Why Arrogant "New Atheists" Annoy Me

[lewisnotmiller]

Many New atheist types who consider themselves enlightened and highly rational do tend to be remarkably ignorant and irrational on the topic of religion.

As soon as they hear/read something negative about religion their 'scepticism' and 'freethinking' magically evaporates into the most credulous form of groupthink.

Much to my chagrin, I used to be exactly like that

It's the funny thing about enlightenment.
Any claiming it are almost universally wrong.

 

[Augustus]

With any wars or conquests, it doesn't matter what the supposed root cause was: if religion was used as the tool of choice to get people to do the killing, then it was done in religion's name. It doesn't matter that the actual reason was politics or money - the killing was carried out because of religion.

So even if killings weren't carried out because of religion, they were still carried out because of religion?

To evaluate the harms of religion, we really need to identify violence that occurred primarily because of religion.

If an appeal to the safety of your family was a 'tool of choice', should we put down family as a major cause of evil in the world?

Anyway, luckily you are so wrong that I can even work under such flawed assumptions and you will still be wrong which saves some time.

I get that you'd like to think I was wrong,

Let's look at the evidence, shall we?

The Muslims, over the course of several centuries, were able to successfully invade and conquer India several times. During the periods of conquest, Islamic leaders tried mass conversions of Hindus into Muslims. Several hundred million Indians were killed in the process of this and this is all a matter of Islamic history, told in their literature.

I'm not quite sure where to begin with this.

Let's start with the sources. It's Islamic history that maybe 20,000 Muslims defeated an army of 200,000 Romans at Yarmuk after receiving help from an army of angels. In reality there were no angels and maybe 25-50,000 Romans. Historical numbers are never accurate, and are usually massively inflated (maybe 5-10 times). This is due to a) propaganda and/or hagiography and b) they didn't know and figures were just supposed to represent 'a large number'. Such evidence could be repeated ad nauseam on this point.

This alone should be enough to discredit your argument, but we'll continue.

You claimed several hundred million, I'll be kind and define that as 200 million.

In 1400 the population of India was around 100 million, in 1700 about 160 million. Notice any more problems yet?

Look at what happened in the Thirty Years War in Europe.

Let's do this. The population of Europe around this time was 80 million.

One of the longest and most destructive conflicts in human history,[20] it resulted in eight million fatalities mainly from violence, famine and plagues, but also from military engagements... It was the deadliest European religious war that left an everlasting national stigma in the German collective memory.[21]

So here we have 'one of the most destructive conflicts in human history' that left an 'everlasting stigma' it was so brutal.

30 years, 8 million deaths = 266,000 per year (many as a result of disease and famine).

The Thirty Years' War devastated entire regions, with famine and disease resulting in high mortality in the populations... The war also bankrupted most of the combatant powers.

The Muslims, over the course of several centuries, were able to successfully invade and conquer India several times. During the periods of conquest, Islamic leaders tried mass conversions of Hindus into Muslims. Several hundred million Indians were killed in the process of this and this is all a matter of Islamic history, told in their literature.

Back to the Indians:

200 million deaths 300 years = 666,000 per year. Notice any more problems?

The Thirty Years' War devastated entire regions, with famine and disease resulting in high mortality in the populations... The war also bankrupted most of the combatant powers.

For 3 centuries, destruction to Indian society occurred at over double the intensity of the 30 years war (One of the longest and most destructive conflicts in human history), yet by the end of this period, Indian population had grown by 60% and it was one of the wealthiest societies in the world. This is your argument?

Also, despite the mass conversions and unrelenting genocide of the population, a significant majority of the 160 million Indians in 1700 were Hindus.

We could also discuss the impossibility of ruling such a country without significant Hindu allies, and all kinds of other evidence against your guesswork, but that's probably over-egging the pudding.

To only use reason and logic and evidence to make claims about things. To abhor religious dogma no matter what form it takes.

So, lest we want to be hypocrites, we should evaluate our own assumptions using reason and evidence. We should also not get suckered in by anti-religious dogmas either.

Agreed?

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

So even if killings weren't carried out because of religion, they were still carried out because of religion?

No, don't put words in my mouth, especially dumbed down to such a level. It's almost like you're trying to present a caricature of what I said, as if you're trying to mock me. You can stop with the condescension, it's unbecoming.

If one of the reasons was that it was their religious duty to engage... Full stop. Think of it like this. If I was POTUS, I might go around giving speeches to the citizens outlining my reasons for going to war. One of those reasons could be religious conflict with those we're fighting, or even not, but at the end of all my speeches I talk about how god is on our side and will have couched the conflict in religious terms saying such things as "god has tasked our nation with defeating our enemies", or things like "It is our religious duty, if we don't do this god will pull his favor back from our nation and our society will crumble as a result", etc...

