How Anti-Religious Bias Prevented Scientists from Accepting the Big Bang

[guillaumeb]

From the article:

Today, the Big Bang model of Cosmology is pretty much taken for Gospel, and for good reason. For more than fifty years, evidence gathered from all manner of sources has supported the notion that the Universe as we know it expanded from an infinitely dense singularity.
But things didn't always look so certain for the Big Bang. In its most nascent form, the idea was known as the hypothesis of the primeval atom, and it originated from an engineer turned soldier turned mathematician turned Catholic priest turned physicist by the name of Georges Lemaître. When Lemaître published his idea in the eminent journal Nature in 1931, a response to observational data suggesting that space was expanding, he ruffled a lot of feathers.....

As Keating continued, anti-religious sentiments provided underlying motivation to debunk Lemaître's theory.

To read more:

https://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2018/05/14/how_bias_against_religion_prevented_scientists_from_accepting_the_big_bang.html

[yallerdawg]

1. Illuminating article.

Many atheist scientists were repulsed by the Big Bang's creationist overtones. According to Hoyle, it was cosmic chutzpah of the worst kind: "The reason why scientists like the 'big bang' is because they are overshadowed by the Book of Genesis." In contrast, the Steady State model was the rightful heir to the Copernican principle. It combined the banality of space with humanity's mediocrity in time. Thanks to Hoyle, humanity had humility.

This scientific saga demonstrates that entrenched beliefs affect the nonreligious as well as the religious. In the end, bias should always bow to evidence.

[msongs]

2. evidence and religion are two words that never will meet. nt

[guillaumeb]

4. I suggest reading the article.

The evidence is unrelated to your assertion.

[yallerdawg]

6. Are you familiar with ...

Gregor Mendel, his work in the garden of a monastery? Of course you are!

Also known as "the father of modern genetics."

[guillaumeb]

3. Agreed.

Perhaps the fact that Georges Lemaitre was a Catholic priest biased all of these supposedly fact driven non-theistic scientists to reject his ideas.

Perhaps also these same scientists rejected the NOMA argument as well.

[yallerdawg]

5. If today's standards of thought...

are applied to the historical record, you get all kinds of biases going.

[guillaumeb]

8. One poster actually accused Francis of Asissi of not having the right attitude.

Meaning a 21st century attitude.

[marylandblue]

7. When Lemaitre proposed his theory, there was no evidence to support it

The competing theory, the steady state model, also had no evidence. Scientists on both sides looked for evidence. Evidence was found in 1964 with the cosmic microwave background. Everyone immediately understood what the evidence met, including Lemaitre even though it was not part of his original theory. Big bang won based on evidence. Hoyle never accepted the evidence for the big bang, he was pretty much alone on this until he died.

Notice that every sentence in the preceding chapter paragraph contains the word evidence. Doesn't matter what scientists originally thought or why, evidence always wins.

Now, how does religion treat evidence? Darwin developed the theory of evolution and presented evidence. The evidence found since then is overwhelming. But people realized it was contrary to the Bible. They still have not accepted the evidence. Those people don't accept the big bang either. Evidence always loses when it contradicts religion.

[guillaumeb]

9. The article concerns possible bias directed toward Lemaitre

by scientists who were non-theists. Could they have been biased because the theory was proposed by a priest?

[marylandblue]

10. Possible but nobody said scientists are perfect

Just that evidence always wins in the end, no matter where it comes from.

Religion ignores evidence it doesn't like, and can do so forever, just because it says so in the old book.

[guillaumeb]

11. Religion does not depend on evidence.

It depends on faith.

[marylandblue]

12. Faith is a bad guide to reality

[guillaumeb]

13. Human perception can also be a bad guide to reality.

If I believed that the world was 5800 years old, that belief would be a bad guide to reality. But I do not.

[marylandblue]

16. That belief would be based on faith

There isn't any other reason to believe it.

