Science: Do we believe or do we accept?
 

I said 'no' but did not expound on that subject in the "Would you date someone who didn't believe in God" thread. I will expound on it here.

Belief is not the word I would use in regard to science. Saying "I believe in science" would be like say "I believe in chemistry" or "I believe in mathematics" or "I believe in history". What would it mean to say that? I accept that on any given subject X, where X is some feature of the natural world we might find interesting, science is going to provide us the best, most reliable suite of tools to understanding that phenomena. That does not mean the process will work perfectly nor does it mean that it will work in every single case, there may be features of the world we might *wish* to explain but which are beyond are ability to grok.

If I have a 'belief' that is connected to science it is in the, overall, regularity of the Universe. By that I mean that for the most part, certainly at the macro level, the Universe is going to behave in a more or less predictable fashion. For instance, on Earth the Sun is *always* going to come up in the East and *always* going to set in the West. It is going to behave that way because the Earth is turning on its axis. There will be no days where the Sun rises in the West the first three days of the week, sets in the North two of those days, rises in the South at some random interval and sets in the East once every random 100 days. That might seem a trivial example so let me give a deeper one. I believe that the universe is *so* regular that Hydrogen always has an atomic weight of 1. It will *always* have one proton and one electron and no neutrons. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is definitional that any object with one proton and one electron is a Hydrogen atom.

Even before we had either the physics or the chemistry to even conceive things like electrons, protons or any other part of the atomic model it was true that there was an element called Hydrogen and that this element always has one proton and one electron. That's what I mean by regularity.

Now, is that a belief? From a strict philosophical standpoint it is. I have absolutely NO proof that the Sun will set in the West this evening and rise in the East in the morning. I do, however, have rather good reason based upon past experience and evidence that this is going to happen. Science is simply the suite of tools we use to explain those features of the Universe that we have some desire or need to explain. But I don't believe in science anymore than I believe in any given tool in my toolkit or in my Magic Trackpad or keyboard.

The other reason I think that belief isn't accurate when applied to science is that science routinely requires us to accept things we would just as soon not be true. The Sun is going to burn out sometime in the next 5 billion years. All stars die. The Sun is a star. We have observed other stars, very much like our Sun, in various stages of life so we have a pretty good idea of what is going to happen. I don't *want* that to happen but I have to accept that given the evidence currently in hand the smart money gets laid on it happening. Another example is that species go extinct. Again, I would just as soon that not happen because we are just another species and so the smart money is that, at some point, we will go the way of the dodo, the dinosaur and, interestingly, every OTHER hominid that has ever walked the Earth (we are the only surviving member of the hominid clade). I accept that but it is not what I would prefer.

The scientific method works for a specific but broad class of problems and it has *some* utility as a general problem solving strategy within a slightly larger domain of problems but it is not a set of beliefs. If you accept that the world is a pretty regular place--and the fact that you did not wake up on the Moon, or fall *through* (not out but through) your bed, or that you did not see a tree walking around is pretty strong evidence that the world operates in a more or less regular fashion--then it follows that one might have some questions about how that regularity manifests itself. Science is going to provide the suite of tools with the best chance of answering those questions. But I wouldn't say that is a belief.

Cheers
Aj

Somewhere on UTube in the last couple of days I ran across all the contestants from the recent Miss USA pagent answering a question. The question was 'Do you think evolution should be taught in public schools?' Some of them said no, some said maybe, and some said yes. That's right, some of them said evolution should not be taught. Another one said evolution should be taught only in college and the students could decide which one to believe. Some said they believed God created them and evolution was just wrong. None of them thought evolution should be taught without also teaching the creation story in the Bible.

Aj.........don't go find it cuz you will break your computer.....I nearly broke mine.

The thing that struck me, was this idea of belief. Almost every single one of them used the idea that science is a belief. Evolution is a theory and not fact. None of them seemed to understand the difference between belief and fact. None of them understood what a scientific theory is and what it means.

I'm not sure where I am going with this, except it is what came to my mind when citybutch asked you if you believe in science.

I don't have a long answer just my thoughts about this today. I accept science because it's factual. No gray areas or fairy dust just the facts.

Too late! My honey, in her never-ending quest to find things that break my brain, played it last night while I was brushing the dog.

Like you, I was struck that not a single one of them seemed to grasp what a scientist means when we use the word theory (it is not 'guess') nor did any of them, as you said, seem to draw a distinction between a belief and a fact. These are non-trivial distinctions. One might, if they wish, hold the belief that Earth is flat, rests on the back of four elephants who, in turn, stand upon the back of a gigantic star turtle named A'tuin. One might hold that belief but that doesn't make it a fact.

I think a useful working definition of a fact is this: a statement about the world that is such that the world is obliged to actually be that way. To give a couple of examples: Barack Obama is the 44th President of the United States. Earth orbits a yellow, main sequence star named Sol. F=ma*. For these things to be facts, we should be able to query the world and ask if there is such a thing as the United States and if so, what is the name of the head of state and/or head of government. We should then be able to determine how many people have held that position before the current one, do the math, determine the name of the current person holding the office and by that method decide if the world is, in fact, in agreement with our statement. The same applies to the other two statements.

