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Freeman Dyson Wins Templeton Prize For Religion
Cy Guy writes "Quantum physicist Freeman Dyson, (father of the Dyson Sphere and Esther Dyson) who has written about religion's role in modern culture, won the $940,000 Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion. 'Religion has a much more important role in human destiny than science.' Here's a link to the wire story."
Doh, of course religion has a bigger impact. That's because of religious fanatics who push their outlandish ideas onto everyone in sight, and this practice has been going on worldwide for millennia.
When was the last time you were visited by a door-to-door astrophysicist insisting that you take a copy of his papers and attend some lectures so that you could be converted to his view of cosmology?
;)
Then, turn to Matthew, and one of Jesus' other semons.
"What goes into a man's mouth does not make him unclean... ...What comes out of a man's mouth can make him unclean. For what comes out of a man's mouth comes out of his heart."
These two tell the same thing -- you have NO right to tell another that what they eat or do, or how they live, is "unclean". That judgement belongs to God, not man.
Couple that with the parable of the tax collector, and you see that your activities are not "sins" in the eyes of the Christian God, but your ATTITUDE. THAT is what the Bible is all about.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
At some level of my thought, I can sense a solution. For example, let me take an assumption that you make and pick on it. You say:
Here, you assume that "metaphorical" and 'false' are equivalent. It is perfectly permissible, at least to me, to find great truth in something that is metaphorical. Did you ever see that Star Trek TNG (entitled 'Darmok') episode where they ran into a race that spoke in metaphor? If not, it is highly recommended reading.There are other ways to communicate truth than the propositional. Now, I would hesitate to say that all of Genesis is metaphorical: but if it is, I don't think we've lost much. How relevant are the precise details of how God created the universe to our day to day life? Answer is they're not. The story, which presents a metaphor for the fall of man from God's perfect creation, is still a valid source of truth.
An awful lot of philosophy and religion has been created using unabashed fiction (from Plato to Boethius to the Bhagvad Gita to Camus) and the thought has not lost any validity in the process. Why, with the Bible, and only with the Bible, do we assume that if it's propositional assertions are not accepted, we must reject the whole?
Of course, this raises other problems. How do we decide what is metaphor and what is not? For example, I am quite convinced that the Resurrection of Christ was not a metaphor. But upon what basis can I determine that it was not, and hold that Genesis is?
Can I have my cake and eat it to?
For the record: I'm not prepared to write Genesis off as metaphorical at this time. I give that issue a big "I don't know" and leave it there.
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Look: being a Christian is not about getting better for your own sake (although we should all strive to be good). It is about joining the kingdom of God.
The kingdom of God is not quite like the "army of God" you mention. Simply, it is an already achieved reality of all things that place themselves under God's controlled. And it is growing. I believe that it will eventually grow to subsume almost all creation -- at which time Jesus will return.
And it is worth joining because it is good and right -- and no other reason.
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> Our societies' fundamental values are founded in religion.
And we live in a very sick society. Cause and effect?
But let's back up and question your claim. Which fundamental values are you speaking of? Marriage and family? The ban on murder and cannibalism? Property ownership?
I suspect that any truly fundamental value we could name actually predates any religion now being practiced in our society. And many of our more sophisticated values were current among our pagan ancestors as well.
> As religion decays, it takes those values with it.
And the supporting evidence is...?
For that matter, is religion decaying?
> until we get there, I take comfort in the knowledge that the redneck with the 10-gauge down the hall is an ardent catholic.
I gave up religion a quarter of a century ago. D'ya suppose I'm more likely to shoot someone now than I was then?
Do the increasingly atheistic nations of Europe have a higher rate of random murder than the over-religious (and exceedingly self-righteous) USofA?
Please, question your assumptions.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> Religion has a great impact on society today, whether we see it or not.
So do crime, warfare, starvation, and economic exploitation. But where's my money for pointing that out?
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> Don't forget that without religious groundwork, a lot of what we take for granted today would be without basis.
The principles of most modern humanities can find allegiance to a lot of the fundamental principles of most of the modern religion bodies that have dominated the world for the past few thousand years. Without these fundamental principles, we may not have come so far.
I can't imagine what you're talking about. My best guess is that your preacher neglected to tell you how much of the supposedly Christian value system actually predates Christianity by centuries, if not millenia.
