Is atheism against evolution?

Galvasean

No science as we know it without Christianity? Excuse my language but PAH!
Can you honestly believe that the scientific method could have come about without the Christian religion?

Zombrex

Soul Winner wrote: »

What did we do before science as we know it today came along? We had what atheistic scientists call stupid religions in abundance, but it is from these stupid religious views - so called - that schools, colleges and universities emerged.

You keep saying that as if there is some important correlation there. Schools colleges and universities emerged from people moving away from the wishy washy "views of reality" you are talking about and towards the scientific method of knowledge.

They did this because the wishy washy views of reality can't actually do anything. As I said before, you can't build a castle or a boat or a train without first understand the reality around you.

(Some) Religious people today want to retreat back to a more ignorant time simply because modern scientific understanding of nature and reality has poo-pooed so many of their once cherished ideas of how the world is supposed to be.

A good example, since you mentioned it, is the idea that humans are fundamentally different than other animals. They aren't. Get over it.

You can retreat back in time to a point where most people seriously believed that, but that says nothing for the correctness of that belief.

Galvasean

Wicknight wrote: »

You can retreat back in time to a point where most people seriously believed that, but that says nothing for the correctness of that belief.

Alas poor democracy, you seemed like such a good idea...

Soul Winner

Possibly yes, actually no. Science needs universities to grow and thrive and without Christianity universities in Europe would not have existed.

Soul Winner

Wicknight wrote: »

(Some) Religious people today want to retreat back to a more ignorant time simply because modern scientific understanding of nature and reality has poo-pooed so many of their once cherished ideas of how the world is supposed to be.

I don't. I want science to move forward and be freed from all its shackles including the grip atheism has on it. I think it is getting there slowly.

Wicknight wrote: »

A good example, since you mentioned it, is the idea that humans are fundamentally different than other animals. They aren't. Get over it.

In biological and elementary make up yes, there is no fundamental difference there but what about cognitive mental faculties and reasoning abilities? Are we no different to animals in those areas too? And if we are doesn’t that say something about us?

Wicknight wrote: »

You can retreat back in time to a point where most people seriously believed that, but that says nothing for the correctness of that belief.

Like it or lump it most people believed in God when universities where being built. Get over it.

Galvasean

You still havent answered my query SW. Allow me to rephrase. Do you honestly think the human race could not have become intelligent enough to build universities and start the scientific method without Christianity?

Zillah

Soul Winner wrote: »

Possibly yes, actually no. Science needs universities to grow and thrive and without Christianity universities in Europe would not have existed.

The reason Christianity is responsible for European universities is because universities require money and power to be established. It just so happens that the Vatican had spent centuries gathering up every scrap of power and wealth they could get their grubby little hands on. Using some of that money to promote education is wonderful, but that doesn't for a second mean that the scientific world view owes anything to the religious world view. The Nazis built the autobahn, and yes, we should be happy that they used some of their wealth and power to do that, but we shouldn't try to conflate our joy of good roads with kudos for Nazism.

Yes, I'm happy that the Pope shot himself in the foot by helping to foster the modern scientific world view, but I won't for a second concede that it had anything to do with his invisible sky daddy.

Zillah

Soul Winner wrote:

In biological and elementary make up yes, there is no fundamental difference there but what about cognitive mental faculties and reasoning abilities? Are we no different to animals in those areas too? And if we are doesn’t that say something about us?

We are to chimps as chimps are to dogs as dogs are to mice as mice are to spiders as spiders are to bacteria as bacteria are to viruses.

Some of those jumps are bigger than others but the principle remains, mental faculties is a scale, not a binary scenario.

Like it or lump it most people believed in God when universities where being built. Get over it.

Yes but look at what happened after they were built.

Soul Winner

Galvasean wrote: »

You still havent answered my query SW.

Its getting like panto in here. OH YES I DID!!!

Galvasean wrote: »

Allow me to rephrase. Do you honestly think the human race could not have become intelligent enough to build universities and start the scientific method without Christianity?

Let me re-answer. Possibly yes and actually no.

Soul Winner

Zillah wrote: »

The reason Christianity is responsible for European universities is because universities require money and power to be established. It just so happens that the Vatican had spent centuries gathering up every scrap of power and wealth they could get their grubby little hands on. Using some of that money to promote education is wonderful, but that doesn't for a second mean that the scientific world view owes anything to the religious world view.

