The Contradiction Between Religion And Science

While science aims to explain particular events and generalizations with the laws of nature, religion aims to explain the same things without being confined to the laws of nature. Religion seeks supernatural explanations to explain the phenomena that science cannot including global why questions, necessary beings, and why the laws of nature are so simple. The conversation between religion and science is often seen as a conflicting debate but Instead of dismissing science and religion as conflicting schools of thought, it is important to acknowledge that they are founded upon entirely different schools of thought. I believe that the problem lies within the extremist notions of religion and science that aim to establish their respective schools …show more content…
Sober’s definition of creationism “maintains that each species was separately created by an intelligent designer” whereas evolution asserts the validity that “mindless evolutionary process are responsible for complex adaptations”.(pg 69) The problem here is that creationism rejects the evolutionary theory which is based on scientific premises, on faithful grounds. When considering the fact that creationism “maintains that mindless evolutionary process are incapable of giving rise to complex adaptations”, it is clear that a conflict arises. From what we can observe, Darwin’s theory is widely accepted as the strongest scientific explanation for the origin of species, and to challenge that would require a stronger scientific explanation or a valid scientific counterexample. Creationism tries to disprove evolution by the erroneous use of the Second Law of Thermodynamics or the feeble dismissal of evolution as just a theory, meaning there is no guarantee of its proof. Science, however, is not a purely deductive type of reasoning. Theories are considered stronger or weaker not right or wrong. In conclusion, the fact that there is no guarantee to Darwin’s natural selection isn 't a sufficient counter argument for its scientific …show more content…
Although observation supports the evolutionary theory, science still cannot disprove the existence of God using observation because faith does not follow the same axioms that science does when forming arguments. Faith considers the possibility of supernatural explanations that cannot be explained with observation. Therefore, the only way that science can challenge religion is if it can prove things outside of our observable universe. Science, as defined by Elliot Sober, can only operate within the bounds of spatiotemporal existence. Assuming that this definition of science is accurate, it would be impossible for science to be able to assess supernatural events. It is at this point that science must claim ignorance and accept that there are things that cannot be explained based on scientific observation. To not concede to this, would give rise to the stricter belief of naturalism. I would argue that it is naturalism that is incompatible with religion rather than science. This is not to say that the primitive creationist argument we see so often today is compatible with science. My claim here is that the alternative hypothesis of intelligent design cannot be disproved by science, because intelligent design is founded on the basis of the scientific method. Furthermore, it is worth noting that a belief in intelligent design does not contradict evolution according to Sober (pg.69). In his