The mind of God? The problem with deifying Stephen Hawking

Re:The mind of God? The problem with deifying Stephen Hawking by haswell on Monday March 15, 2021 @08:06PM (#26471135)

This was my first reaction to this as well. I grew up in a very religious family. The "Science is another religion" take is as problematic as "The republicans/democrats are the all the same".

The #1 thing that strikes me is that any characteristics shared by religion and science only exist because of human behavior, while the fundamentals could not be more different.

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Re:The mind of God? The problem with deifying Stephen Hawking by beaconstudios on Monday March 15, 2021 @08:15PM (#26471232)

Science isn't a religion. Scientism, basically is - they're not the same thing. I used that word specifically.

Scientism is the fetishisation of science.

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Re:The mind of God? The problem with deifying Stephen Hawking by haswell on Monday March 15, 2021 @11:29PM (#26472629)

While I appreciate the distinction, the point still stands: fetishization is something that humans do, and science, while imperfect, stands on a foundation that is entirely unlike that of religion.

The definition and history of scientism is also more complex than "basically a religion".

Meanwhile, a large and growing group of people truly believe that science is religion in a very literal sense, and they're using that belief to reject the reality of climate change, peddle anti-vaccine viewpoints, etc, and that has nothing to do with scientism.

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