Science and Religion

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by cwes99_03

Too Turtle's eternal chagrin, I will most likely follow up this post and begin discussing ...

Discuss away Chuck! It's not 'too', it's 'to'. It's not 'chagrin', it's 'da grin'. Nothing is eternal, even in odd years.

[InfiniteNow]

Originally Posted by catholiboy

Just visiting this forum-
Wow, there sure are a lot of narrow minded scientist types among you, aren't there?
You would not be ill advised to look up some epsitemology...

Who pissed in your cheerios?

[cwes99_03]

While Turtle will have lots to say of whether religious ideas can be backed up in a scientific way (like the Noah's Ark and Lazarus' resurrection type parts of the Bible), I think he wouldn't mind if we scientifically determined whether someone's professed beliefs were in line with their source for their beliefs.

Would you all be up for this? For those of you who profess to be christians, I would ask that we all find a way to get on the same page before we try to discuss whether our beliefs in the Bible can be founded scientifically otherwise we will not present a united front. I'm particularly concerned with this because if you pick and choose which bible teachings you want to follow, then I see no reason why you can't pick and choose what parts of the Bible are mythological and which ones aren't. See the point?

[Southtown]

HA! You nailed it! Internal consistency is the goal. United front... never happen.

[Buffy]

Originally Posted by Southtown

HA! You nailed it! Internal consistency is the goal.

No way. Faith has NO need to be internally consistent! Why should it? Its all about *belief*! And the grief I get from self-professed religious folks about my belief in the Easter Bunny being illogical. Pbbbtbtbt.

Here comes Peter Cottontail,
Buffy

[Southtown]

Originally Posted by Buffy

No way. Faith has NO need to be internally consistent! Why should it? Its all about *belief*! And the grief I get from self-professed religious folks about my belief in the Easter Bunny being illogical. Pbbbtbtbt.

Here comes Peter Cottontail,
Buffy

Well it's not required. Believers do struggle with consistency in my experience. It's only natural. Just because some choose to give faith a chance doesn't mean they abandon all mental prowess.

FYI http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eostre

[Buffy]

Indubitably.

IF <> IFF,
Buffy

[cwes99_03]

Wow, sometimes I can't decide whether to take that as sarcasm or not, because a large number of people believe that. However, that is not religion, that is philosophy.

Interesting comment made by Bill O'Reilly today on the Today show. He stated that our society is not based on the christian religion but on christian philosophy (which has been my point for a very long time, and I'm glad to see someone else say it). The difference between the two was pointed out in my philosophy vs. religion thread back about a year ago.

Some people adhere to "christian" philosophies, that is ideas borrowed from the Bible and "christian" groups and adapted to fit ones own beliefs. These obviously are not "true christians" in that they don't adhere to the Bible and all of its teachings, but instead choose some mixture of philosophy and religion.

Thus that quote "Its all about *belief*! And the grief I get from self-professed religious folks about my belief in the Easter Bunny being illogical. Pbbbtbtbt" is a fairly common thought among those of a "christian philosophy".

So to answer the original question

Originally Posted by MB

I've found that pretty much anything that major religions say can be backed by science.
What do you guys think? Can scientific ideas be backed by religious ideologies? ...and vice versa?

I find this absurd. There are lots of things that "major" religions say that can't even be backed by their own religious books. Thus they are philosophies that have little or no basis in the scientific world either.

Is the test of a true religion a scientific examination of 1) whether its text is coherent throughout 2) whether its text is scientifically viable 3) whether the believers in that religion attempt to have a full understanding and adherence to the teachings of its texts? I think these are the starting grounds for this discussion.

[Buffy]

Originally Posted by cwes99_03

Is the test of a true religion a scientific examination of 1) whether its text is coherent throughout 2) whether its text is scientifically viable 3) whether the believers in that religion attempt to have a full understanding and adherence to the teachings of its texts? I think these are the starting grounds for this discussion.

I think you draw the definition of religion way too tightly. I think South is going to quibble about "the teachings", and I disagree with the need for a "text." Methinks you wish to dismiss us freethinkers (including devout Christian ones) to the benefit of your "organized faith."

I don't take O'Reilly to be an expert on anything, and his intent was to simply distract people from the fact that there are many who would indeed insist that the Ten Commandments be burned into the constitution. Its not too much different than when you hear "our nation is founded on Christian, uh err um JUDEO-Christian beliefs"...the intent is not very well hidden.

The distiction between "Philosophy" and "Religion" is specious, and its offensive to dismiss a whole class of people's faith as mere "phliosophy."

I find your dismissal of the Easter Bunny quite offensive. Its not really a joke.

Hippity hopping,
Buffy

[cwes99_03]

Heb 11:1 "Faith is the assured expectation of things hoped for, the evident demonstration of realities though not beheld."

IOW, faith is based on something. If not a text, then what? How would a group 100 years later know if their faith was based on the same thing that the founder's faith was based on? Even philosophers put their thoughts down in writing. Without writing, how do I know that your faith is based on anything?

The distinction between faith and philosophy is not specious. We already discussed this on the Religion vs Philosophy thread. Perhaps you would like to read it, it isn't very long.

I'm sorry if you feel offended that I would not call your ideology a religion. Perhaps you are only offended because you know that you are truely not a follower of christ, but a philosopher who believes they know better than the Bible (that is assuming that you follow some teachings that are not founded in the Bible but in the philosophies of men.) This is of course a fine line, as pointed out in that thread, because many believe all religion to be nothing more than philosophy.

We did however find an amicable answer to this. That is to say that a religion is also different from a philosophy in that it professes belief in a higher power. For a christian, I here assert that a belief in a higher power must be tied tightly to adherence to the teachings of the higher power without substituting human philosophy.