The Hard, Unadulterated Truth: Science Does Not Need Religion To Advance Or Improve

 

David DeSteno, a professor of psychology at Northeastern University has argued in a NY Times op-ed that Science "can learn from religion".   The question is: 'What?' For example he writes;

"I am no apologist for religion. As a psychologist, I believe that the scientific method provides the best tools with which to unlock the secrets of human nature. But after decades spent trying to understand how our minds work, I’ve begun to worry that the divide between religious and scientific communities might not only be stoking needless hostility; it might also be slowing the process of scientific discovery itself."

This, of course, is provably untrue given that religious precepts, principles, dogmas and claims offer no way to make valid scientific predictions.   None of them, for example, can help a solar physicist predict the next CME or X-9 class solar flare. As for the "endless hostility"  this has transpired because assorted religions - mainly Christian - insist on trying to condemn or ostracize scientific findings - whether Darwinian evolution, or the Big Bang.    More to the point, the consistent invocation of supernatural entities is an absolute non-starter for genuine science so these claims are not likely to be greeted with any amity by natural science.

DeSteno goes on:

"Religious traditions offer a rich store of ideas about what human beings are like and how they can satisfy their deepest moral and social needs. For thousands of years, people have turned to spiritual leaders and religious communities for guidance about how to conduct themselves, how to coexist with other people, how to live meaningful and fulfilled lives — and how to accomplish this in the face of the many obstacles to doing so."

Again, not really relevant or useful for most natural science.   The assertion - if true - that religions offer "a rich store of ideas about what humans are like" - may be of some use to psychology, but not to physics, astrophysics, organic chemistry or evolutionary biology. Again, none of those areas will benefit from any "guidance" that such religious traditions may offer.   As for guidance on "how to conduct themselves" there is already a vast store of such knowledge which is embedded in evolutionary ethics, most recently elaborated in Michael Shermer's  excellent book: 'The Science of Good and Evil" . As Shermer writes (p. 244):

“In provisional ethics moral choices correspond to scientific facts in being provisionally right or wrong, where moral or immoral means confirmed to an extent that it would be reasonable to offer provisional assent. It remains provisional because, as in science, the evidence might change. “

Shermer also emphasizes that provisional ethics rests firmly on the foundation of Darwinian evolution. Darwin, after all, “founded the study of evolutionary ethics  which belongs to a long tradition of ethical naturalism that dates back twenty five centuries to Aristotle. Because Darwin’s biological explanation of morality was grounded in natural inclinations, it has been called ‘Darwinian natural right’.”

Clearly then, there is no similarity between scientific ethics and supernaturally mandated bunkum, or the need to invoke religious traditions to figure out how humans can improve their behavior.. 

DeSteno carries on, oblivious to how his core arguments have already been rendered moot:

"Just as ancient doesn’t always mean wise, it doesn’t always mean foolish. The only way to determine which is the case is to put an idea — a hypothesis — to an empirical test. In my own work, I have repeatedly done so. I have found that religious ideas about human behavior and how to influence it, though never worthy of blind embrace, are sometimes vindicated by scientific examination."

The problem, however, is that religious ideas - which ultimately depend for their coherence on supernatural memes and agents- cannot offer empirical tests of their claims anyway. In any case, any and all potential hypotheses, say as might apply to human behavior, are already covered and explained under evolutionary ethics. The other problem is that the religious temperament and mind is too often grounded in premoralism.  This was best highlighted by Cheryl Mendelson in her book, 'The Good Life', which provides a key core perspective, (p. 157):

"The premoral mind confuses the disgusting with the wrong and retains an infantile fear of things sexual. Its rationality is overcome by emotion, fantasy, wish and projection.."

The implication here is enormous: it means that  religions are most likely to condemn or outlaw actions they perceive to be "disgusting" and conflate  with "evil" or "immoral".  We already are aware of the RC Church's pathological fear of all things sexual - leading it to condemn dozens of sexual acts such as premarital sex, masturbation and use of artificial contraception.   To fix ideas, one can cite St. Augustine, who wrote ('The Adulterous Relations', II, 12): 

"It is impermissible and shameful to practice intercourse with one's wife while preventing the conception of children. This is what Onan did, the son of Judah, and that is why God killed him".