> Too often, various world religions are lambasted for the harm they have caused (holy wars, etc), unfairly
Sorry, but it's the One True Way mentality of world religions that causes those wars (along with witch hunts, judicial murders, and imprisonment of pot smokers). It's hardly unfair to lambast a system for the effects arising directly from its fundamental principles.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
The first thing is that IMHO religion is not a scheme for making anyone a better person. It is a set of statements of fact--true or false, but statements nonetheless. Following the advice of these statements may or may not help improve one's life, much like following the advice of the statement 'Don't drink the bleach' tends to improve one's lot, but that is not the primary point.
Concerning your second point--would a good nonbeliever still be allowed into Heaven--there's a lot of groundwork I have to do to answer that. Let me state that I do not believe in the common 'cloud and harp' view of Heaven. Rather, I believe that Heaven is being in the presence of God and enjoying it. I believe that Hell is being in the presence of God and hating it.
One's actions in life determine one's personality. After death, this personality determines whether one enjoys God's presence or loathes it. Life is the Tuesday-Thursday practice; the Afterlife is the game on Saturday. God does not damn us; we damn ourselves. He loves us, but He has given us the freedom to not love Him. It's our choice.
Sin is another topic of contention. There are two important things to bear in mind. The first is aptly illustrated by the Greek word for sin. Translated literally, it means 'missing the mark.' Sin is not so much the active doing of something worng (although it is), but the failure to be the best possible. It's like aiming at a bullseye and missing. But you don't quit shoting when you miss: you continue, and get better. No-one is a perfect shot. But with practice we can all be decent. That's part of how sin should be perceived. You fall short of the glory of God, you pick yourself up and try again. You do a little better, but still not perfect. You try again.
The second part has to do with the 'wages of sin.' What are the stages of forgiveness and redemption--for anything, secular or religious? Well, first one must be sorry and ask forgiveness. God has already forgiven us for our sins. But we cannot stop with being forgiven. If I break your window and you forgive me, I still need to fix your window. But that price has already been paid on the Cross. So God has already done two things for us. There is a third though: to repent. The word 'repent' comes from the Latin for 'rethink.' Repentance means rethinking your life. To use the earlier broken window example, maybe you should stop playing baseball near glass buildings. The spiritual life is like that as well. We need to rise above our failings, but with the knowledge that we cannot completely conquer them in this life.
And the reason for worshipping God? Well, partly out of thankfulness. Worship should not be focused on us (this is one of my big problems with many 'worship services'--they are entertainment for an audience); worship should be focused on God, out of gratitude. Partly we worship to learn what to do in Heaven. We're going to spend eternity in God's presence; might as well learn how to behave now.
Those are my opinions, anyway. I hope that I addressed some of your concerns. If you have more you may email me (remove the no-spams).
I hate to be pedantic, but you're surely you don't mean to define a irrational system as one which doesn't use the scientific method? What about math?
Yes, "irrational" is tricky to define and mathematics is a sticky point, but I think it is safe to think of our rules of logic as a "physical" theory based on our experence. We have only one real theory of logic, we test the hypothosis frequently, it works out frequently, so we continue to use it. The big diffrence between logic and neutonian mechanics is that we have seen the execptions to newtonian mechanics and built better theories. We don't really know what an expetion to our logic would look like (some people claim that things like quantum mechanics are execptions need new logics, but we really don't know). Anyway, I'd say mathematics is really a physical thing.. we just don't understand how the physics works very well (note: I am a graduate student in mathematics).
the fact that people understand the distiction between a scientific theory and a social interpretation of it makes this harder to do.
Do they? What is it?
I guess it's like the diffrence between a scientist and an engener. The scientist is only supposed to build and test theories, but the engener actually needs to figure out what to use. The science provides the engeners with something concreate to argue over the relivance to a specific problem.
Social Darwinism is a good example. There is little doubt that natural sellection plays *some* role in our culture, but one must ask how efficent it is AND if a specific move to increase it's effectivness is worth the cost. The engenering side has a whole diffrent set of problems from the science side.
This stands in contrast to religion where there is no science side (or they are combined in the case of new religions and cults which can change their rules). The divide between science and engenering helps both stay more objective.. and religion lacks this divide.
I agree the above ideas are not water-tight. It was a psychology professor who first pointed this out to me.. he used it to prevent people from discussing religion and public policy in his classes.. execpt when he wanted them to talk about those things.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
the problem is the people, not the religion. The real problem with the christian relgion is that people have adapted and used it as an excuse to do bad things.
People will try to do this with any belief system, but an irrational system (i.e. not using the scientific method) will make it much easier. People still abuse the social interpretation of scientific theories (extreams of social darwinism for example), but the fact that people understand the distiction between a scientific theory and a social interpretation of it makes this harder to do.