Now, I might have a *belief* that Hillary Clinton is the 43rd President of the United States but that does not make my belief factual, it just makes it a belief. Nothing will ever make my belief factual because we've already had a 43rd President and much to our regret as a nation, it was Bush the Younger. These women seem to confuse belief (i.e. how they might wish the world to be) with fact (how the world actually is).

In the physical sciences there's a phrase "your theory is not in agreement with observation (or experiment)". That means that no matter how beautiful it might be, no matter how much you love it, your theory is wrong. It simply doesn't matter what one believes about one's theory, if it is not in agreement with observation or experiment then it's wrong. If there is no way to articulate how the theory might be shown to be wrong, then it is not even wrong. It's definitely not science.

What struck me was how utterly unconcerned these young women were with the truth. I did not hear any of them say that, ultimately, if evolution is true it is true and it should be taught because it was true. Instead, their beliefs (what they wanted to be true) trumped how the Universe might actually work.

A long time ago, I read a phrase that really stuck with me over the years. It was, I believe, Sagan (or it might have been Dawkins) talking about the work of a scientist. The first task was to 'be humble before the data'. What that means is that even if the data leads you someplace where you discover something you would much prefer were not true, one must be humble before the data, admit that Nature always bats last and conform yourself to what the data dictates.


Cheers
Aj

Aj,
I laughed joyously when I saw you use the word "grok." I loved the book "Stranger in a Strange Land", and have freaked out many a friend when (discussing preferences for a post-life commemoration/celebration) I say "Barbeque me and have a party" (most of my family do not like soup, LOL)

But I digress. I share similar "ideology" with you about science. I see the regularity (and the beauty) of the universe and know that though we do not know all the answers today, we certainly know more today than we did yesterday. I surmise that we will know more tomorrow. To this I add the belief that scientists are just as willing to manipulate us as are preachers.

My Thanksgiving when I was 10 years old was affected by the announcement just prior to the holiday that cranberries contained carginogens and should be removed from the holiday menu (we ate it anyway.) Today cranberries are touted as a healthy choice and a product that supports kidney/bladder function. Science flip flopped you might say. OR, as I believe, they jumped the gun before having all the evidence at hand. OR scientist A found one thing and scientist B found another. OR (as it is entirely possible), business wanted to increase cranberry sales, so they quashed the carcinogenic aspect of the fruit.

I treat science with the same level of suspended belief with which I treat religion. Prove it to me baby.
Smooches,
Keri

Well, rats!

How about a star whale?

No, eh?
I guess no blue police boxes either, eh? :overreaction:
Seriously, however..

I think this comes from a limited exposure to more than a Biblical background. I'd be curious how many of those women were home schooled and only shown one possible method of understanding and comprehending. And not just education but also in home culture.

My uncles went to Catholic parochial boarding school as kids and public high school. All of them are atheists but have a deep understanding of the Catholic church and the various Catholic rights. They have, however, a keen desire of curiousity to learn beyond the boundaries they started with in grade school. My aunts also fall into that category.

As a result, I grew up in an environment where curiousity and questioning everything was encouraged. I cannot personally imagine not being such an environment but it makes me wonder if the opposite of my environment is what those women experienced? If curiousity is discouraged and downplayed, then accepting things at face value would be the result, I would think.

It leads me to believe that this is truly the "Microsoft/Mac OS/GUI Age". That isn't to say that that MS or Apple rules but rather because of making things easier for people to make those tools work without ever really needing to understand has made us -- for lack of a better phrase -- mentally lazy and "curious-less". (keep in mind that I recognize that not everyone has a desire to learn what happens behind the screen but that desire that things just work and we accept things as they are seems commonplace for everything, not just computers).

Anyways, maybe that's why..

Great. I was just getting over being appalled that women are still in pageants. Now you tell me their "beliefs" about evolution. And their exaltation of belief over science. Next you'll tell me that they still do the swimsuit thing.

Let me suggest that there's another interpretation. Scientist A was wrong but did not realize that she was wrong and neither did anyone else. On better evidence, which was gained by scientist B, the error was discovered.

The late Steven Jay Gould, in a brief he helped write to the Supreme Court once stated that all scientific discoveries should come with the following codicil: "this is provisionally true, to the best of our knowledge, subject to revision upon better data". I would add to that that nothing is ever proven in science. I cannot prove to you, once and for all, that an atom of hydrogen has a single electron and a single proton. It can't be done. Even though earlier today I stated that it was diagnostic (I think I used the word definitional) of a hydrogen atom that it has a single proton and single electron, I still cannot prove it to you once and for all. I would fall down dead if we found a hydrogen atom that did not conform to that configuration and I think we could search the Universe for any length of time you care to mention and never find an exception but I still cannot prove it to you.

It is the black swan problem. There is NO observation you can ever make that would prove the statement "all swans are white". However, there is a *single* observation you can make to disconfirm (falsify) the statement "all swans are white". If I present you with a black swan then the whole white swan hypothesis falls apart. This is a subtle but nontrivial difference and one of the hardest things to grasp about how science actually works.

What looks like flip-flopping isn't actually flip-flopping, it's having better data upon which to make a conclusion that is less likely to be wrong.

Not knowing the details I'll hazard only the most tentative guess--chances are that there was enough separation between the first finding and the second that either technology or methodology enabled a more accurate conclusion. So when someone went back and tried to confirm the first study with better tools, they got a better result.

