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I don't believe they are. They both seek to find answers to the mysteries of nature and the universe, but they go about it in completely different ways, and come to vastly different conclusions.

It is interesting that religious people really, really want to be taken seriously by the scientific community, and want science and religion to be compatible, but scientists don't care what religious people think of them. Scientists tend to be the ones claiming science and religion are incompatible, while the claim that science and religion are compatible tends to come from religious people.

Are religion and science compatible? And why does religion want so badly to be accepted by the scientific community while scientists tend to ignore religion?

I like this quote from Sean Carroll, a physicist at CalTech:

It’s not hard to imagine an alternative universe in which science and religion were compatible — one in which religious claims about the functioning of the world were regularly verified by scientific practice. We can easily conceive of a world in which the best scientific techniques of evidence-gathering and hypothesis-testing left us with an understanding of the workings of Nature which included the existence of God and/or other supernatural phenomena. It’s just not the world we live in.

Are these things compatible?

1. The pursuit of explanations of unknown phenomena based on reasoned interpretation of rational evidence. The scientist states he does not know if there is no explanation.

2. The pursuit of explanations of unknown phenomena by stating God did it. The religionist states that if there is no explanation, there is an explanation.

One is using the mind to think, the other to think of how not to think.

They are only compatible to the extent that religious people alter their religious beliefs to coincide with scientific findings. In other words, any compatibility found is due to religion having changed because of scientific findings. Science doesn't budge from its positions due to the influence of religion. Only empirical data, repeatable testing, and predictability can do that.

When people claim that science and religion are compatible, what they're really saying is that they've changed their religion to vibe with science. I think they're also revealing that for the things science doesn't explain, they fall back on the god hypothesis.

So, I guess I would say that fundamentalist religion and science are incompatible. Or more specifically, certain religious views are incompatible with science.

DarkHelmet wrote:I don't believe they are. They both seek to find answers to the mysteries of nature and the universe, but they go about it in completely different ways, and come to vastly different conclusions.

I do think the process of science is meant to understand, explain, interpret the world to the extent we are capable of perceiving it. And in doing so that knowledge which results often has practicable useful applications. It often enables control of the environment, to make prediction which will bear out with some reliability. The scientific method is not meant to rely upon or appeal to the emotions. The method seeks to be objective, deal with factual information in an effort to reach consensus appreciation of the environment.

Religion on the other hand I don't think is about seeking knowledge of the universe. It is meant to appeal to emotions of people, which can be used for comfort purposes, can be used to manipulate and control, can be used to form cohesive groups. A problem with it is that it discourages the use of critical thinking, by its promotion of faith as a superior quality to skeptical thinking and that faith should be employed when no or even evidence which might suggest otherwise, faith should be used. This is much more likely to lead to incorrect unreliable conclusions than using a rational scientific method of reasoning which discourages faith, bias, a closedminded attitude to new information.

So religion may serve a useful purpose, and it may have good teachings, may have good leadership and may offer as a result more benefits then negatives to an individual, to a society, to the world.

However it may also be a detriment to the individual, have poor leadership which cause more harm overall than good and be a detriment to society,to the world.

I think where we are at historically is that religious groups have been allowed perhaps favorable taxation has been one reason, but they have been allowed to become too powerful financially. And finances provde power. Finances can be used to promote an agenda to serve a self interest..not the best interests of others outside the group or those in opposition to the interests of that religious group. In some sense we are fortunate there are many religious groups which oppose one another, because that helps to control and keep any one of them in particular having too much control.

It is interesting that religious people really, really want to be taken seriously by the scientific community, and want science and religion to be compatible, but scientists don't care what religious people think of them.

Science has provided results which are observable and practicable and has a reputation of offering reliable explanations. People with a religious agenda who recognize this often seek to piggy-back that agenda onto science. So I.D. proponents seek to turn their theory into being a scientific one. Often religious apologists will argue how religion and science are both means of obtaining knowledge just different methods employes. I think it is quite a stretch to suggest ...that using assertions absent evidence...is a method of seeking knowledge, which is the extent of knowledge seeking that religion doesn.

