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Comment by alexasmyths | Hacker News Reader

"belief in supernatural powers is doomed to die out, all over the world, as a result of the increasing adequacy and diffusion of scientific knowledge"

That's not what religion is, and it's rather upsetting to see supposed 'intellectuals' with such a sad failure to grasp even the basics of metaphysics, let alone spirituality.

There is no 'war' between Science and Religion.

Maybe a 'war' between 'Scientists' and 'Some kinds of religious people who believe some impractical things' ...

But the real debate is between 'Scientific Materialists' and 'Spiritualists' and that's a reasonable debate.

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Your comment is basically the entire point of this article. There is no conflict between science and religion. There is a conflict between science and a fundamentalist straw man of religion (biblical literalism, for instance, or the Graeco-Roman pantheon).

I think the conflict idea is spread mostly by those who themselves encountered the idea that science and religion are in conflict before they learned much science or much about religion, so they've internalized the idea that the two are in conflict, and everything new they learn only serves to reinforce this.

Of course, there is a conflict between religion and science. They are based on competing and inconsistent methods of acquiring knowledge. On one hand, the empirical scientific method, and on the other revelation, authority, and faith. Whether you're a Biblical literalist or a Church of England progressive, your religion makes some truth claims that are not supportable on scientific grounds.

But this doesn't mean that science and religion necessarily have to be at war, or that one has to lose for the other to win. Human beings aren't perfectly logically consistent. We're quite adept at compartmentalising our minds so that we can apply one set of standards here and another there. A single human being can be a biblical literalist and a coldly-logical scientist at the same time.

> your religion makes some truth claims that are not supportable on scientific grounds.

We just have to accept that science isn't the sole arbiter of truth (in fact, science can't tell us what is true and what isn't, it can only tell us what is more likely to be true and what is less likely) and there are some matters outside the scope of science.

In particular, inductive reasoning starts reaching its limits when observability, reproducibility, and complexity are issues. Sometimes we invent things to push those boundaries (calculus, computers, drug trials on animals), but some complexity can be proven to be incalculable. And some results (The Milgram Experiment) are too terrible to reproduce to be worth the scientific knowledge they could offer.

I think there's plenty we should be eager to learn, but I think it's realistic to think there are areas where "less incomplete understanding" is the best we can hope for.

>We just have to accept that science isn't the sole arbiter of truth (...)

For the sake of argument, accepting that as true, why should religion then be accepted as the arbiter of truth for those matters outside the scope of science?

Because there are a lot of religious TV and Cable channels.

Or philosophy. Ultimately you get to choose your religion.

> ...your religion makes some truth claims that are not supportable on scientific grounds.

"Not supportable", "not true", and "contradictory" are three different concepts.

> Whether you're a Biblical literalist...

How does biblical literalism contradict the scientific method and other forms of scientific inquiry?

There not as competing or inconsistent as people often think. Faith is similar to the scientific method(s). You have faith in God not purely because he's god, but because he's proved himself to be god. We learn more for ourselves as we go along. An example is from university. In first year you'll have a math lecturer who knows a lot, but you're just starting out. They'll at times ask you to take their word on it, but they invite you to study it out yourself. Sometimes you can't yet to get know though, because of ability, time, etc.

And if they're so at odds, why throughout history as religion (and those practicing it) been 'scientists' themselves?

>You have faith in God not purely because he's god, but because he's proved himself to be god.

Convincing yourself that God exists, even believing that God exists, in no way proves that God exists.

> In first year you'll have a math lecturer who knows a lot, but you're just starting out. They'll at times ask you to take their word on it,

Math is perhaps not the best subject to illustrate this. Math lecturers tend to prove everything they teach.

Except axioms.

Agreed except there isn't a problem with biblical literalism. The arguments against biblical literalism generally boil down to metaphysical or theological arguments, which are fine, but they're not scientific. I'd challenge someone to demonstrate a bible passage that cannot be true given an all-powerful God.

They generally come down to "Could God make a fossil record and evolution in a 24-hour period?" I don't see why not. You don't have to think it's true, but it's logically consistent assuming an omnipotent God is possible.

The theological arguments are really much more important than the scientific ones. Genesis 6 conflicts with the basic monotheistic nature of Christianity, and means there's no real way to take Genesis literally while professing the Nicene creed (which pretty much defines Christianity).

In what way? Have you studied the underpinnings of the language used? Is this an interpretation based on you reading an English version of those passages?

Pray tell why it undermines the monotheism of Christianity?

We're talking about taking Genesis literally. Genesis 6 uses the phrase "sons of God" which contradicts the Nicene creed which states "We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God".

The Nicene Creed was later amended in Constantinople to include the word "begotten" to clarify that Jesus was considered a natural born son of God, not simply an adopted son or someone with a special title. This was not an invention but a clarification since the word "begotten" (monogenēs in Greek) is used in the canonical bible, being one of the main points of John 1, but reaffirmed in Hebrews and John's first epistle.

It's pretty clear that the Genesis 6 "sons of God" is an idiom or group title of some sort, but it's not clear precisely what was meant.