is science a religion?

where you have faith that the universe exists?

I'll give you my facts when you pry them from my cold dead brain.

is dog a cat?
is bowl a fruit?

is any unexamined world-view like a religion? i'm sure there are some dogmatic materialists at least.

it seems like some people foten want to say science is something you have INSTEAD of a religion. are they wholesome?

Pretty sure science is science.

but is it religion?

a well-balanced breakfast requires servings from several fool groups

Sorry. A serious response: I think it can be a system of assumptions and beliefs, a culture, but one that is distinct from religion. Obviously this depends on how one defines religion, but I'd argue political affiliation is more similar to religion than science is.

Religion even in the classic sense of authority and means of societal organization seems distinct from science to me.

I think a better way to think about this is of society as moving from a vertical organization with religion at the top to a horizontal one--so in that sense yeah maybe each social system acts as a religion in the manner of having to account for its own authority.

but is it religion?

no

religion always seems like war to me

Brining in all back home: I think I am going to think of my personal relgion as science. I mean I have to rely on scientists to tell me about the universe rhight? I put my trust in them. they better not screw me

i apologize for being flip earlier, but i don't think there's much to say about this. science isn't a religion and it isn't much like religion. some people put too much faith in what they think science tells them, but some people will always put to much faith in whatever they happen to have at hand. dogmatic, aggressively anti-theist materialism seems unjustifiable, and that may be what you're getting at, but i wouldn't call it a religion.

I was browsing a philosophy book at the bookstore the other day and came across an interesting bit that said one could define modernity as the process of philosophical questions becoming scientific questions--not in the sense that we might "run out" of philosophical questions but that that's how can understand the modern point of view--as that transition itself. I think this could be mapped into religion/science to some extent.

This science is a belief system bullshit seems to be the latest tack by the flat earthers, crazies, creationists and the like.Sure there is room for the leap of faith in science but once you've made the leap you you have to bridge back with reason and empiricism.

i was going to say that the defining characteristic of science could be "doubt" in the same way that the defining characteristic of religion could be "faith".

but i'm not a flat earther, crazy i may be, and i think that altho the practice of science has nothing to do with religion its place in the worldview of many people may be fairly indistinguishable from the place that used to be held by one religion or another or general vague magical thinking

I need my savior - Carl SAgan

science is self-correcting, and encourages skepticism and proving itself wrong so that it can improve.

religion is a really broad thing, and i'm sure someone would chime in and say that religion X actively promotes criticism and skepticism, but i associate religion with really dogmatic thinking that punishes aberrations.

can't anythign be called a religion if you really want it too? even baseball?

not in any meaningful sense of "religion", but it's okay to call things by funny names if it passes the time

then what is taosim

i think taoism and buddhism have religious manifestations and philosophical ones

Taoism is the philosophy of Lao Zi that advocates a simple honest life and noninterference with the course of natural events

like reading the Tao te Ching doesn't equal a religion but those taoist monks claiming to have the elixir of life and stuff probly had a wacky cult thing going on

but ny non-interfereing you are interfering!

this is a zero-sum game

even if you decide not to make a decision still you habe made a decion! you cannot lick a qubit without measuring it!

http://1morecastle.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/qbert_regex_16.png

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http://1morecastle.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/qbert_regex_16.png is categorized as Games.

is a firewall a religion?

it does the "mindless authority" bit

The Great Firewall in the Sky.

is religion no more than a red herring in the fast flowing waters of the stream of consciousness????

I mean I have to rely on scientists to tell me about the universe rhight? I put my trust in them. they better not screw me

For real though one of the distinctions is that science says no, you can learn this stuff and see yourself, or you can send on a scientist that you trust, and the science will talk to them as well.

if you believe science can or will explain Everything then that is a species of faith

which religious traditions/ways of thought are like science?
is talmudic inquiry more like science or just lawyering?

you mean scientists let you in to the Holy of HOlies?

It's hard for me to understand how science isn't a belief system. I realize that term may carry some negative connotations, but in the simplest meaning isn't a belief system a set of ideas about how to best describe the world, and isn't that what science basically is?

curious question - where are you from?

have no read thread through but p sure it's a widely held belief in academia that "science" is relative to historic/social/etc. values/paradigms/ideology etc. etc.

the religion metaphor prob works best with scientism

I was watching an episode of Horizon recently, it was about multi-verses and the whole ideo that there are parallel worlds based on quantum physics.

