Retired particle physicist and outspoken atheist Victor Stenger developed a rhetorically powerful aphorism against religion: “Science flies men to the moon, religion flies men into buildings.”
I think Stenger is being a bit too selective in what he chooses to highlight about science and religion, though. Science has also been responsible for great moral atrocities, and religion has also been responsible for great moral goods. To demonstrate how worthless this rhetoric is, I could just as easily develop an aphorism modeled on Stenger’s to make the opposite point: “Science builds atomic bombs to kill millions of people, religion builds hospitals to save billions of people.”
Thinking to Believe 
December 28, 2012 at 4:29 pm
Your model is wrong because you are merely trying to denigrate the righteousness of Stenger’s. Science did not build atomic bombs to kill millions of people; science advanced to the degree that the technology was capable of killing millions of people but the atomic bomb was used only in WW II because of RELIGION: the Theocracy(religious) government of Japan would not stop its ruthless killing since its Pearl Harbor attack and its citizens were duped into believing that their Shinto gods were superior and would protect them until they conquered the world. hat’s why the atomic bomb was used, not to kill people but to put an end to killing people. Furthermore the unconditional surrender of Japan forced the Japanese to write and adopt a NEW Constitution:
SHINTO AFTER WWII:
Shinto was disestablished in 1946, when the Emperor lost his divine status as part of the Allied reformation of Japan. The Emperor wrote:
The ties between Us and Our people have always stood on mutual trust and affection. They do not depend upon mere legends and myths.
They are not predicated on the false conception that the Emperor is divine, and that the Japanese people are superior to other races and fated to rule the world.
from the Imperial rescript, January 1, 1946
One academic has written that the American Occupation Forces “undoubtedly wished to crush and destroy Shinto”, and certainly the orders issued by the occupying forces were very hostile to Shinto which they seem to have regarded as either a government-run cult, or a religion that had been converted into a military and nationalist ideology.
Japan’s post-war constitution separates religion and state in article 20:
1) Freedom of religion is guaranteed to all. No religious organization shall receive any privileges from the State, nor exercise any political authority.
2) No person shall be compelled to take part in any religious acts, celebration, rite or practice.
3) The State and its organs shall refrain from religious education or any other religious activity.
Constitution article 20
Article 89:
No public money or other property shall be expended or appropriated
for the use, benefit or maintenance of any religious institution or
association, or for any charitable, educational or benevolent
enterprises not under the control of public authority.
We, the Japanese people, acting through our duly elected
representatives in the National Diet, determined that we shall secure
for ourselves and our posterity the fruits of peaceful cooperation
with all nations and the blessings of liberty throughout this land,
and resolved that never again shall we be visited with the horrors of
war through the action of government, do proclaim that sovereign power
resides with the people and do firmly establish this Constitution.
Government is a sacred trust of the people, the authority for which is
derived from the people, the powers of which are exercised by the
representatives of the people, and the benefits of which are enjoyed
by the people. This is a universal principle of mankind upon which
this Constitution is founded. We reject and revoke all constitutions,
laws ordinances, and rescripts in conflict herewith. We, the Japanese
people, desire peace for all time and are deeply conscious of the high
ideals controlling human relationship and we have determined to
preserve our security and existence, trusting in the justice and faith
of the peace-loving peoples of the world. We desire to occupy an
honored place in an international society striving for the
preservation of peace, and the banishment of tyranny and slavery,
oppression and intolerance for all time from the earth. We recognize
that all peoples of the world have the right to live in peace, free
from fear and want. We believe that no nation is responsible to itself
alone, but that laws of political morality are universal; and that
obedience to such laws is incumbent upon all nations who would sustain
their own sovereignty and justify their sovereign relationship with
other nations. We, the Japanese people, pledge our national honor to
accomplish these high ideals and purposes with all our resources.
As far as building hospitals are concerned consider this; good people build institutions to help others because religion although trying to claim all good men and all good accomplishments unto themselves as religions are wont to do is a falsehood and one of many falsehoods upon which all religions are based:
The RELIGIOUS Collective serves only ITSELF & has no real life of ITS OWN. ITS minions, proxies and proselytes, are like robots of Protocol without discretionary insight or common sense. “IT” has no innate capacity for moral or ethical action of independent volition & has no capacity to respond truthfully to the moral & ethical concerns of real human beings. To the RELIGIOUS COLLECTIVE, the people are viewed as inventory to be managed and cattle to be prodded.
