Isn't science basically a religion?

@urbanprimate First of all: Welcome to Fluther. Second of all: Prepare to put your debating skills to good use. :)

I fail to see how science utilizes faith. Sure it uses assumptions and theories. And therein lies the difference in science and religion.

Religion does not USE assumptions or theories. Science doesn’t seek to disprove or prove, it seeks to learn and comprehend.

Think about the dark ages, on how chanting, praying or exorcism was used on women who squirted during orgasm, for example. And now look at medical progress. I’ll take that over getting my cunt stitched up any day, even if many things remain uncovered.

I do agree on one point though. I don’t think that the concept of religion is needed to make man what he is. Science may also be exploited and made to be used against others.

Science is different in the way that it recognizes, objectively, its own assumptions and limitations. It acts towards itself in a manner where it is constantly attempting to disprove itself, assumes its assertions are not true, and is always open to critique. Religion, in many ways, is the opposite of this.

Where I think they seem similar is in peoples reaction to science and religion. When people accept scientific conclusions without examining them, when they assume something is true because a scientist says so, they are reacting to science in a way that is, in essence, religious.

And when people pit science against religion, I think both are done a disservice. Science, for me and many, is the pursuit of how. Religion, philosophy, and many social sciences are more suited to the pursuit of why.

overall id have to say its not science but the faith that the masses have in it that makes it similar to a religion

Science relies upon method to make truth propositions. Religion relies upon mania to make truth propositions. Which set of truth propositions would you consider to be closer to the actual truth, those based in method, or those based in mania?

And let’s not forget, there have always been extremely clever charlatan hoaxters out there who have been very successful at making a science out of religion.

@urbanprimate Agreed. However, this doesn’t change the fact that science does shit, despite what most of us believe it can, or cannot do, know what I mean?

Science rewards itself by actually proving itself wrong. Religion cannot prove anything, right or wrong.

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies Holy shit. Best answer ever.

ya i agree with pretty much everything. its just pretty dumb that science is just figuring out how important the sun is for our health (real recent discovery) and shit like that. too much of our money goes to unuseful scientific tests

@urbanprimate – I’m pretty sure that religion would be much “dumber” figuring that out. In many ways, however, things that seem like common sense take a long time for science to prove – considering the multiple variables that would interfere with isolating sunlight as a benefit to health, and the experimental isolation that would be required to demonstrate it, it is no surprise that such a thing would take a while.

good lord, man – you do need to start using your apostrophes and capital letters, though, ;-)

Not really. Some people (not on here) act like it’s theirs.

http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/science.PNG
http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/faith.PNG
These two charts explain.

mammal is valiantly fending off the slimy, clutching tentacles of Religion and the snatching, clamping, chill instruments of Science…..so i’ll gracefully bow out of the arena and allow them to proceed without me.

May they mutually deal each other a mortal blow :)

Science simply is not a matter of faith, it’s not a matter of “assumption after assumption.” It’s a matter of facts and evidence and proof and reproducible results. If you don’t understand that I’m not sure that anyone here can explain it to you.

Welcome to my profile page Fluther.

Faith is believing things to be true without evidence, often times even despite evidence to the contrary.
Religion requires faith to exist, for its claims have no evidential basis.
Science is the opposite. In order to get reasonably close to truth, it makes assertions, called “Hypotheses”, and then must substantiate these Hypotheses with evidence, or dismantle the Hypotheses by collecting evidence to the contrary. Only Hypotheses with a tremendous amount of evidence are considered to be as close as truth as possible and are thusly elevated to “Theories”.
Faith is the greatest enemy of Science.
Once one resorts to faith, discovery stops. New developments and discoveries will fly by you, especially those which would shatter those beliefs you hold by faith, because you have to ignore them to preserve your position.

Lastly, let us look at the practical achievements of either. On the side of science, there are such useless things as:
– Television
– Radio
– Flight
– Space Travel
– Electric light
– Electric motors
– Steam engine
– Internal Combustion engines (all of them, including the car they are made for, invented by Germans, btw)
– electronics
– Computers
– Optical microscopes
– Electron Microscopes
– Wireless Communication at lightspeed
– Wired Communication at similar speed
– Fibre optics
– Modern composite materials, such as carbon ceramics, and carbon fibre
– Higher yields in farming and animal production
– Eradication of once common, and lethal, diseases in the western world
– Expanding the human life span
– lowering mortality in general
– detecting and diagnosing diseases and physical damage to the body more easily with specialised devices and machines.
– repairing damage more easily with specialised devices and machines, like improving vision with laser treatment, restoring partial vision with cybernetic implants, replacing limbs with artificial replacements that can actually be used as an arm, a hand, a leg, even to the point of being able to compete with unmodified humans in sports events.

