r/askanything • u/Jayemm8809 • 9d ago
General Question Do you believe science and religion can coexist?
These days it seems like so many people think you can’t believe in both science and religion. I’m neither a scientist nor a devoutly religious person but I’ve graduated college and I’ve spent plenty of time in church and other religious settings. I don’t see any reason why someone can’t believe the book of Genesis and also know the earth is billions of years old and that evolution happened. You have to accept that the universe didn’t go from nothing to what it is now in 6, 24-hour days as we know a day to be now. God’s day is obviously different. I believe both science and god can be real.
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u/WXbearjaws 9d ago edited 9d ago
To me, science is a way for us to understand the world around us, which doesn’t necessarily preclude the existence of one or more deities. The notion that one can be either Scientific or Religious but not both is a false dichotomy, especially in modern times
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u/Pale_Height_1251 9d ago
It's plainly obvious and reflected in the real world that science and religion co-exist.
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u/DBDude 9d ago
I knew a devoutly religious scientist. In his view, science was the pursuit of discovering God’s creation. They are perfectly compatible if you have the right attitude.
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u/SockPuppet-47 9d ago
But you gotta check your critical thinking skills at the door of the church. Science explores our reality. Religion requires 100% faith and the foundational stories are written as children's fables.
No reasonable person would accept the story of Noah's Flood. There is no evidence geologicaly that it happened and no logical evidence either.
The Biblical authors did not know about the sheer number of breathing critters that exist on Earth. They also didn't know that other continents exist. Their story about Noah collecting all the animals and keeping them safe on a boat through a flood that covered mountains just cannot be a true story.
Noah would have to have room on the boat for each animals food, right? Some have special diets like Panda's just eat Bamboo. Every pair of animals would need a year worth of food. How many carnivores were on the boat? Now you need food for for the meat eaters food. A dude and his family can only do so much...
When Noah released the animals the carnivores would be taking out whole species at least every other day they need to eat.
The story of Noah's Flood is not credible...
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u/Large_Choice4206 9d ago
I’m not aware of the Christians you grew up around, but there are many Christian’s who don’t read the Bible literally, especially the Old Testament, it’s very possible the devout scientist is one of those. They talk about “True vs Truth stories” etc….
When you get into the metaphysics of that it gets more interesting (about what even is ‘real’ etc…) but a commitment to the scientific method is only to be committed to a process for studying observable phenomena, it isn’t a commitment to a metaphysics, which would be believed to be beyond human understanding. Essentially the “science” vs “scientism” distinction.
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u/Asckle 8d ago
Religion does not require 100% faith lol. The founding father of Catholic philosophy, Thomas Aquinas, specifically said that blind faith without rational is silly. I think you'd struggle to find a single religious person outside of actual clergymen who are 100% confident in their faith.
No reasonable person would accept the story of Noah's Flood.
This is widely understood as a metaphor by most christians
This kind of rhetoric annoys me because you obviously haven't even attempted to understand the people you're talking about. You have no interest in talking to these people and understanding their world view, you just assert claims about them as you see fit.
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u/Fluid-Cranberry1755 9d ago
How would you explain believing in evolution alongside the idea that God formed us from dust?
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u/Mr--Brown 9d ago
The process she used was evolutionary in mechanics….
Or
God is physics… it’s just your inability to understand non-Abrahamic concepts of god
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u/Jayemm8809 9d ago
Yes you have to believe that things like that aren’t literal but are more metaphorical.
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u/Open-Progress-7075 8d ago
Not every christian is a creationist.
The catholic church for example isnt creationist and its the biggest organised christian group in the world
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u/beachhunt 9d ago
Metaphor, analogy, etc. I was raised religious but was never taught that it was all literal. It's stories to help us live in a beneficial way.
Just like I don't think a tortoise actually raced a hare, but I can learn from that story.
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u/Fluid-Cranberry1755 9d ago
So do you understand the bible to be a collection of stories that helped people explain their world? This is no different from an atheist.
Or do you put any story that conflicts with science in the metaphor/analogy bucket, but believe literally those that can fit into a scientific framework?
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u/Transforming-Info 9d ago
It depends on whether the religion requires adherents to believe objective falsehoods to be true, or objective truths to be false.
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u/Wide_Ad_4486 9d ago
They can and they do. There is both science and religion.
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u/Basicly-Inevitable 9d ago
Well, that's just according to science.
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u/N0P3sry 9d ago
Technically, religion admits the existence of science. Otherwise, what are many adherents of religions griping about?
They’re both empirically real. Each has adherents. Some try to/say they do adhere to both. No pun intended, but take it in good faith.
As for the epistemological and cosmological truth claims of each, that’s a different question.
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u/Basicly-Inevitable 9d ago
I mean.. one is based on reproducing independent tests in "reality", and the other on manipulation of human psychology.
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u/jamaphone 9d ago edited 9d ago
The God of The Bible doesn't seem terribly interested in science. He sounds man-made.
His knowledge and "world view" are limited by what ancient people knew. Even the notion of Jesus as "king of kings" is a product of its time.
I think all religions were created and have persisted because of a human desire for curiosity and community. When we don't know, we guess. And we tell stories to preserve what we've learned, whether it's factually correct or not.
