Maybe this post can be used as a reflection of how you deal with logic and faith (unlogic). After that, let people know of what you think. Just see how you react to this post.If you're very religious people (almost fanatic) then I guess your reaction will be very different to those who think more logical in response to various occurrence in these universe or even to your daily life. Take an example on a plane crash. Logical approach would yield the answer that lead to "human error" or "engine failure" and then find ideas to fix it. Religious approach will yield the answer that lead to "God's will (fate)". Or... perhaps you are in between them which it called moderate.
Can you compare or even combine the two of the flowchart above? If you can, then I will say you are being in best efforts. Why? Because... even sophisticated computer was run based on the combination of two signals namely positive and negative. What distinguishes human from robot is a human have the ability to trust in things beyond logic which it called instinct / beliefs / feelings. What distinguishes human from animal is a human have the ability to think logically to overcome the wild instinct / beliefs / feelings.
That is why the "Yin and Yang" symbol came from and was intended by the creator of the symbol. Never ignore both positive and negative. Never ignore both daylight and night. Never ignore that you have brain and feelings. Just combine both of them in one unity in your soul and body, and I call it the perfect combination ever. This post does not intend to steer you to certain beliefs, but only to stimulate your mind to reach the equilibrium degree. How according to you?
Additional update on September 28, 2023.
Scientifically, the human brain is said to have 2 main parts, namely the left and right brain. One deals with logic, the other deals with instinct / feelings / beliefs / consciousness / love, but both are in one unity. That means the Almighty (the Owner of the soul) has given you the most valuable treasure, so that you can deal with the mortal world, distinguishing between good and bad. What else do you want? Still confused? Please read these good wishes.
As an R&D professional, I will add a few variations based on experience to the Science chart. First, between "Get Idea" and "Perform Experiment", more than 99% of the time there is a break because of the inability to perform the experiment. How many people do you know who repeated the big bang in their back yard?! Then the "Perform Experiment" also has a huge failure rate as anyone in a college chemistry lab knows, but they are given well designed experiments to repeat using adequate equipment. In general 99% of the experiments also result in anomalies of some sort, whether it is a poorly designed experiment that gives something useless, or perhaps the data is too complex to digest, or something isn't right, or ... Sometimes a bad experiment accidentally gives a result that is similar to the theory, which can either be purely accidental or deliberate ... ! A recent example of this is here:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,955142,00.html
There are also a horde of other potential problems. The theory may have numerous facets of which only one or two are amenable to experiments, leading to unwarranted confidence. The end result is not nearly so neat as the chart on the left implies!
Harold Kroto, who shared the 1996 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, talks about scientific uncertainty in the August 28 edition of Science News:
ReplyDelete"I have a four-out-of-five rule for scientific method. Here it is: If you make an observation, develop a theory you think can explain it. Then design some further experiments to test the validity of that theory. If four observations out of five fit, the theory is almost, and I stress almost, certainly right. If only one out of five fits, the theory is almost, almost certainly wrong. We can never say it was wrong. But we can say it’s almost certainly wrong. We must leave the way open for that element of doubt...."
That's the problem with talking about global warming...the consensus of scientists is that it is happening and the effects may be severe. But they can't predict with certainty exactly what will happen.
I personally don't think intuition and logic are at odds. In solving creative problems one always generates new ideas using intuition. Then if one is sensible one checks those ideas against facts.
I wrote a long comment but it has disappeared!
ReplyDeleteA tantalizing post and a very useful comment by Looney. It's great to combine science and faith. It's great as well to use one's irrational intuition, imagination and creativity to bring about change. As long as one recognizes that faith, intuition, imagination are not necessarily based on facts.
ReplyDeleteHumans do indeed have the 'ability' "to trust in things beyond logic which it called instinct / beliefs / feelings". But I would like to add that unfortunately it sometimes also means that humans trust myths, Fata Morganas and even self deception are facts.
Man I’m impressed with this informative blog, and in fact you have a genius mind. keep up the good work.