I think the optimal belief system for an individual is Atheism, Agnosticism, or a vague philosophical new ageish believ while the optimal belief enviroment for an individual (what the people arround them believe) would be for very few people to agree on anything religious, i.e. it's hard for one religious group to oppress another when there are no religious groups because no one agrees. This is essentially the normal arguement that a personal religion is ok, but an organised religion is very bad.
the southern US prior to the 70's
You know why we have the bible belt today? Slave owners wanted a way to justify slavery. This is exactly what I mean by an irrational belief system allowing you to justify whatever you want.
The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world. -- Bertrand Russell
Hmm...the Wu Li Dancers seem to know a lot. The rest of us know that the true love of Wu Li dancers is coming up with witty truisms.
Science and reason are built on faith. Not faith in a remote intelligence that somehow orders everything, but faith that the laws and order that we observe on this small planet also apply over all time and all space. You have not been to IO to personally observe the volcano's. You have faith that the instruments that returned photographs's were not doctored. Saying that you only believe what you can see/touch/hear/measure/understand means that you don't belive in science in a field where you are not an expert. We believe in science because it is consistent and open to change. As Karl Popper has said, things can only really be scientifically true if they could also be false with different data, but that is not the reality of most work in science. You don't see much published that says some experiment didn't prove our hyposthesis. But more great science has come of experiments that failed than those that just confirmed prevailing wisdom (Michelson-Morley, Darwin's finches etc.)
Science has faith in Occam's Razor, science has faith in the laws of thermodynamics, science has faith that mathematics can adequately describe physical phenomena.
The difference between scientific faith and relgious faith is that science is willing to change its dogma if it finds a counter example, but most religions will deny the counter example if it disagrees with dogma. But even religions gradually change belief over time, witness the Catholic churces acceptance of evolution.
Both positive and negative. :)
Religion has sparked some of the longest, bloodiest wars in the history of mankind. Probably killed just as many people as it's ever helped. Like the man said though, the problem is the people who are too arrogant to admit that they could be wrong. Why do those people always end up in charge?
Religion's impact is only good if you believe it and have reason to think it will change things for the better. One could put an argument that all of religion's effects and in fact anything that changes the actual implimentation of reality from what it really is based on laws of physics and such.
For example reading fiction can be considered detrimential because it distorts our ability to think and model reality.
I think the sweeping statement that religion being more important than science is rather stupid and shortsighted. I would much rather have science to give my penicilin when I have an infection than making some sacrifice, praying in front of a stone tower, or doing various strange chants/rights.
Slashdot social engineering at it's finest
Did he read a story to his shell theory before tucking it into bed?
"Good night F = (GMm/2R)(1/2r^2)[sqrt(R^2-r^2+2ru)-(r^2-R^2)/sqrt( R^2- r^2+2ru)]_{r-R}^{r+R} "
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I know this is a sound bite, I would love to see the context within which this comment was made but since I don't have that info, I'll knee jerk respond:
Perhaps Freeman dosen't think that his work has had much impact, perhaps he believes that physics has not, and will not have much impact on human destiny.
How could he make such a shortsighted statement? First, physics is the ground rules for biology via chemistry. Biology is the study of all life and therefore is all impt for for human destiny. I will agree that religion has had a much greater impact on human life thus far but 100,000 years from now, Science (Physics, Chemistry, Biology) will have played a determing role in human destiny. It has/will provide the means to anhialate(sp?) ourseves, pollute our planet beyond habitability, or whether we manage to colonize human life beyond this planet before destruction. Religion itself dosen't help much here as it tends to promote wars through belief systems that cannot accept views that violate said religious dogma and thus tends to promote destruction.
OTOH Science itself is a religion, a belief system that changes according to what can be reproducibly demonstrated through experiment. A religion that rapidly adapts to current knowlege and one that holds the keys to the both the methods of destruction and the salvation of our species. Perhaps this is what he meant in that quote. Science is religion?!
no sig.
I'd use this space to bash religion, but I just don't feel like it. I simply don't agree with the notion of any type of religion. I do like what religion has done for us as a species in some ways. It has brought order in the world and has set up a set of morals. I see past this and I see the real world. I see no god, I see no after life, I see no heaven, I see no hell. Life is NOW. If you don't try and enjoy what we have now, you won't ever get a chane to enjoy it ever again. I think it's interesting that a quantum physicyst won a $940,000 prize for progress in religion. It doesn't mean much to me. Religion will eventually fade into the background and people will se what is really out there. Nothing. I do, and will continue to let people worship whatever they want as long as they leave me alone and let me be atheist. Oh well. Back to my little world.
