Great recipe for war, as are most half-truths.

@skado Half truths? What exactly do you find in Ingersoll‘s observations to be half truths? This war has existed for centuries, and is heating up in recent years, as religion refuses to go away and is gaining in political power.

“There is an “irrepressible conflict” between religion and science, and they cannot peaceably occupy the same brain nor the same world.”
Robert Green Ingersoll, The Gods, 1872

@p-nullifidian
What makes it a half-truth is that the parts mentioned have some basis in truth, but there are parts that are not mentioned. There is nothing about “religion” that can’t be reconciled with science. The idea that they are forever enemies in the past and in the future is a currently popular idea, but it depends on very specific, and very currently popular definitions of religion, which have otherwise been known to change through time. The various branches of science that study religion are coming to different conclusions these days.

Did you read the article?

@skado I did read the article and disagree entirely with its premise. Nearly all the significant advancements in science over the centuries have come by people who, while members of a religion, dared to think ‘outside the box’ and go against the orthodoxy of their peers and clergyman.

Do me a favor? Cite an example of a religion that is not merely compatible, but consistent with science?

@p-nullifidian
There is no human, animal, plant, or mineral behavior that is incompatible with science. So all religions are compatible with science, including the chimpanzee religion of throwing rocks at trees near waterfalls, etc.
Once you view it from a scientific perspective, it makes perfect sense.

Religion is a major stabilizing influence on human civilization, and without a stable society, no science could proceed.

@skado That is perhaps the most preposterous thing I have ever read on this website.

@p-nullifidian
Before I started reading the related science, say ten years ago, I would have agreed with you. It’s very counterintuitive.

@skado What you appear to be saying is that ignorance, superstition and faith (which is to say believing something without evidence) is compatible with reason, observation and experience and that praying for a miracle is on par with the scientific method. Poppycock!

@p-nullifidian
That’s not at all what I’m saying.
I’m saying that, from a scientific perspective, there are benefits to a species in behaviors that appear nonsensical to the rational mind.
The function of religion is scientifically understandable from an evolutionary perspective.

@skado Got it. The ‘utility argument’ for the existence of religion. Well, whatever usefulness organized religion may have once provided humanity, has long ago been superseded by its liabilities.

@p-nullifidian
That’s an understandable view, but I can’t see that it’s supported by the evidence.

Organized religion, at the onset of agriculture, had an evolutionary function. Among other things, mainly, it mediated certain biological instincts that didn’t fit well in the new lifestyle called civilization. It fostered cooperation among strangers, where our instincts favored xenophobia.

Each isolated society invented more or less the same cultural fix for this same biological problem, as convergent evolution would have it.

This worked well enough, even though never perfectly, for agricultural societies to flourish and grow (it aided reproductive fitness). But the whole time, those biological pressures never went away - they were always just barely well enough constrained. Biological evolution moves much slower than cultural evolution. And evolution never foresees or prepares for the future. It only fixes what is broken (or not).

So now these previously isolated societies are growing steadily less isolated, so there are increasing clashes between religious tribes, which tips the delicate balance between biology and culture back in favor of biology.

This makes religion look like the problem, when in fact, the problem is that the religions we have were designed for isolated societies, which are now no longer isolated.

The temptation is to think that we have outgrown the need for religion and it should be discarded, but the opposite is true. Our biology has changed very little in the last three thousand years, but the pressures of civilization that precipitated the convergent evolution of religion in all locations where sapiens existed, even though isolated, are now growing exponentially due to the massive reproductive success and now advanced technology.

Biologically, we’re no smarter than hunter/gatherers, and we still have all of their evolved animal instincts, but now we’ve changed our environment even more than when we invented agriculture.

What Homo sapiens needs now is a stronger, more universal cultural correction to our Pleistocene instincts - not less. If we can come up with one that steers clear of superstition, all the better, but the fact that we are no smarter doesn’t bode well for that. What is critical is that we come up with one.

We must be mindful of the baby in that very dirty bathwater.

ONLY BECAUSE CHURCHES HOGGED ALL THE BOOKS.

You're still mind-meltingly stupid.

@Toonman I am sorry, I must be stupid because I fail to see what that has to do with my comment. As I said, in the past theist religion was "the leading thought system", so of course it "hogged all the books", that goes without saying.

@Fernapple Please define what scientific principles came from a religious concept. I think you're confusing "inspire" with "controlling". They controlled what could be studied and had the ability to control who got to participate in those studies.

