AidanSonoda:

Indeed, science in practice can be very much like a religion. But its principles set it apart in one important way. Science is a system for determining both the veracity (is it true) and the usefulness (can we reliably draw correct conclusions from it) of an idea. It is dogmatic, but its dogma is fluid…constantly being changed and tested (perhaps not as constantly as one might hope of course). So it is in roughly equal parts a religion, because it offers a view of the world and you have to subscribe to its principals, and not a religion, because it does not offer truth, but a way of testing for truth.

I think this is the fundamental point. Science is a process of open questioning and discovery using evidence. Whereas religion is rigid doctrine that claims to be untestable.

from - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science ;

"Science in the broadest sense refers to any system of knowledge attained by verifiable means. In a more restricted sense, science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge based on empiricism, experimentation, and methodological naturalism, as well as to the organized body of knowledge humans have gained by such research..

Scientists maintain that scientific investigation must adhere to the scientific method, a process for evaluating empirical knowledge that explains observable events in nature as results of natural causes, rejecting supernatural notions."

 

First, not all religions claim a rigid and unchanging doctrine. Second, while they are all untestable to some degree by scientific testing standards, they are not all "untestable". Many so called experiential religions (Buddhism, many neo-pagan faiths, some parts of the Midrashic tradition in Judaism) each expect their followers to experience something within the practice they feel validates it. They do not ask that you accept anything as true that you cannot prove to yourself as valid. Beyond your generalization there is also the not unreasonable point that science requires a leap of faith regarding its applicability. Science is a method for validating things within a logical structure. Euclidean geometry is a good example. It is predicated upon a series of postulates which one must assume are true. Geometry says nothing about reality other that that its conclusions are consistent within its on logical framework. Science, likewise requires that you accept the scientific method as a valid way of verifying reality. Personally that seems obvious, if something can be repeated all over the world and is always the same it follows that it must be true....but that assumption itself is unprovable. Many a religious person would not accept the validity of science and certainly not that scientific verification is the only form of truth.

There is also the lamentable fact that science in practice and science as a philosophy are not one in the same. How easy do you think it is for a young scientist to publish any work, no matter how verifiable, if said work would invalidate the theories of scores of his seniors. Senior scientist who have built their careers and continue to receive their grants based upon their pet theories. Senior scientists who are the very "peers" who will determine whether or not our young friends findings are, in fact published. Ever consider what it takes to get an article into Nature? Certainly politics play a major role. I could dig up some citations regarding valid articles that were not published for 20+ years and also many that seem valid to my eye that Still cannot get published. There is also the vast amount of pseudo-science which lay people are so willing to accept as the real thing. The entire field of psychology is rife with violations of strict scientific method, most notable the scientific postulate that you can't verify a theory using the same data that suggested the theory. Climatology is so hobbled by a lack of verifiable trend data (due to inadequate sample size) that by scientific standards in has no
basis to conclude anything at all and yet people have made entire careers out of the "scientific facts" produced by this arm of science.

But all that aside true science is so very limited in application. True science says that nothing can be accepted as true which cannot be tested and proven wrong. That leaves a whole host of possible truths which science currently cannot address due to limitations in testing. My point is that
anyone who claims that science is his only source of truth either ascribes to some invalid form a pseudo-science or is not being honest with himself. For those people who make such claims, science is simply another source of external doctrine. For the rest of us we are left with many aspects of existence about which science has nothing to say.

Abolitionist:

how is this offensive to you?

This isn't.  Other threads focussing on religion have been because of insults towards religious people.

Abolitionist:

but 'it' and 'things' are both the universe as you say - does the universe control itself? where is the separate power to influence?

It's not really something that can be explained easily.  There is an essence, and parts of that essence form a will at times.(This is just my belief of course.)

Abolitionist:

Why do you want to believe without evidence and against evidence?

I never chose to believe.  I simply gained insight.  The lack of evidence is what makes faith 'faith'.

Well, perhaps the faith-science relationship isn't as interesting a topic as I had hoped.  But, ideal illustrates a good point.  The faithful, it seems, actually value the lack of evidence for their beliefs, much the same as we value the rationality of our own beliefs or lack of beliefs.  But if Abolitionist's rational beliefs make him into a skillful critical thinker and problem solver. Ideal's beliefs may in turn make him more grounded, connected, and satisfied with life.  Are not both systems serving some useful purpose?