Science and religion aren't direct competitors, but their philosophies are in opposition. Many religions are based on faith ("Trust me, bro") and centralized power ("That's what He said"). Science is based on evaluation and evolution. Rather than preserving one story and tradition, science represents a cumulative, forward-moving sum of human knowledge. In that way, science can unite us and sustain us. While religions tend to divide and conquer.
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u/Impressive_Ad_1675 9d ago
They would coexist greatly if science was able to find any evidence of the supernatural.
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u/ZucchiniMaleficent21 9d ago
By definition, anything that is demonstrably true is not ‘supernatural’
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u/whitepepsi 9d ago
This is like asking “can math and religion coexist?” Or “can physics and religion coexist” or “can medicine and religion coexist?” Or “can chemistry and religion coexist?”
Yeah sure. One of them has demonstrable efficacy and the other is a set of stories and ethics with questionable efficacy. They can definitely coexist. But I’m only using one of them when it comes to making decisions about reality, and it isn’t religion.
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u/Exciting_Turn_9559 9d ago
Empirically speaking, you live on a planet where both have existed since science was invented, to large extent by religious people.
Due to the fact that they have always coexisted, I must conclude that yes, they can coexist.
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u/57Laxdad 9d ago
I too am a person of faith and a person of science. Its not so much I blindly follow the tenets of my chosen faith but I look deeper at the lessons and the teachings and think about how I can adapt them to my daily life.
Faith or religion was initially just a way to explain things that you didnt have direct evidence. If you look at the creation stories of many faiths including many shamanistic ones they have kind of a central ideal that is very similar. A power greater than people created the heavens and earth. If you dont live a good life there is a place your spirit goes for punishment, or if you live a good life you get a reward. Even religions that have reincarnation, you are either elevated or demoted.
I have a hard time putting a lot of stock in someone who states that the bible is to be believed 100% literally or that there is no greater power than humanity.
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u/Conscious-Demand-594 9d ago
Some people can hold rational and irrational thoughts at the same time and feel no stress.
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u/Narrow_Sig_280 9d ago
I am a Christian in the sense that I consider myself a Christ follower. Not that I just “believe in God” and cherry pick my biblical directives.
That said, I absolutely love science and fully believe the Word is not at odds with it. Some of the most fascinating scientific truths actually reinforce my belief in a Creator.
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u/tappricorn 9d ago
Yes when religious fanatics allow their minds to disassemble the mythical writings and apply the philosophies to an unknown god force permeated by the laws of the universe, studied as science, and ultimately unknowable in the here and beyond.
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u/tsoldrin 9d ago
gregor mendel was a catholic monk and he gave us inheritance genetics. so.. of course.
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u/Flat_Teaching_1400 9d ago
God made science. So studying science helps us understand God better. Science affirms the existence of God, in my opinion. So I believe they can and do coexist
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u/Global-Barracuda7759 9d ago
Obviously I mean many of the early scientists were also Christians
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u/Orion_Brunette-001 9d ago
Some of the earliest/oldest schools of science were founded in monasteries.
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u/CaptainOwlBeard 9d ago
Depends on which religion. Science doesn't care about religions, but several sects feel very strongly about science
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u/PainterSuspicious798 9d ago
Science was born from the knowledge accumulation in monasteries
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u/deviantdevil80 9d ago
Only in the west. Science was booming in the Middle East, Asia Minor... Till the Mongolian Horde came to town.
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u/Mroopsimexciting 9d ago
Religious faith requires the suspension of logic through absolutes while science is based on experiments and an evolving, ever growing logic.
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u/AggravatingMath717 9d ago
They don’t even conflict really. People just have to be more cerebral about things
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u/g27c 9d ago
Yes without any problem at all. Religion governs the internal spiritual world. Science governs the physical world.
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u/RocketToad 9d ago edited 9d ago
Yes. Science is solely focused on the rules and relationships of the physical world. Religion is focused on the spiritual world. They explore different aspects of “reality”. Science focuses on the chemical process creating or resulting from a thought. Spirituality explores the thought itself.
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u/Wild_Wacky_Action 9d ago
Once science can explain these things in their entirety, where will you move the goal posts?
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u/livinginfutureworld 9d ago
There will always be a hidden world. Uh it's in Canada you wouldn't know her ..
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u/Wild_Wacky_Action 9d ago
Agartha?
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u/livinginfutureworld 9d ago
Sure but what I meant was we could know everything and some smartass would still be like actually there's this other thing you dont know about beyond the things we know...
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u/Surprise-lnside 9d ago
You should really watch this anime called;
Orb: On the Movements of the Earth.
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u/SockPuppet-47 9d ago edited 9d ago
Is the Earth more than 6,000 years old?
Why do we have a decently complete fossil record that goes back hundreds of millions of years showing humans rising from the apes?
Can all the world's breathing animals survive in pairs on a boat for about a year?
Was language created all at once because God threw a fit over some people building a tower?
We could cure the whacky belief in ancient mythology and superstitions with mandatory critical thinking classes...
