Science vs. Religion: the inevitable battle? Examining the conflict thesis

A visual explanation by "What is" Media. We create simple explanatory videos for important and complex topics.

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Are Science and Religion in conflict?

Have you got the notion from pop-culture that science and religion are in constant conflict? Like two rival boxers vying for the title of heavy weight champ.

We're reminded about the Catholic Church's opposition to Galileo, the Scopes trial and more recently, the creation evolution debate or discussions around stem cell research.

It's called The conflict thesis, and holds that religion and science has and always will be in conflict throughout history, and it was made popular in the late 1800's, by John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White.

However, today much of the scholarship that the conflict thesis was first based on, is considered to be inaccurate. An example is the claim that people of the Middle Ages widely believed that the Earth was flat. That idea is still very common in popular culture. But this claim is mistaken, as historians today know "there was scarcely a Christian scholar of the Middle Ages who did not acknowledge that earth was a sphere and even knew its approximate circumference."

Regarding the model in itself, historical research indicates that religion has a much more complex and close relationship with science than the conflict thesis acknowledges.
Today historians know that many scientific developments, such as Kepler's laws were explicitly driven by religious ideas and organizations.

But one reason for the current appeal of the conflict thesis is the existence of ongoing debates that seem to follow a pattern of religion versus science, or religion versus what some claim to be social progress, where this supposed progress is linked in some way to science or technology. But hopefully, as time passes so will the misinformation, because to the nonpartisan both science and religion have important parts to play in our world. Science tells us how the world works and religion tells us why.

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Tags:

• science
• religion
• god
• atheist
• theist
• john
• william
• draper
• conflict
• thesis
• kepler's
• law
• inquisition
• technology
• christianity
• progress
• evolution
• creation

[funnyhead222]

you can tell this video is on the side of the christians because of how many negative votes it has.

[BarrioAztrologist89]

"religion tells us why" WTF???

NO, ACTUALLY IT DOESNT IT JUST CREATES A MYTH. SCIENCE DOESNT EITHER, BUT AT LEAST SCIENCE ADMITS IT DOESNT KNOW AND IT STILL WORKING ON IT.

[pacdaman15557]

@Schism704 Cool story bro, Can the next fairy tale be about dragons?

[Schism704]

@pacdaman15557 Have you actually read the new testament? He does nothing but correct incorrect teachings from the Old Testament, take the Jews views on "unclean" food, Jesus said nothing that enters a man is "unclean", only things leaving a man can be "unclean" like arrogence, lust, greed etc... He was only classed as a Jew by the people of that period because christianity didnt exist at that time, he didnt follow a lot of Jewish rules.

[pacdaman15557]

@Schism704 Jesus was Jewish and believed in the Old Testament. What your saying is you disagree with what your Messiah believed in?

[Schism704]

@pacdaman15557 No your incorrect, most modern christians agree with evolution and all scientific fact due to the lack of historical and scientific evidence supporting what is said in the OLD testament. The Genesis story is one of those examples, as science contradicts it, similarly the Jonah story (the 1 involving a man getting swallowed by a whale) was simply stolen from Greek mythology. Some parts of the old testament are verifiable, many other parts are not.

[pacdaman15557]

@Schism704 You know what makes you an animal? The fact you breath with the same kind of lungs as every other mammal. You have the same kind of processing organs (aka the brain/nervous system) as every other animal. Nothing in your mind makes you an animal because you are an animal whether you want to admit it or not. Evolution doesn't prove god exists because Christianity believed that nothing even eroded, let alone evolved.

[pacdaman15557]

@megaead69 No it can't. "Faith" means to believe in something without any proof what so ever. That is directly against all scientific teachings of today which is to prove everything. Eventually God will be either disproved or proven (most-likely the latter) and it won't be faith anymore regardless of the outcome.

[pacdaman15557]

Religion doesn't tell us why! God must be explained scientifically for them both to coexist and God is a supernatural figure then it can't be explained scientifically. Sorry you stupid Christians but religion doesn't explain why. Also if Christianity DID explain why what about all of the other religions? Are they just a load of shit and you are the one true answer? Because every religion says that.

[StudioOfDah]

I completely disagree. Science all the way, religion is just a fairy tale

[masterkeep]

@mzyzer19 As they said; they did teach this. The idea that they didn't was an invention in the 1800s in a "straw man" argument.

[sweetsweatyfeet]

Science contradicts literal biblical doctrine. If however the the scriptures are taken as metaphor OR (as common with many Christians) spun to make them say what the believer wants them to say then science doesn't conflict.