Sleep well, Jack. Maybe you'll make your question more intelligible in the morning.

"Consciousness" is a scientific problem. IMO religion provides nothing but dogmas – question-beggers not answers, and "solutions" to nothing but pseudo-problems. Thus, philosophy: the study of asking irrelevant (or pseudo) questions and dialectics of seeking relevant questions (which, when an empirical / informational threshold for answering is reached, become scientific problems). Weird scenes inside the gold mine, indeed!

I am logging out for tonight, but I am thinking that the main issue to be addressed is the underlying source of consciousness, whether it is explained in religious or scientific terms. — Jack Cummins

Nothing really gets explained religiously, all of its answers are made up. Sure religion claims to have answers but there is no substance to the claim, no power for those answers to be demonstrated because its all imaginary, mythological.
Why would religions answer to consciousness be any different? It will just be made up, like everything else in religion.
No, the answer to your question is actually “neither”. Science nor religion explains consciousness, it is a mystery. Again, religion claims to explain it but it cannot demonstrate that knowledge any more than science can.
As to whether one or the other will eventually give us answers? I’ll bet you anything it will be science, a bet I would have won over and over and over throughout all of history...the first only time religion gives any answer to anything is when it relies on the same basic tool science utilizes: reason. They only get answers right when they apply reason, and do not apply religion.

@DingoJones And what do you make of esteemed scientists who believe in religion? Have they become irrational according to you?

Not necessarily irrational no...at least no more irrational than anyone else.
I don’t think science inoculates a person against being duped by emotional appeal which is what most religion is. The persons failure of reason on religion doesn’t mean their reason no longer functions.
I would say of these scientist who believe in religion that they are in error to doing so, but I can draw no conclusions about their general rationality.
What do you make of these scientists?

@DingoJones I would say either according to their reasoning religion is rational. Or they feel science is not qualified to deal with the human experience and its aspirations.
Ultimately I think whether a person is religious or not or science based depends on emotional belief factors.
I think rationality in terms of cold logic is a myth.
But that's not to say emotional belief is irrational per se or untruthful. But it can be. There are true beliefs and false beliefs. Deciding which is which is again a personal emotional decision.

The one aspect which I think is important is that when considering religion and religious experience is that it is essential that it is approached from the standpoint of rationality. I believe that this is essential for any serious philosophical consideration of religion. Otherwise I think that it really will be seen as being within the realms of nonsense, and be thrown aside by the vast majority of humanity.

@Jack Cummins The problem is the word rationality is ambiguously used. I prefer the word common sense or "clear explanation."
Rationality has become a dogmatic dialectical tool,and a cover for sophistry.

I think you should try to alter your argument a little. I realise that your thread is focusing on pros and cons more specifically, than the actual discussion here. However, it is really focused on the same topic, which means that they are really almost in competition with one another. Ultimately,this is likely to mean that one is likely to fall and the other succeed. I don't wish to change my title again, especially as it is on its second page, so I am wondering if you could change your question a little. I am writing this here because I don't wish to spoil the start of your first thread. Of course, it is entirely up to you, and it could be that people would rather have a poll, and are sick of my writing.

@Jack Cummins If you look at my thread I'm trying to ascertain what angle people are coming at,without the overheated debates. In other words it's giving people a chance to express their view clearly,not just as part of a dialectic of entrenched opinions.
Look as my thread as complimentary to yours.

In response to your view of rationality, I am not saying that it is the only way human beings approach life. However, if say a person has to stand up to any evaluation, it needs to be subjected and evaluated according to rationality. I don't think common sense is particularly useful because while we may use such an approach in our basic day to day thinking it does not in any way go to the critical level needed.

@Jack Cummins Whose standard of rationality?

:up:

And what do you make of esteemed scientists who believe in religion? Have they become irrational according to you? — Zenny

Just to extend further what @DingoJones has said, here's a few quotes by religiously raised Nobel laureate:

I have a friend — or had a friend, now dead — Abdus Salam, a very devout Muslim, who was trying to bring science into the universities in the Gulf states and he told me that he had a terrible time because, although they were very receptive to technology, they felt that science would be a corrosive to religious belief, and they were worried about it… and damn it, I think they were right. It is corrosive of religious belief, and it’s a good thing too.

One of the great achievements of science has been, if not to make it impossible for intelligent people to be religious, then at least to make it possible for them not to be religious. We should not retreat from this accomplishment.

Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it, you'd have good people doing good things and evil people doing bad things, but for good people to do bad things, it takes religion. — Steven Weinberg, physicist, b. 1933

:fire:

@180 ProofWow! One scientist! Talk about a cherry picker! Is this your famed rationality and dialectic at work?
So those scientists who are religious,they all live in the middle East?