ReplyDeletethanks for the post.
@ Looney,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link to a very interesting story. Really a shameful fraud to science.
@ Cheerful Monk,
That is shows either science or religion are same, complex.
About global warming ... I follow the consensus of scientists as well as the religious consensus who said it's a sign that doomsday will come. I think both of them has shouted the good thing to encourages human to care about the environment, no matter whether the predictions are still vague than not doing anything. ;)
I don't know why your previous comment was automatically considered as spam by www.blogspot.com in my blog. Blogspot has made an improvement to its commenting system. I found your comment in spam moderation and immediately approved it as soon as I found it
@ Colson,
The ability to believe the myth is also an evidence that humans are different from robot and animal. What's interesting is how very religious people react to science to answer a classic question: Is God exists?
@ Stela James,
Thanks for your compliment. I really hope you are willing to join to our discussion.
Tikno, you never fail to amaze me. A philosopher yet! Great post. Hope to see more.
ReplyDeleteI think, on the Faith chart, they do not always strictly keep the idea forever. For instance, in the medieval times, when geocentricism was still the main idea of the solar system and when eventually Galileo Galilei rejected the idea by embracing Copernican theory of heliocentricism, the Roman Catholic church decried Galileo's works. But as our scientific instruments improved and the heliocentricism's physical proof became evident and the church eventually realised that there's no more room to keep geocentricism, they finally recognised heliocentricism.
ReplyDeleteOf course, they did not rewrite anything on the holy book but the best thing they could do was to let people do free interpretations on the ideas from the holy book to meet new physical evidence in modern sciences. Of course, occurrences like this above can take place at any religions not only at RC church.
@ Rummuser,
ReplyDeleteOh dear, you flatter me too much. I'm just an ordinary man who found a place to release my mind into digital world as it was written on the blog's header.
@ Yari NK,
Whether not rewrite anything can be said just keep the idea forever in the holy book? :)
Gosh, luckily science still can not prove scientifically that God exists. ha...ha...
Hi Tikno,
ReplyDeleteVery interesting post.
Have a nice day.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDelete@ H. Nizam,
ReplyDeleteThank you for stopping by.
@ Tomjay,
Sorry to remove your comments. I'm not interested on any affiliate marketing, except Google AdSense.
Thanks Tikno, A very important debate a good post and some quality comment. Science is superior, despite the criminal element (nice link Looney) because it asks questions and admits it's answers can be wrong. Religions however are based on wilful lies made by dishonest people who know they can get rich manipulating ordinary people, often on behalf of dictators who do NOT want a populace to respect honest enquiry - about anything.
ReplyDeleteCorfubob,
ReplyDeleteI can feel your mind is more inclined towards logical thinking (science). Why you are so skeptical against religion?
Common strawman. I expect red herrings and ad hominem to follow my posting, as this too is common.
ReplyDeleteWhile this arguement is understandable, it is flawed nonetheless.
I find it interesting that some people have put 'science' on a pedestal as if it were an infallible, omniscient deity in and of itself in whom they put their unwavering faith for all their answers.
The cardinal law of deductive reasoning is that when one has eliminated the impossible, that which remains – no matter how improbable (or unpopular) - must be true.
How then can one arrive at an informed, rational decision as to the truth of any matter if certain evidence is denied unprejudiced consideration? For if an individual has presupposed something to be impossible based on a priori biases, then the truth can never be determined by that person – even if all the supporting evidence in existence was placed before him.
Furthermore, an honest investigation requires that one does not merely read about a subject – even less so from those with (real, imagined or fabricated) axes to grind; rather, one should if possible, study the source material oneself.
Christians are sometimes castigated for being ‘anti-science’ if they deny unbiblical and pseudo-scientific theories such as Darwinian macro-evolution. They are told that they should adapt their thinking according to the scientific ‘facts’ of today.
