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Plato, his idea of
soul still around
Edmund Gettier,
philosopher
Soren Kierkegaard,
associated with postmodernism
Into the 21s century, biologists in laboratories were observing the evolution of bacteria. Charles Darwin wrote largely about pigeons and also wrote about barnacles and earth worms. That was in the 1800s. Into the 21st century some of Darwin's ideas about specie development remain fundamental in the study of evolutionary biology. But many find fault with a point here or there in Darwin's vast body of recorded thought -- opinions published in scientific journals as well as other literature.
Writes the evolutionary biologist Olivia Judson, the field of evolutionary biology "as a whole has been transformed" by the study of genetics and DNA, and by computers. She writes that the fusion of genetics with natural selection "has enormously expanded our understanding of how natural selection can work." Judson writes that she would "like to abolish the insidious terms Darwinism, Darwinist and Darwinian" because these give a flawed impression of a field that has moved beyond Charles Darwin. [note]
Into the 21st century, some people reject entirely the idea of humans as a product of biological evolution. They may point to scripture or to the wonderment of life. They hold that we surely are more than the product of a series of accidents. Some who disagree might claim that it is accident that produces variety in the world that we know, and that wonderment and beauty is in that variety.
An opinion poll in the year 2007, published in USA Today, described 66.7 percent in the United States as saying that it is "probably true" that God created humans in their present form within the past 10,000 years. The poll described 53 percent as saying that it is definitely or probably true that "humans evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years." This adds up to more than 100 percent as some of those polled held that both views were definitely or probably true.
In the February 18, 2007, issue of Science Daily it was claimed that 80 percent or more of adults in Iceland, Denmark and Sweden accepted the concept of evolution. Turkey was described as having the greatest percentage of people who discounted evolution, and the United States was described as second. This was attributed to a fundamentalist tradition among Christians reading the Bible and to Muslims reading the Koran.
Into the 21st century, life has been seen as created at conception, and in a stricter sense life is seen also as being passed on -- a continuation. And for many people, mixed with the concept of life is the question of soul. Do the newly conceived acquire a newly created soul? Do they acquire a soul that is eternal? Does the spiritual world consist of one great unified soul or does it contain an infinite number of individual souls? And what is soul?
Plato's view of soul is still widely accepted by Christians. Plato saw soul as non-matter, as a spiritual essence that occupied the human body. When a body died the soul survived and went elsewhere. The soul, thought Plato, consisted of reason, emotion and appetite -- which like emotion should be kept in check. Saint Augustine slightly altered Plato's view of soul and still had influence going into the 21st century. Augustine said that when a body dies the soul is purified by purgatorial fires if one dies in communion with the Church.
Into the 21st century the view on soul by Thomas Aquinas (1225?-1274) is still accepted by the Roman Catholics. Aquinas saw people as being soul and matter. The soul, he believed, moves the body, and he described soul as the first principle of life.
Buddhists have a view of soul that involves knowledge. Among Buddhists is the common belief that soul is a primary reality, that people are temporary vessels in this world, that they live in a world of illusion and cannot know their soul until they attain enlightenment -- in a word, Buddhahood.
Hindus believe that people have an innermost soul that has not been created. They see soul as eternal and evolving as consciousness evolves, becoming more and more refined until it reaches its true and eternal form identical with the perfections of the god Siva. Hinduism holds no separation of the body and the soul. This unity they label as "soul-body." They see the body not as a mere vessel containing the soul but as the soul itself, described by Hindus as the finest of subatomic forms.
Among the Japanese it is believed that at death the soul, or spirit (reikon), leaves the body. And, if family members of the deceased perform the proper rituals, and the departed spirit becomes a benevolent ancestral spirit. This is believed also by Chinese, Koreans, Vietnamese and others in Asia. The rituals have been practiced in the West, on All Saints Day, the Day of the Dead, All Souls Day -- rituals adopted by Christians during the Roman Empire.
