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For many of us we all have a religious belief of some sort whether or not we call ourselves ‘religious.
Pushing that opening statement aside for a moment ….. we are seeing the boundaries of space being pushed further and further back these days where science fiction is fast becoming fact or at the very least the fictions are being proved or scientifically ‘rubbished’.
Has it got to the stage where religion is now a state of science fiction with a great story and loads of magic and great adventures?

Science fact?
The latest theory, or so I hear is that dark matter does not need to exist for the universe to exist and for equations of Gravity to balance.
For years scientists believed ther was not enough mass or matter to hold our Galxaies and thus our Universe together.
The latest theory is if Space was not actually Space and contained just four atoms per cubic metre ...
Then due to the sheer volume of pace between stars and galaxies the mass of all these random floating atoms would add up to the missing half of the universe.
It seems to me there would be quite a simple way to test this? any thoughts?

Could you explain that a little further Alie, for us lay people. I know according to the WMAP that the universe is made up of:

WMAP's complete census of the universe finds that dark matter (not made up of atoms) make up 23.3% (to within 1.3%)

WMAP's accuracy and precision determined that dark energy makes up 72.1% of the universe (to within 1.5%), causing the expansion rate of the universe to speed up. - "Lingering doubts about the existence of dark energy and the composition of the universe dissolved when the WMAP satellite took the most detailed picture ever of the cosmic microwave background (CMB)."

I don't know how this relates to what you are stating at all, lol. This can be found here and more:

http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/

As for the religious beliefs, a prophet could conceivably be called a psychic and there are those, have seen them on cable, who say that the "God" they believe in talks to them so people call them prophets and listen to them even in this day and age. There is never really any proof so I guess it would be based on the credibility of the person who is claiming such. There are other groups that believe things that depending on what your beliefs are could be labeled "magic." I think it is just all relative to your frame of reference and what you were brought up to believe or conclusions one has personally come up with. I don't think you can bring science into it because most of the beliefs are centuries old so there is no one alive to really test exactly, as far as the more mainstream belief systems go. Traditions are carried on without questions in some cases but I think people have gotten a little disgruntled with mainstream ideas and are either abandoning them or looking to a different focus. I don't think it has anything to do with science or science fiction. Society changes as time passes and I think that is all there is to it. We are at war in many places of the world and most of the world's countries are having cataclysms while the others are going bankrupt. Some of it is the nature of morale and no burning bush talking to anyone.

I think for a view to be called religious all you need to do is to feel the need to defend it like people defend their religious beliefs even if your belief isnt a common thing for religion.

Well , there are lots of theories I like the Heisenberg principle which relates to the schrodingers cat therory..
When you meaasure at the tiny quantum level your own measurement affects the outcome.
Therefore there is a pre-set limit to that which man can observe and thus known for certain.
Indeed, if you follow this principle through, you end up with the notion that intuition and historical "knowns" are the best way to predict chaotic systems.
As with many things in nature, what is true of the micro is often true of the macro so looking for common sense and the obvious from those with high emotional and social IQ's may well be more productive than burying highly sensitive instruments deep underground.
http://physics.about.com/od/physics101thebasics/tp/10inttheories.htm

Alright... I have dreams, certain dreams that scientists would prefer to acknowledge as Lucid Dreams. My dreams appear to me as very real, as real as astral projection or O.B.E's. On the topic of religion, I am going to take the Spiritualist approach to this since I have no religious dogma to relate to.

As ~AsphaltTears~ pointed out, scientists would more then likely call Prophets - Psychics (clairvoyant would be the prefered term in my perspective). Since my dreams appear so real to me, would they then... if spiritual or dogmatic in essence, be prophetic? Perhaps. If I dreamt about end times and all that jargon and real to everyone else if the dreams came true...?

I was having this same discussion with a few friends of mine a few weeks back. I asked them as they are both very scientifically oriented and minded, if one person saw a tear within the space/time continuum would it be presumed as Lucid Dreaming? If a group of people saw that same tear, would it be perceived as Group Hypnosis? If the whole world saw that same tear... then it would be seen as a reality... WHY? Because the whole of the world approves of its existance?

Answer that one with a sci-fact...

Soul Shroud, I am with you on this one.
I have asked the scientists and researchers for some clues or answers and the truth is they have no answers and probably know less than you and I.
Generally speaking when confronted with evidence that does not fit in "their" known way of how the universe and the human brain operates they always look for the obvious cop-outs. i.e. its coincidence or the mind created that reality. The president himself could swear blind he saw the Occult but unless he has a team of analysts and instruments in the white house...it would be firmly brushed under the rug which is getting rather full.

It has now come to the stage where you cannot take anything for granted. It wasnt long ago were ours was the only solar system and that our plants were the only ones in it and now it is getting bigger and bigger. And we have now discovered more and more solar systems.

In a very short time we have come from just flying to now we can send ships into space and each year we go further and further in space.

Not long ago religon was all people had and that was all people believed in now with more information coming to light people are able to believe in more.

if religion requires "a leap of faith", that is, believing in something that cannot be proven "scientifically" does that require the reverse, ie. if you can't explain something scientifically, then religion must explain it?

that would seem to always set religion and science in opposition. as scientific progress explains more and more of the world and the universe, religion is not needed to explain as much.

if however, you don't expect religion to explain that which science cannot, then advances in science can be made and science and religion no longer need to oppose each other.

I think that depends on what religion you follow and how strictly you adhere to its tenants. For most evangelical christians that's a near impossibility.

