Religion vs Philosophy.

The funniest part about this conversation is that I have yet to see anyone point out the progressive nature of each.

Religion lead to philosophy which lead to science. The three are not in disagreement, they are merely different levels of the evolution of human thought.

Natural spirituality converted to polytheism which converted into monotheism. There is very little worship of multiple gods in the world today.

It's kind of funny because I noticed this progression in my own life. I started with religion, being raised christian. Moved on to philosophy and when I ran out of answers there, I moved on to science. Now I've reached somewhere completely different. Now I am in a place where nothing is real or can be proven but it is required that I take certain things for granted lest I end up in a mental ward before I can complete my research.

Why must we pit religion VERSUS philosophy instead of embracing them both as mechanisms of the same impulse -- desire for understanding. Take what you can from both, and leave the stuff that tunnels your vision.

Galileo and the many other "heretic"proponents of scientific belief not conforming to religious dogma would bitterly laugh at the suggestion that religion is a mechanism of the "desire for understanding". And, as evidenced by the Creationist movement, the Inquisition is still with us.

Galileo and the many other "heretic"proponents of scientific belief not conforming to religious dogma would bitterly laugh at the suggestion that religion is a mechanism of the "desire for understanding". And, as evidenced by the Creationist movement, the Inquisition is still with us.

Good for Galileo. I don't see what that has to do with what I said. I never said anything about conforming to religious dogma.

After further thought, I can see some validity in your positive assessment of religion as a path to greater understanding. It often is. More often and more consequentially, however, it leads in my opinion to greater misunderstanding. You have allowed for that condition by advising us to use the good stuff and ignore the rest.

I completely agree, especially in the contemporary world we find ourselves in, that the dogma that comes along with profession of a religious belief leads only to more misunderstanding.

That doesn't change the fact that, back in the primordial years, religion was one of the first displays of mankind's desire to understand. In today's world, we've outgrown religion. Religion, unlike science and philosophy, does not allow for the rapid evolution of ideas with new evidence and prefers to assume its own beliefs at the exclusion of all other beliefs. History has shown that truth is always been striven for, never arrived at. Religion is convinced it has arrived. But people cling to what they know--and misunderstandings arise.

That is why my view is thus: take what wisdom you can from any and every religion, leave the exclusive labels behind.

Why is this typical of modern times and not pre-modern times? If anything, modernity has allowed the world's faith traditions to cross the globe and mingle. We have westerners studying eastern religion and vice versa. Looking at modern religious movements, we can point to the Baha'i, Unitarians and a host of other religious groups which promote interfaith exchange and understanding as an aspect of their dogma. It seems to me that the more we studying the various religions, the more we will understand. But you suggest that the opposite has been true, that somehow despite the fact that the world over studies a greater variety of religions and employs new ways to study religion (such as Higher Criticism) we modern people are more likely to misunderstand than understand religion.

Several points:
1. Why have we outgrown religion? Has man lost or is he losing his spiritual needs? If man still has spiritual needs, then man has not outgrown religion.

2. Religion does allow for the rapid evolution of ideas. Science, philosophy and religion all change at the same pace - the pace at which man questions what he hears. Religion has never been, and is not, static.

3. Further, religion does change with "new evidence". In the case of religion, the closest thing to evidence to be found is the human condition - and religion changes to accomodate changes in the human condition which influence man's spiritual needs.

4. Religion does not, universally speaking, exclude all other beliefs. Quite the contrary. History is filled with the exchange of religious views. That's a big part of how and why religion changes over time; as new spiritual ideas are introduced to a population, the population begins to adopt at least some aspects of those new spiritual ideas as needed.

5. Religion at large is not convinced of anything. Looking at the world's faith traditions, a sizeable contigent of religious people and religious traditions are convinced that they are striving for truth, and that truth is not absolute nor perfectly represented in their teachings.

People do cling to what they know - but this is true in all other areas of study, science and philosophy included. To single out religion doesn't make much sense to me.

What label is exclusive?

Religion does not = spirituality. Religion is when individuals hand over their spiritual development to gurus and priests and hierarchy rather than basing their spiritual development on personal experience.

What I'm referring to is religion as a social institution. In this regard, religion has very little to do with spirituality. And to imply that man has outgrown spiritual needs is absurd, so I hope I don't make that implication. Perhaps it would be more accurate for me to say that man's spiritual needs have outgrown religion?

But the groundwork doesn't change. You're still always using the same launching point, so to speak.

Again, my view of religion is very detached from the spiritual needs of man. Religion does not change to address the spiritual needs of man, it changes to address its own structural and hierarchical needs.

Historically speaking, I agree. But one of the tenants of a religion surviving is that it has followers that subscribe to it and only it. What I'm referring to is not the religion itself but its followers--in that they are encouraged to profess their belief to that religion and tag themselves as such, to the exclusion of other systems of belief. This is not the mindset of a spiritually healthy person. Does that make sense?

I don't understand why anyone would subscribe to one certain belief system of they weren't convinced that it was the truth. To proclaim, "I am _________" is an absolutism that seems to imply some sort of arrival.

Like I said above, when you are a part of a certain religion, you are excluding other religions from your identity. That exclusivity is not necessary and only breeds tunnel vision instead of well-roundedness.

I really appreciate your comments as they forced me to think deeper about my own. Any replies you have to the above would be much appreciated.

Are you saying that the Christian Galileo would have laughed at the notion that his personal faith helped him understand the world?

That's pretty odd, don't you think?

In my view, religion and philosophy ought to be in total contrast,since religion is based in revelations and myths,has no scientific validity,it provides no evidence or proofs but dogmas.
On the other hand, philosophy is based in critical thinking and judgement ,in sound reasoning and rationality.

No, I'm not saying that. I can't assume, as you are doing, that Galileo's faith helped him in any significant degree to understand the world, or even that he thought it helped that much. His conflict with religious dogma began at age 10, so it would be pretty odd for a smart guy like him not to have soon become skeptical in this regard. Sure, he continued to be a good Catholic but most likely a changed Catholic, more skeptical and independent of the church fathers and their revelations - somewhat of a precursor to most of the Catholics I see around me today.

OK, so Galileo didn't "bitterly laugh". He concealed his bitter disappointment and went on discovery after discovery with the sweet knowledge of which mechanism to understanding was the dependable one.

It's too bad, but there just doesn't seem to be a meeting ground for you and me on this general subject. We can agree on the reality of evidential or reasonable things, but, apparently unlike you, I must restrict my belief to just those things. I claim no superiority for this position..( Who knows? I may well regret it in this world or the next.) .