Mystery

[Cosmic Hippo]

If science can technically only falsify, then there is always an element of mystery in our pecerption of reality. Does anyone believe that anything follows from that? If mystery is certain, is religion any more rational, especially religion that most clearly embraces mystery? Or might I be just repeating the obvious "why are we here" origins of religion?

 

[lucaspa]

If science can technically only falsify, then there is always an element of mystery in our pecerption of reality. Does anyone believe that anything follows from that? If mystery is certain, is religion any more rational, especially religion that most clearly embraces mystery? Or might I be just repeating the obvious "why are we here" origins of religion?

Let's say there is always an element of TENTATIVENESS about our positive claims about reality.

It's hard to compare "rationality" to say "religion" is more rational. More rational than what?

If you are using "rationality", then the only fully rational position based on science is agnosticism. Both theism and atheism are faith positions.

For a person having convincing personal experience of deity, then theism is very rational. Of course, there is also the uncertainty that the experience may not really be of deity but of something else.

So now we are back to tentativeness.

 

[Cosmic Hippo]

Could you clarify the difference between tentativeness and mystery as it relates here? Is it just a difference in degree of confidence?

 

[Cosmic Hippo]

As far as comparing "rationality", what I think I'm getting at is that religion is a system of thought that postulates things fundamentally unprovable and has grappled with the mysterious for thousands of years. So religion might be more reasonable than it otherwise appears in an age increasingly dominated be science. Or am I just trying to insert God where science falls short?

 

[lucaspa]

Could you clarify the difference between tentativeness and mystery as it relates here? Is it just a difference in degree of confidence?

When we say "the earth is round" that is not 100% proven, even tho most people think it is. therfore the statement is tentative, altho not mysterious.

Science uses deductive logic. It does that because deductive logic is the only logic whose statements can be wider than the evidence that led to them. Let's take another example. Inductive logic: the sun rose the day before yesterday, it rose yesterday, it rose today, therefore it will rise tomorrow. That bit about tomorrow isn't valid.

Deductive logic: the sun rises every morning. It rose yesterday, it rose today, and it will rise tomorrow. Now, what happens is that the statement "the sun rises every morning" is a theory. Each day becomes a TEST of that theory. But that means that SOME morning the sun might not rise (it could go nova or be swallowed by a black hole, for example). So, we are always TENTATIVE about the statement, but it is hardly mysterious.

Thus, we accept as (provisionally) true that the earth is round, with the understanding that it is barely possible that someday we may find a better theory to describe the shape. But we are sure that we have falsified that the earth is flat. Whatever shape the earth may be, it will NEVER be flat.

When you say "mysterious", you mean forces that we cannot detect and aren't in the material universe. Tentativeness has nothing of that.

Clear now? Or did I confuse the issue more?

 

[lucaspa]

As far as comparing "rationality", what I think I'm getting at is that religion is a system of thought that postulates things fundamentally unprovable and has grappled with the mysterious for thousands of years. So religion might be more reasonable than it otherwise appears in an age increasingly dominated be science. Or am I just trying to insert God where science falls short?

Atheists have partially succeeded in defining the debate such that "faith" and "belief" are UNreasonable. Untrue. Let's use "theology" in place of "religion". Religion refers to all the secular institutions surrounding how believers are governed. Theology is the study of the existence and nature of the supernatural. Theology can be, and often is, VERY reasonable.

And yes, theists have sifted thru thousands of versions of deity over thousands of years. And have decided that many of them are false. How did they do that? By a form of reason.

I have found that the big difference between science and religion is not mode of thought but the type of evidence accepted. Science has made a conscious decision to accept a very limited form of evidence: intersubjective personal experience. This is experience that is available to ANYONE under approximately the same circumstances.

Theology accepts personal experience that is subjective.

You would find the book Religion and Science by Ian Barbour useful. It deals with many of the questions you are asking. The author is both a practicing and respected astronomer and a devout theist.

 

[lucaspa]

Or am I just trying to insert God where science falls short?

You must always be careful of that. It's called god-of-the-gaps theology and, among other flaws, implicitly accepts the basic statement of faith of atheism. That is, inserting God where science "falls short" assumes that God is absent from the processes science describes. There is nothing in science or theology to justify that assumption.

Perhaps this will help:

"The only distinct meaning of the word 'natural' is stated, fixed, or settled; since what is natural as much requires and presupposes an intelligent agent to render it so, i.e., to effect it continually or at stated times, as what is supernatural or miraculous does to effect it for once." Butler: Analogy of Revealed Religion.

 

[Cosmic Hippo]

Thank you, Lucapsa. Your points are enlightening and have probably helped me avoid some errors down the road.