A Raging Fool

Vincent J. Curtis

15 Dec 2017

Mr. Peter Schneider, a Hamilton resident, had published an article harshly critical of another article and person.  That person was Rabbi Bernard Baskin, who had the temerity to uphold the view that religion and science were not inherently antagonistic to each other, but go hand-in-hand.  This view is upheld by Pope Benedict XVI, who observed that both science and religion employed reason.  Benedict made the same point in his famous lecture at Regensburg University in 2006. (covered elsewhere in this blog.)

Schneider maintains that religion has nothing to offer science.  He asserts that "it should be self-evident that man created the gods, not the other way around."  Schneider really goes over the top in the hyperbole of his attacks.  One telling extract runs as follows, "Not so with science.  The very recent confirmation that gravitation energy is equivalent to inertial energy is providing invaluable insights into understanding stellar evolution - i.e. WHERE WE CAME FROM.  No, religions have nothing to offer science; they are redundant."

After hubris comes nemesis.  Mr. Schneider's ignorance of philosophy is quite blatant.  He is arguing the position of scientism, though he doesn't understand that he is.  His point on the relationship between religion and science is especially egregious.  Religion obviously offers science nothing, or vice versa, because both offer what they have to human beings, not to each other.  Religion and science are products of human understanding, not independent things that are capable of interacting with each other.

Nevertheless, many people hold the view of scientism that valid knowledge can only come from science.  It is refuted briefly below:

RE: Leave this dogma in the dark it came from

Peter Schneider should stop shouting so loud.  Too many people can hear what a fool he is making of himself.

It is quite obvious that Mr. Schneider has never heard of natural theology; he has probably never heard of scientism, and has certainly never studied philosophy.  If he had he would realize that if something is ‘self-evident,’ it is.  If something should be self-evident, it isn’t and never can be.

In his condemnation religion of any kind, Mr. Schneider is advocating scientism, which holds that valid knowledge can only come from science.  Upon examination, scientism either reduces itself a triviality or is incoherent. That ‘valid knowledge can only come from science’ is a philosophical statement, not a scientific one, and so scientism to start with is incoherent.  Science assumes metaphysical concepts like cause and effect, and so must posit that something outside of science must produce valid knowledge if science is even to get started.  If scientism seeks refuge in holding that science is a branch of philosophy (i.e. natural philosophy), then it becomes trivial and incoherent in holding that other branches of philosophy, like natural theology, do not produce valid knowledge also, since both branches rely on the same set of metaphysical concepts and on reason.

Natural theology provides a rational basis for revealed theology, of which Judaism and Christianity are outstanding examples.  Pope Benedict XVI holds that religion and science are complementary and not mutually exclusive spheres, with their connection being reason and the same basic set of metaphysical concepts.  Both science and religion operate to the benefit of man in different spheres of his being, physical and spiritual.

It is quite true that religion formed the basis for terrible wars in the 17^th and 18^th centuries.  But the 20^th century saw even more terrible wars fought between allegedly scientific ideologies, scientific socialism (communism) and a kind of eugenics (Naziism and other fascisms).  Wars are political events, not religious or scientific ones, and religion and then science were used as masks in drives for political power.

Mr. Schneider’s incoherent rage merely proves how little research he has done on the subject.  For a guy who wants to 'leave this dogma (i.e. religion) in the dark it came from' Mr. Schneider seems very much in the dark himself.

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