Religion says: If religion has done evil and harm, science is in no position to condemn. It has done evil too. Unlike science, religion will not destroy the world in a nuclear blast.
Answer: If religion is really as loving of science as it says, what would happen if it took over to do it? It would censor what it does not want people to know, and it would still figure out how to make nuclear weapons. Unlike non-believers, it would see using these weapons to destroy the world as something God is still in control of, so it might not truly be the end for humanity.
Science is a discipline—it is not the people. Thus, science cannot be blamed for the nuclear weapons, etc., that have been developed. Religions wage war over which religion is right, and no scientist has declared war yet for science. If science makes a nuclear bomb, you can’t blame science if a religion decides to detonate the bomb!Religion says: We have faith in the supernatural, and it gives us the sense of transcendence. Faith in God is based on our joyful trust in God and in those whom He has sent to preach the gospel to us.
Faith is good in theory and in practice. We are happy not to check all things out. Faith is not a necessary evil but a blessing, a gift, and a virtue. Even the most rigid scientist has some kind of faith.
Religion likes to say that science is a kind of secular faith. The ambition
is to deter people from accepting the popular view that faith is bad, and
science is not faith, so it is good.
In science, taking the word of a
scientist that something is the case is not something to be celebrated. It is a
necessary evil at best, but only when you really cannot check it out. If this is
faith, it is not faith in the sense of being joyful trust.
Faith is never good in theory, and it is only tolerable in practice. You must believe in theory that, if you could check it all out yourself, you would.
DIFFERENT QUESTIONS?
We are told, “Science asks how?” Religion says science does not ask why. But if that is true, then science assumes there is no need to ask why. Religion says that God is the why and God comes first. So, it says there is a need to ask why.
Religion says the why is answered as follows: “God, who is love, made all things, and a rebellion took place, causing evil. Evil is not His fault but is down to the rebellious. His plan is to see as much love as possible emerge and to make it last forever. Nobody can test if God is acting, and nobody can test love; therefore, these things are beyond the capability of science.”
But science can see if things are really improving.
And science sees love as a chemical reaction, something that is testable.
And science argues that, one day, all things will be destroyed.
It is not true that the why is not a question for science. It is. If you try to put certain things beyond scientific examination, then the end result is not science but prejudice and half-truth.
Science seeks the theory of everything, which is meant to answer why and explain why there is something rather than nothing. We already have most of the pieces of the theory, though there is much more to do.
The “science is about how and religion is about why” argument is really an attempt to make it seem that religion can never be refuted by science. Never condone any system of authority that puts itself outside the risk of refutation. Religious and supernatural claims make it so easy to make false or mistaken but un-falsifiable claims. For example, your cat has risen from the dead but only you see and touch him. His body is still in the grave? No problem - he was resurrected using other material. After all, creatures replace their bodies over time so their material is still out there.
The argument actually makes any particular religion unconvincing. If science has never had anything to say to religion, then religion has never had anything to say to science. Putting science and religion into two totally separate realms means one can never contradict or undermine the other. So, if Hinduism is as outside of science as Christianity, then you may as well choose one or the other, for there is no way of knowing what the best or most pro-science choice is. And if one is convinced by one’s religion and thinks science has nothing to say to the faith, then one is not giving science the importance it demands and deserves.
Science can only say something is inexplicable or unexplained and never calls anything a miracle, for there is no scientific test to show that God really did a miracle. If a miracle happens, you don’t know if God did it. So, if religion truly believes that science is about the how, then why does it bring in scientists when there is a report of a miracle or healing?
Religion says there is no how without God. So, it makes out that the how is inseparable from who and why. Science ignores this. Science and religion, then, are in conflict, and religion is the cause of the conflict.
Also, science sees no need for a who when it asks how. It is clear that there has to be a who if nothing happens without a God who is personally doing it.
It is nonsense to say that religion, by default, does not say how we came to be. Some religions do, and some don’t. The Bible says that all mankind came from Adam and Eve, and that Adam was made from dust and Eve was made from his rib. To say this story doesn’t ring true is to read our modern ideas and better knowledge back into primitive texts. It is to distort them.
Religion asks how, why, and by whom—meaning God.
We are told, “Science asks how things work, while religion deals with another issue: who made all things and why. Thus, science and religion do not conflict, for they are about separate things.”
Science interprets reality as something that has no evident purpose. Assuming there is a purpose will damage the objectivity needed in experiments and scientific reasoning. Even a vague idea of purpose is a problem. For example, if science believes that one day many people will be happy forever, it cannot warn against the big crunch, when everything is destroyed. And it does warn! Science could ask, “Why is there life now when one day there will be none, only destruction?”
Science says the answer to why something exists when there could have been
nothing is that there was a cause. It does not say there was a purpose and
rejects the very notion.
Religion interprets reality as something that has a
purpose, and that purpose is revealed to us by God. The purpose is, broadly
speaking, about God’s plan for us to be holy in this world and blessed in the
next. All that happens is part of God’s big design. We refer to this kind of
thinking as teleological. The bee cannot exist without honey. In science, this
does not mean that something planned for honey to exist so that the bee might
exist. It only means something caused this. Something can be caused without
being arranged by design. In science, you see causation at work, not design.
Science assumes reason is true. Science is not possible unless the laws of correct logic and mathematics are considered valid. It follows that, even if science does not concern itself with whether or not God exists, it does, in the sense that it implicitly rejects belief in God if it is irrational. If reason refutes God, then God is against the methodology of science. It is against reason. Everything that is discovered has countless implications or possible implications. Science cannot explore them all. It makes the discoveries and may look at a few important implications. If science does not focus on the non-existence of God, such as saying, "There definitely or probably is no God," that does not really matter. Ignoring God amounts to saying there is probably no God. And if science will not say it, it does not matter as long as it implies there is no God. Not saying it does not mean it does not imply there is no God.
Religion answers that, "Belief in God is eminently reasonable. The reasonableness or otherwise of belief in God is not science’s concern." Says who? Science, religion, or both? If God is activity, then He could be science’s concern, even if He is not. The “could be” is important.
Religion condemns science for doing its job. It tries to provoke hate against science if it starts to feel threatened.
FINALLY
Religion, when faced
with scientific challenges, may deflect by portraying science as harmful or
incompatible with faith. However, this defense is flawed for several reasons:
Science also tackles "why" questions, and by relying on logic and reason, it
naturally questions religious claims.
Religious claims, particularly those involving the supernatural, often remain untestable because they are unfalsifiable, which weakens their credibility.
The idea of an absolute separation between science and religion is
artificial. This separation undermines religion by preventing it from engaging
with scientific inquiry and dismissing the role of evidence-based reasoning.