Nothing holding back science in all those private Catholic, Methodist, Lutheran, Anglican and non-denominational Christian schools which dominated the Science Teachers' Association award ceremony at La Trobe University in Melbourne recently.

It was kind of funny to see one award after another being handed out to students whose school uniforms were emblazoned with Christian imagery... given that one of the major sponsors handing out awards was the Australian Skeptics.

http://www.skeptics.com.au/about/us/

Meanwhile, on the other hand, look at the long-time atheist and rational believer in science, over at Rational Response Squad who recently announced to his (erstwhile) fellow atheists...

"... I have some bad (or good news depending on how you look at it)...I've de-de-converted.... Sorry if this comes as a shock... call me irrational or whatever.. just thought I'd let you guys know..."

Now he is under siege on all sides from atheists for De-de-converting like "Flew, McGrath, Lewis, Collins..."
And science is - likewise - central to his return to theism.

ubuntuAnyone wrote :
"And what I'm talking about is, as I've said, because science evidence-based reasoning is zero-sum... The arguments for and against belief in a god are shored up by evidence from science on both sides...."

Maybe he had a stroke, or some sort of brain tumor. That's the only way I'd ever convert to theism. Well, good acid, maybe, but only while peaking.

wow, some lunk becomes convinced by faulty reasoning and people call him out for that. CENSORSHIP and BRUTAL ATTACK! get a grip, Lion.

Lion IRC wrote:Nothing holding back science in all those private Catholic, Methodist, Lutheran, Anglican and non-denominational Christian schools which dominated the Science Teachers' Association award ceremony at La Trobe University in Melbourne recently.

It was kind of funny to see one award after another being handed out to students whose school uniforms were emblazoned with Christian imagery... given that one of the major sponsors handing out awards was the Australian Skeptics.

http://www.skeptics.com.au/about/us/

I agree the OP is wrong on most points. But there is probably an explanation for this phenomena...

A huge majority of private schools are listed as "christian" schools. (Even though they each get millions in government funding each year.)

They didn't get top scores because they were being brainwashed with religion, Lion. They are just the rich kids who spend their whole lives studying and happen to go to a private school, of which are mostly Christian schools.

Btw, I don't know about Melbourne but most people I know going to private schools have been completely turned off religion. So just because they have a crucifix on their uniform doesn't actually mean they believe anything they are told in scripture class.

Yes the government kicked in some sponsorship money too.
I like science.

Lion IRC wrote:Meanwhile, on the other hand, look at the long-time atheist and rational believer in science, over at Rational Response Squad who recently announced to his (erstwhile) fellow atheists...

"... I have some bad (or good news depending on how you look at it)...I've de-de-converted.... Sorry if this comes as a shock... call me irrational or whatever.. just thought I'd let you guys know..."

Now he is under siege on all sides from atheists for De-de-converting like "Flew, McGrath, Lewis, Collins..."
And science is - likewise - central to his return to theism.

ubuntuAnyone wrote :
"And what I'm talking about is, as I've said, because science evidence-based reasoning is zero-sum... The arguments for and against belief in a god are shored up by evidence from science on both sides...."

I don't know if I'd say science is central to what he's saying. He's using some key ideas from Pascal's Wager to make a pragmatic case for belief from practical reason. If science was central I'd expect him to be primarily concerned with theoretic reason, whereas he seems convinced that theoretic cases all come out equal and so practical reasoning is the way to go.

Do note that I didn't read the whole thing though. It got pretty repetitive, so I only read the first and last pages.

Flew? McGrath? Collins?

Huh?

Anthony Flew. Alister McGrath. Francis Collins.
ubuntuAnyone specifically identifies with these ppl whose conversion from atheism to theism was underpinned strongly by science - not Pascals Wager.

Oldskeptic wrote:Don't you know that anytime you mention Bruno that Tim descends to tell you how wrong you are?

Bruno is a no no He was persecuted and executed for heretical religious ideas that he could not defend, don't you know? And Galileo caused his own demise because he was a fucking arrogant asshole that could not defend his ideas.

Tim only descends when the case is overstated, and I don't think I've overstated it.

Lion IRC wrote:Anthony Flew. Alister McGrath. Francis Collins.
ubuntuAnyone specifically identifies with these ppl whose conversion from atheism to theism was underpinned strongly by science - not Pascals Wager.

Flew's conversion was not strongly underpinned by science, but by creeping senility. You should be ashamed to even utter his name in support of your fuckwittery.

Lion IRC wrote:Anthony Flew. Alister McGrath. Francis Collins.
ubuntuAnyone specifically identifies with these ppl whose conversion from atheism to theism was underpinned strongly by science - not Pascals Wager.

He identified with them for the "de-de-conversion" as far as I can tell. His own reasons for believing are as he says: a pragmatic case for belief supported by important features of Pascal's Wager. He says that science is central to the theoretic case for either theism or atheism, but he's also stated that he doesn't think either one wins out. So he's making a practical case instead.

So on that understanding, science is not central to his belief.

hackenslash wrote:Well, the most obvious examples are found in expositions of a heliocentric cosmos. Copernicus presented his work as a model for predicting the motions of celestial bodies only, not as an accurate picture of reality, precisely because he was concerned about charges of heresy*.

Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake for going on step further and asserting it as truth. The church was perfectly happy to accept a heliocentric model as a basis for the purposes of prediction, but asserting it as truth strays into heresy, and indeed it was this that led to the trial of Galileo. Galileo, of course, submitted to the will of the church and recanted position in this regard. Essentially, it's the distinction between a predictive model and a metaphysical statement, as susu.exp has pointed out on occasion.

*It should be noted that some of the blame for this is laid at the feet of Osimander, who is thought to have edited the work somewhat when he took control of the publication of Copernicus' work while Copernicus was on his deathbed.

There is also the much earlier case of Aristarchos of Samos who was the first I know of to promote a heliocentric system. Also reasoning that the stars were at vastly greater distances than was commonly believed. Not much of his work survives but he did come up with a method of determining the distance between the Earth and Sun. This was the recorded reaction:

Tassoul wrote:Cleanthes thought it was the duty of the Greeks to indict Aristarchus (sic) on the charge of impiety for putting in motion the hearth of the universe ... supposing the heaven to remain at rest and the earth to revolve in an oblique circle, while it rotates, at the same time, about its own axis.

Different religion. Same story.

Lion IRC wrote:Nothing holding back science in all those private Catholic, Methodist, Lutheran, Anglican and non-denominational Christian schools which dominated the Science Teachers' Association award ceremony at La Trobe University in Melbourne recently.

It was kind of funny to see one award after another being handed out to students whose school uniforms were emblazoned with Christian imagery... given that one of the major sponsors handing out awards was the Australian Skeptics.

http://www.skeptics.com.au/about/us/

Don't worry Lion. Most of them will end up as atheists. They will be smart enough to see through the nonsense if they haven't already.

De Grasse Tyson makes a fairly good case for religious restriction of science at the level of a culture, albeit traceable to an individual.

Evidence for individual effects seems to be lacking. Although he tries to argue that Newton would have discovered perturbation theory had he not been religious, I find that to be a bald assertion.

It is possible to find cases where an individual's religious beliefs do not seem to have harmed their thinking much (Francis Collins, Martin Gardner). It is possible to find cases where the beliefs of someone not working in a scientific field did harm their thinking (Greg Bear). However, I haven't seen cases where an individual working in a scientific field had thinking impaired by religious belief. Of course, there are lots of electrical engineers who have gone off on various rather idiotic rants based on beliefs, but they remain about the same as electrical engineers. Einstein was harmed by his bias toward classical interpretations, but that's not really religious.

This seems odd to me, as it seems extremely plausible that it should happen, but there doesn't seem much evidence that it does.

Even though religion itself was responsible for some scientific theories and discoveries it does see science as major threat. Why? Simply cause religion claims to be true, now if all religions never claimed to be true in the first place we will be a lot more advanced then we are now, we may even be spreading to other planets by now and possibly we haven't fucked up the planet much either. I love how religions try to evolve their claims when they are proven wrong by science like with evolution for example, the evidence of evolution is overwhelming yet religious believers who do accept evoultion simply use the "It was guided by God" line.

When people talk about religion holding back science reminds me of that episode of Family Guy when Stevie and Brian explore parallel universes and they go to one where Christianity never existed and because of that the dark ages never happened which meant that humans are now a thousand years more advanced. While many religious believers are anti-science there are also many who are pro-science but mind you some of those will only use science if and when it suits them. There is a big difference between science and religion, if science is proven wrong then scientists admit it and move on no problem however if religions are proven wrong well you see how some believers react.

klazmon wrote:

Lion IRC wrote:Nothing holding back science in all those private Catholic, Methodist, Lutheran, Anglican and non-denominational Christian schools which dominated the Science Teachers' Association award ceremony at La Trobe University in Melbourne recently.

It was kind of funny to see one award after another being handed out to students whose school uniforms were emblazoned with Christian imagery... given that one of the major sponsors handing out awards was the Australian Skeptics.

http://www.skeptics.com.au/about/us/

Don't worry Lion. Most of them will end up as atheists. They will be smart enough to see through the nonsense if they haven't already.

What about the science teachers (theists) who teach them? What about the Christian parents who send their children to these schools - where science is core curriculum? Science doesnt hold back Christianity or theism in general and I dont see any indication that science is struggling to break free from the constraints of religion.

Scientists - atheist or theist - are still moral agents and accountable ethically for the consequences of their work. If any morality-based "belief" is holding back science it's probably a good thing. And atheists/humanists also have beliefs in this regard.

On a related note, it was refreshing to hear an atheist, Peter Millican, refer to the "beliefs" of atheists in his recent debate with William Lane Craig.

Spinozasgalt wrote:

Lion IRC wrote:Anthony Flew. Alister McGrath. Francis Collins.
ubuntuAnyone specifically identifies with these ppl whose conversion from atheism to theism was underpinned strongly by science - not Pascals Wager.

He identified with them for the "de-de-conversion" as far as I can tell. His own reasons for believing are as he says: a pragmatic case for belief supported by important features of Pascal's Wager. He says that science is central to the theoretic case for either theism or atheism, but he's also stated that he doesn't think either one wins out. So he's making a practical case instead.

So on that understanding, science is not central to his belief.

Science is central to everyones beliefs.

God - yes
or
God - no

Sensory detection of evidence is definitely central to anyone who finds themself at either end of the Dawkins 0-7 scale.

I don't see any pragmatic reasons to believe in god .Theism does nothing special and the justifications for it are unsuccessfull .That ubuntuAnyone dude really needs to do better, a pragmatic keep the most basic belief needed for everyday life what is belief in a god used for ?