There was one guy, a scientist, who came across as being rather arrogant with believing there are infinite universes and saying how this is now an official science and how its a dominant part of science, and how they've proved Einstein wrong etc.

Guy was probably just a hippy (because imo parallel universe theory reeks of mushrooom trips) but something just made me think 'this guy sees his science as a religion'

in the simplest meaning isn't a belief system a set of ideas about how to best describe the world, and isn't that what science basically is?

science is a well-defined method for arriving at a description of the universe, but I think most scientists would not claim that it is the 'best' description, which logically requires that all other descriptions must be 'worse'. those scientists who do make such a claim are generally viewed by their peers as having stepped outside their role as 'scientist' and are engaged in a pointless controversy.

take your pick, is religion a shitty way of describing the world, or not a way of describing the world at all

If "best" means "most probable explanation of reality over alternate ones" I'd say scientists or anyone wouldn't have any reason not call science the best set of ideas to describe the world (or universe).

xpost

If "best" means "most probable..."

What are the odds of that?

It's also kind of obvious to say a book written 2 thousand years ago is less relevant to our lives than something written nowadays. It's so obvious it's not interesting.

Those ancient books are there, and you can read them trying to glean insights into what life must have been like 2 thousand years ago for the wandering community of mystics and desert-dwelling nomads that wrote it, or you can tick a big old X bc it doesn't contain the word gravity in it.

Fwiw science isn't just something one day we decided to start doing, it evolved from trial and error, often the worst possible trials, over hundreds and hundreds of years. Not sure religion or science are easily identifiable apart from a larger society or the philosophical evolution of thought. Both are kind of baked into longstanding tendencies of governing, law, divination, architecture, etc.

science is based on empiricism, religion is based on faith. scientific ideas can be tested. in fact they MUST be testable. science is objective. religion is largely subjective.

but yeah, there's some overlap. the idea of superintelligent AI leading to utopia, for example, is often referred to as "the rapture for nerds".

It's hard for me to understand how science isn't a belief system. I realize that term may carry some negative connotations, but in the simplest meaning isn't a belief system a set of ideas about how to best describe the world, and isn't that what science basically is?

― viborg, Tuesday, September 15, 2015 11:06 AM (8 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it's pretty simple, dudereeno

scientists look to falsify hypotheses. if a hypothesis' reproducibility is high and it jibes well with other highly reproducible hypotheses, then you have a winner. the tricky thing is that science is not a set of unquestionable rules. what was true (highly reproducible) yesterday may be false today because scientists are always observing cool things aroud the world like jimmy neutron

in fact, scientists love for you to challenge their ideas, because they love dialogue and debating them. each scientist has her own pet theory, too, because there are a lot of things science cannot explain yet

also, the role of science according to many scientists is sometimes not even to explain certain things like whether god exists. scientists leave that to philosophers to play with. scientists are just regular people, so some are bad at their job, some are okay, others are great. some are dogmatic, some are agnostic, but mostly, they are sceptics. scepticism is a major characteristic of most scientists, along with curiosity and questioning everything, including authority!

so, onto belief system

scientists know it's pretty hard for everyone to qualify their opinion with first-hand proven results. what i mean is, mister seamus mcsmarty pants may tease you and say, 'dude, do you even have proof that there is no gravity on the moon?' naturally, no, you don't, because first of all, there is gravity on the moon. but you haven't run the tests (the scientific method) to prove that there is only about 17 percent of Earth's gravity on the moon.

you leave that up to scientists to tell you.

so, seamus may say, 'well, well, well, so you're just believing what some guy said'. and yes, this is true. doing science is based on trust. we trust scientists to report only what they observe and publish their findings, so others can interpret it and try to reproduce it. reproducing is double-checking other scientists' work. it's not a lie detector, but it looks into all the details of another scientists' findings, in case they missed something or got something wrong. it's part of being a sceptic!

so in practise, scientists understand they cannot analyse every single idea, because everyone is busy with their own thing, and so they rely on other specialists to tell them what is highly reproducible in their own field.

so while it is true that seamus can accuse you of only listening to authorities without questioning them, this is only done in practise because it is practical. but whoever wants to may question scientists any time they like, without yielding to their authority, and they would love to debate and be challenged and break apart their arguments.

