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From: pindor@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca (Andrzej Pindor)
Subject: Re: Is there a spiritual force etc.?
Message-ID: <CwE43I.4tJ@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca>
Organization: UTCC Public Access
References: <3546sj$4ef@infosrv.edvz.univie.ac.at> <1994Sep14.084938.6638@datcon.co.uk> <Cw4q52.CKt@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca> <1994Sep16.100930.16114@unix.brighton.ac.uk>
Date: Mon, 19 Sep 1994 18:45:18 GMT
Lines: 41

In article <1994Sep16.100930.16114@unix.brighton.ac.uk>,
shute <mjs14@unix.brighton.ac.uk> wrote:
>In article <Cw4q52.CKt@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca> pindor@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca (Andrzej Pindor) writes:
>>You will hopefully agree that the consequences of axioms used by scientist
>>are for all to see (eg. the workstation you are using just now). These
>>axioms are, so to say, born out by the fact that with their help scientists
>>have been able to make a lot of progress in dealing with 'reality'. Now, if 
>>you could give an example of useful practical consequences of religious
>>axioms, you would have a point in putting them on equal footing. However,
>>I am afraid that whatever you come up with will have no comparison to 
>>the consequences of scientific axioms. 
>
>Have you asked any of the lawers in your country from whence the laws of your
>land draw their origin?  [Could it be from those of Britain, which in turn
>would claim some correlation with the 10 Commandments?]
>
>What about the American Constitution?
>I know that you and I are not bound by it... but we both have to admit
>that is every bit as existant as your workstation.  Where does that
>owe its origins, if not from the religious beliefs of the Pilgrim Fathers?

You certainly have a point here. However, is seems to me that there is
a clear difference between consequences (of scientific axioms) for our
ability to deal with 'reality' and consequences (of religious axioms) for
interhuman relations. I hope you agree. Human relationships adapt to
conseqences of religious axioms (look at cultures based on different 
religious axioms). Nature does not adapt to different scientific axioms,
axioms have to be adapted. This, I think, is a fundamental reason why  
it is misleading to put these axioms on equal footing - the above distinction
becomes blurred.
>-- 
>
>Malcolm SHUTE.         (The AM Mollusc:   v_@_ )        Disclaimer: all
>

Andrzej
-- 
Andrzej Pindor                        The foolish reject what they see and 
University of Toronto                 not what they think; the wise reject
Instructional and Research Computing  what they think and not what they see.
pindor@gpu.utcc.utoronto.ca                           Huang Po