Many of these very same kinds of people castigated those within the Church 400 years ago when they did abandon the Bible in favour of the science of its day, i.e. Ptolemaic cosmology, when joined with the Aristotelian Universities in rejecting the findings of Galileo.
The point is that ‘science’ (in modern times oft-established by opinions and prejudices of certain scientists) is as ever-changing as sand on the beach whilst the Word of God is as resolute as the bedrock that this same sand seeks to cover.
We would rather build our house on foundations that the test of time has proven to be solid and trustworthy than that which would be swept out from under us tomorrow. The blunt fact of reality is that truth doesn't change.
Not everything which is real can be quantified such as love, thoughts, numbers or even logic; therefore it is unreasonable to conclude that (alleged) absence of evidence is evidence of absence. Simply because we cannot directly perceive something does not necessarily negate the possibility that one can come to know of its existence.
(In any case, to say that one cannot know for sure is self-defeating as such a statement necessarily requires omnipotence for it to be true, just like outright denial.)
What is ‘science’ but ‘knowledge’ afterall? And if we are honest, we will admit that 99% of what we 'know' is actually faith in the accounts of others, either by spoken or written word, since we haven't personally verified those things ourselves.
True Biblical faith, however is not, as some claim, ‘blind’, but rather is trust based on a foundation which has over the centuries, even to this day, withstood the harshest scrutiny that man has subjected it to – the type of scrutiny that most of these same people would never apply to their own worldview lest they be forced to concede that it is they who, ironically, are living by blind belief.
Each and every one of us, thusly has faith. The question that remains is: which faith is best supported by the facts?
Hello The Whyman,
DeleteYour argument is understandable but also rather egocentric. Feel like you want to say that the argument (faith) that withstood the test of time for centuries can be believed as truth. What about the Hindu and Buddhist faith which has survived for centuries, even longer than Christianity. Would you like to also consider them passed the test of time?
Faith in God is not coming from my arguments nor your arguments but come naturally present in the hearts of every person. If you want to be honest, in the holy books of every well-known religion might have the verses that are not worthy to be disclosed. But luckily humans have the ability to sort out which is good, right?
The aim of this post is to prevent people become too fanatic because fanaticism is dangerous, intolerant. Similarly, people who are too fanatic to science (merely think logically) tend to allergic in trust beyond logic (without evidence) such as allergic to believe in God. For me, the best is living in balance and harmony, accepting both faith and science as part of human life for a better world. Why not?
It is important for religious leaders and persons to make sure that religion is used for overcome the problems of societies in the right direction, also for spreading love and care, and to remove hate and suspicion. That is far more important than debating which faith is best supported by the facts (like your question above). Will you stand with me?
If you have time, please read my other post with the aim to raise the awareness of brotherhood among human, no matter of what is his/her faith, skin color and background, at:
http://love-ely.blogspot.com/2009/08/aware-or-just-dream.html
thank you for visiting my blog. your blog is much more interesting. I like science discussions.
ReplyDeletethe science is comprised among scientists at certain time....
ReplyDeleteyesterday was true, but today could be confused....
Just stupid idea to compare between science and religion.... can't be compared at all.
You're right, Tanza.
DeleteThe purpose of this post is to stimulate awareness. This is like the analogy of a slider that can be moved horizontally to the left or right. On the left end is science, the right end is religion, and in the middle is moderate. If someone moves the slider to the left end, perhaps he/she is more inclined to atheism. If moved to the right end, perhaps he/she is more inclined to religious fanatic. If moved relatively in the middle, perhaps he/she is likely a moderate.
I don't know at which point you will move the slider.
It takes some time for me to understand your post....
ReplyDeletePlease read my response to Tanza Erlambang. That's the simplest version of the intention of this post.
DeleteWhen he grow up our religious thinking is shaped by our parents and elders.
ReplyDeleteIt is very difficult to apply logic at this stage.
Many people choose a religion they like when they grow up, or after feeling independent. Nevertheless, it's not easy in a family, society, or country that does not have religious freedom.
Delete