Science helps more than religion!!

Just a post that pissed me off

Originally Posted by AEIOU

Science is often treated like a Religion too. Infallible. How many people were duped into believing in cold fusion? Apparently some scientists lie too.
Interesting how often science is wrong or how often it is updated with newer and more accurate information.
Think of some of the things that science taught us only one or two generations ago and how it has changed.

Do you know what the word "dinosaur" means? Terrible Lizard. Science use to teach us that dinosaurs were giant (cold blooded) reptiles. Yet now they've found out that at least some dinosaurs had four chambered hearts and were warm blooded. More recently they found some viable dinosaur DNA and when sequenced they found out that dinosaur protein most closely resembles that of chickens. Yes, dinosaur tastes like chicken! So maybe they were more like birds instead of reptiles!

Until Edwin Hubble came along, it appeared that the Universe was static. Now they know the universe is expanding, which logically concludes that the universe had a starting point. All kinds of theories about the universe. Is it dark matter or dark energy? Should they unify the various theories with "string theory?"

The above were only a couple of examples. There are many many others.
Apparently even the periodic table as we know it is being challenged right now. A lot of what science teaches us today will be very obsolete in two generations.

This exactly an example of why science is more viable than religion on a truth standpoint. As we discover new things, we adapt what we know by learning. That's what science is all about, learning about things you can prove exist, and as you learn more, you adapt what you know! You use that knowledge to learn more! That's how we learn! The fact that science can admit they're wrong and continuously become more accurate than religion, which thinks it knows all in the first place. Science isn't infallible, but its how we learn, opposed to religion, which thrives off of rejecting new ideas. Science says the universe was created by the big bang? No! God farted it out! Science says people and animals evolved from pond scum mixed with dinosaur feces? No! We came into existence the way we are, and we're all inbred hicks, and the entire planet is south carolina. Science says you can't come back to life? DENIED. You can come back to life, so FUCK YOU SCIENCE!! Religion may have helped people spiritually, but it never cured any of my illnesses, stopped my stomach from digesting my intestines, or even gave me a easier way to get from my house to the hospital (which science also invented) when my thigh muscle caved in.

I think it would a been alot easier to respond to this in that thread.

i did. lolzoz

Thank you for this post. It annoys me when religious people cite this as a reason for dumping reason and science in favor of a more "faith" based system.

This is one of the reasons science works! Com'on people!

If science didn't try to improve upon itself then we would still be "in the dark" about the workings of the universe. Surrendering what we don't know in favor of a god doesn't bring on answers, it just brings on ignorance.

Originally Posted by Magic Mono

Thank you for this post. It annoys me when religious people cite this as a reason for dumping reason and science in favor of a more "faith" based system.

I think both of them are a bit wack-o sometimes

A religious person who loves science signing off

Of course science helps more than religion. That is, science is concerned with the here-and-now, whereas religion is concerned with the hereafter.

Originally Posted by HannibalLecter

Of course science helps more than religion. That is, science is concerned with the here-and-now, whereas religion is concerned with the hereafter.

If only it really were so. Then the forum wouldn't be cluttered with this bullshit.

is there really a point to this? do you expect someone to argue it? do you think someone's opinion will change because of this?

My agreement with this is mixed, depending on the interpretation of the idea. Science is a manner of gathering information and understanding of the universe. Religion is a societal institution, based on philosophies, a key component of which is often a theistic claim (belief is a deity or deities).

It would be silly to deny that religions as social institutions have done good things for the people of the world. The real key here, however, as I see it, is that those good acts did not require a theistic belief, only an altruistic philosophy (which I think is to some extent intrinsic to the human condition, as social mammals). Science only gives us information, it's up to us how we use it. This is the realm of philosophy, or as some might say "religion." The theistic truth claim is a key component of most of these religious philosophies, which essentially provides a philosophical cop-out as I see it. From what I've seen, the rationale usually used for this philosophy is that the theist spots a false regress, which needs to have something to arbitrarily terminate it (god(s)), which is in reality not a logical regress, but simply a gap in human knowledge not yet filled by our science. That, or it plays as an arbitrary "because I say so" and/or tautology ("it's wrong because it's wrong") on difficult questions of ethics.

The problem with the above is that this lack of serious ethical inquiry, well-intentioned or otherwise, allows room for the justification of immoral actions on a shaky basis, and allows control of the masses on a similar basis. My thoughts have led me to the idea that no matter how well-intentioned a given theist is in holding a theistic philosophy, the shaky theistic component of said philosophy allows others with different emotional or ethical aims to exploit said philosophical basis to accomplish harm. On top of this, the unscientific truth claim of theism is easily spread, and it creates in the masses a fundamental philosophical weakness that allows them to be controlled. This isn't to say that there aren't good theists, or that religious institutions have never done good things, but the way it makes the majority of people approach philosophy (especially ethics) and the universe in general is what brings it into conflict with science.

The very fact that how individuals interpret the philosophy of their religion in wildly different ways, sharing the theistic truth claim, which reflect their philosophical outlook otherwise (not pertaining to theism) and their personal experiences, personality, and emotions, is one factor which leads me to think that "god" is a philosophical concept we've been brought up with for so long and is so ingrained in our consciousnesses that it is a construct of the mind of the individual of the believer, simply because it is their best-known answer (if in my view a simplistic and irrational one, to each their own) to the difficult ethical questions and great uncertainties and fears about our own lives that we all face. Truly, the new wave of "spiritual but not religious" personal gods seem to demonstrate this as well.

Can such a philosophy do good? Of course. There are many golden-hearted religious individuals out there, and some of them have been some of the greatest doers of good in the world. But from where I stand, I see the good actions undertaken as a result of a religious philosophy not needing the theistic component at all. However, many of the problems that have been caused by various collections of religious individuals would be absent without that theistic truth claim so taking over the minds of some human beings.

What am I trying to say with this increasingly rambling and incoherent thinking? I suppose that I'm trying to say that while religion has done good, the same good could be done without religion, while many of the bad results of religion, and the impediments to advancing our understanding of the universe that sometimes come from it, would likely occur much less without theism.

Why not simply abandon the theistic component and begin conducting ourselves according to general philosophies of good that are generally intrinsic to the human condition?

Valdyr, you talk too much. You make great points, but when your points overshadow the OP.....well i cant think of a good idiom right now, given the fact it feels like a horse just shoved it's cock in my ear.