Cheers
Aj

Something my wife observed with the women talking about evolution was that *every single* woman who did thought that evolution should not be taught or that 'the (nonexistent) controversy' should be taught were from a red state. Every. Single. One. The women who, at least, conceded that evolution should be taught were all from blue states. I think that is very telling.

Like you, I think that we have become a culture that expects things to be easy. We have become mentally lazy and, for some reason, we treat the brain as being different than any other organ. No one would ever suggest that you needn't give your heart, or lungs or legs or arms a workout just to keep them working well. Yet we, as a culture, do not promote the idea that the brain is a muscle and that it needs regular exercise as much as any other part of our bodies lest it atrophy.

Evolution is an elegant theory. By elegant I mean it in the way that mathematicians, engineers, scientists and hackers mean it--a solution that is subtle, powerful and no more complicated than it need be to do the job. On paper, it is a very simple theory. In practice it is fiendishly subtle. It also has very wide-ranging implications.

A few months ago, I read an article (that I wish I'd clipped to my electronic scrapbook) about farmers in, I believe, Alabama who were battling some pest or another. They were expressing surprise that this pest, which they thought some pesticide or another had all but eradicated, had come back with a vengeance and was now all but immune to the pesticide in question. This was, perhaps, the most poignant example of what not understanding evolution looks like. Evolution *predicts* that we should see exactly that kind of thing happen.

I'm going to terminate this post because I think that it might be interesting--and worthwhile--to post a general statement about evolution but that will take some time. Stay tuned.

Cheers
Aj

Having been a philosophy student oh so many years ago...
 

I think this is what I was getting at...

I also like your comment "Science is simply the suite of tools we use to explain those features of the Universe that we have some desire or need to explain."

I think philosophically that science is based on perception and a belief system. There is an assumption that:

1) There exists an external objective reality
2) There exists some sort of uniformity through time
a) the universe has structure
b) predictions and generalizations are possible.

In order to pursue a theory there has to be some level of belief involved, albeit a very very small one... Faith on the other hand is something where not a lot of proof is necessary for the person to maintain their belief. But it doesn't mean that an individual doesn't experience or have proof that the divine is non-existent.

I also think in a lot of ways, depending on who you are talking to, your second comment can replace science for spirituality. "Spirituality is simply the suite of tools we use to explain those features of the Universe that we have some desire or need to explain." Is there an evolution of science? Yes.. Is there an evolution of spirituality? Yes...

Interesting comments from scientists and other folks: http://www.templeton.org/belief/

What I'm finding interesting is the fact that the individuals countering science with their beliefs are the ones saying evolution shouldn't be taught.

If they believed that strongly in the concept wouldn't they want every opportunity to disprove evolution?

My computer is now broken, since I'm a biologist and cannot fathom religious beliefs being used to counter carbon dating, along with the assertion that children should be allowed to choose what they want to learn about. These two things combined cause me to beat my head against the keyboard.

OMGoodness... I loved that book as well... and knew exactly what AJ was saying without thinking the source! That was one of my most fav books of all time!

I hope the dog has no bald spots and is ok......laughin....

I agree with you on this one Snow. Science provides emperical data to support theories. It is factual and supported with results, formulas, and data.

I knew I should have chosen my words more carefully. I originally had written suite of tools for understanding Nature. I think that science and spirituality answer absolutely different sets of questions. I will agree, provisionally, that there is no reason to believe that science disproves a belief in one or more divine beings. At the same time, I'm going to insist that there is nothing that science can do to prove that there is any kind of divine being. If one is going to believe then believe and do so wholly but science can offer you not one shred of support for your beliefs. That is not it's job.

At the same time, that street goes both ways. If science cannot tell one whether or not there is a god or many gods, then spirituality/religion cannot tell science what it's conclusions should be. I understand that, for instance, the young women saying that they believe that some divine being created the Universe and all that is in it. I understand that they believe that the Bible offers an explanation about what happened that it renders all other explanations moot. I get that. I also have to say, "so what?" Evolution is the best explanation for the diversity of life available at present. If we're going to educate people in the life sciences then we're going to have to teach them evolution. Otherwise the life sciences won't make sense. However, it doesn't matter if evolution violates this or that holy book. It really doesn't matter because Nature isn't obliged to agree with what our religions would prefer.

I have said before and I'll say again--I don't promote atheism nor do I try to evangelize for a naturalistic worldview. I have nothing with which to replace that which gives people meaning and unless I do (and that question just isn't in my competencies) it would be wrong, in a deep ethical sense, for me to try to do so. That said, I'm not going to apologize for a naturalistic worldview. Just as you wouldn't (and shouldn't) apologize for a non-naturalistic worldview.

Yet, I'm still going to insist on demarcation. I think that's fair. While I don't see any good reason to believe in a heaven and I'm going to apply a fair and consistent standard (i.e. no special pleading) I am not going to argue that science 'disproves heaven' or what have you. For that, however, I think religion/spirituality needs to recognize the demarcation lines as well. Whether someone believes that the Bible teaches that humans were created by God is and should be irrelevant to the scientific process. "God created humans" is a religious statement, it has no business in a scientific discussion unless there is some proof that we *need* to invoke a divine being (and we don't) to explain some feature of the natural world we shouldn't allow it into the discussion. If we *do* have to allow that idea into the discussion then that statement has to be subject to the same criteria otherwise we are no longer doing science.

