Science - Spirituality in Dialogue

Article 145 of the Constitution of Guyana provides as follows: 145. (1) Except with his own consent, no person shall be hindered in the enjoyment of his freedom of conscience, and for the purposes of this article the said freedom includes freedom of thought and of religion, freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others, and both in public and in private, to manifest and propagate his religion or belief in worship, teaching, practice and observance.

Mixing medicine with religion may limit our potential

The existence of similarities among the deities and religious practices of the Indo-European peoples allows glimpses of a common Proto-Indo-European religion and mythology. This hypothetical religion would have been the ancestor of the majority of the religions of pre-Christian Europe, of the Indian religions, and of Zoroastrianism in Iran.

What is AskPhilosophers? This site puts the talents and knowledge of philosophers at the service of the general public. Send in a question that you think might be related to philosophy and we will do our best to respond to it. To date, there have been 1887 questions posted and 2493 responses.

The five biggest mysteries may be related: 1) The mystery of awareness 2) Is there life after death? 3) Does God exist? 4) Why does something exist instead of nothing? 5) Why are we here (and not somewhere else)?

It's a very strange paper. There is a core that is competently done; it's a review of the various functions of the mitochondrion, and 90% of it is useful, detailed stuff. But then… every once in a while, it just goes cockeyed and throws out these incredible non sequiturs, making bizarre assertions that are unjustified by the evidence. In addition, occasionally, often at the same time the weird stuff is being trotted out, the language decays into incoherent babble.

Nelson, a professor in the College of Biology and Agriculture, explained in his lecture titled "Evolution, Science, Religion: Overlaps and Boundaries," that neither faith, nor science alone can answer every inquiry.

"A New Voice Arising: A Pastoral Letter on Faith Engaging Science and Technology,"

Faith is not a matter of "clinging to ancient misconceptions." "Today one of God's most provocative voices is science."

The National Academy of Sciences, the nation's most eminent scientific organization, produced a book on the evidence supporting the theory of evolution (and arguing against the introduction of creationism or other religious alternatives in public school science classes) in 1984. It published another in 1999. This month, they produced a third, but with a twist, for it is intended specifically for the lay public. Further, it devotes a great deal of space to an explanation of the differences between science and religion, maintaining that the acceptance of evolution does not require abandoning belief in God.

Breaking down the firewall between science, religion

Around all matters of religion and theology also, there rages violent controversy. For while the majority declare that gods exist, some deny their existence. . . . And of those who maintain the existence of gods, some believe in the ancestral gods, others in such as are constructed in the Dogmatic systems--as Aristotle asserted that God is incorporeal and "the limit of heaven," the Stoics that he is a breath which permeates even things most foul, Epicurus that he is anthropomorphic, Xenophanes that he is an impassive sphere." (Outlines of Pyrrhonism, Book III, 218

To atone for our mistakes - wars, global warming, whatever - we subconsciously long for catastrophic punishment

Sextus Empiricus advises that we should suspend judgment about virtually all beliefs, that is, we should neither affirm any belief as true nor deny any belief as false. This view is known as Pyrrhonian skepticism, as distinguished from Academic skepticism, as practised by Carneades, which, according to Sextus, denies knowledge altogether. Sextus did not deny the possibility of knowledge. He criticizes the Academic skeptic's claim that nothing is knowable as being an affirmative belief. Instead, Sextus advocates simply giving up belief: that is, suspending judgment about whether or not anything is knowable.[2] Only by suspending judgment can we attain a state of ataraxia (roughly, 'peace of mind'). Sextus did not think such a general suspension of judgment to be impractical, since we may live without any beliefs, acting by habit.