Personally I can tolerate and even celebrate any belief that is choosen or discovered for oneself.  What I have never understood is the mindset by which people can believe what they are told to believe by other people.  If you have considered and developed your own relationship with the divine (or the cosmos, tao, entheoi, whatever) then there is a certain amount of respectability in that.  But those who sit at temple, church, mosque at the foot of priest, rabbi, imam and accept as truth the words of other men are a mystery to me.

AidanSonoda:

not all religions claim a rigid and unchanging doctrine.. ..each expect their followers to experience something within the practice they feel validates it.

Name one please.

It's simple IMO - all religious doctrines can't be true - they directly conflict - thus subjective verification is not valid.

We must remember the lessons learned by discovering schizophrenia.

AidanSonoda:

What I have never understood is the mindset by which people can believe what they are told to believe by other people.

This is very basic primate behavior. We follow the biggest ape because he's the biggest ape-- but our sense of fair play and our need for an orderly universe prevents us from accepting this. Instead, we make up stories about why the biggest ape is the fittest to lead, and we refine those stories, and we use those stories to select the replacement for the biggest ape when he dies.

The stories are necessary, because they allow us to form group cohesion and work together without constant power-struggling. They're the basis for society and culture, which every species of Great Ape-- including Man-- requires for their continued survival. It's dangerous to step outside of those boundaries, because it not only cuts you off from the rest of society, it cuts you off from necessary parts of your own psychological makeup.

 Now, the problem comes in when the stories require us to make a very small ape our leader-- and everyone who believes those stories bands together to keep any of the other big apes from taking command. You end up with a society that isn't working, and isn't capable of fixing itself; very, very few apes are capable of writing a brand-new story and convincing the other apes to abandon the old story in favor of it.

 We may have adopted our views after careful consideration... but how many of us can really claim to have a single, original thought in our heads-- especially on moral issues? We're not writing the story, we're simply choosing one from the many options that liberal multicultural society has offerred us-- often based on criteria that we're not aware of, because they're a feature of an old story that we don't really think we believe in anymore.
 

ideal:

It's not really something that can be explained easily.  There is an essence, and parts of that essence form a will at times.(This is just my belief of course.)

Abolitionist:

Why do you want to believe without evidence and against evidence?

I never choose to believe.  I simply gained insight.  The lack of evidence is what makes faith 'faith'.

How did you validate this insight and what did it stem from? do you consider your experience unique or does your truth hold for others as well?

Has faith (in this case faith in the specific doctrines) ever been validated? If not, can we trust it to form the basis for our critical efforts when we have reliable alternatives?

Korimyr the Rat:

This is very basic primate behavior. We follow the biggest ape because he's the biggest ape-- but our sense of fair play and our need for an orderly universe prevents us from accepting this. Instead, we make up stories about why the biggest ape is the fittest to lead, and we refine those stories, and we use those stories to select the replacement for the biggest ape when he dies.

The stories are necessary, because they allow us to form group cohesion and work together without constant power-struggling. They're the basis for society and culture, which every species of Great Ape-- including Man-- requires for their continued survival. It's dangerous to step outside of those boundaries, because it not only cuts you off from the rest of society, it cuts you off from necessary parts of your own psychological makeup.

This is why I think we need a prime directive that can function as the 'biggest ape' or leviathan. However, instead of making things up - we'll refine our understanding and define what is central to human nature - what is trully universal - and let this form the basis for our endeavors as a species and global entity.

Abolitionist:

how did you validate this insight and what did it stem from? do you consider your experience unique or does your truth hold for others as well?

I didn't validate it.  I have no need to.  The experience is definitely not unique though the beliefs surrounding it may be. 

Has faith (in this case faith in the specific doctrines) ever been validated? If not, can we trust it to form the basis for our critical efforts when we have reliable alternatives?

Your problem(as I see it) is your desire for hard alternatives.  Why not simply use multiple complimentary practices. 

ideal:

Abolitionist:

how did you validate this insight and what did it stem from? do you consider your experience unique or does your truth hold for others as well?

I didn't validate it.  I have no need to.  The experience is definitely not unique though the beliefs surrounding it may be.

How do you know that your experience is not unique? Do you not care whether or not your insight is valid?

ideal:

Abolitionist:

Has faith (in this case faith in the specific doctrines) ever been validated? If not, can we trust it to form the basis for our critical efforts when we have reliable alternatives?

