Science and faith as complementary

[MWin]

Must morality be rooted in the Bible, or more generally, in a worldview of faith, or does morality depend on “common sense”, as is the claim of “Humanist associations” and atheists belonging to different schools of thought? It boils down to the conflict between the spiritual worldview and the ideology of materialistic physicalism, embraced by the atheists. A scientific worldview cannot take into account moral, spiritual, and psychological factors, as reality is portrayed without relation to the human soul. It implies that the scientific paradigm is not quite adequate as a worldview on its own. For instance, medieval paintings have a value perspective in which important persons look larger than others. This is a moral perspective that is equally relevant as the optical perspective, and it is not a sign that medieval man was ignorant. Science and faith ought to be viewed as parallel worldviews that aren’t quite self-sustaining, in themselves, and therefore must be brought to completion by their counterpart.

The medieval painter wasn’t realistic in the optical sense, but neither are today’s scientistic materialists realistic in the moral sense. That’s why there is today no morality of the heart. People instead follow ideological tenets which they have programmed into their heads. This gives rise to an awkward and hypocritical ethics which is neither rooted in the heart nor in the instincts. The consequences are very destructive. For instance, empathy is today viewed as the function by which you donate money to the poor people of the world, to subsidize the growth of vegetative and meaningless human life. This is a robotic definition of empathy. In truth, empathy is the feeling you have for creatures in your vicinity, including your cat and your pot plants.

The distribution of material resources to people who don’t deserve it is by the atheists viewed as the epitome of goodness, which shows that physicalism and atheism cannot function as a groundwork of morality. The moral perspective becomes skewed, perverted, and robotic. The materialistic form of goodness has in the end evil consequences, because it is not founded in the heart, nor in our natural instincts. It is merely a product of the intellect. The foremost example is Marxism, which was created during an epoch in the 19th century when suffering due to poverty and inhumane working conditions was immense. The appalling situation was documented by Friedrich Engels and Charles Dickens.

But Marxist goodness was merely a product of the intellect. The ideal of goodness was “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs”. Atheists, Socialists and Communists programmed this tenet into their heads, aiming to do good, but the result was the opposite. It gave rise to the greatest evil and suffering in world history. Many people still believe in this tenet in some form. According to the American Declaration of Freedom, every person should have equal opportunities to build a good life of their own, but they do not have the right to have all their needs satisfied, which is a Marxist doctrine. As soon as we program ideological tenets into our heads, and stop listening to our heart, we draw the wrong conclusions. Suddenly we start thinking that millions of Third World people have the right to immigrate to our country, and with time take over our country, causing the demise of our civilization. But if we listen to our heart, we realize that it’s not right to give away our country and undermine the civilization that we have inherited from our ancestors. The conclusion is that atheistic morals don’t work, because it is based on mere materialistic premises, just as Marxism.

Mats Winther

 

[jc4751]

Quite a lot of food for thought there.

Some thoughts occurred to me, though –

1. The medieval mind was occupied with the notion of organizing things into hierarchies, with the most “ideal” version of something representing the top of the hierarchy. For example, the lion was considered to be the ideal animal, and the rose the ideal flower, which was why both were well-represented in coats of arms and arts, etc. This is in contrast to modern thought, where the emphasis is to “level” everything, where nothing is better than anything else, etc.
2. I’ve long railed against the notion of “scientism” or whatever term best fits. Science, by its nature, tends to encourage a neutral analysis of data to draw conclusions free of any personal influence or (name removed by moderator)ut (as an example, it’s drummed into the heads of all students to write their lab reports in third person – i.e. “10 mL of H2SO4 was added to the beaker.” – what? Did the acid add itself). The blatantly obvious conclusion is that this ignores “observer effect” (a point made by others, not just myself). So, a scientist trying to make a case for a value-free analysis of a social, economic, or moral situation is hardly doing so, but is just trying to mask a philosophical or ethical argument by an appeal to scientific authority.

2.5. I forget who said it, but “Science makes bad philosophy, religion makes bad science.” Trying to build an ethical and moral system around science has never worked out, from what I can tell. It does not fit a need that people have.

1. Marxism completely ignores observed effects such as spontaneous order and the larger behavior of complex systems, as well as the paradox of perfecting mankind through the use of imperfect men. As a functioning idea and economic system, it is dead and replaced by authoritarian progressivism (I’m not sure how this looks in Europe – in America, Obama embodies it).

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Must morality be rooted in the Bible, or more generally, in a worldview of faith, or does morality depend on “common sense”, as is the claim of “Humanist associations” and atheists belonging to different schools of thought? It boils down to the conflict between the spiritual worldview and the ideology of materialistic physicalism, embraced by the atheists. A scientific worldview cannot take into account moral, spiritual, and psychological factors, as reality is portrayed without relation to the human soul. It implies that the scientific paradigm is not quite adequate as a worldview on its own. For instance, medieval paintings have a value perspective in which important persons look larger than others. This is a moral perspective that is equally relevant as the optical perspective, and it is not a sign that medieval man was ignorant. Science and faith ought to be viewed as parallel worldviews that aren’t quite self-sustaining, in themselves, and therefore must be brought to completion by their counterpart.

