h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Unfortunately, the author's explanation in this article is fundamentally flawed, because it assumes that by definition that religion demands unquestioning acknowledgement of its beliefs whereas science remains open to questioning beliefs. This is not actually true.

Religion recognizes that faith is required where direct sensory observations regarding a belief are not available. However, this does not mean that a person cannot question their beliefs and remain convinced of their validity. An unbeliever is not someone who questions his/her faith, but rather someone who questions their belief and then abandons it.

To turn to the issue of science, once again the author is not accurate in his/her description of the field. Science cannot question or doubt everything and provide verification for every possible belief. For example, science cannot verify the following propositions widely held by human beings:

(1) I exist.
(2) An external physical world exists.
(3) My senses give me true representations of the external physical world.
(4) I have a rational mind.
(5) Other human beings have rational minds.
(6) The scientific approach is the rational method for understanding the underlying structure of the world.
(7) The world is regular and uniform in the way it is structured.

Every scientist must ultimately hold these beliefs without having scientific verifcation for them, which is exactly the same position in which a spiritual person finds themselves when accepting a religious belief.

Sven.

Except that beyond those seven points there are the proofs drawn from experimental evidence and analytical observations. Religion is faith and superstition from top to bottom.

"Every scientist must ultimately hold these beliefs without having scientific verifcation for them, which is exactly the same position in which a spiritual person finds themselves when accepting a religious belief."

Which leads to an interesting point made by Steven Hawking. He said that the reality of a scientific model isn't really important--what matters is tis ability to make accurate predictions. Thus, it doesn't matter whether those seven assumptions are true or not--a theory is still valid if it allows a scientist to accurately predict the future.

Salam to all

Isn't that exactly what a religious person would also claim. That what really matters is accurately predicting the future.

In religion this is known as "prophesy".

Except the religious people tend not to be able to predict the future accurately.