@redbai The inspiration came from an old concept called natural theology, now lost and extinct as a real movement, which saw the exploring of the world and the laws which defined it, as a holy duty. In which nature was seen as an expression of gods mind, which was to be understood through nature. Especially what was seen as design, both in the realm of astronomy, and natural history, where animal and plant adaptions were seen as showing gods wisdom. So that the sciences, were a very popular pursuit for the clergy, like the Rev. Maskelyne the astronomer or the curate and naturalist Gilbert White.

I especially picked those three Newton, Boyle, and Bacon especially though, because they all openly stated that they regarded their science as a sacred pursuit. A couple of quotes from I. Newton show it plainly.

“In the absence of any other proof, the thumb alone would convince me of God’s existence.”

“All my discoveries have been made in answer to prayer.”

That was why Darwin came as such a shock in the nineteenth century, not just because he mounted a challenge to the religious world view, but also because his theories were seen as pulling out one of its major props. The world really did change completely in the nineteenth century so much so that it is very difficult now to even imagine the thinking and mindset of those times.

@Fernapple Still waiting for which scientific principles came from a religious concept.

@redbai I never claimed there were any, I only said that certain early scientists were inspired by their religious beliefs. I wonder if inspired may have a slightly different meaning in American and UK English ?

The one that I am using is very like.
Britannica Dictionary definition of INSPIRED : very good or clever She gave an inspired performance. He was an inspired choice for the role. aroused, animated, or imbued with the spirit to do something, by or AS IF by supernatural or divine influence: With the emphasis on "as if". Of course.

@Fernapple I was referring to this statement.

The inspiration came from an old concept called natural theology, now lost and extinct as a real movement, which saw the exploring of the world and the laws which defined it, as a holy duty.

I think it ignores the concept of natural philosophy which is the actual precursor of science. My understanding of natural theology is the assumption that a person could learn about "God" using observation and reason (i.e. the Socratic Method). I would like to know how trying to understand "God" using the Socratic Method leads to science. Why isn't it just theology using natural philosophical concepts to try and give their beliefs credibility.

FTR, I don't think those quote demonstrate that their science was a "sacred pursuit". I think it simply reflects the mindset of their time to couch everything in a religious context to conform to social norms.

@redbai Yep. I agree with that completely. It was philosophy which gave birth to science, which was at first even called natural philosophy. And the apologists tend to forget that, I suspect quite deliberately and with dishonest intent. Although it is easy to assume , especially if your historical knowledge has been limited by religion contaminated education, that the word philosophy, always meant the kind of abstract study bordering on morality and cosmology it is today. Where in fact, in the past, it simply meant all of secular thought as opposed to religious thought, and a good argument could be made, that philosophy only appeared in the first place back in the late bronze age, because, by then, it was becoming quite clear to many that, the conventionalized religious belief, as a system of thought, was not answering any of the questions any longer, and so people began to work on an alternative.

When I mention natural theology and its probably tiny role in inspiring early science, it is not to say that I believe that it was the main wellspring of science, but only to concede as much as possible to the apologists , at the beginning, to make my anti-religious statements more forceful because I am setting out to be brutally honest at the start, and head of any "buts" they many bring up before time, and there is good evidnce that some early scientists like Newton, who spent far more time on religious mistical studies than he did science, were religiously motivated to a degree, even while they worked within another system, to create a system of thought that would eventually make it pointless.

Hmm. IDK about that. Define science in your thoughts please. If it is simply knowledge then what came 1st.....the ability to start a fire or religion? Isn't this like the chicken or the egg came 1st?

Please provide something that demonstrates that reading and writing were a result of religion as opposed to religion using something that had already existed.

Yes. As it should be.

Not my words. Just a link.

@skado but also a theme in your posts, about religion, and somehow it's important or helpful, or necessary, or plays a role and so on.

@skado It's never your words. When ask for evidence you deflect and dodge.

@xenoview
Not true. It's often my words, and when people engage respectfully, I try to engage in kind.
There is no requirement on this site that posts must be explained, justified, or backed by evidence. You can stomp your feet and demand all you want. But if you pay attention, you'll see that I respond in depth to members who engage with civility.

@xenoview,

Thanks for noticing.

There are lots of posts on this site I have no interest in, and you know what I’m able to do about that? I can scroll right past them without another thought.

I read your engagement as interest.

And it is that persistent interest that motivates me to continue posting.

Thanks for your continuing support!

I own that book. It's a great read and I am always happy to lend it out. Don't get any takers.....