Two astronomers. Separated by only 22 degrees, 58 minutes of latitude, 33 degrees, 29 minutes of longitude, yet seemingly worlds apart. Their common goal: figure out the very nature of the Universe and its womenfolk.

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

My New guiding principle

“Anything that we scientists can do to weaken the hold of religion should be done and may in the end be our greatest contribution to civilization.” (Nobel Laureate Steven Weinberg, 1977)

9 Comments:

Blogger Rob said...

Amen reverend. I mean scientist.

3:28 PM

 
Blogger jps said...

As long as you don't get rid of my Christmas:(

3:48 PM

 
Anonymous Anonymous said...

And in that vein, I've been pointed in this direction:

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/faithschools

It says the deadline has passed (15th Nov), but it still accepted my signature.

Also not very useful to Nil I guess, but ho-hum. Spread the word.

10:49 PM

 
Blogger Rob said...

What about the religion of funk? Is that ok?

10:58 PM

 
Blogger NPR said...

Hmmmm. Not sure about this one to be honest.

There is a (reasonably well-known) theory that suggests, if a race becomes sufficiently advanced, it will be able to essentially create its own Big Bang and consequently its own Universe. Is this what science should aspire to??

Perhaps, "Anything that we scientists can do to weaken the hold of religion should be done and may in the end be our greatest contribution to civilization - as long as science itself does not become the new religion"??

Discuss!!

12:46 AM

 
Blogger Rob said...

Surely: science, by its very definition, cannot become a religion?

9:42 AM

 
Anonymous Anonymous said...

see that's the scientist's blindspot- science can be pursued as dogmatically as anything else. richard dawkins, anyone?

12:44 PM

 
Blogger Rob said...

You could question whether Dawkins' crusade remains entirely scientific - I have my own opnions - but that's not the point.

"Dogmatically" would imply assertion based on at best unproven, at worst unfounded, principles. That conflicts fundamentally with the scientific principle.

1:25 PM

 
Blogger I_am_nil said...

The contribution science can and does make is that it proves that the lies that religion tells us are exactly that - lies. So-called "miracles", "prophecies", "premonitions", and the "divine plan" are nothing but a bunch of hocus pocus cooked up to convince people to hate the other. Science can reasonably proove that all of the dogma associated with these magicians (i.e "priests") should be discarded in favor of common sense.

11:30 AM

 

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