Some people think that scientist can’t take uncertainty, and need an answer for everything. Quite the opposite is true. Most the scientist I know and work with delight in not knowing the answer. In fact, not knowing what the question even is could be the height of joy! Then the hours and days and months of work to find the question, and then an answer is what makes work great!
It is actual the religious people that can’t stand not having an answer.
Why is it raining? God is crying.
Why thunder and lightning? God is mad at us.
People that don’t like mystery will believe the first thing that they are told, or the fist thing they hear Oprah say on the matter.
Think about all the things that used to have a religious answer, that we now know from science is just natural. When was the last time you heard the word Firmament? Probably in the temple. It was thought at one time that there was a dome (the firmament) that held the stars and other celestial bodies. We now know this isn’t true, but it persists in our temple ceremony.
Why is there a rainbow? It is either a “meteorological phenomenon that is caused by reflection, refraction and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a spectrum of light appearing in the sky”, or a sign from God that he would not kill every living sole except Noah and his family next time He got angry. I’ll let you decide which makes more senses.
Wheat & Tares 
I’m not sure that it needs to be either/or BB, science can explain and I can assign meaning. Every time there is a rainbow I can remember God’s promise whilst knowing full well that it is gloriously refracted light. Science is a marvelous thing and only makes the story richer I think. But that’s me, I like to have my cake and eat it all I can.
The rainbow can fulfill both purposes. The reason we didn’t have rainbows until after the flood was because the earth was surrounded by a cloud layer. We will stop having rainbows when the earth is again shrouded, maybe from a nuclear winter or major volcanic eruptions.
I hate to agree with Sam Harris about anything — his depictions of religious beliefs and theological arguments are uninformed and shallow. But I think it is correct that religious explanations of natural phenomena are almost uniformly untenable. That’s easy for most reasonable people to see for historic religions or someone else’s church, but tougher to see about one’s own.
On the bright side, at least BYU has strong and professional science departments. So at least young LDS have a fighting chance of encountering persuasive natural explanations of natural phenomena. That’s if they are bright enough and determined enough to bracket or marginalize the weak religious explanations they are provided in seminary, institute, religion classes, the LDS curriculum, and General Conference. Just off the top of my head, I have heard GAs in the last ten years talk about earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and dreams (the clearly recollected ones, so billions per year on planet Earth) as divinely controlled and initiated. I’ll bet dimes to donuts we hear a GA or two at the upcoming General Conference attribute the coronavirus pandemic to the sins of the world, the laziness of the Saints, or the machinations of Satan.
I train animals for fun and one of the super interesting things to see (and learn to avoid) is the emotional anxiety when an animal is placed in a new situation with a high amount of uncertainty. Uncertainty with no direction or guidance to relieve that uncertainty causes fear (outright panic in some situations). You can see it physically in an animal. And then if given a small nudge in a direction to relieve that fear (do what is right, find the right answer), they leap. Human brains are the same as animal brains. We do the exact same thing. The difference is that for a dog the uncertainties are simple (which cone should I touch with paw to get a doggie treat) and for humans the uncertainties can be unbelievably complex, and thus when humans find a ‘right’ answer that makes us comfortable we justify and rationalize it. Which doesn’t mean it is actually right, just lacking uncertainty.
I’d agree it doesn’t have to be either/or. I also think science does a great job on explaining how things are done, but has no market on the why, although there is some overlap (usually makes for great science fiction). Additionally, if all truth is God’s couldn’t the things God does naturally be explained by science anyway? As an example, I think of the Tower of Babel. Most scientists and linguists would probably dismiss the story, but as I learn more about the brain, perception, genetics, language acquisition, infectious disease, and brain injury, I would not completely dismiss a rapidly mutating but short-lived viral infection as a source of confounding. If science found a way today to confirm this was the case, that doesn’t mean God had no part in it.
I’d like to hope you’re right that most scientists welcome uncertainty. It sometimes seems the media prefers to talk to those who do (Bill Nye immediately comes to mind. I know, not strictly a scientist but he does have an engineering background). However, it seems whenever there is a hole or anachronism in a fairly well-established scientific theory, scientists quickly get defensive. And when the hole or anachronism lends support to established religious views, they often go on the offensive. I always have a hard time understanding this. After what scientists like Galileo went through at the hands of religion, you’d think scientists would be the last people to persecute to advance their views, but perhaps humility, forgiveness, and avoiding revenge are aspects of humanity that better fit the domain of religion than science.
One of my favorite quotes from Bram Stroker’s Dracula: “Ah, it is the fault of our science that it wants to explain all; and if it explain not, then it says there is nothing to explain.”
I don’t see anything wrong with trying to explain everything, but the dismissals do annoy me from time to time.
San Harris is right when it comes to natural phenomena. But religion is often more than just providing a description of natural phenomena.
