Why wasn't Gould's NOMA accepted?

[Person19960]

Hey IIDB. Twenty-plus years or so ago, here on this forum, ("here" haha), nearly everyone rejected NOMA, or the "non-overlapping magisteria" concept of religion and science not being in opposition at all, just separate subjects.

Stephen Jay Gould was known as an advocate of the NOMA argument, but in most of the Secular movement world, both Gould and NOMA were rejected.

Non-overlapping magisteria - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

An AI tells me some popes also liked the concept.

It seemed fine to me then and still does. How about all of you?

Links would be appreciated, top, thank you.

 

[Spacetime Inhabitant]

The problem with NOMA is that hypothetically it is possible but in practice much religion is opposed to science - on many topics - evolution, abortion, creation, etcetera.

 

[Person19960]

The problem with NOMA is that hypothetically it is possible but in practice much religion is opposed to science - on many topics - evolution, abortion, creation, etcetera.

But some religions are not opposed to these or anything in practice.

Isn't it dangerous to present "religion" as some sort of monolith, when it's not just hypothetically but demonstrably false to do so?

Isn't NOMA reasonable?

 

[bilby]

The problem with NOMA is that hypothetically it is possible but in practice much religion is opposed to science - on many topics - evolution, abortion, creation, etcetera.

But some religions are not opposed to these or anything in practice.

Isn't it dangerous to present "religion" as some sort of monolith, when it's not just hypothetically but demonstrably false to do so?

Isn't NOMA reasonable?

No, it's not.

Physics renders any supernatural interactions with the natural world detectable - indeed, at human scales (ie bigger than atoms but smaller than solar systems) any such interaction is easily detectable.

Yet we don't detect it.

Either all matter and energy interactions rule out human scale supernatursl phenomena of all kinds (divine intervention, an afterlife, prophetic visions, answered prayers, etc.), OR our entire model of physics is wildly and obviously wrong.

It isn't.

We checked.

 

[Person19960]

What would we detect about a matter of faith? Why would anyone try such a thing?

I don't understand. If it's supernatural then it can never possibly be natural.

Haha are people wasting money trying to prove the transcendent?

What a ridiculous thing to try!

Of course the supernatural can't be detected!! Hello, it's in the name of it! what a reply "We decided that matters of faith remain so" ohhh okay and perhaps dreams are all in our heads? Haha what isn't?

Was that really the reason why NOMA was rejected? Oh I wish.

 

[bilby]

I don't understand. If it's supernatural then it can never possibly be natural.

It's worse than that, Jim.

It can never possibly interact with the natural.

If I have a material brain and/or body, and an immaterial soul, then the former cannot in any way be influenced by (nor can it influence) the latter.

So "my" soul (or anyone else's; Or any gods, or any other thing not made up of particles and forces from the Standard Model) has, and can have, nothing whatsoever to do with me, because I am made of Standard Model particles and forces, and we know all of the ways those interact with anything at energies consistent with human existence.

Rendering the entire concept pointless and valueless.

Unless, of course, physics is completely wrong, and only appears to actually work by a massive and sustained series of wildly implausible good fortune.

There are certainly particles and forces that we don't know about yet. But to generate such particles either requires energy densities that humans cannot survive; Or has only galactic scale influences, and cannot affect a person without simultaneously affecting the entire planet and everyone on it.

 

[Jarhyn]

My take on it is this: in general, certain concepts of religion are "relatively compatible" with science, but this relative compatibility breaks down at the juncture of the condemnation of doubt despite the presence of such inaccuracy.

Academic thought is, generally, based on making structures of knowledge AND doubt such that the careful structure of the processes of academic doubt becomes constructive to the advancement of the knowledge.

As I'm fond of saying, this means that while faith can act as a starting point in the progress towards better knowledge, it does not at all serve other roles except to serve as a system to be regularly back-filled with the fruits of careful philosophy.

The result is that while a translation can be made between academia and religion, generally this is going to require the faith based thought to accept some pretty major adjustments to doctrine.

A good example of this, at least in my mind, is the mutation of "omnipotence" via the lessons learned from simulation theory. The fact is that "the ancients" did a passably good job of thinking about simulation theory, BUT without being able to get their hands on a well formed simulation to observe the overall structure of process, they were dead in the water on trying to complete the discussion. The result is such nonsensical ideas as an entity not only with side channel access to the state of a structure running an emulation, but with side channel access to itself without consideration of where they travel through to access said "side".

I agree that modern discussions of "spiritual" phenomena are also sorely in need of academic attention, but once such social phenomena get treatment by academia, it is our understanding of "spirituality" that is going to see the bigger shift, because most of the discussion on the subject was pre-scientific, and academia went on a bit of a tear in the era of Modernism, throwing out a bunch of ideas not because they were wrong, but rather because they were "passe".