- Stop praying for someone to save you, and save yourself.-
KMFDM
- Think for yourself, question authority.-
Don't forget that without religious groundwork, a lot of what we take for granted today would be without basis.
The principles of most modern humanities can find allegiance to a lot of the fundamental principles of most of the modern religion bodies that have dominated the world for the past few thousand years. Without these fundamental principles, we may not have come so far.
Definitely, you must account for the destructive elements in religious movements over the years, but you cannot honestly do this without also asessing the positives.
And I believe that this is one of the foundations for Dyson having been awarded this prize - that he was willing and able intellectually and morally to look at the issue of religion in modern life and present an honest view that brings value to those that read it.
Too often, various world religions are lambasted for the harm they have caused (holy wars, etc), unfairly and with shadowed intent...
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Secondly, religion is not about "simplistic beliefs", no matter what anyone says. There are many millions of religions in existance, ranging from a basic faith that it's safe to walk out the door without being struck by a meteorite, through to more advanced systems, such as Christianity, Buddhism, the Celtic Wyrd system, etc.
(Yes, you can mathematically prove that the odds are very small that you will be struck by a meteorite, but unless you do the maths and carry out the observations EACH TIME, you're still relying on faith that your numbers are valid for that time. And faith is the foundation of all religion.)
Thirdly, yes, religion WILL have a bigger impact on the future. Science has no power in the moral and ethical realms. It may never have. It was never built to. But morals and ethics ARE essential for a society to function. Without those, you have no laws, you have no structure, you have nothing. We'd all wind up back in the Stone Age, pronto, with no way out, because with nothing to build on, there'd be no means of progressing.
Lastly, ANY "Christian" who knocks on the door to "convert" you has broken a dozen laws laid down by Christ, not least of which is the commandment to tolerate others and not judge them. Christians are STRICTLY forbidden from judging or condemning others, other views and other ways of life. If those religious sects involved -lived- the life they claim to profess, everyone would be a great deal happier. And the non-Christians would greatly profit from learning that commandment, too.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Er, Thomas Huxley, a "obnoxious pseudo-scientist" -- hardly -- he was probably the most important 19th century biologist next to Darwin himself. And it is a quite recent development that it was okay for religious people to consider the Bible merely allegorical rather than divine truth. There really was a conflict between science and religion. Scientists were persecuted and even in some cases executed by religious officials.
As for cults, the only objective difference between them and religions is size. Consider: in the 19th century Mormonism was considered a cult by most Americans, but now that it is more popular it is considered a religion. Heck, in Roman times, normal Christianity was considered to be a cult.
Let me explain why I do not follow/practice any religion but agree with a good chunk of what you are saying. From experience, many people share this view to some degree.
:)
First of all, let me make it clear that I am not opposed to the following of religious beliefs and I do not hold it against people when they say they are. I hold things against people when they are bull-headed and just plain assholes about their beliefs. You do not sound like that type of person.
You are correct that there are many strawmen in the science vs. religion debate. You are correct that signing up for a religion (Christianity) is not necessarily voluteering for the "Army of Jesus". You are also correct that there are many thought provoking theological, philosophical and scientific books written from a Christian point of view, that following a religion has you accepting a set of principles and devoting your life to them.
I grew up a Lutheran, going to church, getting confirmed - the whole bit. I was kind of forced into it and resented it because of that. However, maturity and reflection made me forgive my grandmother/parents for that (there's a complicated story I'll avoid here). I also believe that the morals instilled in me from my church-going youth are very good things. I think they are fundamentally sound beliefs that transcend most different types of religions and is something most humans tend to follow (don't kill, steal, hurt others, be malicious, take your neighbour's wife, etc.).
From what I got (and keep getting is that), following the teachings of Jesus Christ (or whomever is the spokesperson for the religion) will enhance your life. In this mix is the notion that worshiping a higher entity that created all the universe is needed. To me, this feels extremely "tacked on". I get great pleasure in helping others and being just-all-round nice to people. I really fail to see how belief in a higher being will make it any better.
If there is no God, per se, the point of worship is moot. It doesn't matter if you have faith in whether or not he exists - you won't be going to His Kingdom, as there is not one. If there is a God, then will I go to Hell if I am a general all round good person but just didn't believe in Him? If belief in God is required for enterance into His Kingdom, that sounds awfully self-righteous.
Perhaps this is the faith thing I'm supposed to have for God. Regardless, I still find this egotisical. Am I just very well grounded and happy with myself, not needing guidance from belief that there is something out there far more powerful than I could ever hope to be that can help, nay, is needed by me to feel better? I don't know - it would take a lifetime to answer a question like that. I've always noticed that for those who don't wish to think, a higher entity makes things easier to explain. For those who want to discover the workings of complex things outside our current knowledge, belief in a God makes it seem more attainable, that is, God can inspire and perhaps guide.