Religion has always been a cancer on planet earth perpetuated by clergy promoting the supernatural of the reptile brain and all around the world religions sound off its righteousness and morality like the retching of a cat as she hocks hairballs for the accolades of men; how can anyone associated with religion do what’s right when they look to one and other for approval and refuses to acknowledge the approval that comes from the one true spirit within; the spirit within all good men from whom all morals, all virtue, all good constructs on planet earth derive? Good people build hospitals, not religions.
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January 4, 2013 at 8:59 am
@ Leonardo – Surely the original analogy is as susceptible to your argument as Jason’s? Since you refuse to allow the statement “religion builds hospitals” and “science didn’t create atomic bomb”, the same can be inferred onto the original: Science didn’t send men to the moon, and religion didn’t fly men into buildings.
I do not follow your argument in the the atomic bomb was used for religious reasons. It was the new biggest bomb that the US had and therefore it was used in warfare. It was not used by the Japanese and therefore has zero relevance to your Shinto disestablishment. Whether or not you want to attribute Japan bombing Pearl Harbour as a “religious” entity has no factor in the use of atomic weaponry (and is a seperate argument as I do not think you can successfully argue the it was due to religious reasoning rather than political).
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January 5, 2013 at 7:23 am
“Science flies men to the moon, religion flies men into buildings”… I’m assuming the writer is implying one is better than the other? I find it hypocritical that athiests will claim how “evil” religion is and go on tyraids about freeing minds from the “evil” clergy all the while having no moral objective basis to call ANYTHING truly good or truly evil. On athiesm, there is no objective moral good, morality is an illusion. Morality is simply the result of socio-biological processes, there really is no GOOD or Evil, it just IS. There is no moral authority with which to root ANYTHING being truly good or evil OBJECTIVELY, it’s just simply an illusion,…or nothing more than an opinion. So before athiests go on the big crusade to free minds from religion and push their “truth” to humanity they should ask themselves, “what makes what Im doing so GOOD?”. I mean, if we are enlightened and have the revelation that our moral experiences aren’t really real or that good and evil is simply subjective… why trouble yourselves , there is nothing REALLY wrong with flying into buildings, its just socially unpopular. Simply put, you can’t argue that God or religion is evil accept that God exists.
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January 7, 2013 at 10:20 pm
Jaysen76,
I agree. But these new atheists aren’t like the old atheists who recognized the logical implications of atheism: nihilism. These new atheists want to have their cake and eat it to. Many of them still maintain belief in an objective morality, though their accounts of the ontological grounding for morality fall short (and often reveal the fact that their moral system is actually subjective rather than objective).
I give kudos to these atheists for admitting rather than denying the obvious: moral truths exist. But they do need to consider much more seriously the grounding problem. Instead, they continue to graze in the field of epistemology, happily accepting moral truths without a satisfactory account of where they come from or why we should obey them.
Jason
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January 8, 2013 at 8:09 pm
Jason,
Yeah… that sounds like having their cake and eating it too alright.
I remember watching a debate between Sam Harris and William Lane Craig and discovering that one way atheists try to get around the moral issue is by simply redifining the word “good” to mean, ” the well being/flourishing of consious creatures”. But Craig easily demonstrated that creaturely well being and moral goodness are not identical after all. Atheism = empty.
Hey Jason, I just want to say that I love your thoughts here on theosophical ruminations and on the website onenesspentecostal.com. I really enjoyed your article ” You can’t know atheism is true unless God exists”. I have had several interesting discussions with the people I work with based off several of your articles. I was told today actually that because of some of these discussions, they had changed their mind from the belief that there is no possibility of a being like God, to the belief that there IS. PTL
I always look forward to each thought provoking and informative topic you bring to us , thankyou!
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January 9, 2013 at 10:52 am
Good to hear Jaysen. Thanks for the report!
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January 12, 2013 at 10:00 am
OK, well consider the following scenario. The local ‘Cedars Sinai’ hospital closes down due to lack of funds. Fortunately a religious group puts forward money to sponsor a new hospital, with even better facilities and cheaper costs for patients. The hospital is named after Abu Bakr, the first Caliph (successor to Muhammad). How would you feel? What do you think of the motives of those who built and sponsor this new and better hospital?
best regards,
Neil
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January 15, 2013 at 10:13 am
Neil,
Why should I care who built the hospital, or what it is named? All I care is that when I’m sick, they are there to help me.
