Quote:
Originally Posted by octothorp
If the scientific community takes a rigid stand, it's going to come back and bite them in the ass. As scientific exploration becomes increasingly intangible and decreasingly practical, they're going to want to be granted the same tolerance that religion deserves. Consider string theory: most string theorists talk in terms of belief, as opposed to knowledge: a series of complex equations that can't currently be proven or disproven, and which they may never be provable; and objections to string theory have largely been answered by tweaking the equations. I'm not directly equating string theory with religion, but in looking at string theory, it's pretty easy to imagine how, in a predominantly atheist world, theories gradually become dogmas. Sure, it's possible for experts still to grapple with the theories themselves, but certainly it's becoming increasingly difficult for the common man to have more than a passing familiarity with advanced scientific concepts. As that disconnect between science and public knowledge expands, scientists will need to ask the public increasingly for belief. If you discount religion simply on the grounds that it cannot be proven, some areas of scientific study may eventually reach a point where they, too, are unable to advance because doing so would require belief.
|
I agree with you on one thing...
The Majority of people need everything to make sense, and will take "leaps of faith/science" for that to happen...
However i disagree that science is becoming overly theoretical and hard to prove.... if you read about the history of science you know that people have taken these leaps of science throughout history... from Einstein to Newton to Darwin to Gallileo... these guys understood the universe differently from convention and hence did not really receive recognition for their acheivments until much later... how many people even today understand Einsteins Special Theory of Relativity???
I think it is a mistake to think that we will reach a boundry in science where beleif is required to make sense of the world.... because there is always someone out there trying to prove/disprove the theory..
Fact is... our understanding of the way the world works changes everyday and has expanded exponentially in the last few centuries... but our understanding of the way god works hasnt changed for Millenia... I think it is time for relgion to catch up with the modern times and realize that "god created it" is not a suitable answer for problems in life.