Esprime, a mio avviso, abbastanza bene il mio pensiero (e descrive il pensiero scientifico, UAAR o non UAAR ).

Relationship between religion and science - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Riporto i passi che reputo significati e che dovrebbero far riflettere:

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Perspectives on the relationship between religion and science


Medieval artistic illustration of the spherical Earth in a 13th century copy of L'Image du monde (ca. 1246).


The kinds of interactions that might arise between science and religion have been classified using the following typology:[2]

1. Conflict when either discipline threatens to take over the legitimate concerns of the other
   • For example, John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White's conflict thesis
2. Independence treating each as quite separate realms of enquiry.
   • For example, Stephen Jay Gould's Non-Overlapping Magisteria (NOMA)
3. Dialogue suggesting that each field has things to say to each other about phenomena in which their interests overlap.
   • For example, William G. Pollard's studies in Physicist and Christian: A dialogue between the communities
4. Integration aiming to unify both fields into a single discourse.
   • For example, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin's Omega point and Ian Barbour's sympathy towards process philosophy/process theology[3]

This typology is similar to ones found in Ian Barbour[4] and John Haught.[5] More typologies that categorize this relationship can be found among the works of other science and religion scholars such as Arthur Peacocke.[6]
[edit] Conflict

A variety of historical, philosophical, and scientific arguments have been put forth in favor of the idea that science and religion are in conflict. Historical examples of religious individuals or institutions promoting claims that contradict both contemporary and modern scientific consensus include creationism, the Roman Catholic Church's opposition to heliocentrism from 1616 to 1757[7] including the Galileo affair, and more recently, Pope Benedict XVI's 2009 statements claiming that the use of condoms to combat the AIDS epidemic in Africa was ineffective and counterproductive.[8] Additionally, long held religious claims have been challenged by scientific studies such as STEP,[9] which examined the efficacy of prayer. A number of scientists including Jerry Coyne[10] have made an argument for a philosophical incompatibility between religion and science. An argument for the conflict between religion and science that combines the historical and philosophical approaches has been presented by Neil Degrasse Tyson[11] -- Tyson argues that religious scientists, such as Newton, could have achieved more had they not accepted religious answers to unresolved scientific issues.
[edit] Conflict thesis

The conflict thesis, which holds that religion and science have been in conflict continuously throughout history, was popularized in the 19th century by John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White. Most contemporary historians of science now reject the conflict thesis in its original form, arguing instead that it has been superseded by subsequent historical research indicating a more nuanced understanding:[12][13]

Although popular images of controversy continue to exemplify the supposed hostility of Christianity to new scientific theories, studies have shown that Christianity has often nurtured and encouraged scientific endeavour, while at other times the two have co-existed without either tension or attempts at harmonization. If Galileo and the Scopes trial come to mind as examples of conflict, they were the exceptions rather than the rule.

– Gary Ferngren, Science & Religion[14]

Today, much of the scholarship in which the conflict thesis was originally based is considered to be inaccurate. For instance, the claim that people of the Middle Ages widely believed that the Earth was flat was first propagated in the same period that originated the conflict thesis[15] and is still very common in popular culture. This claim is mistaken, as the contemporary historians of science David C. Lindberg and Ronald L. Numbers write: "there was scarcely a Christian scholar of the Middle Ages who did not acknowledge [earth's] sphericity and even know its approximate circumference."[15][16] Other misconceptions such as: "the Church prohibited autopsies and dissections during the Middle Ages," "the rise of Christianity killed off ancient science," and "the medieval Christian church suppressed the growth of the natural sciences," are all reported by Numbers as examples of widely popular myths that still pass as historical truth, even though they are not supported by current historical research. They help maintain the popular image of "the warfare of science and religion."[17]
While H. Floris Cohen states that most scholars reject crude articulations of the conflict thesis, such as Andrew D. White's, he also states that milder versions of this thesis still hold some sway. This is because "it remains an incontrovertible fact of history that, to say the least, the new science was accorded a less than enthusiastic acclaim by many religious authorities at the time." Cohen therefore considers it paradoxical "that the rise of early modern science was due at least in part to developments in Christian thought — in particular, to certain aspects of Protestantism" (a thesis first developed as what is now known as the Merton thesis).[18] A review of alternatives to the White/Draper conflict thesis has been composed by Ian G. Barbour.[19][20]
[edit] Independence

