Church and State, or State Church?

[SDR]

My last post was written before I saw yours (above.) I take your points.

I agree that these matters inflame many -- it almost seems that any discussion of religion will arouse emotions, and is ultimately not able to be reduced to "rational" argument. Perhaps this is why religious and political discussion are so often "forbidden at table" by the sensitive host or hostess.

I will relinquish the argument, as it is likely only to cause further pain. Thank you for a lively, if finally, fruitless, discussion. You have, finally, explained your frustration, and I see your points.

SDR

[Architorture]

i am against any establishment of a state religion... but if you want to work entirely within the law, often times these various things happen under the law...

the fact is that evolution [which i do believe btw] is a theory... and other people what to have the opportunity to have their theories heard as well, such as the theory of creationism... or the 'new creationism' called intelligent design which works almost entirely within the structure of science to demonstrate there had to be some kind of intelligent being or force at work when things were created...

it has alot to do with extremes... people trying to outlaw the teaching of evolution are at the extreme... that isn't your normal run of the mill religous person... so an entire party ends up getting characterized by a group that is associated with it b/c of its extreme beliefs...

do you think bush or any federal level elected official is going to come out and say they really think evolution being taught in school is a bad idea... you might get 1 or 2 that say something along those lines looking to make a splash, but no reasonable person is going to get involved with it...

the schiavo case, granted has alot of people who are obviously religious involved in it... but i don't think the central questions in the case have explicitly religious overtones to them...

in the end it is a question of human dignity, medical ethics, and whether or not she wanted to die... had she had a living will in writing there would be absolutely no problems caused by any of this...

it just happens that the exciting images on tv are of the religious folks running around with their signs banners...

funny irony of it all... she is catholic, a faith that isn't exactly included in the stereotypical evangelical group...since most of the evangelicals have deep reservations about catholicism as much as having no faith at all....

i'm surprised you didn't include the abortion debate in there as well as part of the establishment of a christian state...

[Architorture]

oh please no carry on

however frustrating some people can be in these discussions i absolutely love having them...

of course this is sorta a combination religion/politics thread so its double edged...but its a good discussion to have...

it is by no means hurtful towards me... as i guess i alluded to in the previous post, i have no great love for the evangelicals and distrust them quite a bit myself, but not simply b/c they are religious...

[SDR]

If it isn't too late, the Lehrer News Hour is at this moment running a piece about Creationism vs Evolution, as being taught and received in America today. Only about one third of Americans presently believe that Evolution is the correct explanation of our origins!

SDR

[Architorture]

well i imagine that is probably due to the lack of a real 'beginning' in evolution...

evolution is really only good at talking about how things progressed... it isn't very good at outlining how they started...

like i think when i was reading a thing about intelligent design, they sited the flagellum on a microbe as being something entirely unexplained by evolution... that this little hair like thing on a single cell organism was without explanation by traditional science... so if science couldn't explain this extremely simple organism how could they possibly think they got the story right on so many much more complicated organism...

that is what they has been coming out of the ID camp for the last few years... and evolutionary science does have some trouble coming up with a quick answer... at least any high school science teacher certainly would

there is also a big problem in the evolution camp that many think evolution is the foil of religion, which isn't always the case... many faiths entirely subscribe to evolution as something that did in fact happen and it works perfectly well with all their other teachings [catholic church for example]

and of course evolution isn't without its own leap of faith, like any kind of explanation of how it all got started and when... those questions are still wide open... evolution does a great job at explaing things like opposable thumbs but it does a very poor job at describing how human consciousness or the emotion of love evolved over the millenia... and i think that is why some people don't necessarily think that evolution has got it all right... you know...

[SDR]

The semantic difficulty with the word "theory" should not be brushed off lightly, once uncovered; it may be at the core of the problem of communicating the facts. In my Webster's, five of the six variant definitions of the term "theory" reflect its use in the sciences; it is "a formulation...which has been verified to some degree" -- as distinguished from "hypothesis." The last definition reads "popularly, a mere hypothesis, conjecture, or guess." People who denigrate the "theory of evolution" as a scientific conjecture are innocently or deliberately using the popular use of that word in place of its scientific use.

