Faith and Science: Who killed more?
By ParaTed2k
@ParaTed2k (22940)
Sheboygan, Wisconsin
June 2, 2009 10:55pm CST
I was reading an article the other day. The author said that spiritual people and religion was the root of all evil in the world. He cited all the usual suspects in such a bit of prose; The witch hunts, the Inquisition, the Crusades. He then brought up more modern evils like Islamist Extremist Terrorism and Catholic Pedophile Priests.
Sadly, I can't say he was wholely wrong. In the name of deity, evil men have reigned with blood and horror through the ages.
However, he made the same mistake a lot of people do when writing against the spiritual in favor of science. He forgets the fact that spirituality has motivated people to acts of charity and kindness also. More importantly, they forget that science is not without its blood stains.
Science has brought us wonders that defied the imaginations of past great thinkers. Using science, human beings became the only species on Earth that was ever able to save the lives of each other, and other species. Science has given us means of communication that has brought the people of earth closer together than ever before.
But there is something else we learn from science. That is, with the power to create comes the power to destroy.
Almost every means spiritual people have come up with to kill, science provided them the means to do it.
Even healers can use our knowledge to destroy if we choose. I joke that the Army taught me how to kill, Paramedic school taught me how to get away with it. In my entire military career, I never killed anyone. I can't say the same for my 10 years in EMS... and neither can any medical professional who treats patients.
So why do people of science hold spiritual people to a difference standard than they hold themselves? Why do they make excuses when people of science kill, but condemn religion for the same thing?
True, there are times when medicine can't help and the patient dies anyway. We try to comfort the loved ones by saying, "we did all we can do".. which is usually true. However, there are also times when the "all we can do" is what caused the death in the first place.
Yes, evil people have abused faith to bring about countless horrors, but haven't evil people abused science for the same end?
So why does religion stand forever condemned when science is just as guilty? Why is science revered for what it has brought us, but the beauty brought into the world by the faithful is quickly forgotten or explained away.
Yes, religion was used by tyrants, but it also gave us Mother Teresa, The International Red Cross, the entire concept of the classroom, and charity.
3 people like this
1 response
@turandotty (228)
• United States
3 Jun 09
Very good points. I hadn't thought of that before - that scientists don't hold themselves to the same standards. After all, who developed the atomic bomb?
I really never understood why science has to be separate from religion. It's like - can't you see religion within science? For me, God is science.
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@ParaTed2k (22940)
• Sheboygan, Wisconsin
3 Jun 09
Well, to me, science is man trying to figure out how God does it. But at this point, neither have enough information about the other to come to a logical conclusion. I look to science to teach me the ways of the physical and religion to teach me the ways of the spiritual.
2 people like this