Religion versus Science has always been a controversial issue of our generation, “religion deals with super natural; science deals with natural”. In this assignment I will first evaluate Mr. S. J. Gould's essay “there is no conflict between religion and science” and then I will also evaluate R. Dawkins “Religion and Science Cannot Be Reconciled” and lastly I will state my personal opinion regarding this matter and why I believe religion and science can coexist together.
In his essay “there is no conflict between religion and science” Stephen Jay Gould argues that both religion and science never overlap each-others domains, but instead both are closely bumped against each-other and that both are necessary to understand the human life experiences and existence. Gould does this by first examining Pope John Paul's controversial document which had raised eyebrows about a Pope accepting the theory of evolution, and compares it to one of the previous Pope Pius work called “Humani Generis”. Gould states that the main message of the “Humani Generis” was: “Catholics could believe whatever science determined about the evolution of the human body, as long as they accepted that, at some, time of his choosing, God had infused the soul into such a creature” (Gould/ non-Overlapping Magisteria, 53). Also through the “Humani Generis” Gould introduces us a Latin word called; Magisterium- or a form of Teaching Authority. With this he creates the main bases of his argument called “nonover-lapping magisteria” or NOMA. Gould then goes on to say that “The net of science covers the empirical realm: What is the universe made of (fact) and why does it work this way (theory). The net of religion extends over questions of moral values. These two magisteria do not over lap, nor do they encompass all inquiry” (Gould/ non-Overlapping Magisteria, 54). In this statement Gould is making a clear understanding of his case that shows that both science and religion work together but never overlap each other. He also goes on to show that Pius also accepted the NOMA principle though his main message of “Humani Generis” (stated earlier in this paper). In his closing argument Gould restates that NOMA concept “represents a principle position on moral and intellectual grounds, not a diplomatic solution”, and that religion and science cannot interfere with each others domains.
In the essay “Religion and Science Cannot Be Reconciled” Richard Dawkins argues that religion cannot accommodate with science and that religion itself has “hidden inconsistencies” about its domain. Dawkins states that “No civilized person uses scripture as ultimate authority of moral reasoning. Instead we pick and chose the nice bits of scripture and blithely ignore the nasty bits. (Dawkins/ You cant have it both ways, 57) what Dawkins means is that people pick and chose what they like about religion and ignore the dark side of it he goes on further and argues that just like our religious view we only tend to follow the good religious teachers such as Jesus and ignore the bad ones like Charles Manson. Dawkins goes as far as questioning God and his theories, and he states that religion domain continuously interferes with science domains by stating that “Religions make existence claim, and this means scientific claims”. Furthermore he states an example “Either Mary's body decayed when she died, or it was physically moved from this planet to Heaven” (Dawkins/ You cant have it both ways, 58) what Darwin is questioning here is the domain of religion and the physical