We see this every election cycle, where individual politicians vying for power rally the greater population to argue and fight their battles on their behalf! When all the while, in most cases neither ‘side’ (referring to the general public) has a profound understanding of whatever it is they think they are arguing about,
or what ideas they think are being promoted. Whenever there are controversies on the scale of an entire culture or country, or planet, there is ALWAYS an institution, or set of opposing institutions, instigating the conflict.
For example, there is a popular conception that a large portion of the United States is ‘anti-science’… that we live in a largely anti-intellectual culture.
Though outwardly this may seem the case, it is only a symptom of the deeper (true) cause. The true causes --the prime motivator behind this external societal dissonance -- are the institutions of politics, religion, academia and media which have co-opted the general population to further various agendas – agendas that have nothing to do with truth or intelligent ways of thinking.
If the nation were truly anti science, we should expect to find those who believe computers are 'magic;' cell phones to be some kind of voodoo... yet almost without exception, people understand these are engineered devices operating upon the advanced principles of scientific thought. No one denies the existence of DNA - even though not a single human eye has ever witnessed the molecule. An anti science population would reject these ideas. Rather, we are anti 'inconvenient truths' (Truths that require us to change our ways, or accept unpleasant things about ourselves); our individual biases can be exploited by special interests in the quest for power and profit.
Thus, our culture is not so much “anti-science” as we are susceptible to the undue influence of interests who have sought to promote anti-intellectual ideas – or, ideas that would be deemed ridiculous by a populace capable of exercising their natural intellect. And, again, all this for the sole purpose of preserving the institution. Irrespective of the truth, we are vulnerable to trusting the messenger over the message.
The trouble is compounded because as an institution grows, its power grows as well – but also its potential to act in a way biased in favor of itself even at the expense of reason, liberty, ethics, etc.
Yet, we are not passive and defenseless victims in this institutional war. By surrendering our allegiances to unsubstantiated ideas or assertions -- we form an immunity from such mischief. To hold an allegiance to an idea irrespective of its validity is the source of all conflict. This cancer is called bias. Bias simply refers to a conflict of interest. If you profit from the ideas that (x is true); you are naturally resistant to all evidence which suggests (x is not true); or even, x may possibly not be the whole, complete truth (Japan nuclear studies). This type of ignorance is called willful ignorance – because it is not the lack of intelligence which prevents true understanding, but instead the DESIRE that a potentially truthful notion be rejected in order to protect the world we associate with security and stability – the world that makes sense to us and keeps us feeling ‘safe.’
Usual Suspects
As mentioned, the primary institutions are: The Church, the State and Academia. The ideals pertaining to them are Deity (Creative powers), Liberty and Reason. The Church is an organization that deals with religious practices, codes of ethics, and spiritual/metaphysical beliefs or identity. The state (or nation) is the system which establishes the lawful conduct of citizens and handles affairs such as national defense, public works and elective projects too large for individual persons or companies (like space exploration). Academics (sometimes funded by the state, sometimes private), has to do with the belief systems and technical skills acquired by new generations and therefore affects the whole.
Game Changer: Origin of a Lie
Of every possible topic of consideration or belief, “where we come from” is the most powerful – it is our origin. It defines reality.
Consequently, in modern culture we continue to witness the competition among groups and special interests all seeking to define the “official story” of our beginnings. Materialist belief systems (which possess all of the negative qualities often attributed to religious thought, as reflected in western academic literature) insist life and the universe are the products of accidental causes, that the universe is mechanistic and largely deterministic. Materialism simply means the belief that the world can be explained adequately at the material level, and that no ‘unseen’ forces or creative (intelligent) powers are needed. *A manifestly false worldview. The church has various narratives, all of which metaphorically describe creation as a creative act.
Because the two rationales --accident vs willful intelligent act-- are so distinct, we are told that science and religion are “opposites” – that somehow they are inherently at odds with one another. We are made to believe that religion is a collection of fairly tales which were useful before valiant ‘science’ came and rescued us, with reason, logic, and empirical observation.
This, however, does not reflect the relationship between science and religion. Nor does this account reflect the accurate history of the relations between Academic and Church institutions. * The concept of “science vs. religion” is actually quite recent. Up until the 19th century, it was “common sense” accepted as a basic fact that some creative agency or intelligence is required to account for what we see in the natural world. Solar systems, cosmo-logical structures, as well as bio-logical systems. [See also: Science of the Ancients] The word, logical when used in cosmology or biology, refers to the fact that there is a level of order in these systems patterned after or that reflect meaning or purpose; more than strictly physical.
The word ‘logical’ stems from logos: logos means ‘the divine word’; So, bio-logical means an order of life acting according to the precepts of Divine mind or will. This is more than slightly ironic, but not accidental – as we will discuss in the next section, word origins, and patterns in our language use reveal
a lot about the ideas we hold.
Regarding the so-called dichotomy of science and religion, to begin with, there is no actual consensus in the religious or scientific communities on any issue whatsoever, most certainly not where we come from and how we came to be. Pause for a moment and ask yourself what it means to call "science" and "religion" opposites when these labels refer to groups with no uniform belief system, and which possess wildly differing views on major topics? What it means is nonsense. Such comparisons are not only without merit, they are logically incoherent. Logically, two variables with undetermined values cannot be compared. It is asking to compare (x) and (y) when neither have a fixed value. Or where either has an array of values with no common principle.
As a first principle let us recognize the following: the dichotomy of science and religion is false; it does not represent reality. False dichotomies blind us to ourselves and to each other.
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