Why Science And Religion Are Not Compatible

Throughout human existence, there has been constant controversy between science and religion.  For instance, Galileo, in spreading his ideas of a heliocentric solar system, failed to convince the Catholic Church and was punished for his blasphemous scientific theories.  Under the rule of Edward VI, two heretics were executed for denying Christian beliefs.  Scientists use the scientific method to test ideas and let their work speak for itself.  Theists share supernatural experiences and teachings by testimony and holy texts with the expectation of tolerance.  Each purport to be the way to learn truth about human existence and the universe.  Some theists even claim that science and religion are complimentary, in that science gains truth by recording and studying natural phenomenon, while religion seeks to gain knowledge by way of the supernatural.  Supposedly, the universe is composed of both, but that is assuming the supernatural is real.

Methods of acquiring knowledge conflict in both science and faith.  Science includes the scientific method, which requires physical evidence before determining if a conclusion is true.  Thusly, if scientists begin their experiments with conclusions, like "the Christian god is real," such carelessness would destroy their credibility.  Conversely, believers of the supernatural create conclusions and then seek supporting evidence, of which there is none.  The biblical authors say the Christian god is real, but this claim isn't scientifically verified.  If there is no physical evidence, then a hypothesis should remain as such or be discarded, but theists tend to ignore this part of the process.  Essentially, believers reverse the scientific method, which in and of itself goes against a scientist's principles.

Alternatively, in response to the conflict of evidence collection methods, believers say that the supernatural cannot be tested as it is beyond the natural boundaries of the scientific method.  This statement is not only wishful thinking, but it gives the false assumption that science cannot test for the supernatural.  If a cause and an effect occur, it can be scientifically recorded.  For example, if a devastating hurricane destroys a city, but everyone survives, believers like to say that their god was merciful and His act of kindness was a miracle.  Yet, they don't consider the natural phenomenon of safety preparedness for the zero fatalities.  Statistics are available to measure these events.  Additionally, some people hear noises in their homes and assume ghosts are present, when in fact old water pipes or a foundation shift is the culprit.  Saying the supernatural exists and is outside the realm of the natural is simply not true.

Then there is the argument from some that science is a religion.  In Kansas, the Christian group, Citizens for Objective Public Education (COPE), "claim that public schools 'promote a non-theistic religious worldview by allowing only materialistic or atheistic explanations to scientific questions.'”  They say the teaching of evolution, which is a scientific theory, is indoctrination into the religion of atheism or secular humanism.  Such a claim is inaccurate on multiple accounts and widens the rift between religion and science.  Firstly, atheism is not a religion and neither is secular humanism.  Secondly, science is not biased toward atheism.  If there was scientific evidence for the supernatural, then atheists would be encouraged to change their mind.  Thirdly, evolution doesn't really say anything about atheism or secular humanism other than the fact that humans evolved with the ability to have complex beliefs, and that includes belief in the supernatural.  Also, don't confuse all beliefs, ideas, or scientific facts to be religious.  According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, religion has several definitions: "1. the belief in a god or in a group of gods. 2. An organized system of beliefs, ceremonies, and rules used to worship a god or a group of gods. 3. an interest, a belief, or an activity that is very important to a person or group."  Scientists do not adhere to the first two since there is a consensus that the supernatural doesn't exist.  The third is so vague that anything of interest, like football, knitting, eating, or politics, can be considered a religion.  Yet, none these interests have a religious tax-exempt status as determined by the United States government by the people.  This is why atheists and secular humanists don't receive a religious tax-exemption.  This is why scientists don't receive a religious tax-exemption.  All three groups are simply not considered religious.

There are many theists who claim that such scientific theories as evolution are harmonious with Christianity.  Such people are more moderate in their beliefs and take a more figurative approach to the biblical story of Adam and Eve; in that women like Eve didn't come from a man's rib.  Yet, this approach is problematic because the veracity of the entire Bible comes into question if even one story is not understood literally.  If the Adam and Eve story is just a fable, then the flood, Noah's Ark, and Jesus walking on water could be too.  Essentially, if a Christian believes in the theory of evolution, they must perform a mental gymnastics routine in order to accept the supernatural bits included, since the Bible does not explicitly state what stories to read literally and metaphorically.  Otherwise, such a scientific theory and supernatural belief system are deemed incompatible.

Christianity's Celebration of Death

Today, I walked out of the local grocery store as a Christian walked in.  I could tell she was a Christian because she wore a huge blinged-out cross around her neck; you know, like the over-sized necklace bling that many hip-hop artists wear to show off their money.  Yet, this old woman wasn't showing off her bank account.  She was displaying her obsession with death.  I am reminded about how the cross is just one of the many symbols and ideas of death that are part of the Christian faith.

