Scientists have blood on their hands.

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 10:22 am

JFAgnostic wrote:

madoba wrote:

Everyone here ... thinks an ancient christian crusade is more dangerous today. Wake up! Neitzche already declared God dead over 100 years ago.

It's not the ancient crusade that is dangerous today, it's the current and future crusades. Nietzsche may have declared God dead (though he's a bit more complicated than that), but GW Bush and Osama bin Laden and Rev. Phelps and Newt Gingrich etc. etc. didn't get the message. Religion is still a threat, and if technology is used by these zealots for ill, it will be religion and dogma that is the problem, not science.

People, yes. And they will use the findings of science to do harm, and the harm they do will be directed by a dogma to do harm. Like I said, it makes as much sense to blame fossil fuels for global warming as to blame science for what dogmatic people do with technology.

You will be pleased to know that I am beginning to see what you are saying here. Dogma, be it religion, or political dogma, like Stalin, Hitler etc... any dogma will be the cause, not science.

This also came up in those video's I mentioned earlier.... it was very interesting, because Sam Harris was trying to point out that Religion (he really has a thing against Islam and yet, seems in favor of Buddhism, which one scientist also questions him about ) was the problem when another scientist, Scott Atran, (Research Director at the National Center for Scientific Research in Paris, suicide terrorism expert), said that any kind of "dogma" will cause evil and not necessarily a religious one. I can't express myself as well as I would like here. But if you want to see this particular bit, I think it's Video no. 9.

Watching Sam Harris here, really gave me a different perspective of what he's all about.

The Learned Joined: Feb 27, 2006 Posts: 110

sunamiren wrote:

This also came up in those video's I mentioned earlier.... it was very interesting, because Sam Harris was trying to point out that Religion (he really has a thing against Islam and yet, seems in favor of Buddhism, which one scientist also questions him about ) was the problem when another scientist, Scott Atran said that any kind of "dogma" will cause evil and not necessarily a religious one. I can't express myself as well as I would like here. But if you want to see this particular bit, I think it's Video no. 9.

Watching Sam Harris here, really gave me a different perspective of what he's all about.

Those videos are excellent. Sam Harris' The End of Faith covers everything he mentioned in those videos. Atran was missing the point, and taking Harris to task for picking on religion. Harris concentrates on religion, but in his book he makes explicit that it is ANY kind of dogmatism that is the problem--not just religious dogmatism. He argues against religion because it's taboo: we can say anything we want about anyone's politics (including Hitler's, Stalin's, George Bush's, or even our neighbor's) and that's okay; but mention religion disrespectfully, and everyone is shocked. One mustn't question religion--we must all respect everyone's religion. And that's Harris' point. Religion is the only dogma that we aren't allowed to question.

So, while we can progress by fixing non-religious politics, we can't fix religion because it's sacred. And when religion pipes up about, say, stem cells, we have to respect it for some strange reason, much to the chagrin of advances in health sciences.

Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2006 10:54 am

JFAgnostic wrote:

sunamiren wrote:

This also came up in those video's I mentioned earlier.... it was very interesting, because Sam Harris was trying to point out that Religion (he really has a thing against Islam and yet, seems in favor of Buddhism, which one scientist also questions him about ) was the problem when another scientist, Scott Atran said that any kind of "dogma" will cause evil and not necessarily a religious one. I can't express myself as well as I would like here. But if you want to see this particular bit, I think it's Video no. 9.

Watching Sam Harris here, really gave me a different perspective of what he's all about.

Those videos are excellent. Sam Harris' The End of Faith covers everything he mentioned in those videos. Atran was missing the point, and taking Harris to task for picking on religion. Harris concentrates on religion, but in his book he makes explicit that it is ANY kind of dogmatism that is the problem--not just religious dogmatism. He argues against religion because it's taboo: we can say anything we want about anyone's politics (including Hitler's, Stalin's, George Bush's, or even our neighbor's) and that's okay; but mention religion disrespectfully, and everyone is shocked. One mustn't question religion--we must all respect everyone's religion. And that's Harris' point. Religion is the only dogma that we aren't allowed to question.

So, while we can progress by fixing non-religious politics, we can't fix religion because it's sacred. And when religion pipes up about, say, stem cells, we have to respect it for some strange reason, much to the chagrin of advances in health sciences.

Very well said, thank you JFagnostic, yes, I have not yet finished reading "End of Faith"... so perhaps I will come to that part soon. I agree with Harris off course, that we cannot criticize religion and that has to change.
When Atran talked about being a "hostage negotiator, and in this instance you can't call their religion bullshit"... I thought he had completely lost the plot. How can he compare that to what Harris was saying?.... glad you saw those video's.... we need more like this, and they really should be televised.

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2006 2:07 am

madoba wrote:

Sorry for obsessing about this topic but no more comments from me.
I agree I'm going around and around.

This is my final comment, 'the dark side of science will be used for evil purposes by evil men who will not require religion.'

Beware the dark side and may the force be with you.

But this is irrelevant to the efficacy of science.

Another difference is that one has to bend the scientific attitude to get evil out of it. When religion is unilaterally intransigent, one does not need to be bend it get evil out of it. In this sense, religion is inherently evil while science can be used for evil as an unplanned side effect.

As far as Stalin and Hitler, the things that were bad about them (as a consequence of the above) have more in common with religion than with science. As Dawkins put it, the Holocaust can hardly be blamed on an excess of rationality!