To the point about Indians and Muslims... What is it with you and the air of condescension? Look, I'm aware that some inflation of numbers went on in the telling of the Muslim invasions into India between 800CE and 1700CE, and just because the population of India was around 100 million people that doesn't necessarily prove my point wrong.

I'm talking about waves of invasions into India territory over centuries, ie the Turks, the Afghans, . Take a look at this article about it...
Islamic Invasion Of India: The Greatest Genocide In History

Anyway, as I said, and as you seemed to gloss over it... Yes, we've got the numbers on purely religious wars; WHAT WE DON'T HAVE ARE THE NUMBERS ON COLLATERAL DAMAGE.

In any event, we know with pretty good certainty just how many people have lived and died since the dawn of mankind... 100 billion people...

It is pretty safe to say that billions of people have died due to religion and religious conflicts, both the people who died as soldiers, as well as all the collateral damage civilizations incurred as a result of those conflicts.

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

This is little more than a confused non-sequitur. We're talking about new atheist philosophical bankruptcy. A bankruptcy you continue to demonstrate.

And this is what atheists have been faced with for centuries. We are told how ignorant we are of certain philosophies, how we are just angry at religion and deep down we really believe in God. We have words put in our mouth all of the time.

It isn't too surprising that some atheists respond in kind. Unfortunate . . . but not surprising. Most of us just shrug it off and realize that often it isn't really worth engaging someone who has such a twisted view of what atheism is. They don't understand the type of skepticism we operate under, and some people are not willing to understand it. It isn't because theists are unintelligent or gullible. It is just a very human thing to be stubborn.

 

[Augustus]

If one of the reasons was that it was their religious duty to engage... Full stop. Think of it like this. If I was POTUS, I might go around giving speeches to the citizens outlining my reasons for going to war. One of those reasons could be religious conflict with those we're fighting, or even not, but at the end of all my speeches I talk about how god is on our side and will have couched the conflict in religious terms saying such things as "god has tasked our nation with defeating our enemies", or things like "It is our religious duty, if we don't do this god will pull his favor back from our nation and our society will crumble as a result", etc...

So every war when anyone has ever mentioned god in a speech to boost morale is a religious war? Is every war when anyone has mentioned family a family war? This is every war in human history pretty much.

If you want to call WW2 a religious war or count its victims as victims of religion, be my guest. It doesn't much chime with someone who claims to value reason, but each to their own

Anyway, even under these ludicrous conditions, you are still wrong. There probably haven't even been 1 billion war deaths in total in recorded history, so even if you claim 100% of war is religious because someone once mentioned god, you're still over 4 billion short.

To the point about Indians and Muslims... What is it with you and the air of condescension? Look, I'm aware that some inflation of numbers went on in the telling of the Muslim invasions into India between 800CE and 1700CE, and just because the population of India was around 100 million people that doesn't necessarily prove my point wrong.

I'm talking about waves of invasions into India territory over centuries, ie the Turks, the Afghans, . Take a look at this article about it...
Islamic Invasion Of India: The Greatest Genocide In History

The article is a load of rubbish, the title alone tells you that.

I used the Mongol period as that is widely considered the most violent (although it wasn't actually unusually violent at all).

Seeing as it makes no difference though change the 200 million deaths timescale to 1000 years. That's a millennium of warfare almost as intense as the 30 years war. A timescale during which the population increased, and the empire was famously wealthy. And after 1000 years, they were still majority Hindu.

How do you think a minority rules an empire with Hindu help for so long if they are fanatically killing as many Hindus as possible? How do you become famously wealthy if you are culling your population in a manner that ruined Europe? They are your source of income, military power, food, etc.

Anyway, as I said, and as you seemed to gloss over it... Yes, we've got the numbers on purely religious wars; WHAT WE DON'T HAVE ARE THE NUMBERS ON COLLATERAL DAMAGE.

Where does this 4 billion come from?

The highest rates of HIV are in countries with small Catholic populations like South Africa and Botswana so its hard to make a case that Catholicism is a major cause.

"How many people have died because religious teachings said that disease was caused by demons instead of germs?"

I find it pretty hard to take this seriously.

Anyway, the consensus among academic historians of science is that religion, particularly Christianity, was a major contributor to the development of modern science. The conflict hypothesis that you are promoting is a common myth, but not one believed any more by experts. But, hey, who needs experts and evidence when you've already decided on the truth, evidence be damned.