The medieval painter wasn’t realistic in the optical sense, but neither are today’s scientistic materialists realistic in the moral sense. That’s why there is today no morality of the heart. People instead follow ideological tenets which they have programmed into their heads. This gives rise to an awkward and hypocritical ethics which is neither rooted in the heart nor in the instincts. The consequences are very destructive. For instance, empathy is today viewed as the function by which you donate money to the poor people of the world, to subsidize the growth of vegetative and meaningless human life. This is a robotic definition of empathy. In truth, empathy is the feeling you have for creatures in your vicinity, including your cat and your pot plants.

The distribution of material resources to people who don’t deserve it is by the atheists viewed as the epitome of goodness, which shows that physicalism and atheism cannot function as a groundwork of morality. The moral perspective becomes skewed, perverted, and robotic. The materialistic form of goodness has in the end evil consequences, because it is not founded in the heart, nor in our natural instincts. It is merely a product of the intellect. The foremost example is Marxism, which was created during an epoch in the 19th century when suffering due to poverty and inhumane working conditions was immense. The appalling situation was documented by Friedrich Engels and Charles Dickens.

But Marxist goodness was merely a product of the intellect. The ideal of goodness was “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs”. Atheists, Socialists and Communists programmed this tenet into their heads, aiming to do good, but the result was the opposite. It gave rise to the greatest evil and suffering in world history. Many people still believe in this tenet in some form. According to the American Declaration of Freedom, every person should have equal opportunities to build a good life of their own, but they do not have the right to have all their needs satisfied, which is a Marxist doctrine. As soon as we program ideological tenets into our heads, and stop listening to our heart, we draw the wrong conclusions. Suddenly we start thinking that millions of Third World people have the right to immigrate to our country, and with time take over our country, causing the demise of our civilization. But if we listen to our heart, we realize that it’s not right to give away our country and undermine the civilization that we have inherited from our ancestors. The conclusion is that atheistic morals don’t work, because it is based on mere materialistic premises, just as Marxism.

Mats Winther

Let’s not beat around the bush. What is the basis for the " morality " we must all have?
What is it and how do we get there? If there is no answer, why raise the issue?
And, whatever it is it will have to be something that can easily understood by the masses, not just by a few academics here and there.

 

[Khalid]

Science, properly interpreted, and the faith, properly understood, can never be in contradiction. Of course, I’m a young-earth creationist, so maybe you shouldn’t listen to me on matters of science.

So, a scientist trying to make a case for a value-free analysis of a social, economic, or moral situation is hardly doing so, but is just trying to mask a philosophical or ethical argument by an appeal to scientific authority.

For that matter, a scientist trying to interpret scientific facts in order to organize them in to a coherent theory, or even a conjecture or hypothesis, can not do so except through his worldview; even the most “unbiased” scientific observation is biased by the observer. The facts are absolute and universal (and quite useless); the interpretations of the facts, which sets them in to a framework, is most emphatically not. That is to say, every scientific argument, as understood by one who has not performed the necessary experiments nor has the relevant data to hand, is an appeal to authority*; all the more so when scientists attempt to do philosophy and explain the nature of morality, or attempt to do theology and explain the origin of all things.

The same is learned in any introductory philosophy classroom (or creationist text), but one must be careful lest one falls in to absolute postmodern relativism (contradiction intended) with such a line of reasoning.

*This is not to say that appeal to authority is inherently unusable, or even inherently fallacious. All of sacred theology is based on an appeal to authority, as is all of civilization and culture - the authority of foundational institutions, of cultural axioms, if you will. The difference is the authority itself: the authority of an infallible and perfect God as he has revealed his will and, truly, himself, or the authority of the conjectures and speculations of fallen men? (Indeed, every thought that comes from man - including sacred theology and interpretation of the Bible - is adulterated with his fallen conjectures and speculations; the rules of logic [and general internal consistency, as well as consistency with aforementioned laws, and the Scriptures] are one way to minimize this, amongst others, although it can never be eliminated this side of the parousia. However, many disciplines have no such checks and balances, so to speak, other than yet more, and opposing, conjectures and hypotheses of fallen men, as they are not amenable to formulation in logic to which the laws of logic can be applied; yet, however, they appear to be internally consistent, giving them a veneer of verisimilitude: thus, “scientific orthodoxy” in the modern Darwinian synthesis, etc. Not long ago, the “scientific orthodoxy” would not have allowed the use of infinites of any sort; enter Cantor. Not long before that, gravity was caused by the earthliness or aetheriferousness of a given substance, tending lower or higher [Aristotelian mechanics]; enter Newton.)

 

[MWin]

Thanks for the comments. The biblical creation story is another bone of contention. Richard Dawkins and the British Humanist Association repudiate it as unscientific. But it is relevant in the same sense as the value perspective of the medieval painter. According to the subjectivistic moral perspective, humanity is much more important than the dinosaurs, and that’s why the creation story focuses on mankind. From an objectivistic perspective, homo sapiens is a latecomer, a speck in the boundless ocean of time and space.

Of course, what perspective you are brought up with is highly relevant to the moral development of the individual and of society. In certain quarters of life, the scientific paradigm is unable to give us the right perspective, and things are given the wrong proportions. What is insignificant from the perspective of the human soul is blown out of proportion, whereas what really matters, namely the improvement of the individual soul, is deemed insignificant by comparison with material betterment and the maximization of the human population on earth.