Aside from the theistic view of human life, we have neuroscientists, biologists and psychologists who view consciousness as a function of the brain -- a function of matter. Among the psychologists is Stephen Pinker (who has a book summarized on this site on what he refers to as the denial of human nature). These scientists see consciousness as dependent on body chemistry and physical constructions. Those among them who limit their beliefs to the realm of science or empiricism dismiss consciousness after death as unknowable. Soul for people adhering to this point of view is a poetic synonym for mind and feelings. For them, this kind of soul develops as their mind develops.
Different views on life and the soul mix with the question of abortion. Some see abortion as murder. They might also argue that semen and eggs not involved in conception are also a destruction of life. And they might argue that the human embryo is life and entitled to protection. A rival point of view holds that one is not fully human until there has been some mental development, including self-consciousness. They might deny that preserving a fetus has the moral equivalence of preserving the life of the girl or woman who carries it.
The issue of circumstances governing when abortions are permissible has raised controversy. Some believe that it is never permissible and that preserving the life of girl or woman is never an issue. (See "Abortion and the Mother's Life" at Catholic.net.)
The latest figures on abortion, published at Nationmaster.com in October 2008, has a world average of 4 abortions per 1,000 persons. Russia is described as leading with 19.29 per 1,000, Sweden with 4.16, the United States 4.09, Finland 1.89 and Germany 1.88. Poland, presumably heavily influenced by Catholicism, is listed as 0.14 reported abortions per 1,000.
Into the 21st century, some across the world, including the United States, believe that they acquire knowledge intuitively and with certainty. Moreover, they believe they can apprehend these realities with certainty. And they might deride scientists for creating theories that lack certainty.
Those who adhere to the philosophy of science differ. Not all scientists adhere to the philosophy of science: some use the methods of science while believing in the supernatural. Those who adhere to the philosophy of science believe that scientists cannot be sure that they know all of the connections. They admit that scientists do not know the whole and that this creates a degree of uncertainty. Scientists put forth an hypothesis, believing more sophisticated hypotheses might follow. Philosophers of science believe in approximate knowledge. This has nothing to do with truth being relative. One person's map of reality might have more and better lines than another. He might know more, while that other at least knows something.
Those adhering to the philosophy of science believe that we understand by making associations and differentiations, a process that involves interpretation -- a point of view in contrast to those who believe they know without interpretation. Scientists apply abstract methods of measurement to specific things gathered from our senses, but anything beyond the world of sense impressions the philosopher of science relegates to the unknowable -- in a word they are agnostics. Because this denies knowledge of the supernatural it is also known as naturalism. Some call it atheism (a word that literally means non-theism).
The scientist assumes an interaction between the mind and a reality external to the mind -- not as a dogma but as a practicality. Some others have attempted a complex explanation of this relationship. The have tried to put into a coherent whole their belief in invisible spirits and their world of sense impressions.
Historically, philosophy has been divided between those who describe reality as essentially idea, as in the mind of God, and those who describe reality as essentially matter. And those adhering to the philosophy of science believe that we cannot prove that reality is essentially idea or matter.
In the 1600s a Frenchman, René Descartes, advocated disciplined philosophical argumentation integrated with physical science. He believed in doubt. The only thing he could claim that was beyond doubt was the observation of his own existence: I think therefore I am. But in time this came to be accepted as unedifying.
Complexity was added as recently as 1963 by Edmund Gettier. Wikipedia writes of Gettier calling "into question the theory of knowledge that had been dominant among philosophers for thousands of years." Wikipedia's contributor claims that Gettier does this by arguing that there are situations in which one's belief may be justifiable through reason while not qualifying as knowledge." In other words, someone believes something by grasping actualities but not all parts of an event [note]. Gettier's position is essentially that if you do not know everything you do not know anything -- contrary to seeing knowledge as approximation. To those who see knowledge as approximation, Gettier's position also qualifies as unedifying.