Given the role of science in medical treatment, religion might have a net positive. What about lives saved by religious charity? What about the wars prevented by religion? Anyway, still don't need these as you are over 4 billion short even having every war in recorded history as a 'religious war'

Can you make a logical case for 4 billion please?

In any event, we know with pretty good certainty just how many people have lived and died since the dawn of mankind... 100 billion people...

It is pretty safe to say that billions of people have died due to religion and religious conflicts, both the people who died as soldiers, as well as all the collateral damage civilizations incurred as a result of those conflicts.

Why is it safe? You have offered nothing but fantasy in support of you opinion.

100 billion.

20-40% of whom probably died in infancy or early childhood going by high mortality rates in ancient times.

If 25% you are saying around 1 in 15 humans who didn't die in infancy/childhood ever have died because of religion? This would probably equate to maybe 1 in 10 males.

In the industrialised slaughter of WW2, with carpet bombing of civilian populations, and modern weaponry 1 in 10 German males died.

Religion has killed men at the rate of WW2 for ever and ever? Notice another problem here?

You can't be serious, surely?

 

[Thermos aquaticus]

We can have an opinion from pure ignorance if it tickles our fancy. That doesn't mean it deserves respect though.

What would it take for an atheist opinion to have respect in your eyes?

 

[Augustus]

What would it take for an atheist opinion to have respect in your eyes?

Well given that I'm an atheist...

In general though, there are just opinions that deserve to evaluated on their own merits. I try not to be too bothered by the nominal beliefs of the person who expresses them.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

So every war when anyone has ever mentioned god in a speech to boost morale is a religious war?

No, but the mentioning of god and religion in a speech is an appeal to authority fallacy employed against the laity to stir them up and get them engaged. Couch the war in religious terms, and those who live their lives through the prism of religion and religious thought will fall in line. It's all about justification, and religion is almost always one of those justifications trotted out to stir up the populace...

For god and country!

Manifest Destiny

For Christendom!

For the Umma!

Regarding the Indian Muslim persecution. It comes as no surprise that you would characterize it that way... Whatever is contrary to your argument, discredit it, is that how it works?

How about this wikipedia article outlining a lot of the same arguments my initial link laid out? (I can hear the objections already and you haven't even begun to type out a response)
Persecution of Hindus - Wikipedia

Anyway, like I said when you first popped up in the discussion, this discussion would be fruitless.

You have your version of events, I have mine, we both have the same data, we just interpret it differently.

Regarding Christianity and the advances of science that took place in the west... The west developed science and medicine in spite of religion, not because of it.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

So every war when anyone has ever mentioned god in a speech to boost morale is a religious war?

To a certain extent, yes.

When a participant says that their motives are religious, why would you automatically dismiss this?

I think it's pretty hypocritical when the religious - or their apologists - are happy to say that every mundane activity they do is an expression of their faith (and therefore entitled to legal protections, tax breaks, etc.), but suddenly when their actions have negative consequences, those actions don't have anything to do with the religion that informs their entire lives.

 

[Augustus]

No, but the mentioning of god and religion in a speech is an appeal to authority fallacy employed against the laity to stir them up and get them engaged. Couch the war in religious terms, and those who live their lives through the prism of religion and religious thought will fall in line. It's all about justification, and religion is almost always one of those justifications trotted out to stir up the populace...

Most people didn't have a choice to fight in most wars. They did it because someone powerful said they had to.

Lumping together motivational rhetoric for people already engaged in wars with wars fought over religions is silly.

For example, Caesar wanted to rule Rome. He no doubt mentioned gods to his troops at some time, but the cause of the war was Caesar wanting to rule Rome.

Spartacus and co wanted to be free men. No doubt some of them mentioned gods...

The vast majority of wars throughout human history would have happened regardless of religion.

Regarding the Indian Muslim persecution. It comes as no surprise that you would characterize it that way... Whatever is contrary to your argument, discredit it, is that how it works?

Whatever is contrary to the facts, discredit it.

The article claims the population of India was 600 million prior to the invasions

The facts disagree: Demographics of India - Wikipedia

You have your version of events, I have mine, we both have the same data, we just interpret it differently.

We have very different data, one set compares a lot better with reality.

Regarding Christianity and the advances of science that took place in the west... The west developed science and medicine in spite of religion, not because of it.

The vast majority of contemporary historians of science disagree with you. Why do you think this is?