The cross is the symbol that epitomizes what it means to be Christian, since their savior supposedly died on one.  Christians decorate tombstones, churches, and public and private lands with it.  Many Christian officials proudly display a bloodied Jesus hanging from a cross within church walls.  Another idea of their celebration of death is the Eucharist, Holy Communion, Sacrament, or Lord's Supper, in which transubstantiation occurs.  Transubstantiation is the symbolic change from wine into blood and bread into the body of Jesus Christ.  This could be viewed as symbolic cannibalism; an unnerving deathly observance.

Some fundamentalist Christians even believe what is called The Rapture; the idea that Jesus will return a second time and believers will immediately move on to the afterlife in Heaven, while non-believers will be left behind to perish in the apocalypse.  "The majority of present-day Christians support the idea that war is regrettable but unavoidable..."  They believe wars and killing are just if it positively influences their future.  The Christian Bible also celebrates genocide.  This fascination with death and quickly entering the Christian heaven is depressing.  Many Christians incorrectly think atheists can't find a purpose for living, but since Christians obsess about death, it's curious how they can find positive fulfillment in their own life.

In Theocracy We Trust

The United States of America still has the words "In God We Trust" inscribed on its money and its pledge of allegiance still includes "under God."  This should concern all Americans.  It's been roughly a half-century since Congress adopted the motto and the pledge at the request of a majority.  Yet both changes go against the constitutional right to freedom of and freedom from religion.

Having a religious motto with God on U.S. currency essentially turns America into a theocracy.  It says that all Americans believe in God, the Christian god; because if one trusts in God, logically they must first believe in God.  If that isn't enough, in most states, the U.S. Pledge is required.  There are no state or federal laws prohibiting the U.S. Pledge.  Texas public school students, for example, are required to recite the U.S. and Texas Pledges, both of which include "under God," even though public schools are government entities.  Other examples of Christianizing that could lead to tyranny can also be seen in the placement of crosses and the Biblical ten commandments on public government property.  This is not the separation of church and state as Thomas Jefferson intended.

The Establishment Clause within the first amendment in the Constitution states that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion."  U.S. currency is legal tender, which is why it's concerning to see "God" on it.  Regardless of recent efforts by Dr. Michael Newdow and the Freedom From Religion Foundation to have the motto removed, federal judges continue to deny atheists their first amendment rights.  Supposedly, the Establishment Clause doesn't apply to atheists, according to the ruling on the Newdow case.  That couldn't be further from the truth.

If people are allowed to believe whatever religion they desire, then atheists should be able to freely disagree with theism.  America doesn't have blasphemy laws.  It prides itself as being a country of many cultures and ideas.  America's first amendment is suppose to cover people of all worldviews and protect all minorities from tyranny of the majority.  The inclusion of "God" on public property prevents equality for all citizens.  One could argue that if "Allah," "Krishna," or "Zeus" were in the place of "God," Christians would most likely feel like their rights were being threatened; but they still demand that Christian displays exist in the public domain. Non-Christian minorities are forced into deity worship, which goes against their worldview.  They have a right to be upset.  This coercion not only violates an atheist's right to free thought, but it also violates the Jehovah's Witnesses' desire not to swear allegiance to any god or salute any flag.  Whether Christians like it or not, having their god in the Pledge and on money is divisive, unconstitutional, and disrespectful; and in other words, it's anti-American. If one accepts the Pledge and U.S. legal tender as they are, then they don't believe in freedom of or from religion and become a non-compassionate trampler of minority rights.  Minorities, like atheists, Jehovah's Witnesses, Muslims, and others, are citizens and people just like Christians and should be able to enjoy their first amendment freedoms too.  America is not the land of the free if theocracy is allowed to flourish.

Do Rights Come From A God?

United States citizens know they have personal freedoms of religion, speech, gun ownership, speedy trials, and unwarranted searches and seizures.  These are the perks of being born American.  Yet, many do not know where these freedoms come from.  Conservatives like Rush Limbaugh broadcast that the Christian god is the giver of these rights and without God, there is no natural law.  However, those who believe this have not studied the history of natural rights and the United States Constitution.

People want to succeed in life in pursuit of happiness, so they cooperate with fellow humans to achieve mutual goals.  Tom Head writes, "We believe that rights exist because we care enough about people to respect their livelihood and their autonomy."  Humans are sentient empathetic creatures, different than most animals.  Animals are selfish and violent, yet most humans try to suppress their natural instincts in favor of cooperation and love.  It is because of this tendency toward compassion and cooperation that humans give each other rights.

American citizens receive their basic rights from the United States Bill of Rights as part of the United States Constitution.  Founder James Madison introduced these rights as amendments and the House of Representatives adopted them on August 21st, 1789.  These Constitutional rights came into effect through ratification on December 15th, 1791.  The Bill of Rights was influenced by other documents such as Virginia's Declaration of Rights of 1776, the Magna Carta written in 1215, and the English Bill of Rights of 1689.  These are all government documents.  Most famously, and perhaps also most confusingly, in the Declaration of Independence is the statement, "We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."  Nevermind that the "all men were created equal" part only extended to rich, white, land-owning men.  What does the term "Creator" mean here?  Founder Thomas Jefferson is on record having said that state delegates are an assembly of "demi-gods."  Could it be that "Creator" symbolizes the United States founders?  Perhaps a better statement would be that rights are endowed by our fellow citizens or humans.  In any case, without the government's creation of the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights, American citizens wouldn't have the guaranteed rights protected by these documents.

