Science and Faith

[Vajradhara]

Salaam Moshin,

thank you for the post.

it's rather long, so i'm going to pick one bit to respond to.

Originally Posted by Mohsin

Mendel's principles of inheritance have turned out to be the most compelling proofs exposing the fallacy of the theory of evolution, the part associated with natural selection.

Having refuted the theory of evolution(especially the part where everything is a product of chance) with his discovery of the principles of inheritance, Mendel further believed that God had created the world, and that blind chance could not be responsible for the outcome.
(Dan Graves, Scientists of Faith, Kregel Resources, 1996, p. 143)

this is a strawman of the worst kind! no part of the Theory of Evolution says that it's by chance!!!! Natural Selection is not chance... and presumes the pre-existence of life.. and has absolutely nothing to say about how things came to be.. including the world.

who's this Dan Graves fellow? i'm going to have to investigate for this is sheer lunacy!

no wonder people think that the Theory of Evolution doesn't make sense

[Avinash]

Namaskar,

Originally Posted by I, Brian

I have to say, that I intensely dislike it when "science" is tied to any form of religious or spiritual belief - it always seems like a faith is trying desperately to gain validation via some objective process - which, ultimately, cannot validate it.

I also get irritated when science is tied to any form of religion or belief. Belief and religion are largely made up of dogma and superstition so they have no connection to reality, let alone to science.

To pick a more immediate example [] - "Tantra" has been referred to as a "practical science". But what does that actually mean?

I explained what it actually means earlier in the thread but more importantly Tantra is not a religion or a faith but a set of spiritual practices that can be found within (and even in part without) all kinds of spiritual traditions. Such a practice will always lead to real results and so it cannot be compared to the dogmas and the ritualism found in religions or beliefs. It is not an objective science where you take some measurements and draw conclusions about the objective world around you, its not such a limited type of science.

My perception is that religion and science are simply incompatible - they are effectively two separate languages of the human experience.

Your perception is correct, religions are indeed incompatible with the objective sciences. Tantra however is neither a religion nor an objective science.

[Mus Zibii]

This debate is a long one that tends to go in circles, but the other day I got a thought that broadly relates to it.

I look at politics as a guilty pleasure of mine and while watching one of the numerous news channels, heard about the Texas GOP presenting a manifesto of beliefs that included the opinion that America was, is and should always be recognized as a Christian nation. The pundits, of course, had it out and much was made of the argument that 'old' equals 'established'. Many quotes were brought up.

The thing that kept obscenely slapping me in the face was the lack of faith. Faith as defined by any dictionary is the belief of something without the slightest evidence to its existence. These people, and many others unrelated to this matter, though they raised religion as their masthead lacked faith.

When you find it necessary to disprove something that conflicts with your perception of God, you've forsaken faith of said God.

[Mohsin]

Originally Posted by Vajradhara

Salaam Moshin,

thank you for the post.

it's rather long, so i'm going to pick one bit to respond to.


this is a strawman of the worst kind! no part of the Theory of Evolution says that it's by chance!!!! Natural Selection is not chance... and presumes the pre-existence of life.. and has absolutely nothing to say about how things came to be.. including the world.

who's this Dan Graves fellow? i'm going to have to investigate for this is sheer lunacy!

no wonder people think that the Theory of Evolution doesn't make sense

Regards Vajradhara.

By the way, it h before s in Mohsin .

The point actually was that the mechanisms for evolution that were put forward have always been proven wrong, I mean there have always been flaws in them. Before genetics, there was something else. After genetics came mutation which also have got a lot of bugs in it, fails at many points.

About Dan Graves, I simply have got no idea. Found his name along with the reference. I think that if you are going to look something up, look at the book 'Scientists of Faith', also something which also came along the reference, you might find somthing there. By the way, I did not do the research, so do not start throwing any errrors that you may find at my face. I think you know what I am saying .

The part that I think is confusing is that how this theory has been taken. Different people, different views, different thoughts, different outcomes.

Regards,
Mohsin.

[Mohsin]

Originally Posted by Mus Zibii

The thing that kept obscenely slapping me in the face was the lack of faith. Faith as defined by any dictionary is the belief of something without the slightest evidence to its existence. These people, and many others unrelated to this matter, though they raised religion as their masthead lacked faith.

When you find it necessary to disprove something that conflicts with your perception of God, you've forsaken faith of said God.

Mus Zibii, I personally think that I can actually be a bit rational and have faith, both at the same time. It would be hard to explain it all here, but Islam allows us to think about logic and stuff, and well, according to a small debate or lecture of some sort by a person, Islam can be about evidence and having faith along side it or moreover in it. People often get afraid when being a bit rational when thinking about their beliefs. I do not. So, I am not challanging my faith(or forsaking it, whatever you may call it), because, when being rational and all, I think it increases in me, my faith gets stronger, and I thank Allah(The Almighty God) for that.
Lets not discuss this here as to not to deviate from the topic.