Well yes it does because without universities there would be no science as we know it today. And without Christianity there would be no universities. Which means if science where an engine of its own making I'd say it would probably still be at Model T phase, whereas because of Christianity it is the BMW it is today, it is still a far cry from a Ferrari though, but we’ll get it there no doubt.

Zillah wrote: »

The Nazis built the autobahn, and yes, we should be happy that they used some of their wealth and power to do that, but we shouldn't try to conflate our joy of good roads with kudos for Nazism.

I agree.

Zillah wrote: »

Yes, I'm happy that the Pope shot himself in the foot by helping to foster the modern scientific world view, but I won't for a second concede that it had anything to do with his invisible sky daddy.

Neswflash just in: I DON'T CARE!!

robindch

Soul Winner wrote: »

Possibly yes and actually no.

There had been schools and academies in the Mediterranean region for centuries, if not millennia, before christianity assumed control of the Roman Empire. In fact, in general, the system of education that the Roman Empire built up fell into a long, slow decline after the early fourth century, as academies became less interested in education per se, and more interested in acting as conduits for religious indoctrination and the adaption of history to the role of one of religion's supporting actors. With the eventual result being that -- give or take a couple of centuries around the year 1000 -- religion was all, and the scientific, medical and engineering advances made by the Greeks, Romans, Egyptians and others were lost and forgotten.

One heart-rending example of this is the Archimedes Palimpsest, a parchment which which seems to have been copied around the 900's or so, only to be overwritten with christian prayers in the 1200's. As it happens, the Palimpsest shows Archimedes discussing infinitesimal calculations that are done by integral calculus today.

One can only wonder where world civilization would be today if Archimedes' calculus -- two thousand years ahead of Newton and Leibniz -- had not been obliterated by page after page of religious prose.

Zillah

Soul Winner wrote: »

And without Christianity there would be no universities.

Nonsense. The fact that Christianity funded many European educational initiatives does not mean that no one would have were they not around. If Christianity was not around someone else would have had all that money and power.

And as I described above, the fact that Christian money was used to develop universities means exactly zero for what science owes Theology. If a philanthropist Satanist funds some cancer research is doesn't mean that Satanism deserves respect for contributing to curing cancer.

robindch

Soul Winner wrote: »

Which means if science where an engine of its own making I'd say it would probably still be at Model T phase, whereas because of Christianity it is the BMW it is today

Totally, entirely, splendidly and impressively false. Christianity not only willfully destroyed much of what went before it, it also did much to rewrite history in its own favor.

If you're interested in learning more, then check out Charles Freeman's book The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason which explains in detail how religious certainty did for the curiosity that's necessary for any successful science.

Freeman soundbites about the book here.

Overheal

Wicknight wrote: »

Our chances at what exactly? Evolving?

Charmeleon was an atheist...NOW look at him!

Dades

Soul Winner wrote: »

I want science to move forward and be freed from all its shackles including the grip atheism has on it. I think it is getting there slowly.

I can't believe I just read that. I'm trying to formulate a response, but I find myself speechless.

Dave!

robindch wrote: »

Totally, entirely, splendidly and impressively false. Christianity not only willfully destroyed much of what went before it, it also did much to rewrite history in its own favor.

If you're interested in learning more, then check out Charles Freeman's book The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason which explains in detail how religious certainty did for the curiosity that's necessary for any successful science.

Freeman soundbites about the book here.

If you're interested in learning more, then you should read the Bible, by the Lord Our God! :mad:

oeb

Dave! wrote: »

If you're interested in learning more, then you should read the Bible, by the Lord Our God! :mad:

I have. On more than one ocasion.

The simple fact of the matter is the bible can not be verified, where as the studies and books robindch can. Sure, it's an interesting story, but that does not make it real.

CerebralCortex

Dades wrote: »

I can't believe I just read that. I'm trying to formulate a response, but I find myself speechless.

<cartman voice>Flame war, flame war.<cartman voice>

<southern drawl>Beware the shackles of atheism folks they will keep you in the dark ages.<southern drawl>
Soul Winner I can't understand why you said that. Care to explain?

robindch

Dave! wrote: »

If you're interested in learning more, then you should read the Bible, by the Lord Our God! :mad:

That's the KJV you're linking to. The NT's occasionally a good read, with much of the best English prose of the period, but heavens above, it's far more overwrought than the simple, not to say simplistic, Greek from which it was derived.

