Re: How many of you are religious!
fonis said:
Yet, as often repeated in this thread, science itself evolves and changes and has enough shame to admit itself wrong, amend itself, and progress onward. Religion, however, requires upsets in the church/what-have-you and establishes a new "this is what happened" story every time, only to be toppled again years later.
This is the beauty of science: it attempts to transcend the arrogance of man.
Religion is also fluid based on its society of believers. Some believers in Christianity take the bible as literal, others as metaphor. For example, eating meat on Friday used to be a hellworthy trespass - now some believers eat meat on Friday, others do not eat meat on Friday during Lent, and others still do not eat meat at all.
The fluidity of both systems of belief is a result of evaluation and interpretation. The scientists evaluate their environment, interpret their perceptions, and draw their conclusions. Religious believers evaluate their doctrine, interpret their perceptions, and draw their conclusions. Some religious believers will stay true to the original doctrine as they believe only that is true. Others will make adjustments to their beliefs based on their interpretation of the original doctrine. That is why there are so many branches of Christianity, divisions of Buddhism, and why there is such a shit-storm in the middle east.
I was talking with some friends this weekend about the dynamics of religion and we came to the conclusion that there is a certain sense of apathy to science. As in, to believe in science truly, you accept the atheistic view and thus accept your inevitable and uneventful death and no afterlife. Because of that there is no inherent energy or motivation to the system of belief. The discoveries are observations but the conclusions are ultimately meaningless because the discoverer will die the same death he would had the discovery not been made. The only motivation, then, is the assurance that life carries on after your death and thus your discoveries and observations carry a timeless meaning. Which has a sense of beauty to it. Religion, in contrast, exists almost exlusively in that timeless meaning. So a disagreement among scientists is passive, casual, and hued with mutual respect because the apathy inherent with the acceptance of inevitable death is then spurred with the quickly approaching finale. A scientists urgency is to accomplish a task within his/her lifetime, while a religious believer's urgency and passion is a result of having his/her eternal life at stake. They're ultimately equal, but I would say the distinction offers a lot when analyzing the mental state, perspective, and reactions, of the believers in science vs the believers in religion.
