Brain Fertilizer

"There is nothing in science that disproves God."

There is nothing in science to disprove the great galactic chicken either, but that doesn't mean it exists!

"There is nothing in religion that contradicts science."

Unless of course you ignore the creation of the Earth in 6 days, parting the Red Sea, Turning water into wine, a man being swalloed by a whale and living to tell the tale, walking on water, surviving a warm moment in a furnace, coming back from the dead, healing genetic defects through touch, etc...

Ooh! You really got me on that one!

[snicker]

Actually, people do cling to ideas they know to be wrong, or probably a better way to say it, they cling to incomplete data because they're afraid to have their worldview changed. It means a lot of work and some discomfort.

But we're human. We have a finite mind, and there's an infinite amount of information. Everyone makes judgements on incomplete data. The human mind is a pattern recognition machine which means it doesn't require 100% information to process.

Why we call this 'intelligence', I have no idea. ;)

I know what you mean, and that's a large part of what I'm saying, SaaM.

I just find it ironic when someone who uses science as their authority claims things any decent scientist never would, i.e., we already know all we need to assume there is no room for God in the universe...
There is overlap, and someone's understanding of science can and does lead to greater faith, and people's faith in God can often lead to startling insights in science.
It is no accident that both Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein were Christians.

Let me clarify my agreement with SaaM in light of stating nearly the exact opposite in my post:

Logically, we only espouse the views we believe. "Playing Devil's Advocate" is the only way we might argue for a belief we don't hold, but most people won't argue from that viewpoint consistently and deeply.

But as SaaM points out, some people do argue for some things that they don't want to believe, but do. That's where we get things like cognitive dissonance and subconsciousness running counter to what we think we believe. It can be as simple as "knowing" there is no bogeyman upstairs and yet still be scared to go up there alone.

However, that is beyond the scope of what I was talking about.

The thing is, they type of people who enter into these type of arguments are the type of people who feel they have investigated the matter and come to the right answer (or at least a right answer), and so aren't really willing to budge. And yet, most people do hold varying amounts of self-contradictory beliefs, and that means that these types of arguments often hit our sensitivities, which is why so many of these arguments turn uncivil.

Science and Religion have different spheres. I often argue that the Bible is perfect and inerrant when used correctly, i.e., you wouldn't expect a road map to be perfect and inerrant to use as an aircraft navigation chart, would you? Well, science and religion have different uses/purposes/functions as well. You don't use philosophy to answer the math questions of building a bridge. But you also don't use all of science, i.e., biology may be absolutely 100% correct, but is of little use in building that same bridge.

The overlap I mentioned is not in the spheres, but in people's hearts/minds. That's why so many (but not all...heck, I wouldn't even say 'most') scientists are Christians, and so many Christians are fully conversant in science. I am just as at home reading Stephen Hawkings as C.S. Lewis, although I really haven't read enough of either lately, alas!