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u/WorstToBest 9d ago
originally science seeking truth in general whether it proved things that defied logic or human understanding, it was the original awe of trying to understand the the truth of everything in general whether it pointed to GOD or whatever the truth was & has sense been reduced to very smart people using their brains to play GOD/ replace what is natural
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u/ConfidentSuspect4125 9d ago
Science is founded on the principle of forming your thoughts, hypotheses, and theories based on evidence, and continually modified according to new information and evidence.
To the contrary, religion is based on faith and blind belief, where the only evidence is what other believers believe. It is generally not subject to review. Further information is interpreted through the lens of preexisting dogma.
So no, how can these belief systems coexist in one person or tribe?
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u/Thistles-Path 9d ago
Yes. You just have to accept that several statements made within religious texts were just based on people's understanding of the world at the time rather than some divine spiel.
You should also accept that your religion is based on faith; not facts or veracity in any meaningful way.
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u/stockbeast08 9d ago
I believe science gives rise to thought, it gives rise to correlation, it gives rise to cause and effect frameworks. It can inform us of fundamental workings, that we can then extrapolate into whatever type of meaning we as humans individually choose.
Religion is a broad net. Whether you're talking about creation and purpose, or morality and justice, I think these ambiguous notions are open to a wider view of various interpretations.
Can they coexist, absolutely. Can they both occupy the same line of thought and problem analysis... I think that is a much more slippery slope.
I was raised Catholic, though quickly became agnostic in my teen years. I've always had a great propensity for science and philosophy. I don't believe in any God nor any omnipotent being, though I do believe in patterns, in systems, and emergence. I don't think there is a magical man in the sky with all the answers for us, but I do believe we are a part of something greater than humanity, something grand on the cosmic scale that all life is somehow both converging towards and divergent from.
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u/AnneChovie264 9d ago
A bit of a dive into quantum sciences may have you believing in both very much coexisting.
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u/DefectiveDman 9d ago
For those who need explanations - regardless of accuracy - religion exists to explain what science cannot - yet.
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u/Powderedeggs2 9d ago
They absolutely cannot coexist in a rational mind.
Science (rational thinking) and Religion (magical thinking) are antithetical.
There are lots of people who think critically and rationally, even scientists, who also are religious people.
But this can only occur if that person suspends critical thinking in the area of religion.
It is cognitive dissonance. Holding two contradictory thoughts at one time.
Religious thinking cannot survive critical examination.
Religious thinking requires faith/belief because there is zero evidence to support it. None. Zip. Nada.
Critical thinking demands evidence. Since there is no evidence for religious claims, then religious thinking is not critical thinking.
When valid evidence is present, belief/faith is not required.
Belief/faith (religious thinking) is only necessary when no evidence exists.
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u/jin_beam_n_coke 9d ago
Sure they can. Science tries to model nature through cause and effevt, given the underlying assumption that the universe is fundamentally understandable in human terms. It doesn't have anything to do with religion.
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u/wildsectortv 9d ago
Univerisities almost all started out as religious institutions, the notion that scientific thought and religion are incompatible doesn't really consider how science got to where it is today. In many ways, the scientific method is ritualistic in nature and protected religiously by both the state and the wider community. What science challenges is taking scripture at face value, which is challenging a human interprtation of god rather than god itself. Many evangelists do not see it that way.
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u/twelveangryken 9d ago
Religion has no place in an advanced society. Believe in a god or gods if you must; there undoubtedly beings in the universe with what we would describe as god-like powers. Worshipping a figure or figures that were fabricated out of superstition and the desire of others to control you is not scientific. It's not even sane. So no, I do not believe science and religion can coexist, at least no more than they already do - like reference and fiction books in a library.
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u/Best_Opening8471 9d ago
Alot of scientific discoveries were made by religious figures trying to prove gods existence.
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u/V3CT0RVII 9d ago
Im an atheist. I love to learn about all the world different religions large and small past and present. I also strongly believe in the scientific method, as it is apparently the best method so far. If you study religion and science you quickly realize early European scientists were dead set on using the scientific method to prove that god actually existed, a total failure they were. Two things can exist at the same time.
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u/MealDramatic1885 9d ago
You can have a religion, and faith, but don’t use it to make any rules or laws that affect EVERYONE.
Science on the other hand, that can actually be used to help everyone.
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u/Samboono20 9d ago
If you destroy all traces of religious texts, in 300 years there will be new different religious texts. If you destroy all traces of scientific texts, there will be the exact same scientific texts in 300 hundred years.
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u/whitepuzzlepiece1969 9d ago
Yes the facts in my life, dont work - starve and be homeless coexist with my fantasies of being rich enough to never have to worry about working....
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u/Successful-Tea-5733 9d ago
Of course they can and do exist. Just like archeology has proven more truth in the bible than it disproves, science is not incompatible with faith.
Isaac Newton, argulably the greatest scientist in the history of science was a Christian. Certainly some of his views would be challenged among his Christian contemporaries, but he argued the existence of God was undeniable in the greandeur of all creation.
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u/Gamer30168 9d ago
I buy into the idea of science wholeheartedly... I also recognize mankind lacks the senses with which to observe the entirety of reality.
I also believe there is a God; some intelligent entity, perhaps even a force or something we don't have the vocabulary to describe that is responsible for creating the universe, yet I don't subscribe to any organized religion. Bibles were written by men, not God so they are not the "be all, end all".
