ZERO, THAT WORD SUMS UP THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CHRISTIANITY AND SCIENCE

When religionists say that faith and science can agree and are in harmony why are those religionists nearly all Christians?  What gives them the right to implicitly deny that maybe Hinduism fits science better?  When they speak for their own religion they by default speak against others.  They speak for others in reverse as it were.

Why do people not argue that there is a link between their political party or view of politics and science? Or that their bingo group has a relationship with science? Mainstream religions claim to be good for science and that science is good for them. This comes from a sense that science is a threat to faith and they want to counteract anybody who might realise that. And what gives religion the right to assert that science should take it seriously enough to regard it differently from a jogging club? If science is unbiased it cannot elevate religion more than any other grouping.

Christianity's hyper-core doctrine is that God called all things into existence from nothing. The doctrine is thus so important and so sacred that anything that does not base itself on it is thus by definition anti-God. Science cannot base itself on the doctrine and admits that if it could test it and find it cannot be true it would reject it. The alleged good relationship between science and Christian faith is a facade.

Science has debunked creation out of nothing. “There is no creation ex nihilo. As Sean Carroll said: The axis for time goes from the top to the bottom and it goes forever. The only sense in which this universe is not eternal is that there is a moment in the middle where entropy is lowest – that has nothing to do with the kind of beginning you would need to give God room to work.” (Christianity in the Light of Science).

Some say that scientists cannot show how creation came to be.  [The religious say that so now they are speaking for science and they are not scientists?  So much for science and faith being friends!]

For some, there was always something there.

For some, the universe popped into existence from nothing and it was spontaneous and had nothing to do with God.

For others, a time warp might explain how the universe started itself.

For others, an infinite intelligence, perhaps a God, made the universe from nothing.

Many prefer to say we cannot know.  [Buddha said that.]

Christians argue that all these options fail to take us to science. They take us outside of its expertise. So they say then that any atheistic theory about the origin of all is just as faith-based as a religious one.  But they won't tell you how the suggestion that there was always something there sounds like it needs the least faith.  If you are forced to believe or have faith when proof is better then the next best thing is to choose whatever belief has the least mysteries.  To say we cannot know defeats how science never assumes that and keeps trying.  That religion puts it on the menu is disgraceful.

It does not follow that if both science and religion are based on belief or faith that they are both equally based. If science simply believes or assumes that there is no magic and religion assumes there is the magic of something coming from nothing then science is not as much faith as religion is. Religion cannot say faith in creation and faith in science are separate because once you say things are created you are saying they are not brute facts. But science treats them as if they are for it cannot detect any power bringing them into existence and keeping them there.

The excellent book from 2014, Christianity is Not Great! fills us in on the lies Christians tell about how you don't have to flush science down the toilet to become a true Christian.

It points out that Robert Ingersoll noted that the Bible and the faith have not given us one useful fact to help us technologically or medically or any other way. Thus the person of religious faith is not intrinsically better than the secularist who through science and wisdom helps us to progress materially and in terms of our health. Faith in religion is not better than faith in secularism. Even if faith in secularism seems barren and difficult it is what you owe the best things in your life to at the end of the day.

Richard Carrier in the book makes the extremely significant point that Christianity did nothing to encourage science and democracy in its first millennium. This attitude held the world back.  Christianity was to blame for the Dark Ages.  It is to blame for our loved ones dying young for medical science has been set back.

Science and religious values do not have to agree. They often oppose each other. Religion assumes there is no point in looking to live to 500. Science says there is. Religion does not like three parent babies but science does. Religion threatens what is best for us. If it does good for us it makes sure it does not do what is best for us!

Has science come about because people believed a smart intelligent and rational God made all things and so to honour him we have to learn and research and engage in science? No - even believers usually keep religious motivations out of their work or are too unconvinced to care about God. And if God alone matters and you want to find him through research and hard work your avenue would be theology not science. And if you did look at science it would not be important in comparison to theology.

Religion says, "Science and religion seek truth in different ways. That is why they are not mutually exclusive." That is a lie. Two things can look for truth in different ways and be mutually exclusive. And as science claims to be always seeking truth it has to.

Another reason it is a lie, is that science cannot tell you that you must find a religious way of knowing for that requires evidence and religion has no use for evidence. If you are doing forensic tests to see if X committed murder and the tests show X might have done it that is evidence that you need evidence of a different kind. You may need to look for CCTV footage. The evidence tells you to look for different evidence but not just any evidence. Evidence from the astrology chart is irrelevant. Evidence from eyewitnesses will not even be an avenue if the village where X murdered is full of drug addicts. It depends. Any evidence then must stand on scientific evidence. If there are other ways of knowing apart from science, science will give evidence that you need to find other ways to know even if it does not tell you exactly what those ways are. It is enough if science tells you what those ways are not. If something else is a way of knowing there will be evidence. 

