give up before even starting, cause just to figure out "where" to begin has lost you a full year.
That's why science progresses in "smaller" questions. It is progressing, btw. We will have an answer.
Well, that's anyone's prerrogative. I think people have the right to be pissed off of what some religion has done to their particular field of interest.
But also a lot of it was poltics as well - a funny example is the persecution of Cantor by Kronecker. I'm not saying this is giving religion a mulligan - but a lot of stuff is intrinsically linked with politics.
Everything social is politics. Even science is political. We are apes, and are condemned to behave as such.
Is reality teleological?
I'm not sure. However, reality doesn't make sense, especially when we face paradoxical situations.
Innit.
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I think that you really believe there is some truth to what you are saying, while I don't. The fact that you choose to ignore this part of the conversation doesn't win you any points... but then again I don't think conversations should be about points ;). Let's just agree to disagree then.
Because its goes into super vague territory about gradients of dualism and dualism turning into monism. It's like a grayscale with infinite variations, that's why I prefer not to go there because it devolves into headeaches.
It's like trying to make logical sense from the vagueness of natural language.
We will have an answer.
Depends on the field, but frankly I don't have an answer to when we can reach a proper time table. :D
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I think that you really believe there is some truth to what you are saying, while I don't. The fact that you choose to ignore this part of the conversation doesn't win you any points... but then again I don't think conversations should be about points ;). Let's just agree to disagree then.
Because its goes into super vague territory about gradients of dualism and dualism turning into monism. It's like a grayscale with infinite variations, that's why I prefer not to go there because it devolves into headeaches.
It's like trying to make logical sense from the vagueness of natural language.
I can agree with that 100%.
We will have an answer.
Depends on the field, but frankly I don't have an answer to when we can reach a proper time table. :D
Well just wait and see. for me it's like entertainment, to watch the yearly progress in these areas, it's quite fun to see what the scientists are finding out. It'll take decades, perhaps centuries, but still it's fun.
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No, it isn't (a sad day), I'd venture to say that to "know" the bible is a prerequesite for many people to become atheists.
I was trying to make him ashamed of making such a basic mistake. Way to go blowing it. :p