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>To: N.Monks@nhm.ac.uk >From: c583scb@semovm.semo.edu (Dr Peter Roopnarine) >Subject: Re: "No Bolides!" > >>Dear All, >> >>Mike McReese said something along the lines of "why is everyone one in an >>uproar about psuedo-science? How can there be psuedo science it science >>has nothhing to do with truth?" >> >>The uproar in my experience is pretty asymmetrical. I have yet to meet a >>scientist who has said that his or her discipline convinces them that >>"faith" or "religion" is all bunk. They may well believe that, but usually >>for reasons other that their work. >> >>But I have heard religious people state that their beliefs prove that >>science is wrong. A scientific fact may well be wrong; but rarely for the >>reasons they propose! >> >>As has been said many times, science is concerned with those questions that >>can be answered, and so tends to deal with small points one at a time. If >>science gives us any sort of world picture or cosmology, it is purely >>serendipitous. Faith, on the contrary, presents a global image, which if >>accepted allows the individual to see divine handiwork in all things from >>the orbit of planets to the migration of birds. It does not need evidence, >>but rather acceptance and then interpretation. >> >>In my opinion, the two things simply don't conflict, even if they overlap. >>There is nothing to stop the faithful considering Van der Waal's forces or >>Bolide Impacts to be anything other than evidence of divine order. Let us >>not forget that many great palaeontologists, like Richard Owen, believed >>this to be true. >> >>Conversely, an aethistic scientist (or more commonly, agnostic) can see >>divine action is uneccessary: but that does not prove the absence of such >>actions. >> >>That any conflict exists between the two viewpoints is generally through >>misunderstanding what the other side is saying. >> >>Best wishes, >> >>Neale >> >> >> >>>From Neale Monks' PowerBook, at... >> >>Department of Palaeontology, Natural History Museum, London, SW7 5BD >>Internet: N.Monks@nhm.ac.uk, Telephone: 0171-938-9007 >> >> >> >There is a basic difference! Science works by constructing testable hypotheses, however difficult those tests might be to implement. Belief in divine order, intervention, etc. is a matter of faith. The existence or absence of such divine media is not testable (the old "Strike me with lightning where I stand" does not seem to work). There's nothing wrong with faith or belief. But that system differs fundamentally from science. In science we do not prove anything; we simply support or fail to support hypotheses, and construct theories accordingly. > >Peter D. Roopnarine >Department of Biology >Southeast Missouri State University >Cape Girardeau MO 63701 > >
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