And how does this relate to the science is good and religion is evil topic?
Jason
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January 15, 2013 at 11:03 am
If you recall, you mentioned the hospitals that religions build to save billions. A hospital built by a religion (or a political group) is meant to promote goodwill towards that organisation, thus paving the way for conversions (or keeping the donations coming). So not for free at all. Also in the US, medical care is not generally free, even in church hospitals – where is the altruism there?
Take care,
Neil
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January 15, 2013 at 11:37 am
Neil,
Yes, I remember, but your example involved two different religoius groups. Since the issue is the social good of science vs. religion, a more fitting scenario would be that Cedar Sinai is replaced by an endowment from MIT scientists.
I don’t see how a hospital built by, say, Catholics is only meant to promote goodwill toward Catholics. There is no requirement that only Catholics go there. And I’ve been to Catholic hospitals and evangelism was never part of the experience.
As for cost, why think that it must be free to be a good thing? Everything costs money, including good things. Imagine if no one, including religious organizations, created hospitals and you needed knee surgery. Would you not consider it a good thing if the Catholics built a hospital to repair your leg, even if they charged you money for doing so? Access to medical care is a good in itself.
Jason
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March 12, 2013 at 7:29 pm
Worthless, misguided rhetoric indeed. It presupposes that religion and science are two competing approaches to inquiry and technological advancement. But in reality it’s equating apples and oranges. Might as well show a Picasso painting next to the international space station with the text “Where has art gotten us lately?” It would equally miss the point.
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October 29, 2013 at 3:16 am
Thanks allot you guys gave me a bigger picture on this argument
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December 25, 2016 at 2:16 pm
There is something between belief in a god-being and atheism — it is embracing the (?). I don’t have to believe in a god to acknowledge my empathy for my fellow sentient beings. Perhaps that can be labeled “good”, and lack of empathy can be labeled “evil”. When a particular religion promotes the idea that it’s members are more favorable in the eyes of an all-powerful deity vs members of another religion or atheists, and this particular religion is superior and it’s member’s lives have more intrinsic value than other beings outside of that religion, and this value system is used to perpetrate harm upon others, that could be considered an “evil” of religious belief.
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December 25, 2016 at 2:26 pm
Sarah F.
I think you are correct in your observation that when “…….this value system is used to perpetrate harm upon others that could be considered an “evil” of religious belief.”
But this observation can also be considered as the evil of Nationalism and Sports Fanaticism and this is not just is national sports or regional sports but in cultish groups generally even in our schools one school group sets themselves on another school’s group and they have school fights over sports or over different school groups.
This might be called the evil of egotism of which religion does not have a monopoly but a domain of which is very prevalent in world affairs like soccer matches and football games and the like. You know the ole saying Birds of a feather flank together. Not an uncommon thing for security or sense of belonging and of course than also goes right down to families…the Hatfields and the McCoys. and my father is better than your father and so on……
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December 31, 2016 at 5:09 pm
Sarah, you are right. You don’t have to believe in God to have empathy for fellow human beings or to do good. But that’s not the issue. Christianity doesn’t teach that belief in God is necessary for such things. What Christianity claims is that God must exist for such things to be true. In order for true goodness to exist (as opposed to mere preferences or social mores), and in order for true empathy to exist, God must exist. He is what gives meaning to such things. He is the ontological grounding for such things. It’s like books. One does not need to believe in authors to be able to read books, but authors must exist for there to be books to read in the first place.
As for religions and favor, not all religions teach the same things. Your description surely does not fit the teachings of Christianity. We do not believe that some humans have more value than others. We simply believe that some humans have correct thoughts about the divine and some do not, and that one’s religious beliefs matter. If, as Christianity teaches, everyone is suffering estrangement from God due to their sin, and that Jesus alone provided the solution to our sin problem, then one must be a Christian and trust in Jesus to be saved. it is not about superiority, but about finding a real solution to a real spiritual problem. It’s like medicine. When one has cancer, and the only solution is chemotherapy, it’s not hubris on the part of the doctor to tell you that you must undergo chemo if you want to be saved. Jesus is the only cure for our sin, and that’s why we must believe in Him.
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