"All Scientists Should Be Militant Atheists"

[SmootherPebble]

Lawrence Krauss just wrote a piece for The New Yorker titled, "All Scientists Should Be Militant Atheists". 

I'm sure a lot of you know who he is, but if you're not, he is a theoretical physicist, often noted for his lecture and book on "A Universe From Nothing" (it's worth checking out on YouTube). He was also a friend of Christopher Hitchens. 

Curious what you think of his opinion in this article. My opinion is in complete and total agreeance, almost to the letter.

[ScepticOrganism]

I fully agree as well. If anything, it should be mandatory.

Of course, you'll always have people pretending that evolution/Big Bang ect ect... are all part of god's creation. Which just goes to show you how much ground religion has lost. When they can't prey on scientific gaps, they hijack the pre-existing scientific ideas, and claim that they were foretold millenniums ago by their respective religions.

[Alex K]

I think he's being silly again. Of course, in the methodology, every scientist has to act as if God does not directly interfere with what you are describing. But many more or less religious scientists manage to do that.

I mean, of course I'd love for all scientists to be militant atheists. But then, I think everyone should...

[Crossless2.0]

I'm much less concerned that all scientists be atheists, let alone militant atheists, than that they all endeavor to do significant work and help to educate the lay public about their findings. There have been plenty of theists who contributed mightily to our understanding of the world. I'm more grateful for their contributions than irritated that they privately held beliefs I find silly.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I'm with Crossless on this one. There are scads of religious scientists who do exemplary work in spite of their religious delusions. The ability to separate what you would like to be true from what is true is the hallmark of how science and scientists operate. People who are unable to make that division would do well to stick to preaching - they'll never contribute anything meaningful to human knowledge.

Boru

[abaris]

Lawrence Krauss loves to hear himself talk. As long as a scientist does his job, it's nobodys business if they believe or not. And if their belief interfers with their findings, they make fools of themselves anyway. So, this is a moot point anyway.

And by the way, waving wads of cash in front of some scientists compromises their work ethics too. As can be seen with the select few climate change deniers among them.

Whenever someone brings up militant something, my alarm bells go off in any case. This isn't a fight and this is no flag to rally behind. I spent my whole life evading flags like the plague, so I'm certainly not a friend of militant atheism.

[vorlon13]

Scientists with their own doomsday devices (yes Professor Farnsworth) probably shouldn't be militant anything.

[brewer]

Definitely don't agree with militant, to many negative connotations. Don't necessarily agree with atheist. How about separation of church and science?

[SmootherPebble]

Definitely don't agree with militant, to many negative connotations. Don't necessarily agree with atheist. How about separation of church and science?

Well I think that's the point of Krauss' hyperbole. That there's no such thing as reconcilable science-religion because then you wouldn't, by definition, be able to do science. So any scientist worth his/her weight in anything must be atheist in the lab... must be either completely atheist, or only religious in public.

[AFTT47]

Scientists need to use the scientific method in their work. That's it. It may seem like cognitive dissonance but there are a minority of scientists who do good science in the lab and have their faith outside of it. I won't pretend to understand it but it's there. And a militant atheist is one with a socio-political agenda. That is hardly necessary for doing science.

The theoretical physicist Steven Weinberg has said that he doesn't care enough about religion to even bother calling himself an atheist.