Try the Koine NT sometime -- with a couple of years intermittent effort, it should be possible to read the NT in the original. You will find it less than convincing, especially when compared against the far loftier, and far deeper, prose of, say, plain and simple humans like Plato whose ideas the NT plundered wholesale and reduced them to the banal.

robindch

Soul Winner wrote: »

I want science to move forward and be freed from all its shackles including the grip atheism has on it.

And when your car runs out of petrol, do you say a prayer over the fuel tank and drive on, or do you bring it to an atheistic fuel pump?

Dave!

robindch wrote: »

That's the KJV you're linking to. The NT's occasionally a good read, with much of the best English prose of the period, but heavens above, it's far more overwrought than the simple, not to say simplistic, Greek from which it was derived.

Try the Koine NT sometime -- with a couple of years intermittent effort, it should be possible to read the NT in the original. You will find it less than convincing, especially when compared against the far loftier, and far deeper, prose of, say, plain and simple humans like Plato whose ideas the NT plundered wholesale and reduced them to the banal.

....

HEATHEN!!!

robindch

Dave! wrote: »

HEATHEN!!!

Clearly

Goduznt Xzst

Soul Winner wrote: »

What did we do before science as we know it today came along? We had what atheistic scientists call stupid religions in abundance, but it is from these stupid religious views - so called - that schools, colleges and universities emerged.

There are many philosophic viewpoints that still remain in universities today, don’t make the mistake that the scientific view is the only way to view the world because it isn’t. Every department in our universities be they scientific or otherwise have at their base a philosophy of how to operate.

Soul Winner wrote: »

Without Christianity there would have been no universities in Europe at least and without universities there would have been no science as we know it today.

Soul Winner wrote: »

Well yes it does because without universities there would be no science as we know it today. And without Christianity there would be no universities. Which means if science where an engine of its own making I'd say it would probably still be at Model T phase, whereas because of Christianity it is the BMW it is today, it is still a far cry from a Ferrari though, but we’ll get it there no doubt.

Seriously? You seem to have left out something in your assumptions. Namely the "Christian Dark Ages". If it wasn't for Christianity the human race would be a lot more advanced then it is now

Soul Winner

I'm sorry guys. I was only messing

Dades

Your messing with science made baby Jesus cry! *

* not to mention a bunch of heathens...

Soul Winner

Goduznt Xzst wrote: »

Seriously? You seem to have left out something in your assumptions. Namely the "Christian Dark Ages". If it wasn't for Christianity the human race would be a lot more advanced then it is now

Good piece from Wiki

"The public idea of the Middle Ages as a supposed "Dark Age" is also reflected in misconceptions regarding the study of nature during this period. The contemporary historians of science David C. Lindberg and Ronald Numbers discuss the widespread popular belief that the Middle Ages was a "time of ignorance and superstition", the blame for which is to be laid on the Christian Church for allegedly "placing the word of religious authorities over personal experience and rational activity", and emphasize that this view is essentially a caricature. For instance, a claim that was first propagated in the 19th century and is still very common in popular culture is the supposition that the people from the Middle Ages believed that the Earth was flat. According to Lindberg and Ronald L. Numbers, this claim was mistaken, as "there was scarcely a Christian scholar of the Middle Ages who did not acknowledge [Earth's] sphericity and even know its approximate circumference."

"Ronald Numbers states that misconceptions such as "the Church prohibited autopsies and dissections during the Middle Ages", "the rise of Christianity killed off ancient science", and "the medieval Christian church suppressed the growth of natural philosophy", are examples of widely popular myths that still pass as historical truth, even though he says that they are not supported by current historical research."

Soul Winner

robindch wrote: »

Totally, entirely, splendidly and impressively false. Christianity not only willfully destroyed much of what went before it, it also did much to rewrite history in its own favor.

If you're interested in learning more, then check out Charles Freeman's book The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason which explains in detail how religious certainty did for the curiosity that's necessary for any successful science.

Freeman soundbites about the book here.

Just the thing I wanted to read. Thanks. I don't think for one minute that Christianity is without its sins but it does come in for a lot of undue stick as well. Ill founded and un-researched stick to boot.

Soul Winner

I could have sworn there was a post by CerebralCortex asking me why I think Science is in the grip of atheism. Did you delete it? I wanted to respond

robindch

Soul Winner wrote: »

Just the thing I wanted to read.

Freeman, btw, is sympathetic to religion and he draws heavily on primary documents and recent historical research. He also outlines how the then-current ideas of the earlier Greek philosophers directly influenced the religious ideas of the NT, and how these differed from Jewish religious and philosophical thought.

