I just watched "Contact" for the second time...

[arib]

... and I'm forced to wonder:

Why do so many scientists, as well as many religious figures, see science and religion as diametrically opposed to one another?

I mean, I'm a fairly religious person, and science is something that's very important to me. In some cases, scientific acheivements don't adversely challenge my faith, they help me define it.

I'm sure I have more to say, but I'm tired right now. SO, I'll open the discussion up to you, my friends. What do y'all think?

Comments

Re: seems pretty obvious to me

[mhw.livejournal.com]

All theories are provisional; they may be overturned or radically revised at any time by one more little experiment. Scientific "law" is no more than a theory that has withstood so many tests at so many times that even the canniest scientist wouldn't like to bet a brass farthing that they'll be alive on the day that a "law" is overturned. Yet such "laws" are overturned, or at least revised, often enough; Newtonian gravitation - your "Law of Gravity" from schooldays - won't deal with extremes of mass and velocity, so Relativity is necessary. The "Law of Causality" has received several excellent shocks in this last century. And this is all to the good, and the sloppy use of the term "Law" in the context of science is only that: a sloppy use - not an attempt to claim that a theory is Universal, Eternal and Unalterable.