If you think about it, religion, science, philosophy are all quite similar. They all go about trying to answer fundamental questions about existence…such as why are we here. They just have different ways of going about it.
Science deals with observable phenomena, but any logician or philosopher can tell you that science is fallible. It is merely a method of making predictions based on observation. Science can never deliver certainty, only very high probabilities. This is because we can never observe the future, only the past, and predict accordingly.
Philosophy at one point dealt with many of the same things as science, but now it is mainly the realm of asking questions about the world that science cannot answer. Science can tell us how, but not why, or what we should therefore do.
Logic, unlike science, can deliver certainties, and in this respect is superior to science. It often relies upon observation to form the assumptions that make its premises, but if the premises are true, and the conclusion follows, the conclusion is certain.
Religion goes on to answer questions that none of the others can answer. Logic dictates that it is impossible to prove or disprove the existence of God, seeing as he is by definition omnipotent. Science can tell us a lot about matter, but not where the matter came from. Philosophy can tell us the best way to live, but rarely can come up with any convincing reason to do so, apart from religion (i.e. how can murder be wrong if animals kill each other all the time?)
Finally, I would like to say that though some terrible things have been done in the name of religion, these are usually the work of extremists apart from the main-line. Al Queda is not a good representation of Islam and the Westboro Baptist Church is not a good representation of Christianity. There has been a lot of good done by religion over the years, and I would say with certainty, more good than bad. At the very least, they are an improvement over atheism in practice. Atheist communist/socialist countries have killed far more people in ”peace” than all religious wars put together.
|