BTW, Freeman seems to have been requested by Amazon to reply to the comments left on the book's homepage. His reply is well-thought out and gives a rough summary of the book's main ideas:

Charles Freeman wrote:

I am grateful for the care with which Amazon readers have reviewed my book whether they have agreed with my argument or not. The reviews are worth a reply.
My thesis is that Christianity was heavily politicised by the late Roman empire, certainly to the extent that it would have been unrecognisable to Jesus. Note the linking of the church to the empire's success in war, opulent church building and an ever narrowing definition of what beliefs one had to hold to be saved. (Hand in hand with this went an elaboration of the horrors of hell, a radical and unhappy development which can only have discouraged freedom of thought.) My core argument is that one result of the combination of the forces of authority (the empire) and faith (the church) was a stifling of a sophisticated tradition of intellectual thought which had stretched back over nearly a thousand years and which relied strongly on the use of the reasoning mind.
I did not depend on Gibbon. I do not agree with him that intellectual thought in the early Christian centuries was dead and I believe that the well established hierarchy of the church strengthened not undermined the empire. After all it was the church which survived the collapse of the western empire. Of course, Gibbon writes so eloquently that I could not resist quoting from him at times but my argument is developed independently of him and draws on both primary sources and recent scholarship.
On the relationship between Christianity and philosophy I argue that there were two major strands of Greek philosophy , those of Plato and Aristotle. The early church did not reject Greek philosophy but drew heavily on Platonism to the exclusion of Aristotle. In the thirteenth century Christianity was reinvigorated by the adoption of Aristotelianism , notably by Thomas Aquinas. It seems clear that Christianity needed injections of pagan philosophy to maintain its vitality and a new era in Christian intellectual life was now possible. I don't explore it in this book. Even so, when one compares the rich and broad intellectual achievements of the `pagan' Greek centuries with those of the Middle Ages, it is hard to make a comparison in favour of the latter. Where are the great names? (The critic who mentioned the ninth century philosopher Erigena should also have mentioned that he was condemned as a heretic.)
When one reads the great works of second and third century AD thinkers such as Plutarch, Galen, Ptolemy and Plotinus, which are remarkable for their range and depth, one cannot but feel that much has been lost in the west by the fifth century. Something dramatic happened in the fourth century. In 313 Constantine brought the traditional policy of Roman toleration for different religious beliefs to its culmination by offering Christians (who had condemned the pagan gods as demons) a privileged place within the empire alongside other religions. By 381 the Christian emperor Theodosius when enforcing the Nicene creed condemns other Christians as `foolish madmen.. We decree that they shall be branded with the ignominious names of heretics . . .they will suffer in the first place the chastisement of divine condemnation, and in the second the punishment which our authority , in accordance with the will of heaven, shall decided to inflict'.If this is not a `closing of the western mind' it is difficult to know what is. It goes hand in hand with a mass of texts which condemn rational thought and the violent suppression of Jewish and pagan sacred places. There is no precedent for such a powerful imposition of a religious ideology in the Greco-Roman world. The evidence of suppression is so overwhelming that the onus must be on those who argue otherwise to refute it.
Some readers have related my book to the present day- I leave it to them to do so if they wish -it is important to understand ANY age in which perspectives seem to narrow and religion and politics become intertwined as they certainly did in the fourth century. After all American Christianity was founded by those attempting to escape just such political straitjackets. Christianity has never been monolithic or static. In fact,as my book makes clear, one of my heroes is Gregory the Great who, I believe, brought back spirituality, moderation and compassion into the Christian tradition after the extremes of the fourth century. It is the sheer variety of Christianities which make the religion such an absorbing area of study.
I hope Amazon readers will continue to engage with my arguments whether they agree with them or not. Keep the western mind open and good reading! Charles Freeman.
N.B. Amazon insist I award my book some stars! I have chosen ''four' because since I wrote it I have come across a lot of new material which I think could improve its argument further.

Soul Winner

robindch wrote: »

Freeman, btw, is sympathetic to religion and he draws heavily on primary documents and recent historical research. He also outlines how the then-current ideas of the earlier Greek philosophers directly influenced the religious ideas of the NT, and how these differed from Jewish religious and philosophical thought.

BTW, Freeman seems to have been requested by Amazon to reply to the comments left on the book's homepage. His reply is well-thought out and gives a rough summary of the book's main ideas:

I know I read it there earlier. I like him. Gonna buy it. Just to ballance things out I'll buy this one to: by David C. Lindberg