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Is evolutionary chance impossible?

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Dexter

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Re: Is evolutionary chance impossible?

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DWill wrote: However, if you see this from Gould's own perspective, I mean as a religious person who obviously didn't flirt with fundamentalist belief, he's right. What he thought religiously did not impinge on what he thought scientifically. Our generalizing tendency can get us into trouble. What is religion? What is a religious person? I believe we should specify that with Dawkins' criticism we're taking aim at the extreme.
I'm not sure what you mean by the extreme. If Gould and other scientists believe in God, sure they can do their scientific work particularly if they are doing very narrow questions, and they can have moral views that are influenced by religion. But if you believe in souls and miracles or some kind of cosmology that relies on God, then you're conflicting with known science. If you're talking about a general deism, then that won't conflict very much, but that's also very much a minority religious position.
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DWill

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Re: Is evolutionary chance impossible?

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Dexter wrote:
DWill wrote: However, if you see this from Gould's own perspective, I mean as a religious person who obviously didn't flirt with fundamentalist belief, he's right. What he thought religiously did not impinge on what he thought scientifically. Our generalizing tendency can get us into trouble. What is religion? What is a religious person? I believe we should specify that with Dawkins' criticism we're taking aim at the extreme.
I'm not sure what you mean by the extreme. If Gould and other scientists believe in God, sure they can do their scientific work particularly if they are doing very narrow questions, and they can have moral views that are influenced by religion. But if you believe in souls and miracles or some kind of cosmology that relies on God, then you're conflicting with known science. If you're talking about a general deism, then that won't conflict very much, but that's also very much a minority religious position.
By the extreme, I'm thinking of what we call fundamentalism. Even if that might represent a fairly big chunk of the U.S. population, it's still the extreme in my view. While I agree with what you said, I think it's impossible to say yes or no to a question like, "Is religion a bad thing?"--that is, in a fully reasoned way. It's complicated, is all I'm saying. Even this matter of believing in something, and what that belief concerns, is complicated. If you say you believe in a god that works in our world and that this god has performed and could perform miracles, you are making a statement for which there is no scientific evidence--but will there necessarily be a lot of material difference in how you act as a member of a society? On the other hand, if you believe that blind people are afflicted because of their sins in a past life, as some Buddhists think, your religion has determined your behavior, in this case in a very bad way.
Last edited by DWill on Tue Feb 21, 2012 9:58 am, edited 1 time in total.
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