*See my thread in "existence of gods".

 

[steve_bank]

I heard Gould speak here in Seattle in the 90s.

According to the principle of NOMA — “nonoverlapping magisteria” — science covers the empirical universe, while religion covers questions of moral meaning and ethical value. This principle was obeyed by both Pius XII and John Paul II. They both saw no conflict between Catholic faith and a theory of evolution.

There is no ethics or morality inherent in science, and if we apply morality to science it is science that produces nuclear weapons and weapons being used in Gaza.

The translator of the Koran I read dating around 1930 wrote science and religion cover different aspects of reality.

A 16th century Jewish philosopher Maimonides wrote when interpretation of scripture an science conflict, interpretation of scripture mist change.


A text I read on cosmology stared with a revue of the history of cosmology. Science always had to make room for the prevailing theologies. That was certainly the RCC. No separation church and science.

Our Evangelicals would never accept NOMA. Evolution obvious;y.


If you look at religion as a myth based moral philosophy then the OP can be re framed as no overlap of secular morality and ethics, and science.

 

[bilby]

Sure; But just as science is made less effective by the meddling of religious insanity, so are morality and ethics.

Morality has at least one thing in common with science - neither can benefit from religion.

 

[Spacetime Inhabitant]

I heard Gould speak here in Seattle in the 90s.

According to the principle of NOMA — “nonoverlapping magisteria” — science covers the empirical universe, while religion covers questions of moral meaning and ethical value. This principle was obeyed by both Pius XII and John Paul II. They both saw no conflict between Catholic faith and a theory of evolution.

There is no ethics or morality inherent in science, and if we apply morality to science it is science that produces nuclear weapons and weapons being used in Gaza.

The translator of the Koran I read dating around 1930 wrote science and religion cover different aspects of reality.

A 16th century Jewish philosopher Maimonides wrote when interpretation of scripture an science conflict, interpretation of scripture mist change.


A text I read on cosmology stared with a revue of the history of cosmology. Science always had to make room for the prevailing theologies. That was certainly the RCC. No separation church and science.

Our Evangelicals would never accept NOMA. Evolution obvious;y.


If you look at religion as a myth based moral philosophy then the OP can be re framed as no overlap of secular morality and ethics, and science.

Technically speaking it is not science that produces weapons, it creates the blueprint, it is industry that actually produces them. But regardless of that, it is religion that provides the motivation for using the weapons being used in Gaza and many other locations/times.

 

[steve_bank]

Science is a murky catch all contextual word.

In our modern cultural paradigm science pursues new things without regard for consequences.

Separating the pursuit of science as without morality and saying consequences are from what people do with scientific knowledge is a from of apologetics as used by theists.

It takes both engineers and scientists to build a nuclear bomb.

I worked for a Lockheed division in the 80s on weapons systems, the peak of the Cold War.

I worked on sensors for the Sidewinder air to air missile and an anti tank weapon. I watched a video of the anti tank weapon test. A pretty gruesome way to die in a tank.

I felt good about in the day in the context of what we were facing with the Soviets and Chinese. I still feel good about my small contribution. The mix of purpose, science, and invention was intoxicating. The pursuit of science can be intoxicating.

With Gaza if I were younger today I do not know how I would feel about working for a defense contractor.

 

[pood]

Science is a murky catch all contextual word.

In our modern cultural paradigm science pursues new things without regard for consequences.

Separating the pursuit of science as without morality and saying consequences are from what people do with scientific knowledge is a from of apologetics as used by theists.

It takes both engineers and scientists to build a nuclear bomb.

I worked for a Lockheed division in the 80s on weapons systems, the peak of the Cold War.

I worked on sensors for the Sidewinder air to air missile and an anti tank weapon. I watched a video of the anti tank weapon test. A pretty gruesome way to die in a tank.

I felt good about in the day in the context of what we were facing with the Soviets and Chinese. I still feel good about my small contribution. The mix of purpose, science, and invention was intoxicating. The pursuit of science can be intoxicating.

With Gaza if I were younger today I do not know how I would feel about working for a defense contractor.

The movie Oppenheimer brilliantly explores this theme. You can’t separate science from values. Science does not exist in some ethereal Platonic netherworld, it exists in the real world with real consequences.

 

[Jarhyn]

There is no ethics or morality inherent in science, and if we apply morality to science

I would argue this, in that if one accepts "science" to rather mean "all the things captured to the axioms of math through study and demonstrated isomorphism" then ethics and morality would specifically be subjects of such "scientific" study, and more specifically are the purview of game theory.

That some people involved in math and science disregard the usefulness of information yielded by other branches of academic thought than their specialization is common.

The further someone tends to get from their branch of specialization the more common this is.

