What are some examples of this? I'm also an atheist (although I detest the label) who was raised Catholic and seriously considered joining the priesthood. But a life guided by reason and rationality I've found to be so much more fulfilling than the guilt and fear that made up much of my Catholic life.
String theory? Read Smolin, who points out that for decades, string theorists dominated physics, despite the absence of experimental evidence.
Expert systems? I saw this back in the mid 1980s at Stanford, when the CS department had gone all-in on expert systems. Claims were made that strong AI was just around the corner. This from a technology that doesn't really do all that much. You write simple statements about something in a notation based on predicate calculus, after which you can ask questions. You get out pretty much what you put in. Systems like that still exist, mostly as chatbots for answering the easy questions so customer support doesn't have to talk to you. A programmed FAQ, basically.
And those are hard sciences. Economics is hopeless. Psychology is worse.
(I made the unpopular comment at the time that expert systems would turn out to be more important than syntax-directed parsing, but less important than relational databases.)
As Fred Hoyle once said, "Science is prediction, not explanation". The parts of science that work lead to engineering that works and products that work. Belief is then unnecessary.
Think about the statement "We believe in science in this house". What does that even really mean? As you considered joining the priesthood, you should know there is a great deal of scholarship that priests engage in. Not just religious scholarship, but the study of the natural world. Many of the minds that pushed humanity forward were priests. Priests believe in science, but the people who put those signs on their lawns tend not to agree.
That gets me to my point, science isn't a noun to me. Yet everyday I keep hearing how the science has spoken. Often, when I look at the evidence provided and I deem what was said to be correct. Just as often, I find small sample sizes, hacked p values or a logical flaw with the conclusion. If I start a dialog about my findings in the wrong places, I get told I'm anti-science by people who didn't even read the paper.
If forced to provide a good example it would the talk of Covid escaping the Wuhan Institute of Virology. This has become a more main stream opinion in the past month or so, but if you wanted to discuss the possibility of this around this time last year, you would've been called a conspiracy theorist by people who reportedly "believe in science" or even be censored by some of the major platforms in the name of science. That is the opposite of the science I grew up with.
Part of science is acknowledging epistemic uncertainty yet still acting on imperfect information.
I think for most people it means that they believe the process of using science to discover how the world works is better than the other alternatives offered by religion, philosophy, conspiracy theories, etc. They don’t usually think it’s infallible, just better than the alternatives.
I don't see how you can claim with a straight face that priests believe in science. Religion at its core is asking for belief without proof. Science is the opposite.
Further: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lay_Catholic_scientist...
You are robbing yourself if you don't speak to priests you encounter. They tend to be very well read people, with an interesting perspective on the world if you can be tolerant enough of them.
What I've meant above is hostility in the literal sense. As in, trying to oppose science with some religious fantasies, like with Intelligent Design, or pretty much anything Catholicism says about human sexuality.
Faith is believing things without evidence.
If you have evidence for a thing, you don't say, "i believe it on faith".
I've seen a few things quite concerning, specifically with COVID. However, the overall message (that I'm guessing you'd disagree with) to trust the experts, isn't necessarily a call for deference/faith either.
The concern is that people will go out looking for validation of their preconceived biases, listen to misinformed parties, possibly with perverse incentives, or political motivations. It's not all about shutting down discussion, as much as keeping the crazies from preventing the public from gaining herd immunity.
The two do (religion and rationality) are not mutually exclusive concepts.
Only if the religion is unfalsifiable. If it can be proven false then it's irrational to believe in it. If it can be proven true there is no need for faith.
If the beliefs are benign then one could make a case. Even so I prefer believing only what can be proven over ignorance and self deception.
If i don't need evidence,
I can believe white people are better than black people and take it on faith. I can believe men are better than women and take it on faith. I can believe cis people are better than lbgtq+ people and take it on faith.
If i don't have to demonstrate the accuracy of my claims, My claims are as valid as your claims.
According my mental dictionary, religion and rationality are mutually exclusive when the religious doctrine is proven irrational.
If we look at the history of the Varna, particularly the Brahmin, if I'm not mistaken... From my fragmented recollection, the Brahmins created increasingly sophisticated and esoteric rituals which began to jointly increase in expense. They were eventually castigated [EDIT: the Vedic religion was actually challenged by a variety of religions, this period, ≈700BCE, gave rise to Buddhism and Jainism.] for this — I'd say science draws a pretty close parallel.