Russel Anderson, I had not heard of the “cloud layer” before the flood theory. Very interesting, but only useful for a young earth explanation. For it to extend to current scientific theory of the earth, the substantially cooler temperatures of the earth for those 50,000 or so years that humans have been around would be documented in fossil and plant remains. But my guess is that anybody that believes that a universal flood was a true fact (I don’t) would also believe that humans have only been on the earth for 8000 years. I’m not saying that is your beliefs, and in fact you may only be pointing out how religion and science can coincide with the flood for those that believe there was a flood, and believe in a young earth.
Religion is broad and can serve many functions. It can provide morals, origin, identity, a worldview, community, ritual, and explanation of various things etc. Most scientific claims about the natural world have greater predictive power than corresponding religious claims. Religious claims about the natural world tend to be explanatory rather than predictive. They are often teleological explanations that fit into or contribute to the worldview rather than predictive laws applicable to research, development, engineering, etc. Conversely, religion also makes many claims, such as moral claims, or meaning claims that are outside the purview of science. I would say that religions greatest value lies there. For many, however, carving out the boundaries between science, philosophy, and religion is quite challenging and different people draw boundaries in different places.
Sometimes religion gets there faster than science.
(Click on “science” above)
Russell, Interesting idea about the cloud layer, but it still doesn’t explain what you are saying. Rainbows come from light being reflected/refracted through water vapor. If there was a cloud layer, that means there never would have been sunshine falling on the earth and crops would almost be non-existent. Also, I don’t know if you’ve ever flown in an airplane or not, but I have seen many wonderful rainbows while flying through clouds, as the sunlight is refracted through the moisture. In fact, the cloud rainbows are fantastic, as they usually are 360 degree rainbows.
So no, I’m not buying your cloud theory.
lastlemming, alcohol consumption is a complicating factor with regard to any illness, but it is not among the top 10 among primary causes of death globally. Even the Lancet study you link to mentions the possible protective benefits provided by moderate alcohol consumption. You know what is in the top 10? Diabetes. I’m still waiting for religion to weigh in on sugar consumption, processed foods, lack of exercise and poverty.
Paul, I’ve actually heard the cloud theory before this, and I’m not sure I buy it either (I’ve heard some postulate that the cloud layer also allowed mankind to age longer, which sounds slightly more ridiculous to me as I think there were other factors involved). I would, however, have to disagree with your assumption that crops would nearly be non-existent. Crops as we know them now would probably be non-existent. Adaptation tells us that crops can change, and from what I learned in biology, evolution doesn’t always progress in the positive direction. Certain crops may have been far superior back then.
My father-in-law, a former pilot, spoke highly of cloud rainbows, and I’d love to see them some time. Just because they may have always existed doesn’t necessarily mean pre-flood humans saw them.
Russell, assuming your cloud theory is true it wouldn’t necessarily take a new cloud layer to stop visible rainbows. Extreme worldwide drought could do it too.
My 10:54 comment yesterday has meaning-changing typo. It should have read “media prefers to talk to those who don’t,” not “do.”
The more I learn of the attitudes of popular scientists (as opposed to the pure science itself) the less convinced I am they are any more open-minded than many of the religious people they accuse of being the opposite.
What Is Religion?
Religion is an attempt to deal with the non-rational, not the irrational, the non-rational, those powerful forces that inform all of our lives; love, beauty, the search for meaning, our mortality, grief, alienation. These cannot be empirically measured. Religious systems are human creation, God is a human concept. All religious systems are flawed. All of them are finite attempts to deal with the infinite, to deal with those transcendent forces and need that all human beings have for the sacred. What religion is trying to do is acknowledge and preserve and to a certain extend explain these forces that make up a complete human being.
Chris Hedges
Corrado,
That quote makes for a great sound bite that seems to somewhat strive for the end of debate, but it raises a couple of questions on its own.
“These cannot be measured empirically.”
I don’t think this is limited to religion. Although more objective than many believe, you see this in the social sciences and literature as well, among others.
” . . .to deal with those transcendent forces and need that all human beings have for the sacred.”
I think this begs the question, Why the need for the sacred? Forgive me for repeating somewhat since I’ve written something similar on another of BB’s posts, but if we assume there is no God and evolution as full on fact in every sense, logic tells me religion is an unlikely scenario. I know evolution does not necessarily lead to perfection, but logic and nature as we currently know it tells me there are so many other ways nature would likely allow us to cope, survive, and thrive. Logic tells me that for humans to be the way they are, something higher has to be involved.
Of course, logic can make sense and still be valid down so many different avenues that any number of things can make sense while not necessarily being true. I can see the logic of the quote. That doesn’t necessarily make it true. I realize the same can be said of what I believe is the logical explanation for the sacred.
Bringing it back around, I can see the logic of BB’s post of either/or explanations for a rainbow. I can also see the logic of believing it doesn’t have to be either/or.