The question then becomes, why don't rights come from religious texts and by extension a deity?  Part of it is because rights aren't explicitly given in religious texts.  Sure, there are examples of love and compassion in the Bible, but it's not equal.  The Bible supports slavery and women as servants to men.  It rejects education and supports injustice since all future generations of innocent children were punished because Adam and Eve simply ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.  Plagues and genocide were frequently thrust upon civilizations so God must not care for human life as many think.  Amos 3:6 says that God is the source of all evil; "Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? Shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?" Religious texts aren't a model for social justice, because they encourage so many human injustices.  Since the Bible tells of a god who supports evil and violence, we shouldn't assume that such a being would guarantee human rights.

Surely, religions and their followers are a model for where rights come from?  In fact, they are not.  William T. Cavanaugh finds that religion is absolutist, divisive, irrational, and shows a tendency to promote violence.  He found that "Jehovah's Witnesses...were attacked, beaten, tarred, castrated, and imprisoned in the United States [a nation with a majority of Christians] in the 1940s because they believed that followers of Jesus Christ should not salute a flag."  In many Islamic countries like Syria and Pakistan, girls are not permitted to go to school and risk injury and death for attempting to go.  Religions don't support the social construct of basic human rights.

So if rights do not come from a god, how will they be guaranteed?  Some, like Glenn Beck, say the United States government can't be trusted to guarantee such rights.  Yet, it is because of the United States government that American citizens have rights.  Luckily, the American government was set up by its founders to include protections against changing the United States Constitution.  There are three branches of government, including the Judiciary, Executive, and Legislative, that enforce the Constitution and serve to keep the other branches in check.  As an added protection, every citizen is required to go to school and learn about United States history, including learning that they have rights.  The United States government also functions by implementing the will of its people through elections of government representatives.  If government representatives go against the will of the majority, they are replaced.  This system has worked well for 237 years.  This system of secular social contract that American citizens will treat each other equally and nicely is strictly an agreement between Americans.  However, it can change at any time if there is a government overthrow.  This is why Americans need to be vigilant against any threat, foreign and domestic.

Those who still think that their rights come from their god must ask themselves, if they lived in a different country, would they have what they consider natural rights?  Citizens of poorer countries don't have the same rights that United States citizens enjoy.  Many African nations cannot ensure the safety and well-being of their citizens.  Some of the most religious places on Earth, like the Middle East, are also centers of extreme violence. This is because rights are not granted and enforced by holy books.  They are granted and enforced by societies with strong and economically sound secular governments.  Rather than serving our own self-interests, caring and rational human beings realize that for the survival of the species it is in our best interest to look out for others.

Are We Intelligently Designed?

The short answer is yes and no.  Most people question how they came into being and what it means to exist.  Is there an intelligent designer?  If a supernatural creator put us here, what were his or her motivations?  What is our purpose for living?  Yet, what many people seem to ignore is the likelihood that nothing paved the way for the human species, other than millions of years of selective reproduction, or natural selection.

To understand these questions, we must first know how we each individually got here.  The birds and the bees discussion is quite handy.  Most caring parents at some point or another discuss this with their children at maturity.  Yet, it appears that when people question their existence, they don't think about the birds and the bees.  Each individual can determine whether or not their parents are intelligent, but the problem is that they take their mom and dad out of the equation completely and look toward a god for help in understanding their questions.

Human parents are the creators of baby humans and their parents were their creators.  The logical conclusion here is that there had to be a first human, the first common ancestor.  Surely, they were created by a god right?  No.  Evolution points to tranistions between species.  We have to look further into the past at the first single-celled organism as the common ancestor to all life on Earth.  Was that cell intelligently created?  Science tells us that the world and universe are constantly changing.  Particles enter and exit each other all of the time.  The first lifeform came into being because the particles needed to sustain life came together.

If we look at statistics, the likelihood of such particles coming together was astronomical given that Earth has water, a fluid substance.  We call this chance and people don't like that they were created by chance.  Chance makes it more difficult to determine self-purpose.  The question then becomes if we weren't created by a god, then what is our purpose for being here?  Humans are silly creatures.  We must know why and how everything works.  People also like having mentors help them through the difficult and winding path that is life.  They like thinking that there is a supernatural sky daddy watching over them.  They like wondering if this sky daddy gave them a pre-determined destiny.

The cool thing about not having a divine purpose is that we get to decide our own purpose.  Just as we have our parents to thank for our existence, we also have our parents to thank for our specific skills and talents, due to genetics.  Such skills and talents are often what people use to determine identity, friendships, love interests, and occupations.  Other than that, it is up to each person to figure out how they want to live, given that they live in a country that supports free will.