Again, see Richard Dawkins and his complete and utter dismissal of the struggles faced by women in the western world and his most recent “hot take” on trans lives. Or maybe see the numerous women and people of color of all genders who have been literally erased from history until recently, because only white men were scientists, apparently.
ANY institution that confers power on some over others will lead to systemic abuses. ANY. It’s ahistorical and unscientific to NOT see that in the various fields of modern science, too.
Except when it doesn’t.
What gives me hope is when individuals recognize our common humanity, our common failings, and use whatever tools at their disposal to improve all of our lives, rather than the lives of the elite. Dumping entire groups of people or even entire ideas on the trashpile because they don’t entirely conform to one’s view of right isn’t really doing that. Atheists can be just as likely to embrace dangerous ideology as anyone else. Because even using a scientific world view without taking one’s own biases into account and admitting that one doesn’t know everything lead to wrongheaded thinking. There are none too few scientists who are so blinkered, because they just can’t acknowledge that they might be wrong about something.
You do realize that many Christians don’t see that as a literally historical event, even though some do, right? But still consider themselves people of faith. And let’s not forget how many grown ass adults who aren’t religious still believe that Columbus “discovered” a place that was teeming with people.
It was an example to illustrate my use of “religious faith.” Yes, I’m quite aware that not everyone holds exactly the same beliefs. In fact I’d say it would be very difficult to find any two people with exactly the same religious beliefs.
Of course there are always individuals pushing in other directions, trying to upset the applecart. Sometimes they succeed, or build their own cart all together and take it in a new, better direction. That’s one of our human superpowers, fortunately.
You seem to be trying to put words in my mouth. My point is that there is a fundamental conflict between religious faith and science. And that conflict is because faith can allow someone to believe something that falls apart under scientific scrutiny.
I’m fully aware that a person can be a great scientist and (for example) also believe in a god as commonly described by Christians (all-powerful, created the universe, interacts with humanity). Cognitive dissonance exists, and just about everyone has it at varying levels. It doesn’t necessarily mean that someone is “great” or “not great.”
That wasn’t the case until fairly recently and it’s not the case for many scientists today. It’s just factually incorrect to say that science and faith can’t be reconciled, since for much of human history, it very much was and is.
I’m not disagreeing with you. The pursuit of science has all the same problems and shortcoming of all human institutions. Of course there is bias, of course there are abuses of power and self delusion. Of course scientists, even very prominent ones, can be narrow minded idiots about things. I did not say science manages to avoid any of those issues.
The difference is that reason and evidence in the pursuit of truth and understanding is the core attribute. It explicitly strives to account for inevitable biases and calls on others to point them out whenever they are discovered. It explicitly encourages that nothing be taken for granted, and a new theory may fit existing data better than anything previously imagined.
It’s a bumpy, winding, indirect road, but I do believe it ultimately takes us closer to better understanding of the ourselves and the universe we live in, in a manner unique among all other human endeavors yet to be conceived.
Can’t really be any experts on extraterrestrial life until we find some.
At this point they operate on the same level as a panel at an SF con debating dragon anatomy and mating habits or the legal and social framework of Hobbiton.
This is in error. Debating the fictional mechanics of a fiction world is not constrained by what is known about the real non-fictional world. Speculating about unknown outcomes of mechanics in the real world is. In the latter, Bayesian credences are constrained by prior knowledge of the real natural universe. In the former, they’re constrained by prior knowledge about a made-up universe.
Any extraterrestrial life that does or has existed is thus constrained by the same natural mechanics as life on Earth. There’s nothing supernatural about it.
Ugh - Dawkins. I actually agree with his scientific views, but still want to smack him in the mouth when he talks. Exhausting.
One other note on the subject, the Catholics actually a group of scientific advisors, many of them secular. I think it is things like this is why the Catholics don’t officially have a problem with the concept of evolution. (even if some members do).
I dunno if that is true… yes, you could make a case for some religions at certain times in history - but you also could make the case for the exact opposite.
The Protestant Reformation shifted thinking into viewing God as a personal God, and thus focused more on the individual and lead to the eventual idea that man shouldn’t beholden to kings and that we all had a more or less equal worth as humans.