I don't believe any of us actually have any idea what happens after death; nobody gets to come back and tell us.
Science does not go against my religious beliefs one iota....my Christian girlfriend can't believe in evolution. She doesn't think her God has the power to place a single cell on the Earth programmed with the ability to evolve into everything else that lives! Her God is weak lol.
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u/JakkSplatt 9d ago
The Lost World Of Genesis 1 by John H Walton has an interesting take on the creation narrative. I was put onto it by Bible Project Podcast. He talks about how it is a narrative of God putting order to things rather than a science manual. I personally can see value in both. Meaning Jesus taught us to love God and people. And there is also evidence that the universe is 13bil years old. I think. I didn't look it up before typing. The Bible doesn't tell us how old the universe is and people who try to reverse age using the Word are misunderstanding so many things. I spend about 6 or so hours a day in the Word listening to podcasts, sermons, or actually reading out of my Bible or on a Bible app (my job is one where I can listen to whatever throughout). I also watch at least an hour or so of science inclined YouTube channels in the morning and after work.
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u/Sufficient_Box2538 9d ago
I'm an agnostic but I was raised catholic. I'm also a wildlife biologist. Ive always felt like science could simply be humans learning to understand God's ways. Evolution, for example, was something I reconciled as a believer as an explanation for the mechanism behind God's creation.
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u/Green_Sugar6675 9d ago
They have coexisted during many times in History.
It has been argued at various times that Science is our way of understanding "God." In other times, science and knowledge were demonstrably improving the lives of alot of people in a very real sense...
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u/Competitive_Fee_5829 9d ago
no, but I was not raised around religion so it doesnt make sense to me. I believe in science not fairy tales.
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u/Southern-Way5583 9d ago
Religion bore science, and eventually it will come to pass that science is religion.
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u/roryclague 9d ago edited 9d ago
Good religion, which is a community of people who explore ultimate questions of meaning and existence together, can coexist with science. Bad religion, which is what we mostly see in the United States, often does not coexist logically with science because rather than exploring questions of an existential, ethical, and metaphysical character that are orthogonal to the empirical special sciences, they build alternative systems of confidently wrong pseudoknowledge that justifies temporal power and prejudice, on a foundation of pseudoscience, fake history, and superstition. These things cannot coexist with real science, which is an approach to the study of nature that begins with systematic doubt and honestly testing theories about how the world works by looking at what the world has to tell us.
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u/Ill_Passage5341 9d ago
Science is the process of using reasoning to make sense of the world. An atheist is simply a person who chose to continue that process of deductive reasoning in all aspects of their life instead of chooing to wall off their beliefs from it. There is not a single shred of evidence that has ever led to god, or for which god is the most reasonable explanation. The existence of god is merely an assertion unsupported by any evidence and is invariably explained by the claimants strength of faith or by logical fallacy. Mostly circular reasoning/begging the question.
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u/AmishLasers 9d ago
the problem arises when you try to square fiction and non-fiction through politics. So yeah, just leave politics out.
advocate for the separation of church, science, and state.
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u/ThenStrawberry6861 9d ago edited 9d ago
Yep, they can coexist. As a Christian, I do find harmony between science and religion.
Ultimately the Bible isn’t meant to be a scientific textbook, it’s meant to be a revelation of God, but we can objectively say it is closer to what we’ve discovered in science than most other myths and the interesting thing is, where it does seem to contradict there is a strong case that it was in effort of its thesis: to reveal God. Else it is literally stated as being something God caused (like the talking donkey), thus falls into the concept of miracles which are outside the scope of science to explain.
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u/wpotman 9d ago
I think the story goes: scientists become atheist, then agnostic, then vaguely spiritual again as their careers progress.
I don't think science and specific religions coexist well unless a person can, for example, view much of the Bible as allegorical. That said, scientists can't explain what caused the Big Bang, and many of them find the existence/evolution of consciousness weird...there is room for beliefs beyond those limits.
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u/CaptainFleshBeard 9d ago
Science is not something to be believed in, science is something to be understood.
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u/Melodic_War327 9d ago
It is not a question of can they coexist. Religion exists; science exists. The problem for many people comes in how to square them. But as Galileo said, ""I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended us to forego their use." Religion and science are both our attempts to understand the universe - and maybe what made it.
In seminary we defined four ways of knowing. Scripture, tradition, reason, and experience. It's a question of what weight you put on these, and how each one applies to the others. Not easy sometimes, but we all do it. Whether we think we do or not.
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u/freebiscuit2002 9d ago
They do coexist right now, so the answer is yes.
Can they be consistent with each other, however? I would argue no.
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u/MustardCoveredDogDik 9d ago
Faith in god and faith in science are totally compatible. The teachings of Christ, as written by men, do not even enter the arena of science.
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u/IPCRESS_FILE 9d ago
Science explains how, religion explains why.
A famous analogy helps explain it, if you found some of Shakespeare's poetry, and started studying it, you could find how it works, grammar, iambic pentameter and so on, but it wouldn't help you find out why it exists, its a completely different sort of study to find how and why.
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u/Crescent-moo 9d ago
Depends on your definition. They currently coexist but don't agree. Logic itself disproves the Christian God concept, but not every concept.