religion's role is very different. it helps you overcome philosophical and psychological troubles in your life. religion does not stop you from doing science, and science does not stop you from practising your favourite religion. dogmatic religions or attitudes toward religion have hard and fast rules. but as you gain more experience living on this little planet we call earth, you'll know there are very few hard and fast rules. there are many types of religions, sometimes called denominations, because there are many different ideas on how to make living on earth better. you'll encounter individuals and/or groups of people that are mean, envious, foul-mouthed, sneaky, liars, and much more. you are free to choose a religion, who to hang out with, what you like or don't like, and anything else that fits into your worldview, but always strive to be fair, respectful, and kind, because those are qualities not of religion or science, but of human beings.

If "best" means "most probable..."

What are the odds of that?

― Aimless, Tuesday, September 15, 2015 1:58 PM (52 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

All I'm saying is that using methodologically gathered data to draw conclusions from them (science) rather than speculation (other) makes it the most probable explanation by default.

Given a certain set of assumptions. (Says the hardcore atheist.)

this is a very silly question

Yeah, I think the issue gets into scientism or hardcore ultra-rationalism or the whatever you wanna call it. That manifestation of dogmatism or militancy or zealotry that can come off of certain hyper atheistic or pop-sci types that _only_ science matters(which as guys like Curtis White have pointed out, usually comes down to physics), so stuff like philosophy, history, sociology et al is useless, has no value or wisdom in studying, and can just frankly sod off.

In other words, it can become a pissing match between competing forms of dogmatism and tribal identity/belief system, and wind up as reducing down to nothing but a power grab for Authority

^

idk, "useless" is a bit of a strawman word there. those things are nice hobbies and have lots of ancillary benefits I'm sure

the tricky thing is that science is not a set of unquestionable rules

But neither is religion. We don't stone people in public anymore. Heck, the whole New Testament was Jesus throwing the rulebook out the window.

I think uncritical science boosterism and fetishization is actually bad for science in the long run

there more subtle questions about the broad function of science, the kinds of things that are deemed worthy of scientific research, e.g. so science is about testing hypotheses, but what's yr basis for choosing this hypothesis, for going down this line of inquiry, how are the decisions made about which proven hypotheses are the important ones that require further research, etc etc. the scientific method has its correctives but they're not always as immediate and useful as those coming from other disciplines, e.g. how numerous fields had complicated the understanding of sex distinctions before the mainstream of scientific research started paying heed to the evidence that would allow it to do the same. the militant atheist / hardcore rationalist types aren't the only ones who overstep the boundaries of the legitimate application of scientific principles, it's a tempting commonsensical position to take on a lot of things.

xp

i dunno, it's just armchair fan bullshit, it doesn't change much, like religion afficionados who still sin like crazy on the q.t.

I think whether or not it's a "belief system" is sort of a micro vs macro question. The use of the scientific method to determine the correctness of a hypothesis is not a "belief system," but I think it is possible for a person to have a science-based "belief system," e.g. believing that scientifically ascertainable truths are the only or most important truths, or that one's life decisions should be made as much based on scientifically verifiable conclusions as much as possible.

People who react strongly against this argument seem to think "belief system" is equivalent to "dogma." Ironically, by doing so you are just affirming that you have a science-based belief system.

I mean there is no necessary, overarching truth to the fact that living as much by science as possible is the objectively best way to live, because it's not possible to verify a best way to live.

But neither is religion. We don't stone people in public anymore.

Only for certain values of "we."

sensible carbon policies: verifiably better
vaccinate my kids: verifiably better
is red wine good or bad for me: ????

dmac otm

I don't understand why people don't ask equally silly questions, like "is mathematics a religion" or "is critical theory a religion". only science gets tarred with this stupid brush.

ah tbf ppl ask lots of silly questions all the time.

it's maybe just that when those silly questions posit science vs religion its an opportunity to go for the cheap wisdom look, which tbf is a good look, I may well be going for it right now idk

One thread down is called Homemade Jokes for you haters of silly questions.

xpost

it's because the prestige of science is so much higher than critical theory. that makes it a greater threat. whereas pure mathematics, by its nature does not come into conflict with religion, because religion makes no particular claims about pure mathematics.

loaves, fishes tbf

^applied mathematics

https://ericgerlachdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/pythagoras.gif

beat me to it