Rationality is seen as a the main aspect of philosophy since the enlightenment. It is not as if every human being probably uses it, but if any discussion of religion is explored in a way within philosophy this is essential, or else we might as well just say absolutely anything. Anyway, I am about to log off for now, because I haven't got out of bed, and was really just checking my phone. I think that we will probably communicate a bit later.

I hope that our threads are seen by others as complementary, but you will have to bear in mind that the there is already a major one focusing on praising science and at least one on religion already.

@Jack Cummins But it is important to know what people really mean when saying rationality.
Out threads are complimentary,don't worry.

Refute the man if you can. It's only one guy's opinion – how hard could that be? :smirk:

I will just answer this really quickly by saying that it involves sound principles of logic. In particular, if one wishes to say that they believe in God, it is not enough from a philosophical point of view to say simply that one feels that way. Of course, that is not to say that one is not entitled to do that on a personal level, but that will not hold in the way of philosophical argument. Essentially, a major aspect of any tension between religion and philosophy is that science is based on facts, or, at least, what appear to be facts.

@180 Proof Nothing to refute. I don't play your dialectic game,sophist.

@Jack Cummins But who decides what is sound logic or apparent facts?
And clear explanations trump cold abstract dialectics and unnecessary reductionism. I mean philosophers don't even agree amongst themselves. So what has this sound logic achieved philosophically or practically?

Gotcha! You're all ... sound and fury, signifying nothing.

@180 Proof Yawn!

@180 Proof Another book cliche from Shakespeare!
Have an original thought chap!

I have thought about what I am trying to achieve in this thread. It is prompted by the way in which I am seeing so much opposition between the ideas of science and religion on this forum. Often, if I am involved in threads where it appears like a war is breaking out over these questions, I am inclined to get out of the discussion, but that is probably because I have a war over the issues within my own head in the first place.

I understand that you are an atheist and I am sure that you have come to that position based on your own searching. I am just surprised how people seem to get to a clear position because I see the debate between science and religion as being so mushy. I think that for many people Darwin's ideas are of key importance. I can remember as a child, going to school and having a teacher explain these ideas very badly and also being taught Biblical ideas at home and at church, which gave me so much grounds for confusion later. But, I think that there is so much potential for confusion and I believe that Darwin did not really come up with the idea of evolution to discredit religion in the first place.

I am aware that the differences between religious ideas and science goes way beyond Darwin. I am starting this thread with a view to some discussion about it, and it is quite likely that it may fizzle and die out before the end of the day. I would like it to be some kind of construction discussion about the topic, partly to sort out my own thoughts and I would like it to have this potential for others too.

If I am discussing religion with you I see it as being more than just defining the word religion and others. What I am aware of is the thread which you wrote several months ago on one of St Paul's letters, in which you were asking about whether being a Christian had to involve an emphasis on suffering. I did have very brief engagement with you on that thread and, at some stage in the thread you describe yourself as a default Christian.

I am probably in a similar position, but with a lot of niggles over it. I was extremely religious as a teenager. The real trigger for me questioning Christianity was due to a friend killing himself over his own angst, which I think was over this, although I had not seen him in the couple of weeks before he killed himself. But, on the last time I spoke with him he was reading St Paul's writings and he told me that he had smashed up a mirror because he was unable to live up to the life which involved following Jesus.

This lead me to really questioning the Bible, but I was beginning to do so anyway. I have never become an outright atheist, because something feels a bit wrong with it to me intuitively. Nevertheless, I see the biggest issue in trying to make sense of The Bible as being to what extent to take the ideas literally. I do often dwell on it, and wrote this thread in connection with how I am doing so based on the many different posts and threads on the forum for or against religion.

So, you are not sure about the nature of my question. The particular one comes in connection to my observations of some people who seem to think that religion and science can work together. For example, I know many people who work in the field of science and are Christians, or belong to some other organised religion. However, I am aware of other people who see the relationship between science and religion as involving an inherent clash.

I think that you are right to say that some aspects of life can be looked at by religion and others by science, but I don't think that it is as simple. I know that many people who are religious come to that by saying that they have faith. For many, this can even make it into a sin to question religious beliefs at all. But, I think sometimes the facts of science seem to glare in contrast to this. For example, I was taught to believe in the Virgin birth of Jesus, and many other supernatural beliefs. I could give up any kind of religious beliefs altogether and maybe I will. However, something seems a bit wrong with atheism. I was reading Plotinus yesterday before writing this thread and he was speaking about the soul and some of this seemed to resonate truth for me, and I think that perspectives of some who remove religion just seem rather flat.

I recall during high school, in a discussion with a priest after Mass in which I had just performed my altarboy duties, being told that "faith reveals truths beyond this world" and that we have "reason to solve problems of common survival". Both are "God given" – the latter included in our nature as humans and the former received by "divine grace" – but with different functions, my priest added (gratuitously, I suspect), faith to "love God" and reason for "loving (caring for) our neighbors as we love ourselves" ... or some such homily.

