You’d think from the way that science tends to be reported in the mainstream media, that Professor Helsing von Frankenstein goes into the dungeon laboratory of his castle one morning, dons his white coat and, by 11:00 AM, working completely alone – discovers a way to kill all known germs, safely.
He gets his assistant, Igor, to set up a press conference at lunchtime, at which the professor emphasizes that the research raises more questions than it answers. By the 5 O’clock news he has won the Nobel prize and his magic nostrum will be available from the CDC next morning.
Well, as we all know, science doesn’t work like that.
Scientific research gets trapped in more box canyons than the Lone Ranger; does more U-turns than the average tourist driver; falls to certain death more often than Wile E Coyote and generally gets the wrong answer.
The problem is that we, the great unwashed public who won’t know the difference between a Levine tube and an entrenching tool are told, very often, and by people who ought to know better, that science is a one-way street of ever-advancing progress. It is allegedly a zero-sum game in which facts are accumulated and ignorance dispelled.
In reality, the more we discover, the more we realize we don’t know. Even worse, we don’t know WHAT we don’t know.
The answer is that those who are scientists, or who pretend to be scientists, cling to the mantle of a kind of religious authority. And as anyone who has tried to comment on the new secular religion has discovered, there is no such thing as criticism. There is only blasphemy.
Science is portrayed as one way street with no u-turns or detours needed.
Its THE one way path which continues to lead humanity forward in its quest for absolute and unassailable truth.
Significant errors or, — god forbid — scientists contradicting one another, is not discussed openly as this might undermine the faith of the public in it. Scientists are seen like “gods” not to be questioned or doubted. Only fools would do so. The fact that scientists debate and disagree frequently over how to interpret and explain data, and what to conclude etc is lost on the general public.
One of the hallmarks of religion is faith. And faith is the belief in something without there being evidence to support the belief.
Ah yes…such as the “quantum string” theory, the serious postulate of multiple universes, the existence of “black energy”, “dark matter” , origin of life from aggregates of organic molecules, the evolution of tremendous diversity and steadily increasing complexity of life from prokaryotic precursors in the Pre-Cambrian with NO remains of links gradual change whatsoever!
Science even has its own martyr— Galileo Galilei.
Certainly a good scientist but nothing on the level of a Newton or Einstein. But he is exalted on to the chopping block — the poster child for all that is wrong with religion and how science emerged in spite of the oppressive Catholic Church to lead us into enlightenment. There was a bit more to it than that, but that’s for another day.
WHAT!?! Equating science with religion? HERESY!
Well, here are a few principles that secular science and traditional religion agree;
Humans are Special
It is understandable that religion might place man in the center of the universe – but for science to do so is inexcusable. However, a great number of astrophysicists and cosmologists are eager to talk about how the universe conforms to the “anthropocentric principle”.
There is absolutely no scientific reason why human understanding – above that of slugs, dolphins and monkeys – should be wide enough to encompass the universe. Anthropocentrism – the assumption that humans take center-stage in the universe – is rife in the sciences, as it is in religion.
It Casts Out Heretics and Persecutes all Other Religions
Science, like God in the Old Testament, behaves jealously against any other religion. So science will say to its followers: “You shall have no other gods before me”.
If you have any doubts, try asking a group of scientists to join you in a prayer. From that moment on you’ll be called a theist-anti-scientist. A heretic. A miasma. An abomination. A not very nice person.
Science Reveres Its Own Saints
The ranks of science martyrdom may be thin, yet its members are revered as far greater scientists they actually were.
Take Galileo Galilei, for example, the patron saint of all scientists persecuted by religious orders. He actually contributed very little to science: most of his achievements were technical, such as tampering with telescopes. Heliocentricity was known since the 4th century BC.
Science Makes up Stories, (they call them theories), to Explain Our Origins
The Sumerians, the Babylonians, the Greeks, the Chinese, the Aztecs – all of them had/have creation myths, probably invented around a fire. All of them took their creation myths seriously. Now, of course, we have science to explain our origins.
You know what sciences latest version of this story is? In the beginning, there were giant membranes. These membranes touched each other, triggering something called the “Big Bang”.
Sure. And the planet Mars is inhabited by lizard people.
Well, so far this is enough to boggle your mind for today, (if you get too boggled you will get very dizzy and vomit). Tune in tomorrow, same time, same channel for the next exciting episode of “It’s Settled Science”.