On Creating Imaginary Worlds: Questions and Answers

[Zubi-Ondo]

The answer is in your post.

I really don't believe that you can mix religion and science in this way. Either the way in which life has developed was divinely inspired (in which case, science has no role, and is in fact useless) or evolution has followed a logical pattern which is explicable via natural forces (in which case divine intervention has no role). You can't have it mostly natural but with a bit of religion added, any more than a girl can be "just a little bit pregnant".

I'm not trying to "mix" them. That's why I said "balance" is a better word. I want them to co-exist. You said "Science has nothing to say about the spiritual side of life". That's because it simply isn't concerned with it at all. I think it's people's interpretations of spiritual text that is at fault. People want to use religion to explain the origins of life and such, and I don't think that is the proper use of religion. Religion should be simply asking people to have faith, and let science do the explaining. How that for an un-popular position?

You could argue that "Genesis" does exactly what I'm saying it shouldn't, but if you look at it the way I did earlier, all of the "creating" is going on in the spiritual world, and then it gets "implemented", or realized in the material. If you try, you can see that my notion has possibility in it. Plus the fact that the story is 2000+ years old, and has passed through countless translations, and people's hands in the meantime.

- Z.

[Anthony G Williams]

I hope we can agree that science and religion can coexist amicably as long as science only attempts to explain the material world, and religion confines itself to explaining the spiritual one.

The problem in the past has been that religion (Christianity, anyway) attempted to provide an explanation for everything - spiritual and material - and bitterly resisted the explanations of science where they conflicted with doctrine. Still does, in some places. I am still amazed and baffled by the results of a survey carried out in the USA in 2005, in which people were invited to answer the question "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animals: true or false?" The answers given were: true 40%; false 39%; not sure 21%. To me, that is a sad indictment of the US educational system.

[Zubi-Ondo]

Originally Posted by Anthony G Williams

I am still amazed and baffled by the results of a survey carried out in the USA in 2005, in which people were invited to answer the question "human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animals: true or false?" The answers given were: true 40%; false 39%; not sure 21%. To me, that is a sad indictment of the US educational system.

I am surprised that the number of those who responded "true" was so high!

My guess is that people find it difficult to reconcile their egos with any suggestion that they could have shared a common ancestor with an animal. Funny if true , because that ego is one of the most animal instincts we posses.

- Z.

[Urlik]

I really don't believe that you can mix religion and science in this way. Either the way in which life has developed was divinely inspired (in which case, science has no role, and is in fact useless) or evolution has followed a logical pattern which is explicable via natural forces (in which case divine intervention has no role). You can't have it mostly natural but with a bit of religion added, any more than a girl can be "just a little bit pregnant".

try reading The Star by Arther C Clarke for an interesting mix of science and religion

[lin robinson]

To me, that is a sad indictment of the US educational system.

I don't see why. The educational system is not, nor should it EVER be, in the business of instilling uniform beliefs.

[Anthony G Williams]

Originally Posted by Zubi-Ondo

I am surprised that the number of those who responded "true" was so high!

My guess is that people find it difficult to reconcile their egos with any suggestion that they could have shared a common ancestor with an animal. Funny if true , because that ego is one of the most animal instincts we posses. .

There must be more to it than that, since the same question was asked in many western European countries, plus Japan, and the percentage of people believing in evolution was typically about double that in the USA. There is something qualitatively very different about the USA's attitude to this issue, among the countries of the developed world.

The only country polled which was more sceptical of evolution than the USA was (Muslim) Turkey. Strange bedfellows!

[Anthony G Williams]

Originally Posted by Urlik

try reading The Star by Arther C Clarke for an interesting mix of science and religion

You can do anything in fiction - that's what makes it fun to read and write!

[Anthony G Williams]

Originally Posted by lin robinson

I don't see why. The educational system is not, nor should it EVER be, in the business of instilling uniform beliefs.

That depends on the type of beliefs. If you mean religion, I agree entirely (in fact, I strongly believe that schools should not teach religious beliefs at all - if parents want it, that should be left to lessons out of school). But do you think that schools should not instill the uniform belief that lying, theft and murder are wrong? Do you thing that schools should not teach that 2+2=4 rather than allowing children to invent their own answers?

I see an understanding of science as being a fundamental issue which must be taught accurately, just as mathematics and language skills must be taught accurately. Children should be taught the importance of the scientific process of; observation to collect evidence, hypotheses to account for the observations, and testing of the hypotheses with the aim of developing an agreed theory (until such time as better, contradictory evidence emerges).

For anyone to say, "no, science doesn't necessarily work when it conflicts with religion, it's up to you to decide whether or not to believe religious doctrine instead, regardless of the massive quantity of objective evidence against it" - that isn't education, that's undermining education.

[lin robinson]

Belief is belief. Science really shouldn't rely on it.

Much of the reaction against sciencism in modern society comes from the fact that it is giving answers to questions it isn't qualified to provide answers to.

One of those would be: where to we come from?

The main one would be: Why?

Before anybody goes off, look around a little bit. How many times to you see people saying things like, "We evolved this so we could do such-and-such"?

A big clue was the appearance of the "DarwinFish" bumper stickers. The whole idea of "Jesus vs Darwin" is an indication that science has become a cult and overstepped its bounds. Certainly in the popular perception.

Maybe they should have made it multiple choice, with "I believe that live on this planet immigrated here from another planet".

