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-   -   Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny? (http://www.flashflashrevolution.com/vbz/showthread.php?t=98737)

Magewout 09-30-2008 08:40 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
I see the faith argument as a weak excuse to escape all criticism and nothing more.

Tired_Old_Man 09-30-2008 10:10 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by iceefudgesickle (Post 2821414)
People BLATANTLY DESPISE religion, specifically Christianity, in this country, and religion is under copius amounts of scrutiny.

There's an awful lot of Christians just on ffr for you to say that. In this new age of reason Christianity is still going strong, weak people need hope, who doesn't need some hope? Christianity is what's wrong with America, it's the reason Mcain and his female Bush will be elected and we'll go into recession.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Afrobean (Post 2821517)
If I were trying to tell people that guns should be allowed in schools, could I tell them that I had faith that nothing bad would happen?

I have faith that dinosaurs never existed. Faith is how you get around blatant flaws.

devonin 09-30-2008 12:37 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

This is why we have the rule of no religion discussion here. What happened? Why are these things allowed now?
This is a debate about the concept of religious debate, not a religious debate. That's why it's been allowed.

Afrobean 09-30-2008 01:20 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by devonin (Post 2821671)
This is a debate about the concept of religious debate, not a religious debate. That's why it's been allowed.

:|

You deleted my post, didn't you :(

But really, there is no debate to the concept of it. It's simple. You can't debate it because it's beliefs rather than fact. You can't debate with religion on the grounds that it is unprovable by its own nature.

Not only that, but due to the nature of serious debate, unfounded beliefs aren't admissible on the grounds that they are not empirical. You could mention beliefs and such, but they cannot be used as support or as a means to denounce the opposition. If I have a belief that the death penalty is wrong, I can't walk into a debate and say "my beliefs say this is wrong" and walk out the winner of the argument.

lord_carbo 09-30-2008 02:15 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Afro, the thread is not about whether religion is true or not, but whether religion is scrutinized as much as it should be, and how it should be scrutinized. I'm not sure what you don't understand about that.

Afrobean 09-30-2008 02:32 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by lord_carbo (Post 2821746)
Afro, the thread is not about whether religion is true or not, but whether religion is scrutinized as much as it should be, and how it should be scrutinized. I'm not sure what you don't understand about that.

It's not a debatable topic. You cannot say "prove it" to someone talking about religion.

That's the problem. You can't scientifically test religion, because if you try, your returned result is that it's not scientifically true. But a person's faith can be contrary to empirically proven truth, and as far as this topic is concerned, that's where it lies.

Thus, this scrutiny that some would suggest is tandamount to frankly stating "gods don't exist and all religions are wrong and/or lies." I personally am in favor of people taking that stance on the subject, but as far as this forum is concerned, I know it can't work. Too many people have their beliefs and they are at odds with the function of this forum. Thus, the best solution is to simply avoid such discussion, not to put a big sticker on it saying "god isn't real".

Vendetta21 10-12-2008 09:48 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by iceefudgesickle (Post 2821414)
When one openly attacks a religion, they're thought of as rude? You joking? People BLATANTLY DESPISE religion, specifically Christianity, in this country, and religion is under copius amounts of scrutiny.

This is pretty much all that needed to be said to answer the OP's question. QFE.

runnerxc 12-17-2008 12:40 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
The idea that religion and science are two non-overlapping realms is not true. Religion makes various claims about the world, as does science. A universe with a god will look very different from a universe without one. Science is concerned with explaining what exists, so the truth claims of religion are directly in conflict with empirical science.

Necros140606 12-17-2008 03:10 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
what about this? science usually doesn't tell religion to stop doing something because it's wrong. religion has been telling science to shut up for centuries, now they go all out for contraceptives, genetics, and such. latest thing they've done is saying you can't check the genes of your embryons to see if there will be malformations/genetic diseases. THEY WANT BROKEN HUMANS TO BE BORN BECAUSE,THEY SAY, THE DIFFERENT SHOULDNT BE AVOIDED. yet they burned dissentors and "witches" in the past, and even nowadays people are exorcized. people who most likely need a psichiatric help, not a purification ritual. the amount of contradictions in the religious matters is huge and just cannot be ignored. this alone should keep people far from any religion, but it seems most people still need a sweet lie to feel reassured.

dore 12-17-2008 06:14 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
I'd say religion isn't under as much scrutiny is because religion is unprovable and science can be disprovable, so if you're going to criticize something you're more likely to go for the one you can actually disprove. It's hard to criticize religion because religious people believe in what is set forth in a book, and so any argument relies on whether or not you take that book as valid.

