a small reflection

Reading the discussion board, Claire has said-

"When reading through the lecture you were, in a sense given the answer to a question before being given the question itself. By this I mean, in defining a gestalt you realise which of the pictures you can see.

...[An] example of what im trying to illustrate comes from the 'Magic Eye' series of books. Focusing in and out trying to find a hidden picture? I always found that as soon as i looked up the answers in the back I could see a picture where I thought there was none.

And so, even as a religious person I find myself asking is there a picture there or did I get the answers from a 'book' and then see the picture..."

For me, this poses a small but interesting thought.. to me this seems to suggest that science and religion are virtually the same in concept, in that both science and religion provide two different explanations for something we previously didn't understand or had limited knowledge of. So if a different group of people had written the holy texts of the religions today, then we would have a completely different set of beliefs. Imagine if the Pastafarians (of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster) had written today's equivalent of the Holy Bible. Instead of Jesus being the Saviour, we might be worshipping aliens or something totally different.

Crazy!

But then Claire also goes on to say,

"For science to progress (as in the Cell Theory example) there is no 'back of book' answer by which to check your progress in the same way that Christianity for example makes use of the Bible. Religion embodies constantly checking your answers while science seeks answers?"

I'm not so sure about that final sentence. To me it seems like it would be the other way around, that science continually redefines the answers which we hold as truths or facts, whereas religion is all about trying to understand the questions created by the curiosity of the concept of life itself.

This course is rather interesting - it makes me think that science and religion are so alike, and yet their content is so different, in some ways. In any case, the discussion boards are confusing but an interesting read. Makes me want to do so much more reading (in books etc) about religion!