[lin robinson]

I was looking at an elementary science textbook the other day and was checking out their pictures of dinosaurs.

Okay, they don't know what color they were, but have to make them some color. And understandably, kids will end up thinking that's the color a Triceratops is, etc.

But they had a picture of a winged reptile skimming above the ocean scooping with its long, pelican-like lower jaw. And the text SAID that the bird drank and fed by that method.

Well, guess what, you don't have to be a rocket scientist or avionics engineer to know that a huge bird can't skim along the water scooping up fish. But there is was, in a science book. Based on actual fossil evidence, right?

Bounds have been overstepped, "proof positive" overstated, faith diminished.

[lin robinson]

do you think that schools should not instill the uniform belief that lying, theft and murder are wrong?

It is not the business of schools to instill beliefs on these matters one way or the other. Who are they to tell kids what is right and wrong? That's a pretty slippery slope, when you think about it.

[Anthony G Williams]

Originally Posted by lin robinson

Belief is belief. Science really shouldn't rely on it.

There are two types of belief: those which are supported by objective evidence (e.g. a belief that the sun is going to rise tomorrow morning) and those which are not (a belief in astrology). There is nothing wrong with teaching the first kind, as long as the reason for the belief is explained. The second type is best described as faith, and should never be taught as fact.

Much of the reaction against sciencism in modern society comes from the fact that it is giving answers to questions it isn't qualified to provide answers to.

One of those would be: where to we come from?

The main one would be: Why?

I don't know what "sciencism" is, but science is basically concerned with evidence which can be observed, collected and analysed.

As far as "where we come from" is concerned, there is evidence from various fields (palaeontology, genetics, language evolution) which enables the evolution and spread of homo sap to be theorised (subject to adjustment as new evidence emerges). "Why" we exist, in a metaphysical sense, is not something which concerns science. Individual scientists may have their own views on that, but that's a different matter.

Before anybody goes off, look around a little bit. How many times to you see people saying things like, "We evolved this so we could do such-and-such"?

Which merely proves that there is a lot of ignorance out there about what evolution is and how it works. More education is the answer!

A big clue was the appearance of the "DarwinFish" bumper stickers. The whole idea of "Jesus vs Darwin" is an indication that science has become a cult and overstepped its bounds. Certainly in the popular perception.

No, it's an indication that fundamentalist Christians refuse to accept the evidence for evolution, and prefer their ancient mythologies instead.

Maybe they should have made it multiple choice, with "I believe that live on this planet immigrated here from another planet".

To which science would respond: "There's no evidence in support of that".

But they had a picture of a winged reptile skimming above the ocean scooping with its long, pelican-like lower jaw. And the text SAID that the bird drank and fed by that method.

Well, guess what, you don't have to be a rocket scientist or avionics engineer to know that a huge bird can't skim along the water scooping up fish. But there is was, in a science book. Based on actual fossil evidence, right?

Well, there's the Black Skimmer whch currently fishes by exactly that method: http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/Condor/...0298-p0298.pdf

I don't know exactly what the book you mention said, but what it should have said is: "The shape of the head and the lower bill is similar to that of surface skimmers which we can observe today, which suggests that these creatures may have fed in the same way". That's a reasonable assumption, from the fossil evidence. See: Skimming for Fish? -- 297 (5580): 297 -- Science

It is not the business of schools to instill beliefs on these matters one way or the other. Who are they to tell kids what is right and wrong? That's a pretty slippery slope, when you think about it.

Any teacher who fails to correct a pupil who lies, cheats or steals (let alone commits murder) isn't doing their job. Some moral issues are debatable - and should be debated - others are much more clear-cut, like stealing from somebody or cheating in an exam.

[TorrnT]

Um, so do you think the short story would be a good idea?
You are debating about something that the greatest minds can only theorize about.
Bacteria obviously don't know they must replicate to endure.
Because we know we must also reproduce, does that make us any less fragile or any more secure?

We are all females for our first 6 weeks in the womb,(we also have gills) even though our sexuality is determined at conception, we still continue to develop as females unto the sixth week (this is why men have nipples).

We could debate forever, but I was hoping on feed back for the short story idea. The catch is there were 2 bacterium capsules made. one to propagate the theropod species (made by the theropods) and one by the humans(made by the humans) the short story ends when the capsules get mixed up, only one gets sent back in time, (remember this bacteria was created in a lab to endure extreme conditions) you never find out which capsule has been sent back the only way to know is if, we either find theropods or humans (if any life at all) on other planets (if we survive as a species long enough to develop the tech for high speed space travel).

I just hoped the story could remain within the bounds of credibility.
And hold someone's interest and not laughed at as utter bull.

Science fiction peppered with science fact, seems some like pepper more than others.

PS. Mayan calender says a catastrophe will happen 2012, I was gonna add something about that, but i thought leaving the story open ended would be better.

[Anthony G Williams]

You could always write is as a comedy of errors rather than a straight story (you can get away with a lot more in a comedy!).

This has reminded me of a story I heard about a couple of decades ago (although I never had the book). It followed the lives of a group of early hominins, and the running joke was that they knew all about evolution and were actively encouraging it. So if a mother saw a child crawling, she'd yell "Get up and walk! You want to waste millions of years of evolution?"

[Urlik]

write the story
there are similar hard SF books with similar themes, although not exactly the same.
I'd be interested in reading it and as long as it is left open ended, I can't see it slipping beyond the bounds of the reader's credibility as they would fill in the gaps with what they believe is possible