I think if anybody is comfortable with their religion then they will find that science and religion work well together.
Science isn't disproving religion it merely follows a path of fact.

i agree...my first degree was in physics, and the more i have studied, the more firmly i believe in something greater than myself.
i also suspect that everyones idea of the gods is probably wrong...but i also dont think in the end it will matter.

ifyou want some weird stuff to consider, read up on string theory.

we all may just be a particular vibration.
i find that to be quite odd...and a bit disquieting.
~W~

I personally feel that ALL religion comes from SOME sort of fact. It is just the means of the VARIABLE that documents them. The VARIABLE in this case being human beings. It is inevitable that all humans lie or stretch the truth to some extent, making real accounts of awesome things into unbelievable accounts of the same things. I think what is important here is that YOU trust in your beliefs and are happy with them. After all, isn't that what counts in life?

Religions, superstitions, whatever you choose to call it, have always had a history of explaining things. What I despise is the religious preachers on Tv spouting their intolerance for anyone who's different and identifiable. Pure spirituality is the answer.

I wonder if it's easier to have extremists in religion as they have nothing in theory to prove or rather it is all just theory. Whereas having the need for a scientist to prove their theory is quite necessary, and facts have to be sort.

Mr Wolf some latest facts, yes we seem to be the stuff of thought and oscilation.

1. They still have not found the Higs Boson particle that gives matter its mass its weight substance and gravity.

If they don't find it soon they will have to tear up their books and start again...LOVE THAT!

2. THE LATEST OF DARK ENERGY AND DARK MATTER.

It does seem to exist and the Maths works when computers (as Humans do) only calculate that 4 % of the universe is the real stuff (stars planets etc)

Most of the rest is invisible so the chances are there are multiple universes and perhaps Dark Universes(watch the film Thor for some nice ideas -2D is best)

This link is the latest-
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1389206/Dark-energy-DOES-exist-increasingly-driving-universe-apart-scientists-claim.html

The difference between Fact and Religion is the leap of faith that one must make to follow a religion. There is some un-knowable that a person has to take on faith.

Science only has one leap of faith to accept, that the "scientific method" will establish the natural law of the universe, as such, it is as much a religion as those that say there is but one God who created the universe and all in it.

Seen in this light, paranormal events cannot be explained by science and therefore, they must be imaginary, from a scientist's point of view.

Whether the paranormal experience is a fact of nature is not something that can be proven using math, scientific inquiry or any of the hard sciences. We find that those that typically experience paranormal phenomenon have typically learned to rely on their own senses. When they experience something visually, audibly, tactile experience taste and or smell. The phenomenon is real and requires no leap of faith to know that this is reality.

The problem comes with others. For the experient to convince another of the reality of their own experience requires the other to take it on faith, that the experient is telling the exact truth without embellishment.

Perhaps these are more factory false trails mmm they look real to me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NcuXyNY1XXY&feature=related

The difference between Fact and Religion is the leap of faith that one must make to follow a religion. There is some un-knowable that a person has to take on faith.
-Gregor

Science fiction is only science that has not yet to be perfected in modern times. Just like magic.

A few quotes from a very famous author and philosopher.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

Arthur C. Clarke, "Profiles of The Future", 1961 (Clarke's third law)


The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.

Arthur C. Clarke

I wouldn't insult science fiction, by connecting the two...

religion is more about faith, whereas even when it's recognised as fiction, there is a basis of science, to the fiction...

So this thread is about, or rather, has seemed to turn into, science vs. religion?

Well if you're looking for which one to believe, the answer shouldn't be hard.

I have my own theories that I am refining as the days go by, and unless by popular demand, I wont post them here, as I feel they may confuse the heck out of everyone.

I have always look at religion as more of a guid line. You read the book, which ever it may be for you, and you should interperate the stories inside for yourself. Regardless of if its real or not. But I can't see it being described as it was in the last bit of the begining of the thread

don't know about any others here, but I'm not knocking religion: it works, for some.

tho...

to me, I look at Creationism, which talks of one thing and what I percieve to be right... and, well...

These days there are so many different religions and it is all about what you believe. Science is completely different. Religion isnt a science and never will be so the two cannot be the same.

religion and science are two completely different things. The only way these cross is when they try to prove things ie the Ark they found it so that proved it did exist.

When people begin to mingle religion and science the lines become too blurred. And what's worse are those people who are denying science because of their religious beliefs.

They have never found Noah's Ark and won't it's a shame that people believe in such fanciful tales. The talking snake really makes me shake my head

Exactly, Mel ... exactly.

Beliefs are usually always anti-thetical to the Scientific Method.

Belief begins at the opposite end of where Science does. Belief first requires a preconceived "truth" or "law" (dogma) for which evidences only in support of such are sought. Science begins first with seeking evidences, whatever they might be, and sticking strickly to them and slowly moving on from there to a hypothesis that, after deliberate attempts to disprove it, ultimate lead to a theory that... even then... will continue to be tested and tried, honed and improved upon from there.

In short, Science results in questions that may never be answered while Belief results in answers that may never be questioned.


Now... Sci-Fi is the combination of imagination with science fact and extrapolating from there on to a possible scenario for the sake of the story. And, as seen so often, it is not uncommon that such a story, if well conceived and thought out, can actually predict future science facts.

Eben all religions, including mine being a pagan is filled with lore, myths, mysticism and madness. *LOL*However there's more science fiction as when I was involved as an evangelical christian, with the talking snake, original sin, the rapture, and other silly notions.

A majority of what has to be accepted is illogical.

Well perhaps, but then again if it harms none so big worries

The illogical bits form the foundation for behavior that is indeed harmful, just think how many suicide bombings could have been avoided if the Fantasy of 40 virgins was never started.

I know Muslim Clerics who dismiss that notion of the virgins after death. They say it';s allegorical at best, and some fanatical elements take it as literal