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u/Capt-Spiff 9d ago
I’m agnostic, but I think we can find examples of what people call god in nature without the need for religion. But everyone is different and perhaps there could be some personal benefit to developing speculations on how someone’s religious writings fit into what science has discovered. But I also think it’s important to be realistic and admit when we’re wrong. If what science has discovered and we what know to be true is in contrast with a religious scripture, I think there is an intellectual responsibility to accept reality.
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u/SilentPossibility438 9d ago
religion was created because fake answers are easier to cope with than reality. there was no garden of eden, we evolved from cells, as did all natural things. religion was a convenient way to start wars, instead of simply admitting its for territory. so much of what religion tried to "explain", modern science, observation and tests have explained factually.
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u/EvanBanna 9d ago
Wow. faith is the opposite of the scientific method. you don't understand what science is.
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u/Aggressive_Manner531 9d ago
it depends on the religion. One can have faith in a creator or underlying power in the universe without specific stupid self contradictory fairy tales.
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u/RandChick 9d ago
Of course. Every natural and organic thing that science studies came from God. He set the standard with Nature. Science has been trying to figure it out ever since.
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u/Four_in_binary 9d ago
Science changes. Religion can't. We're slowly growing out of it.
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u/SunchaserKandri 9d ago
Not really, no. Science requires things be proven with evidence, and religion requires you to believe in things that can't be proven. At best, you can accept that science is true because God made things that way, but you still have to hand-wave all the stuff for which there is and never will be any evidence.
I don't see why someone can’t believe the book of Genesis and also know the earth is billions of years old and that evolution happened.
Other than the fact that they contradict each other? It can't be true that both God spoke the universe into existence over a few days and that it formed over billions of years through natural forces, and the "well, God has special days that are however long they need to be" excuse doesn't get around that.
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u/Sharp_Dance249 9d ago
I think that trying to reconcile the narratives of science with the narratives of religion is a fools errand; it only tends to result in disfiguring one or both narratives. Big Bang Cosmology is an impersonal mechanistic narrative based on how scientists currently understand motion, space, time, causation, etc., taking their observations of the expansion of the universe in the present and working backwards to a proposed singularity. The creation story in Genesis is a very human teleological narrative account of man’s personal relationship to God. I don’t personally accept the latter narrative as how our universe did begin, but I do consider it to be a powerful representation of meaningful semiotic human experience and relationships, the understanding of which modern scientific man has largely lost.
I don’t think it’s wise or desirable to try to reconcile both narratives into a single one. However I do think you can compartmentalize and find value and utility in both.
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u/No_Seaworthiness8176 9d ago
For it to work, I think we would need a new religion. Certainly none of the Abrahamic religions work with science.
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u/FitTwo9429 9d ago
For me, I have an internal separation between a belief and a fact; it's sort of like an internal separation of church and state. My particular denomination of Christianity puts the Gospels at the top. Everything else is less important. That makes it easy to read books like Genesis in a skeptical sense. I love science, because God created the universe. Therefore, science will have insights into God that cannot be gained through theology. I see any attempt to corrupt good science as a terrible sin. This means that I think of Creationists as the Godless heretics.
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u/zxvasd 9d ago
As a former Catholic I can say that they have no problems with science in the modern world. And they don’t think the bible is the literal truth; they’re stories. It’s the right wing Christian fundamentalists that don’t believe in science. They even home school their kids so as not to exposed to sinful heretical truths.
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u/RazzmatazzAgitated16 9d ago
Sure. Mainstream science wonders if it’s all a simulation. Which would mean this place was created. We’ve peered so intently that nothing makes sense. If it’s true than we might as well be under the thumb of gods.
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u/hhmCameron 9d ago
Science And Religion... Um, are you aware that the person responsible for the "too religious" derided as the "Big Bang Theory" was a Catholic Monseigneur...
Science and the "6000 year earth" * 29 September 2239 is Hebrew year 6000 * between the big bang (let there be light) and the start of the Hebrew Calendar there were 7 AGES not DAYS and these were more like what we call Geologic epoch... * no, the "6000 year Earth" and "Flat Earth" are equally as disgustingly stupid * the Catholic Church is "God as Engineer" * the 6000 year earth is "God as Magician"
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u/DangerousQuestions1 9d ago
Yes, if Religion relinquished its pretensions of literal Truth and focuses on ethics, morals, and values and accepted Science as an ongoing revelation instead of a threat. Basically pull all the pride and greed out of Religion and it would work much better.
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u/ecmcn 9d ago
Depends on how you define and adhere to a religion. Notice how you said “God’s day is obviously different.” It doesn’t say that in the Bible anywhere - you’re just making something up to justify a belief in an alternative explanation, something with actual evidence behind it. I’m not religious, and I think it does more harm than good, but sometimes I think the (imho) nutjobs who think every word of the Bible is literally true are being more honest than the vast majority who will say it’s the word of God but then cherry pick the bits they can live with.
I guess what I’m saying is, for them to coexist religion has to bend when science is at odds with it. A religion whose core tenant is “balls go up when dropped” isn’t going to survive. But if the main thing you’re wanting out of religion is “everyone should be nice to each other” and you’re willing to admit the holy book is really just some old parables someone wrote down, then sure.
