Science is the Religion of the Enlightenment

[freshmeat]

The more intelligent people are, the more likely they are to have ideas and opinions and life styles that diverge from popular norms. At least according to psychological studies.

But psychological studies also reveal that the more educated you are the more likely you are to believe your own bullshit and tunnel even deeper into your own cult of delusions and peer group fictions.

Science is in every meaningful way every bit as crippling, manipulative and debilitating as the religions it was supposed to replace.

It also relies upon immersion into dogmatic environments to indoctrinate it's subjects into believing whatever it's authority figures proclaim to be truth.

And it also relies upon a faith based adherence to the scriptures and ideas it concocts.

And it relies upon a monopoly over knowledge that only it's prized authority figures can understand.

And it speaks a language that the overwhelming majority are not fluent in.

And it chastizes as infidels and sinners anyone who won't adopt the values and fictions it promotes.

And science seeks to answer all of the same questions and address all the same needs that religions do, like the purpose of life, creation myths, what happens when we die etc.

And it flails and fails continually at a snails pace of modernization while it ever so slowly adapts to new info and readjusts itself toward the truth.....


..meanwhile being dead wrong over and over and over and over as it very slowly and begrudgingly adapts to correct it's flawed doctrines due to pressure from new information.

There are dozens of obvious similarities between science and religion and no meaningful distinctions between the two.

Which governs every thinking, intelligent and honest person to admit that science is no more than the most modern global religion.

As much a collection of myths and confirmation bias anecdotes and just plain crazy fabrications as the Jebus myth and astrology or numerology.

Is Science a superior religion or an inferior one? Time will tell. But for now science is just another cult practiced by sheeple and skilled leaders hoping to extract a sliver of power from their obedient followers/televangelist practitioners.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

 

[Faust]

Science is a flashlight, everything else you describe is something else.

[freshmeat]

Science should be a flashlight, but sadly more and more of it is like a sleep apnea mask.

fify

[freshmeat]

I am trying to shine a light on a topic that A) scares the shit outta me and B) is critically important to the thrival of our species, imo.

This forum is populated by some extremely smart posters, but that offers them (apparently) little immunity against derp.

If this forum can't see through the derp what chance does society at large have?

[LMNO]

Any reason why you deem psychological studies more valid than other sciences?  After all, your premise seems to be built on them.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Freshmeat will unfortunately not be able to continue this conversation, due to veering off into Identity Europa jabbering about multiculturalism.

[LMNO]

Aw.  I was hoping we could gather all the PhDs and science majors together and flay his soul.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Aw.  I was hoping we could gather all the PhDs and science majors together and flay his soul.

He'd just ignore anything that disagreed with his views.

Anti-rationalism is no respecter of a powerful intellect or good intentions, and this guy had neither.

[Hagtard Celine Dion Mustard]

There are dozens of obvious similarities between science and religion and no meaningful distinctions between the two.

I'll bite.

You don't understand the difference between science as practiced by scientists and understood by people who know what science is and how it works... and people who are not scientists but would rather put their faith into it than religion.

The difference between science and religion is that the "dogma" of science adapts and changes (as you have pointed out), but the "dogma" of religion does not. With religion, there is always an argument between people who want to adapt it to suit a contemporary context and sensibility. With science, there is no argument unless you're a fucking Flat-Earther.

Religion is subjective and not internally consistent. Science constantly reforms itself for maximum internal consistency. (Note that according to the incompleteness theorem, no such isolated system can be totally self-justified.)

People who treat science as reliable and immutable truth are not scientists. But they're probably still one-up on the religious freaks in terms of "truth".

That being said, science does not dictate morality, and religion encompasses far more than objective truth. Spirituality (and perhaps an open-minded subscription to religion) have much more to do with philosophy than the question, "What is real and how do things work?"