Your problem (as I see it) is your desire for hard alternatives.  Why not simply use multiple complimentary practices.

Not 'hard' alternatives - 'proven effective' alternatives. The 'multiple complimentary practices' (in this case religious practices) simply aren't a solution - this has been proven.

Abolitionist:

This is why I think we need a prime directive that can function as the 'biggest ape' or leviathan.

The problem is, stories can never actually rule; they can only influence the behavior of apes, and in most cases they only justify what the ape was already planning on doing anyway. No matter how good the story is... it's only as effective as the biggest ape that believes in it.

 It's the same as the law. The law has no power; it merely informs the behavior of men with power-- and even then, sufficiently powerful men are free to bend, reinterpret, or outright ignore the law as suits them. Power only exists in the hands of men.
 

Abolitionist:

However, instead of making things up - we'll refine our understanding and define what is central to human nature - what is trully universal - and let this form the basis for our endeavors as a species and global entity.

 I do not think your findings will be nearly as palatable as you seem to imply. A lot of what is "central" to human nature is utterly repulsive to people who have grown accustomed to modern liberal society.
 

Perhaps I should rephrase. I can understand such behavior, for the zoological reasons you cited. What I should have said is that I have never been able to stomach people with such a mindset. You cannot tell me that we are completely enslaved to the structure of our biological past. I would consider you direct evidence that humans can free themselves from the desire to follow the biggest ape. Atheism is not the biggest ape, certainly. Rationalism is not the biggest ape in our culture. If it was this forum would be a lot larger yes?

Indeed, I accept your point, but I think it is important to look to the future. Embrace the fact that we ARE biologically hard-wired to certain propensities, but also utilize our demonstrated ability to move beyond those propensities when it is beneficial to do so....Nietzsche anyone?

First off science has a rigid doctrine that says "The scientific method is the only valid way of measuring truth." So if we are to say that science has a fluid doctrine (because the truth it presents can be changed) then we have to judge religion by the same yard-stick. To that end, if a faith has a god whose name does not change...but who's nature or message changes then we have to take note that the doctrine (ie what it tells its followers is true) does indeed change. So:

Taoism (doctrine is: all things are fluid--Pa Kua and all that: "Thus whose thinking is stiff and inflexible is a disciple of death."), Threvada--Mahayana Buddhism (essentially a prescription for finding the truth of the universe, it says little about that truth outside of the fact that it is "impermanent"), Tibetan Buddhism (admittedly they have the four noble truths..though one of these is that all things are impermanent), Hinduism Jnana-yogic (which claims that truth is different in different times and in different lands), Kabalic Judaism (mystic world view), Mystic Gnoticism (the world is the product of interacting forces and is therefore ever changing), Neo-Trad Wicca, Modern Asatru, Most polytheistic religions make few claims about the ultimate rightness of their doctrine...in fact most readily speak of the gods of other lands and people. Practitioners follow/worship the archetypes that suit them at at any given time. Anyway

I think you have missed the point in your discussion with ideal, who I would venture to say is uninterested in validating his belief by your standards. To him the veracity of his conclusions is already proven. He assigns no value to your rational need for proof. He doesn't value reason as you do. In turn you do not value the subtle, personal experience which he has had. You look at his "feeling" of truth and deny it as being unprovable, untestable, meaningless. He looks at your reason and sees a denial of the subtler, ineffable functions of the human experience. I'm not interested in saying which one of you is more, or less right. But it might make more sense if each of you stopped trying to get the other to validate his experience by your own standards...and realized that what ideal considers true, is true by his standards regardless of how it may rate by Abolitionist's standards. And the converse.