Now, in addition to the Creationists, we have the Intelligent Design people. Apparently reacting to the prohibition by the courts to the teaching of Creationism as fact, the third group are careful to use scientific terminology, and omit the mention of "God," in their texts. The long-accepted theories of Darwin and his followers are treated as controversial and tentative, with the ideas and precepts of Creationism and/or Intelligent Design placed beside them as putative equals.

In man's existence, at least, the emotions trump the intellect, every time. If certain facts or ideas don't jive with our "need to believe" contrary views, guess which ones will be discarded? For persons who claim to be honestly and diligently searching for "the truth," whatever that may be -- and I would think that members of all the mechanical professions would count themselves among that group -- to discard the painfully-gained collection of ideas and understandings we call "scientific truth" -- ideas subjected to rigorous proof -- in favor of "received wisdom," no matter the source, is an indication of the degree to which we are capable of fooing ourselves about the sincerity of our beliefs and actions.

I say that we are moving backward, when we put our spiritual beliefs ahead of things we can prove, in the "world of work," where we accomplish things by mutual effort and mutual consent. I'm sure it is dificult for some to put aside things they are convinced are true, when those things conflict with provable facts. What saddens me is the degree to which some are able, with a straight face, to say (in essence) "black is white," in order to conform to their personal and, I say, emotionally-driven belief system, and to mislead others in the process.

Apparently, this sort of "scientific revisionism" is more widespread in America (according to the News Hour report mentioned above) than in Europe and elsewhere (?), at the moment. Where will the next generation of scientists come from, if this is how they are being taught today? Will we get to Mars (or whatever goals we might have) on "fuzzy science"? If two-thirds of Americans today believe that some other explanation than Evolution explains our presence on this planet (more than enough of a miracle though that is, in itself!) where are we headed?

SDR

[SDR]

So, because science hasn't yet explained EVEYTHING, any and all of what it HAS accomplished, is suspect?

The science of psychology, perhaps understandably the least-developed of the disiplines, so far, because it seeks to understand "the invisible," is coming along nicely, thank you. It is apparently well-enough equipped to serve in courts of law, under some circumstances. Stay tuned. . .

SDR

[Architorture]

the word 'theory' does get tossed about quite a bit... but it is also how science was made to work... they can never said that something is an absolute fact, b/c then of course something will come along and prove it wrong... look how long newton's theories stood unchallenged, then we got off the planet and suddenly they weren't working anymore....newton wasn't wrong, he just wasnt' able to explain all the phenomena he thought he was...

so science has sort of shot itself in the foot by always leaving the opportunity open to be disproven...which gives its opponents an opening for an attack...

but like i said, evolution is a great way to explain what has happened over the past several billion years... but it is very bad at explaining how it started... scientists have never been able to entirely replicate the 'beginning of life' where everything in the stew is there, but it never ends up becoming anything that is 'living'

and of course evolution in no way rules out the existence of some high being etiher...some would say the proof of this being is the lack of scientific evidence to explain some phenomena...

believing in evolution doesn't have to mean you don't believe in a god... and i think that is something that both sides seriously need to think about, instead of being so combative over it...

i could write my theory on how evolution works perfectly with the creation story, but it might get a bit long winded... i guess it more or less sums up as the following...

whenever some human being looked at the world around him and realized that there was something bigger than him, something greater than him right there and then and he loved that thing [being, spirit, ect ect] that is when that human being became 'man' that was adam... he wasn't the first human, but he was the first man...

personally i think that is a nice poetic and possibly supported by science explanation that works for both sides

[Architorture]

[SDR]

If I'm not mistaken, the most fundamental of the fundamentalists point to a passage which (apparently) states that the world is about 10,000 years old (they have an exact date, I believe) -- and some have apparently taken to explaining dinosaur fossils by claiming that the were "planted" by those tying to justify the theory of evolution. So, I think they have more explaining to do than the scientists. . .and a good long look in a mirror wouldn't hurt, either.