Patricoo 12-17-2008 10:51 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
You guys have this argument all screwed up. We all know you can't put the same level of scientific testing to religion because of one simple reason previously stated.

Quote:

You can't scientifically test religion, because if you try, your returned result is that it's not scientifically true.
Science, past the theoretical and mathematical concepts, relying on testing. We can talk and talk all day, but the matter is that you can put any major concept of religion into scientific testing. Without testing, without data, it's a discussion of theory.

We can put CERTAIN elements of bible events to scientific recreation, but that doesn't prove most current contexts, especially modern miracles. (Many of which are well documented. The Catholic church has few dubious miracles. For a religion that still has exorcisms, they do a damn good job of investigating "legit" miracles.)

But again to my main point, you guys are completely wrong in this discussion.

You shouldn't be thinking about testing religion on scientific standards, as it's impossible. Now, if you used philosophical standards... *wink wink*

Afrobean 12-18-2008 02:22 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Patricoo (Post 2924366)
You guys have this argument all screwed up. We all know you can't put the same level of scientific testing to religion because of one simple reason previously stated.



Science, past the theoretical and mathematical concepts, relying on testing. We can talk and talk all day, but the matter is that you can put any major concept of religion into scientific testing. Without testing, without data, it's a discussion of theory.

We can put CERTAIN elements of bible events to scientific recreation, but that doesn't prove most current contexts, especially modern miracles. (Many of which are well documented. The Catholic church has few dubious miracles. For a religion that still has exorcisms, they do a damn good job of investigating "legit" miracles.)

But again to my main point, you guys are completely wrong in this discussion.

You shouldn't be thinking about testing religion on scientific standards, as it's impossible. Now, if you used philosophical standards... *wink wink*

No.

#1: Can we observe him?
#2: Can we observe his actions?
#3: Can we observe any effects of his actions?
#4: Is there any actual evidence to suggest that he exists?

Going after a hypothesis is secondary to answering those questions. If something isn't even observable in any way, it does not exist in the empirical sense. Extradimensional existence that has no effect on our World is irrelevant. You'd be just as right to be arguing that Mister Mxyzptlk exists in the 5th dimension and we just can't see him.

slipstrike0159 12-18-2008 04:18 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Listen, its very easy. There is one term that brings it all together; "moot point."
Its like many have said, it will not work to hold that kind of concept to a scientific standard because it is just that, a concept. No one said, "I believe that noahs arc existed so therefore it is a scientific fact." Even in a previous question about allowing guns in schools. You can believe it, but to claim it as scientific fact does not coincide because it was not tested through those means.
If you really want to know why it doesnt receive the same kind of scrutiny then do an 'experiment'. Go up to as many religion geared individuals and you can and try to 'scientifically' prove to them that God doesn't exist just to see what their reaction will be. To 'prove' my point ill go along with something that was said earlier about being able to "insert God here." You could go all day trying to prove evolution to me but you will get nowhere because of one simple bit of logic. Say, "evolution happened through mutations in genes" and ill say "God made those mutations happen", can you scientifically prove that God did not do that? The answer is no, you cannot and until you can then i will not change my opinion. Moot point.

Necros140606 12-18-2008 06:57 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
the "you can't prove or disprove it" argument is just a weak excuse to believe in something that makes you feel better. it has no relevance, no sense, and no reason to exist. anything i can imagine, going down this road, has the same legitimacy as a god from any religion with millions of faithful followers, then. good point.

devonin 12-18-2008 09:10 AM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

it has no relevance, no sense, and no reason to exist.
To you, as a clearly non-religious person. To a religious person with faith, God has relevance, sense and a damn good reason to exist.

Just because you elect to not follow their belief system doesn't make their belief system irellevant, nonsensical and pointless, just irellevant, nonsensical and pointless TO YOU.