In fact, this is a gross misinterpetation of the Onan passage but is also what is probably responsible for engendering the masturbation bogey. Since from then, "spilling seed" was equated to "onanism" and onanism to masturbation.  Also, no surprise that from Augustine's passage the Church still regards use of artificial contraception as "mutual masturbation" and a mortal sin - one incidence of which can send the sorry soul to Hell if it dies before confessing.   This was confirmed in the Loyola University Ethics course I took over 1966-67, given by Fr. Alvin Holloway, e.g.

What was Fr. Holloway's science? Well, Church "natural law" which is no real science at all, simply postulating that any act which doesn't conform with the Vatican's conception of "natural" is mortally sinful. Or to cite Pope Pius XI's  encyclical Casti Connubii  the "sin" of artificial contraception entails making primary a sexual aspect that in reality is only "secondary". According to that pontiff:

"Since therefore the conjugal act is destined primarily by nature for the begetting of children, those who in exercising it deliberately frustrate its natural power and purpose sin against nature."

Which, of course, is BS.  Indeed, as biologist Elizabeth A. Daugherty  points out ('The Lessons of Zoology'. in Contraception and Holiness, p. 110):

"Why do we call secondary the ends of the sexual act which have been accorded in fullness to us, and why do we call primary the end which we share with the lower animals?"


Good question! But that seems to be the sort of input that DeSteno advises us to adopt to have less divisive relations with religion. Oh, I almost forgot, it was Julian Pleasants in the same monograph who pointed out that the Church once believed it "natural" that some men be enslaved because they were “unable to manage their own affairs” (ibid.)  So why be surprised when the same Church seeks to ordain all her members abide by a sexuality more fitting of lower primates?  

This leads us to DeSteno's next bit of codswallop:

"Consider the challenge of getting people to act in virtuous ways. Every religion has its tools for doing this. Meditation, for example, is a Buddhist technique created to reduce suffering and enhance ethical behavior. Research from my own and others’ labs confirms that it does just that, even when meditation is taught and performed in a completely secular context, leading research participants to exhibit greater compassion in the face of suffering and to forgo vengeance in the face of insult.

Another religious tool is ritual, often characterized by the rigid following of repetitive actions or by engagement with others in synchronous movement or song. Here, too, an emerging body of research shows that ritualistic actions, even when stripped from a religious context, produce effects on the mind ranging from increased self-control to greater feelings of affiliation and empathy"

Interesting here is how he omits the number one bogey tool for trying to force people to behave in "virtuous rays": Hell! 


And, of course, the invocation of "Hell" necessarily has meant the supplemental invocation of supernatural agents like "Satan" and "demons" to wield the tortures - inflict them on those who have not embraced virtue in whatever guise.

E.g.



                                                                                                                   



So, in other words, De Steno has dodged the main tool - not anything empirical - that's been used and still is to drive respective flocks to obey silly commands or dogmas.

To DeSteno's credit he does admit, citing Steven Pinker for insight, i.e.:

"When I broached this body of research with the cognitive scientist and religious skeptic Steven Pinker, he emphasized that it was by no means a vindication of religion as a whole. He made a point to differentiate between what he called religious practices and cultural practices, with religious ones being those more likely to have doubtful supernatural rationales (like using prayer to contact a deity for favors) and cultural ones having more practical justifications (like using ritual to foster connection and self-control)."

Adding:

"While I can see Professor Pinker’s point — and I agree with him that religion as a whole must be judged by its full set of positive and negative effects — the dividing line between cultural and religious can be blurry. The Jewish practice of Shabbat, for instance, stems from a divine command for a day of rest and includes ritualistic actions and prayers. But it’s also a cultural practice in which people take time out from the daily grind to focus on family, friends and other things that matter more than work."

