Religion, were does it stand in this Age of Science and Technology

Firstly I would like to state I believe religion is going to be with us for a long time, as it already has been. It would take something like a catastrophic event and even then it would probably reappear. I believe it to be hard wired into our brains for those that cannot face the reality of death.
However we do live in an age governed by science and technology, it shapes the civilizations we live in, and if we can get past the stupidity of war you'll see what science can really achieve.

In this current Age of Science and Technology, religion has been forced to the sidelines. It has had to accept evolution by natural selection* and also the early earth was bombarded with meteorites containing organic matter, as NASA recently discovered. If this was proposed a few hundred years ago you would be dead. Now religion is on the sidelines and science pushes on.
Evolution by natural selection basically falsify's genesis the foundation of the bible.
The discovery of an expanding universe, the launch of the Hubble telescope and the images taken by it and others on earth of hundreds of thousands of other galaxies.
The pictures taken by Voyager 1 were our planet is but less than a pixel.
All firstly, quite clearly make the geocentric view look laughable, and secondly show we do not live in a privileged reference frame, humanity holds no special place in the universe. It also put's the idea that we are not alone in the universe into perspective, there are likely to be trillions of planets out there, how ignorant is it to think ours is the only one to harbor life?

In 1905 Albert Einstein published the Special Theory of Relativity, in 1913 Niels Bohr and Ernest Rutherford discovered the structure of the atom, In 1920, Arthur Eddington, was the first to suggest that stars obtained their energy from nuclear fusion of hydrogen to form helium. And The discovery's continued from there. That everything we and everything else are made of was created in the deaths and explosions of suns. Another piece of the puzzle were god is not needed.

We are about a month or two away from knowing whether the Higgs Boson exists, which will explain what gives the fundamental building blocks of our reality their mass. Thus explaining the origin of mass again no god needed.

Despite all these fantastic discovery's i am aware there are still gaps in understanding that the religious just love to cling too. But there is a message in this. Science is trying to make the unknown, known through the strictest possible method.
Religion glorify the unknown with fantasy which doesn't really get us anywhere in terms of progression you just go around in circles.


*(Those that do not accept evolution by natural selection, you only make yourself look stupid, if you took the time to study the subject you would realize this.)

which is the more powerful science or religion? i rather fear religion is!

Powerful in what way?

Science as a methodology has far more explanatory power than any religion.

Where does religion stand? Based on my experience it is always behind and to the right.

When was the last time a religion offered new knowledge of the world around us? For all the claims of believers to have a 'hotline' to the grand architect and font of all knowledge, it seems that their deities are content with keeping their followers in abject ignorance.

Gods are only ever as wise as those who believe in them.

powerful because i've yet to hear of science getting subjects banned from school or make death threats and kill people. powerful because in science everything has to be proved and validated and scientists love asking awkward questions whereas in religion you just have to have faith and not ask awkward questions. powerful because most politicians claim some religious belief yet seem to have little understanding of science.

science as a methodology is great but 'god did it' saves all that time and effort!

Science is more powerful because all it's claims can be demonstrated. Religion relies on the insecurity's, fears and the unknown to mankind. My point is in recent times there is a lot less unknown to mankind and religion has felt a bit of a squeeze in the past 100 years or so.

Aj,
I agree, as I said religion continues to go around in circles. As science continues to progress, shaping the modern world.

Richard,
Evolution by natural selection, is a banned subject in many schools across the world due to religion, and it's a crime in my eyes.
Very interesting you mention politicians generally having some religious belief and little scientific knowledge, which in my experience seems to be the case. But my point is the current government seek to change how the scientific community is funded. Instead of a committee of scientists making the decisions on what areas of research are important we will have a committee of clueless politicians looking for areas of research that will drive industry forward.
When the scientific community have demonstrated time and time again, fantastic discovery's often come out of left field research, in something unknown. Look at the laser, first thought to be useless, is now in nearly every home within a technological civilization.
And not only that we trust these politicians in very important decision making, in a world currently dependent on science and technology, when they barely understand it.
But i suppose that's a separate argument.

i agree that religion has felt the squeeze of scientific rationalism but i also think religion is fighting back quite successfully. science may disprove some religious claims but many seem willing to dispute them and choose to believe in their religion over science. much of science these days is so complex that those outside of a particular discipline may only grasp a basic understanding of developments in that field. evolution and creation of the universe are two examples where for many people the arguments are way over their heads and they rely on others to interpret on their behalf. not surprising that some religious people are trusting to their religion to tell them what it all means and that is another example of where religion has power, it's followers trust it to tell them the truth.

science and religion are both great at writing books, which one do you think is better at banning/burning them?

Joe,

i think it's a crime to deny children scientific knowledge as well. yes science in many cases has to show commercial use to get funding and it's not that difficult to see how research into areas that religion find sensitive might be restricted through lack of funding or enthusiasm! i don't think it is part of a separate argument because scientific research needs funding and some research needs a lot of it. if grants and funding are ultimately controlled or influenced by those that profess a religious disposition or by those who feel their position is dependent on the votes or good will of religious followers then they are open to compromise.

