Jim wrote:
> Another point I hadn't really considered is that people in
> the church will begin to believe that they need to test all
> religious teachings and empirically, and when they learn this
> cannot be done, they will likely become disillusioned and go
> away. Now he is not saying religious types shouldn't use
> their brains and think, but some extent faith and religion
> is not rational and it's pretty unempirical, so again, using
> scientific rules to judge the merits of religion is a losing
> proposition.
Without addressing the other aspects of the issue, the above
leads to one very interesting observation:
Jim states (correctly) that if people attempted to judge the
"rightness" or "truth" of religious teachings on a strictly scientific
basis, religion would do rather poorly. Clearly, while this would
demonstrate the fallacy of some aspects of each religion (i.e., most
would agree that scientific evidence for evolution is more than adequate
to dispute the literal creationism of Genesis and is growing stronger
every day), it certainly wouldn't provide "proof" that the moral or
spiritual teachings were in error.
Yet, this is _precisely_ what more conservative religions (such
as fundamentalism) demand of science--that it accept judgment of _its_
"rightness" or "truth" on the basis of scriptural doctrine! Many
religions, for example, state that science should not define such things
as homosexuality or non-monogamy as "normal" for humans--because their
_moral_ teachings state otherwise!
Sorry, but to me if it's valid to judge scientific statements on
a "moral" basis (and, to be honest, I personally see no "morality"
what-so-ever in claiming ANY group of people are superior to another),
it's equally valid to judge religious statements on an empirical
basis--i.e., either religion needs to get out of science or science has
ever reason and right to judge religion.
Just a few thoughts to muddy the waters.
Rick
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". . . and the only measure of your worth and your deeds will be the
love you leave behind when you're gone." --Fred Small
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