A widespread myth that refuses to die...maintains that consistent opposition of the Christian church to rational thought in general and the natural sciences in particular, throughout the patristic and medieval periods, retarded the development of a viable scientific tradition, thereby delaying the Scientific Revolution and the origins of modern science by more than a millennium.

Historical scholarship of the past half-century demonstrates that the truth is otherwise.
David C Lindberg in the Cambridge companion to science and religion

No institution or cultural force of the patristic period offered more encouragement for the investigation of nature than did the
Christian church. Contemporary pagan culture was no more favorable to disinterested speculation about the cosmos than was Christian culture. It follows that the presence of the Christian church enhanced, rather than damaged, the development of the natural sciences.
Michael H. Shank Ch2 in Galileo goes to jail and other myths about science and religion - Harvard University Press


in this case it is clear from the historical record that the Catholic church has been probably the largest single and longest- term patron of science in history, that many contributors to the Scientific Revolution were themselves Catholic, and that several Catholic institutions and perspectives were key influences upon the rise of modern science. Margaret J Osler

No account of Catholic involvement with science could be complete without mention of the Jesuits (officially called the Society of Jesus). Formally established in 1540, the society placed such special emphasis on education that by 1625 they had founded nearly 450 colleges in Europe and elsewhere. Many Jesuit priests were deeply involved in scientific issues, and many made important contributions. The reformed calendar, enacted under Pope Gregory XIII in 1582 and still in use today, was worked out by the Jesuit mathematician and astronomer Christoph Clavius (1538–1612). Optics and astronomy were topics of special interest for Jesuits. Christoph Scheiner (1573–1650) studied sunspots, Orazio Grassi (1583–1654) comets, and Giambattista Riccioli (1598–1671) provided a star cata log, a detailed lunar map that provided the names still used today for many of its features, and experimentally confirmed Galileo’s laws of falling bodies by measuring their exact rates of acceleration during descent. Jesuit investigators of optics and light include Francesco Maria Grimaldi (1618–1663), who, among other things (such as collaborating with Riccioli on the lunar map), discovered the phenomenon of the diffraction of light and named it. Magnetism as well was studied by several Jesuits, and it was Niccolo Cabeo (1586–1650) who devised the technique of visualizing the magnetic field lines by sprinkling iron filings on a sheet of paper laid on top of a magnet. By 1700, Jesuits held a majority of the chairs of mathematics in European universities.10

Undergirding such scientific activities in the early- modern period was the firm conviction that the study of nature is itself an inherently religious activity. The secrets of nature are the secrets of God. By coming to know the natural world we should, if we observe and understand rightly, come to a better understanding of their Creator. This attitude was by no means unique toCatholics, but many of the priests and other religious involved in teaching and studying natural philosophy underscored this connection. Margaret J Osler


Although they disagree about nuances, today almost all historians agree that Christianity (Catholicism as well as Protestantism) move many early-modern intellectuals to study nature systematically.4 Historians have also found that notions borrowed from Christian belief found their ways into scientific discourse, with glorious re- sults; the very notion that nature is lawful, some scholars argue, was borrowed from Christian theology.5 Christian convictions also affected how nature was studied. For example, in the six- teenth and seventeenth centuries, Augustine’s notion of original sin (which held that Adam’s Fall left humans implacably dam- aged) was embraced by advocates of “experimental natural phi- losophy.” As they saw it, fallen humans lacked the grace to understand the workings of the world through cogitation alone, requiring in their disgraced state painstaking experiment and ob- servation to arrive at knowledge of how nature works (though our knowledge even then could never be certain). In this way, Christian doctrine lent urgency to experiment.6

Historians have also found that changing Christian approaches to interpreting the Bible affected the way nature was studied in crucial ways. For example, Reformation leaders disparaged allegorical readings of Scripture, counseling their congregations to read Holy Writ literally. This approach to the Bible led some scholars to change the way they studied nature, no longer seeking the allegorical meaning of plants and animals and instead seeking what they took to be a more straightforward description of the material world.7 Also, many of those today considered “fore- fathers” of modern science found in Christianity legitimation of their pursuits. René Descartes (1596–1650) boasted of his physics that “my new philosophy is in much better agreement with all the truths of faith than that of Aristotle.”8 Isaac Newton (1642–1727) believed that his system restored the original divine wisdom God had provided to Moses and had no doubt that his Christianity bolstered his physics—and that his physics bolstered his Christi- anity.9 Finally, historians have observed that Christian churches were for a crucial millennium leading patrons of natural philosophy and science, in that they supported theorizing, experimentation, observation, exploration, documentation, and publication. Noah J Efron

