Christianity, Knowledge and Science

Last question first; By religion you mean Christianity, as per the rest of the OP. It is important to remember that the vast body we call christendom is composed of an endless assortment of denominations and individuals within the denominations. No two agree on everything or treat the Bible in the same way. You need to make a much better case to show that through all of time christianity has impeded progress, before you can scape goat the Bible. The Bible is at fault only because men put so much stock in it being the infallible and literal Word of God, that whatever less-than-inspired interpretation they come up with is regarded as infallible in itself. It doesn't seem to be the trend anymore to shape a religion around a doctrine. The newer sects that have sprung up are more centered around prophesying the end of the world and causing their adherents to react like crazies over physical events rather than dwell on spiritual life. These type of sects are 100% SURE of themselves because the Bible says so, no matter that no one else sees it. The thought they alone possess this TRUE superior knowledge of the Bible adds even more fuel to the fire. Are we stagnating as humans? I think this is one of the questions that is completely relative to the observer's viewpoint. I will leave it an open question.I do not see a direct link from Gen 1 to the idea that ALL knowledge is evil. The knowledge of good and evil is a one-time event. It is this specific knowledge that God forbade in the garden, not knowledge in general. There is no forbidding of scientific knowledge, or of progress, but already the implication that man SHOULD learn to use the beasts as helpers and to use the fruits for sustenance. God even allowed Adam to name the beasts for himself.Our knowledge of science and technology is not good or evil. It is how we use the knowledge that is called into question. We are called to be good stewards of knowledge, to use it to better ourselves and to serve our fellow man. Remember this verse;To he whom much has been given, much will be demanded? I have a big problem with this further lumping together of christianity. There may be some sects and individuals who claim to have all the secrets of earth and heaven bottled up, but please, for the most part, the only secret knowledge christian leaders seek to give out is of the spiritual kind. I would like to hope that some day all christians will not be confused with fundie preachers of Biblical creation science. I keep having to whip this one out. Oh well... Have you ever put together a list of what christians HAVE accmplished in the way of progress, or do you just dwell on the tiny minority who profess christianity to be incompatible with it?

Praying for wisdom is obviously not shunning knowledge. It is asking for the best course of action based on current knowledge, or asking for enough knowledge to plan a course of action that will benefit the good. I think we all have the same knowledge that christians are using here. That knowledge is called 'love thy neighbor'. The Bible does not anywhere mention when a soul appears, but christians have a better safe-than-sorry mentality in defense of the value of human life which conflicts with the scientific study inasmuch that science is ALSO trying to serve fellow man and save life. If only we could go back to the Bible and ask;But Lord, who is my neighbor?

Yes, there are plenty of newer sects which have a specificly themed belief which rejects 'progress' via denying to it members medical attention, voting rights, political affiliation or participation, use of the internet, etc. Of course it doesn't. No one in their right minds would think a church was using the word 'truth' in anything but a spiritual sense.Look at 1 Timothy; If you think Paul means secular/sensorial truth, well there goes the whole argument that christianity wants to impede progress.Oh, and Romans 2:8; I am not a big Bible-quoter miner, but if christians start using 'truth' to mean secular/sensorial evidence, well I guess we had better get cracking! According to the Bible, if we don't look for truth, we will be condemned.Here's one more, from Galations. Well, my oh my, I can't seem to find Paul anywhere distinguishing spiritual truth from secular truth! I also don't notice him giving science lectures at universities. Certainly not, I asked for repetitive examples of christians helping science, or at the very least some evidence that all scientists are non-christian.

You are making a big ugly mountain out of an innocent mole-hill. You have attempted to present an argument that christians consider knowledge evil. They have to get it from 'authorized' knowledge dealerships. Priests deal with spiritual things, pyschiatrists deal with mental things, doctors deal with medical things, and we like them to be 'authorized'. Prayer is not relevent here, the question seems more to be 'why would anyone ask their doctor to appraise an objet d'art?' I don't think it is necessary to ask why humans don't want to make decisions by themselves, and I think there are times when even the doctor and the pastor feel helpless. If you are going to get all terminological here, it would be useful to know just what kind of knowledge your OP is talking about. Do you mean wisdom, or factual knowledge? Is the 'knowledge of good and evil' factual?