That’s why the scientific paradigm, despite being a success story, is deficient. In the end, it must be complemented by a spiritual paradigm that sees things differently. It should be possible for the two paradigms to exists side by side, provided that they both give up their ambition of world hegemony. A scientist must realize that there is some sense to the mythological creation stories and the spiritual worldview. On the other hand, creationists must realize that the scientific version of creation is unshakable scientific truth. It should be possible for two complete worldviews to exist side by side, while giving due admission to the alternative worldview. They are not competing worldviews anymore, but alternative aspects of reality.

The scientific paradigm studies nature and its laws as wholly independent of the human soul. Prior to this, people thought that calamities would happen if they had kicked over the traces, for instance. So there was a connection between the soul and the universe. The autonomy of the material world is central to science. There is no magics anymore. That’s why science is unfitted for matters pertaining to the human soul, as it can only relate to the world objectively. The subjective relation is equally important, which means that the spiritual paradigm is not obsolete. Science can take us a long way towards an understanding of the world and the human condition, but in the end it proves inept since it cannot take into account moral, spiritual, and psychological factors, as reality is portrayed without relation to the human soul.

Complementarity is a paradoxical principle invented by Niels Bohr. In the Gifford lectures (‘Causality and Complementarity’, 1948–1950), he suggested that it be used outside the field of quantum physics. I suggest that the sacred and the profane be viewed as two mutually exclusive worldviews, both of which are largely complete. If it is correct that the human self is twofold and complementarian, then it should be possible to uphold both worldviews. Psychology can be described in profane and scientific terms, void of superstition. Psychology may also be accommodated in a spiritual and trinitarian universe, where it always stands in relation to God and the world. Such a relation can always be taken up, so to speak.

But these worldviews cannot be mixed. An advanced consciousness cannot maintain a conglomerative worldview, since the modern individual has been deprived of the unitarian naiveté, characteristic of historical mankind. It is natural for the modern individual to relate to a scientific worldview. He is also capable of taking up a sophisticated trinitarian belief involving contemplation, simplicity, and reclusiveness. I know that many intelligent people find this idea attractive, to go live in retreat and lead a simple life for a time. One must make up one’s mind, for the time being, whether to live in a profane or a spiritual universe. Is this a satisfying solution? In quantum physics, certain theorists have expressed the view that complementarity is a provisional solution, and they are expecting something better in the future. But the complementarity principle seems unshakable. I discuss these matters on my homepage, here.

Mats Winther

 

[edwest2]

I don’t understand why you titled this thread as you did. Humans do not have instincts as animals do, except a baby has a natural instinct to suckle at its mother’s breast.

Science as it understood today is purely mechanistic. At present, scientists are attempting to reverse engineer the entire human body, including the brain. Eventually, genetic switches will be better understood and nano-machines will be introduced into the bloodstream to lodge in cancerous masses, destroying them, and/or cutting off their blood supply. Further advances in adult stem cell research will also add to the healing of damaged body parts.

And make no mistake about it, genetically engineered humans are the goal. At present, I am quite certain that the mechanists will go about this wrong and create stronger, faster soldiers, with greater endurance and perhaps even a natural light armor, but they will ignore the unknown psychological effects. The brain is far more complex than any computer, and the mechanists will have to do far more than duplicate function.

Faith can be understood by natural reason by observing what is made. The mechanists have fantasies about controlling and replicating all life forms. Ethics are unimportant. We and all life, will become products. Enhancements will be expensive. Although life will never be produced in a lab, it will be manipulated, especially in its earliest stages. The resulting life form will be human, but it may have no freedom to make its own choices.

Once a suitably complex artificial intelligence is developed, it will be placed in a robotic humanoid body and armed. Ethics are unimportant. Such humanoid bodies already exist.

Most leading scientists are in the grip of a non-belief system. There is no God, just mechanisms. Their non-human, but human-like creations, will be made of carbon nanofibers, and ceramics and contain nano-machines for self-repair. In the end, they will be used by whoever paid for them in whatever way they see fit. They will even be servants of the ultra-rich.

Faith comes from hearing. Hearing the word of God. Then the Father draws us to the Son, and once we humble ourselves and realize that we are the clay made by God, and formed by Him, we accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Finally, the Holy Spirit comes to dwell in us through water Baptism. Once we are in communion with God and begin to seek the kingdom of Heaven and all that is in it, we look at Faith and Tradition and the teachings of the Catholic Church to help us reach our final goal which is God.

That none of us is without sin and God is no respector of persons. That all we did and said in life we will have to give an account. And the Talents our Lord gave us as gifts through the Holy Spirit, which are different for each of us as He wills. We will have to use them and not bury them in the ground.

I picked up a copy of New Scientist lately and one look at their Letters pages convinced me that the mechanists love what is not alive, and that life is only mechanism. They love things that cannot speak or think on their own. To admit to a greater being who is alive would not suit their worldview. Yes, there are some scientists who know and are in a relationship with God. But with a mind that believes only man is in control, it will be difficult for the others.

Peace,
Ed

 

[MWin]

Human beings have instincts, indeed. Ever heard of Freud? Psychoanalysis has shown that we are driven by instinct, but we tend to rationalize out motives afterwards, claiming that our behaviour is rationally motivated. Arguably, the spiritual urge is even stronger than sexuality.