Yes, this is a limitation science imposes on itself but it is a necessary limit. It is the reason why you can take a scientist in Mumbai, one in Berkeley, one in Beijing and one in Cairo and all present them with data and they will be able to have a conversation about that data. They may all hold different religious beliefs or none what-so-ever but that won't get in the way because there is a common language to talk about the matter. The problem with invoking religious language in a scientific discussion is that in order to have a common ground we now have to agree that one person's religious assumptions are the correct ones. It cannot *simultaneously* be true--in the sense that I used it earlier, where that means 'the world is actually obliged to be that way'--that the Universe was created by one divine being in 6 days and was birthed by another divine being while being the egg of yet another divine being. Those three statements are mutually exclusive if are meant to take them as factual.

So before we can get down to explaining how something might give birth to a universe we would have to establish that this something exists. If I really and truly believed that the Greek pantheon described an objective "out there" reality is there anything you could say to convince me otherwise? Most likely not.

In science, on the other hand, ultimately there *must* be things that would convince me otherwise. If there isn't, I'm simply not doing science. I may not have a word for what I am doing, but whatever that word is it isn't science.

As an aside: something I have always found curious about the idea that there is not an objective reality 'out there' is how astoundingly self-centered it is. I take your existence as read (otherwise I'm either hallucinating or you are an AI in which case you can pass a Turing test). I presume that you take my existence as read. That means that without proof, I presume that your existence has some objective fact whether or not I have ever encountered you. If I had never been on the Internet, or had I died in, say, 1977 you would still exist. Therefore, barring evidence that I'm hallucinating or that you are an AI, I can say you objectively exist. I think that an objective reality is a pretty safe bet--like using a scale between 0 and 1, with zero being "does not exist" and one being "does exist" that objective reality is a .9 easily. I would say that our confidence on that should be high enough that for any ordinary purpose we can treat it as if it were true.

That .1 percent of skepticism is, to me, the mark of a scientist. There is a chance, however unlikely, that there isn't an objective reality. Although I think that there are a lot of other entities--certainly on this planet--that would probably disagree and would go about behaving as if they actually exist whether or not we believed in it. Like the honey badger, it don't care, it exists whether we believe in it or not.

Cheers
Aj

This.



It is my understanding (don't get me wrong, I'm no expert, having decidedly NOT majored in theological studies or anthropology) that spirituality and religion, per se, were devised as a means to explain "the unexplainable" in early developing culture. Phenomena that weren't understood were attributed to higher beings, spirits, gods, etc. as a way for emerging societies to make sense of the world around them. As the sciences evolved and offered explanations for these occurences with data and repeatable results, spirituality was no longer required to insulate us from fear of what we do not understand.

That being said, I think the concept of demarcation is valid. Spirituality should absolutely be applied to philosophical questions, and that which cannot be explored by science (until we evolve the technology to do so, of course). However, I see the religious card being used less as a tool to promote community and more as an excuse to hide behind bigotry and ignorance. Unfortunately, science cannot be applied to human morality.

Forgive me, I neglected to mention the division of power and all associated repercussions of that! Thank you for being so much more eloquent about it! :)

Theology does have a place in concert with science when one discusses morals. The reason why is because we are spiritual creatures... even AJ. *Grabs popcorn, sits back, and waits for three pages of arguments*

I'd be very interested to know how you would apply scientific methods to a personal experience based on societal constructs such as morality.

unfortunately, as a history of science buff and my major being in physical anthropology (fuck me, if that wasn't a primarily racist backdrop for the beginning of a science, I don't know what one is!) many people do use science attempt to back of some really hideous sh*t. Don't get me wrong, please. I *love* science and I love the history of science and I love philosophy of science. I was also brought up in a household of two researcher parents. Science is not faultless or pure in this regard. As mush as I love it, it's been used pretty destructively. I know it's the individuals that corrupt it, but that's really no different imo than corruption in any other field. People, all people, even scientists, can be fucked up bastards with no concept of the implications of what they are doing or it's repercussions at the very least of the baddie scale, and at the top end of the baddie scale, they can be unfathomable bigots of every rainbow flavour and use what they are doing to try and make a reason why X people do X and M people do M.

Sociobiology and eugenics are extremely slipperly slopes, for example. And I really *really* am wary about people looking for "genes" of behaviour. The implications being we cannot help who we are and cannot change. I know the gay thing slides into that, however my argument is the gay gene should be fucking moot. If gay was *truly* ok, it wouldn't matter that you had a genetic "excuse." And I personally won't use it to back up my argument for the vary reason that you can then use the gene excuse for xenophobia and all other types of human behaviours that frankly should be examined and overcome.

So while I honour and have a sense of beauty and purpose in science, I'm very aware of people being people with it. It's not different than any other human endeavour.

I completely understand and, to a large extent, agree that humans use their own morality (or lack thereof) to justify their use of science. The thing I'm getting at is how would you use science influence your morality? I admit at this point I can only see this as a one way street, since I don't think you can use fact-based reasoning to shape something as nebulous as morality and personal opinion.