[Act_of_Reparation]

41. Gosh. If only we had some way to test the validity of our perceptions.

[trotsky]

44. Good thing science is a lot more than just human perception then, huh?

Of course there ARE people who believe the world is only 5800 years old. Their claim is based on faith, and it's 100% wrong. But in your worldview, you aren't allowed to call them wrong, because every religious belief is just as valid as any other.

[yallerdawg]

14. Faith imparts meaning and purpose to reality.

Otherwise, it'd be "Whatever" all day and all night.

[marylandblue]

15. Not relevant to this topic

[yallerdawg]

17. You said "Faith is a bad guide to reality."

Seemed relevant to me, but you can say whatever you want.

[marylandblue]

20. The topic is physical reality as described by science

Not the meaning of that reality. On this case, if your faith tells you the earth is 5800 years and that is the only way you can find meaning, I'd suggest you drop that particular faith no matter how meaningful and join the reality-based community.

[edhopper]

18. Try reading Sartre

for meaning without God.

What unabashed arrogance that only those that believe in your Christian God have meaning in their lives.

What a narrow point of view.

And the OP talks about possible anti-religion bias? How ironic.

[yallerdawg]

19. You're peddling existentialism?

Would that be evidence-based or just confirmation of "Whatever?"

[marylandblue]

21. That would be how to find meaning without religion

Which would mean rejecting your false dichotomy.

[yallerdawg]

22. And this "meaning" would involve no faith in anything.

Humanism is just a godless, religious-free form of faith.

The only pre-determinant for some people is the assertion that there is no God, figure it out from that viewpoint.

Many existentialists believe religious faith is the only solution to that "dreadful freedom, kind of goes hand in hand with "free will" (you recall who gave us that).

[edhopper]

23. You seemmto have no understanding

of Secular Humanism.

Not unexpected.

[yallerdawg]

24. "Man is the measure of all things."

This is the secure footing for your... "confidence" in THE meaning of life?

If you can reject any and all religion, why would you expect I couldn't make my own informed rejections?

Seems pretty arrogant on someone's part, I must say.

[marylandblue]

27. Man is in fact the measure of all things

Even God. Why? Because we have no choice but to make such measurements. Even if God appeared before you and said, "I am God, believe in me," you'd still have to make your own determination as to whether you were hallucinating or not. Paul, faced with this dilemma, concluded it was no hallucination. Other people may have chosen otherwise. But the choice is still yours. You can choose religion, but you can't choose not to make a choice.

[yallerdawg]

29. We all choose to give our lives some kind of meaning and purpose.

Philosophers suggest we examine our lives and choices.

Religions do, too.

All the irreligious are doing is eliminating a set of possibilities.

[marylandblue]

32. Are we talking about existentialism or philosophers in general

If we are talking about existentialism, then you have it backwards. We choose one possibility, thereby eliminating all others. We don't eliminate a set and choose from the rest.

[marylandblue]

25. Sartre certainly didn't believe that faith is required for meaning

In fact, he thought faith was a way of being "inauthentic," because you are putting faith in a thing outside yourself as a way of escaping your inherent freedom, without ever admitting you are escaping something you can never escape. Most existentialists still follow Sartre in this.

Some religious existentialists in the 20th Century jumped on the existentialist bandwagon, but they had very little impact because they were being inauthentic - they did it because existentialism was in at the time.

Kierkegaard was one of the few (perhaps only) authentic religious existentialists, but he did not think that faith was the only solution and he did not think faith would solve "dreadful freedom," in fact, faith forces you to choose the absurd, and very few people are able to do that. Yes, Kierkegaard thought religion was absurd. Do you think that?

Sartre extended Kierkegaard - he realized that all of life is absurd. There is nothing special about faith.

[yallerdawg]

26. If we determine the world is meaningless and completely randomly absurd...

what basis could we possibly have for any choice we make?

"Whatever" is the only authentic response.