John Heilbron, no apologist for the Vatican, got it right when he opened his book The Sun in the Church with the following words: “The Roman Catholic Church gave more financial and social support to the study of astronomy for over six centuries, from the recovery of ancient learning during the late Middle Ages into the Enlightenment, than any other, and probably all, other institutions.”4 Heilbron’s point can be generalized far beyond astronomy. Put succinctly, the medieval period gave birth
to the university, which developed with the active support of the papacy. This unusual institution sprang up rather spontaneously around famous masters in towns like Bologna, Paris, and Oxford before 1200. By 1500, about sixty universities were scattered throughout Europe. What is the significance of this development for our myth? About 30 percent of the medieval university curriculum covered subjects and texts concerned with the natural world.5 This was not a trivial development. The proliferation of universities between 1200 and 1500 meant that hundreds of thousands of students—a quarter million in the German universities alone from 1350 on—were exposed to science in the Greco-Arabic tradition. Michael H Shank (all above quotes from Gallileo goes to jail)

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Lumping together motivational rhetoric for people already engaged in wars with wars fought over religions is silly.

For example, Caesar wanted to rule Rome. He no doubt mentioned gods to his troops at some time, but the cause of the war was Caesar wanting to rule Rome.

It wasn't just a matter of rhetoric.

Have you heard the story of the Battle of Drepana?

Roman naval battle. As was the religious requirement, Pulcher (the Roman commander) consulted the sacred chickens he had on board the ship: if the chickens ate grain thrown to them, this would mean that the gods favoured attacking. If they didn't eat, this meant the gods didn't favour attacking. This morning, the chickens didn't eat. Same for the next few times they tried.

Finally, Pulcher - pretty frustrated and angry at this point while his chance for battle was slipping away - consulted the chickens one last time. They didn't eat. Pulcher shouted "well if they aren't hungry, then perhaps they're thirsty!" and threw them overboard. Pulcher ordered the attack... and was soundly beaten.

Whether the details of the story are true, the fact that it was used as a cautionary tale points to an important fact: it was customary in ancient Rome to only order an army into battle once it had been ascertained through religious rituals that it was what the gods wanted.

If that's not religiously motivated war, I don't know what is.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Another thing:

Most people didn't have a choice to fight in most wars. They did it because someone powerful said they had to.

Through large chunks of history, its was very common for the power and authority of that "someone powerful" to be rooted in the divine right of kings or the endorsement of a religious leader.

Pretty much every powerful leader in Europe from the fall of Rome to the French Revolution was inexorably intertwined with religion.

 

[Augustus]

When a participant says that their motives are religious, why would you automatically dismiss this?

I wouldn't. Some wars were significantly due to religion. ISIS are motivated by religion for example.

But that's not the reason most people fought in wars.

I think it's pretty hypocritical when the religious - or their apologists - are happy to say that every mundane activity they do is an expression of their faith (and therefore entitled to legal protections, tax breaks, etc.), but suddenly when their actions have negative consequences, those actions don't have anything to do with the religion that informs their entire lives.

And it's pretty hypocritical to always blame the bad on religion but not the good (role in Enlightenment and creation of modern science, human rights, abolitionism, etc.)

Humans are just violent, it's in our nature. Animist, polytheist, monotheist, duellist, atheist, whatever: all have been violent.

Do you believe that, historically, without gods humans wouldn't want to conquer their neighbours and steal their wealth? That leaders wouldn't strive for glory and greatness? That they wouldn't desire to take slaves? That people wouldn't disagree over whatever ideologies they actually believed in or identities they actually had?

Personally, I think it's more meaningful to look at individual instances of bad/good and try to identify the role of religion (if any) in this particular scenario.

 

[Apologes]

If that's not religiously motivated war, I don't know what is.

For a war to be religious, religion has to be the main driving force without which the war could not have happened, not just one way to justify actions one has already had the intention of doing. The specific tale you share makes the point crystal clear. The commander was driven by non-religious motives. His gods didn't align with his motives, so he literally dumped his gods and went along with his motives.

Besides, it wasn't all that uncommon for people in the ancient world do see divine action in the ruling bodies but the religious undertone was really just a contingency which may have helped people be more willing to go to war, but it was hardly the deciding factor. Given how there was no real separation between the government and religion (priests would often serve as advisers and what not) even the most mundane things could have religious connotations. Religion was (and still is) after all one of the fundamental aspects of a civilization. The tale you mention is more of an example of religion (being a part of a given civilization) being reflected in the tasks that civilization undertook rather than being the thing that drove the civilization to undertake that task.