It's increasingly opaque, expensive, esoteric, and despite all that it's informing opinion, debate, and policy. It's also a closed circle that is arbitrarily delimited, and given high autonomy and authority in society. Not to mention most people have a poor grasp of the fact that science isn't the truth. It also does little to inform us in the way of morality, yet it appears the "rationalists" (pardon, I've no better term) in usurping religion, have little in the way of an answer for this. Yet the constituent mass that composes it is one of the most trusted groups[1]. Which is easily exploitable if you factor all this together, not unlike religion. And it has been leveraged for maligned purposes, before and will continue to be.
[1] https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2019/08/02/trust-and-mis...
At the start, the scientific dogma was that masks don't work, and travel bans don't work, and worrying about COVID was irrational alarmism. Anyone who suggested otherwise was treated as not believing in science (this extended to censorship or at least misinformation banners on major social media platforms).
Now, the scientific dogma has flipped, and for example anyone questioning the effectiveness of masks is treated as a science denier.
The "Science" dogma that the general public is induced to adhere to gets filtered through these institutions.
Science changes course as more data comes in.
At first there wasn’t evidence that masks worked, once that had been accrued science was pro-mask.
The reason people questioning the effectiveness of masks is called a science denier is because there have been innumerable studies on the effectiveness of masks, and every one that has stood up to scrutiny has come out in favor of masks.
Calling scientific consensus that is backed but huge amounts of direct evidence “dogma” is nonsense.
Dogma is an absolute opinion on something in the absence of (or indeed denied by) evidence.
And that's reason to express epistemic uncertainty when basing one's conclusions off limited data.
> At first there wasn’t evidence that masks worked, once that had been accrued science was pro-mask.
First of all, there was already evidence that masks worked.
Second, officials did not tell people that we lacked evidence that masks work - they told people that masks don't work period.
> The reason people questioning the effectiveness of masks is called a science denier is because there have been innumerable studies on the effectiveness of masks, and every one that has stood up to scrutiny has come out in favor of masks. Calling scientific consensus that is backed but huge amounts of direct evidence “dogma” is nonsense.
The studies show limited effectiveness of masks, particularly with newer variants that have higher exhaled viral loads. People who argue that the benefits of masking are outweighed by the costs are labeled science deniers. This is despite there being some evidence of negative impacts from masking (e.g. on childhood development).
Some said we lacked evidence, others said they didn’t work. There was no single voice on this.
This is not how that worked. The evidence in terms of tests and trials is inconclusive, either for or against masks, in terms of experimental evidence of effectiveness. Nevertheless East Asia was all fro masks from the beginning and the WHO, CDC, FDA, Surgeon General were against, very vehemently. The western establishment changed their minds based not on experimental evidence but on people going "Are you morons? You're saying masks are literally useless? Not of limited use, actually worthless? Do you understand how airflow and droplets work at all?"
Besides, it is perfectly scientific to change your beliefs and guidance based on new evidence, especially when it comes to novel diseases and a generation-defining pandemic.
But there is clearly a faction of media and political institutions which wield "Science (TM)" as a cudgel to stifle public debate / opinions - and they aren't even doing it out of bad faith / political opportunism - they're doing it because they believe it's important to have the general public universally believe in established science "facts".
Your portrayal of the recent scientific dogma as being discriminatory of people who don't wear masks does not match mine, however. As far as I know, the current dogma is "get vaccinated and no one really cares if you have a mask on or not, maybe wear one when your grandma comes over though and consider getting a booster if your regional leaders are advising you to".
Anyway. The culture war is still firmly between the un/vaccinated, not the vaccinated but unmasked.
edit: Maybe try leaving the bay area if you disagree.
> travel bans don't work, and worrying about COVID was irrational alarmism…
Clearly you were listening to different medical and scientific advice than I was seeing at the time. The medical establishment was warning about the dangers from very early on. The question about travel bans was mainly about timing, not whether they would be needed or not.
This is not some crackpot interviewer.
I work with good hearted scientists everyday. Science is amazing. Science is the foundation for my whole goddamn life. But, our leadership did not hold up to the standard I was expecting them to. And, they crumbled under political influence and their inability to lead with objectivity and truth. They are weak. Almost childish (see it for yourself). It is no surprise they eroded public trust.