Some people describe those who believe in knowledge as approximation as postmodernists. A contributor to Wikipedia describes Wittgenstein, Thomas Kuhn, Paul Feyerabend, W.V. Quine as postmodernist philosophers. Edwina Taborsky, as of today absent from Wikipedia, is also known as a postmodern philosopher. Wikipedia describes Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche of the 19th century as having contributed to postmodern philosophy, but one can surely arrive at the version of the philosophy of science described on this page without having read either of these philosophers or any number of other so-called postmodernists.
Postmodern philosophy has produced at least one aphorism, by Paul Karl Feyerabend (1924-94), an Austrian who was a professor of philosophy at U.C. Berkeley. Said he: "The only absolute truth is that there are no absolute truths." in this, Feyerabend is extending his point of view into a realm that he need not enter: the realm of metaphysics. One who believes that his knowledge is limited cannot with justification proclaim that there are no absolute truths.
Into the 21st century some people remain far removed from "postmodern" philosophy. Among them are Christians called "fundamentalists." The expression came to life between 1915 and 1920 with the publication of pamphlets entitled "The Fundamentals: A testimony to the Truth." Fundamentalists tend to be Protestants. They are opposed to theologians who view scripture critically. Scripture, they believe, is absolutely reliable because they know that it is God's word. They oppose anyone applying to scripture his own metaphorical interpretation. Into the 21st century, Biblical fundamentalists in the United States and Russia have been described as around 27 percent of the population.
What has been called Judaic "fundamentalism" holds that all aspects of the lives of Jews should be determined according to the Torah, in other words that religious observance is to be above any government directive or military order. But among so-called Jewish fundamentalists it is also held that in debates the majority decides. Judaic "fundamentalism" would be problematic if in the 21st century Deuteronomy 13:16-17 were followed literally. There it says that a city that has become idolatrous should be set afire and its inhabitants slain. But in Deuteronomy (10:19) it says to love the stranger.
Among the core beliefs of Jews that have been labeled fundamentalists is: the Torah was given to Moses; there will be no other Torah; Jehovah knows the thoughts and deeds of men; Jehovah will reward the good and punish the wicked; The Messiah will come and the dead will be resurrected.
Rabbi Moshe Weiss writes: "Both Judaism and Islam are religions based on rituals (‘works’ to use the Christian term) rather than faith. In this way these two religions are closer to each other than either is to Christianity."
Fundamentalism applied to Muslims can refer to the authority of the Koran as sacred text to which all else is subordinate. American historian Ira M. Lapidus writes that Islamic fundamentalism "is at best only an umbrella designation for a very wide variety of movements, some intolerant and exclusivist, some pluralistic; some favourable to science, some anti-scientific; some primarily devotional and some primarily political; some democratic, some authoritarian; some pacific, some violent." [note].
Bernard Lewis writes that all Muslims "are in principle at least fundamentalists. Where the so-called Muslim fundamentalists differ from other Muslims and indeed from Christian fundamentalists is in their scholasticism and their legalism. They base themselves not only on the Qur'an, but also on the Traditions of the Prophet, and on the corpus of transmitted theological and legal learning." [note].
In Islam the issue of literal versus metaphor is not the issue that it is in Christian fundamentalism. The University of Chicago's "Fundamentalist Project" defined fundamentalism as "a strategy, or set of strategies, by which beleaguered believers attempt to preserve their distinctive identity as a people or group ... by a selective retrieval of doctrines, beliefs, and practices from a sacred past." [note]
Hinduism has not been confined to one prophet or one book. Hindus consider the four Vedas as primary scripture, and they have sacred works such as the Bhagavad Gita, Ramayana, Puranas and other supplementary literature. Hinduism does not claim to be the only true religion and ladder to salvation. The Vedas describe one God who has many names and faces, who can be reached by many paths. Hindu "fundamentalism" has been described as a "back to the basics" approach to Hinduism, and it has been described as a myth created by the media.