Quote:

anything i can imagine, going down this road, has the same legitimacy as a god from any religion with millions of faithful followers
You'd take the same general tack in answering objections to your belief system, but that doesn't make the system equally legitimate.

I'm not actually sure why this thread got revived or why this angle on the discussion is still going on. I thought this sort of thing was put to rest back when I pointed out

Quote:

Intelligent religious people never suggest that their views are scientific, or should stand up to scientific rigor.

Intelligent scientific people never suggest that their views are religious, or should stand up to religious constructivism (constructionism?).

All kinds of religious and scientific people try to cross those lines all the time. You'll notice the lack of extra adjective in the preceding statement.

Anybody who says religion should stand up to scientific rigor or be discarded simply doesn't understand or doesn't -want- to understand religion and how religion works.
You're pointing to a container of vanilla ice cream, clearly labelled "Vanilla Ice Cream" and criticizing it for not being chocolaty enough. If it was claiming to be chocolate ice cream, you'd have a really good and well-founded objection that it wasn't chocolatey enough, but since it never claimed to be chocolate, the degree to which it is or isn't chocolate is TOTALLY IRELLEVANT.

QED Stepfiles 12-18-2008 02:06 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
I think it's a gross oversimplification to just make the argument that science and religion should stay out of each other's faces because they are distinct realms of thought. Yes, religion at its core is a construct, and as such it is impossible to scientifically determine the legitimacy of religion at the most fundamental level. However, this does not mean that the two things are really distinct. Religious ideals usually lead to religious assertions about the how the natural world is structured, and when this line is crossed, science definitely has the right to get involved.

Assertions pertaining to such things as the age of the universe, or the existence of intelligent design, definitely fall within the scientific method to test. And, should these things be scientifically shown to be most likely false (which they pretty much have been), then this still says a lot about the religion itself as a construct. Logically, if natural observations result from religious concepts, and those natural observations are false, then it's an easy logical jump to conclude that there's something wrong with that construct of religion in the first place. Of course, this falls far from actually proving the existence or non-existence of a God, but it does suggest that the particular treatment of such a God that a particular religious construct has used is somewhat flawed.

The major problem, though, is not that science should not be allowed to test certain aspects of religion, but it is more that science is inherently flawed. Testing and repeated testing only yields statistics - we can only say that things are most likely true, but we can never really show that anything is definitely the case. After all, 99.9999999% is still not 100%. And, for this, science can never really show that a certain religion is definitely flawed, but only that a flaw most likely exists.

So, yes, the existence of God or gods is definitely not really something that science can ever say anything about, but there is something to be said about what certain religions say that the existence of such a God translates to in terms of our world. And, there are plenty of intelligent scientists who use this concept to talk about certain aspects of religion. There are also a considerable number of intelligent religious people who argue for religion in the context of science. I've seen and read books that argue for religion in scientific terms, and while I personally didn't find many of the arguments satisfying, there was still an impressive amount of scientific detail.

The point is, I reiterate, that at their most basic levels, science and religion are separate, but as we look past this basic level, then there is a noticeable overlap. So I think it's just being lazy (and, to a degree, politically correct, which to me is even worse than being lazy) to just nonchalantly throw this argument away as "irrelevant."

Patricoo 12-18-2008 05:02 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

Originally Posted by Necros140606 (Post 2924618)
the "you can't prove or disprove it" argument is just a weak excuse to believe in something that makes you feel better. it has no relevance, no sense, and no reason to exist. anything i can imagine, going down this road, has the same legitimacy as a god from any religion with millions of faithful followers, then. good point.

When you have hundreds and, in most cases thousands of years of scripture, teachings, dogma and generations upon generations of followers, that argument holds some weight. When something is the "generally accepted norm" you often find yourself needing to prove otherwise.

Ironically, this is the case with science. Many theories still hold significant weight just because they are widely accepted as true, but not proven factual. E.G. gravity. You need to disprove them completely, or at least enough so to make it seem outstandingly unlikely, to disprove them.

It's not the strongest argument, but when your best argument against a point contrived on the concept of belief and opinion is "thats stupid" then you don't have much sway, do you?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Afrobean (Post 2924545)
No.