Yes, the soul of modern man is being invaded with the mechanistic, materialistic spirit, which also comes to expression as Marxist ways of thought, i.e., that human flesh all over the world must be fended for and humanity must be cultivated to grow out of bounds. Also Catholics have been indoctrinated with this materialistic, mechanistic morality. In the 19th century, Catholics did not think that humanity is the supreme good. Nor did they think that the physical welfare of people over the world is of central importance. Something has happened. An obsession with matter and human flesh has taken over. M-L von Franz (Alchemy, 1980) says:

"This pronounced lack of a feminine personification of the unconscious has therefore been compensated by the radical materialism which has gradually taken hold of the Christian tradition. One could say that practically no religion began with such a highly one-sided spiritual accent and has landed - if you think of Communism as the end form of Christian theology - in such an absolutely one-sided materialistic aspect. The swing from one to the other is one of the most striking phenomena we know of in the history of religion…
…]
what seems to be self-evident, i.e., that the State should look after its children, is really the projection of the mother image, and that is not self-evident. He ends his book very intelligently by saying that we should become conscious of what we are projecting onto the State and begin with a real Auseinandersetzung, or confrontation, and not change our laws by just projecting a mother image.

[Marti’s book Urbild und Verfassung] describes a small aspect of a slow turn which on a large scale has happened in the whole Christian civilization and which one could call a secret unobtrusive return to matriarchy and materialism. This enantiodromia has to do with the fact that the Judaeo-Christian religion did not face the archetype of the mother consciously enough. It had to a certain extent excluded the question. It is well known, also, that when Pope Pius XII declared the assumptio Maria his conscious aim was to hit Communistic materialism by elevating, so to speak, a symbol of matter in the Catholic Church, so as to take the wind out of the Communists’ sails. There is a much deeper implication, but that was his conscious idea, namely that the only way to fight the materialistic aspect would be by raising to a higher position the symbol of the feminine Godhead, and with it matter. Since it is the Virgin Mary’s body which is raised to Heaven, emphasis is on the physical material aspect." (von Franz, 1980, pp.212-15)

Mats Winther

 

[Khalid]

Thanks for the comments. The biblical creation story is another bone of contention. Richard Dawkins and the British Humanist Association repudiate it as unscientific. But it is relevant in the same sense as the value perspective of the medieval painter. According to the subjectivistic moral perspective, humanity is much more important than the dinosaurs, and that’s why the creation story focuses on mankind. From an objectivistic perspective, homo sapiens is a latecomer, a speck in the boundless ocean of time and space.

Of course, what perspective you are brought up with is highly relevant to the moral development of the individual and of society. In certain quarters of life, the scientific paradigm is unable to give us the right perspective, and things are given the wrong proportions. What is insignificant from the perspective of the human soul is blown out of proportion, whereas what really matters, namely the improvement of the individual soul, is deemed insignificant by comparison with material betterment and the maximization of the human population on earth.

That’s why the scientific paradigm, despite being a success story, is deficient. In the end, it must be complemented by a spiritual paradigm that sees things differently. It should be possible for the two paradigms to exists side by side, provided that they both give up their ambition of world hegemony. A scientist must realize that there is some sense to the mythological creation stories and the spiritual worldview. On the other hand, creationists must realize that the scientific version of creation is unshakable scientific truth. It should be possible for two complete worldviews to exist side by side, while giving due admission to the alternative worldview. They are not competing worldviews anymore, but alternative aspects of reality.

The scientific paradigm studies nature and its laws as wholly independent of the human soul. Prior to this, people thought that calamities would happen if they had kicked over the traces, for instance. So there was a connection between the soul and the universe. The autonomy of the material world is central to science. There is no magics anymore. That’s why science is unfitted for matters pertaining to the human soul, as it can only relate to the world objectively. The subjective relation is equally important, which means that the spiritual paradigm is not obsolete. Science can take us a long way towards an understanding of the world and the human condition, but in the end it proves inept since it cannot take into account moral, spiritual, and psychological factors, as reality is portrayed without relation to the human soul.

Complementarity is a paradoxical principle invented by Niels Bohr. In the Gifford lectures (‘Causality and Complementarity’, 1948–1950), he suggested that it be used outside the field of quantum physics. I suggest that the sacred and the profane be viewed as two mutually exclusive worldviews, both of which are largely complete. If it is correct that the human self is twofold and complementarian, then it should be possible to uphold both worldviews. Psychology can be described in profane and scientific terms, void of superstition. Psychology may also be accommodated in a spiritual and trinitarian universe, where it always stands in relation to God and the world. Such a relation can always be taken up, so to speak.

But these worldviews cannot be mixed. An advanced consciousness cannot maintain a conglomerative worldview, since the modern individual has been deprived of the unitarian naiveté, characteristic of historical mankind. It is natural for the modern individual to relate to a scientific worldview. He is also capable of taking up a sophisticated trinitarian belief involving contemplation, simplicity, and reclusiveness. I know that many intelligent people find this idea attractive, to go live in retreat and lead a simple life for a time. One must make up one’s mind, for the time being, whether to live in a profane or a spiritual universe. Is this a satisfying solution? In quantum physics, certain theorists have expressed the view that complementarity is a provisional solution, and they are expecting something better in the future. But the complementarity principle seems unshakable. I discuss these matters on my homepage, here.