According to a report in the British newspaper the Guardian, on January 10, 2008, in Japan,
... public donations are drying up and many of the country's 75,000 [Buddhist] temples are in financial trouble. Applications to Buddhist universities have fallen so dramatically that several schools have dropped the religious association from their titles.
Also in 2008, Lutheran churches in Denmark were described as either padlocked shut or those that were open on Sunday having only a few in attendance.
On October 5, 2008, Pope Benedict complained that "nations once rich in faith and vocations are losing their own identity under the harmful and destructive influence of a certain modern culture". The Pope has been described as having stated that "the West has declined because of its postmodern rejection the old rapprochement between Christianity and the classics of ancient Greece and Rome." [note]
The Pew Global Attitudes Project described a majority of U.S. citizens as claiming that religion played a "very important" role in their lives, similar to that found in its neighbors in Latin America. And another study, the American Religious Identification Survey, described between 76.5 and 78.5 percent of adult U.S. citizens as identifying themselves as Christians, with 15 percent describing themselves as having no religious affiliation. For Britain, this was described as 44 percent, and for Sweden 69 percent [note].
In the United States, the number of those identifying themselves as having no religion had been increasing. In 1986, 11 per cent of 18 to 25 year-olds described their religious preferences as “no religion/atheist/agnostic”. In 2006, this had increased to 20 percent. For those older than 25 it had increased, in this same time period, from 8 percent to 11 per cent. [note]
In addition to increase in number of those who have described themselves as having no religion, among Christians there has been a move away from traditional forms of worship -- praise for the Lord, shunning the Devil and the dangers of hell -- to a focus on solving mundane personal matters and finding success in the world, with maybe biblical verse cited here and there. These moves away from traditional religion are not easily explained, except to say that in modern times of greater freedom of thought and exposure to diverse ideas the young have been growing up questioning the attitudes and beliefs of their parents. The exposure to diverse ideas might compare to the difference between the more stable religious heritage of rural people in the South in the twentieth century -- known to us through the "country music" of that period (Roy Acuff, et cetera) and the views of urbanites in the northeast, who were more exposed to diversity and new ideas.
Why are the Czechs and Estonians the least religious of Europeans? According to a Eurobarameter Poll in 2005, Czechs believing in God are 19 percent and the Estonians 16 percent. The Estonians have been predominantly Lutheran and through the nineteenth century religion was associated with detested German feudal rule. Then in the twentieth century generations of Estonians lived under Marxist-Leninist rule, which might have contributed to a loss of interest in religion. Fifty years of Marxist-Leninist might also have had contributed to a declining interest in religion among the Czechs in diminishing -- a diminution that appears not to have been significantly reversed with the fall of Communism.
In Uzbekistan the end of Soviet power was followed by an increase in religious teaching and interest in Islam. After 1991, hundreds of mosques and religious schools were built or restored and reopened. But, according to Wikipedia, only "about half" of ethnic Uzbek respondents to a survey professed belief in Islam, and adherence to Islam was "weakest among the younger generations." In Islamic societies that did not pass through communism, adherence to Islam has been more prevalent.
In Japan, traditional religion was closely tied to the great patriotic war to 1945, and, with defeat in that war, traditional religion was discredited. Many Japanese began to see traditional religion as feudal and too old-fashioned.
World War II also challenged traditional religion among Europeans. It may be that the United States has remained more religious than Europe because it passed through World War II without the turmoil that Europe experienced.
With Japan's postwar technological success, a belief in science increased. But going into the twenty-first century, among some of the younger generation a backlash appeared that encouraged a return to tradition. The buying of books on spirituality increased. And international cultural diffusions were on the rise, increasing exposure to what for them were new religious ideas from India and elsewhere.
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Copyright © 2008 by Frank E. Smitha. All rights reserved.
address of this article: http://www.fsmitha.com/h2/ch37sci.htm