Brandon Fibbs · @bfibbs
15th Sep 2012 from Twitlonger
I have never, ever heard any scientist claim that science can or will explain everything. Never. Forget the false equivalence argument this author contends. Concentrate on the blatant strawman instead. Science is very clear about the end of its knowledge and the ocean of ignorance that lies beyond. The difference is that you are not allowed to then name that ocean God. Because the moment you do, science learns a little bit more, and that ocean recedes just a little bit further.
So long as religion is based on faith--believing in spite of a lack of evidence or even in the face of contrary evidence--then yes, author, science, which as you point out is based on what "is" rather than what one wants it to be, is indeed "God's 'rational' opponent," or more accurately, those who claim to speak for God. What other arbiter of truth is there? And ask yourself author, if religion is as ready and willing to bend and alter course with new information as you rightly describe science to be. That is the very antithesis of the sort of dogma with which you intend to saddle science.
The weaknesses or limitations of one system do not, reciprocally, enforce those of its opposite, as some like to delude themselves into thinking. And no, science is not often seen as mystical by those who practice it, though it often is by those who don't and know little about it. Awe and wonder is not the same thing as "mystical," just as you do not get to frame a debate by altering the definition of words in favor of your argument.
The misrepresentations of science and scientists here show how little the author truly understands the discipline.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/occams-corner/2012/sep/04/science-mystical-cool