In fact there are people who are advanced members among their peers with respect to for instance, neurosurgery, and yet the same persons may be seen advocating against even adjacent medical science with respects to masks in schools.

 

[Spacetime Inhabitant]

Science is a murky catch all contextual word.

In our modern cultural paradigm science pursues new things without regard for consequences.

Separating the pursuit of science as without morality and saying consequences are from what people do with scientific knowledge is a from of apologetics as used by theists.

It takes both engineers and scientists to build a nuclear bomb.

I worked for a Lockheed division in the 80s on weapons systems, the peak of the Cold War.

I worked on sensors for the Sidewinder air to air missile and an anti tank weapon. I watched a video of the anti tank weapon test. A pretty gruesome way to die in a tank.

I felt good about in the day in the context of what we were facing with the Soviets and Chinese. I still feel good about my small contribution. The mix of purpose, science, and invention was intoxicating. The pursuit of science can be intoxicating.

With Gaza if I were younger today I do not know how I would feel about working for a defense contractor.

But without politicians authorizing the money for the scientists and engineers to build the bombs they would not be able to do so, and in turn those politicians get their authority from the populace, so everyone is responsible, as certain philosophers and songs have pointed out.

 

[DBT]

Faith and science appear to be incompatible. Religious belief rests on faith, science examines, questions and tests....

 

[Person19960]

Faith and science appear to be incompatible. Religious belief rests on faith, science examines, questions and tests....

Agreed

That's why I asked, too.

 

[Wiploc]

Hey IIDB. Twenty-plus years or so ago, here on this forum, ("here" haha), nearly everyone rejected NOMA, or the "non-overlapping magisteria" concept of religion and science not being in opposition at all, just separate subjects.

Stephen Jay Gould was known as an advocate of the NOMA argument, but in most of the Secular movement world, both Gould and NOMA were rejected.

Non-overlapping magisteria - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

An AI tells me some popes also liked the concept.

It seemed fine to me then and still does. How about all of you?

Links would be appreciated, top, thank you.

What would be the magisterium of science? On what subject does science have authority?

Logic, right? And fair observations. Double checking. Peer review. How not to be fooled by your hopes and prejudices. Stuff like that.
Anything that helps us approach knowledge and avoid delusion. This is the stuff of science.

What, then, is the magisterium of religion?

Nothing. They've not no authority at all.

How does the Trinity work? How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? Who did Cane and Able breed with? How long were the six days of creation?

None of those questions can be answered authoritatively. Your guess is as good as mine, and mine is as good as the Pope's.

 

[Person19960]

So, they do not overlap, right? Yay!

 

[stanley]

Hey IIDB. Twenty-plus years or so ago, here on this forum, ("here" haha), nearly everyone rejected NOMA, or the "non-overlapping magisteria" concept of religion and science not being in opposition at all, just separate subjects.

Stephen Jay Gould was known as an advocate of the NOMA argument, but in most of the Secular movement world, both Gould and NOMA were rejected.

Non-overlapping magisteria - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

An AI tells me some popes also liked the concept.

It seemed fine to me then and still does. How about all of you?

Links would be appreciated, top, thank you.

I always and still do find NOMA highly dishonest in it's ignoring of the assumptions of fact that are essential to religious beliefs, and the emotional and therefore moral/"spiritual" consequences of facts that are inherent byproducts of science.

Plus there is the more general epistemological conflict that is inherent between faith and reason, and faith is essential to religion/theism and is the definitional anti-thesis of the evidence based reasoning that is essential to science. There is no logical dividing line where reason must end. Any conceivable thought is something to with reasoning is applicable, and always has conceivable alternatives that are logically incompatible with that idea. Thus, no idea can ever be accepted as true, without implicitly declaring alternatives untrue. Thus, the principle of reason always applies and any application of faith weakens and erodes that principle.

 

[bilby]

There are two ways to reach an understanding of reality: You can take a look at reality; or you can guess.

We call the results of these two approaches "science" and "faith", respectively.

One of the things we can show, through science, is that there are things (amongst the long list of stuff we don't know) that we cannot ever know.

For these unknowable things, any guess is as good as any other.

Gould's failure is to suggest both that science and faith are similarly useful, within their respective spheres (they are not), and that those things currently in the "faith" sphere cannot and should not be examined to bring them over to the "science" sphere (they can, and should).

The negative value of faith is further underscored by its tendency to dogma. Science is, of course, not immune to dogma; But in science, observed reality is the ultimate arbiter. In faith, the arbiter is a person whose guesses are no better than anyone else's, but who usually has a fancier hat.

Science is the study of everything it is possible to study; Faith can have the crumbs, but only until science obtains the tools to hoover up those crumbs. Science and faith are roughly equal in their importance and power, in the same way that the President of the USA is roughly equal in importance and power to the President of the High School chess club in Power Cable, Nebraska.