#1: Can we observe him?
#2: Can we observe his actions?
#3: Can we observe any effects of his actions?
#4: Is there any actual evidence to suggest that he exists?

Going after a hypothesis is secondary to answering those questions. If something isn't even observable in any way, it does not exist in the empirical sense. Extradimensional existence that has no effect on our World is irrelevant. You'd be just as right to be arguing that Mister Mxyzptlk exists in the 5th dimension and we just can't see him.

Is sounds like your agreeing with me. Are you agreeing with me?

devonin 12-18-2008 05:39 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
Quote:

So I think it's just being lazy (and, to a degree, politically correct, which to me is even worse than being lazy) to just nonchalantly throw this argument away as "irrelevant."
Criticizing a religion for failing to stand up to scientific rigor is only relevant if that religion has made any claim that it does in fact stand up to scientific rigor.

Otherwise, you're straw manning the religious claim by misrepresenting it as "Scientific claims we can expose the flaws in" when it has never suggest that is what it is.

This has nothing to do with political correctness, this has to do with apples and oranges.

I'll direct you, once more, to the claim I quoted above, especially in regards to the "intelligent religious people" versus "religious people" distinction I drew.

When you say that you've seen all these cases of religious people trying to use science to prove their beliefs, well yes, I've seen them too, I've read several books on christian apologetics, and looked into several "scientific" proofs for ID and so forth. The reason you find these things not very compelling is that they aren't very compelling. They tend to either try to justify after the fact, or just stretch credulity much further than the broadest extrapolation.

As regards your specific examples of "the age of the universe, or the existence of intelligent design" I'd suggest that for one, most realistic proponants and opponents of ID differ primarily in their conception of whether "Things just happened" or "Things were made to happen" actually represents the proper application of Occam's Razor, rather than any more formal disagreementm and for two, the only religious people who disagree over the actual age of the universe are, in my opinion, idiots.

QED Stepfiles 12-18-2008 07:10 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
While religious claims are not scientific claims, whenever you make any remark about an observable phenomenon, there is implicit scientific content in your statement. As was repeated ad nauseum throughout this thread - many religious ideologies escape the realm of testability, but this by no means means that some of the specifics of what such ideologies claim manages to do the same. Anything really that relates to concrete ideas in our natural world is subject (rightfully) to scientific scrutiny. It's not like comparing apples with oranges, it's like comparing vanilla ice cream with a chocolate/vanilla twist ice cream and remarking "hm, I don't know about the chocolate in this, but the vanilla smells a bit strange."

Of course, this falls down to whether or not you believe in science as an ideology - but then again, science is founded upon the simplest set of assumptions we can come up with, and is also founded upon observable, repeatable experiments, so Occam's Razor really doesn't favor religion or ID at all...

I'm actually not quite sure what you were getting at in the last paragraph, Devonin... I think you missed a punctuation mark or something because I couldn't really understand what the structure of the sentence was (the one with Occam's Razor) <.<... and most religious supporters (Christians especially) disagree wholeheartedly with the scientific perspective on how old the Universe is (it comes with the territory), so I'm not sure where you are getting that from.

devonin 12-18-2008 11:39 PM

Re: Why religion isn't under the same amount of scrutiny?
 
My statement goes like this: People who support ID intelligently tend to claim that the unliklihood of the universe existing by pure chance means that a creator is the simplest explanation. People who oppose ID intelligently tend to claim that the characteristics implicit in a creator are too complex and advanced, and that random chance is the simplest explanation.

They both think they are correctly applying Occam's razor to the question of the creation of the universe.

Quote:

and most religious supporters (Christians especially) disagree wholeheartedly with the scientific perspective on how old the Universe is (it comes with the territory),
I disagree. I think you'll find that "The earth is 4000 years old" people are in the miniscule tiny minority of most religious people. The true converging of religious and scientific ideology is best expressed as "The process happened as it appears to, but guided by God's divine plan" I think very few people seriously believe the 7 days genesis creation story as anything other than a good allegory for the process that led to the evolution of humans. Creationism and Evolution are perfectly compatible unless you have an unnecessarily critical view of religion, or an unnecessarily cynical view of science.


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