Can Science + Religion Co-Exist?

[dreadfulpenny81]

The answer is YES.

A recent study from Rice University indicates that 15% of scientists at major research universities see science and religion in constant conflict.
They interviewed a scientifically selected sample of 275 participants, pulled from a survey of 2,198 tenured and tenure-track faculty in the natural and social sciences at 21 elite U

Comments

[stephantom]

They are only in conflict if people view their religious beliefs as decided issues, closed for debate. That kind of stubborn, dogmatic thinking, especially combined with literalism, is what makes people refuse to acknowledge what scientific research and philosophical thinking has led most of to believe about things like evolution or even whether something like homosexuality is acceptable.

If you move beyond that narrow conception of religion, then religious stuff just gets all hazy. And that's ok! What anybody really mean by "god" becomes an issue really fast in religious debates where people aren't taking the assumptions of religious traditions literally and as a given. Baruch Spinoza (18th century philosopher) claimed to believe in god, for example, yet he used the word like it was a synonym for "reality" or "nature" or "the universe." It's perfectly possible to be a materialist and a determinist yet still have a religious attitude toward existence and science.

Which means that these statistics probably tell us very little about what any of these scientists are really thinking.

In answer to your questions,
1) Sure. I guess that's a pragmatic way to think of it. But on the other hand, I think the same people that are adamantly refusing science now will probably not like it any better just because lots of scientists consider themselves religious. That just makes them heretics. (Because, again, science and dogmatically literal interpretations of some religious traditions ARE in conflict a lot of the time.)
2) No. Probably not for most of them.
3) Very little? I guess I hope it might make people reconsider some assumptions and maybe revisit some philosophical issues they've already come to conclusions on, but idk.

[stephantom]

I know I'm kind of just rambling on and on, but I wanted to elaborate on this thought just a little:

It's perfectly possible to be a materialist and a determinist yet still have a religious attitude toward existence and science.

By "religious attitude" I do not mean religious in the sense people mean when they say, "I brush my teeth (or whatever) religiously." I think that some other qualities of religious feeling, like reverence, a sense of awe, a curiosity about and maybe even longing for the unknown, transcendent experiences, the understanding of being a small part of something unfathomably big and mysterious... All that can (and should, I think) be a part of scientific study.

[dreadfulpenny81]

What about religious people who are skeptical of science because people use it as a talking point to try and tear-down their belief system -- can you understand why they'd be stubborn?

[stephantom]

I can... to a point. I have to admit I have some trouble sympathizing because I came from a very religious background myself (went to church every sunday; uncle was a priest; aunt was a nun; grandma sometimes read us the bible when we were "bad"; attended a religious high school and "got confirmed" etc.) and, while I did feel defensive of it for a while, I never wanted to deceive myself by not considering every possibility. And eventually (it wasn't a straight path -- in fact, it involved a few years of becoming very deeply religious, more than I'd been in childhood, albeit with some views that would be considered heretical by really traditional Catholics) I realized where I was going with all my questioning and philosophy-reading: atheism (or maybe belief in some incomprehensible and impersonal, mindless god).

Not everyone has to come to that conclusion, of course, but I don't understand why people wouldn't open themselves up to outside ideas. If their beliefs are sound, they'll survive the questioning. And if they're not, well, it's for the best if they don't survive it. Truth is important.

I could see how it might be even harder for people in a more marginalized, and simultaneously tight-knight group, than Catholicism, which is kind of a dying religion in my eyes. And the Catholic church has even officially accepted evolution, so there wasn't actually that much of a built-in skepticism of science with my upbringing. If there had been, I'm sure it all would have been harder.

[dreadfulpenny81]

Well I pointed out in another post that the Catholic faith recognized the Big Bang theory was in accord with their concept of creation. That was in 1951, and I don't think it's been renounced since then.