Talk-Polywell.org

Religious does not mean stupid. Plenty of religious scientists whether they be christian, jewish, muslim, hindu or whatever. There are plenty of non religious scientists too.

Humility before the facts is the cornerstone of science, and that is the complete opposite of religious belief

There's plenty of history of dogma in science. It's often a battle to get new ideas accepted. There is no reason to keep this back and forth going. Science leaves room for belief, and belief leaves room for science. I say both are needed.

except that scientific thinking MEANS holding all your beliefs up to rigorous empirical standards.

the arcstone of science is rejecting unfalsifiable claims.

holding at the core of your belief system and world view the mother of unfalsifiable claims is the exact opposite.

one cannot base their beliefs rigorously and without exception on evidence and simultaneously passionately and without exception on some "faith" in a total delusion.

they are not orthogonal. they interfere with each other destructively. and quite directly, at that. at the very core of their foundations.

JoeP wrote:Funny that the original Farnsworth was a Mormon IIRC.

Guess he was IQ impeded as well according to happyjack and didn't have the "mind for it" to develop anything successfully. Ah well.

are you really that frickin' thick?!? do you really not understand the basic concept of probability? i've even given you a scatter plot! how much clearer can i possibly make it?!? geez!

Diogenes wrote:

happyjack27 wrote:
touche. very good counter-example.

nonetheless, activity and growth in the anterior cingulate cortex and amigdyala tend to be mutually exclusive. in fact, the amigdyla has a tendency to hijack the higher cognitive functions.

But if one example is not sufficient, here are too many to name, among them Maxwell, Planck, Heisenberg, etc.

it's not that one example is not sufficient. it's that:
a) examples are absolutely worthless for elucidating overall trends
b).empirical evidence cannot contradict empirical evidence.

Religion deceives, science enlightens; that's quite a difference. Dogma in science can be overturned overnight by a good experiment and reasoning, good luck overturning religious dogma in the same manner.

That's not to say a scientist can't be 'spiritual, but a 'religious scientist (as stubby puts it) isn't really applying the same rules to their beliefs as to their science, somewhat convieniently;

As for the example so readily praised, In times gone by, it could be quite dangerous to ones health/career to profess to atheism, and religion was de facto the norm; even now kids are made to do religious education at school, its hardly suprising that scientists from 100-300 years ago are tagged 'religious'

303 wrote:Religion deceives, science enlightens; that's quite a difference. Dogma in science can be overturned overnight by a good experiment and reasoning, good luck overturning religious dogma in the same manner.

That's not to say a scientist can't be 'spiritual, but a 'religious scientist (as stubby puts it) isn't really applying the same rules to their beliefs as to their science, somewhat convieniently;

As for the example so readily praised, In times gone by, it could be quite dangerous to ones health/career to profess to atheism, and religion was de facto the norm; even now kids are made to do religious education at school, its hardly suprising that scientists from 100-300 years ago are tagged 'religious'

Tell that to the climate 'scientists' that got caught manipulating their data and models...They believe just as much as a religious person does, and they are willing to lie to push that belief. Of course I wasn't talking about organized religion, that's just another system used to manipulate people, but I see this same type of manipulation when it comes to politics too. People that don't have even a basic understanding of economics agreeing with policy they don't comprehend, for example.

You'll never separate belief and science from the individual. It's in our nature. Besides, we all believe in something, even if it's just our selves.

303 wrote:
As for the example so readily praised, In times gone by, it could be quite dangerous to ones health/career to profess to atheism, and religion was de facto the norm; even now kids are made to do religious education at school, its hardly suprising that scientists from 100-300 years ago are tagged 'religious'

And lets not forget "that's where the money was at. " church's had funded many projects during that time and we all know that a scientist would do just about anything to get funding up to and including selling his mom for funding. (sorry mom)

happyjack27 wrote:

JoeP wrote:Funny that the original Farnsworth was a Mormon IIRC.

Guess he was IQ impeded as well according to happyjack and didn't have the "mind for it" to develop anything successfully. Ah well.

are you really that frickin' thick?!? do you really not understand the basic concept of probability?

You made an absolute statement, against which a single contradicting example is sufficient. If you want to reduce the level of sarcasm aimed against you, you might try restating your original argument. You are getting responses outside the framework of probability because your original statement was made outside of that same framework.

easyBob wrote:

303 wrote:Religion deceives, science enlightens; that's quite a difference. Dogma in science can be overturned overnight by a good experiment and reasoning, good luck overturning religious dogma in the same manner.

