Scientific American Religion provides a sense of meaning and comfort for believers, and
studies show that such beliefs intensify during threatening situations.
Now research suggests that some people's faith in science may serve the
same role.
Miguel Farias and other researchers at the University of Oxford and
Yale University investigated whether it is belief in religion that is
beneficial or in fact any belief about the world's order and our place
in it. In two related experiments published in November 2013 in the Journal of Experimental Psychology,
the scientists developed a scale to measure belief in science—the view
that scientific inquiry offers a superior guide to reality. As expected,
belief in science was inversely correlated with religious beliefs. Next
the researchers assessed whether belief in science increased in
threatening situations.. [...]
“It is likely that some people use their ideas about science to make
sense of the world and for emotional compensation in difficult
situations in the same way that religious people use their supernatural
beliefs,” Farias says. “Our findings suggest that it may be belief
itself, regardless of its content, that helps people deal with adverse
situations.”
Quelle surprise! I guess better scientism than Scientology, but not by much.
ReplyDeleteScientism (as opposed to science) is very much a comforting idolatrous religion. Science is predictable and it can be manipulated just like heathen idols.
ReplyDeletePeople who work in science can also be dishonest, arrogant or foolish. For example, is it possible to have an allergy to a plastic or to a chemical? A Doctor once refused to listen to me, because one definition of allergy is that it must be a protein (biological product) that causes it. So there are bad scientists , whose work becomes sloppy due to closed mindedness. But the same pitfalls exist in religion.
DeleteThis seems like a tough pill to swallow. It doesn't follow logically. Belief in religion is a belief that bleak situations can improve for your sake while belief in science may further indicate that an issue is not only out of your control but more likely to resolve in your wort interest.
ReplyDeleteArgh! Who in his his right mind would want to use the ever-shifting sands of science as a basis for meaning & comfort?
ReplyDeleteWHICH science should make me happy? Last years, or this years?
For a list of scientific theory that mainstream scientific consensus once commonly accepted but now no longer considers the most complete description of reality, or simply false, see:
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superseded_scientific_theories
The same issue is noted in http://listverse.com/2009/01/19/10-debunked-scientific-beliefs-of-the-past/, but with with a positive spin.
The author claims that the "beauty" of science is that it supposedly "self corrects" its own distortions. Only problem is, that the correction may or may not come in our lifetime. Besides, who is to say that the "corrections" won't again be corrected?
Rabbi E-
ReplyDeleteI don't mean to kvetch, but that link is to a blurb ABOUT the article. If you want to read the actual article you have to pay $$$$$$.
In the future can you try to indicate that in your post title? (if it's not too difficult)
Thanx
http://discovermagazine.com/2013/nov/14-defense-free-will#.Uydsr84htWw
ReplyDeletefree-will, OCD, interesting
Interestingly, the only thing that has been found to help people with compulsive behaviors, is the 12 step program. which is basically an exercise in connecting with deep religious beliefs and experiences. So while in theory anything can be hypothesized, in practice religion is the thing that works and is actually administered.
ReplyDeleteI would be interested to hear RDE's views on this, not even sure if he recognizes OCD. But religion can also become a OCD - for example being OCD about kashrut.
DeleteEddie,
DeleteStudies have shown that proportionately there are slightly fewer religious people who suffer from OCD than non religious people. However, when a religious person suffers from OCD, it almost always comes out in his religious "observance".
source?
DeleteKT
Joel Rich
Not sure whether by "compulsive behaviors" you mean substance abuse or OCD.
ReplyDeleteInterestingly, cognitive behavioral therapy has pretty good support in the literature for both. Neither require religious beliefs. The 12 step approach has the benefit of being less expensive and more generally available, at least in the US, than competent therapy in the CBT universe.
The comments here are amazing in that they show how threatened religious/charedi people feel about science, scared to death that it might God forbid disprove one or any of their closely held religious or kabbalistic beliefs, to such an extant that they express denigration of all scientific pursuits and will go so far as to disbelieving any fact produced by science because "theories change all the time in science, don't belive anything they say!" I believe this is mostly the result of the kiruv (rehokim and kirovim) propaganda which tries to assert Judaism over science in a constant defensive posture. The kiruv people also feel deathly threatened by science as a "competing" force, and like most competing forces they have no idea how to deal with it except to trash it. How sad.
ReplyDeleteThat is a very good point. HARav Goren ztl pointed out that certain statements made by previous generations, regarding "touching the moon" or that it is a pure intelligence, were disproven by the moon landings in 1969. Now it is not really a big deal for most people whether the moon is a huge rock or if it is an intelligent being. And it also shouldn't be a big deal to know that the ancient (greek) view of 4 elements is outdated and that there are over 100 chemical elements. But because Rishonim held these conceptions, it somehow is viewed as "heretical" to question them.
DeleteI am referring to substance abuse(or other such compulsive behaviors). There are cases where CBT doesn't work. Sometimes the underlying cause of the disorder is that the person is מיואש and feels no purpose in his life. All common goals do not 'speak' to him. The prospect of those successes aren't sufficient to motivate him. He needs to find a more real meaning in his life. For this, the only antidote is religion, because that is really in fact the only true purpose in life.
ReplyDeleteThe reason that this is important for us all to understand, is that I believe that we are all this way, in a sense. Although we haven't taken to substance abuse or the like, we are wasting our lives to the degree that we are not fully utilizing our כחות הנפש, and not living up to our potential, and we while away our days with 'relative דברים של מה בכך' abuse. We need to find 'real' religion, which means a real connection with the רבונו של עולם and not just מצוות אנשים מלומדה.