What really matters here is not whether a non-religious motive could be painted in religious colors so as to make it more appealing, but whether a religious motive could have caused the conflict in question in the absence of any non-religious motives.

 

[Augustus]

If that's not religiously motivated war, I don't know what is.

In the middle of an ongoing war against their mortal enemies, the Carthaginians, where they had an army/navy because they were already at war, were going to fight because they were already at war, they asked the chickens when to attack, then ignored them.

If true, the cautionary tale was 'when you are already in a war don't tempt fate'.

No historian considers the Punic Wars to be 'religiously motivated' anyway.

Through large chunks of history, its was very common for the power and authority of that "someone powerful" to be rooted in the divine right of kings or the endorsement of a religious leader.

Vouthon covers a lot of stuff in this thread related to such issues. It's very interesting.

Meaningful Atheistic Lives

Pretty much every powerful leader in Europe from the fall of Rome to the French Revolution was inexorably intertwined with religion.

Why start at the fall of Rome? All leaders are inexorably tied in with culture, and until very recently, all cultures had a religious dimension.

And the leaders in the French Revolution were inexorably intertwined with the Enlightenment Values and reason that are supposed to save us from these violent religions, so it seems we're doubly screwed. Then revolutionary hero Napoleon came to power, then we had the 20th C, and we all know how that went.

So, god or no god, people still be killing each other.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

The vast majority of contemporary historians of science disagree with you. Why do you think this is?

Without interviewing each one of them personally I can't say, but it could be that those historians may be religious and so want to portray religion in a good light?

The myth of Christianity founding modern science and medicine comes from the conflation of the fact that most modern scientists were Christians at the time science began to take shape in Europe. Almost invariably, they mention scientists such as Isaac Newton, Kepler, Galileo, Tycho Brahe, Copernicus, Boyle, Haller, Euler, Vesalius, or others who believed in a Christian god. Moreover, some love to report that the Church continues to finance and encourage experimental science, including the Vatican Observatory as one of the oldest astronomical institutes in the world, and the Trinity College at the University of Cambridge which claims many alumni scientists. Therefore, from these examples (don't you see?) Christianity established modern science.

Just because Christians did scientific work has nothing to do with the founding of science. Not only does it not follow, but science existed long before Christianity, practiced by the Ancient Greeks and Romans and preserved by early Muslims while Europe was in its Dark Age. Nor did science derive from the pagan religions as even then, scientists sometimes held views contrary to the prevailing religions. The ancient theological opponents did not have the encompassing institutional power as did Christianity during the Dark Ages.

From its very beginning, the Church served as a stumbling block against scientific progress. Although the Church did not initially purposely set out to destroy scientific works, the atmosphere of faith over reason during the first 1000 years of Christianity stymied much scientific thought. The few Christians that did any science during the early Dark Ages had little or no impact on later Renaissance scientists.

It was only after much pushback by the laity that the church began to get out of the way during the Renaissance and let naturalistic, rather than theological, teachings and learning flourish and give us all of the technological and medical wonders we have today.

I came across a great Neil DeGrasse Tyson video the other day where he describes what happened with scientific thought in the Muslim world. The same thing happened to Europe when Christianity achieved its spread continent wide where Roman and Greek sciences were lost/forgotten.

 

[Augustus]

Without interviewing each one of them personally I can't say, but it could be that those historians may be religious and so want to portray religion in a good light?

It's true of religious and non-religious alike.

The conflict thesis is not considered tenable in light of the evidence

Dark Age

The Middle Ages (Dark Ages has been rejected as pejorative and misleading) were not a time of scientific stagnation, but continued progress and an important stepping stone to modern science.

Again, this is the view of a diverse range of scholars who engage with the primary sources.

Just because Christians did scientific work has nothing to do with the founding of science.

A minute ago anyone who so much as mentioned god in a battle was 'religiously motivated', however natural philosophers reasoning directly from theological principles: 'nothing to see here, move along'.

The Physicist Paul Davies notes:

"Historians of science are well aware that Newton and his contemporaries believed that in doing science they were uncovering the divine plan for the universe in the form of its underlying mathematical order. This was explicitly stated by René Descartes:

It is God who has established the laws of nature, as a King establishes laws in his kingdom ... You will be told that if God has established these truths, he could also change them as a King changes his laws. To which it must be replied: yes, if his will can change. But I understand them as eternal and immutable. And I judge the same of God.

(Descartes, 1630)...

