philosophy essay on the relationship between religion and science

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The relationship between religion and science has always been a complicated, precarious and sensitive issue. Religion and science have the same goal - to seek truth and understanding to our own existence and surroundings. Modern scientific thought is based on systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment. Religious thought differs as it’s based upon reflection and spirituality and focuses on beliefs and values. This is contrary to science which focuses on factual knowledge and relies on empirical evidence.

The relationship between religion and science never used to be an issue for early philosophers as scientific explanation would work around the existence of a deity (generally). However in recent times we’ve seen various conflicts arising due to disagreements and even cases of religion holding back scientific progress. For example, in 1610, the Catholic Church banned Galileo’s works (specifically his studies on the Heliocentric model) and branded him as a heretic. Unfortunately today we still see the the long term effects of this decision as 1 in 5 Americans still believe that the Sun orbits the Earth (Study by Jon D. Miller of Northwestern University in 2005). Another fine example of dissension would be Charles Darwin and his work on The Origin Of Species (published 24 November 1859). He was hesitant to publish his work for decades as he feared religious persecution and knew that his theory would controversial as it essentially disproved the theory of Intelligent Design. Natural Selection is now accepted amongst the Catholic Church as God can still play the role as the omnipotent designer who set off the long process. As wonderful as this is we still find c...

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...gent cause. This term, ‘Intelligent design’, was first coined in the respect to Creationism in an American court case in 1987 (Specifically the Edwards v. Aguillard case about teaching intelligent design in schools). Many devotees of Intelligent design such as the Philosopher William Dembski and the biochemist Michael Behe believe that Intelligent design proposes a serious scientific challenge to evolution. Specifically Michael Behe looks at the processes of cells such as his example of the E. coli bacterium which propels itself with its own ‘flagellum’ (rotating tail). From there he expands by making the point that the flagellum needs to be complete to be of any use; this is where he coined the idea of the Irreducible complexity concept. Simply he states that the removal of any one of the parts from a complex system the whole system effectively ceases to function.

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