I think you have deeply misinterpreted me and my beliefs. I believe in both evolution and a divine nature to... well, nature. I am not sure where you get anywhere in my post that I do not believe in evolution. I don't even believe in heaven for goodness sake. Well, at least a heaven that is beyond this life.

I was merely asking in a philosophical sense and hoping for a more intellectual conversation not a rebuttal of my post and an analysis of my "beliefs" which I did not state in this thread and have barely stated in others. ... The questions are common ones when one is having a conversation about the philosophy of science...

Your assumptions led you a little astray in your response to me...

I accept scientific inquiry and conclusions based upon valid and reliable research methods. Continual replication of scientific study that yields consistent results is the backbone for my accepting results about a hypothesis. Yes, this has been drilled into me academically and professionally. Probably as much or even more than my early life religious indoctrination. I don’t believe in scientific outcomes in research, I accept that if a study is well constructed (based upon solid scientific methodology being utilized), it yields information that I will want to pay attention to.

Does this apply to my spiritual belief system? Sometimes it does and I don’t fear “scientific” dismantling of my believe systems. I will remain who I am no matter the results of empirical data. But, I might just live a better life due to the imagination and plain curiosity of minds that choose to ask questions about this universe.

hum. I dunno about that. My dad taught me certain morals based on ecology and biology. Not all of them mind you, but a chunk. Not using the scientific method, exactly, but the results of behaviour (cause/effect type stuff). Plus physchology, though a messy science with unisolatable variables (like ecology) does make some attempt in a sideways way that one could then apply to moral "law".

for example when I was little:
"barbara, don't throw that on the ground. it's littering. You know how we share this environment with other people and other animals? if everyone put their on the ground whereever in great quanities, then it will cause people and animals to get sick and die. We wouldn't be able to farm the land and use plants for medicines and the animals that help us (ecology web explained earlier) and have their own value would disapear." kind of thing.

also I don't shit close to a river when I'm hiking/camping and I make sure it's in the top soil. I also don't shit very much in the same place and am very aware of where other people in the camping group are shitting and what kind of clime we are in. Those are moral choices (are they? not to fuck with the water supply or the environment) based on scientific knowledge.

I dunno, does that fit in to that slot? I'm not sure but it sort of does??

or maybe not. I'm on pain meds today so my thinking is a bit fuzzy.

Well, this is kind of what I was getting at in a way. If your Da didn't care about the environment (morality) and knowing the repercussions of poor ecological stewardship, your own beliefs wouldn't have been influenced the way they were. That's using morality to influence morality.

I'm saying there's no set of data you can use to measure whether something is more or less moral, more or less worthy of being enforced as a standard. I'd go so far as to say most people believe that killing is wrong, that is a moral judgment. There is no scientific data to back this up, though. That tenet of their personal beliefs is influenced only by opinion and not fact.

Conversely, depending on your beliefs you can end up on either side of the argument when it comes to something like the "gay gene" mentioned previously. Some people want to prove there is one, others don't. Some people want there to be a cure, others want to prove homosexuality is innate and therefore cannot and/or should not be "cured". You use your personal opinions to decide what you deem "important" research.

I wasn't saying *you* didn't believe in evolution, I was offering evolution as an area of contention. You may not doubt evolution but you are in a distinct minority in the United States. Forty percent of Americans believe that human beings were created, in our current form, within the last 10,000 years. They ignore any evidence to the contrary and do not know nor do they want to know what evolutionary theory says. They insist that because their holy book *says* this that nature is obliged to agree with them and that the entire biological sciences are just wrong. Not on some empirical issue, but rather we are wrong because we do not agree with the biblical account. It was an example of the demarcation problem, not meant to say that you doubt evolution.

Put it this way, you seem to like Deepak Chopra. I am not fond of him for reasons I won't get into. It would be uncalled for me to show up at a Deepak Chopra speaking engagement and then, every time he mentioned 'quantum' ask him to explain how he squares his interpretation of QM with the scaling problem (which I won't get into here). What I see happening with creationists is that they are showing up in schools and saying that they reject this theory in biology because it offends their religious sensibilities and that therefore, biology is *required* to submit itself to those sensibilities. I see no reason why biology should do that.

I wasn't trying to analyze your beliefs or rebut your post.

As far as spirituality being a set of tools to understand the Universe, okay so far as it goes but it is a different set of questions. I think that spirituality is *useless* for understanding how stars work. In fact, I would say that it is worse than useless. My problem isn't when spiritual people say "these are the set of tools to help me get through my day while staying sane". I have no problem with that. I do have a problem when spiritual people say "my <insert holy text here> teaches that the reason that stars burn is that <insert pre-scientific account of stars here>". To be clear, I am NOT saying that you are doing this. I am trying to clarify the point I was making.

I was, more or less, agreeing with you. I was not trying to say you believe in heaven. I do not know what your beliefs are other than that you are some form of Christian. But large numbers of Christians *do* believe in heaven and that is fine, unless they are going to insist that heaven is a factual place in which case I think that it is reasonable to treat it like any other factual place and begin to ask questions about it.

Again, this is not to say that you believe in heaven or that you are like a large numbers of Christians. For all I know you are in a denomination of one. I am offering up examples of where I see the demarcation lines being drawn. This is completely separate of your beliefs about heaven, evolution or, for that matter, quantum mechanics or any other specific issue.