That's not to say a scientist can't be 'spiritual, but a 'religious scientist (as stubby puts it) isn't really applying the same rules to their beliefs as to their science, somewhat [conveniently];

As for the example so readily praised, In times gone by, it could be quite dangerous to ones health/career to profess to atheism, and religion was [de facto] the norm; even now kids are made to do religious education at school, its hardly [surprising] that scientists from 100-300 years ago are tagged 'religious'

Tell that to the climate 'scientists' that got caught manipulating their data and models...They believe just as much as a religious person does, and they are willing to lie to push that belief. Of course I wasn't talking about organized religion, that's just another system used to manipulate people, but I see this same type of manipulation when it comes to politics too. People that don't have even a basic understanding of economics agreeing with policy they don't comprehend, for example.

You'll never separate belief and science from the individual. It's in our nature. Besides, we all believe in something, even if it's just our selves.

The important part of your post is the word 'caught'. Other scientists proved them wrong. Anyone can lie, for whatever reasons like funding or dogma, but eventually they get outed.

Stubby wrote:The important part of your post is the word 'caught'. Other scientists proved them wrong. Anyone can lie, for whatever reasons like funding or dogma, but eventually they get outed.

Caught, yes, outed, not yet. Mann is still in a position of authority at Va Tech IIRC, and the climate 'scientists' that had their emails hacked and released are still working too, again, IIRC.

Beliefs change over time, which is why religion has changed over time, it just took time to get to this point. Sadly, the science community is very similar....it takes time to change minds. It would be great if good evidence changed minds instantly, but that never happens. Religious or scientific, we all suffer from human nature.

I'm reminded of that South Park episodes with the otters...'Hail Science!' I think their point being was that most people don't understand the science itself, so they just believe it. That's a dangerous situation, as just like organized religion, that belief can be taken advantage of.

dnavas wrote:

happyjack27 wrote:

JoeP wrote:Funny that the original Farnsworth was a Mormon IIRC.

Guess he was IQ impeded as well according to happyjack and didn't have the "mind for it" to develop anything successfully. Ah well.

are you really that frickin' thick?!? do you really not understand the basic concept of probability?

You made an absolute statement, against which a single contradicting example is sufficient. If you want to reduce the level of sarcasm aimed against you, you might try restating your original argument. You are getting responses outside the framework of probability because your original statement was made outside of that same framework.

incorrect.

here is what i originally wrote:

ah, but it says he goes to church regularly.

so clearly he doesn't have the mind for it. ah well.

this was talking about an individual person, and a specific activity. an acitvity that shows not only devout religion but exteme dogmatism. an extremely dogmatic mind that, that consciously engages in repetitive activity with no evidence to justify it.

when challenged, i supported it with a general argument about intelligence and religiousity, and provided evidence. this is the argument - the general one, that you tried to rebut. a single contradictory example is not sufficient for that.


as for the specific case - that you were NOT rebutting - the only contradictory example that is sufficient is that in the specific case. mr. fansworth jr. himself. and no evidence has been provided against that original, specific claim, in the specific.

if i claim rover is in his dog house. the claim that sam is not in a pool is not sufficient to refute my claim that rover is not in his dog house.

this is your scientific brain.

Broun was born in Atlanta, Georgia, the son of Gertrude Margaret (née Beasley) and Democratic Georgia state senator Paul Collins Broun, Sr. (1916–2005), who represented Athens and the surrounding area from 1963 to 2001. His paternal grandfather was a minister.[4] Broun is a graduate of Athens High School and the University of Georgia at Athens (B.S., Chemistry, 1967) and earned his Doctor of Medicine (1971) from the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta.[5]

Committee on Science and Technology
Subcommittee on Energy and Environment
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight (Chairman)
Republican Study Committee

this is your scientific brain, on religion:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2 ... tion-video

any questions?

dnavas wrote:

happyjack27 wrote:

JoeP wrote:Funny that the original Farnsworth was a Mormon IIRC.

Guess he was IQ impeded as well according to happyjack and didn't have the "mind for it" to develop anything successfully. Ah well.

are you really that frickin' thick?!? do you really not understand the basic concept of probability?

You made an absolute statement, against which a single contradicting example is sufficient. If you want to reduce the level of sarcasm aimed against you, you might try restating your original argument. You are getting responses outside the framework of probability because your original statement was made outside of that same framework.

your rebuttle here follows my links to empirical data that shows a that higher iq leads to a higher likelihood of aethism, in the wikipedia article. that is in fact the only place where i mentioned iq or presented information that mentions iq. so it is the only thing you can be referring to, assuming, that is, that you are referring to something i said or presented.

if you put the chart - or just the basic concept of probability - or logic - in a venn diagram, you would see that higher A implying a higher likilihood of B does not mean that not B implies not A.

so you see either you are not referring to anything i said ( - and to preempt what i expect your argument to this will be: there are many different components to i.q. one can have a high general i.q., and yet not have a mind for rigorous science, or engineering, for that matter, so you see my original statement was no implication about his i.q., but, rather, a specific factor -), in which case, your entire argument is moot, or you are refering to that; your argument is an attempted rebutal of that, in which case it is a hopelessly failed one. and in either case, you are being intellectually dishonest.