One of the strengths of the blogging medium is the ability, long withheld from authors of all persuasions, of posing a question in print, and actually receiving an answer. Taking advantage of this capability, I am posting a series of (at least to me) thought-provoking questions, in the hopes that anyone reading this blog will offer their perspective. This is post #5 in the series.
I recently came across the World Question Center website and was fascinated by last year's question, "What is your dangerous idea?" One that popped up frequently was conflict between religious worldviews and scientific reality. The contributors are psychologists, physicists, journalists, and others from the academic and intellectual community. I was struck especially by two contributors on the matter (they're short, so give both a read):
Jordan Pollack, Computer Scientist, Brandeis University
Carolyn Porco, Planetary Scientist, University of Colorado and University of Arizona (among other affiliations)
What do you think? Is there a war between religious and scientific worldviews? Is science not only displacing religion, but becoming its ceremonial replacement? Can the "evidence-based silent majority" speak with moral authority?
HOW I FEEL WHEN I’M TWO WEEKS OUT FROM QUALS
9 years ago
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5 comments:
I think Michael Nesmith's kinda crazy.
http://www.edge.org/q2006/q06_8.html#nesmith
that Pollock fellow is hilarious! He should go on SNL - Lord knows they need the help. Oh, wait, was he serious? Then he really oughtn't to talk until all the grown-ups have had their say.
Best line from that unfortunately named Porco chic: 'and we don't have one God - we have many of them! We find gods in the nucleus of every atom, in the structure of space/time, in the counter-intuitive mechanisms of electromagneticsm. What richness! What consummate beauty!' Even leaving aside the abhorrent grammar (too busy to write out 'space AND time, what?), this really has potential. Dude, like, EVERYTHING is God. And God is like... EVERYTHING. Like my sofa. And that mosquito that just bit my arm. And the dead battery in my flashlight. Duuuuude.
And then she says the individual energy particles of our bodies will, in what we can only assume to be a similar manner to that of Celine Dion's heart, go on and on and on. This is very sweet, but not terribly original. Is it really so much to ask that she come up with something cleverer than badly summarised and truncated Buddhism?
Were these two authors to ever read this humble blog, I think we could safely say they got told. I wonder though, do you know anyone who genuinely thinks along these lines? How do you deal with these beliefs with people you know?
And yes, I'd say Michael Nesmith is certifiable... and also not a scientist, so I'm not sure why he gets to comment.
no, sadly enough. the nearest i've ever come was my mad gnostic hippie roommate Francesca last year, with whom i had a good many frustrating and highly unfair discussions in italian. fairly unproductive, too: i'm told she's living with the elves these days.
but at least hypothetically, i think it's a toss-up. we oughtn't to be rude, certainly, but at the same time i don't think that we have to dignify rubbish as 'interesting'.
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