Scientists tend to be the ones claiming science and religion are incompatible, while the claim that science and religion are compatible tends to come from religious people.

People who argue for religion wish to piggy back onto science, because of the reputation science has developed. Science truly does use a rational method of seeking knowledge..religion does not have a method of seeking knowledge. They can exist together in that as long as religion does not make claims which is in opposition to science. Science addresses the natural world, it says nothing about the supernatural. So if religion makes claims about the supernatural which does not interfere with science, science has nothing to say about it. A person can believe in the existence of a particular God and still use the scientific method in reasoning in other areas of life.

Are religion and science compatible? And why does religion want so badly to be accepted by the scientific community while scientists tend to ignore religion?

The religious method of seeking knowledge if one can even suggest it does that, is to rely upon assertions and faith in the absence of evidence and contrary to evidence, as well as good reasoning. It is the antithesis of good critical thinking whereas the scientific method is what good critical thinking is about. But religion appeals to emotions, and science does not.

Dark Helmut, your comment seems to center upon the proposal that both science and religion are trying to discover the mystries of nature and the universe. The catagory religion has a fairly wide variety of social practices in it. My perception is very little of that activity is trying to discover the mystries of nature. My own view may be a bit more extreme than some. I do not see religion as involeved in such a search at all. I do not think of religion as having any information about such mysteries or clues about them.

I respect science for doing science and religion for doing religion. Provided the doing of religion helps the participants to live well.

I don't see why not. Religious views and science are compatible in the same way that science and poetry can be compatible.

marg wrote:The religious method of seeking knowledge if one can even suggest it does that, is to rely upon assertions and faith in the absence of evidence and contrary to evidence, as well as good reasoning. It is the antithesis of good critical thinking whereas the scientific method is what good critical thinking is about. But religion appeals to emotions, and science does not.

I'm not so sure there is such a wide divide - in my view, both "religion" and "science" involve truth, and the search for it.

There is at least written evidence (including hostile witness evidence) that there was a person named Jesus, for instance, and that this person is claimed to have said and done certain things.

I'd think good critical thinking would involve an effort to determine if those claims are true, regardless of the emotions involved.

EAllusion wrote:I don't see why not. Religious views and science are compatible in the same way that science and poetry can be compatible.

Well, sure, if by compatible, you mean, "can co-exist by mentally compartmentalizing where the two conflict."

Of course, I don't think poetry tries to assert truths in the same manner religion does (unless you're a poetry fundamentalist, or take a literalist view of poetry, but that sort of ignores intended metaphor and simile).

It occurs to me that the problem in the question is with the word "compatible." Some clarification from DH might help.

I think poetry occasionally tries to assert truths about how the world is that are scientifically incorrect. Heck, some religious poetry does just that.

The term "religion" is very expansive and covers a wide variety of things. Religion and science are compatible, like poetry, to the extent that they don't claim things about the world that are in conflict.

huckelberry wrote:Dark Helmut, your comment seems to center upon the proposal that both science and religion are trying to discover the mystries of nature and the universe. The catagory religion has a fairly wide variety of social practices in it. My perception is very little of that activity is trying to discover the mystries of nature. My own view may be a bit more extreme than some. I do not see religion as involeved in such a search at all. I do not think of religion as having any information about such mysteries or clues about them.

I respect science for doing science and religion for doing religion. Provided the doing of religion helps the participants to live well.

Sure, religion and science don't always compete in the same fields. By ""compatible" I mean do science and religion fit together and support one another. If they were compatible, human remains in the earth would not be older than about 6000 years. We would not have dinosaur fossils. Some people think they are compatible. I've heard many religious people say that science actually supports their religion and has increased their faith. It would be nice if religion did religion, and science did science, but unfortunately religion tries too often to do science, and science sometimes tries to play god. The Intelligent Design movement is a great example of religion trying to do science.