What part of “more likely” in the thread title don’t you understand?
And what qualifies religion to answer these questions with any more authority than does science?
Why was the universe created? How should we live our lives? What takes place after death? Why are some people good and other bad? What is good and evil? Why is there evil? Where does good come from? What is joy and how can I have it?
As a former psych major, you last statement is ridiculous.
What makes religion an authority on any of questions? On what factual basis should I turn to religion for answers to those questions?
Your statement is some variation of the “no true scotsman” fallacy or the false dichotomy fallacy. Plus “make sense” is very subjective.
Historically, Christians have very often disagreed about what the Bible means and what it means to be Christian. And we continue to do so. While you can define what Christianity means for yourself, expect a lot of disagreement.
Christianity is not monolithic. I think you need to talk to more Christians who follow the liberal traditions. (Not to be confused with Christians who are liberal politically, although there is often overlap.)
Time, popularity, personal experience.
Science tests the repeatable and the observable. Conclusions are only as good as the data they are based on. Scientism rejects that and says that scientists are experts about everything regardless of the amount or quality of data.
Sheldon Cooper is a parody not a role model.
There is no authority.
Anyone who wants answers has to find them themself. Science can’t answer the questions. What else is there? Religion is a choice. If a religion’s traditions and philosophy helps a person, then it is silly to refuse the help.
Questions that religion can’t answer:
- How should I live my life? Can I have a fulfilling life? Should I?
- Why should everyone be equal before the law?
- Why does the universe follow (more or less) comprehensible physics?
- Should I eat ham or tuna for lunch?
This isn’t even close to true. Religion is, and always has been, about what is. The whole purpose of it is to explain what is. Of course it has surrendered most of that ground now, but if you tell me you read the Bible and it doesn’t tell you what is (and what was), I’ll tell you you can’t read.
Besides that, “what should be” is often far more dangerous. Look at the stances on stem cell research, abortions, contraception and gays frequently taken up by various mainstream religions.
Simply throwing “No True Scotsman” at it is a fallacy. One could quite reasonably say “No true Scotsman would be born to French parents, live in France their entire life and never set food in Scotland”. One could also quite reasonable say “No true Christian would be an atheist”. How much further you can go from that is up for debate. Can a true Christian believe Jesus is not the son of God? At some point a belief becomes so far removed from one classification that it no longer belongs to it.
To what extent does Catholicism not believe in taking the Bible literally? I’ve heard various members of the Roman Catholic clergy say they believe that bread and wine will literally become the body and blood of Jesus. I’m not sure how literally they mean the word “literally”, since presumably they are still sensing bread and wine in their mouths, but I very much doubt I’d have to look far to find a Catholic belief that clearly contradicts science. I mean, even prayer has been shown to have no effect.
And yeah, I would say it’s watered down. If it weren’t, it would be a criminal organization. At least the Catholic Church of old was honest.
I can look up the background of science to see how reliable it is when used properly. I can find verifiable results, evidence, facts etc.
How do I test to see which religion has the best and/or right answers? How do I factcheck the answers any religion gives me?
So religious authority on these subjects stem from logical fallacies? Is that what you’re saying?
See my last post for responses.
Watch it, Pleonast - that’s a “how” question!
But really - science answers “why” questions all the time: Why does the ocean level at the shore go up and down a couple of times a day? Why do the planets take the paths they do through the sky? Why is there so much diversity of life forms on Earth?
A thousand different religions with ten thousand different answers. When it comes to personal questions about my life choices, which one of these should I choose over my own thoughts on the matter?
The distinction is really between questions that ask about the process that leads to a particular phenomenon versus questions that ask what the purpose is. Valid scientific questions can phrased using the word “how”, and “how” should be the real answer you’re seeking.
Your question is based on a false premise. If you read this article (Iannaccone, Laurence. Introduction to the Economics of Religion. Journal of Economic Literature, 1998.) you’ll see that a considerable body of research evidence indicates that measures of religiosity are similar for science professors and the population of the USA at large. A vast body of research shows that, in general, religious people are more educated than non-religious people. For example:
Patrick F. Fagan, Ph.D., Religious Practice and Educational Attainment: A Research Synthesis.
The social sciences show religious practice has very beneficial effects on the educational attainment of children. It may well trump income in its effects on
educational outcomes. The direct positive effects of religious practice by the student include:
• Higher grade point averages,
• More time spent on homework, and
• A significant decrease in high school drop-out rates.
All these hold even more so for children from low-income neighborhoods. Religious practice benefits the poor more than it does those children who are relatively well-off, likely because religion is one of the very few wellfunctioning institutions the poor can readily access and rely upon.
Lehrer, Evelyn. Religiosity as a Determinant of Educational Attainment: The Case of Conservative Protestant Women in the United States. Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 2(2), pages 203-219.
This paper examines the role of religiosity as a determinant of the educational attainment of women raised as conservative Protestants in the United States. A human capital model based on the demand and supply of funds for investments in education is used to develop hypotheses about various causal links between religiosity and years of schooling. The hypotheses are tested using data from the 1995 National Survey of Family Growth, a large-scale survey addressed to a representative sample of women in the United States. Among respondents raised as conservative Protestants, those who attended religious services frequently during their adolescent years are found to complete one more year of schooling than their counterparts who were less observant. The gap is smaller, but still sizeable and statistically significant, when other factors are held constant in a multivariate analysis.
Annebert Dijkstra and Jules L. Peschar, Religious Determinants of Academic Attainment in the Netherlands. Comparative Education Review (Feb. 1996) Vol. 40, No. 1, pp. 47-65
Students who held a strong “Christian worldview” and whose families attended religious services scored higher academically than those who did not report religious involvement.
More here and here. So the real question would seem to be: why are non-believers are consistently less educated than religious people?
Only if the topic is about educated people in general, and not just scientists…and it isn’t.
Why do you think there has to be a “why?” I know “it just happened” isn’t satisfying for some, but the universe cares little for our satisfaction.
Science doesn’t pretend to have an answer to this one, though you can look at happiness based on certain life choices statistically. Religion does pretend to have an answer - but it is always different, and none of them seem to work.
Easy. We decompose and brain function ceases, and since our minds are a function of our brains, no more minds. I know religion has a ton of fantasies about this, but none are backed up by any evidence. I’d go further but if I do you know who might pop in.
Easy. Our goodness and badness is based on some mix of nature and nurture, and we have a lot of variance in both. Now, how does religion explain it, except by original sin by an Adam and Eve that non-fundamentalists no longer believe in.
Labels - which are not real things, unless you are a Platonist.
Why is there natural evil in a world with god? Easily explained by science - the world is put together in a way such that earthquakes and the like happen - and the world has no sense or intelligence, so we puny people get in the way. Now, why did God kill all those babies in the tsunamis?
As for joy, science books are not self help books. Why do you need religion to find joy? I’ve had plenty in a god-free life.
My daughter is just finishing her dissertation in Psych, and she knows far more statistics than I do. I’m sure an undergrad psych major doesn’t get to see a lot of research. She has designed and run tons of experiments, some of which annoyingly don’t support her hypothesis. One year her favorite Christmas present was a Matlab manual. 
If you are an Orthodox Jew, this one is easy. Since it appears that they think resolving questions like this has some bearing on what religion to follow, all the Christians can go visit a rebbe to convert.
If you read the Iannaccone paper you’ll see that it deals specifically with religiosity of science professors as compared to others, though only in the USA, as I noted.
Thank you! This should /end thread
But it won’t, so I won’t hold my breath