Mats Winther

If I interpret you correctly, you are advocating a form of Gould’s non-overlapping magisteria, yes?

 

[MWin]

If I interpret you correctly, you are advocating a form of Gould’s non-overlapping magisteria, yes?

Thanks for pointing me to this. I hadn’t heard about it before. No, it doesn’t seem to be quite the same. Science and faith are largely separate and standalone systems, but they aren’t wholly self-sufficient. In the end, they can’t make do without each other. My notion of a complementarity of science and faith is coupled with the twofold nature of the human self (here), which mirrors the hypostatic union of the two nature’s of Christ. The trinitarian self is capable of seeing the universe in symbolic and spiritual terms, whereas the quaternarian self interprets reality in profane and material terms. So they interpret the same reality, which partly overlap. In Stephen Jay Gould’s system, there is a demarcation line between science, which is an explanatory system, whereas faith pertains to moral matters. I am not entirely unsympathetic to his views, but the complementarian view that I suggest is rooted in the human self. The trinitarian self looks at reality with a “third eye”, capable of seeing the spiritual reality that overlays physical reality, a reality in which the biblical creation story is true. It corresponds to the worldview of Australian aborigines. There is a Dream Time in which creation of the world took place, inhabited by the forefather spirits. The aborigines can still see the tracks that the forefather spirits made in the landscape. Aeons ago they already knew about the Man of Suffering, that His sign was the cross, and that he dwelled in Heaven. The following is the Australian aborigine story named The Southern Cross, shortened by me:

…the first humans, two men and a woman, walked the earth. They ate only plants. But one day during a famine, one of the men broke the rules of Baiame, the sky king, and killed a kangaroo rat. The woman ate of it, but the other man would not eat though he was famished for food. Weak as he was he walked angrily away towards the sunset, while the other two still ate hungrily. He continued to walk until he fell down dead under a white gum tree. The death spirit Yowi, a black figure with huge fiery eyes, appeared and dropped the man into the hollow centre of the tree. Then was heard a terrific burst of thunder and the gum tree lifted from the earth towards the southern sky where it planted itself where the Southern Cross is now seen. Two of the shining stars are the eyes of the death spirit, and the other two are the eyes of the first man to die. When all nature realized that the passing of this man meant that death had come into the world, there was wailing everywhere. So is the first coming of death remembered by the tribes, to whom the Southern Cross is a reminder (cf. Langloh Parker, p.9f).

As I say in my article on the blood sacrifice: “The cross is the symbol of the original man who is faithful to God. The conquistadors were surprised to find that it is the symbol of Quetzalcoatl, too. His sacrifice coincides with the disobedient act which creates ego emancipation in its pristine form. With disobedience comes death into the world. But original man, the god-man, is also the future ideal of psychic economy. He is the once and future king, the prototype of a new form of consciousness.”

A person who has a sensitive consciousness, since he lives according to the trinitarian self, can see the truth in the above story of creation. In it, he can also see the truth of Christ. A scientific and a mundane consciousness simply cannot see it, but it doesn’t mean that it is evil. The profane worldview only becomes evil if it tries to oust the trinitarian perspective in order to achieve dominion. But science is not capable of explaining all creation. In the end, scientists will find that the last piece is missing, and it cannot be found. The trinitarian paradigm has the missing piece in the jigsaw puzzle. The same would be true of the trinitarian perspective. A complete worldview cannot be achieved if the last missing piece isn’t provided by the quaternarian paradigm. That’s complementarity in terms of Niels Bohr.

Mats Winther

 

[Burdensome1]

Thanks for the comments. The biblical creation story is another bone of contention. Richard Dawkins and the British Humanist Association repudiate it as unscientific

This is because they are busily warring against fundamentalist Biblical literalism, not mainstream and traditional Christianity, but I think most people know that already.

 

[edwest2]

This is because they are busily warring against fundamentalist Biblical literalism, not mainstream and traditional Christianity, but I think most people know that already.

And the specific consequences of Biblical literalism are what? No one - ever - answers that question.

People like Dawkins, et al, are just angry and want things the way they want them. They want their conscience unimpeded by the fact that there is a God.

Peace,
Ed

 

[SuperLuigi]

Must morality be rooted in the Bible, or more generally, in a worldview of faith, or does morality depend on “common sense”, as is the claim of “Humanist associations” and atheists belonging to different schools of thought? It boils down to the conflict between the spiritual worldview and the ideology of materialistic physicalism, embraced by the atheists. A scientific worldview cannot take into account moral, spiritual, and psychological factors, as reality is portrayed without relation to the human soul. It implies that the scientific paradigm is not quite adequate as a worldview on its own. For instance, medieval paintings have a value perspective in which important persons look larger than others. This is a moral perspective that is equally relevant as the optical perspective, and it is not a sign that medieval man was ignorant. Science and faith ought to be viewed as parallel worldviews that aren’t quite self-sustaining, in themselves, and therefore must be brought to completion by their counterpart.

The medieval painter wasn’t realistic in the optical sense, but neither are today’s scientistic materialists realistic in the moral sense. That’s why there is today no morality of the heart. People instead follow ideological tenets which they have programmed into their heads. This gives rise to an awkward and hypocritical ethics which is neither rooted in the heart nor in the instincts. The consequences are very destructive. For instance, empathy is today viewed as the function by which you donate money to the poor people of the world, to subsidize the growth of vegetative and meaningless human life. This is a robotic definition of empathy. In truth, empathy is the feeling you have for creatures in your vicinity, including your cat and your pot plants.