Richard,
"but i also think religion is fighting back quite successfully."
Were is the success? Evolution is still regarded as fact, all religions have done have found a gap in understanding e.g how proteins originally formed. So what is being suggested? God came down used a bit of magic made some dna, protiens... and then went about his way and left evolution to run it's course...
No it's not that hard to get a decent understanding of both evolution and the big bang, it takes a bit more effort to get an in depth understanding, but if your interested it's really not difficult.

Religion is most definitively the better at burning and banning books, the great library of Alexandria is a painful but distant reminder of this fact, who knows what untold discovery's lay in that library. It would probably be a different world today if it's contents remained.

The procession of the dull of wit.

Joe, by all rights the major world religions should have become a part of our past and we might be in a more 'spiritual' age of enlightenment but they are still there and that is a measure of their success. Evolution is regarded as a fact, well not by everyone and amongst those religious folk that do accept it they have intelligent design so no real harm done there to their faith. it may not be that hard for some but for others who have a limited education, and there are plenty of them, even most basic concepts can be difficult to comprehend and not every one has the time nor inclination to go and learn these things. maybe someone that is happy to take what a preacher says as truth simply because they said it is not the best person to adopt scientific methodology! remember that a religious person probably thinks they already know 'god did it' so why would they need to go and investigate? if they want to understand more then they look to the scriptures for answers.

Richard,
Religion as i said will continue to be, as it propagates it's self further, it is passed down to children and it's scripture is often preached, you can see how it can be compared to a virus.
Intelligent Design is the god of the gaps, and I believe as long as science is freely practiced, time will decay those gaps in understanding also.

"maybe someone that is happy to take what a preacher says as truth simply because they said it is not the best person to adopt scientific methodology! "
That is a fine point i'm a bit stumped lol, to take on the scientific method they would have to change their way of thinking.
A religious person may already think they know god did it, but when there are many scientific facts suggesting otherwise... can someone really be that ignorant?

watched a profoundly affecting programme on Beeb2 last week about whales and dolphins.
we appear to be far closer to understanding (and perhaps communicating with) them than God.
And, i suggest, a much more profitable experiment.

Hi Joe
That was very funny. Thanks for the laugh. Have you ever read any critical thinking dealing with the scientism you seem to extoll, like The Last Superstition: A Refutation of the New Atheism

Or perhaps you are unfamiliar with the fact that there is at present, other than the aforementioned really naive scientism, no actual philosophy of science and so may I recommend The One and the Many: A Contemporary Thomistic Metaphysics.

As well, you might consider From Aristotle to Darwin and Back Again: A Journey in Final Causality, Species, and Evolution to discover how classical metaphysical assumptions are back-doored into contemporary empiricism.

Have you read any of these works? Perhaps you could share with us the theistic philosophical thought you have considered.

I've read fairly widely in science generally, and I find the materialistic scientism of so many authors like Stephen Hawking , Dawkins and others to be so simplistic as to be an embarassment to the western intellectual heritage.

What 'science' do you see as capable of articulating purpose or final cause or even explaining what motion is?

You seem, if you don't mind the observation, to be offering exactly the same nonsensical empiricist view of theism that imagines the theistic notion of God as but another empirically demonstrable force, a notion virtually any traditional Christian philosopher or science teacher would find quite amusing.

I might also point out that modern physics is essentially rooted in the seminal work of Jean Buridan, a French priest who develpled the theory of impetus while also rejecting somewhat ironically, the errors of William of Ockham whose nominalism or conceptualism still haunts modern science and your post.

Working and teaching at the University of Paris in the 1300's modern science is inconceivable without his contribution. He saw no scientific, philosophical or theological - religious problems, and indeed, as I recall, used a theological conclusion on the nature of action to reject the Aristotelian idea of objects in motion while accepting his metaphysical works as developed within scholasticism.

Is your view of religion scientific? Is it good science? It seems only to apply to fundamentalism.

Joe,

this must surely be religions greatest asset that it is passed on from generation to generation and within a culture.

i think that even if all the gaps are closed by scientific explanation it is still possible to say that god designed it all to be that way. if the universe can be explained all the way back to the big bang then god made the big bang happen. if science can go back even further to before the big bang then god was there. if science explains everything then all it's really done is describe god or at least reveals him/her/it in all their glory. science can not disprove god so god can always be there somewhere for those who believe him to be.

can someone really be that ignorant...........................have you read some of the posts on this forum? :-)

i've heard that all the dolphins have to say is ..............."so long and thanks for all the fish"

For that definition of powerful, I agree. Not sure it's particularly good power, though.

Sam,

oh no good didn't come into my consideration at all.

There are those who would say that we have passed the age of science - we are a postmodern society - a society that believes that science doesn't hold all the answers.

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Feeling a bit of squeeze hasn't stopped it growing.

Should we teach children to split the atom?