Short and sweet today. It blows my mind how many science folk think that to be a REAL scientist you have to be an atheist. (While this is from my experience the minority, it is still a vocal minority.) I appreciate that some who espouse this view have come to an atheistic position via in-depth study and logical reasoning. I think that some do this by taking reductionistic scientific materialism to the logical extreme and thus come to the conclusion (at this extreme) that belief in God is impossible. If it is impossible, then clearly you can’t be a scientist and hold this belief, with the assumption that all will take it to the logical extreme and that this is, of course, valid. I get why they think that way.
But what most annoys me about this vocal minority is that it is apparent that a number of them didn’t do the thinking and reasoning for themselves. Instead, it’s become ‘cool’ or it gets you in the ‘in-crowd’ to shout out that real scientists can’t believe in God. I have worked in labs ranging from small ma and pa shop types to corporate beasts run by Nobel Prize winners. None of the lab heads has been to my knowledge an atheist. Perhaps I’m wrong and they are. The point is that it doesn’t matter.
For Francis Collins to go from a real scientist to not because he shares his Christian beliefs is ridiculous. If scientists are afraid that he will “use his belief” in negative ways as NIH head, fine, say that. (I don’t agree but that’s beside the point.) But to say that he is now no longer a REAL scientist is, to me, ignorant and reeks of grasping at straws to defend an atheist position. There are other better ways to defend atheism. Use one of them instead.
We don’t use faith and beliefs to monitor the abilities or quality of scientists. Degrees, peer-reviewed publications, promotions, awards, etc., is how we do it.
I agree. I know some people who profess to be atheists, and I get the feeling they just chose to be atheists because they think doing so makes them look smart. I respect those people who did a lot of thinking before coming to their atheistic positions, but if the only reasoning they have behind their belief in atheism is just “I liked reading the God Delusion”, then they really haven’t thought these things through at all.
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I haven’t read that book but I have heard from theists and atheists alike that it’s not good. It would be like me writing a book on pottery or something like that. Like I said, I think there are obviously strong arguments for atheism, but some of the tactics of the new atheists just get in the way of there otherwise solid defense. The real scientist thing mentioned above really set me off. Of course, theists (of which I’m a member) have been prone to some poor tactics and arguments as well. I try my best to avoid it…
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