To give meaning is to take a leap.

Even if it starts from "There is no God."

[marylandblue]

28. No, not "whatever"

Because choosing "whatever" is still a choice. In Camus' terminology, the only choice have to make is what reason do you have for not committing suicide right now. People have all sorts of answers as to why they don't commit suicide, but rarely do they say "whatever."

[yallerdawg]

31. Suicide would require an act and commitment.

"Whatever" would be the meaningless, purposeless choice.

[marylandblue]

34. The choice is not meaningless, the choice is the meaning

Sure, you can choose to live a life of "whatever." But few people seem to choose that. I didn't. Did you? Do you know anyone who has?

[yallerdawg]

36. I know many people who will reply "Whatever"...

long before they'd give their lives any kind of self-examination or have any kind of conversation about meaning and purpose, including church-going folk.

Me and you are not them. We just see different informed choices.

[marylandblue]

38. They are replying whatever to the examination, not to the question of suicide.

[marylandblue]

30. Also we don't make the leap from "there is no God"

We make the leap from existence itself. That's the only starting point because that's all you have, and all you ever had. Belief and faith is secondary to existence itself.

[yallerdawg]

35. A "leap of faith" requires an open-mind.

In your assessment, you are somehow making the determination that religious belief is not a viable, authentic choice (unless you do make that choice).

For many people, it's an ultimate confirmation of who they are and the choices they have made.

[marylandblue]

37. I've never made a determination that religious belief is not a viable authentic choice

I chose to follow the evidence wherever it may lead me. I also chose to acknowledge that I have in fact made this choice. I don't judge people who chose faith instead. But I have noticed that there are very few existentialists in the world. Non-existentialists don't realize that they have in fact made their own choices. In fact, the idea that they may have done so, and have to continue doing so scares them to death, so they pretend they didn't. If you are scared to death by choices but willingly and openly make them anyway, then you are an existentialist. What did you do?

[yallerdawg]

39. I understand we choose to give meaning and purpose to our lives.

I understand this is also the intention of the "free will" we have been given.

[marylandblue]

40. ok

[edhopper]

46. But you don't understand that we can do this

without God.

You don't think atheists can find meaning in life?

[yallerdawg]

48. You can.

You can take all the "best" of all the religions, dismiss the deity, and call this secular humanism.

Or should we just do whatever each of us determines to be "best" - or do we pick someone and say, "Oh, yes, that is best for me."

Or - "Whatever. It's all meaningless and absurdly random anyway."

[MineralMan]

49. Humans created religion to systematize and legalize the social order they

already had. The reason all religions have the same basic moral imperatives is that they are common to almost all human cultures. Humans invented religions. Many cultures; many religions. Think about it.

No deities are required. If they are needed, humans can create them, too. And so they have, by the hundreds and more.

It's so simple that anyone who looks at more than one culture can understand it.

[Major Nikon]

50. Those who view science as a religion would undoubtedly be confused on secular humanism

Secular humanism determines morality from the science of ethics, not some metaphysical fax from the almighty. The idea it just did a cut and paste from religion and blacked out all the references to an imaginary friend isn't a good one. The idea of divorcing ethics and organized religion originated with Plato and Aristotle who predated Christ by a few hundred years. Their works were immensely popular well before the alleged Jesus came along. It's more accurate to posit Christianity was highly influenced by secular humanism than the other way around.

[edhopper]

52. Yes take it from religion

The meaning of life is to martyr oneself while killing as many infidels as one can.

You don't see that believers pick their own meaning anyway.

Is the meaning Hasidic Jews find the same as Australian Aborigines?

Is the meaning for MLK the same as Mike Pence?

[guillaumeb]

64. Sartre said that hell is other people.

In the play Huis clos. Is Sartre a model for you?

[edhopper]

70. I think we all feel

hell is other people at times

[Lordquinton]

54. The article ignores real concerns directed towards the theory

It's an anti-atheist hit piece.