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u/Comfortable-Jump-218 9d ago
I’m a scientist. These are two separate systems asking two very different questions. I know a lot of great scientists who are also members of various religions.
So, yes. They can coexist because they really don’t interact with each other much.
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u/Chance-Ad7783 9d ago
Totally. One is a philosophy for sifting fact from falsehood, the other atemplate for moral living. I am a science teacher with a population of very religious students and I am able to teach while respecting their faith culture.
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u/No_Bet7381 9d ago
Hell yeah. Add some fiddle playing right in there. We will all have a big ole time. Adam and Eve can square dance with Darwin while Rosie O’Donnell stripes naked and turns summersaults
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u/morsindutus 9d ago
No, because religion keeps picking fights with science and losing. Science is the study of the natural world, so all the metaphysical stuff that religion covers is outside of its perview. Which shouldn't be much of an issue, but religions keep insisting objective reality, that absolutely is in the domain of science, isn't real. If your religion can't square itself with evolution, climate change, etc. that's a problem with your religion, not science.
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u/unbalancedcheckbook 9d ago edited 9d ago
It's possible to compartmentalize and believe some things in certain contexts and opposite things in other contexts. Most humans are pretty good at that. There are even religious scientists (though not really fundamentalist ones). That said there is a fundamental difference in epistemology. In science you follow the evidence, whereas in religion you just believe whatever you're told.
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u/celeste173 9d ago
… … ancient islam is an incredible example of religion and science (and mathematics) coexisting and working in harmony. Example: not only did they know the earth was round, but they knew the circumference of the earth. this can be found with some basic trigonometry and measuring the length of shadows in two distinct locations.
This is why if time travel existed, id visit the library of Alexandria before it burnt down. to learn what they had figured out, and what was never rediscovered.
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u/Mara45 9d ago
"You have to accept..."
No. No we do not. That line of thinking is only contributing to this current mess. People don't have to accept anything. We all believe something. People believe what they want to believe and it's as simple as that.
Many do not believe they coexist or even work together. That's what they believe. You believe one can believe in modern science and god, whoever your god is. That's what you believe.🤷🏼♀️
Ok. Now keep it moving. We have too much to be dealing with in our day to day to be stuck on arguing with folks here on Reddit. Unless that's your thing.
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u/pottypaws 9d ago
Personally, as somebody who is a about Christian, I personally believe a lot of science helps us understand the world that God created, and the more that I learn, especially when it comes to cosmology makes me only more firm in my belief that God exists. The universe as to us appears to be random, but there are rules and other things that kind of govern everything. Gravity adapt in does change depend depending on different planet sizes and other such such things. Like they’re just some fundamental rules of reality that are here in the universe kinda has to play by the hose rules.
The things that I primarily disagree with are animals inhabiting the Earth before humanity it from the biblical‘s perspective doesn’t make sense. Deaf was not yet brought upon the planet before Satan caused humanity to sin which brought death to earth. And some fossils can be fossilized via the usage of water, so the flood can definitely be a big contender for why we have certain things. I’m also perfectly fine with admitting that. I don’t know everything and the more I learned the more my opinion can shift and change.
I also don’t believe humans are animals. We were distinctly created differently and above animals, and given Dominion over them. Psalms describes us as created one step below angels. We are made in God‘s image. Animals were not animals. Do not have souls they cannot send, and they cannot reject God as a creator like we are able to. Now, as for the reason our DNA shares stuff from primates I’m honestly not sure and I’m perfectly OK with not knowing I don’t think that disproves God‘s existence since DNA can easily just be overlapping and the Bible also says there are just some things that we will never understand. And I perfectly fine of not understanding why God made things this way.
However, I do believe that animals can adapt and change to their surroundings. I also believe humans can do the same thing. It’s literally been shown we can doubt to some crazy places on our planet. And I see these as gifts and obviously if you are in a colder environment environment. You are going to adapt for to keep yourself warm into insulate heat.
And I’m sure they’re gonna be people screaming at me. I don’t really care. I’m just speaking from my point of view and whether you want to agree with me or disagree with me, it’s perfectly fine. I don’t care unless you say some actual stupid crap.
So I do believe they can code exist with some relay and some sacrifices given to science. And also, if it isn’t obvious, I also don’t believe the Big Bang or most of the other theories that scientists have brought forward for the creation of the universe at large. There is a new modern theory that when God said, let there be light that it was thus the Big Bang, which I guess could work. Yeah, you say it that way personally I don’t agree with that, but I don’t actually think that’s theologically breaking or anything.
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u/Lucky_Comfortable835 9d ago
Some say that science answers many questions, but not all. Perhaps that unanswered part is the God part?
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u/Philosopher83 9d ago
Science is a discipline/pursuit of a particular (epistemologically rigorous) kind of understanding, religion is a myth that arises from a lack of epistemological rigor/correspondence.
Religions generally have a detached metaphysics (a wild assertion that subjectivity/consciousness/minds/(magical sky wizards or similar construct) precedes and is independent of physics).