[Vajradhara]

Namaste Mohsin,

thank you for the post and my apologies for mistyping your name earlier.

Originally Posted by Mohsin

The point actually was that the mechanisms for evolution that were put forward have always been proven wrong, I mean there have always been flaws in them.

what on earth are you talking about?

the mechanism for evolution is Natural Selection... and it has never been proven wrong, at least thus far. of course, our technology is constantly improving and thus, we may discover another mechanism. at this time, however, Natual Selection is it.

here's the defintion of Natural Selection:

"If, during the long course of ages and under varying conditions of life, organic beings vary at all in the several parts of their organization, and I think this cannot be disputed; if there be, owing to the high geometric powers of increase of each species, at some age, season, or year, a severe struggle for life, and this certainly cannot be disputed; then, considering the infinite complexity of the relations of all organic beings to each other and to their conditions of existence, causing an infinite diversity in structure, constitution, and habits, to be advantageous to them, I think it would be a most extraordinary fact if no variation ever had occurred useful to each beings welfare, in the same way as so many variations have occured useful to man. But if variations useful to any organic being do occur, assuredly individuals thus characterized will have the best chance of being preserved in the struggle for life; and from the strong principle of inheritance they will will tend to produce offspring similarly characterized. This principle of preservation, I have called, for the sake of brevity, Natural Selection." [Origins, p 127 6th ed.]

Before genetics, there was something else. After genetics came mutation which also have got a lot of bugs in it, fails at many points.

are you talking about Descent with Modification? mutations were never the proposed method, see the quote from Darwin above.

About Dan Graves, I simply have got no idea. Found his name along with the reference. I think that if you are going to look something up, look at the book 'Scientists of Faith', also something which also came along the reference, you might find somthing there. By the way, I did not do the research, so do not start throwing any errrors that you may find at my face. I think you know what I am saying .

no worries... i'm not going to take you to task for someone elses understanding... that wouldn't be a very productive method of dialog, in my opinion.. however, i know that some folks do that and i appreciate the senstivity involved.

The part that I think is confusing is that how this theory has been taken. Different people, different views, different thoughts, different outcomes.

Regards,
Mohsin.

i absolutely, 100% agree with you. and this is due to poor understanding and lack of education on the subject, in my opinion. the other thing that makes this a bit difficult is that lay people and scientists use the same words, but they have different meanings when used by the two groups.

thus we see the confusion amongst lay people in the use of the scientific definitions of the words "facts" "theory" and so forth.

[arthra]

The Baha'i view is that there needs to be harmony between science and religion as well as balance:

"It (humanity) cannot fly with one wing alone. If it tries to fly with the wing of religion alone it will land in the quagmire of superstition, and if it tries to fly with the wing of science alone it will end in the despairing slough of materialism."

Religious people need to use a more scientific approach to religion...especially many dogmas to avoid fantacism:

"Weigh carefully in the balance of reason and science everything that is presented to you as religion. If it passes this test, then accept it, for it is truth! If, however, it does not so conform, then reject it, for it is ignorance."

and scientists need ethical and moral parameters offered by religion to temper the misuse of their inventions and discoveries....

- Art

[Vapour]

ah, firstly, there are two different linguistic issue here. Science means laboratory science, i.e. general concept in regard to process of empirical verification. Also, linguistically, science could mean " methodological activity, discipline, or study".
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=science

When someone says, Buddhism is a science, it could simply mean that it is a step by step path, if followed faithgully, allow one to attain enlightment. Of course, if someone wish to imply from the above statement that Buddhist cosmology such as reincarantion can be emprically verified fact, that is a false use of the term.

[Avinash]

Originally Posted by Vapour

ah, firstly, there are two different linguistic issue here. Science means laboratory science, i.e. general concept in regard to process of empirical verification. Also, linguistically, science could mean " methodological activity, discipline, or study".
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=science

Nice site, I like this one:

Science:
5. Art, skill, or expertness, regarded as the result of knowledge of laws and principles.

In which case laws and principles could also pertain to spiritual development.

[Vapour]

As of the theory of evolution, my understanding is this. Until the discovery of genetic, the theory was in lower level of scientific verification compared to say, Newtonian physics.