A modern view, described by Stephen Jay Gould as "non-overlapping magisteria" (NOMA), is that science and religion deal with fundamentally separate aspects of human experience and so, when each stays within its own domain, they co-exist peacefully.[21] Gould's view can also be seen as an attitude of neglect towards religion. It has been compared with a similar attitude of neglect towards evolutionary science, which has been seen in the works of theologians Karl Barth (who fails to mention evolution in his major work Church Dogmatics), Emil Brunner, and Hans Kung (whose Theology for the Third Millennium (1988) has a chapter on the relationship between religion and science yet never mentions evolution).[22]
While Gould spoke of independence from the perspective of science, W. T. Stace viewed independence from the perspective of the philosophy of religion. Stace felt that science and religion, when each is viewed in its own domain, are both consistent and complete.[23]
[edit] Two takes on experience

Both science and religion represent distinct ways of approaching experience and these differences are sources of debate.[24] Science is closely tied to mathematics—a very abstract experience, while religion is more closely tied to the ordinary experience of life.[24] As interpretations of experience, science is descriptive and religion is prescriptive.[24] For science and mathematics to concentrate on what the world ought to be like in the way that religion does can be inappropriate and may lead to improperly ascribing properties to the natural world as happened among the followers of Pythagoras in the sixth century B.C.[24] The reverse situation where religion attempts to be descriptive can also lead to inappropriately assigning properties to the natural world. A notable example is the now defunct belief in the Ptolemy planetary model that held sway until changes in scientific and religious thinking were brought about by Galileo and proponents of his views.[24]
[edit] Parallels in method

Many language philosophers (e.g., Ludwig Wittgenstein) and religious existentialists (e.g., those who ascribe to neo-orthodoxy) accepted Ian Barbour and John Polkinghorne's type II categorization of Independence.[25] On the other hand, many philosophers of science have thought otherwise. Thomas S. Kuhn asserted that science is made up of paradigms that arise from cultural traditions, which is similar to the secular perspective on religion.[25] Michael Polanyi asserted that it is merely a commitment to universality that protects against subjectivity and has nothing at all to do with personal detachment as found in many conceptions of the scientific method. Polayni further asserted that all knowledge is personal and therefore the scientist must be performing a very personal if not necessarily subjective role when doing science.[25] Polanyi added that the scientist often merely follows intuitions of "intellectual beauty, symmetry, and 'empirical agreement'".[25] Polayni held that science requires moral commitments similar to those found in religion.[25] Two physicists Charles A. Coulson and Harold K. Schilling both claimed that "the methods of science and religion have much in common."[25] Schilling asserted that both fields—science and religion—have "a threefold structure—of experience, theoretical interpretation, and practical application."[25] Coulson asserted that science, like religion, "advances by creative imagination" and not by "mere collecting of facts," while stating that religion should and does "involve critical reflection on experience not unlike that which goes on in science."[25] Religious language and scientific language also show parallels (cf. Rhetoric of science).
[edit] Dialogue


Clerks studying astronomy and geometry.
France, early 15th century.


A degree of concord between science and religion can be seen in religious belief and empirical science. The belief that God created the world and therefore humans, can lead to the view that he arranged for humans to know the world. This is underwritten by the doctrine of imago dei. In the words of Thomas Aquinas, "Since human beings are said to be in the image of God in virtue of their having a nature that includes an intellect, such a nature is most in the image of God in virtue of being most able to imitate God".[26]
Many well-known historical figures who influenced Western science considered themselves Christian such as Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, and Boyle.
[edit] Concerns over the nature of reality

Science in the Enlightenment and Colonial eras was conceived as ontological investigation which uncovered 'facts' about physical nature. This was often explicitly opposed to Christian Theology and the latter's assertions of truth based on doctrine. This particular perspective on science faded in the early 20th century with the decline of Logical Empiricism and the rise of linguistic and sociological understandings of science. Modern scientists are less concerned with establishing universal or ontological truth (which is seen, and dismissed, as the pursuit of philosophy), and more inclined towards the creation of pragmatic, functional models of physical systems. Christian Theology - excluding those fundamentalist churches whose aim is to reassert doctrinal truths - has likewise softened many of its ontological claims, due to increased exposure to both scientific insights and the contrasting theological claims of other faiths.
Scientific and theological perspectives often coexist peacefully. Non-Christian faiths have historically integrated well with scientific ideas, as in the ancient Egyptian technological mastery applied to monotheistic ends, the flourishing of logic and mathematics under Hinduism and Buddhism, and the scientific advances made by Muslim scholars during the Ottoman empire. Even many 19th century Christian communities welcomed scientists who claimed that science was not at all concerned with discovering the ultimate nature of reality.[24]
[edit] Integration

[edit] Christianity and science


Science and Religion are portrayed to be in harmony in the Tiffany window Education (1890).


