I think the biggest flaw with “nonoverlapping magisteria” is that the line between science and religion does not go both ways. Absolutely there is a line because religion has absolutely no place in the methodological definition of science. But religion has no such methodological definition and certainly nothing which makes the findings of science inapplicable to the conclusions of religion.
I don’t think it has to do with methods, per se. I think it has more to do with what we are trying to understand. If you have the goal of building a house you will get all of the right tools and materias to meet that goal. Science is the tools and materials. Knowledge about the natural world is the goal. Religion (and philosophy) is used to help us answer questions about morality, ethics, spirituality, and meaning in life. Science can’t answer those questions for us, but religion and philosophy can. At least in my eyes, we start by asking what our goals are and then we look for the best ways to achieve those goals.
2 Likes
Dog breeders, for example, have tried every trick in the book to produce novel variations and they’ve discovered that their are limitations to how much dogs can be changed - pushing the genetic boundary produces nothing but weak, dysfunctional, unfit animals.
Green Warblers speciating into more Green Warblers, for example, is hardly evidence that a eukaryote can give rise to a human being.
The limit is the rate of accumulation of mutations, which takes time.
If the genome of dogs couldn’t be changed to make other species there there wouldn’t be other species, there would just be dogs. The reason species are different from each other is the mutations that make their genomes different from each other.
Humans are eukaryotes. Fungi and humans are both eukaryotes, as was their common ancestor. It is eukaryotes speciating into new eukaryotes.
2 Likes
Well they are certainly connected. After all I am the one who said…
Because science is based on some methodological ideals it is restricted to things which those methodological ideals are applicable. You cannot test an hypothesis which is not even falsifiable let alone testable. And you can hardly come up with written procedures giving the same result no matter what you want or believe unless there things you can in some way isolate, dissect, measure, predict, explain and control.
Those methodological ideals are the only things which separates science from the work of lawyers, politicians, preachers, and used car salesmen – all based on rhetoric. It is the only thing which gives the findings of science any epistemological superiority. The rhetoric of atheists imagining science to be on their side as some sort of priest of logic and rationality is no different than the rhetoric of any religion… or snake-oil salesman for that matter.
So why do we do science to begin with?
I fully agree. As an atheist, it makes me cringe when my fellow atheists use science in that manner. There are many, many great and respected Christian scientists, and millions of everyday Christians who love science.
4 Likes
I don’t understand.
Just because can-openers only work on cans (and a particular type of can at that), is that a reason not to use them? They work really well for cans, just as science works really well for what can be isolated, dissected, measured, or controlled. I don’t think it ever offered itself as some sort of explanation for everything. Isn’t that more of a religious trick?
Why do science? Why do we choose to employ the methods of science?
Why do we open cans? Is it because can-openers open cans?
Reasons vary. They always do. Put simply we do what we can.
Perhaps you are looking for some high minded noble answer, and I have little doubt that many can give you such an answer.
Me? At the age of about 13 I conceived of a Solomon like ambition to understand the secrets of the universe – to know how things worked. It took me a long time to realize that understanding things wasn’t always the answer to finding a way to change things.
Exactly. The same thing happened to me.
We want to know how the universe works, and we use science because it works really, really well for that task. We don’t use science because of some rules or adherence to an ideology of methodologies. We use science because it works.
Do we use science to determine morality or ethics? No. Science doesn’t work for that task. Do we use science to define purpose in our lives? I don’t, and I hope others don’t. Do we use science to understand our spiritual side? No.
All I am saying is that we start with a question. We don’t start with a method.
1 Like
But the same question doesn’t take everyone to science for the answers, obviously.
The reason I looked to science first was because that is how I was raised. It was my first expectation that this is where answers were to be found. So naturally I began with science and only then looked to philosophy and finally religion. But clearly other people are raised differently without the same expectations – starting with religion because that is where they are taught to expect answers.
Well yes… it works on that which it works. Others say the same for religion – it works for what they think is important.
I agree. Different people choose different tools.
The fact that science works is something we take for granted in the modern era. Early in the history of science the method was based on Rationalism which was the idea that you could find the answers to questions about nature through rational thought. That form of science didn’t work well. It wasn’t until the revolution of Empiricism that science really took off. Then science worked for what it was intended to do.
1 Like
I think you need to read this:
The first thing that you must do is make sure that you are challenging what the theory says in reality, and not an incorrect cartoon caricature of it. Attempting to debunk something that no real scientist does or teaches is called a straw man argument, and it is a form of lying. So for example, don’t start claiming that “fossils are used to date rocks and rocks are used to date fossils,” and don’t start describing evolution as “a cat turning into a dog” or “a cat giving birth to a dog.” Stratigraphy and evolution do not work like that.
6 Likes
Huh. Interesting point.
2 Likes
Depends on what you mean by “Evolution”.
Atheism and methodological naturalism are virtually the same thing. So little wonder the atheism-science alliance resembles some kind of pagan cult - it’s basically the worship of nature, replete with its own creation myth (evolution).
If you call a plumber or get out a wrench rather than calling your pastor when you have a leaky pipe, you’re practicing methodological naturalism.
9 Likes
And if the plumber says you have demons in your sewer pipes, and is not being metaphorical, you get a new plumber.
9 Likes
I dunno. I think I heard our plumber invoking divine judgment a few times when he was working on our root-clogged sewer line.
10 Likes
Again chaps, what we’re dealing with here is motivated reasoning, which cannot be reasoned with using critical thinking. Holocaust denial, 9/11, Illuminati, etc, etc flat earth and all religious truth cannot be examined or refuted. Every fact that does refute them is the cutting off of a hydra head.