Fighting the wrong battle? Science vs. Religion?

Question

I found this article today - thoughts?
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v403/n6772/full/403831a0.html

"It is true that certain religious groups have been highly critical of science and impeded its advance. We have all heard reports of Southern Baptist preachers inveighing against evolution. Likewise, towards the end of the nineteenth century Roman Catholicism took an anti-science stance.Yet there is another side to the coin — religion has often provided the motivation for pursuing science. Newton and Faraday were two of the many eminent scientists who turned to science to better understand God. They saw no conflict between God's two books — Nature and Revelation."

"Taking cheap and uninformed swipes at religion is hardly the best strategy to adopt when trying to encourage people to take science seriously and become better informed about its methods and content."

"Religion has also traditionally provided people with communities, with social values and with emotional warmth — aspects of human experience that science cannot offer."

"Those who articulate the conflict between science and religion have set the terms of engagement and have forced many religious people into adopting questionable ways of integrating the two domains. Thus we find religious scientists undergoing contortions trying to bridge science and religion through concepts such as indeterminacy in quantum theory. Whatever their validity, such intellectualized responses also fail to tackle many of the most important topics at the science–religion interface, such as the ways in which the values of different faiths lead their members to understand Western science, technology and medicine or, more specifically, how they respond to both physical and mental illness."

Answer 1

First of all prove this statement you made.

"Roman Catholicism took an anti-science stance."

Secondly, I'm not sure I agree with either science or religion 100% Because men with selfish motives rewrite science and scripture to fit their own glorification or when their pride or position is threatened in even the most infinitesimal way. No new hypothesis is allowed not even for the sake of discussion.

If science and religion do agree then both will grumble and complain and have the information changed or the link removed. Similar to book burning except on the internet.

As an example

Science says;

So the fact that Neanderthals and modern humans coexisted at least for some time seems certain. However, because of In some areas of the Middle East and the Iberian peninsula, Neanderthals did, in fact, co-exist side by side with populations of anatomically modern Homo sapiens for roughly 10,000 years. There is also evidence that it is in these areas where the last of the Neanderthals died out

difficulties in calibrating the C14 dates the duration of this period is uncertain

One skeleton that has led some researchers to claim that it shared Neanderthal and Cro-magnon features has been found at Lagar Velho in Portugal; it is uncertain whether this is in fact a hybrid of the two species, or simply an extreme individual of one or the other. This may suggest the two species may have interbred.

Tests comparing Neanderthal and modern human mitochondrial DNA show some dissimilarity. The mtDNA indicated a split between Homo sapiens and Neanderthals occurred little more than 500,000 years ago.

In November 2006, a paper was published in the U.S. journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, in which a team of European researchers report that Neanderthals and humans interbred.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal_interaction_with_Cro-Magnons

Can different species interbreed? here is a recent discovery. http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/Electronics_Technicians/message/2488

Religion;

Nephilim are supernatural beings, specifically the offspring of human women and “sons of God” (proposed to be fallen angels), who appear significantly in Genesis 6 and are mentioned also in other biblical texts and in some non-canonical Jewish writings. Others consider the Nephilim, in contrast, to be the offspring of human men descended from Seth and human women descended from Cain. Both interpretations say that the lustful breeding of the Nephilim was one of the provocations for Flood

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nephilim

Partially contradicted here by a different religion at the link:

Moses sent the spies to spy out the land, Numbers 13:33. Over a period of several hundred years the Israelites made war against them, ultimately destroying them out of the land of Canaan.

http://www.raptureready.com/soap/giants.html

And so on

If you spend more than fifeteen minutes studying this information you will eventually see that both science and religion have a similar story and a simalar amount of uncertaianty. Note that despite the scientific proceedure they find fault with themselves. And despite similarities various religions will contradict each other needlessly.

Thus I say we are still in the tower of babel having shown that we are more ape than god. We can't communicate. Even when we agree we fight to disagree.

Answer 2

"Taking cheap and uninformed swipes at religion..." I was kinda with this until this statement. It assumes that most people are uniformed about religion and/or that the requests for evidence to support a historical document are cheap. Granted there have been many cheap and uninformed swipes on both sides, but there are some serious issues and problems that religions tend to gloss over with "faith".

Also consider that Newton and Faraday both lived at a time when the bible was more accepted as an accurate account of history, as opposed to now when we see that there is no evidence for it.

Answer 3

They should be hand in hand with people.

The problem is that religion should be a personal matter between you and your beliefs. NOT an organized church group that bands together to attack/discredit any outsiders. If you need a group support system for your faith...you have NO faith. True faith isn't something you share or celebrate with a ggroup....it is a connection between you and God.

Too many people though think it is a club matter and all those who are not in the club must be attacked or driven away and that anyone who violates the sacred parchment must be out to destory everything. This is what comes of organizing a religion

Answer 4

I think we need to put the academic arguments aside and get together against the c$£ts (and I choose that word carefully) who seem to be running the planet into the ground at the moment, those that have highjacked the advancements both science and theology have made to bring about a civilised society. If you want to believe in a god- fine, we all rationalise the world to stop ourselves going nuts anyway- what worries me is that their won't be a society for people to hold these academic arguments in if we leave the sodding merchants in charge of stuff for much longer- they haven't got a clue what to do other than hoarde wealth, and are too thick and unambitious to consider any endeavour that won't bear fruit beyond their lifetimes.

Answer 5

Baha'u'llah, founder of the Baha'i Faith used an analogy to explain the relationship between science and religion. Knowledge is one, represented by the bird. Science, which investigates physical reality, is one wing. Religion, which investigates spiritual reality, is the other wing. To soar, the bird requires both wings to be equally strong and work in tandem. "The fourth teaching of Bahá'u'lláh is the agreement of religion and science. God has endowed man with intelligence and reason whereby he is required to determine the verity of questions and propositions. If religious beliefs and opinions are found contrary to the standards of science they are mere superstitions and imaginations; for the antithesis of knowledge is ignorance, and the child of ignorance is superstition. Unquestionably there must be agreement between true religion and science. If a question be found contrary to reason, faith and belief in it are impossible and there is no outcome but wavering and vacillation."

Answer 6

Just a heads-up, once you start calling people, "uninformed," because they are "taking swipes," at religion, your credibility drops 95%.
Also, the best strategy for encouraging people to take science seriously is EDUCATION.

Answer 7

This is a battle fought on the fringes of both. Usually guided by agendas unrelated to both science and religion.

Answer 8

God bless you for posting this.

to the answerer who said something about killing in the name of science- naziism applied genetic principles to darwinism, while communism took an economic approach to darwinian principles. millions upon millions were imprisoned, tortured, and killed as a result. if we're going to discuss the facts, let's discuss ALL of the facts.

Answer 9

The fact that a few great people persued science in spite of the church, tells us only that there have been great people willing to take personal risk to advance knowledge.

Answer 10

Main line churches are in with the science clan