I understand why science "frightens" (I'm not sure this is the right
word) some religious people too. But the ability of science to
"threaten" (again, I'm not sure this is the right word either) religion
is surely over-stated. To use Chris Lund's example, science might be
able to test the efficacy of prayer -- when the prayers at issue seek
divine intervention that changes the course of natural events, such as
the progression of a terminal illness. But most prayers express
different messages. They express praise, gratitude, repentance, and
promises. When people pray for help from G-d, it is often for help in
finding the strength or wisdom to deal with their problems. And, of
course, they pray for their souls and the souls of others. I doubt
science can test the efficacy of such prayers because these prayers are
not directed at producing a particular material result.
Alan Brownstein
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Christopher C.
Lund
Sent: Wednesday, November 23, 2005 7:06 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: RE: Kansas and Intelligent Design: A Twist
I think I agree with both Ed and Doug. But I have a question about the
content of the category of statements in between Doug's dashes --
"claims
about the supernatural, about the existence and nature of God, about
God's
desires for humans." Those are the exclusively religious statements,
out of
the domain of science (and therefore out of the government's ability to
promote or disapprobate). Of course, this whole fight was started
because
many people thought "claims about the origins of human life on this
planet"
belonged on that list, but evolution changed that. (Those people can
still
climb the ladder -"claims about the origin of the universe" are still,
at
this point, out of science's domain.)
But why are "claims about the supernatural" outside the domain of
science?
Science's standard commitment to naturalism entails a rejection of the
supernatural, which is certainly a claim about the supernatural. And
science can directly investigate the supernatural. Take the
perhaps-sound-but-everyone-has-trouble-believing-them experiments
allegedly
showing prayer has effects on unknowing subjects that are unexplainable
by
naturalistic phenomena. (I won't go into the experiments here, but you
can
find them in Kent Greenawalt's piece, Establishing Religious Ideas:
Evolution, Creationism, and Intelligent Design, 17 Notre Dame J.L.
Ethics &
Pub. Pol'y 321, 322 (2003), and his book, Does God Belong in the Public
Schools?)
Science could come back at those experiments and investigate
supernatural
phenomena directly, right? It could investigate the efficacy of prayer,
run
some double-bind experiments, and conclude something like: Prayer has no
empirically demonstrable, statistically significant, this-world effects.
Such findings, like the findings of evolution, could then be taught as
true
by the government.
The realm of the purely religious -- the stuff between Doug's dashes --
seems always shrinking. Surely it won't disappear. (Even if science
runs
experiments showing prayer has no this-world effects, for example, the
question of whether it has other-worldly effects would remain.) But I
understand why this frightens a lot of people.
Chris
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