Point of honor: on science and religion: religion and science really are profoundly at odds on a variety of dimensions, and science really is, on all those dimensions, far and away the more admirable enterprise - Readings in Science And Religion

Modern science kills God and takes his place on the vacant throne ... as ... the sole arbiter of all relevant truths. [Vaclav Havcl] (1)

In the same way that each of us has had to grow up to resist the temptation of wishful thinking ..., so our species has had to learn in growing up that we are not playing the starring role in any sort of grand cosmic drama. [Steven Weinberg] (2)

Havel and Weinberg agree that there is a real tension between religion and science. I believe they are right. Havel, however, thinks that science, pretending to be the sole source of truth, has blinded us to truths of a spiritual kind; while Weinberg thinks that intellectual maturity demands that we give up such wishful thinking about ourselves and our place in the universe, and takes it as a "point of honor" not to seek consolation by adjustment of our beliefs. And here, I believe, Weinberg is right, and Havel wrong.

I say this more than a little diffidently, for the whole topic makes me somewhat queasy--I have, I realize, less the temperament of those village-pump atheists who relish speaking out against religion, than of those more retiring types for whom religious belief just isn't a live option. I have never felt moved to write a manifesto explaining "Why I ant not a Christian"; but now I can neither avoid the question of the relation of science to religion, nor duck the obligation to answer it honestly.

Of course, "the" question of the relation of religion and science isn't really one question, but a whole tangle. An initial complication is that religion may be construed quite narrowly, as a commitment to the existence of a personal god or gods interested in human beings' behavior, in our prayers and rituals, or very broadly, as with Einstein's Spinozistic conception of religious feeling as "rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law." (3) Even with religion narrowly construed, there is the problem of the many competing religions. But I shall cut through these complications by focusing primarily (though not quite exclusively) on Christianity. The most important complication for present purposes is that religion and science differ from each other in a number of interrelated ways: in their conception of the essential character of the universe and our place in it; in the kinds of account they regard as genuinely explanatory; and not only in what they believe, but in how they believe it. This doesn't mean that science and religion are incommensurable, but it does mean that the most illuminating comparisons are neither so easy or so one-dimensional as is sometimes supposed.

Science is not primarily a body of belief, but a federation of kinds of inquiry. Scientific inquiry relies on experience and reasoning: the sciences have developed many ways to extend the senses and enhance our powers of reasoning, but they require no additional kinds of evidential resource beyond these, which are also the resources on which everyday empirical inquiry depends. Among other things, while in even the most ordinary of everyday inquiry we often depend on what others tell us, scientific inquiry has become the joint, ongoing effort of a vast inter-generational community.

The natural sciences seek explanations of natural, and the social sciences of social, phenomena and events. In the natural sciences, the explanations sought are in terms of physical forces and events. In intentional social science, as in history and detective work, the explanations sought are in terms of human beings' beliefs, goals, etc., and the actions they prompt. But both natural-scientific and social-scientific explanations are "natural" in the sense that they eschew appeal to any supernatural, otherworldly, spiritual forces.

Imaginative speculation is essential, but imaginative hypotheses have to stand up to evidence. In the scientific enterprise, respect for evidence, intellectual honesty; are prime epistemological (and ethical) virtues. At any time, there are new speculations as yet untried, and many contested issues, controversial claims, and competing theories or theory-fragments; the body of accepted claims and theories is far from complete, and it is fallible. Though much of it is by now firmly established, none is in principle beyond the possibility of revision in the light of new evidence. Parts of the presently accepted scientific account of the origin of the universe and of our place in it are well-warranted, other parts less so; and many, many questions are as yet unresolved. But the main outlines, and many of the details, are pretty well warranted.

According to the best-warranted theories of modern science, the earth is just one small corner of a vast universe, a small corner which happened to be hospitable to life, and in which human beings evolved from earlier life-forms.

Religion, unlike science, is not primarily a kind of inquiry, but a body of belief--"creed" is the word that comes to mind. At the core of a religious world-view, as I shall understand it, is the idea that a purposeful spiritual being brought the universe into existence, and gave human beings a very special place. This spiritual being is concerned about how we humans behave and what we believe, and can be influenced by our prayers and rituals.