Cheers
Aj

It seems strange to me that people would feel the need to say that scientists are people. People can be amazing bastards. My defense of science is not based upon it being pure or perfect, it is, like democracy, the least *bad* tool we have for understanding the natural world. It works, *well enough*, over time that it is useful in general. But that does not make it pure.

Actually I have to strenuously disagree with your characterization of sociobiology and looking for genetic influences on behavior. Sociobiology does not imply there is nothing we can do to help who we are or what we can and cannot change. Actually, explanations based upon culture are just as deterministic--in fact in many ways more so--than any reasonable sociobiological explanation of that same fact. Look at some of the discussions around race that happen here and you will see determinism at work--we live in a majority white culture, whites have traditionally benefited from race-based constructions in that culture, whites have white privilege, therefore whites will defend white privilege even unconsciously. That is as deterministic as it gets and I have not mentioned genes at all. I actually take a sociobiological view of racism that it is a special case of xenophobia and that xenophobia was adaptive at some point but is maladaptive now. So my construction is not 'humans are xenophobic and therefore we can do nothing about racism'. Rather it is 'humans are xenophobic, racism is just a special case of xenophobia, therefore we are going to have to work hard as both individuals and as a civilization to give racism no haven or quarter in our lives, in our laws, or in our institutions. It will be hard work because we are fighting a somewhat uphill battle but it is doable.'

Also, I will give an example of a gene for behavior--most of us speak one or more languages. Your genes built a brain that is hungry to learn language and boots up the language learning systems in the first year. It then sponges language up for the next 15 - 20 years. After which it becomes a bit more difficult to learn a new language--but not impossible. That is *entirely* genetic. The fact that I speak English is an artifact of culture, the fact that I speak ANY language is an artifact of genes.

This is two different things. The statement that members of some group X is a moral statement and has absolutely nothing to do with whether it is genetic or not. I understand why people in the gay community want their to be a genetic basis for homosexuality but it does not buy us what many people think it does. Being black is as genetic as something can be--in fact it is entirely genetic, no cultural experience gave me a black phenotype. Yet, for all but the last half-century blacks were treated, in the West at least, as barely human. In fact, when we were treated as barely human that was an *improvement*! Being Catholic is as non-genetic as something exists and yet we protect Catholics from discrimination. The basis for not discriminating against blacks or against Catholics is predicated on something completely separate from the question of why there are blacks or Catholics.

Again, I think that there's a mixup between explanation and excusing. I want to understand *why* xenophobia happens and it is not just a product of Western culture nor is it a product of white people. If there are multiple lives and you can swing it, go to Japan as either a Korean or a black person. You will be treated to a full measure of xenophobia. That deserves explanation for why it is so widespread. Religion is another behavior I think is biological--not what specific religion someone practices but that religion is practiced in all cultures so far. EVERYONE honors their dead. EVERYONE has a set of stories about how to live. I would call religion species typical behavior. It would be absolutely remarkable if there were a species typical behavior that did not have a genetic component to it. Again, that does not mean that people can't help but be religious, it does mean that it might take a little more work to maintain a naturalistic worldview since our brains seem to favor a supernatural worldview. Again, not deterministic but influential.

Cheers
Aj

Sorry about that AJ. Because you responded to me and put my post in yours it was a natural conclusion to assume you meant me.

I think the demarcation lines are a lot easier to draw if your mind sits in either one extreme area or the other... and so yes, I do agree with you. I just think as we get down into the scientific subject of matter (for example) the demarcation gets a little fuzzy. And perhaps science will progress to a point where we have absolute answers... In fact, I have little doubt that it will. However, as it stands right now, there has to be a small bit of assumption when you get down to this area... a part of it that is accepted as truth without proof... and THAT was my point. There is, to be a scientist, just a little bit of faith involved (even if you don't want to call it that)... By the way this is a conversation I engage in with both my brother and his wife... He is a nuerobiologist and she a geneticist.. both with their own labs.. Very smart people (like you) who have little spiritual interpretation in the world around them. It's sometimes hard for me to engage but my "play the devils advocate" side comes out and we have fun!

I like Chopra a lot more than you do I guess :) but to be honest haven't read that much of him. I am too busy studying these days than digging deep into spiritual writers and thinkers. I did enjoy his fictional rendering of Jesus though.

I want to say more but I have to go sit for an exam this morning...

Thanks for your response! :)

can I just say, Aj and scandalandy I'm *loving* this convo deeeeeply. and I really wish I could continue, so I'm going to put a book mark here and come back on saturday. My brain really is too drugged to try and solve some of these dilemas that I have, I adore sociobiology but I loathe it's use and how it gets manipulated (just like some people love gnosticism but hate how it gets twisted and misused by insane bastards). So in that I have a lot of empathy for how people twist an original message. Aj, I haven't fully read your post cause I have to run and gets some chores done but I really do wish I lived close to you (and scandalandy!) just to be able to sit down and hash this out. There's a philosophical question that has been BUGGING me for about 15 years and Aj, I'd love to sit down with you if you felt you might want to waste the brain power to try and tease it appart. My philosophy of science instruct sat me down when I came to him about it and we talk for THREE HOURS till my brain hurt. still no resolution.