Clearly, then, the orthodox concept of laws of physics derives directly from theology. It is remarkable that this view has remained largely unchallenged after 300 years of secular science. Indeed, the “theological model” of the laws of physics is so ingrained in scientific thinking that it is taken for granted. The hidden assumptions behind the concept of physical laws, and their theological prov- enance, are simply ignored by almost all except historians of sci- ence and theologians. From the scientific standpoint, however, this uncritical acceptance of the theological model of laws leaves a lot to be desired."


Regarding an experimental approach to science (one of the driving forces behind the creation of modern science):


"The experimental approach is justified primarily by appeals to the weakness of our sensory and cognitive capaci- ties. For many seventeenth-century English thinkers these weaknesses were understood as consequences of the Fall. Boyle and Locke, for their part, also place stress on the incapacities that necessarily attend the kind of beings that we are. But in both cases, the more important issue is the nature of human capacities rather than the nature of the Deity. And if the idea of a fall away from an originally perfect knowledge begins to decline in importance towards the end of the seventeenth century, it nonetheless played a crucial role by drawing attention to the question of the capacities of human nature in the present world." Peter Harrison - The fall of man and the foundations of modern science

In general, the Greeks, and 'intellectualist' Christians such as Descartes, approach had not been based around experimentation as they believed that the senses and reason could be trusted to create a reliable understanding of nature. However, voluntarist theology, influenced numerous natural philosophers to reject this faith in reason.

Of course Christian theology wasn't the only possible route to such beliefs, but in this case it was the route and many earlier great thinkers had not taken this approach.

science existed long before Christianity

Of course.

But it is generally accepted that there was a significant change in scientific methodology that led to significant advances sometimes often called the 'scientific revolution' (although some argue it was more evolution over centuries, beginning in Europe in the late Middle Ages)

I came across a great Neil DeGrasse Tyson video the other day where he describes what happened with scientific thought in the Muslim world.

Tyson is a good scientist, but a terrible historian. Is he going to argue that al-Ghazali ended the Golden Age again like he did in Cosmos?

Again, not something supported by people who actually study the period and have read the primary texts. Basically, philosophical output increased after al-Ghazali and scientific output continued. The myth was caused by poor orientalist scholarship and lack of knowledge of Arabic source material.

All of this 'conflict hypothesis' stuff has generally been refuted by modern scholarship now the primary material is better known and studied.

Could find some sources if you like.

The same thing happened to Europe when Christianity achieved its spread continent wide where Roman and Greek sciences were lost/forgotten.

Except this didn't happen.

Most Greek sources were preserved by Catholic/Greek Orthodox institutions and the translation of Greek and Arabic texts (when they became available) was primarily carried out by the Church.

 

[Drizzt Do'Urden]

It's true of religious and non-religious alike.

The conflict thesis is not considered tenable in light of the evidence



The Middle Ages (Dark Ages has been rejected as pejorative and misleading) were not a time of scientific stagnation, but continued progress and an important stepping stone to modern science.

Again, this is the view of a diverse range of scholars who engage with the primary sources.



A minute ago anyone who so much as mentioned god in a battle was 'religiously motivated', however natural philosophers reasoning directly from theological principles: 'nothing to see here, move along'.

The Physicist Paul Davies notes:

"Historians of science are well aware that Newton and his contemporaries believed that in doing science they were uncovering the divine plan for the universe in the form of its underlying mathematical order. This was explicitly stated by René Descartes:

It is God who has established the laws of nature, as a King establishes laws in his kingdom ... You will be told that if God has established these truths, he could also change them as a King changes his laws. To which it must be replied: yes, if his will can change. But I understand them as eternal and immutable. And I judge the same of God.

(Descartes, 1630)...

Clearly, then, the orthodox concept of laws of physics derives directly from theology. It is remarkable that this view has remained largely unchallenged after 300 years of secular science. Indeed, the “theological model” of the laws of physics is so ingrained in scientific thinking that it is taken for granted. The hidden assumptions behind the concept of physical laws, and their theological prov- enance, are simply ignored by almost all except historians of sci- ence and theologians. From the scientific standpoint, however, this uncritical acceptance of the theological model of laws leaves a lot to be desired."


Regarding an experimental approach to science (one of the driving forces behind the creation of modern science):


"The experimental approach is justified primarily by appeals to the weakness of our sensory and cognitive capaci- ties. For many seventeenth-century English thinkers these weaknesses were understood as consequences of the Fall. Boyle and Locke, for their part, also place stress on the incapacities that necessarily attend the kind of beings that we are. But in both cases, the more important issue is the nature of human capacities rather than the nature of the Deity. And if the idea of a fall away from an originally perfect knowledge begins to decline in importance towards the end of the seventeenth century, it nonetheless played a crucial role by drawing attention to the question of the capacities of human nature in the present world." Peter Harrison - The fall of man and the foundations of modern science

In general, the Greeks, and 'intellectualist' Christians such as Descartes, approach had not been based around experimentation as they believed that the senses and reason could be trusted to create a reliable understanding of nature. However, voluntarist theology, influenced numerous natural philosophers to reject this faith in reason.