Newtonian law of physics such as the demonstration Galieo conduct using Pisa Tower (never mind that he was way before newton), can be *demonstrated* in controled environment again and again. On the other hand, many of the law of cosmology can be *observed* again and again, thought one can't do, for example, an explosion of start in a laboratory. Theory of evolution or theory of Big Ban, on the other hand can only be *deduced* from existing scientific laws. No one can observe another big bang or process of emergence of another species of mammal by fastening up 1 million year of procreation (though there is an experiment done on micro flies with very short life span to develope different trait which was very successful).

Having said all that, I don't think many would dispute the theory of big bang because underlying laws of physics as well as scientific data in regard to cosmology is rock solid. Similary, after the discovery of genetic code, biology can pretty much calculate, how long it had taken to change certain percentage of gene which will generate required trait given the natural rate of mutation and natural selection,

I don't think no one will nowaday disagree with theory that gene set species biological traits and this will inevitably change through the process of procreation (i.e. evolution). Now a day, because this pace of change in gene can easily be calculated, unless one claim that the existence of life in this planet is only 10000 years old (which goes against evidence supplied by physics), it is hard to say that evolution is a false theory.

But then, it is possible to *belive* that God created this universe only few 10000 years ago, but happen to do it (such as genes in species, carbon dating, radiation trait from big bang and so on) so that it looks like something else. But to do that, you have to come up with evidence that something like that happened.

[Mus Zibii]

Originally Posted by Mohsin

Mus Zibii, I personally think that I can actually be a bit rational and have faith, both at the same time.

Well, I suppose. Most people today seem to think so, but I've seen so much (for lack of a better word) insanity follow the apologetics it takes to reconcile the ancient with the modern.

[believer142]

several people say that science and faith are seperate. But darwinists require a great deal of faith in their beliefs as well. In my opinion, it is a far greater leap of faith to believe that nothing came from nothing then to believe that an intelligent designer exists. It is hard for me to comprhend why some evolutionists attribute all the order in the universe to an accidental cause. Many attempt to disprove Gods existence with evolution but evolution appears to be a "plan" by a being that transcends time and space. Namely- God
DNA is an extraordinary factor of the belief in God. Everything that exibits the passing of information has an intelligent designer(I.e. software). Using deductive reasoning i can only presume that DNA has an intelligent designer too.

[believer142]

several people say that science and faith are seperate. But darwinists require a great deal of faith in their beliefs as well. In my opinion, it is a far greater leap of faith to believe that nothing came from nothing then to believe that an intelligent designer exists. It is hard for me to comprhend why some evolutionists attribute all the order in the universe to an accidental cause. Many attempt to disprove Gods existence with evolution but evolution appears to be a "plan" by a being that transcends time and space. Namely- God

DNA is an extraordinary factor of the belief in God. Everything that exibits the passing of information has an intelligent designer(I.e. software). Using deductive reasoning i can only presume that DNA has an intelligent designer too.

Science does not prove everything. In fact, this statement is contradictory because it cannot be proven by science. Many things are known through introspection. For example, the fact that i know that i have free will is introspection.

To me, as little information as i have provided, it is sufficient enough to validate my belief in god. However, i dont rely on this rationale for my faith. I rely on my experiences and the feelings i cannot escape.

p.s Im sorry if i seem too factual about evolutionists. I have only written what i perceive to be true about their beliefs

[Nitai]

Hare Krishna

Where science stops to work, there spiritual explanations can jump in.
Although some may consider this to be what is called 'the God of a gap' the inability of the science to go above observation of matter is quite obvious. Many things science can explain very nicely e.g how things work. It is a mechanistic way at looking things. But beyond that there is a non-mechanistic explanation of existence. One good example for this is the knowledge about consciousness - the moving life force of our existence without which our mind, brain and body would not work at all.

The study of consciousness nowadays becomes very popular in the universities. Below I am giving to you an interesting essay that discusses whether consciousness is material or not. Have a fun.

It is taken from

http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:e5uUII4pD-QJ:www.metane…

and if you like more details go ahead, read it.

