New 100 Spaniards and God

• Física, General
• Falsedades, Filosofia
• 20 September, 2016

Mariano Artigas:

Commenting on the book by José Maria Gironella

“…the interviewees who are scientists or have studied science they do not see any opposition between science and religion, and that, on the contrary, those who think that opposition exists are people who, although educated, have not dedicated themselves to science. […] …among people with an important social impact, those who have greater relationship with the world of science are usually those who do not see difficulties for combine science and religion.”.

“Personally, the conclusion seems logical to me: the era of conflicts between science and religion, when some claimed that science opposed faith and it would even destroy it, belongs to the past. Nowadays nobody who is moderately informed will hold that opinion”.

Contrary to the positivist thesis, religion is not based on human ignorance, in which case progress would be enough to leave it out of the game. Religious issues are inscribed in the human heart and affect their most fundamental aspirations, which can not be resolved only by science, and refer to experiences and reflections that are in the proper field of religion.

In the field of current philosophy of science, the positivist thesis appears too simple and almost nobody is willing to defend it. In the field of specialists, positivism does not deserve any credit, and it is accepted that science and religion respond to two different but complementary perspectives.

Discredited, but influential

However, positivism is not dead. Not much less. Perhaps it is discredited as a doctrinal interpretation, but its basic idea influences today more than ever. There are few who consider that the last questions have no answer, and that only the sciences provide objective knowledge. Or not even the sciences.

The current positivism usually appears under the title of naturalism. Naturalism seeks to exclude God from any serious rational explanation. And usually focuses on the study of the human person, which is reduced to its material, physical-chemical and neuronal dimensions. As one of the scientists interviewed points out, the biggest challenge que la religión debe afrontar hoy en nombre de la ciencia es el que se presenta como avalado por la neurociencia: algunos they pretend to explain everything human, including conscience and religion, through the chemistry of the brain.

Text extracted from the article online: Around the book-survey of José María Gironella, “New 100 strongiards and God”. Editorial Planeta. Barcelona, 1994.

Mariano Artigas Mayayo
(Zaragoza, 1938 – Pamplona, 2006)
Philosopher and strongish priest.
Doctor in philosophy, in physics and in theology.

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