Do you have evidence that those against stem cell research have been shown to offer less support to African nations? I don't like statements like this which increase the scope from one topic to the entire African continent. It is good to remember that there are issues in the world which we forget about too easily, but I don't think it is fair to look for a 'winner' amoung the 'piles of cells', the folk in dire need of a cure for disease, and the people of Africa.

Oh, sorry, I thought those catholics were newer but seriously since I happen to be one of this brand, I have not felt bound in my life to accept pronouncements about the nature of reality, only those about the reality of the supernatural.While a particular scientific idea is still in the theory stage, it is not unusual for a religious figure to make a pronouncement of how that theory clashes or conflates with their doctrine. I agreed that they may well be at times. I also gave you an example by Augustine which shows that very early on men knew that the Bible should not be researched for factual truth over spiritual truth. You called this 'proof-texting'.

All life should be treated equally. You seem to imply that a living breathing individual is more equal than a comatose one. Or that an individual who uses portable oxygen or lifesupport is less equal than one who breathes on their own. Honestly, even if you did not say this or imply this, there is no way to start deciding which life is more important...the little cells included. Since we simply don't know if they are life or not I am not inclined to take a stance either way, but to sympathize with both sides.

Just supposing the majority of the christian opposition has no scientific knowledge, the Biblical law they are following is quite simply 'thou shalt not kill'. No, I can't imagine anyone being so callous. There are those who do not seek medical treatment for themselves because of religious views such as the above, but I have not heard of them interfering with the rights of others to seek treatment, or of science to discover cures. You could be right, of course, but I don't imagine the majority of folk to base their opposition to stem cell research on that. Since I am not a scientist I prefer to end this part of the topic here...and to hope that one of the alternative means of harvesting stem cells proves viable so that we no longer have this dilemma.

What I am saying is that 'life' is anything which has an immortal soul in it. Don't pick my usage of 'life' apart...I am very aware that there are animating forces within all life forms. But you know that 'thou shalt not kill' does not apply to such life forms as mice or cockroaches. In some religions it does...wonder how they view science?So since a fetus or an embryo MIGHT have an immortal soul, some christians feel justified in trying to have the fetus treated with the dignity that all human life deserves. Once again, I am not a scientist, I have taken no steps to speak out or become active in any protest against sten cell research, and until I might be better versed in the details, I will not make a case for or against it.What this thread is about is whether christianity is fearful of knowledge and science. I am only saying that striving to preserve human life, even if there is a mistake and there IS no human life, DOES NOT prove that christians resent knowledge, but only that some of them disagree on what life is.

There IS a problem, and as I see it is not likely to be resolved very soon, precisely because the idea of a soul is untestable. To further what Ringo said, at one time it was moral to use Jews or African Americans as guinea pigs. Growing up near the infamous Byberry Mental Hospital I have heard much about the deplorable conditions that the mentally impaired were subjected to. These situations came from a false idea that certain people were somehow less than human, or that mere cognizance was what determined being 'human'. I can only say that if science were to discover the existance of a pre-natal 'soul' which made even tiny cells completely human long before any awareness, many people of many faiths might change positions. It won't happen. We are left to go with our gut feeling...and that ultimately has nothing to do with any church or any notion of God or even of atheism.

Somewhere in the thread, Cocytus hinted at seperating factual knowledge from wisdom, i.e., the ability to make good decisions based on factual knowledge. Morality might serve the purpose just as well.When it comes to the GoE, what exactly was stigmatized? Was the 'knowledge' of good and evil factual knowledge? Was it wisdom? Or simply a misnomer for the ability or awareness to recognize a good action or a bad one? Was knowledge evil? Evil did not yet exist. But yet Adam and Eve were ALREADY choosing between good and evil. Did they simply not know this? Then why were they punished for disobedience? Maybe,the knowledge WASN'T evil, but it had consequences, like getting kicked out of the GoE, just because they didn't know how to handle it yet. Knowledge is power, without wisdom or morality it can be dangerous. Knowledge is not evil in itself, but if we have all knowledge and no wisdom, it can be dangerous to leave us alone with the tree of life?

Read the OP. I think I am asking the same question you are. That's the connection I was making...our scientific ability is sometimes greater than our 'knowledge' of what is good and evil in the application of it. We do see experiments done on people whom we at one time felt were inferior, or experiments done where we just didn't know the psychological effects it would have, etc. The stem cell issue may be one area where are ability to do something is at a more advanced stage than our ability to reach a moral concensus on it...that's why I said we were not ready to be left in a garden with the Tree of Life.