[guillaumeb]

65. I disagree.

[Lordquinton]

66. What a truly compelling argument

You sure made a case for your position and articulated your side well.

[guillaumeb]

67. As was your own:

"It's an anti-atheist hit piece."

Very articulate and well thought out.

[Lordquinton]

68. You could have just written "#3" for yours

I've written long, thought out and cited responses and gotten the same response from you. I've learned to not go to the trouble anymore.

Plus everyone else more than made up for my lack of details in this case.

Plus, if you go up to what I responded to it's on par:

The article concerns possible bias directed toward Lemaitre

by scientists who were non-theists. Could they have been biased because the theory was proposed by a priest?

[Major Nikon]

69. Why take the time to answer a detailed response when a canned one will do?

Then you can claim others just aren’t interested in dialogue by citing violation of a personal made up rule.

[Lordquinton]

76. This always happens

Some are quick with the trite response,but when they get hit with actual content they flee with tail tucked.

[longship]

33. Aha! The Georges Lemaitre ploy.

So often invoked by theists, without ever understanding what it really means.

[Voltaire2]

42. It is a clear example of why science works.

When the confirming evidence was discovered in 1964 resistance to the Big Bang theory collapsed. The fact that a few people like Hoyle refused to accept the soon overwhelming evidence is not some problem with science, it is part of how science works. Hoyle worked until the end of his life to disprove the hypothesis, he failed to do so. Had he found new and compelling evidence that the hypothesis was wrong, the theory would have been revised or discarded.

Hoyle’s motivation might be of interest in understanding why he maintained his position, but it was irrelevant to the scientific process, which process worked spectacularly well in this example.

[Major Nikon]

47. I thought science IS a religion?

If what we are told is true, then it can't possibly be anti-religious bias.

All the article really proves is scientists are poor historians. When one puts the facts of what happened in their historical context, the idea of "anti-religious bias" becomes a ridiculous notion.

Quantum mechanics itself was not well accepted and was quite controversial at the time Lemaître got his letter published in Nature. Einstein refused to accept it. It's was viewed by many as metaphysical and having no place in the realm of science, which sounds a lot like religion. So the best you can say about the article in the OP is they completely ignored the context of Sir Fred Hoyle's statement. When you consider the context, the motivation becomes far more about anti-quantum theory bias which was quite strong at the time.

It's also worth noting how Lemaître got published in Nature to begin with. It's probably safe to assume there would have been atheists on the editorial board at the time and they could have easily axed publishing a letter containing controversial subject matter had they wanted. It's also worth noting that Lemaître wasn't the first or last significant Jesuit physicist by any means, and "anti-religious bias" certainly didn't impede any of his predecessors.

[trotsky]

55. Quiet, you.

That doesn't fit the narrative some want to believe.

[Major Nikon]

56. At least being stalked isn't as bad as being BBQed

So there’s something to be said for a couple of thousand years of progress.

[trotsky]

43. Oh no! Did those evil atheist scientists burn him at the stake for heresy? n/t

[MineralMan]

45. No. That's just silly.

Scientists treat hypotheses that do not yet have evidential support skeptically. As evidence is available, they look at it and adjust their views, if that evidence is valid.

Nothing prevented anyone from accepting the Big Bang concept. Once evidence that supported the hypothesis, additional study and research supported it as a theory.

Unlike with religion, science demands supporting evidence before accepting ideas about the physical universe. Faith is not involved. Facts are required.

Your point is not made.

[DetlefK]

51. How anti-scientific bias prevented the church from accepting the heliocentric model.

Today the heliocentric model is pretty much taken for Gospel, and for good reason. Ever since Copernicus, Galilei and Kepler started analyzing the movement of celestial objects, evidence gathered from all manner of sources has supported the heliocentric model.