5. Life and Consciousness

We can all agree that consciousness is one of the most important characteristics of life.Nobody can deny its existence. It is the birthplace of noble human qualities such as forgiveness, humility, love, etc., and it is also the birthplace of sacrifice, tolerance and truthfulness. In fact, it is the birthplace of even the creative scientific theories being guided by the Supreme Spirit, God. According to Vedanta, consciousness is a fundamental quality of the ‘spiriton’. Thus it is purely spiritual and transcendental to matter. As explained earlier, matter is the inferior energy of the Supreme Lord. It is inferior because matter, however complex it may be, will never have conscious symptoms. On the other hand, the living entities are the superior energy of the Supreme Being. They are superior because they have consciousness.
The renowned physicist, Eugene Wigner also expressed, “There are two kinds of reality or existence; the existence of my consciousness and the reality or existence of everything else.”25 All living beings, microorganisms, birds, animals, etc., possess different degrees of consciousness. In other words, all these living beings are covered by different degrees of the three modes of material nature (see section 8). Microorganisms exhibit very little symptom of consciousness because of the very thick layers of covering of the material modes. However, they possess consciousness. The well-known biologist,
George Wald and others such as, Lynn Marguilis indicated that Protozoa,
single-celled animals and bacteria also possess consciousness. Since the last
few decades there is a growing interest to investigate consciousness among
quantum physicists, neuro-physiologists, cognitive philosophers and
spiritualists. William James, von Neumann, Eugene Wigner, Erwin SchrÎdinger, and David Bohm are some of the pioneers in the study of consciousness. One common feature among the leading quantumphysicists is that they all try to explain the collapse of the wave function through some interaction of the mind or consciousness. However, there is very little evidence that such acollapse of the wave function really occurs. In the author’s opinion, quantum mechanics, with its limitations in mathematical language, can, at best, indicate the presence of consciousness but can neither prove it nor describe it. Max Planck remarked, “It is a fact that there is a point, one single point in the immeasurable expanse of mind and matter, where science and therefore every causal method of research is inapplicable, not only on practical grounds, but also on logical grounds, and will always remain inapplicable. This is the point of [our] individual awareness.” There are many different views among scholars regarding consciousness and a deeper study is necessary. According to Vedanta, consciousness is not a function of the brain. As said earlier, the brain in developed living beings is an important organ of the body machinery in which the symptom of consciousness is transmitted. The conscious energy is transmitted from the spiritual soul, ‘spiriton’. Thus consciousness is purely spiritual. It is the living energy and the fundamental quality of life particle, ‘spiriton’.
Just like a computer, however sophisticated it may be, will never be conscious. The program has to be supplied by an intelligent programmer. The computer is simply relaying the circumstantial choice fed into the program by the programmer, the human soul. It will be a good research field to study how the conscious energy is transmitted from the spiritual soul, ‘spiriton’ to the
brain. Niels Bohr, who made profound contributions to our understanding of
atomic structure and quantum mechanics expressed, “We can admittedly find
nothing in physics or chemistry that has even a remote bearing on consciousness.
Yet all of us know that there is such a thing as consciousness, simply because we have it ourselves. Hence consciousness must be part of nature, or more generally, of reality, which means that, quite apart from the laws of physics and chemistry, as laid down in quantum theory, we must also consider laws of quite a different nature.”26 Furthermore, Vedanta describes matter as the field of activity and by its nature, matter is inert and has no consciousness. But there is interaction between the individual particle of consciousness and matter through universal consciousness. Moreover, the natural events that are taking place in the material world are maps of the events occurring in the spiritual plane (consciousness). About four centuries ago, the famous French philosopher Rene Descartes concluded that he knew one thing for certain: “I think, therefore I am.”27From the Vedantic point of view, the expression, ‘I am’ is the conscious experience and inherent transcendental property of the self. Thousands of years before Descartes, the sages of the Vedic tradition realized the principle even a step further, aham brahmäsmi, meaning, I am Brahman, I am spirit, conscious self. This is consciousness for which the Sanskrit word is cetanä. The act of thinking by a human being is the symptom of consciousness and it belongs to life. False consciousness is exhibited under the impression that ‘I am a product of material nature’. Thus modern biologists and biochemists should include the
study of consciousness in their research works. The field should not be left
mainly to the neuroscientists, quantum physicists, psychologists and philosophers only.

[dayaa]

hello all
well i was going to try to post here but i think mohsin said what i was going to try to say but 20 times better anyway, i'll still have a go.
i'm no expert.....i find religion confusing....but i don't find faith confusing at all....all i need to do is remember a science for the people type programme i saw once on tv...it explained the balance mechanism in the middle ear....that said it all to me ....something i had never even thought about, taken completely for granted.....yet it is so amazingly and obviously (to my mind) engineered.
isn't the origin of the word science = knowledge? i do think that the general understood meaning of science these days is something that can be proven by experiments and so on like chemistry and genetics and i think it is preferable to stick to that meaning otherwise it can be misleading. personally i find that science greatly enhances my faith....i could almost say it is the cause of it....and it is certainly what keeps me sane amidst confusing and conflicting arguments between religions as i try to find where i belong. i wouldn't really class myself as a very "spiritual" person actually....i'm pretty down to earth....and questions of truth and reality concern me. at least i have found one absolute truth.....God exists....and it was science that provided that for me.....religion seems to be some sort of communal expression of that same feeling.....i just wish they wouldn't claim absolute truth and exclusivity. i just remembered something else....DNA....the first time i saw DNA on tv my reaction was: woooooooooow....God's machine code!