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Subject: Re: science, lawfulness, a (the?) god
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Date: 24 Aug 88 17:53:00 GMT
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Date: Tue, 23 Aug 88 10:06 EDT
From: sas@BBN.COM
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cc: sas@BBN.COM
In-reply-to: AIList Moderator Nick Papadakis's message of Mon 22 Aug 1988 22:21-EDT
Subject: Re: science, lawfulness, a (the?) god

I think people are getting a bit confused on this one.

Religion is centered around the human soul which in many religions
can be characterized as damned, saved, pure, untested, tainted and so
on.  In Western religions, which are largely guilt based, it is used
to assign human thoughts and actions a place on a good/evil or
moral/immoral scale.

Science is centered around the testable world.  Various statements
about phenomena are assigned values on the true/false scale, in which
truth is determined by testing the statements predictive value, the
predictions being tested by active experiment or passive observation.

To my knowledge there is no scientific litmus test which can determine
the good or evil of a particular thought of action.  Beeckman does not
make a scale to weigh one's soul against a feather.  (Actually, the
popular American view of the afterlife is surprisingly
NON-judgemental)!  The story of Job can even be viewed as a tract
denouncing the attempt to apply human reason to matters religious.

One might expect, given the powers ascribed to the almighty(ies), that
religious law would be more or less self enforcing.  Notice the
difference between the following two sets of taboos:

- Don't eat amanitus bolitus.	- Don't hit yourself with a stick.
- Don't eat human flesh.	- Don't hit other people with a stick.

To keep people from eating human flesh and hitting other people with
sticks, people need some form of government, which is ruled not by
science, not by religion, but by politics.

Will a big enough fire kill a man?  Will the atom bomb explode?
That's science.

Did Bruno reach Nirvana?  Is Truman rotting in hell?  That's religion.

Should we burn people at the stake for heresy?  Should we drop the
bomb on Japan?  That's politics.

					Seth

P.S. I can't help adding for you movie buffs, "When a ghost and a king
meet and everyone ends up mincemeat. That's entertainment."