Is Science Better Than Religion?

[Mycroft]

I think religion is better. It shows us a way to eternal peace and contentment.

How would you propose to use religion to cure diseases, regrow or replace lost limbs? How would you use religion to increase crop yield without exhausting the soil? How would you use religion to solve the problem of warming ocean currents?

 

[Mycroft]

Religion helps people in crisis situations because that is their source (their priority, more important) of healing. While they may not deny medication, without religion, they may find no purppse in taking it...

How can religion be used to prevent further crisis situations?

For example, if an earthquake collapses buildings, how do you propose to use religion to design stronger earthquake-proof buildings?

 

[Skwim]

If a country requires food aid as the result of a natural disaster, religion may be more efficient at generating food donations to help that country than science, at least in the current systems we have.

Actually, it isn't religion per se,

"The belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods. And, a particular system of faith and worship."
​

but like-minded individuals who happen to worship together. And science, like the arts, is simply not a vehicle to generate food donations. It's like faulting religion for not helping to correct global warming.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

How can religion be used to prevent further crisis situations?

For example, if an earthquake collapses buildings, how do you propose to use religion to design stronger earthquake-proof buildings?

Religion helps "people" handle the situation. It is the foundation of peoples being. You can build a bridge to cross over a river but in some people, only religion lets them be able to cross it no matter how dangerous it may seem.

Science built the bridge. Religion helped the person cross it. Science motivates someone to cross the bridge because that person can test the safety of it. However, science cannot make the person go regardless the safety. "They" have to make the effort and for some people that souece or effort comes from within others from without. Religion is not science, of course. So using it as you would use medication for an illness wont match. Both do separate things. Religion is the source of psychological and emotional survival. Science is the physical part (unless you believe in miracles)

If you have hears that emotional trauma is sometimes worse than physical...same concept.

 

[suncowiam]

Depends what the end goal is?

Is it better to heal people physically? I positively think so.

Is it better to heal people mentally? I don't know. I would choose a different route than religion but I believe religion can help reduce stress and fear for some.

Is it better to creating a car, computer, air planes? Yes, yes, yes...

Is it better to define the merits of abortion, homosexuality and marriages? Tricky question. Social science for me can be really murky at times. Not sure if there a fundamental concept for both science and religion here.

 

[Mycroft]

Religion helps "people" handle the situation. It is the foundation of peoples being. You can build a bridge to cross over a river but in some people, only religion lets them be able to cross it no matter how dangerous it may seem.

Science built the bridge. Religion helped the person cross it. Science motivates someone to cross the bridge because that person can test the safety of it. However, science cannot make the person go regardless the safety. "They" have to make the effort and for some people that souece or effort comes from within others from without. Religion is not science, of course. So using it as you would use medication for an illness wont match. Both do separate things. Religion is the source of psychological and emotional survival. Science is the physical part (unless you believe in miracles)

If you have hears that emotional trauma is sometimes worse than physical...same concept.

So your long-winded answer boils down to: It can't.

The point being that the more science is able to find methods of adequately protecting people from disasters, the less and less religion will be needed in that area. In the final analysis, a new kind of building that protects your family from earthquakes is more appropriate than religion comforting you after they've all died.

 

[George-ananda]

How would you propose to use religion to cure diseases, regrow or replace lost limbs? How would you use religion to increase crop yield without exhausting the soil? How would you use religion to solve the problem of warming ocean currents?

Ahh, read my answer again. I said religion is better; not that science isn't great and useful because it is. People with all the greatest physical circumstances are often miserable and depressed. Even infirm people with simple faith are often happier. Religion/Spirituality is about happiness through an eternal greater connection.

Actually scientific advantages to man have come through motivations (the desire to help others) that are Religious/Spiritual whether or not the person believes in some abstract God concept. Science does us no good without that desire to help others.

 

[Marisa]

Religion helps better tham science because religion makes up someones being. People die for their faith. Not many would for science.