The reconciliation of Christianity with science has had at least three attempted solutions that have proven themselves quite problematic.[citation needed] These three problematic solutions are biblical literalism, religious experience, and the evolving consensus of scientific truth.[citation needed] Each of these methods of reconciliation have various historical and present-day examples. Respective examples include creationism, liberal Christianity, and scientific imperialism.[citation needed] Earlier attempts at reconciliation of Christianity with Newtonian mechanics appear quite different from later attempts at reconciliation with the newer scientific ideas of evolution or relativity.[24] Many early interpretations of evolution polarized themselves around a struggle for existence. These ideas were significantly countered by later findings of universal patterns of biological cooperation. According to John Habgood, all man really knows here is that the universe seems to be a mix of good and evil, beauty and pain, and that suffering may somehow be part of the process of creation. Habgood holds that Christians should not be surprised that suffering may be used creatively by God, given their faith in the symbol of the Cross. Habgood states that Christians have for two millennia believed in the love of God because he revealed "Himself as Love in Jesus Christ," not because the physical universe does or does not point to the value of love.[24]
[edit] Reconciliation in Britain in the early 20th century

In Reconciling Science and Religion: The Debate in Early-twentieth-century Britain, historian of biology Peter J. Bowler argues that in contrast to the conflicts between science and religion in the U.S. in the 1920s (most famously the Scopes Trial), during this period Great Britain experienced a concerted effort at reconciliation, championed by intellectually conservative scientists, supported by liberal theologians but opposed by younger scientists and secularists and conservative Christians. These attempts at reconciliation fell apart in the 1930s due to increased social tensions, moves towards neo-orthodox theology and the acceptance of the modern evolutionary synthesis.[27]
[edit] Buddhism

Main article: Buddhism and science
Buddhism and science have increasingly been discussed as compatible.[28] Some philosophic and psychological teachings within Buddhism share commonalities with modern Western scientific and philosophic thought. For example, Buddhism encourages the impartial investigation of nature (an activity referred to as Dhamma-Vicaya in the Pali Canon) - the principal object of study being oneself.
[edit] Hinduism

Hindu views on evolution include a range of viewpoints in regards to evolution, creationism, and the origin of life within the traditions of Hinduism. The accounts of the emergence of life within the universe vary in description, but classically the deity called Brahma, from a Trimurti of three deities also including Vishnu and Shiva, is described as performing the act of 'creation', or more specifically of 'propagating life within the universe' with the other two deities being responsible for 'preservation' and 'destruction' (of the universe) respectively.[29] In this respect some Hindu schools do not treat the scriptural creation myth literally and often the creation stories themselves do not go into specific detail, thus leaving open the possibility of incorporating at least some theories in support of evolution. Some Hindus find support for, or foreshadowing of evolutionary ideas in scriptures, namely the Vedas.[30] An exception to this acceptance is the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), which includes several members who actively oppose "Darwinism" and the modern evolutionary synthesis (see Hindu Creationism).
[edit] Bahá'í view

Main article: Bahá'í Faith and science
A fundamental principle of the Bahá'í Faith is the harmony of religion and science. Bahá'í scripture asserts that true science and true religion can never be in conflict. `Abdu'l-Bahá, the son of the founder of the religion, stated that religion without science is superstition and that science without religion is materialism. He also admonished that true religion must conform to the conclusions of science.[31][32][33]
[edit] Current scholarship

The modern dialogue between religion and science is rooted in Ian Barbour's 1966 book Issues in Science and Religion.[34] Since that time it has grown in to a serious academic field, with academic chairs in the subject area, and two dedicated academic journals, Zygon: Journal of Religion & Science and Theology and Science.[34] Articles are also sometimes found in mainstream science journals such as American Journal of Physics[35] and Science.[36][37]

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