I must have accepted the dichotomy way back when, and I still do; only reason, however, is of any use here and now – the "hereafter" will have to take care of itself if and when that time comes – as "faith" amounts to nothing more than (placebo-like anti-anxiety) make believe in the lives of most believers. After all, one can live by reason alone, without faith in g/G or mysteries as many (myself included) do, but no one can survive long, without reason, solely by faith. Their comparative worths, psychologically & empirically, are starkly unequal. Thus, the vast majority of believers rely for surviving and thriving on compartmentalized reason as an acquired add-on to their hereditary homespun faiths, and on occasion struggle with bouts of cognitive dissonance and self-sabotaging hypocrisy that often follow.

Philosophy's dog in this peculiarly (inaugurally) modern fight of "religion vs science" is genealogical, that is, religion-as-ancestor and science-as-descendant of philosophical inquiry (i.e. critique, doubt (epoché) + speculation). If the ancestors had sufficed there would not be any science. Likewise if religion had sufficed there would not be philosophy. From the seeds of religion have grown the roots system of philosophy which has flourished into the tree of arts and sciences that bears both medicinal and poisonous fruits. Earth is still covered in seeds and dirt, and roots must dig deeper and spread further in order to nourish the tree for it / us to continue to flourish.

I think that perspectives of some people who remove religion just seem rather flat. — Jack Cummins

The arts, especially music as (e.g.) Pythagoras, Bach, Beethoven, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Albert Murray, et al teach, render religion redundant. The numinous is everywhere (Thales, Blake) for those who patiently look and listen, play/create and wait (Beckett).

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VlIyqiIJ98w :fire:


:death: :flower:

I am aware that there is a big debate on science on the forum at the moment. However, the question I am raising is a bit on the side of this. It is not purely about whether science is beneficial or not but, to what extent ideas can be fit into that context, and especially whether the divide can even be collapsed into the division between religion and science? — Jack Cummins

Have a read of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_thesis . It ‘maintains that there is an intrinsic intellectual conflict between religion and science and that it inevitably leads to hostility’. There are some exponents of ‘the conflict thesis’ on this forum, and many in modern culture.

In my view, the conflict is generally between different varieties of dogma. Religious dogmatists tend towards fundamentalism or extremism. Anti-religious dogmatists tend towards materialism and scientism.

Freeman Dyson, an esteemed physicist, had this to say:

The universe shows evidence of the operations of mind on three levels. The first level is elementary physical processes, as we see them when we study atoms in the laboratory. The second level is our direct human experience of our own consciousness. The third level is the universe as a whole. Atoms in the laboratory are weird stuff, behaving like active agents rather than inert substances. They make unpredictable choices between alternative possibilities according to the laws of quantum mechanics. It appears that mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent inherent in every atom. The universe as a whole is also weird, with laws of nature that make it hospitable to the growth of mind. I do not make any clear distinction between mind and God. God is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension. God may be either a world-soul or a collection of world-souls. So I am thinking that atoms and humans and God may have minds that differ in degree but not in kind. We stand, in a manner of speaking, midway between the unpredictability of atoms and the unpredictability of God. Atoms are small pieces of our mental apparatus, and we are small pieces of God's mental apparatus. Our minds may receive inputs equally from atoms and from God. This view of our place in the cosmos may not be true, but it is compatible with the active nature of atoms as revealed in the experiments of modern physics. I don't say that this personal theology is supported or proved by scientific evidence. I only say that it is consistent with scientific evidence. — Freeman Dyson’s Templeton Acceptance Speech

There are other such thinkers who see a continuity between the scientific and religious vision. Even Einstein did in a way - he was completely uninterested in ‘churchianity’ or organised religion but he maintained that the order of the cosmos bespoke a higher intelligence.

I am not an Atheist. I do not know if I can define myself as a Pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds. May I do not reply with a parable? The human mind, no matter how highly trained, cannot grasp the universe. We are in the position of a little child, entering a huge library whose walls are covered to the ceiling with books in many different tongues. The child knows that someone must have written those books. It does not know who or how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child notes a definite plan in the arrangement of the books, a mysterious order, which it does not comprehend, but only dimly suspects. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of the human mind, even the greatest and most cultured, toward God. — Albert Einstein

(The last sentence was clearly mistaken, in that many will not agree with his sentiment, but the point remains.)

I will write a full response to you and Dingo Jones later, but I am going to do a few things and go to the shop. However, I think that the idea of you being an altarboy will make many on the forum smile. I have often wondered is the picture on the profile you as a child?

Thanks for the response, I will read it fully this afternoon.

I've mentioned that quite a few times already on the forum (to you, in fact, too) describing my teen apostasy, so I'm not sure many will be surprised. Okay, no hurry, I'll be around later myself; it's dawn here, good time for a walk ...