Defenders of the Faith:Scientists who blast religion are hurting their own cause.

Just something to consider.... But they don't hold the opinions I do though I mostly agree. I think Dawkins and his ilk are using science as a cover to shove their belief system down everyone else's throat as if science backed their claims *It backs neither position btw. The question it's self is unscientific no matter the answer be it yes or no.*. Oh, and I love the Dali Llama's quote.

As soon as Francis Collins, an evangelical Christian geneticist who headed up the pioneering Human Genome Project during the 1990s, was floated as the possible new director of the National Institutes of Health—he was officially named to the post on Wednesday—the criticisms began flying. Evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne of the University of Chicago, for one, said Collins is too public with his faith. Collins wrote a book called The Language of God, frequently talks about his religious conversion during medical school, and recently launched the BioLogos Foundation, which declares, "We believe that faith and science both lead to truth about God and creation."
The critics, though, have it exactly backward: the United States needs more scientists like Collins—researchers who show by their prominence and their example that a good scientist can still retain religious beliefs. The stunning irony in the longstanding tension between science and religion in America is that many scientists who merely claim to be defending rationality from religious fundamentalism may actually be turning Americans off to science, doing more harm to their cause than good.
*Watcher’s comment-“From what I can see they are not so much defending scientific rationality so much as attempting to legitimize their beliefs. They do this by inferring falsely that science and indeed rationality only can be found within atheism. Despite the fact that many of their actions including those above are highly irrational.”*
The poster boy for the so-called New Atheist movement today is biologist Richard Dawkins, author of the bestselling book, The God Delusion. He and other New Atheists attack faith without quarter, and insist that science and religion are fundamentally irreconcilable. In the process, they are helping to keep U.S. society polarized over science and likely helping to make it still harder for many religious believers to accept scientific findings in areas like evolution.
*Watcher’s comment-“Dawkins…….. This guy’s rhetoric is vastly more harmful than mentioned here but I do agree with the article here as well. Rhetoric, albeit not of the same content as his, has caused untold suffering and persecution.”
Although the New Atheists are not so numerous, and much younger as a movement than their polar opposite—the Christian right—they've amassed a powerful following, especially online, and have sold millions of books by prosecuting a culture war in precisely the opposite direction from the one waged by Christian conservatives. Science is their watchword, but it has always been about much more than that. The New Atheist science blogger PZ Myers, for instance, has publicly desecrated a consecrated communion wafer, presumably taken from a Catholic mass, and put a picture of it, pierced by a rusty nail and thrown in the trash, on the Internet.
*Watcher’s comment-“Rationality? Defending rationality they say? While doing such silly childish BS things like this? Rrrriggghhhttt. And from what I have seen of a few of them, science is little more than their buzzword a word they honestly don’t seem to much understand, rather like Christian’s who claim to believe in and follow their J.C. yet ignore more or less his teachings.”
The New Atheists are unswerving in their conviction that irrational religion is the source of many of our ills—especially when it comes to the public's poor understanding of science—and vociferous in their criticism of scientists who nevertheless retain religious belief, like Collins, even though Collins is himself a strong defender of evolution. But the truth is that religious scientists like Collins have the best chance of making religious Americans more accepting of modern science.
Consider the survey evidence, which shows that while most Americans want to have both science and religion in their lives, they'll only go so far to preserve the former at the expense of the latter. According to a 2006 Time magazine poll, for instance, 64 percent of Americans would hold on to a cherished religious belief even if science had disproved it. Many Americans who reject evolution—a stunning 46 percent, according to surveys—assuredly fall in this category.
The public's willingness to reject science for religious reasons is certainly lamentable. But by arguing that science contradicts religion and makes it untenable, many atheists reinforce the very concerns that are keeping people from accepting science to begin with. Someone like Collins, by contrast, can convince those who think science conflicts with their beliefs that this needn't be the case.
And Collins's approach isn't just good as a strategy to get the public to better appreciate science. The idea that science and religion can be compatible is strong on the intellectual merits as well. Granted, it depends how you define your terms: if your religion holds that Genesis must be read literally, then you are in direct conflict with scientific findings about the age of the Earth, the diversity of life on the planet, and so on. Yet if we consider religion more broadly—in its own considerable diversity—we find many sophisticated believers who've made a peace between their belief and the findings of modern science. It's not just Collins; consider the words of the Dalai Lama: "If science proves some belief of Buddhism wrong, then Buddhism will have to change."
Americans have serious problems with science, and religion is definitely part of the reason. But that doesn't mean fighting religion, indiscriminately, is the answer. A far better approach is to work with religious believers to help them separate their personal religion from everybody's shared science, and move toward a much needed middle ground.
The New Atheists will hardly be pleased by the Collins choice, but that's unpreventable and perhaps even to the good: science and atheism aren't the same, and the former must always remain a broader, more inclusive category.
Mooney and Kirshenbaum, an atheist and an agnostic Jew, are the coauthors of the new book Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future.

SOURCE:www.newsweek.com...

[edit on 15-7-2009 by Watcher-In-The-Shadows]

Wasn't it the atheists who became cling-on peeps to Science as a defense to their cause?

And you're right - it doesn't prove anything. The non faithers have dubbed the Scientists who do believe, as "Creation Scientists" as a new way to separate and debunk them.

It's kind of comical to watch them running around trying to debunk the universe's creation though.

reply to post by nomorecruelty


IMHO the fact that either side spends sooo much time attacking what the other believes shows how little the whole thing is about "the truth" and more about petty human bs.

Originally posted by nomorecruelty
Wasn't it the atheists who became cling-on peeps to Science as a defense to their cause?

And you're right - it doesn't prove anything. The non faithers have dubbed the Scientists who do believe, as "Creation Scientists" as a new way to separate and debunk them.

