Science and religion

Setanta- Perfect!

(Then again, there ARE some journalists who treat "fairy tales" as the news! )

Those aren't journalists, Phoenix, they're "wolves in sheep's clothing."

From science and religion to media and jornialists. "Wolves in sheep's clothing" sounds so much like a story in the bible.

To me religion is science written in the form of poetry.
For instance:

God created adam, and of a part of adam he created eve. It sounds like a fairytale, but if we change the lingo into something more modern it would be: Nature (god) created the first organism, an ameba (adam) and of part of him nature created eve. (cytogenesis). These things eventually evolved to become humans and all other living creatures.

The garden of eden was the home of adam and eve until they ate the forbidden fruit. Then they were banished from eden. This moment I like to think of as the moment when humans learned to think (when they discovered a sense of self, and a sense of individuality). They were from that time on painfully aware of the dangers that lurked in the forests, the predators and so on, and so they were banished from the garden of eden. Not an act of god, simply a consequence of higher perception. We have the same thing today to some extent when children grow up. They realize that the safety their parents has provided must end, and that life on their own must begin. The time of playing and safety is at an end, and the harsh realities of life set in. Banished form the eden that youth really is.

There are many more examples, but I think I have made my point. It is a question of words and interpretations. It is of course easier to understand the language of science, since we have an almost complete record of its origins, and it is the modern language. Religion on the other hand is based on fragments of fragments, and the language is thousands of years old. What did "god" mean three thousand years ago? Did the people of that time associate the word with what we associate it with today? The ancient hebrews, for instance, did not believe in a god that was an entity...

truth
Cyracuz, regarding the tree of knowledge, I've made a similar point in a couple of places.

All these religious myths have been repeated over and over in many different cultures. They are symbols that represent transformations we go through in different stages of our lives. The virgin birth, for instance, represents our rebirth into the spirit and an identification with something beyond our personal egos.

There is an excellent book that is easy to read and follow that I highly recommend. It is "The Power of Myth" by Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers. This is a word for word dialogue Campbell had with Moyers shortly before Campbell's death. The dialogue was taped and has been presented on PBS numerous times.

When one begins to study the history of cultures around the world, we learn that most had created gods of one kind or another, and most became the king of their land or they created gods to enhance their idea of omnipotence.

Science has been giving benefits and sufferings to humans, but it has no roles of leading a human spirit. Religion can, even through myths, have guiding roles for a human spirit. Myths cannot be dismissed simply because of the reason that it is not scientific.

Whether myths are dismissed or not by the minority of us, many of this world will continue to "believe" in them. I doubt that will ever change.

There is a problem with the use of the word "power" in connection with the evaluation of "philosophical propositions". What we normally mean by "power" is successful "prediction and control" which of course is the epitome of what we call "science and technology". It is this concept which differentiates "science" from "religion", the latter being largely concerned with matters "beyond our control".

However philosophy calls into question that very preoccupatation with "control" that drives both science and religion. It points out that this pre-occupation together with language and the concept of "time" are essentially species specific to homo sapiens (anthropocentricity) and that other vantage points might produce different delineations of enquiry which might even relegate "conventional science" and "religion" to the category "historical curiosities".

I believe that it is this power of philosophy that JLN hints at.

truth
I agree, Fresco. We must take note of the fact that your placement of philosophy (and religion) into a broader perspective (regarding the relativity of "vantage points") is itself a philosophical proposition.

JLN,

I didn't intend to elevate "religion" from a "control paradigm", but I'll allow that shift for "spirituality" if you like.

I am in progress of listening to the tape . I'm doing a painting about an epic hero.

The way in which animals function is consistent with the predictions we have about the world based on our own oberervations. We are also removed from subjectivity by the use of tools - measurement devices with constant degrees of accuracy.

I would be more apt to believe that things of existance outside of our solar system and visible universe are functioning differently. Maybe not all life forms are carbon based and dependent on heat energy.

Portal

""The way in which animals function is consistent with the predictions we have about the world based on our own observations.""

Sorry, that misses the point. Other species do NOT seem to "predict" for themselves even if we are able predict their behaviour. One definition of "intelligence" is in fact "the capacity to delay a response" and to some extent it seems this depends on use of language to play out the scenario internally.

I'm talking about thier senses - they have similar ways of navigating the world. Ex: the visual cones found in dog's eyes. Their behavior and anatomy is consistent with what we have found to be true of our observable universe. Unless you believe that animals are only images in one human mind (yourself) which imagines them, they are an outside source of observation of this universe.

Portal,

"Similarities" in peripheral apparatus are a different issue to "differences" in mode of interaction with the world. At the extreme all "animals" must by definition be "similar" is some respect. (Note it is we who define rods and cones for our purposes. Other animals (and African bushmen) couldn't care less !)

I think it is the philosopher Searle who wrote an article entitled "What is it like to be a bat ?" implying that "reality" from a bat's point of view would be very different from ours. And in a similar vein Wittgenstein wrote "If a lion could speak we would not understand him" implying that "meaning" itself is bound up in local and specific rationalities.

The issue remains that "science" operates at the supposed level of "universals" but we should consider "whose universe" we are talking about.