Religion helps people in crisis situations because that is their source (their priority, more important) of healing. While they may not deny medication, without religion, they may find no purppse in taking it.

Science is not the foundation of many peoples life. We use it to cure many things, but itnis not important as the cure for the soul.

I bet Galileo would disagree with you.

ETA: There's no evidence that a soul exists.

 

[Marisa]

Religion helps "people" handle the situation. It is the foundation of peoples being. You can build a bridge to cross over a river but in some people, only religion lets them be able to cross it no matter how dangerous it may seem.

I'm sorry, but this is simply not the universally true statement you want it to be. I work in a psychology practice. I can assure you that religion is not the emotional panacea that you think it is. Some people benefit from it. Some don't. It's that simple.

 

[Mycroft]

Ahh, read my answer again. I said religion is better;

And I wasn't postulating that it wasn't, if you read my OP. The subject here is that science is more appropriate for solving problems in many areas.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

It cant what?

Religion helps people psychologically and emotionally get through crisis situations. Someone is dying in the hospital, science can give them medication "and" it will not always cure their ache inside. Religion keeps one sane.

You can use different words for it, but yes, it is more powerful than science. It does not "replace" science. BIG difference.

What you said is correct. Religion doesnt replace science. People have survived in crisis situations "because of" their faith.

So your long-winded answer boils down to: It can't.

The point being that the more science is able to find methods of adequately protecting people from disasters, the less and less religion will be needed in that area. In the final analysis, a new kind of building that protects your family from earthquakes is more appropriate than religion comforting you after they've all died.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

I bet Galileo would disagree with you.

ETA: There's no evidence that a soul exists.

Galileo, how so? I dont about him much.

Of course, there is no evidence for a soul and that does not mean it does not exist. Why does everyoje try to find evidence for what, by definition, is suposed to be "beyons" what we know with our five senses.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

How can religion be used to prevent further crisis situations?

For example, if an earthquake collapses buildings, how do you propose to use religion to design stronger earthquake-proof buildings?

It helps the people handle the situation. Id a christian is treated for cancer, religion does not replace chemotherapy. It helps that person to know God is watching out for them. Any doctor will tell you religion (like afformations) help peoples bodys cure or treat illnesses.

Im not talking of miracles. Im saying to many people, religion is more important than food itself. If they can survive off of religion, then their treatments, in their view, wont be as bad because theyd know, if christian, God will take care of them.

 

[Marisa]

Galileo, how so? I dont about him much.

Of course, there is no evidence for a soul and that does not mean it does not exist. Why does everyoje try to find evidence for what, by definition, is suposed to be "beyons" what we know with our five senses.

Well, speaking for myself, things that exist tend to leave evidence. Like Matt Dillahunty, I want to know as many true things and as few false things as I can.

Galileo Galilei - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Unveiled Artist]

Well, speaking for myself, things that exist tend to leave evidence. Like Matt Dillahunty, I want to know as many true things and as few false things as I can.

Galileo Galilei - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Thats kind of limiting life. We dont know all the laws of nature. Its like years ago we thought the earth was flat, now we know its round. I dont understand how anyone can say something cannot exist just because no one has studied it, witnessed it, and tested its existence. Why limit what exists in life by what we know today when years from now it may be something different?

 

[Marisa]

It cant what?

Religion helps people psychologically and emotionally get through crisis situations. Someone is dying in the hospital, science can give them medication "and" it will not always cure their ache inside. Religion keeps one sane.

No, it does not. Did you miss that part of my post in which I told you I actually work in a place where mentally and emotionally challenged people are treated? This psychology thing that you keep talking about? I live in one of the most religious states in the US, and we have quite a heavy caseload of devout (mostly) christians. Religion does NOT keep one sane. It didn't keep Andrea Yates sane when she drowned her 5 kids in the bathtub because god told her to. But you know what DOES help people with Post Partum Psychosis? Psychotropic medications, developed from science.

