Religion & Ethics: Content from Across the ABC




Date/Time 29 May 2016 2:46:14pm
Theology, [or anything else], does not need to save science from naturalism. Methodological naturalism is about taking natural phenomena and building mathematical or verbal descriptive models and then testing the emergent predictions of those models with evidence from further observations and experiments. If models pass the tests, then they are tentatively accepted as working theories, subject always to any further ammendment as/when any new data suggests. As such it is not about truth, purpose or even reality. The epistomology of science is both rigourous and free of metaphysics.
Religions on the other hand, have no methodology, are loaded with metaphysics, and claim absolute truths. Science is not anti-religion or atheistic, it is just a process and body of knowledge. Indeed, many religious people can do good science if they stick to methodological naturalism. Anyone can. The reverse is not true. Religious people who deny scientific facts do not have any epistomological support for their claims, nor evidence. If one wanted to do "methodological supernaturalism" I am sure people would use it if it worked. It does not.