Either way, it’s still belief.

K, it just seems like you’re dug in at this point. Let me leave you with this. If we had different words for “scientific belief” vs. “religious belief”, I don’t think you’d be trying to make this same point.

If you can’t see how problematic it is for a state to dictate what people can’t believe, that’s a you problem, not a me problem.

No, I get that. Religious freedom is a founding principle of my country, the government has no place telling people what they can and can’t believe. But in our world of reality, that concept has nothing to do with science, is my whole point.

Some religions are specifically about the mystery of the unknown. It sounds like you’re approaching this with a very narrow view of what a religion is. We tend to call that a bias.

Cool, how many people believe in religions like that? How many people believe in religions that follow the scientific method? Yes, I’m most familiar with how Abrahamic religions work because that’s what I grew up around, and that’s the kind of religion that over half the planet participates in. Call that bias if you want, none of that changes the fact that no religion relies on the scientific method, critical and rational thought, and evidence the way science does.

I don’t really feel a need to address anything else you said because, like I said earlier, I agree that freedom of religious expression is important. What I don’t agree with is your attempt to conflate “belief in religion” with “belief in science”.

Wait, which is it? I shouldn’t believe any extraordinary claim without extraordinary proof? Or just the ones that were made during the cold war? You still haven’t given your definition of “extraordinary” either. And how is a layman supposed to obtain “extraordinary proof”? Is “extraordinary proof” different from “external validation”?

What are you actually trying to say here? Because it sounds like you’re tacitly implying that laymen shouldn’t believe scientists, but that would be asinine, so please correct me if I have that wrong.

Is it not an extraordinary claim to say that a giant flaming ball of plasma millions of miles away is responsible for our day/night cycle, seasons, and in a large part, weather?

Is it not an extraordinary claim to say a large, spherical rock hundreds of thousands of miles away is responsible for the tides?

Is it not an extraordinary claim to say we’ve launched astronauts into orbit around the earth, where they’ve lived for months at a time?

Is it not an extraordinary claim to say that all things with mass warp the very fabric of our reality, to the point where large enough masses can bend or even permanently trap light?

Is it not an extraordinary claim to say that light is actually made up of particles that have no mass, but travel at a measurable speed and interact measurably with other particles?

Is it not an extraordinary claim to say that tiny, basically invisible organisms are responsible for a wide variety of ailments and sicknesses that have affected all life on earth for billions of years?

Like seriously, what’s your bar for “extraordinary”, and why does the moon landing meet it?

So are you claiming that it’s irrational for a layman to believe anything they cannot prove themselves?

That doesn’t change the fact that until it had been demonstrably proven, it was still within the realm of belief rather than fact.

Again, in science, the “realm of belief” is something different than the “realm of belief” for religion. If you can’t acknowledge that, I can’t assume you’re approaching this conversation in good faith.

I’m sure the first people to conceive of the idea of a god had reasons for believing too. The stars in the night sky, the light in the eyes of their first child… How do you explain those things before you understand atoms and molecules and photons?

So, that’s actually the difference I’m talking about. In science, when you come across something you don’t know the answer to, the first thing you say is “huh, I don’t know the answer to that”. You don’t claim you know the answer to those questions until you actually know the answer. But by using rational, critical thought, evidence, and carrying out the scientific method, you figure out those answers, piece by piece. In religion, when you come across something you don’t know the answer to, the first thing you do is make up an answer based on unprovable, unobservable supernatural forces, and then that’s basically the end of it. Is the difference clear yet?

Isaac Newton had reasons to believe in his model of physics. And for many years, they were the best explanations for the way things behave the way they do. Until it wasn’t.

Right, he “believed” in his model because of evidence, observation, rational and critical thought, and the scientific method. His model was superseded when we were able to make better observations, and saw unexpected things in certain cases that didn’t match his predictions. That clued us in that his model wasn’t quite right, and there must be a piece missing. People went looking for that piece and found relativity, which has proven to be an even more accurate model than Newton’s.

Now that we know about general relativity, does that change the fact that Newtonian physics were science?

Of course not, and the fact that you’re even asking shows you have a deeply flawed understanding of science (or are not engaging honestly). Religion is largely constant. Science is very much not. Religion is constant because it fabricates the answers and then stops. Science changes because it leaves room to say “I don’t know”, and has well-defined mechanisms for filling those gaps with good, rational answers, as well as improving upon or even replacing those answers when we learn better. In that way, the “belief” in religion is nothing like the “belief” in science.

None of this matters, really. At least it’s not pertinent to the subject. Because no matter how you look at it, it doesn’t justify forcing your worldview and beliefs on others. And that’s what this whole conversation has been about.

It may not be directly pertinent to the main point, but it does absolutely matter. Understanding the differences between religion and science is paramount if you’re going to argue about them, and I hope this has given you (and anyone else who reads it) some food for thought.

Someone believed in the Higgs Boson before it was proven.

Because there was evidence of its existence, in the form of occasional (but detectable) interactions between particles that produced unexpected results. No one thought the Higgs Boson existed until there was a scientific reason for its existence. If this is what you’re referring to as “belief in science”, then we’re dealing with multiple definitions of the word “belief”, because that’s nowhere close to how it works in religion.

What in the Kingdom Hearts is that title

Dude is all over the place and I kinda love it. From his teardown of capitalism, his insight on how music streaming platforms take advantage of musicians, to making spacey dream music with an antique model train control board, to an in depth analysis in how cicadas make noise, and now becoming a privacy activist and amateur white hat hacker. It’s crazy

“It’s a little bit tricky if we have it inherited, and then people will ask for seeds,” he says. “We can do it also in tomato, potato, corn.”

LMAO this dude is a natural salesman

And I’m saying that that’s a pretty meaningless observation to make, unless you’re trying to defend voter suppression.

So you think voter suppression is ok, as long as it applies equally to everyone?

I feel like Earthsea is appropriate for middle-school-aged kids (so like 11-14ish), right? Maybe our definitions of “grade schoolers” is different, but I was trying to give examples for a wide range of ages

which means open borders and protecting criminal illegal aliens

There’s no such thing as “criminal illegal aliens” when you have open borders, you stupid fucking troglodytes

The Fast and Furious franchise

Ugh. The sick sense of relief I got when they announced it was cancelled, and the disgusting, fleeting hope I felt when they announced it was coming back 🤢

The world building is weak because Rowling is a bad fantasy writer, not because it was written for grade schoolers. There are tons of series aimed at grade schoolers with incredible world building - Redwall, Warrior Cats, Earthsea, just to name a few, all have way better world building than Harry Potter.

She didn’t embrace gay people, she used them as a prop for profit, to generate buzz, to get people taking about her and her books again. She did the exact same thing with black people when she tried to claim Hermione has been black the whole time, after a black actor played her in the Cursed Child play.

JK Rowling has always been a terrible person, and it shows in her writing and her actions if you look a bit more than surface-deep.

No, the punishment was increased pain, hardship, expulsion from the garden of Eden, and mortality.

Have you even read the book? From an “as a story” concept, whatever that means?

Well now I have to see some Italian pussy

Well, that’s the explanation they give publicly. In reality, they just want to hurt and oppress people.