NP

[David Casseres]

Did someone on this list claim that science refutes or supplants
religion, that people who believe in gods are idiots, etc.?  If so, I
missed it.

Science is a threat to one of the most primordial foundations of
religious belief, though: the argument/question/feeling/perception
that the origin of life, the Universe, and everything, especially
including man, can can ONLY be explained by the intentional actions of
something supernatural and sentient.  Not all religious people believe
this, but many do.

Science doesn't refute the supernatural, but it offers an alternative
that more and more people find plausible (especially if they do the
homework): life, the Universe, etc. could have arisen through the
action of simple, natural processes, over very long periods of time,
with very many repetitions and deadends, and with no "intelligence" or
intention.  Since science doesn't like to assume anything that is not
necessary to an explanation, it does not assume god.

Yes, there are scientists, and spokesmen for science, who get this
wrong.  I don't think they are important, and most of them exist in
the imagination of a poorly educated public.  Your time would be
better spent commenting on Pynchon than on attacking this particular
windmill.

On 10/13/05, jbor at bigpond.com <jbor at bigpond.com> wrote:
> On 13/10/2005 François Monti wrote:
>
> > Well, if they live in a postmodern world, and a theory is built on a
> > postmodern world by people you call postmodernists, thean I'd assume
> > that "normal" (non-theorists) people are affected by this PoMo world
> > they live to the point that they actually are in the "pomo condition".
> > If not, then what kind of theory is it that observes a world where
> > everyone acts in a way that has nothing to do with said theory? I do
> > not believe either that postmodernists theorist are just "critique" of
> > PoMo world(s). They are also theoricians of this world, whose works
> > have come handy to justify relativism and the whole "there is no
> > truth", everything is true and nothing is true at the same time.
> > That's why I actually think you are maybe the only one to have been
> > consistent in the ID debate, what with not going the "evolution is
> > great, ID is stupid" way, because you know exactly that, in postmodern
> > theories, there is no objectivity in science, the theories are
> > construction based on arbitrary postulates, a knowledge based on
> > social pressure or religious convictions. Which leads us to say that
> > neither of both theories can be said true. I was very surprised to see
> > other people defend evolution with much violence and then going on
> > about postmodernism. Well I guess contradictions are a very postmodern
> > thing...
>
> I'm not sure I understand or agree with you. But that's OK.
>
> I will correct you on one point, however. I didn't follow the ID debate
> at all, and the one time I did mention ID I got it wrong. Duly
> corrected, it does sound like it's something which has absolutely no
> basis or place within the discipline of science education.
>
> The more interesting point, and the issue I've been focused on, is this
> idea that Science refutes or supplants Religion, that it's an either/or
> proposition, that people who believe in gods are idiots incapable of
> rational thought. It's not correct. In fact, it's fundamentalism, and
> absolutely at loggerheads with "the scientific method".
>
> "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind."
>
> http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/10/
> 1018_041018_science_religion.html
>
> best
>
>
> >>> Well, I'd argue that postmodernism being a theory about the world we
> >>> live in as well as being the tag applied to our era (or at least the
> >>> post WWII era), people who live(d) in the era are/were, consciously
> >>> or not, postmodernists. They might have no clue about this
> >>> "philosophical construct", but if this construct bears any
> >>> resemblance to the "real" world, then they are postmodernists.
> >>
> >>
> >> I think this is a misunderstanding of postmodernism. Yes,
> >> postmodernist writers and theorists observe, describe, critique a
> >> world (or worlds) labelled as postmodern, but it doesn't then follow
> >> that everybody in that world is also a postmodernist theorist. Just
> >> because they're studied by microbiologists doesn't qualify
> >> parameciums as microbiologists. ... And George Bush sure ain't no
> >> postmodernist.
>
>
>