[RickJ]

NO scientists say 40 billion. The Universe is only 13.7 billion years old, and the Earth is 4.6 billion years old.
excon

I, the admitted "right winger", agrees.

And I agree too that no reputable scientists say the earth is just 6000 years old.

[asking]

Since we have fresh blood in this thread now (yay!), can we clarify the question?

Obviously, science and religion do coexist in the world and do coexist in many people's minds.

In addition, there are definitely reputable scientists who are religious. The one I keep mentioning is Francis Collins who helped guide the Human Genome Project to completion.

From Wikipedia, for example:

Collins has described his parents as "only nominally Christian" and by graduate school he considered himself an atheist. However, dealing with dying patients led him to question his religious views, and he investigated various faiths. He became an evangelical Christian after observing the faith of his critically ill patients and reading Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis.[9]

In his 2006 book The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief, Collins considers scientific discoveries an "opportunity to worship." In his book Collins examines and subsequently rejects creationism and Intelligent Design. His own belief system is Theistic Evolution which he prefers to term BioLogos.

Francis Collins (geneticist) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

So, Shelesh, what do you mean by coexist-- beyond co-exisitng in the world and co-existing in a particular person's mind? We already know they CAN coexist that way. Please clarify what you are asking. Do you mean, SHOULD they coexist? Something else?

Thanks!

[Shelesh]

Correction:
Sorry guy, I missed the '.' in 40 billion and did not pay attention.. --- 4.0 billion

[Shelesh]

Since we have fresh blood in this thread now (yay!), can we clarify the question?

Obviously, science and religion do coexist in the world and do coexist in many people's minds.

In addition, there are definitely reputable scientists who are religious. The one I keep mentioning is Francis Collins who helped guide the Human Genome Project to completion.

From Wikipedia, for example:


Francis Collins (geneticist) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

So, Shelesh, what do you mean by coexist-- beyond co-exisitng in the world and co-existing in a particular person's mind? We already know they CAN coexist that way. Please clarify what you are asking. Do you mean, SHOULD they coexist? Something else?

Thanks!

A previous post stated that only a few percent of the scientists believed in God. So, this means that religion, somehow tends to close and limit the mind of man. It acts as a barrier to intellectual inquiry and observation. But their coexistence depend on the individual.. maybe, it depends how people interpret science and religion. Even if it is a few percent, it does exist.. Am not saying they should coexist but can they co-exist in the world of today.

[RickJ]

Correction:
sorry guy, i missed the '.' in 40 billion and did not pay attention.. --- 4.0 billion

No problem. 4-6 billion works for the purposes of this discussion :)

[firmbeliever]

I'll create a thread for a discussion on Christianity and Islam..

That may not be such a good idea, as it just may very well turn into an argument on who's right.
Obviously each of us believe in our faiths with all our hearts and will not like to see it belittled,but if we could put out our beliefs as information and not have it slammed down,that will be nice as I too would like to read more on the Christian belief in such things.

[RickJ]

That may not be such a good idea, as it just may very well turn into an argument on who's right.
Obviously each of us believe in our faiths with all our hearts and will not like to see it belittled,but if we could put out our beliefs as information and not have it slammed down,that will be nice as I too would like to read more on the Christian belief in such things.

I agree. There's already umpteen discussions/debates over this very thing - already here on the site.

... see, for example, the Similar Threads listed at the bottom of this page...

[asking]

A previous post stated that only a few percent of the scientists believed in God. So, this means that religion, somehow tends to close and limit the mind of man. It acts as a barrier to intellectual inquiry and observation. But their coexistence depend on the individual..maybe, it depends how people interpret science and religion. Even if it is a few percent, it does exist.. Am not saying they should coexist but can they co-exist in the world of today.

Shelesh, Thanks.

To clarify and sum up

... Belief in God
Americans generally:... 73%
Scientists generally:... 30%
NAS* scientists:... 7%
NAS biologists:... 5%

*National Academy of Sciences (a prestigious organization of the top ranking scientists)

Here's an interesting interview with biologist Francis Collins on this exact subject.
He is a Christian AND a member of the National Academy.
Voices - Francis Collins - National Geographic Magazine

(I might have mentioned that a lot of good biologists ride motorcycles. :) )

[RickJ]

Beware the source on statistics like that.

Here's a statistic worth a chin scratching:
99.73% of Statistics are not accurate.

:)

I'd be curious what the statistics compiled by a Theistic organization would show.

... and my guess is that the truth would be somewhere between the two.

[asking]

It is easy to dismiss statistics simply because they ARE statistics. But that doesn't make them false.