The distribution of material resources to people who don’t deserve it is by the atheists viewed as the epitome of goodness, which shows that physicalism and atheism cannot function as a groundwork of morality. The moral perspective becomes skewed, perverted, and robotic. The materialistic form of goodness has in the end evil consequences, because it is not founded in the heart, nor in our natural instincts. It is merely a product of the intellect. The foremost example is Marxism, which was created during an epoch in the 19th century when suffering due to poverty and inhumane working conditions was immense. The appalling situation was documented by Friedrich Engels and Charles Dickens.

But Marxist goodness was merely a product of the intellect. The ideal of goodness was “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs”. Atheists, Socialists and Communists programmed this tenet into their heads, aiming to do good, but the result was the opposite. It gave rise to the greatest evil and suffering in world history. Many people still believe in this tenet in some form. According to the American Declaration of Freedom, every person should have equal opportunities to build a good life of their own, but they do not have the right to have all their needs satisfied, which is a Marxist doctrine. As soon as we program ideological tenets into our heads, and stop listening to our heart, we draw the wrong conclusions. Suddenly we start thinking that millions of Third World people have the right to immigrate to our country, and with time take over our country, causing the demise of our civilization. But if we listen to our heart, we realize that it’s not right to give away our country and undermine the civilization that we have inherited from our ancestors. The conclusion is that atheistic morals don’t work, because it is based on mere materialistic premises, just as Marxism.

Mats Winther

People need to be free to prosper and succeed.

Marxism was never purely successful anywhere, not even in Cuba or the USSR.

The night janitor at St. Petersburg high wasn’t making the same as the head of the KGB.

Equal distribution of everything cannot work because it’s just against human nature.

Most of the people I see who are socialists are so because they think they will get more, not have to give something up.

In a sheer twist of irony, even the fundamental fabric of sacrifice in socialism has been compromised by the entitlement society.

The US Constitution provides for equal opportunity, but not equal outcomes.

As far as atheists and non-religious folks go, here’s a favorite quote:

“A society that believes in something will always defeat one that believes in nothing”.

 

[Khalid]

This is because they are busily warring against fundamentalist Biblical literalism, not mainstream and traditional Christianity, but I think most people know that already.

Mainstream traditional Christianity, as represented in the unanimous consent of the Church Fathers, treats the Genesis creation account as factual, narrative history, and the world as less than 10,000 years old (at the outside - Origen is the only one I know who wrote of “younger than 10,000 years”), and, generally, 6,000 years old (they generally used the Septuagint chronology which added 1,000 years, but which is demonstrably false on a close reading, as Methuselah lived for years after the flood according to it). Even those Fathers who are interpreted in some way as being “less literalist”, such as St Augustine, are “less literalist” in the wrong direction, believing that all of creation was instantaneous instead of taking a week - but still believing in a young earth (cf. the chapter in City of God called “On the Foolishness of those who Believe that Many Thousands of Years of History Have Passed” or something similar).

Now, if all of the Church Fathers made an error (I don’t believe they did), it’s still an error: truth is not amenable to majority vote, not even if it’s a unanimous majority of learned and saintly men. Falsehood is falsehood due to a lack of truth, and truth is a thing in and of itself. But, insofar as determining what the Church has historically believed, it - Patristic consensus - so determines it. Even if they were all in error, it was unanimous error.

The literal parts of the Bible should be taken literally, the metaphorical parts metaphorically, the poetical parts metaphorically or poetically, the parables as parables, the visions (Daniel, Ezekiel, Revelation) as who-knows-what, so on and so forth. This is not “rank Biblical literalism”, it’s sound basic hermeneutics. (That’s not to say that the literal passages don’t also have a metaphorical meaning or a sensus plenior: but the metaphorical meaning is based on the real, historical, literal one, such as the typology of Melchizedek/Christ/the Priest, or Noah’s Ark/the Barque of Peter. Cf. “the four senses of Scripture”.)

The “mainstream” Christianity that interprets the Bible otherwise (not just in the creation account, but, often, in the moral injunctions of the New Testament, etc.) is equivalent to (and indeed, is the hermeneutical lifeblood of) the “mainline” Protestant churches, which, I heard an evangelical say once, are, indeed, the “sideline” churches (he was speaking of numbers, but it is equally applicable to continuity with the tradition of historic Christian belief and orthodoxy).

And the specific consequences of Biblical literalism are what? No one - ever - answers that question.

People like Dawkins, et al, are just angry and want things the way they want them. They want their conscience unimpeded by the fact that there is a God.

Amen. I believe that they are lacking in knowledge of theology to such a degree that they believe that “literalism” entails following the Mosaic demands for clothing, re-establishing the Levitical priesthood, rebuilding the temple, and killing children who swear at their parents. And have obviously no concept of “coventant(al) theology”, or “supersessionism”, or “old” v. “new” covenant, or supersessionism, or Church as Israel, etc., etc.