Quite frankly, I don't need that kind of inspiration or guidance. I do quite well with the belief in myself (not that religious people don't belive in themselves, just probably not as much as I do).
That's probably the real irony here - God is what you make of Him... and He's having a good laugh about it
Ok, first of all, in Islam you can have 4 wives, in Christianity you can only have one. Islam beats Christianity.
Homer's Greek is better than God's, but it's not God's first language. Hades isn't as bad as Hell, but it's more inevitable. Tough call. I'm going to give the nod to Christianity, because I'd rather piss off Zeus than Jehovah.
John Travolta is a Scientologist. Greek Mythology is better than Scientology.
There. You just can't take the shallow view of these things.
Further, they conflict with each other, so no, they 'cant all just be friends'
Greek Mythology conflicts with Scientology? Damn. I wonder if you can be a Unitarian Druid?
"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." - Alexander Hamilton
Here we go again. Based on past stories, here's my breakdown of how the commentary will go:
.sig....
30% -- Comment threads defending religion's place in society, ranging from clever, well-spoken, impassioned defenses of spirituality and religion as necessary to a well-balanced life, on down through "GOD LOVS ME AND SIENTIST SINERS WILL GO TO HELL!" Interesting subflavors include "Some of the most reknowned scientists in history were religious," and "Scientific method isn't the only way to gain knowledge."
35% -- Comment threads alleging that any belief system based in faith is worthless because there's no empirical repeatability, ranging from graduate-level epistomological essays down through "SIENCE MAKES SENSE RILIGION DOSNT." Interesting subflavors include the issue that science is typically learned from elders with no empirical repeatability on the part of the learner and is therefore also based in faith, and oh-yeah?-yeah exchanges about the provability of (math|god|intelligence|grits)
15% -- Pot-calling-kettle-black posts, where someone makes an allegation about science or religion that's also true of the other. Typically starts with history of deaths, progresses through history of art, stalls out somewhere about the time the invention of Tang is being compared to televangelists.
10% -- Topical trolls. "Jesus was an idiot and so are you." "Scientists are all atheists." "Freeman Dyson naked and petrified."
5% -- Typical trolls. "First post." "Grits." Stupid repressed-homosexual Katz/Columbine stories.
3% -- Meta-posts. Commentary on the nature of the story. Ponderings about the makeup of Slashdot's readership. This post.
1% -- Posts that crept in from other threads. Slashdot bug? Posters losing track of multiple browser windows? It's a mystery. In any case, posts about Paying Bills Online, Chili!Soft, and whatever story gets posted next.
1% -- People karma whoring by posting mirror links, pasted text from the wire story, and other bloat that inexplicably keeps getting moderated up as 'informative.' See my
Predictions for final count of comments: 500-600.
Predictions for final count of comments that have anything new or interesting to say (and no, this one doesn't make that count): 5.
In any case, this whole story should be moderated (-1, Known-Controversial Ad-Banner-Revenue-Generation Flamebait).
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The net effect is that a whole lot of straw men have set up and both sides have a great time knocking them down. For more (from an unabashedly religious perspective) see http://www.cornerstonemag .com/features/iss112/baloney.htm.
Look guys: being religious (including, specifically, Christian) does not mean checking your brain at the door. And it never has. It means (broadly speaking) acceptance of a setup of principles, a world view, and a decision to devote your life to it. In Christianity, this is expressed by (to oversimplify) the Ten Commandments, Christ as the risen savior, and (of course) the decision to act on this information -- we call that decision faith.
It also doesn't mean (in most cases) that you are signing up for some militant crusade -- whatever Pat Robertson or the Pope would have you believe. You still have the one natural right God gave you: self-determination as a free moral agent. FWIW, I regard most "cults" (e.g. the Heavens Gate bit) as more a psychological experiment than a religious one.
Also, let me comment that anyone who thinks religion, esp. Christianity, is for the simple minded should read Karl Barth or George Fox sometime (to pick a couple of examples among many).
Also, if you're interested, check out Geeks for Christ. We're still in a fledgeling state, but one of the purposes of the site is precisely to be open to intelligent discussion of Christianity.
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I first read this book, by Gary Zukav, quite a few years ago. A quote:
"The Wu Li Masters know that 'science' and 'religion' are only dances, and that those who follow them are dancers. The dancers may claim to follow 'truth' or claim to seek 'reality', but the Wu Li Masters know better. They know that the true love of all dancers is dancing."