Horace, science and religion play by different rules. Science uses
objective, testable reality and religion uses faith, i.e. the
arbitrary belief based on tradition. Of course the two can never
agree. Science does not give anyone the right to believe any anything
that evidence shows is wrong. Religion, on the other hand, rejects
any belief that is not part of the particular tradition. Mankind only
made progress when this faith-based approach was changed, at least
with respect to the physical world.
If the rules of science were applied to a study of the spirit reality,
then progress in understanding the spirit could be made and agreement
could be reached. Science is now exploring this approach, but
religion never will. As a result, religion is slowly becoming
irrelevant and, I predict, will someday become as pointless as some of
the strong beliefs mankind held about the physical world in the past.
Ed
On Nov 19, 2008, at 12:41 PM, Horace Heffner wrote:
Yet religion has much to say about the ethics of science, and
science has no certain say about the miracles of religion despite
the confidence of the scientists that might confabulate regarding
them. It seems to me not hypocritical for a scientist to be
religious, nor for the religious to study science, and that the
ethical thing to do is respect the rights of others to hold their
views and express them while the world struggles to find a
consensus, or determine if a consensus is even possible.
Best regards,
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
