Science - Religion?

A major problem of religion is it relies on convincing someone that something is true, which can either be accepted or rejected.  A Catholic, Mormon, Scientologist, even a Buddhist relies on written doctrine and regurgitated memes, and if successfully described to a recipient, they will accept this information as fact.  Religions claim absolute truth and knowledge, so that their worldview is correct, and others are flawed, mistaken, or wrong.  No one can have absolute knowledge, or be absolutely correct, because we only know what we can measure.

But isn't it the job of science to do just this?  We are convinced of our view of reality by the written and spoken collection of theories of the day, which we believe to be the truth.  Science without God or the supernatural is the default position, accepted as truth, while all religious claims are seen as false.  Science convinces us that it is the real, absolute, one truth without having to say it is. 

The key difference is science uses evidence and testability, but there are a number of scientific theories that are believed in with no testability.  Many theories are based on best guesses of what we're observed, without knowing for a fact they occurred- we simply accept their truth based on past interpretations of data, when those interpretations may be flawed, just as ancient sheep herders may have misinterpreted bad weather as the will of God.  Sure we have better measurements, but in the end we only know what we think we've experienced in the past, based on limited observation methods, so we can write it down and regurgitate it for the future to accept.

/sci/ence only claims to be the current best estimate.  It never claims to be the "truth".  It tries to be the truth, but everyone involved knows that there are limitations to what we can know.  When it's wrong, we start over again, and accept that something is wrong.

Religion claims to be the "truth", is generally wrong, and denies being wrong.

Listen to #2.  It is exactly not the job of sciece to give us absolute truth, for the very underlying philosophy behind science is that we can not ever have absolute truth.  All knowledge is tentative in nature, from that point of view.

The words "theory" and "model" are very often used in science for even things that we have very high degree of confidence in, at least confidence in usefullness even when certainty in underlying reality is lacking.  The underlying philosophy of science keeps our certainty in check, and so we keep exploring.

That's the official view of science, but there are certainly a lot of scientists who feel confident enough to claim their theories are better than all religion, as science at least tries to be more truthful than anything else.  Take evolution vs creationism- creationists want alternative views taught in schools, but evolution wins out because it has more evidence, with the implication, even unstated, that it is more true, more likely to be true, and as far as we know, is true.

>>4
Also, and most importantly, because evolution is scientically derived knowledge, and therefore actually belongs in a science classroom.  It is simply reasonable to teach reason-based knowledge in a science class.  Faith-based knowledge that is not discovered so much as presumably granted to us by a deity is just not within the philosophical framework of how science is supposed to generate knowledge.

psyops fake godfag in every thread

>>1
>>The key difference is science uses evidence and testability, but there are a number of scientific theories that are believed in with no testability.

the key difference is that real science is willing to change its ideas in the face of new information. Religion is dogmatic. Religion is willing to change the information to fit the ideas. Any science that is "regurgitated" as you so charmingly put it is in fact the CURRENTLY accepted theory.

Science is based on the humble idea that individual human knowledge is imperfect. That our individual experiences are unreliable. Our memory is imperfect, we remember things as abstract bits and pieces and tend to filter things out, we can hallucinate, we can confuse dreams with memories, we can confuse those things we imagine with things we sense.

Philosophical skepticism is the idea that for these very reasons, human knowledge is unreliable, if not worthless. Scientific skepticism is the idea that for these reasons, knowledge must be obtained systematically, carefully, and from many sources, and even after some idea has been discerned from information gathered, it may be false, and thus must be open to being tested in the future.

There are all sorts of things we simply accept because the current explanations are the best we have SO FAR. so go be a scientist and test these things. Do it, add to the sum of human knowledge.

The big difference between retards that try to disseminate the feesability of using either religion or science is completely obsurd. Use both! They are both tools, amirite? Think about it for a second. Would you rather have a hammer to use on all your repair and construction jobs or a tool-box cholk full of screw-drivers, hammers, drills, wrenches...are ya getting the point yet? Jeez, why all the segregative attitudes about, "I have to be one of the pack and that is the one fitting the bill" bullshit. Seriously, use the law of integration like it's already there, as it already is in motion whether you "believe" it or not. The only thing a human is, is a God of his own movements. Learn your capabilities, vulnerabilities, and try to make something out of your life. FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! THIS OLD SHIT IS GETTING OLD!
btw, saged to the back of the bus. fuck ya.

