Why do so many people think science and religion are mutually excusive?

Question

misspelling, should be "exclusive."

Answer 1

I have always wondered the same thing. Science can explain the things that religion doesn't and religion can explain the things that science can't prove.

Just look at the world- Science has a theory that it was created as a result of a giant explosion in Space, yet science has also showed how well everything on the planet works together.

Science has proven that every living thing needs Oxygen to live, yet plants produce Oxygen, the very thing they need to live. It is a huge regenerating cycle. Then you look at the bees, they pollinate the trees and plants, without bees plant life would basically die. Without plants the bees would not survive- the great Circle of Life.

Those are simple examples, yet there is still something that makes no sense to me. How could a giant explosion cause everything to work so perfectly together? We have all seen explosions- they are utter Chaos. Just a big giant mess. The debris from an explosion has no rhyme or reason. I can't understand how something so chaotic and random could create something so intricate as this world is and as it cycles are. That is where the Religion comes in- religion teaches intelligent design. Logically intelligent design makes much more sense. Someone with a master plan, who knew the science of how worlds work, applied that science and made this earth. He did it carefully and had a plan to make sure that it all worked together so well. However had we relied soley on religion we may never know about the circle of life and all the other cycles that keep things alive on this earth.

I Believe that the Creator-God, wants us to learn how everything works, study the world and the life on it. When we run into something we can't answer, rely on our faith and on the recorded history(the bible) to explain these things for us. When science and religion stop fighting each other and work together, we will get so many more answers.

Answer 2

Spirituality or a general sense of God, which may not be proven false can cooperate with science, but religion is another story.

Many religious holy books make claims that are falsifiable. This means when we developed the tools to test these claims, they did not appear to be true. Many argued that our observations must be faulty and this was the birth of the conflict.

Answer 3

Because it is easier to fight against or deny the validity of new information than to figure out a way to integrate it into one's worldview. Learning new things also inevitably means admitting that we were wrong about some things, and that is a hard thing for many people to do. In other words, it all inevitably comes down to pride and an unwillingness to learn.

Answer 4

It requires a loose interpretation of most holy books in order to make science match what they say.
People who are able to do so generally feel that their particular scripture is more of a guide, and not a literal truth.
Those fundamentalists who hold that their books are the literal word of god and cannot be interpreted (which isn't really possible) reject science because many areas are contradictory to their own dogma.

Answer 5

Science and religon are orthogonal, by definition,

(phyiscal reality) - (empirical reality ) = faith

In the whole of human history across the entire planet not one deity has volunteered Novocain. It is a telling omission.

Answer 6

There is no excuse for religion....

Did you mean exclusive? Because they are. Religion requires blind faith to unchanging dogma. Science requires opening one's mind and changing views when new evidence comes to light.

Answer 7

technological information and faith/sprituality are 2 separate levels of analyze, so in that way they do no longer look to be truly reconciled. technological information asks "how," even even though it does not ask "why." faith asks why. technological information on no account claims to be waiting to furnish the "why." Why are we here? technological information does not care. technological information can, even although, let us know how we greater from the 1st organisms. faith/spirituality asks the "why," so technological information-minded human beings should not be threatened whilst that time of analyze leads to solutions that don't mesh with technological information. besides, quantum physics itself says that the variety you be conscious something variations it truly is totally nature (unusual yet real). This holds real on the quantum point, and although we can't degree this result on the macro point, all of us understand that the macro worldwide is composed of very small issues (quantum debris). what's my my component? technological information is the skill of using methodical fact and diagnosis to understand the worldwide. This fact has extra approximately a undeniable information of the worldwide, yet technological information does not have a monopoly on the character of certainty. definite, people who think of that technological information trumps faith/spirituality tend to get on their extreme-horse and phone all and sundry else believers in magic and superstition. the certainty is, lots of the terrific minds of our time have pronounced that the worldwide is composed of such secret that technological information somewhat scratches the exterior. How conceited to assert that historical styles of understanding that contain spirituality are easily moot, and that the only valid information of the worldwide is that of present day technological information. Our information of the worldwide may be so constrained (technological information already tricks at separate dimensions, to no longer point out the funkiness of quantum mechanics) that magic is a extra precise variety.

Answer 8

Not science and religion in general, but science and specific religions.

Take christianity - for example the creationist 'museum'
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/05/the_creation_museum.php

or, hey, the bible
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/science/long.html

Answer 9

They are, they have nothing in common.

Religion is mainly a belief in invisible flying beings and imaginary friends. I cannot see how there is any room for science.

Answer 10

Again, only if you wish to take bronze-age origin myths as literal truth. Otherwise, no.