Ted Leung on the air
Ted Leung on the air: Open Source, Java, Python, and ...
Ted Leung on the air: Open Source, Java, Python, and ...
Sat, 12 Jun 2004
Posted by Pingback from Ted Leung on the air : books/1075 : Dark Age Ahead at Thu Aug 26 00:27:48 2004
Science is a religion
Joshua Allen (with a little help from Dare) is writing about science. Dare definitely gets the quote for this;
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science is the modern world's new superstitionThis is truer than many people would like to admit, especially highly educated folks. I saw this a lot when I was an undergraduate. There were various members of the faculty at MIT that would loudly proclaim their understanding and mastery on various aspects of natural science. I always viewed this with some suspicion, and I always appreciated the professors who would get to a certain point and say "and we just don't understand how it works here" Much of the American populace is so in the dark about science, the scientific process, and the politics of the scientific process that it's hard for them to judge assertions "backed" by science. For these folks, the difference between scientific and religious assertions is pretty minimal.
Science has nothing to do with religion, by definition. The idiocy is in the eye of the ignorant, I guess. Stupid people will be stupid regardless of the target of their latest wishful hopes.
Posted by Gabriel Mihalache at Sat Jun 12 11:52:00 2004
Posted by Gabriel Mihalache at Sat Jun 12 11:52:00 2004
I've sat on this one for a day thinking maybe I would stop being so irritated by it. I guess I'm won't stop until I've discussed it. The greatest gift of a scientific mindset is doubt. Doubting what is real, what is valid, what belongs where and ...
Posted by Trackback from Something Similar at Mon Jun 14 15:26:21 2004
Posted by Trackback from Something Similar at Mon Jun 14 15:26:21 2004
The difference between accepting scientific claims and religious ones, without verifying them for yourself, is a significant one.
Scientific culture encourages skepticism and empirical evidence; you can be sure that almost any theory has faced meaningful scrutiny.
Religion, however, is based on faith and requires no proof to back up the claim that plants (Gen. 1:11) predate the sun (Gen. 1:16). If it's in the bible, it's taken as truth. In fact, religion frequently discourages any such skepticism.
Posted by Joe Grossberg at Mon Jun 14 15:48:49 2004
Scientific culture encourages skepticism and empirical evidence; you can be sure that almost any theory has faced meaningful scrutiny.
Religion, however, is based on faith and requires no proof to back up the claim that plants (Gen. 1:11) predate the sun (Gen. 1:16). If it's in the bible, it's taken as truth. In fact, religion frequently discourages any such skepticism.
Posted by Joe Grossberg at Mon Jun 14 15:48:49 2004
That some people accept scientific theories on faith and even promote them with religious fevor does not make science a religion. Science is accumulated knowledge, verified by published experiments and peer review. Religion is faith based, no proof required.
That said, belief systems based upon scientific or pseudo-scientific theories may function as secular religions. Communism was a prominent example of this in the past century.
Posted by Steven Rogers at Mon Jun 14 20:03:53 2004
That said, belief systems based upon scientific or pseudo-scientific theories may function as secular religions. Communism was a prominent example of this in the past century.
Posted by Steven Rogers at Mon Jun 14 20:03:53 2004
sorry Ted, I don't buy this one, and I don't think you ever got me to comment before! In a religion, people are not typically willing (or able) to question the fundamental structure of their belief system. Nor are they able and willing to challenge it. While admittedly there are some areas of scientific knowledge that seem to be pretty rock-solid, that's only because they've withstood the test of time, experimentation and skepticism.
And occasionally the so-called paradigm shift occurs, ready to throw even tried and true theories out the window!
Humanity being what it is, nothing is ever perfect, and some beliefs have been held in the name of science, but that doesn't make them so.
Now I do have to admit, to the person not acquainted with scientific theory, it may seem like "faith". And to those unfamiliar with the deep details of a particular branch of scientific knowledge, the notion that other scientists have skeptically reviewed and vetted a new hypothesis has to be taken on some faith - but that's not the same thing as unwavering belief without question. The ability and willingness to question, to create new hypotheses, and to risk failure of them is what makes the difference.
Posted by rick gordon at Mon Jun 14 22:07:15 2004
And occasionally the so-called paradigm shift occurs, ready to throw even tried and true theories out the window!
Humanity being what it is, nothing is ever perfect, and some beliefs have been held in the name of science, but that doesn't make them so.
Now I do have to admit, to the person not acquainted with scientific theory, it may seem like "faith". And to those unfamiliar with the deep details of a particular branch of scientific knowledge, the notion that other scientists have skeptically reviewed and vetted a new hypothesis has to be taken on some faith - but that's not the same thing as unwavering belief without question. The ability and willingness to question, to create new hypotheses, and to risk failure of them is what makes the difference.
Posted by rick gordon at Mon Jun 14 22:07:15 2004
I tend to think that people who say things like "science is the modern world's religion" don't understand what it is that scientists really do. The real scientists I know are constantly bumping up against the boundaries of their knowledge; they know they don't know. The most exciting thing that can happen in science is to overturn a previously believed theory.
I think the closest thing scientists have to faith is the belief that there is no phenomena that, by its nature, cannot be understood by the human mind.
Now, it might be true that a lot of lay people have a blind "faith" in science, and its ability to create the perfect society or some such shit, but I don't think that's what people are usually talking about when they make statements equating science with religion.
Posted by John Wiseman at Thu Jun 17 11:02:53 2004
I think the closest thing scientists have to faith is the belief that there is no phenomena that, by its nature, cannot be understood by the human mind.
Now, it might be true that a lot of lay people have a blind "faith" in science, and its ability to create the perfect society or some such shit, but I don't think that's what people are usually talking about when they make statements equating science with religion.
Posted by John Wiseman at Thu Jun 17 11:02:53 2004
Posted by Pingback from Ted Leung on the air : books/1075 : Dark Age Ahead at Thu Aug 26 00:27:48 2004
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