Most of you will be aware of Pascal's Wager, and indeed, of those of you who aren't aware of it by name, most of you will likely have heard it without knowing what it's called
( Read more... )
Well, if you didn't like your religion best, I would wonder what in the world was going on with you!
Atheism in and of itself doesn't contain any assumptions, any teachings, any ideas or positions except for one isolated stance on one isolated topic: "My position is that gods are not real." This single statement falls somewhat shy of being a religion, as much as many of the world's more strident opponents of atheism would like you to believe otherwise. Indeed, even a scientific worldview is not innately atheistic per se; it's just that, without supernatural dogma atanding in the way, atheists tend to have less reason to be resistant to science than many of their theistic peers and thus more likely to embrace its findings.
I know that no scientist and nobody who really takes a scientific view of the world in any kind of informed way would ever claim to have all of the answers; the whole point of science it to try to think up all of the questions, and then spending the rest of your life either finding the answers or else laying down the groundwork that might allow future generations of scientists to do so. And then asking the new questions which those answers suggest.
The thing is, the whole approach of science is to tear down and discard old ideas that don't hold up under the light of constant, ruthless scrutiny. Scientists do this to one another's ideas constantly; it's called peer review. The idea is that that last idea that cannot be torn down, that no fault or flaw can be found with, must for the moment be considered the truth. Until such a moment as some fault is found with it. A lot of religious people get freaked out by this, and consider science the enemy, because science seeks to tear down all of the old religious ideas. They don't get that they're being treated by scientists the same way scientists treat anything else; its not animosity per se. It's just what science does.
They are unrelated concepts, science and atheism. They just happen to find a common audience since they appeal to similar people for similar reasons.
Atheism in and of itself doesn't contain any assumptions, any teachings, any ideas or positions except for one isolated stance on one isolated topic: "My position is that gods are not real." This single statement falls somewhat shy of being a religion, as much as many of the world's more strident opponents of atheism would like you to believe otherwise. Indeed, even a scientific worldview is not innately atheistic per se; it's just that, without supernatural dogma atanding in the way, atheists tend to have less reason to be resistant to science than many of their theistic peers and thus more likely to embrace its findings.
I know that no scientist and nobody who really takes a scientific view of the world in any kind of informed way would ever claim to have all of the answers; the whole point of science it to try to think up all of the questions, and then spending the rest of your life either finding the answers or else laying down the groundwork that might allow future generations of scientists to do so. And then asking the new questions which those answers suggest.
The thing is, the whole approach of science is to tear down and discard old ideas that don't hold up under the light of constant, ruthless scrutiny. Scientists do this to one another's ideas constantly; it's called peer review. The idea is that that last idea that cannot be torn down, that no fault or flaw can be found with, must for the moment be considered the truth. Until such a moment as some fault is found with it. A lot of religious people get freaked out by this, and consider science the enemy, because science seeks to tear down all of the old religious ideas. They don't get that they're being treated by scientists the same way scientists treat anything else; its not animosity per se. It's just what science does.
They are unrelated concepts, science and atheism. They just happen to find a common audience since they appeal to similar people for similar reasons.
Reply
Leave a comment