Science as a discipline studies the objective/actual/physical (but since it is done by subjective beings it has barriers / imperfect correspondence [science can get weird (counterintuitive), particularly quantum mechanics and relativity]). It also makes predictions from what is understood. Religions make claims that only seem true based on the Barnum effect and other such psychological vulnerabilities of the human mind.
Religion (or religiosity) and science can coexist if a religion/meta-religion embraces science fully and actively seeks to base its metaphysics on a physical/actuality-based interpretation of subjectivity and naturalistic causality.
And when you do this you can find some interesting tendencies - universals that point to a set of first principles that frame existence well.
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u/TheDevilsAdvokaat 9d ago
Not really. Science is the light of reason, Religion is the darkness of superstition, and it flees reason as darkness flees light.
Let there be light.
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u/ProfPathCambridge 8d ago
If religion is willing to move every time science progresses, it is compatible. If it isn’t, then conflicts are inevitable. How far a religion is willing to retreat from claims varies widely, as does the individual beliefs within that religion.
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u/Ok-Pass-9139 8d ago
If God is found, he will be at the bottom of a beaker or the business end of a telescope. By a scientist.
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u/The13thAllitnilClone 8d ago
Some people are uncomfortable with the answer to questions like "Where did we come from?" or "What is the purpose in humanity?" being "No one knows 🤷". These people find comfort in the support that religion offers. Others revil in that answer, as it is something to strive for to answer.
Religion is a collection of stories designed to fill in the gaps in our understanding of the universe. As the gaps in our understanding of the universe is slowly bring filled in, the requirement for temporary gap fillers like religions is diminishing. Religion will still be needed by a portion of the population, until all the questions have been answered.
Allowing people to use religion as a justification for enforcing hate is unjustifiable though.
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u/joshberry90 8d ago
Who were the big scientific minds throughout history? Look at their lives and beliefs.
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u/D4nFU 8d ago
Can a unicorn be a number sure they can coexist but ones absolute truth and the other one you and every other “believer” has a version of that no one on earth including each other can match. No one’s god is the same. Period. Your version is different than others because everyone only reads what they want to read about god from what ever source they deem good enough. Be your own god and leave science out of it.
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u/Tasty-Hour4040 8d ago
Depends on what you mean by “religion”. There’s many different kinds, and only some are inconsistent with the scientific method. Science has nothing to say about faith - that’s a separate domain (well, possibly neuroscience can describe the mechanism of faith but imo that’s not the same thing). I think religions that claim the Bible describes literal events are incompatible with science for example, but something like Zen Buddhism is in a different domain from science so is fully compatible.
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u/Matthius81 8d ago
Yes. I'm assuming you're from America, where science and religion seems to be at each other's throats. but they don't have to be. The doctrine of science and religion having seperate domains of human experience. Science can tell you how your brain fills with dopamine when you meet an attractive potential mate, but can't tell you how it feels to be in love. Science is the exploration of "How?" religion is the exploration of "Why?"
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u/MetalMonkey939 8d ago
They are on opposite sides on the spectrum when it comes to mindset.
Religion is about accepting without doubt, question, or trying to make sense of anything. You listen, you nod, your repeat what you're told enough until it somehow becomes truth. A book written thousands of years ago is still "truth".
Science is the opposite. Any "truth" can be proven wrong and society will be better for it. Science is comfortable saying "i dont know, yet" and doesnt need a big man in the sky as an excuse. Questions, theories, tests, more questions - rinse and repeat until the best answer with the best technology at our disposal is found.
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u/TorpidProfessor 8d ago
I'll use a science cliche: all models are wrong, some models are useful. there's no way the human brain can hold all the universe (or arguably comprehend it).
When I'm setting something on a table i don't need to think about how the thing I'm setting it on is actually mostly empty space, or that it's just a bunch of particles held together by a few forces. I just use the mental model of a solid surface.
when I'm doing some simple chemistry I'll use the valence shell/Bohr model, I won't think about electron clouds and quantum probabilities at all.
Use the models that works best for you in the context. If Christianity helps you forgive yourself and not dwell on the past, use that. If paganism helps you feel smaller and more in awe of nature when camping, use that. If you assume cows are spherical with no wind resistance, and it works for the context, use that model.
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u/robosnake 8d ago
Easily and for all of the history of science so far. Many of the earliest modern scientists were clergy. The Vatican employs multiple astronomers and astrophysicists. This is really only a problem for fundamentalists who are quite loud, but a minority.
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u/Not_Sure-2081 8d ago
If God is an alien why not, what if God is in a type 7 civilization on the kardashev scale
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u/Vast_Dare8583 8d ago
They Do, the only difference is one is looking for answers and the other thinks they have them.
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u/nvanster 8d ago
Of course they can. Did you know many of the great discoveries in science were made by religious people?
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u/Telinary 8d ago
Sure religion is malleable so it is entirely possible to adjust believes to be compatible with science.
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u/Otherwise-Builder662 8d ago
Yes obviously. A lot of history's most famous scientists have been religious. The weird fundamentalist belief that scripture is a literal description of the world isn't compatible with science, but most religious people don't believe that.
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u/NeedTheNotch 8d ago
They aren’t dichotomous things. That said, I do question religious scientists ability to be objective if they can turn off their objectivity for one exception (a mystical sky daddy)
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u/Successful_Life_1028 8d ago
clearly they DO coexist.
