initial thoughts for the week

Larissa poses the question,

"Sociologists describe science as a 'human activity.' For some, science is nothing more than what scientists do. What do you think about this idea?"

I don't think I could ever see science as 'nothing more' than just a person's job. It's like you're writing them off, when really, everything happens for a reason (surely), and a scientist works in the hope that he or she will find answers, or better answers, to the worldly mysteries that remain unsolved.

Reading through the week's material, I can't help but agree with the idea that 'When you're at the cutting edge, you don't know which facts are the good ones (etc)'.

Also what springs to mind is that people will believe if it makes sense to them. And with everybody being subject to different influences.. of course there's going to be a variety of beliefs and belief systems.

I also like this statement in the readings-

"Notice that it only takes one observation to disprove a theory while 100 observations in favour do not prove a theory. They strengthen its believability but never prove it. Notice the fundamental asymmetry here."

It's curious how 'darkness' and negativity seem to bear more substance, more depth, and more weight, than 'lightness' and all things positive and happy. It's easy to wallow in self-pity and depression and it's also harder to break out of that negative cycle, but it's so easy for somebody to bring you down from a cloud of happiness. I find that a little odd, and also a little sad.

The week also provides an audio clip of Bob Russell:

"The only statements that can be meaningful are those which can be proven true or false by science. The problem with that is, that statement itself cannot be proven true or false by science. In fact, that statement has to be taken on faith."

It's nuts, but it's true. Or at least, I believe it to be true.. (argh, this is messing with my head! Hehe)

Continuing on with the week's lecture, and on the topic of 'How does Religion develop?',

"In primitive religions there are all kinds of fetishes, taboos, superstitions and sacrifices... For example the Mayans used to worship the rain god Chaak because rainfall was uncertain in their area. They used to perform human sacrifices by throwing young maidens into holes which developed in the ground called cenotes."

What gets to me is that humans used to sacrifice other humans to their gods, and by that I don't just mean the Mayans. I mean, if you think about it, and you assume that God created everything, least of all humans, would he really want his creation returned to him in a state of rigor mortis, or smoked on a fire, or diced up into lots of little pieces?

Surely not.

Which then brings up the topic of war, in a way. Because you have all these people killing each other to uphold their own beliefs and values, and from my understanding most of the big wars in history are religiously/politically driven, and taking the viewpoint of religion being the driver, nobody's God would want them to kill one of their own, would they? Even if they did have a different religious belief. If God really wanted people to have one faith, then wouldn't He have created us so that it wasn't possible for us to 'create' any other faiths for ourselves?

Apparently (according to my friend), there's a new religion emerging which seeks to combine all the major religions into one, and as a result they go through the religious rites of all the different religions... I couldn't help but be amazed, and also comment that it would take them all day to perform the rites for each religion being accepted into this new combination. I'm curious to find out more about this supposedly emerging belief system.