Intern Joined: Feb 02, 2006 Posts: 205

Quote:

Harris concentrates on religion, but in his book he makes explicit that it is ANY kind of dogmatism that is the problem--not just religious dogmatism.

Including scientific dogmatism.

The Learned Joined: Feb 27, 2006 Posts: 110

madoba wrote:

Quote:

Harris concentrates on religion, but in his book he makes explicit that it is ANY kind of dogmatism that is the problem--not just religious dogmatism.

Including scientific dogmatism.

And can you give an example of this "scientific dogmatism"?

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2006 4:21 am

Scientific Dogmatism is an Oxymoron.

Dogmatic science is not science. Science produces hypothesis, observational and/or experimentation data and ultimately theory and world models. Theories and models are rarely completely thrown out and generally are refined by the continued process of science itself.

Thus science is a process to achieve tentative Knowledge. Putting labels like good and evil on it is pure human silliness.

Such it was that when I was in high school. It was theorized that an asteroid destroyed the dinosaurs. As an adult I have watched as they discovered the impact crater in the Yucatan that dated to this event. Then I watched the slow collection of the world-wide ecological and geological data that concluded the veracity of this theory of asteroid impact and the resulting cataclysm that followed it. I watched as a theory espoused in my childhood became accepted as scientific fact in my adulthood. Not because some blessed scientific scholar ordained and anointed with oil came down from on high and decreed it to be so. But because science provided reams upon reams of data that anyone, even a layperson can review for themselves and conclude the results of. Thus the theory has tentatively been proven. How tentative? No other theory yet explains the evidence and thus it is considered proven or a scientific fact.

But let's say new evidence did come along. That instead of a meteor impact that an alien death ray struck the Yucatan 65 million years ago and had a similar effect as asteroid impact. Science allows for that to replace the current thinking as long as the evidence is there. Because the scientific method is not a dogmatic process. There can be dogmatic defenders of one theory or another, but they are just people. The process itself overrides bad ideas, replacing them with better ones because science is open to anyone who wishes to pursue it, from the laymen to the multiple P.H.D. holder. This is the very definition of progress and I for one trust it more than answers from a government, from a church or from a religious text.

Science is considered self-evident.

Can you worship a progress? Well humans are nutty they can worship anything but it is much harder to worship a process that is designed to enlighten and instill knowledge not supply them with answers.

A car is not Science. A car is technology. A car is not produced by Science. A car is produced by Engineering.

Engineering is the application of Knowledge learned through science.

The application of technology produced by science can be labeled good or evil by human beings. But science itself--the pursuit of knowledge? That cannot by itself be evil. Knowing something cannot be evil. What you do with it is subject to that.

This Luddite appeal to cast of the yoke of progress and become Amish-like will not result in a better world. It will just mean more inability to respond to the world as it is.

If we turned off all our satellites, all our machines and denied the further pursuit of knowledge, every disaster would be complete. There would be no evacuees before Katrina because we wouldn't know about Katrina until it hit. There would be no or at beast weak relief afterwards because we would not have the planes, trucks and helicopters and ready preserved foods and chemicals to be used to help people. Medicine which uses engineered technology AND scientific knowledge to save and improve lives would have to stop advancing or worse return to just being a band-aid. Children will again suffer from childhood diseases which would kill them in wholesale lots.

And ultimately some malady would strike the world as a whole and we would go extinct simply because we never left the cradle of our home-world and/or we refused to know about it until it was too late because we gave up the pursuit of knowledge.

We must never be afraid to know. We should be wary of how knowledge will be used.

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2006 4:39 am

I agree. There is no such thing as dogmatic science. But there are, of course, dogmatic scientists. There is nothing special about scientists but there is something special about science. The way science is constructed, dogma is non-issue.

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2006 4:57 am

I'm starting to think madoba is simply trolling us with these completely irrational and baiting comments/questions.

Intern Joined: Feb 02, 2006 Posts: 205

I'm not trolling. In fact I'll admit I was wrong in my comparisons of science and religion as tools. Religion is part of our social fabric and not seperate. I learned that yesterday.

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2006 7:55 am

alright, then.... but i'm watchn' you. *narrows my eyes*

Intern Joined: Feb 02, 2006 Posts: 205

No really after I repeated my argument for the 99th time, I read something that made more sense. It was kinda like a light bulb clicked in my head. LOL!

Graduate Thinker Joined: Jan 11, 2006 Posts: 713

madoba wrote:

I'm not trolling. In fact I'll admit I was wrong in my comparisons of science and religion as tools. Religion is part of our social fabric and not seperate. I learned that yesterday.

Where did you learn this?

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2006 2:18 am

I skipped some of the posts, so forgive me if this has been mentioned.

I think it's easier if we see that Science will be the "HOW" of our eventual destruction (if our destruction is, in fact, unavoidable), but Religion will be the "WHY" Science won't be used as the support for WHY someone may use science for evil purposes. Religion (or some other ideology) will take that purpose up...

The Learned Joined: Feb 27, 2006 Posts: 110

phewd wrote:

I skipped some of the posts, so forgive me if this has been mentioned.

I think it's easier if we see that Science will be the "HOW" of our eventual destruction (if our destruction is, in fact, unavoidable), but Religion will be the "WHY" Science won't be used as the support for WHY someone may use science for evil purposes. Religion (or some other ideology) will take that purpose up...

I think we should distinguish between science and technology here, and say that the technology is the "HOW."


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