But why the need to go outside Christendom to the Jewish Shabbat? What? He can't find any compelling cultural practices among the Christian religions? Say as opposed to blocking abortion or Planned Parenthood clinics, calling artificial contraceptives "abortifacents" and filling teens with dread if they go to sleep without making a "full act of contrition" - say if they masturbated once.  So given all of this backstory it's kind of choice to next read:

"My purpose here isn’t to argue that religion is inherently good or bad. As with most social institutions, its value depends on the intentions of those using it. But even in cases where religion has been used to foment intergroup conflict, to justify invidious social hierarchies or to encourage the maintenance of false beliefs, studying how it manages to leverage the mechanisms of the mind to accomplish those nefarious goals can offer insights about ourselves — insights that could be used to understand and then combat such abuses in the future, whether perpetrated by religious or secular powers."

Well, he's correct there! Certainly in respect to how religions "leverage the mechanisms of the mind to accomplish nefarious ends".   But one doesn't need to be involved in any religion or to read religious fare to grasp that leverage. I can recommend Howard Bloom's book, 'The Lucifer Principle', which explores in depth the gestation of memes in all religions, and how these memes can induce all manner of  vile behavior from burning heretics and "witches" to beheading "infidels". 

Then there is the best explication ever of mind viruses as memes, i.e. in Jacques Monod's book, Chance and Necessity'  (Chapter 5, 'The Kingdom and the Darkness',  Collins Books, UK, 1970 )  Basically, Monod ties the spread of inherently primitive, anti-human and perverse ideas to a kind of mind-to -mind infection. He does this also by appeal to actual empirical (biological-chemical processes). Hence the  basis for the "mind virus",  though that specific term is introduced later in Richard Dawkins' book, 'The Selfish Gene' .  See e.g. a summary here:

[PDF]

the selfish gene - Home page

old.unipr.it/arpa/defi/econlaw/SELFISH%20GENE.pdf

DeStenos babbles on:

"Science and religion do not need each other to function, but that doesn’t imply that they can’t benefit from each other."

This may possibly be so, but not until religion jettisons all of its supernaturalism, all the assorted memes, agents and McGuffins.  Else, there is nothing really that genuine science can learn from religion.

DeStenos does end his essay with a faint note of promise by reference to what Millennials are into:

"A yearning for a science-religion synergy is growing in some circles. Ms. Tippett cites as an example the Formation Project, an initiative designed by a group of millennials who are looking to cultivate their inner lives and form a community by combining ideas from psychology and neuroscience with practices from ancient spiritual traditions. In doing this, she points out, these young people are not blindly accepting any doctrine. They are asking questions and choosing what works based on evidence. In short, they are doing exactly what I think the communities of scientists and clergy need to do in a more rigorous way and on a much larger scale."

To which I say, 'Bravo!' if the millennials aren't seduced by supernatural hokum and bunkum, or have their critical thinking undermined in any way.  The point is that irrespective of how they combine these "ideas from neuroscience" with "ancient spiritual traditions" they ensure the former are not subtly corrupted or diluted by the latter. And before they plow ahead, I strongly suggest they read Jacques Monod's monograph.  I would also heartily recommend these young folks get their hands on: Why God Won't Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief' wherein the authors (Andrew Newberg and Eugene D’Aquili) show clearly why the brain's belief claims can't be trusted.

 Most critical is how the brain’s OAA (orientation and activation region) translates an image into a religious reality which is described in detail.This is in connection with a person given an image of Christ and asked to focus on it. Within minutes, neurological measurements, i.e. from PET and SPECT scans, shows how domination of the image- attuned brain proceeds. This is via electrical discharges spiraling down from the right attention area (right OAA) to the limbic system and hypothalamus “triggering the arousal section of the structure”. The authors’ test results and ancillary investigations are important as they are based on genuine empirical science- not a bogus substitute

DeSteno ends:

"Will it work? That’s an empirical question. But if we choose not to investigate it, we’ll never know. And I suspect we’ll be the poorer for it."

Fair enough. But if we do choose to investigate this supposedly "empirical" question, we agree to do so by rigorously empirical means - not baloney or specious supernatural mumbo- jumbo!  In other words, not "empirical" merely because a pro-religious writer opts to throw that word around.