Religion can be comforting to some. But it's not a cure, and considering the high number of people on antdepressants, it's only marginal at comforting. Then there's this:

"Prayers offered by strangers had no effect on the recovery of people who were undergoing heart surgery, a large and long-awaited study has found.

And patients who knew they were being prayed for had a higher rate of post-operative complications like abnormal heart rhythms, perhaps because of the expectations the prayers created, the researchers suggested."
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/health/31pray.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

You start off talking about a more meditative style of prayer that can be beneficial to people and then try to assign healing powers to prayer that just aren't justified. Positive thinking is a thing, but that has as much to do with how the chemistry in the brain is being rearranged (it is absolutely true that negativity breeds negativity), but prayer simply doesn't have the type of medicinal powers you continue to ascribe to it.

 

[Marisa]

Thats kind of limiting life. We dont know all the laws of nature. Its like years ago we thought the earth was flat, now we know its round. I dont understand how anyone can say something cannot exist just because no one has studied it, witnessed it, and tested its existence. Why limit what exists in life by what we know today when years from now it may be something different?

What possible reason could I have for anything that isn't of this world, the natural world, the only world in which I can exist? Nothing that's not in the natural world has any demonstrable power to affect me. It's not limiting. It's reason and rationality. One could go crazy playing "what if" games. And it doesn't make me closed minded to the possibility that there is something left to discover. That's rather the point, actually. But I'm not going to waste my time looking for something which, by definition, I can never find. That is an exercise in futility.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

No, it does not. Did you miss that part of my post in which I told you I actually work in a place where mentally and emotionally challenged people are treated? This psychology thing that you keep talking about? I live in one of the most religious states in the US, and we have quite a heavy caseload of devout (mostly) christians. Religion does NOT keep one sane. It didn't keep Andrea Yates sane when she drowned her 5 kids in the bathtub because god told her to. But you know what DOES help people with Post Partum Psychosis? Psychotropic medications, developed from science.

Religion can be comforting to some. But it's not a cure, and considering the high number of people on antdepressants, it's only marginal at comforting. Then there's this:

"Prayers offered by strangers had no effect on the recovery of people who were undergoing heart surgery, a large and long-awaited study has found.

And patients who knew they were being prayed for had a higher rate of post-operative complications like abnormal heart rhythms, perhaps because of the expectations the prayers created, the researchers suggested."
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/health/31pray.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

You start off talking about a more meditative style of prayer that can be beneficial to people and then try to assign healing powers to prayer that just aren't justified. Positive thinking is a thing, but that has as much to do with how the chemistry in the brain is being rearranged (it is absolutely true that negativity breeds negativity), but prayer simply doesn't have the type of medicinal powers you continue to ascribe to it.

Now I understand your point of view. I saw wonders just because someome believed. It is not a cure (it doesnt replace medical treatments). Its more than a comfort for some people as I talked about my friend who have severe physical health conditions and without religion, Ill say what she calls her only source of comfort, she would be dead.

Religion is not medicine. I wouldnt belittle its affects on some people (rather than gernalizations) who benefit from it far more than just physical treatment alone.

This is personal experience and just being around people in messed up situations health and otherwise who cant live without, say, God.

I cant speak for all people with mental health conditions.

 

[Unveiled Artist]

What possible reason could I have for anything that isn't of this world, the natural world, the only world in which I can exist? Nothing that's not in the natural world has any demonstrable power to affect me. It's not limiting. It's reason and rationality. One could go crazy playing "what if" games. And it doesn't make me closed minded to the possibility that there is something left to discover. That's rather the point, actually. But I'm not going to waste my time looking for something which, by definition, I can never find. That is an exercise in futility.

Im just saying there is more than meets tbe eye. You dont have to ask what if questions about it. I find it limiting life to say the natural world is only what we know today (my words). Everything is part of the natural world, even things we dont know yet or will never know. I just find it confusing that some people cant say "maybe" and leave it at that.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Neither. They both have their place. The comparison is nonsensical. Must as well ask if science or art is better.