I say this because I have often heard, as a snide and unlearned remark, while defending a literal view of Genesis, or, sometimes a literal view of the Pauline Vice Lists, or Paul’s inspired statements on gender, “if you take that literally, [the word “literally” here being enunciated as if it were an insult or curse of the highest degree], I suppose you believe we should be polygamists [like the Patriarchs] and kill our children for disrespecting their parents, and stone adulterers to death”. The Muslims may be on to something with how they deal with adultery, but such a comment betrays an extreme Biblical ignorance (disregarding the question of authenticity of this passage), in that “stoning adulterers to death” was a literalism that Jesus Christ himself addressed in the Pericope Adulterae (and abolished). (Just as Genesis was a literalism he himself addressed in several other areas [and unstintingly upheld].)

 

[Khalid]

Oh, and Dawkins, he predecessor Sagan, etc. could care less about Biblical literalism or the Genesis creation myth (the term used here purposefully).

They rail against, disdain, and often actively hate theism (Dawkins does especially, likening Sunday School to child abuse), and Biblical theism especially. If all Christians were liberal Episcopalians, Dawkins would still rail against Christianity.

 

[Justin_Time]

Just a thought! Reality … E=mc2 proves the existence of 2 dualities, Matter/Energy, Time/Space, another duality exists which can’t be proven, (because it’s transcendental) but without it no theories would exist! The 3rd duality is Mind/Spirit! Think, conceptually 1/3 of reality we can’t prove exists, yet how much of our time, space, matter and energy in our existence is given to that? The contents of books, and other media, the buildings; Universities, Temples, Churches, etc. Philosophies, Theology all about what we can’t prove! (And some Religions don’t acknowledge this reality!) Think about how this three dimensional creation is a reflection of our Creator. What is; sunlight through a prism gives 3 primary colors, sound is tone, pitch, and volume, matter and space are measured by length, width, and height, matter as liquid, solid, gas, time can be viewed as past, present, and future (but not in OUR reality for our past or future does not exist, only now is!) It’s funny, the Theory of Relativity (Also 3D) proves the absolute content of the Universe, but no one can prove relative content (In our minds we can hold ideas of an absolute nature, God, math, and concepts like uniqueness, but much of what we think is dependent on or interconnected with something else; not absolute.)! If I could do that rather than just reason how things are than I’d be smart! I can’t claim this reasoning is mine at all, as I just asked God for help when an atheist said he only believed in what he could sense (touch, hear, see) but he wasn’t using his common sense … and this is what God gave me! Ahhh, Reality, and our perception of it! I heard of an explorer who met a South American tribe that had no word of name for the color blue. It’s difficult for me to assimilate as how they could not have such basic conceptual knowledge! For me inconceivable. Maybe their environment didn’t contain enough blue for it to be important enough to name, or their culture had not developed to that extent, the more I thought about it the harder it was for me to accept, like sound without volume, or time without past, how could … and then it happened! Time stood still for me! It was only an instance of time, but then it was my choice, I could either continue with time, or let time pass me by. I decided to stay with time, but that instant was so illuminating, so powerful, so absolute it’ll be with me until I’m in that state again, not in or out of time, but before, and after time. We seen things in a certain way. We’ve been formatted into a consciousness, an awareness of ourselves and the world around us, a view of reality, a perception of the way things are! But things are not as we think they are! Peter came to this understanding when he asked Jesus to allow him to come to Him when He was walking on water! Peter only took a few steps before the way ‘he knew the world was’ made him sink in his reality! So this is it! Welcome to what some call unreal, but is the truth! All that is, is caused or allowed by God! If you feel this has any relavant worth, please keep it to yourself, or share it if you like, especially with those in need!

 

[buffalo]

** The Magician’s Twin - CS Lewis **

A powerful must see video:

---

**The Magician’s Twin: C.S. Lewis and the Case against Scientism **

The Similarity Between Science and Magic

1. Science as religion
2. Science as credulity
3. Science as power

 

[CHRISTINE77]

Science and religion have gone hand in hand for eons, until this modern age. If you want to take a really great course try: Science and Religion by Lawrence Principe (Great Courses)

Here’s a little snippet:

Professor Lawrence M. Principe unfolds a surprisingly cooperative dynamic in which theologians and natural scientists share methods, ideas, aspirations, and a tradition of disputational dialogue.

St. Augustine warned that it is dangerous for religious people to ignore science: “Many non-Christians are well versed in natural knowledge, so they can detect vast ignorance in such a Christian and laugh it to scorn.” He added that interpretation of biblical passages must be informed by the current state of demonstrable knowledge.

On the other hand, Sir Isaac Newton freely discusses the attributes and activities of God in Principia Mathematica, which sets forth his theory of gravity and laws of motion.

These examples represent the traditional relationship of science and religion that is too often obscured by the divisive, hot-headed rhetoric and the gross oversimplifications we often see in today’s headlines. Long before the shouting and the sloganeering, scientists and theologians pursued a unity of truth, and most theologians have agreed with the advice of Galileo’s colleague, Cardinal Baronio, that the Bible “tells us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go.”

 

[edwest2]

Science and religion have gone hand in hand for eons, until this modern age. If you want to take a really great course try: Science and Religion by Lawrence Principe (Great Courses)

Here’s a little snippet:

Professor Lawrence M. Principe unfolds a surprisingly cooperative dynamic in which theologians and natural scientists share methods, ideas, aspirations, and a tradition of disputational dialogue.