But it will have to wait. big love and massive appreciation xxx

No worries, City I probably should have been more clear that I was offering examples.

Oh, I think there is faith in as much as I trust the natural world to be consistent. Like I said yesterday, I did not wake up on the moon although there is a quantum mechanical description of my body, lying in bed in my house, wherein I wake up and find that I have suddenly found myself on the moon. Perhaps a better example is this. There is a means, using quantum mechanics, to describe the state of all of the atoms making up the Statue of Liberty that has her waving the arm holding the torch. It is *possible* for that to happen, no physical law forbids it. However, in order for it to reach that state, we would have to wait for several hundred times the lifetime of the Universe for just one movement. I have faith, if you will, that the universe is a regular enough place that the statue will not be waving her arms about next time I visit New York. I have somewhat less faith that we glorified chimps are smart enough to figure out most of the questions about the natural world we might have. That said, I think there are questions we will never be smart enough to answer such as "what came before the Big Bang".

I'm looking forward to your next response. :)

Cheers
Aj

I'm going to echo ScandalAndy's question and start out asking 'so how would theology help in a scientific discussion'?

Now, I think that we can, in a VERY limited sense, bring a scientific understanding to issues of morality. I will use a couple of examples.

Sexual assault: From an evolutionary point of view, we should expect that women--on average--have a *very* strong preference for choosing who they will be sexual with and under what circumstances. Given the investment any given human woman will make in any given child, she should not want to have sex--with the risk of pregnancy--forced on her under any circumstances. So, we should not expect to find a society that has convinced women that they should *not* resist sexual assault. This does not give us the basis for "don't assault women" it DOES give us the basis for "society should, under no circumstances, tolerate the sexual assault of women".

Slavery: Again, from an evolutionary standpoint we should expect that, all other things being equal, people will see themselves as autonomous agents who have a very strong preference for being able to act as such. Slavery robs people of the ability to act as autonomous agents by making them the property of another person. We should, again, expect anyone in that condition to desire to be free and to take whatever steps are needed to become free. Therefore, we should not expect slavery to be a stable, long-term solution for a society.

Incest taboos: These are, like religion, ubiquitous. Where there are exceptions (almost always amongst nobility) they are notable *because* they are exceptions. Again, we should expect ALL sexually reproducing species to have some built-in mechanism for avoiding sexual contact between close relatives. This may be the closest, of all the examples, to an actual scientific basis for morality but even that doesn't get us quite there. It tells us why human beings have incest taboos it does not tell us that we *must*, just that it is a better deal all around if we do.

Once again, this does NOT get us to "slavery is wrong" it DOES get us to "if your society practices slavery, then it should expect to have a whole host of problems because slavery is not a condition human beings will just accept".

So, the closest science can get us to a moral answer is this: presume that all human beings have a basic human nature. Presume that, left to their own devices, human beings would strongly prefer to be free, to not be subject to violence or violation, and to desire the company of other human beings at least some of the time. We should expect that, on average, parents will prefer their children over some random child they have never met such that if it is a question of giving their child or the random child the last scrap of food the family possess, most parents, most of the time, will give it to their own child. They may feel horrible about doing so, but we should expect that under most circumstances of desperation that is how they will behave.

Now, I've managed to describe a couple of different areas where science can give us insight into the why of a moral rule but it does not tell us how to apply that rule or how to enforce it. Yet, I have not needed, at all, to invoke any kind of theological construct. What could theology add to the *scientific* question? Theology can carry a lot of water of the "if you do X, this or that divine being will be displeased and may punish you" variety but I don't see how it can add anything more than that. Am I missing something?

Cheers
Aj

I did a lot of work in teasing apart the relation of religious and scientific discourse when I was a philosophy student back in the 90's. Briefly, I think you hit the nail dead center, AJ, when you said that it is not the job of scientific language to address issues of religious faith. That isn't its function, yes. There is a lot of confusing of one type of concept for another when talk of an intersection occurs.

I am going to come back at some point hopefully soon (it is pride weekend so there's a lot going on) when I can posit my thoughts more elaborately. I also have some book recommendations to make that really do a great job expounding on this topic.

There are lots of great posts in this thread and I am enjoying reading what you all have to say. :)

Yes, this precisely. The closest I think we can get, using your killing example, is that we should expect that in any given population P, there will be rules about killing and that those rules will be harsher for in-group killing than out-group killing. Can we observe that anywhere? Yes, as a matter of fact we do. From various HGF (hunter-gatherer-fishing) cultures to modern, complex urban societies we see a distinction made. If some bloke goes out, grabs a gun and shoots a random person we call him a murderer. If some other bloke, wearing a uniform, goes out and kills some number of other blokes who are wearing different uniforms, then we call him a soldier. We may even call him a hero. What is the difference? In the first case, the guy did not have sanction but in the second case he did have sanction because in the second case we call it war. Soldiers cannot be charged with killing the enemy in wartime, *provided* that the enemy was shooting back or could be expected to do so. There are very good reasons a given society would strongly prefer that any violent impulses were directed outward rather than inward.