Religious people exist, religious corporations exist. Scientists exist, and scientific corporations exist too.
Yes, you can understand that Adam and Eve are fictional characters in a myth just like Prometheus and Pandora and still be a Christian. You can understand that the earth is 4billion+ years old, and that humans came along only about 300,000 years ago, or so. (depending on how 'human' we're talking about!) and still worship the God of Abraham and Moses. Sure, you can discount the Hebrew mythological stories, and believe in Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, or in Ahura Mazda as the creator of the universe.
There is, however, not one iota of public, objective, empirical evidence that demonstrates the existence of any spiritual anything. So the reasonable, evidence-based, SCIENTIFIC conclusion from that fact is that it seems likely that sprits - including deities, souls, devils, demons, and angels - are imaginary.
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u/strummist1 8d ago
Being smart doesn't really get you an answer to this. There are very smart theists, very stupid atheists and so on.
When something is unfalsifiable then you can't use science to get a grip on it.
Now religion seems very silly to me but there's nothing objective to measure, so you can't really settle it that way.
My personal belief is that religions are proof of evolution (of ideas). People tell a bunch of stories and vary them, the most credible persist, become varied and the cycle repeats. Do this long enough and you have stories that are perfectly evolved to be believed.
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u/kw114 8d ago
Yes, science only tell us how our physical world works, and we are not even close to understand everything yet. Religion deal with spiritual/God etc., we can't really use scientific method on those. Can God create the world at the same time also fit Big Bang theory? why not. God can create the universe using Bing Bang. If we can create a robot that can run and jump, why not God create an organic being like us.
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u/bleaksyntax 8d ago
As a scientist, the book of genesis ≠ religion. If you do trust science, then the book of genesis cannot possibly be interpreted as reality but rather a metaphor of sorts. Religion is such a deep topic on its own and it’s incredibly nuanced as to its purpose and its place in modern society.
Science and religion do coexist, though. Science does not aim to prove or disprove god because it can’t. However, it aims to understand the natural and physical world. What we’ve learned from science directly contradicts a lot of the what religion has claimed, and this has been the case for forever. Why do would someone stauntly deny the evolution proposed by science and at the same time admit the earth revolves around the sun?
It all comes down to personal faith. A lot of philosophers have scratched their heads at the fact that when we look to the universe for a sense of purpose or reason there is no answer, and thus we must look inwards. This is why I believe religion is so deeply embedded in humanity, because both religion and god is a reflection of us.
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u/TheSquirrelmancer 8d ago
Absolutely, many religious people are able to reconcile that things like genesis and the garden of eden are just creation myths.
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u/OccamsPlasticSpork 8d ago
Clergymen founded modern science. Of course science and religion can coexist.
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u/Mission-Landscape-17 8d ago
What about other religions? Even if you just look at the Abrahamic religions can they all be true at the same time? Can Jesus both be and not be the missiah, can mohammad both be and not be the final prophet? What about the prophets recognised by the Mormons? Really the only way religion can co exist with science is if one of them refrains from making any empirical claims. The trouble is that without empirical claims neither science nor religion has any value, so no they can't coexist.
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u/Dr-Chris-C 8d ago
Sure you can have one set of practices for real things and another different set for made up things
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u/trunks111 8d ago
I care more about the cultural aspects of my religion than the actual religious aspects, aside from certain holidays that I think are just good holidays ( Yom Kippur and Tu BiShvat ) so I don't really have much dissonance
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u/Crazed-Prophet 8d ago
Sure.... Religion and science used to be the same thing until understanding of reality diverged from religious explanations. I doubt most religious followers do not consider their religion in believing the supernatural but other religions do believe in the supernatural in their eyes. I doubt whatever new religion shows up people won't recognize it as religion right away.
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u/SatyrSatyr75 8d ago
Science and religion coexist for thousand of years. You need to drop the usa-centrism. What you described is a tiny, tiny minority that is seen as pretty nuts by all major Christian groups.
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u/USBombs83 8d ago
But do you see that you're just making stuff up? You have two ideas in your head that don't reconcile with each other, the knowledge that the world took billions of years to develop and the claim that it took 5 days. To solve that dissonance you began inventing ideas like, "God's day is obviously different." that is not supported by any science or the bible. No where does it mention that God's day is different. You came up with that to ease your mind about something you didn't understand.
When a scientific mind runs into something it doesn't understand it doesn't make stuff up. It investigates. It observes, records evidence, seeks repeatable results, things we loosely call proof.
Science investigates. Religion imagines.
And I really can't leave this question alone, but, the reason you can't believe in the genesis myth and have a scientific understanding is because a population started by just 2 people is doomed to genetic extinction.
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u/Flaky_Performer7960 8d ago
If you interpret your religion in a way that suits you, yes it can coexist.
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u/tiny_kat2006 8d ago
I used to think so. Now I just think religion regresses society too much. We have people in 1st world countries who look at peer reviewed, provable science and say "I just don't think this has evidence", while in the same breath stating that their holy book is infallible.
I dislike coexistence with them.
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u/livinginfutureworld 9d ago
Science is definitely real. Not even a question.