You are begging the question a bit...I have to ask; if those in power decide that stem cell research is good isn't it still untestable?Working with only the physical reality and the knowledge we have thus far, it IS good. Whether or not it is morally right in terms of a soul, is something we can only determine upon discovering the existance of such. In that sense both sides are operating equally under assumptions. One assuming there is, one assuming there isn't. There is some type of 'faith', from both pro and con positions, that the decision they are making is moral. There is a third choice; since we don't know, we won't make any assumptions, but carry on with progress using the knowledge that we DO have.

Hi DorfMan. I am not sure if I have an internal commotion. I think you are assuming one for me. Or maybe you could be more specific? That is not true. RCC is Biblical to the utmost extent which human understanding allows. The gaps in the scriptural picture are filled out with Sacred Tradition and human reasoning. Do you mean the 'verse' from Augustine? Are you suggesting that modern science has proved him wrong, and that we should insist on Biblical science even when it contradicts what we observe with our senses?It's somewhat enetertaining to imagine the possibility of science being revealed in the Bible...but still neither here nor there when it comes to asking ourselves 'why' would God care if we knew about science? If He created everything, doesn't He already know the ability we have to look around us and make discoveries?Let's look at you examples; This verse is out of context, but just from what you have quoted, God says 'LOOK AT NATURE', and it will tell you, not 'Look at the Bible'. So what? No offense, but I mean, many animals are. If dinosaurs lived and we have evidence for that, it could have been common knowledge, at least from oral tradition, in Biblical times. Even if you prove that Job was talking about dinosaurs, it doesn't prove that he had any mystically imparted scientific knowledge. Again, so what? All the Bible says is that there are countless stars and countless grains of sand. Anyone with their naked eye can see that. Sounds like Paul is being very un-scientific and calling the sun and the moon both stars, which is fine, because all he is doing is making an analogy with the varying degrees of brightness visible in heavenly objects, again, visible to the naked eye. Your conclusaion doesn't add up. As your source says, living people in the first century CAN see a difference in the stars, hey, even I can, and I am half blind. The only thing you are proving is that we now know WHY they look different, and I don't see Paul explaining that. Besides, the wording in the phrase doesn't mean that one STAR differs from another; it refers back to the three types of 'stars' Paul saw. He say 'for...one star differs from another' not 'and...one star differs from another'.The rest of your examples can be broken down in the same way. In all cases the language is so general as to sound scientific and very ignorant of science, depending on who is reading the text. It is certain that blood would be very mysterious to ancient man, but all sorts of useless medical procedures revolved around the erroneus conclusions of the nature and importance of blood.There is really nothing cryptic about these passages. It is all easily observable or blatant symbology.P.S.,...I am wishing your scientists monumental success in counting the grains of sand...I wouldn't want to be responsible for seperating the real sand from the fossilized seashells and volcaninc ash, let alone the part of the shore where you find grains of sand mixed with sediment and/or earth.

Way back at the beginning of the thread I asked for examples of Christians who have contributed to our knowledge of the world around us.Now the field has broadened to just 'religion' in your above quote. This makes your position logically less supportable, as now you have to find examples of scientists who had NO religion.Can you even support your position by bringing in any evidence that science was hindered by a religion other than christianity? I would think this is important for proving that religion LENDS itself to cultures of ignorance. It doesn't seem likely that Christianity could be the only religion harboring ignorance, does it? That's why Cocytus had to bring in the part about the Bible stigmatizing 'knowledge' in the first place.Religious beliefs attempt to explain that which we don't understand...in the dark ages and for many years afterwards we knew very little about the nature of the world around us. Consequently much was attributed to a presumed God, and yes there was certainly a downfall to this in that anyone who had knowledge of something new was condemned with terms like witchery, sorcery, alchemy, and astronomy. Without the preseumption of the divine, there would have been no presumption of the diabolic.We have since learned that much can be discovered usig only natural means, but certainly not everything that we question has been answered. There is still plenty of room for faith even if we let down the barriers we think God told us not to cross. At this stage in history, the mysteries of life and the after-life are still sacred boundaries, which only our ethical, moral, or religious presumptions may hinder/help us in matters relating to these mysteries. There really is no 'educated' position to have concerning souls or the Ultimate/ultimate origins of the world. Edited by anastasia, : No reason given.