But things didn't always look so certain for the heliocentric model. In its most nascent form, the idea was that the planets are orbiting the sun in circles. When Galileo Galilei published his idea, he ruffled a lot of feathers.....

Anti-scientific sentiments provided underlying motivation to debunk his theory.

[Major Nikon]

53. Galilei had to renounce his work to keep from getting BBQed

The threat was real as Giordano Bruno found out the hard way.


Meanwhile all Christian scholars have had to worry about is one disparaging remark taken out of context, yet we must accept this as an equivalence to the dangers of atheist "belief". Meanwhile some public schools all over this nation are teaching the idea of 900 yr old humans is an alternative to Darwinism.

[Act_of_Reparation]

57. Careful, now.

Our esteemed colleagues maintain this Bruno fellow was not executed for his unorthodox cosmology, but for his unorthodox theology. Like that makes a difference.

[Major Nikon]

58. The trial records tell a different tale

The strongest case they had against him was his refusal to deny his ideas on cosmology that conflicted with the church. Those ideas were deemed heretical by law and as such infractions were deemed worthy of torture and execution.

[MineralMan]

59. He certainly was a troublesome fellow, it seems.

At that time, the Church had a way to rid themselves of troublesome fellows like Bruno. I'll bet it sometimes wishes it could resurrect those methods. Fortunately, the secular world put the kibosh on the burning of heretics and the like. Otherwise, we'd all be in deep, deep trouble.

[Mariana]

60. Yes. Nowdays, instead of burning us literally

they have to make do with the pleasure they derive from their fantasies about us burning for eternity after we die.

[MineralMan]

61. Well, it's been a long time since I had a Christian say he'd be happy

to watch me burn in Hell. Most appear to have toned that rhetoric down, at least publicly.

[marylandblue]

62. Yes they have gone from "Burn in hell sucker!" to

"I hope you don't die in your sleep tonight and wake up in hell."

[Major Nikon]

63. Hubris always gets you in the end

[DetlefK]

72. Giordano Bruno is a bad example, as he was an actual religious heretic.

Giordano Bruno's belief was founded on Hermeticism and Llullism, both of which are esoteric offsprings of Christianity but far outside mainstream.

He had this idea that there had been an original true religion in ancient times (predating Jesus Christ), of which "Christianity" is just the name we know it by. And this true and original Christianity had been corrupted over time.
Bruno's goal was to reform Christianity back to its pre-Jesus roots and to usher in a new Golden Age for mankind via astrological magic.

Bruno had some interesting ideas, but he was also deeply enmeshed in his esoteric and magical thinking and he preached a version of Christianity far, far, far outside of the mainstream.



The Church obviously did not take it well when somebody accused them of preaching a corrupted and false Christianity. And on top of that dabbled in magic.

[Voltaire2]

74. It is a fine example of how authoritarian religious

institutions deal with ideas they think are wrong. Compare that to how a non-hierchical system based on consensus manages “heretical” ideas.

Note that the RCC continued to suppress heretical thinking through its index up until 1966.

[Major Nikon]

75. As was Galilei, who was convicted of heresy by the Inquisition

The difference was Galilei recanted while Bruno decidedly refused. Did it help that he also held religious views the church didn't like and he basically dared them to BBQ him? Probably not. But they would have done so regardless.

[Bretton Garcia]

71. It's not bias to be suspicious of religion

Religions like Christianity have long made many absurd and obviously false promises.

John 14.13 for example, promises you all the miracles you ask for. But even a simple experiment reveals that promise to be false: ask God to make a flying elephant appear in front of you now, and observe the result.

[Major Nikon]

77. Mescaline and psilocybin have a far greater success rate

Which says a lot for certain indigenous religions. One could certainly posit the advancement of organized religion is inversely proportional to literacy.

[Voltaire2]

73. I have to train-rec this op too.

Two in one week. A miracle.

[Major Nikon]

78. Shitposting is more of a phenomenon than a miracle

Just sayin'