Momma Angel wrote:You seem to have a different view of science than many I have come across on these threads. Most seem to think that science is pretty infallible.
I don't know that this is true. If it is, this view is not shared by any meaningful number of scientists or philosophers of science. Almost all of them hold views similar to parados'. The advantage of science over religion is that it provides a method of improving our understanding which, unlike religion, tests whether a new hypothesis is actually an improvement.
Quantum mechanics, for example, is a scientific theory, and it's arguably as esotherical and "out there" as the immaculate conception. But if it had been wrong, your computer couldn't work on the basis of its transistors, nuclear power plants couldn't produce electricity and the PET scan in your hospital couldn't possibly work either. Thus, the demonstrable fact that all these things do work is overwhelming evidence that quantum phyiscs is a correct scientific theory.
There is no way one could say the same of hypothesis like "Maria remained a virgin after conceiving Jesus" and "God is infallible". They might be false, they might be true. But there is no way to test it, and we know from experience that stories are usually fictional if their truth cannot be tested and they sound good enough to be retold just because they're good stories. On that basis, the case for skepticism about religious doctrins is much stronger than the case for skepticism about tried and tested scientific theories. Quantum physics is such a theory. And so is evolution.
