I don't think "being afraid to have public discussions" is really the issue here.
Just to take a bit extreme cases, I won't be afraid to debate flat earthers, creationists (once I did a debate with UFO experts) etc... but as a scientist, at some point feel you should not legitimate a debate between science and stuff which is just not sharing the same method.
"Sprituality" obviously is not.
What is there to debate?
@franco_vazza @NatureMC What is to debate? Life, the universe, and everything !😀
@franco_vazza @NatureMC How and how long should we treat elderly people at the end of their lives? You can scientifically calculate how much treatments cost, and you could define an optimization function that optimizes the best health treatment for a society based on efficiency and finances. However, healthcare started not in order to make society efficient but because of compassion, which depends on your view of how valuable a human being is. That is also a spiritual question.
@franco_vazza @NatureMC now I’m afraid we’ll have a very lengthy debate on that topic, I’m afraid, for which this probably is not the right forum and where I am not really competent about all the details involved…
In Germany we have we have for those questions an ethics council where scientists and church representatives and others are represented.
@hfalcke @franco_vazza @NatureMC one hard thing I learned as an atheist is we are far too willing... eager, even, to give up all sense of soul and god to organized religion. it's worthwhile and useful to redefine it and take it back in a way that suits yourself... well, not in a way that imposes on other folks, I mean.
@spacegeck @hfalcke @NatureMC
Paradoxically, the fascination for astronomy came to me as a reaction to the sort of void that came with becoming atheist during adolescence. So you might say astrophysics became my "organised religion" (btw sometimes it is, with its many gurus and schisms and holy wars 😅 ) .
And one of the first (in retrospective, VERY bad) book was "The Physics of Immortality" by F.Tipler.
@franco_vazza @spacegeck @NatureMC That is certainly true for others as well. Astronomy has a ability to create spiritual feelings by itself and such questions. However, I don’t think it’s able to ultimately answer them. Hence, you always need to take a leap of faith in some form or the other. With less and less astronomers, being trained in philosophy or theology even at the lowest levels, we are, however, missing out in this discussion more and more.
@hfalcke
Maybe there is this synthesis position to bridge you two: Theology has its place in all the sciences, but in Astronomy the big debates have already happened and passed into the canonical history of the field, so the remaining space is very small.
As an example what happens when you have a new field, but there is low theological literacy among its actors, consider the transhumanism movement in computer science: https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/23779413/silicon-valleys-ai-religion-transhumanism-longtermism-ea
In summary: you always risk people doing theology when they start speculating about the future of the field, and its good if at least some of the actors can recognise that's what they are doing.
@franco_vazza @spacegeck @NatureMC
@tobychev @hfalcke @spacegeck @NatureMC
And I am not saying that because I hate religion (well I am also not a big fan either tbh) but because there is a fundamental difference of approach, methods, boundaries, procedures.
Seriously, the scientific method (in good parts, not entirely) is built to be the antithesis of a religious belief.
We can not mix the two in the same debate, we did that for the past centuries, please, not this over again.
@franco_vazza
Did you read down to the example of what happens when scientists soeculate about the future without theological training? They just reinvented theological stories on their own, didn't realise it, and now Musk is super popular for being "rational".
I guess I see your point, if you accept the restriction that scientists should *never* speculate about the future of society in their role as scientists.
I don't think it's a very usual restriction, because the public is more likely to not see the difference between the vulgar and filthy 🤢speculation🤢and the pure and truthful ✨science✨. But I will happily admit this is an argument from resigned pragmatism and not pure principle.
@hfalcke @spacegeck @NatureMC
@tobychev @hfalcke @spacegeck @NatureMC
"and now Musk is super popular for being "rational". well exactly, I don't think it's very popular among scientists, even al those remaining on X.
Surely scientists should not pose as eschatologists.
If the question is: "is the climate become hotter and can we stop it?" I just want scientists speaking in that room.
If the question is "should we care"? it's becomes a moral/philosophical question, to which all humans are entitled to speak.
@franco_vazza
ok, so let me say it like this: theology can have some place in the scientific enterprise (meaning the whole social structure with schools and funding agencies and the public begging for inspiration) in the same way that history of science has a place, as it informs us about the social realities that birthed the theoretical structure we use and study
This is not to say theology has a place within the theory itself, I'm not saying we should put god into hydrodynamics*, rather I mean that it's useful if at least some practitioners know how to recognise when speculation about what we could do in the future is actually just poorly remembered bits of the book of revelation (or whichever it is, I've never studied, I just get it by osmosis).
*supply your own joke about magnetic fields here.
@hfalcke @spacegeck @NatureMC
@tobychev @hfalcke @spacegeck @NatureMC
"Maybe there is this synthesis position to bridge you two: Theology has its place in all the sciences"
well...big no on my side!
No, theology should have zero place in any science: it can well have any relevant place in people's mind, as any other philosophical belief, but I really don't see/want theology to debate science. How?
It can debate "the meaning" of a scientific result, if you want, but that's outside science.
I see no intersection.