Off Topic — HabitableZone

Off Topic » in reply to Note that it's getting about 3 or 4 times the discussion on OT

See what happened to us during the Enlightenment?
Socrates II — (archived)

The humanities and the sciences (or natural philosophies, as it was
then known) used to work together in harmony, often where the two
were indistinguishable and co-dependent.

But now they have been separated and this is why we have the
situation which created this thread in the first place: One group who
looks at facts and disdains squishy emotions and "soft" fields of
endeavor, and the other who focuses on feelings and the esoteric
and disdains the perceived cold hardness of the factual world.

This is why we have those who support creationism largely from
their feelings and who not only dismiss the scientific evidence behind
evolution but consider it an outright threat to their way of life. And
sadly, science often counters this by restating the facts and the
evidence, but not providing a "comfort zone" or sense of purpose to
this knowledge.

I know this is not what scientists are supposed to do (and I would not
want a lot of them doing that anyway), but they keep thinking if they
state the facts that somehow this will be enough for most people -
and it isn't. Religion isn't popular with so many just for the heck of it
or the weekly bingo, you know.

We need to take the natural interest in the world that most kids have
and keep it going in their minds as they grow up. School continues to
be really great at taking that young natural scientist in all children and
suffocating it. Thus we will continue to have a majority of Americans
(2/3rds by one estimate) who think a supernatural deity made
everything and a minority of educated folks who keep scratching
their heads as to why so many around them think their views are
tricks of the Devil.

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