Of course you're right: no individual should be judged because he seems to be a part of a particular group. That's at least as facile and dishonest as any other "sin' I've mentioned.

Science has "shot itself in the foot" because it hasn't anticipated and explained all phenomena? Did you have a good physics teacher in high school? Do you know what the "scientific method" is?

No one, scientist or otherwise, should ever think he or she has -- or perhaps ever will have -- all the answers. I have no problem with unexplained mysteries. I consider the fact of our existence, even if finally explained entirely in terms of physical phenomena, to be a wonderful miracle, adequate to any poetry we might construct around it.

I wonder if, in their own way, some religious people are as anxious to have an explanation for everything as are the most hard-headed rationalists. It's human nature to want answers, to want to understand, to compare and pigeonhole -- these are survival strategies, at their most basic. What troubles me is the readines to "shortcut" the process of arriving at those answers. We simply aren't willing to wait for the truth; a "plausible" story will do, as long as it satisfies the "need to know."

We can do better. Those heretical mathematicians and astronomers, who toiled alone before the birth of Christ and again through the Middle Ages, having to hide their work and their conclusions from the "authorities" (the Church, I'm so sorry to say) until such time as later men could confirm and build upon their work -- these are our heroes. And, in modern times, the discoverers of electricity and the inventors of radio, etc etc -- we owe our modern lives of relative ease and endless amusement to them, not to our religious leaders, who even today seem intent on holding back the progress of man, in my view. If the comfort they provide is essential to many, I'm glad for those who are benefitted. But my money is with the truth-seekers, who can back up their claims, and who move us forward.

In other words, in my world, religion is an "option," while science is a necessity. They apparently each have their place. Man is far too imperfect to do without his stories, yet.

SDR

[Architorture]

well the most fundamental fundamentalists simply trace the time line back through the old testament to adam... making a date somewhere in the range of 10k...although i think it is a bit longer, b/c the great flood was 10k i think but anyway... just read genesis and you can get all the great dates... my favorite is that noah lived to be like 900 years old or something...

i'm not saying science is wrong for leaving questions... i'm just saying it is the 'weakness' that its opponents like the prey upon... in order for science to work the way it does it has to leave room for questions, but those who wish to exploit that opening will...and usually with some effectiveness...i'm not trying to trash science there, just point out the inherent chink in the armour for those who are looking for it...

i guess the problem just comes in with interpretation... i mean i see many of our scientific discoveries and such as better understanding the world around us, unravelling the mysteries... and if you want to tie scripture into that, then it says quite clearly we were made in God's image, wouldn't it make sense that we would eventually begin to better understand His work if we were made in His image???

that isn't so much a question for you as it is the hardline fundies...

the history of science is also something i really like looking into... since long ago science and religion were entirely inseparable... look at civilizations first well known great scientist, imhotep... he was a medicine man [taught hypocrates everything he knew] priest, scientist, and ARCHITECT...

for hundreds of years the act of observing the physical world and recording those observations and then religion were the exact same thing.. b/c science was seen as a way to better understand whatever higher spirit[s] were of interest...

then of course at some point science and religion set off on different although somewhat complimentary paths... but i think the politics also grew up between them and some amount of competition began and has continued since then... i think today, some of the actions of certain faiths have pointed towards trying to reconcile those differences and once again enter into a complimentary relationship...

[Kevin]

The main 'weakness' the real opponents of real science prey upon is their own ignorance.

[SDR]

Paul Krugman today speaks to some of the issues raised in this thread.

www.nytimes.com/2005/03/29/opinion/29krugman.html?th&emc=th

SDR

[SDR]

Now let's hear from Senator Danforth:

http://forum.truthout.org/blog/story/2005/3/30/95936/3920

SDR

[Richard Haut]

http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/21631/