Another reason it is a lie is that when religion says it agrees with science it means some science not all. The American Psychological Association says homosexuality is natural which is against Church teaching. That is one example. [How an early baby is not a person with a right to life is another. ] Religion is against much of the science of psychology.
 
Psychological testing and studies have found that people tend to dehumanise those who do not agree with them. If you are in a grouping that is or thinks it is socially dominant and influential you will look at other groups of people as being less people than the people in your group. Ktiely and his researchers used a scale to measure how one group dehumanises others groups (Bruneau & Kteily, 2017). The results were alarming for example Israelis virtually rated Palestinians as being almost animals. It is no wonder then those who are pro-Trump tend to care less if something awful and destructive happens to Obama supporters and vice versa. Haslam and Stratemeyer (2016) determined that this denial of the humanity of others in a different group is caused by how different groups emotionally respond differently to different situations. The Irish in the past hated the British partly for allowing abortion or tolerating it instead of being enraged. This hate was enough on its own but you see the point: people prefer those who have the same feelings as themselves about most things as this makes their social interaction easier.

Religion undermines the good work psychologists could do to make society more open and inclusive and accepting.  It does that merely by NOT being based on psychology.  It does that by ministering to people and blocking or delaying their sense that they need to go to a psychologist.  If people are inclined to see those who contradict them as less than them or less than human then religion should not be creating extra grounds for disagreement and using guesses and un- evidenced doctrines and rituals.  That only makes the problem worse.  There is enough to disagree about without that nonsense.  If you believe in God but say you don't have a religion then you are a one-person religion so you are still part of the problem.  You think you and God are running a religion, the religion of you.

Religion is about God primarily or only God.  Suppose that God is real and religion really is connecting to him and pleasing him.  Then it follows that science should be defined as, "Investigating and experimenting and testing to see how God has set the universe up." Science in that view is the study of how God makes nature function. Science is not about how nature works but about how God makes nature work. The basic conflict between science and religion is about how science is defined. Science leaves God out and religion puts him in. Science wants to avoid a God bias and religion wants it in for it says that God is about that which is desirable and that you would need or want to believe in. Even if religion uses science, it is therefore still the enemy of science. Science will not assume anything to be true without evidence so involving God is anti-scientific.

Religion stresses that we cannot understand God or his ways for he is so much bigger than anything human and is the origin of all.  Secularists and atheists are accused of believing only what they understand. Understanding isn’t everything. But beliefs you understand ought to be valued more than ones you do not. Thus science comes before anything else including God - the doctrine that God comes first is an insult to that principle and to the sacrifices people make for it.

Religion says, "Science says that all questions can be answered by science. But many questions are not answered." If that is true, if science claims to have all the answers even religious ones then it is a rival to religion.  Science says in principle the questions can be but that does not mean in practice it always can be done. Science does not answer all questions but says it would if it were practical.  So if science does not proclaim God then clearly it denies the importance of God. It as good as says God does not exist. Silence in that case is rejection. 

Science bans you from saying what is in somebody else's mind. Religion routinely does that with God.  God supposedly sent Jesus and became Jesus.  He supposedly decided to choose Moses and inspired the Bible.  So if science does not tell you everything that is an argument against involving God and faith not an argument for it.

Another reason it is a lie because all sensible people see science as a tool and the best tool we have for finding truth and working for progress. Christians object that it is not the only tool.  Nobody says it is. But Christians cannot see science as the best tool we have when they hold that the truths that really matter are revealed by God in the Bible.  Increasingly there are those who say they are Christian but who claim to be inspired to speak for God.  So instead of Prophet Moses or Isaiah you have prophet Kirsty or Dylan.  This is insane.  Do they really think they are equal to Moses?  What use is that for who else is going to take them seriously but themselves?

Science is based on valuing knowledge and testing as good. Christians say that science then is based on faith for it just assumes that knowledge and testing are good and cannot do experiments to prove they are good. That claim is a lie. If you say that knowledge and testing are bad then you are saying it is good in the sense of being true that they are bad. So you just see knowledge and testing as good and there is no assuming involved.  Science would test even if God told them to stop so science in that sense is godless.

We conclude that rather than attracting each other, science and religion repel each other.  We now see why religion is so superficial and defensive when it says that they attract each other.