Monday, August 19, 2013

Do science and religion teach the same lessons?

From the HuffPo, writer Elad Nehorai reflects,
The more I learn about science, and the more I learn about religion, the more I feel like the two so beautifully complement each other. The more people debate and argue, the more I see the commonality between the two...
He goes on to enumerate some of the lessons he thinks they teach in common.
1. I'm Not In Control
Learning about science taught me just how little control I have over the universe....
Believing in G-d is so similar, on an emotional level, that it's almost like we've used different words to describe a similar idea. Accepting that G-d is completely in control of every moment immediately implies that we aren't in control of anything....
2. I'm Insanely Small
The more science learns, the more it seems to realize just how small we really are. ....within a universe more vast than we can imagine. 
If that's not a spiritual realization, I don't know what is.... 
.... To remember that our smallness is simply a reminder to live our lives in a state of giving is the greatest lesson both science and religion can teach us. 
3. I'm A Miracle 
...[N]o matter what you believe, there's no question whatsoever that our just existing is the most special thing we could ever imagine. 
Let's take science. If you believe that we originated in some sludge, and then that sludge turned into a single celled organism and that turned into something and that something turned into something and eventually, after billions of years, out came you... um, how insanely amazing is that? ... 
And if you're an insane religious nutball like me and you believe that G-d made the world in six days (however you interpret that, whether it be six days that were really billions of years or six days that were actually six days), you simply can't help but be blown away. I mean, that something as immense as G-d, something so beyond reality and so real, the only thing that's real, could take a moment out of his busy day and make me, and care about me..... 
4. Nothing Makes Sense 
This is one I think that both the fanatics of science and the fanatics of religion hate accepting. In fact, you could say they twist the reality of both science and religion to make themselves believe they have some measure of true understanding of the way the world works. 
What's funny is that it seems the more you study about science, the more you realize how little you know. ... 
The same is true, I've found, of religion. ... 
a true believer of religion knows that he knows, essentially, nothing. And anyone that accepts that the reality of science is a constant growth in knowledge that changes, evolves, over time, realizes how little they really know.
What do you think of these lessons?  Which ones would YOU add?

5 comments:

Erp said...

Science (and engineering, the application of science) has made possible the removal of the scourges of smallpox, polio, measles, cholera, and many other diseases (that they haven't been removed is due to political and sometimes religious obstacles). It is our hope of removing malaria and cancer. It created the internet (for both good and ill). It allows us to design building that are less likely to kill us in earthquakes. It enables us to predict reasonably well the future be it the weather in the next 7 days or global climate change. It enables us to discover our unwritten history in time. Can any religion do these?

JCF said...

"Science" didn't do bupkus, Erp.

*People* made these discoveries. People w/ various belief-systems, about the Ultimate Meaning of it all. Some great scientists have "religious" belief-systems, wherein their religious faith compliments and spiritually (emotionally, if you prefer) EMPOWERS their vocations to scientific discoveries. Other scientists, of course, have non-theistic belief-systems.

Unless one's belief-system is *specifically* anti-science (sadly, there are some), there's no reason to set religion and science at odds. It's a false dichotomy.

IT said...

I don't think the writer's argument is that they do the same thing, obviously, but that there are some big things they share. Like a sense of wonder.

JCF said...

Hmmm. I think they're rather merely differing aspects of the same thing. They share MANY things (therefore), a sense of wonder being one of them.

IT said...

PZ Myers, responding to Steven Pinker's essay, writes:

Science is a fantastic tool (our only tool, actually) for probing material realities. Respect it for what it is. But please, also recognize that there’s more to the human experience than measurement and the acquisition of knowledge about physical processes, and that science is a relatively recent and revolutionary way of thinking, but not the only one — and that humans lived and thrived and progressed for thousands of years (and many still do, even within our technological culture!) without even the concept of science.

Scientism is the idea that only science is the proper mode of human thought, and in particular, a blinkered, narrow notion that every human advance is the product of scientific, rational, empirical thinking. Much as I love science, and am personally a committed practitioner who also has a hard time shaking myself out of this path (I find scientific thinking very natural), I’ve got enough breadth in my education and current experience to recognize that there are other ways of progressing.