I have every reason to think these are all accurate, possibly excepting the first one -- 73% for Americans generally, which I picked up from Wikipedia's entry on the demographics of atheism. Another page at Wikipedia gives the figure 78%, which I'm prepared to accept. If you have a neutral source for this figure, possibly a government or academic source, please contribute it. But the numbers on scientists are from well-conducted surveys and I feel comfortable with the numbers.

I provided the source for these statistics earlier. These were surveys conducted by a historian at the University of Georgia and published in the scientific journal Nature.

You can see more details than I have provided by reading this article originally published in Nature and reproduced at this website. (I cannot show it to you in Nature because it costs $300 to $400 a year to subscribe... )

Nature, "Leading scientists still reject God"  July 23, 1998

[RickJ]

I am 99% sure :) that if asked a different way, 96% of Americans would say that they believe in "God".

[asking]

I obviously can't persuade you, but you should go and read about the rate of belief in the United States. The consensus from various polls is that it's lower than you appear to think and, also, that atheism has become somewhat more widespread and acceptable over the last 10 to 15 years.

By the way, to be clear, all the people not listed as believing in God are not atheists. Many are agnostics who just don't care one way or the other, or don't think about religion much. These are people who may become religious again at some point, or may become atheists, or may never give the matter any attention.

But please do your own reading before taking a strong position on any numbers.

[Capuchin]

I obviously can't persuade you, but you should go and read about the rate of belief in the United States. The consensus from various polls is that it's lower than you appear to think and, also, that atheism has become somewhat more widespread and acceptable over the last 10 to 15 years.

By the way, to be clear, all the people not listed as believing in God are not atheists. Many are agnostics who just don't care one way or the other, or don't think about religion much. These are people who may become religious again at some point, or may become atheists, or may never give the matter any attention.

But please do your own reading before taking a strong position on any numbers.

I agree, 96% is way too high, even for America.

[excon]

A previous post stated that only a few percent of the scientists believed in God. So, this means that religion, somehow tends to close and limit the mind of man. It acts as a barrier to intellectual inquiry and observation.

Hello S:

Religion and the Bible aren't the same thing. Most Christians don't take the Bible literally, so they have no problem with the hard numbers science comes up with. Their religion doesn't close their minds.

Others, however, take what the Bible says literally. Therefore, they couldn't go along with ANY of those scientific numbers... THEIR minds are closed - no matter HOW enlightened they try to sound.

excon

[luckycharm1978]

The thing I have never understood is the creationist believe in religion and only religion god made this god made that no if ands or buts about it.
But then you take the scientific route evolutionist who believe that we evolved they believe that there is a higher power that helped everything come into existence.
If religion and science are going to coexist, religious freaks need to realize that science plays a part in everything but also their god plays a part in it too.

[NeedKarma]

But then you take the scientific route evolutionist who believe that we evolved they believe that there is a higher power that helped everything come into existence.

Actually that is incorrect. An evolutionist does not posit on how "everything come into existence".

[Tj3]

Hello again:
Actually, NO scientists say 40 billion. The Universe is only 13.7 billion years old, and the Earth is 4.6 billion years old. We know that, because of carbon 14 dating. No, really, we KNOW that! We're not making it up!

C14 has a half-life of about 5000 years, therefore any attempt to use it to date something to the billions of years would be astronomically inaccurate.

I submit to you, that any person who says they believe in science, but that the earth is only 6,000 years old, doesn't know how silly he sounds.

I may sound silly to someone who tries to use C14 to date something billions of years old, but that is okay with me.

[Tj3]

Beware the source on statistics like that.

Here's a statistic worth a chin scratching:
99.73% of Statistics are not accurate.

:)

I'd be curious what the statistics compiled by a Theistic organization would show.

...and my guess is that the truth would be somewhere between the two.

Before you put a stake in the ground on such numbers, make sure you also know what the actual question that was asked.

[Tj3]

Actually that is incorrect. An evolutionist does not posit on how "everything come into existence".

Agreed. I have yet to find one who can provide a feasible answer to that question.

[Capuchin]

C14 has a half-life of about 5000 years, therefore any attempt to use it to date something to the billions of years would be astronomically inaccurate.



I may sound silly to someone who tries to use C14 to date something billions of years old, but that is okay with me.

You're right, Carbon 14 is not used to date anything much older than 60,000 years (~10 half lives). Uranium-lead dating, Potassium-argon dating, or some other similar process is used. These processes have half lives on the order of many billions of years. excon still has a point, though, even if his facts were a little wrong. (C14 still shows that the Earth is NOT 6000 years old... )