From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Sat Jul 14 2001 - 16:48:14 MDT
Samantha Atkins wrote:
>
> As I've written elsewhere, what I see as scientism is more of an
> anti-religion - especially in its aspect of reducing everything
> to simply matter and physics with little room for valuing or
> values much less for the sacred.
As one who sees everything as 'simply matter and physics', I can also
stated that I most certainly don't think that doing so eliminates value
or values or the sacredness of anything. This, I find, is a primary
fault of those who wax excessively about religion and spiritualism,
claiming that science is no better than another superstition. They
cannot imagine the possibility that the universe can be looked at in a
completely rational manner while simultaneously having a sense of awe
and wonder at it. They also have extreme difficulty imagining the
possibility that one could derive a set of values from objective
rational observation of the universe that is anything but a rather crass
and simplistic dog eat dog existence.
It is these cognitive failings in the religionists that I find most
troubling, and is what I meant earlier when I said they are lacking. I
take great umbrage at the assertion that I lack in a sense of
aesthetics, that I don't appreciate beauty or human spirit, just because
I choose to look at the world rationally rather than from a position of
superstition and supernaturalism. I don't need religion to be spiritual,
and I don't need supernatural phenomena to feel at one with the
universe.
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