And on the side of Religion we have such marvels as:
– Inquisition
– Witch burning and Heretic hunting
– Crusades
– Violent conflict because of religious differences, even today.
– Setting the monetary value of people in case you want to sell them into slavery
– Condoning slavery
– Suppression of Science and Progress™
– Suppression of dissenting opinions
– Patriarchy and general oppression of women and other minorities
– condemnation of and violent retaliation against benign activities such as Premarital Sex™, Homosexual Activity™, Believing in gods other than your own™, Eating Lobster™

”if science were more intelligent than other religions how come we can’t disprove half of the worlds religious beliefs and predictions”
Science has, but religious people tend to ignore that.
Earth is not 6000 years old, it is 4.5 milliard years old, the universe itself is about 3 times that old.
Earth is not the centre of the universe (which technically does not even have one), it is not even the centre of the solar system, but a spheroid rocky body orbiting a massive star, which itself orbits the centre of your galaxy, which itself moves away from all other galaxies in a massive universe of which most is empty.
Earth is not flat.
The sky is not a solid dome.
Stars are not holes in that dome.
Diseases are not caused by demons.
Today’s species, including humans, were not conjured into existence, they evolved from previous life forms.
There was no global flood.
Satan could not have stood on a mountain with Jesus to show him all the kingdoms of the world.

Ahhh, but in Christianity, we get to eat our God once a month! You can’t eat a scientist @ragingloli… legally…

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies
Yes, a real shame, is it not?

And lastly, I could not have made this without science.

@lillycoyote – science isn’t faith-based, surely. However, there are initial assumptions that any scientific theory have to work with, considering we have a profoundly limited understanding of the physical world. The problem I think @urbanprimate is trying to address is when we accept people stating that something is so because they have scientific evidence at face value, we are, in essence, acting on faith.

Stating that the universe started with the big bang because Stephen Hawking said so, or that DNA is shaped like a double-helix because Richard Dawkins said so, and resting on that promotes as little intellectual depth as stating that anything is anything because god said so.

Science isn’t faith based, but people often approach it with the same level of faith as many approach religion.

Science has no set belief system as it is always challenged. When all challenges have been exhausted a scientific theory will become fact. Even then it will still be open to challenge as we progress in our understanding. %98 of all scientists that have ever existed are alive today, and our information is doubling every six months.

Religion hasn’t changed or adapted, it has just used faith to repel proven facts. It is not based in anything other than the writings of people long dead. Mired in inconsistancies, religious texts cannot stand in the face of reason. Science can.

So it cannot possibly be a religion as
It is not worshipped.
It is based pure reasoning not faith.
It can be tested.

It is not worshipped.

I would disagree.

Do science & religion have great chemistry? God knows! :¬)

Definition of worship; •idolize: love unquestioningly and uncritically or to excess; venerate as an idol; “Many teenagers idolized the Beatles”
•show devotion to (a deity); “Many Hindus worship Shiva”

@iamthemob “Unquestionably and uncritically” slaps right in the face of scientific reasoning.
Individual scientific theory, or scientist may have been venerated by some by thats not worship.

@thekoukoureport – but you’re assuming that everyone who accepts scientific information does so in a questioning and critical manner. I have already agreed, personally, that science itself runs contrary to such acceptance. However, there is a worship of science by some individuals – I would say that anyone who accepts evolution as a fact without really trying to understand how it works do, in essence, worship science – without the reverent emotional elements – but that really seems to be about semantics.

Certain scientific theories have turned into a religion without a large amount of facts or evidence to back them up (because they satisfy the status quote). I don’t believe that science itself can ever be considered a true religion when the proper scientific method is used.

Like others said, essentially, you’re confusing people that ‘worship’ science with actual science. Science is not a religion, but some people treat it like one.

Both are man-made but science seeks the truth.

Religion claims to have found it.

thats like Parker Brothers claiming to have a line on the Underworld with the Ouiji Board.

even if science seeks the truth, for many things there is not proof and science could still be wrong. There is evidence for most Religions too, but there are also unexplained things. Think of the countless theories of science ( theory of evolution ect.) I would say that science is basically a religion because even though some things are proven, there is still a lot of gray area that some people may be putting too much faith into.

yes there are many unexplained things… but all things are explainable. and when science proves itself wrong, everyone benefits. when religion tries to prove itself right, everyone suffers.

not everyone…

when religion tries to prove itself right, it does so by expousing a perceived moral authority over the common person. who benefits from that… aside from those who pass judgments upon others?

I find it funny that this question has turned into a debate on weather religion is right or wrong.

Right or wrong for what? Religion is perfectly fine for those who benefit from it, the lonely, desperate, those in need both spiritually and financially. But it has no basis whatsoever for determining absolute truth propositions. It’s purely subjective. Science is objective.

At the heart of many religions and many approaches to “science” (such an amorphous term) lies an attempt to monopolize truth (or Truth).

@RealEyesRealizeRealLies – Science may be objective – that doesn’t mean that scientists are. They should be…of course.

you ain’t nevah lied @iamthemob. you ain’t nevah lied

No. But scientism is like a religion.