St. Augustine warned that it is dangerous for religious people to ignore science: “Many non-Christians are well versed in natural knowledge, so they can detect vast ignorance in such a Christian and laugh it to scorn.” He added that interpretation of biblical passages must be informed by the current state of demonstrable knowledge.

On the other hand, Sir Isaac Newton freely discusses the attributes and activities of God in Principia Mathematica, which sets forth his theory of gravity and laws of motion.

These examples represent the traditional relationship of science and religion that is too often obscured by the divisive, hot-headed rhetoric and the gross oversimplifications we often see in today’s headlines. Long before the shouting and the sloganeering, scientists and theologians pursued a unity of truth, and most theologians have agreed with the advice of Galileo’s colleague, Cardinal Baronio, that the Bible “tells us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go.”

There is no reason to believe the opening statement. Science, as practiced today, cannot study God or the soul. No dialogue is desirable or possible. There are no peer reviewed papers about the supernatural. However, you will hear this:

secularhumanism.org/index.php?page=harris_27_2&section=library

Interpretation of biblical passages? There are strict rules:

“Let them strive with every force and effort to further the progress of the sciences which they teach; but let them also be careful not to transgress the limits which We have established for the protection of the truth of Catholic faith and doctrine. With regard to new questions, which modern culture and progress have brought to the foreground, let them engage in most careful research, but with the necessary prudence and caution; finally, let them not think, indulging in a false “irenism,” that the dissident and the erring can happily be brought back to the bosom of the Church, if the whole truth found in the Church is not sincerely taught to all without corruption or diminution.” Humani Generis, 1950

Peace,
Ed

 

[Faith_is_bad]

To believe something without evidence is not scientific, faith is not needing evidence. There are scientists who believe unscientific things, but they don’t apply those thoughts to their science. Issac Newton believed in alchemy, it doesn’t mean that alchemy isn’t nonsense. To say that there is no issue with faith in science is true in the sense that you can ignore the contradictions. If you think that faith and science go well together then use faith as a justification in a scientific paper and see how it goes. Also it seems like you have no idea what you are talking about when it comes to the moral philosophy that you claim atheists have. You can chose to define the word morality however you like, in that sense it is subjective. Saying that it’s what god commands doesn’t make it any less subjective, you just subjectively chose to use the definition that the church has provided for you. I subjectively chose to base my morality on the real suffering and happiness of other people. If you use that standard, things like telling a person who is attracted to the same sex that they have an “inherent moral evil” is morally reprehensible. Especially since you have no evidence for such a claim. Faith may be a high enough standard for you, but it’s not good enough to tell other people how to live their lives. Good day sir.

 

[VeritasLuxMea]

Mainstream traditional Christianity, as represented in the unanimous consent of the Church Fathers, treats the Genesis creation account as factual, narrative history, and the world as less than 10,000 years old (at the outside - Origen is the only one I know who wrote of “younger than 10,000 years”), and, generally, 6,000 years old (they generally used the Septuagint chronology which added 1,000 years, but which is demonstrably false on a close reading, as Methuselah lived for years after the flood according to it). Even those Fathers who are interpreted in some way as being “less literalist”, such as St Augustine, are “less literalist” in the wrong direction, believing that all of creation was instantaneous instead of taking a week - but still believing in a young earth (cf. the chapter in City of God called “On the Foolishness of those who Believe that Many Thousands of Years of History Have Passed” or something similar).

Now, if all of the Church Fathers made an error (I don’t believe they did), it’s still an error: truth is not amenable to majority vote, not even if it’s a unanimous majority of learned and saintly men. Falsehood is falsehood due to a lack of truth, and truth is a thing in and of itself. But, insofar as determining what the Church has historically believed, it - Patristic consensus - so determines it. Even if they were all in error, it was unanimous error.

This seems unlikely. For starters, what scientific credibility would these people have had? It wouldn’t be until at least 15+ centuries later that we would discover germs, so what, am I supposed to believe that they’re examining the fossil record? We hadn’t even fully formulated the scientific method, but we’re already determining the age of the Earth?

These were learned men and I have no doubt they were taking their best guess, but seriously now, how could they possibly be trusted to make such judgements? It’s not fair to us (insofar as we are forced to abandon scientific inquiry to reach this conclusion) and neither is it fair to them (insofar as they are being held to a standard they cannot possibly reach).

Are you saying we should believe this because they were in direct communication with God? If so, how is one supposed to even begin to counter such a non-falsifiable claim?

Further, how are we to make sense of the unanimous agreement of modern scientists that the Earth is far older than 10,000 years? Is it a grand conspiracy? Is Satan leaving us boatloads of false clues about the age of the planet? If it is that easy to create such a false consensus then why even trust scientific inquiry at all, on any subject, at that point?
Faithisbad:

You can chose to define the word morality however you like, in that sense it is subjective. Saying that it’s what god commands doesn’t make it any less subjective, you just subjectively chose to use the definition that the church has provided for you. I subjectively chose to base my morality on the real suffering and happiness of other people. If you use that standard, things like telling a person who is attracted to the same sex that they have an “inherent moral evil” is morally reprehensible. Especially since you have no evidence for such a claim. Faith may be a high enough standard for you, but it’s not good enough to tell other people how to live their lives. Good day sir.

I tend to agree with much of what you say, but this is not the time or place for this conversation.