Of course Christian theology wasn't the only possible route to such beliefs, but in this case it was the route and many earlier great thinkers had not taken this approach.



Of course.

But it is generally accepted that there was a significant change in scientific methodology that led to significant advances sometimes often called the 'scientific revolution' (although some argue it was more evolution over centuries, beginning in Europe in the late Middle Ages)



Tyson is a good scientist, but a terrible historian. Is he going to argue that al-Ghazali ended the Golden Age again like he did in Cosmos?

Again, not something supported by people who actually study the period and have read the primary texts. Basically, philosophical output increased after al-Ghazali and scientific output continued. The myth was caused by poor orientalist scholarship and lack of knowledge of Arabic source material.

All of this 'conflict hypothesis' stuff has generally been refuted by modern scholarship now the primary material is better known and studied.

Could find some sources if you like.



Except this didn't happen.

Most Greek sources were preserved by Catholic/Greek Orthodox institutions and the translation of Greek and Arabic texts (when they became available) was primarily carried out by the Church.

LOL! Oooooh! How nice! You quoted Descartes!

I like to think of Descartes as the first Deist. It doesn’t mean a thing that he professed to being a Catholic, as there were no Deists before Descartes. He was the first to discard all the theology and try and find the Deity by his own faculties.

When speaking about God in his ‘Meditations’, he defines what ‘God’ is with mathematical precision. His God has nothing to do with ‘an old man in the sky’. His God is one of mathematics, reason and order.

Further, coming from the first deist, the quote is even a poke in the theists eye, who believes that god suspends the laws of nature in order to perform the miracles he supposedly does, and they didn't even know it...

RE Tyson, he is spot on in what he said.

It was superstitious nonsense, such as the Muslim belief that numbers are the work of the devil, that afflicted early Christianity and the church. It is well documented that the church hunted down all books and book owners for a long time, both books that ran counter to the teachings of the church, as well as copies of bibles (which the laity weren't allowed to own)

 

[Milton Platt]

Many New atheist types who consider themselves enlightened and highly rational do tend to be remarkably ignorant and irrational on the topic of religion.

As soon as they hear/read something negative about religion their 'scepticism' and 'freethinking' magically evaporates into the most credulous form of groupthink.

Much to my chagrin, I used to be exactly like that

There are a people of all kinds on both sides of the equation.

Can you give an example of how an atheist heard something negative about a religion and wasn't sufficiently skeptical (in other words, didn't logically analyze the statement and arrive at a sound conclusion)?

 

[Apologes]

LOL! Oooooh! How nice! You quoted Descartes!

I like to think of Descartes as the first Deist. It doesn’t mean a thing that he professed to being a Catholic, as there were no Deists before Descartes. He was the first to discard all the theology and try and find the Deity by his own faculties.

When speaking about God in his ‘Meditations’, he defines what ‘God’ is with mathematical precision. His God has nothing to do with ‘an old man in the sky’. His God is one of mathematics, reason and order.

Further, coming from the first deist, the quote is even a poke in the theists eye, who believes that god suspends the laws of nature in order to perform the miracles he supposedly does, and they didn't even know it...

You've rambled for so many pages yet you don't understand that deism is a form of theism, not it's polar opposite. That aside the Christian God also has nothing to do with "an old man in the sky" either. As others have pointed out, Aquinas talked about the transcendent creator who could be discovered through reason alone centuries before Descartes or deism. Not to mention Descartes himself used arguments proposed by Christians in order to prove his God (ontological argument was invented by st. Anselm). Also, his God wasn't the distant God of deism but a morally perfect and close God with his philosophy being based on the assumption that God would care about him and would not deceive him. You also seem ignorant of the fact that the ancient philosophers like Plato had already conceived the concept of God without ascribing religious connotations to it. It was actually Christianity who took this idea of the Logos and used it to describe the God of Israel.

I find it funny that you're trying so hard to draw a line between the sophisticated God of philosophy and the shallow primitive God of Christianity when the two are almost identical. I get your beef is with dogma, but screaming "LOL" in each post and presenting caricatures of it (along with many many factual errors) doesn't really make you look sophisticated. It just makes you look petty and confused.