timetochange wrote:
: I'm closing my part in this discussion for now with this quote from a Talk Origins Archive Post of the Month-August 2006 titled: An Atheist'sDefense of Religion
The article you quoted is really a rehash of Stephen Jay Gould's notion of "Non-Overlapping Magisteria", which he explained in his 1999 book Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life. Gould also wrote about this in the July/August 1999 edition of Skeptical Inquirer magazine. Says a wikipedia article ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Jay_Gould ):
Gould used the term "Non-Overlapping Magisteria" (NOMA) to describe how, in his view, science and religion could not comment on each other's realm.
A good commentary on Gould's idea can be found here: http://www.stephenjaygould.org/library/gould_noma.html
Science philosopher Michael Ruse reviewed Gould's book and commented ( http://www.metanexus.net/magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/3044/Default.aspx ):
Gould has tied things together in a short book - Rocks of Ages: Science and Religion in the Fullness of Life - in which he expounds the principle by which he tries to preserve harmony and dignity between science and religion. Essentially his principle is one of separation: good fences make good neighbours. He thinks that science and religion speak to different dimensions and properly understood do not and cannot overlap and conflict. He speaks of science and religion as separate "Magisteria" - domains of understanding -- and Gould advocates the principle of "NOMA" - Non-Overlapping Magisteria. Science has its dimension and religion has its dimension and ne'er the twain shall meet.
A serious problem for religious believers exists in Gould's notion, however: religion cannot be taken as a serious explanation for phenomena that exist outside the human mind. Skeptical author Martin Gardner states in a review of Gould's book, "The religious views of Stephen Gould and Charles Darwin - Special Issue: Science and Religion: Conflict or Conciliation?" ( http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2843/is_4_23/ai_55208043/print ):
Although Gould calls himself an agnostic inclined toward atheism, his book is a passionate plea for tolerance between the two realms. Science and religion, he contends, are examples of a principle he calls NOMA, or Non-Overlapping Magisteria. There is indeed a conflict between the two if religion is taken in the narrow sense of a creed that requires God's miraculous interventions in history, and refuses to accept the overwhelming evidence for evolution. Such superstitions, by entangling the two magisteria, generate mutual enmity. If, however, religion is taken in a broader sense, either as a philosophical theism free of superstitions, or as a secular humanism grounded on ethical norms, then Gould sees no conflict between the two magisteria. Not that they can be unified in a single conceptual scheme, but that they can flourish side by side like two independent nations at peace with one another.
A poster on talk.origins comments more strongly ( http://www.talkorigins.org/origins/feedback/oct00.html ):
Re: Gould's "Rock of Ages" and the NOMA concept
Gould really misnames the concept. As he describes it is a one-sided NOMA. Science proscribes not only its own boundaries but also the boundaries of religion. This eviscerates religion which, in Gould's scheme of things, is not allowed to discuss origins in any meaningful sense. Gould's vision is of a naturalistic science which necessarily discounts any possibility of the supernatural determining or affecting the natural. It's NOMA as far as religion is concerned, but not as far as science is concerned.
Many people disagree with Gould's NOMA notion, and have even said that Gould probably didn't believe it himself but formulated it as a way to appease religious believers. Lately, some authors have argued against Gould's idea. A wikipedia article comments ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Jay_Gould ):
Richard Dawkins in his book The God Delusion argues against the effectiveness of the NOMA principle in shielding religions from scientific scrutiny. According to Dawkins, "the God Hypothesis," that "there exists a super-human, supernatural intelligence who deliberately designed and created the universe and everything in it, including us," is a scientific hypothesis, and is therefore not exempt from scientific examination. Dawkins suggests both that NOMA is wrong and that Gould did not believe in it, but simply wanted to pay lip service to certain aspects of political correctness. With the exception of this last explanation, Sam Harris has suggested the same. (Harris has not openly stated what explanation, if any, he finds tenable.)
A number of reviews of Gould's Rocks of Ages can be found in this wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocks_of_Ages_(book)
I agree with Dawkins and Harris that there really is no good way to reconcile supernaturalish views of real phenomena with scientific views. History has shown time again that whenever religion and science conflict, religion tends to lose in the long run.
While the author of the article that timetochange quoted goes out of his way to be accomodating, his arguments ring hollow. A good way to see this is to replace references to "religion" and such with references to "the Tooth Fairy" and such. I've done that below. It should be evident that the quoted article can be valid only if religious belief can be demonstrated not to be on the same level of reality as belief in the Tooth Fairy.
For the same reasons that scientists of faith are not beset by cognitive dissonance I am able to maintain that belief in the Tooth Fairy can be a viable and valuable human endeavor. The epistemic limitations of both "ways of knowing" lock out fundamental contradiction. Science is method. It is an operational tool for discovering natural reality. As such it is limited in scope. Science can comment only upon that which can be observed and measured. There is no operational capacity within the methodology of science for evaluation, much less dismissal, of extra-natural ideas. And as science can never be complete, it can never rule out extra-natural possibilities.
Tooth Fairy theology, to the degree it relies upon the extra-natural, deals substantially with morality and message. It addresses understandable human concerns about the nature of their existence and, regardless of whether the message is evidentially or logically supported, is capable of offering contentment and direction to those in need. On the other hand, when this theology proposes to make statements about nature, which only science is configured to address effectively, it must be prepared to cede ground. Belief in a thing can never be enough to demonstrate its factuality.
Science and Tooth Fairy religion operate in different spheres of influence. When they come together, as they do now and then, in collision or confluence, it is because of the conceits and misconceptions of humans, not any inherent compatibility or contradiction.
In making the case for Tooth Fairy religion from a less philosophical perspective, it seems clear to me that one thing none of us, a-Tooth-Fairy-theist or Tooth-Fairy-theist, wants is for a massive population of flawed and fallible humans (as are we all) that believes it cannot act ethically without the Tooth Fairy, to try to do so. The last thing we need is a bunch of people who believe they have no internal moral compass running around without their external one.
As a-Tooth-Fairy-theists or a-Tooth-Fairy-gnostics we may feel that a believer is misguided in his acceptance of things unseen, but we have to acknowledge that science, by definition, leaves the set of things unseen unaddressed, and consequently in no way disproved.
If one accepts the methods of science one accepts that knowledge is provisional - that one can be wrong. If it's possible to be wrong, even about something so apparently fanciful as a Tooth Fairy, then the belief in a Tooth Fairy exists as an intellectually live alternative to an a-Tooth-Fairy-theist's provisional philosophy. An acceptance, even a spirited defense of that live alternative shows both the intellectual confidence to take in and consider ideas antithetical to one's own, and an openness to a universe that will never be completely known.
I want to comment on what I think is the fundamental problem with the philosophy given by timetochange's quoted author. He said:
In making the case for religion from a less philosophical perspective, it seems clear to me that one thing none of us, atheist or theist, wants is for a massive population of flawed and fallible humans (as are we all) that believes it cannot act ethically without religion, to try to do so. The last thing we need is a bunch of people who believe they have no internal moral compass running around without their external one.
This leaves out another possibility: that this "massive population of flawed and fallible humans that believes it cannot act ethically without religion" really can be educated in ethics without Tooth Fairy religion. The only reason that a great many religious people believe that ethics cannot exist without Tooth Fairy religion is that their religious teachers tell them so, and they gulliby believe it. It doesn't have to be this way.
AlanF