Lastly I really like Korymir's point about stories. In studying history one cannot help but notice the power of myth. Myth is important. The English myth was that the disciplined Englishman could conquer all problems if he gave of himself. And following this myth the English sent their sons from home by the thousands to the far corners of the world to conquer and to bring light to the heathen. Young English men, for pitifully little money would slave away in foreign lands, often for the benefit (read as industrial improvements, medicinal improvements, trade improvements) of foreigners who hated him and blamed him for all their problems. Now, whether or not the English had a right to invade foreign lands, subjugate foreign peoples, and force them to abandon their less advanced (read as "technologically--socially advanced") culture is another debate all together. But the English DID it. They sent their children off to die for it. Myth is a powerful mover of will. Abolitionist's talk about discarding make-believe myth with something more grounded in reality is an interesting point. It reminds me of Prof. Steven Pinker's book "The Blank Slate." He argues for us to stop denying that biology has bequeathed to us a certain set of directives that dramatically affect our behavior, individually and collectively. Why not replace myth stories with a recognition of our ape like need to have a Big Ape leader? Wouldn't it be better to concentrate on making the best of our aggressive natures and shortcomings than to continue to deny them, to continue to pretend that it is society that makes people violent (aww he had a rough childhood). We waste a lot of time teaching peace and non-violence in school, it doesn't change our nature. Much greater progress would come from attempting to discover physiological/neurological roots of our violent selves and find ways to work with instead of against ourselves? Myth based upon Neuroscience would be a far more useful sort of myth for us to embrace.

AidanSonoda:

First off science has a rigid doctrine that says "The scientific method is the only valid way of measuring truth."

Science does not say this. Science says that evidence must be observable.

One reason for this is that we cannot expect others to see our truth without providing them evidence.

AidanSonoda:

I think you have missed the point in your discussion with ideal, who I would venture to say is uninterested in validating his belief by your standards. To him the veracity of his conclusions is already proven. He assigns no value to your rational need for proof. He doesn't value reason as you do. In turn you do not value the subtle, personal experience which he has had. You look at his "feeling" of truth and deny it as being unprovable, untestable, meaningless. He looks at your reason and sees a denial of the subtler, ineffable functions of the human experience. I'm not interested in saying which one of you is more, or less right. But it might make more sense if each of you stopped trying to get the other to validate his experience by your own standards...and realized that what ideal considers true, is true by his standards regardless of how it may rate by Abolitionist's standards. And the converse.

That's fine, but his standards (in this case a feeling of something) should not become the standard by which we evaluate public policy.

Science allows for re-evaluation - whereas faith (in a doctrine or theory) compels one to avoid re-evaluation or is itself the act of refusing to question.

History is filled with examples of incorrect theories - therefore I think it's wise to allow for re-evaluation.

In fact it should be encouraged. I believe we all benefit from the rigorous testing of theories - after all we want to build our society upon the best available knowledge.

Abolitionist:

One reason for this is that we cannot expect others to see our truth without providing them evidence.

That is certainly true, which is one of the reasons I find prostelatization a distasteful feature in any religion. Still not all religions demand that you accept their story without your having a personally satisfying reason to do so. What I'm trying to say, is that not everyone places so high a value on "proof" and "evidence." Religions provide an experience. In its purist sense, if a person finds that experience rewarding then they may choose
to buy into the practice. Evidence of the truth of whatever world view is being espoused it not the only valid measure of that experience.

Abolitionist:

That's fine, but his standards (in this case a feeling of something) should not become the standard by which we evaluate public policy.

Perhaps, but any superior standard is going to have to allow for the fact that not all people share your (and my, incidentally) high value on externally verifiable evidence of truth. People value the religious experience because of how it makes them feel, not because of the verifiability of the precepts of their faith. If we put in place a public policy based upon rationalistic principles only
then we will be denying something that is a large part of many people's lives. Simply because you or I think it is silly, pointless, or even dangerous does not mean that it is worthless to everyone.

Abolitionist:

Science allows for re-evaluation - whereas faith (in a doctrine or theory) compels one to avoid re-evaluation or is itself the act of refusing to question.

Science does not have a monopoly on re-evaluation (though it is probably the leader of the pack). I would refer you to the Midrashic tradition of Judaica. Hasidism even has a tradition of holding god against Rabbinic tribunal as a way of determining whether god has invalidated his word by his work (or lack thereof) on earth. To say nothing of other faiths that actively construct and re-evaluate their myth in an attempt to discover what they value within it (my own for example). Even Christianity had many internal discussions about its theology before the catholic church came to power, and the motivations of theologians turned from the religious to the political. Do you not think that it is possible, with your closely held belief in the monopoly of science as the only valid measure of human understanding that you are failing to undertake, yourself, the very re-evaluation that your beliefs demand?

Abolitionist:

In fact it should be encouraged. I believe we all benefit from the rigorous testing of theories - after all we want to build our society upon the best available knowledge.

Absolutely agreed. But I would point out again, that the best available knowledge would by definition have to be all encompassing. Until we incorporate an understanding of what all people value, our knowledge is insular.