It's kind of comical to watch them running around trying to debunk the universe's creation though.

It's funner, while creationist insist that the universe is 6,000 years old. That the only way to make a human, is well simply dust.

That it's fine and logical to believe someone can walk on water, or that there is no reason why a man can't live a few days in a fish, a big fish at that.

While science has proven the earth isn't 6,000 years old, but much older, and that we're not the center of the solar system, nor galaxy, (although they were killed at the start for the blasphemy).

Science, has more wins, religion has none, except for the jesus shaped cheeto, and excorcisms that should've been epileptics seeking medical help.

I guess, the whole murder for the witch hunt trials over religion are ok, to, because any logical person, believes in witches on brooms.

While you laugh and say your god is a mighty god, that he must exist because you are here, then shut your eyes, and when we say we don't know how exactly everything happened, we sincerely doubt that we came from a handful of dust.

Childhood indoctrination= Lack of logic.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


And that's just how mankind is - always wanting to compete and be the winner. That is how our world got so mucked up in the first place.


My opinion anyhow.

reply to post by Republican08


Everyone's entitled to their own opinion - you're not an exception.

Nor am I.

reply to post by nomorecruelty


I personally believe that a more likely scenario is retrocausality; that by existing right now to observe the universe, we are causing the universe to have been created. It's a little weird at first, but the principle is explicable, and it obviates the need for something outside the universe as a creative force.

Also, asking "How could the universe exists unless it was created?" begs the question; How could a Creator exist unless a bigger Creator created him? And on into infinity.

Scientists differ in their interpretation of the results, but it cannot be inferred with current observation methods whether or not a god exists. One way or the other, there is no certainty. And there CAN BE no objective certainty, as if there is a god, he/she/it has made sure to cover their tracks very well. not so much as a giant toenail clipping.

I do not object to a scientist being public about their faith, as long as they are not making the claim that science backs them. It doesn't. it also doesn't back atheists. It backs agnostics if anything.

reply to post by Republican08


And yet you take two positions too what is ultimately a unscientific question and call one of them science *atheism, and yes you do, you compare religion to science as if comparing theism to atheism*........ Science does not and has not proven atheism. As much as I respect you as a person that particular tired old line of thinking is old.

reply to post by '___'eviant

Also, asking "How could the universe exists unless it was created?" begs the question; How could a Creator exist unless a bigger Creator created him? And on into infinity.

Does a mother "create" a child? And I mean create in the sense you mean in this part. Does she wave her hands or mold some clay and a child exists?

Originally posted by nomorecruelty
reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows

 

And that's just how mankind is - always wanting to compete and be the winner. That is how our world got so mucked up in the first place.


My opinion anyhow.

That whole thing is ignorant.

The competition gene, is really what gives you the priviledge of having a computer right now, your nice cell phone, (also science helped, we couldn't wait for god to poof one out of water).

Competition, survival of the fittest. It's mucked up either way, because the process hasn't been perfected, and we're still fighting over "My god can beat up your god" "Nuh uh, my god can beat up your god" "Well my god told me to slaughter 12,000 of your women and commit mass genocide" "Oh yeah mine too!".

lol.

Competition, is essential to life. I guess if we never competed against ourselves or others, we'd all be stuck on stupid.

No need to be school valedictorian, because competing promotes bad behavior, Get Real!

reply to post by nomorecruelty


I can agree wholeheartedly with that one. Too much competition in things that largely shouldn't be a competition.

reply to post by Republican08


And now we have atheists gearing up to slaughter those that hold beliefs that are not theirs. Rather like those people you speak of in history. It's a well traveled road and alot of them are happily skipping along it and calling it something new.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


Science, is like a final answer.

And science tends to lean to atheism, and lean away from theism.

The fact that it hasn't proven atheism, isn't necessary, if you can provide to me how it proves theism, is it the gaps of knowledge we have, that are so quickly filled with mythical beings as a final answer?

At least atheism fights to understand the universe, whilst theism fights to say we can't understand gods ways, while we get closer and closer everyday to finding the universes ways.

Oh, and competition on such things as answers to unanswered questions, possibly unanswerable is a horribly destructive thing. As you point out rather unevenly.

reply to post by Republican08


Only because you see it as you wish to see it. Science does not lean either way. Only by pretending your intrepretations are the only possible ones do you come by this view.

[edit on 15-7-2009 by Watcher-In-The-Shadows]

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


Alright then, i'll back off and let he who insulted first, be the one to boast himself.

And have a one sided arguement, with no other point of views

Atheism takes a position. True science does not. It's really rather simple. Beyond the propaganda and mental and semantic acrobatics taken by some.

reply to post by Watcher-In-The-Shadows


Irrelevant, as the mother was once a child born to a mother. The cycle repeats back to the begninning of humanity.

Or if the mother was initially created with clay and hand-waving, then the hand-waving clay shaper was made the same way at some point, right? And if not, if the clay-shaper can just always have existed, why not his creation?

reply to post by '___'eviant


You completely missed the point I was getting at. Why exactly does the existance of what we would call "god" be a situation with a creator and the created?

[edit on 15-7-2009 by Watcher-In-The-Shadows]

Originally posted by Watcher-In-The-Shadows
reply to post by Republican08

 

And yet you take two positions too what is ultimately a unscientific question and call one of them science *atheism, and yes you do, you compare religion to science as if comparing theism to atheism*........ Science does not and has not proven atheism. As much as I respect you as a person that particular tired old line of thinking is old.

ATHEISM is not something that needs to be proven. AT ALL.
atheism is "a lack of belief in gods" theres nothing that needs to be proven. however, "god did it" needs proof before its a reasonable claim. whats the best way to prove something? SCIENCE!