I think that the question of what causes homosexuality is an interesting question but I do not think it will, ultimately, make much difference on the issue of rights. At any rate, the way rights are framed in the West is not predicated upon it being genetic or on human beings being identical (i.e. there are no differences between different ethnic groups). Although it is in vogue to say that racism is wrong because race doesn't exist, that doesn't work. To take one example, two or three years ago my doctor diagnosed me with hypertension. When she did my response was "well, that's no big surprise". The reason that was my reaction is that I knew that ~85% of all black Americans will have high blood pressure sometime in middle-age. We are 28% more likely to have high blood pressure than whites and just under 20% more likely than Hispanics and 32% more likely than Chinese Americans. Now, is that entirely genetic? Probably not, some of it is certainly diet and stress. However, since that number just leaps out at you it strongly suggests that there is a genetic component to the issue. Now, if races 'don't exist' how can we even say that blacks are more likely to have high blood pressure than whites, Hispanics or Chinese? We can't.

This can *all* be true without, even for an instant, giving aid or comfort to racist ideologies.

Cheers
Aj

Okay, before I really have to get into my workday one more thing:

Ironically, when I am drawing these demarcation lines I am doing my best to both respect AND protect religion. I know the power of the scientific method and I know it's limitations (both imposed from within and from without). The problem I see, for religion, is when it tries to insert itself into scientific discussions. I'm not talking about religious *scientists*, I'm talking about, for example, creationism or New Age interpretations of quantum mechanics.

The minute someone says "my <insert divine being here> created the Universe and all things within it and this explanation supersedes any explanation from biology" then I think it is fair to then evaluate that statement on the scientific merits just like we would any *other* scientific statement. It is not enough to just say "this theory is wrong". That gets you nowhere in the physical sciences. You have to also be able to say "this is WHY it is wrong and here is why this alternative theory better explains the data". This is where sectarians of various stripes get themselves stuck in a morass. In order to justify why the religious explanation is a better explanation, that particular bit of dogma has to go through the meat-grinder of scientific questioning. To take just one example (against staying in biology since that is where I am most comfortable).

In sexually reproducing mammals, the gender ratio is slightly favoring males (e.g. slightly more males are born than females). This is true even for species that have a 'winner take all' or 'winner take most' breeding system. For instance elephant seals have a winner take most system. That means that a bull has near exclusive breeding rights in his colony. He will defend those breeding rights, sometimes risking life and limb. Other males will attempt to best the bull so that they can breed or try to get a little seal sumthin-sumthin on the side taking quite a bit of risk either way. What that means is that the VAST majority of male elephant seals will never breed. Isn't that kind of wasteful? Why would an intelligent entity keep the sex ratio close to 50/50 when most males aren't going to breed?

Now, from a gene's-eye point of view it makes perfect sense to maintain that sex ratio. Why? Because nature doesn't care about 'wasted' genes. Sure, if you are a male elephant seal you may not breed but if you *do* breed boy will your genes spread so from that point of view being a male elephant seal has the potential for a fantastic genetic payoff--if only you can become the bull.

Do religious sectarians really want us asking questions like "why does your deity waste so many male genes" or "why does your deity prefer digger wasps over caterpillars"? I think most likely they would prefer we *not* ask those questions but the moment it is stated that the particular story that religion tells to explain why there are things like digger wasps or caterpillars they open their beliefs to just that kind of questioning.

Cheers
Aj

See but this is the problem. The Torah can be interpreted many ways because it is a metaphor. There is no need to explain things in factual terms unless you want to read it literally. In fact that is kind of a bummer.

Here is a good article by my rabbi. It talks about exactly what you guys are discussing here in the tension between science and religion and evolution. Maybe it will be interesting. Sorry to butt in!

http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/2000...2-935.aspx?p=1

However, those who seek to read Torah as a history book, or worse, as a science primer, may well miss the spiritual significance of the text.
Fundamentalists and other Biblical literalists often pounce on naturalistic explanations of Torah events, such as the Red Tide, as "proof" that the Bible "really happened," and thus possesses authority even beyond that of profound religious and moral instruction.


Yes, this exactly. As long as sectarians of various stripes do not try to rope science into 'proving' that their holy book is the actual factual account of how things really work or went down, then I am perfectly happy for them to believe what they wish. As Jefferson put it, it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket. If, however, the demarcation lines get crossed then I think that it is absolutely in bounds to play by the rules of the house. If we are having a topic on some question that is clearly in the realm of the sciences (how do stars burn, why are there birds, etc.) then the house rules are those of science. If we are having a discussion about this or that point about the nature of the afterlife, then the house rules may be that of one or more religion.

What I'm not comfortable with is special pleading. Religious rules applied to scientific questions without having to worry about scientific questions being applied to religious statements. If a Christian and a Hindu are talking about this or that point of theology, there's no need for science to be invoked. It has no place there and if either partisan invokes science I think it should be called out of bounds OR they should concede that the rules have just changed and now they're playing by the house rules of science.

So yes, what your rabbi said, exactly. I would apply that up and down the line. It applies to New Age invocations of quantum mechanics or chaos theory or relativity theory and it applies to Christian fundamentalist creationism. Trust me when I say that most scientists I know and have ever met would just as soon NOT be dragged into conversations about whether this or that god is strict or not.

Cheers
Aj

Here are some more science and religion articles from The Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences. They do a lot to further the conversation.

http://www.ctns.org/about.html