As long as Satan is responsible for all my failings, I have no problem with life.

Science is a tool with which we can learn objective truth about the universe and discover new facts about the world in which we live.

What is religion good for, again?

*crickets chirping*

>>10
Religion gives us the moral base which keeps people like me from beating people like you to death.

>>11
Considering the number of deaths associated with religious actions, it's difficult to imagine that y'all are showing restraint.

I enjoy crickets chirping.

>>11
The best moral base is an inborn sense of empathy that all non-sociopaths enjoy regardless of religious belief.  The oft-repeated "golden rule" is merely a verbal expression of the existence of natural empathy, the sense of feeling bad when others have been violated against.  Therefore, the only people requiring an external motivator for moral behaviour are indeed sociopaths.

The following are morally acceptable according to God in the Bible:

Adultery, rape, incest, child abuse, slavery, muder, betrayal, treason, genocide, xenocide, infanticide, fratricide, summoning bears to maul 42 children because they called you "baldy", cursing a fig tree to eternal damnation for not producing fruit when you want it (this one was Jesus, as related by both Matthew (21:19) and Mark (11:13-14)), genital mutilation, sentencing infants to death for not having their genitals mutilated, killing people so you can put their foreskins in a bag to buy yourself a wife, etc, etc, etc.

So you can preach your ten commandments and golden rule bullshit all you want, but (stories of [acceptable]) actions speak louder than (stories about) words.

>>15
Also, in before "you're taking it out of context" apologists. So tell me, what is an acceptable context for any of the multiple mass murders and genocides involving children?

o yer, i saw da South Park episode on dis

>>17
Poor attempt at ad hominem.

>>15
sauce on that last example b4 the "etc"s
This sounds too hilarious to pass up.

In Ezekial 23, we learn that the god of the jews does not approve of whores.

>>19
Agreed. Sauce on this should be creamy and delicious, with a hint of coconut.

>>16
Also agreed. The whole "Biblical lessons must be appreciated using context, genre and common sense" is so iffy. It just means that Christian ethics can be interpreted so as to be relevent to whatever cultural norms hold at that time and place. Unless you believe in the Omnipotent, Beneficient Death-Machine the Bible talks about, there is no universal human standard of common sense and no possible reasonable historiologically accurate idea of the context or the genre.

>>14
The things you take for granted as being an "inborn sense" are, in a word, not. That's why we have laws. Laws which are just codified tenents of religion...

Ummm...Speaking of Science - Religion, I heard there was a torrent of 'Expelled' somewheres on teh intarnets. Anyone got a link?

>>22
Not for you, maybe.  That's what makes you a psychopath.  How do you think people thought that something such as murder should be prohibited law?  Not because it offended a powerful ghost, but because it offended our inner sense of what is good.  But you have no such sense, which makes you dangerous.

>>24

That "inner sense of what is good" is product of evolution. Science figured it out pretty well. Google "altruism in evolutionary biology", that should be good starting point.

Therefore >>22 should be institutionalized.

>>22,24,25
Typical scifags. Ignore the truth to fit whatever your agenda is. This is why scientists are increasingly losing credibility.

Man-made global warming, anyone?...

>>26
?

>>27
¿

Of course science can be completely wrong, just as physicians believed the four humors were correct, opium was a medicine for treating mental disorders, and the continents had land bridges.    Sure we've progressed a great deal, but in several hundred years some of our commonly accepted ideas of physics, astronomy, chemistry and medicine may be obsolete.  One must maintain a strong belief that modern theories are the most accurate measurement of the truth in order to keep science progressing.

>>29
One must maintain a strong belief that modern theories are the most accurate measurement of the truth in order to keep science progressing.
This isn't even about belief; even in those rare cases where our knowledge is nearly entirely incorrect, it's always going to be the best approximation of reality we have available.

if you want to have any hope of ever knowing anything about reality, you're going to have to use a scientific kind of thing - religions are doomed from the start