Gibburt

Some people, it seems, have an obsession with hearing “both sides” of everything. Aside from the fact that this stems from a ridiculously oversimplified world-view in which there are precisely two sides to anything, the desperate notion that these sides are always balanced is rather boorish. Arguments should be weighed by their merits and, more importantly, all arguments for a ‘side’ must be summed up and compared to those of other sides. If we are to respectfully allow everyone their arguments and we refrain from checks and balances at the end, there is no discussion or discourse, but merely autistic and self-indulgent muttering.

This year is the bicentennial of Darwin’s birthday. Celebrating this great scientist somehow brings out the fanatic anti-evolutionists. There has been a national mailing in The Netherlands of flyers giving the readers a “balanced” overview of the arguments for evolution versus those for creation. It poses that, because the evolution theory can “fundamentally not be proven,” the arguments for it are by no means stronger than those for the notion of creation.

This flyer intrigues me in more ways than one. The mass distribution of it got me to thinking most of all. We live in a time of truly heightened sensitiveness. In a universe far, far away, or so it seems, the Freedom of Speech stood above all others. At the moment, however, the Freedom from Offense seems to be considered vastly more important. Be that as it may, I would like my slice of the freedom pie.

In a recent discussion with a few friends, one of them suggested that he could come up with his own religion and that he could then claim his rights to do whatever that religion told him to do, regardless of social and – in some cases – even legal context. Another threw this argument aside as childish. I can agree with both, to some extent. However, I think the idea behind the argument of coming up with one’s own religion is to emphasize the absurdity of the exclusive claim to a freedom from scrupulous reflection religions have in the spectrum of ideas.

The core motivation behind the protection of religions from criticism seems to be the fact that people tend to get offended when their religious ideas are measured, weighed and found wanting. This seems very reasonable, on face value, but upon closer inspection a problem does arise. Many people have devoted their life to a larger than life vocation. I hope to count myself amongst them. To members of that weird sect called science, the pursuit of knowledge often is a calling in its purest form. Considering this fact, is it not reasonable to say that scientists have the right to be offended when the scientific method is distorted or erroneously explained to misrepresent scientific findings?

It seems that, because science is not generally considered a religion (which it may very well be soon, as an absurdly ironic post-modernistic proverbial shot-in-the-foot), scientists should just take it like adults and not complain. This does illustrate nicely, however, the point made by suggesting starting one’s own religion. If a deep vocation does not give someone the right to be insulted, then, it seems, it must be that one refrains from trying to build an argument for one’s ideas altogether.

Some ideas simply are better than others. In many countries, holocaust denial is prohibited. Personally, I find forbidding the expressions of specific ideas a questionable pursuit. Aside from the overwhelming piles of evidence for the occurrence of the holocaust, it is considered offensive by many. Ironically, it is the latter, rather than the former that seems the motivation for the prohibition. I call this irony, because it is precisely the fundamental idea behind the Freedom of Speech to be allowed to say what many find offensive.

A far better line of reasoning seems to be, that if you want to oppose the standing paradigm, you have to come with the stronger argument, or you may well be dismissed. This is actually quite normal within the scientific community. Eddington proved that Einstein’s model described our solar system far better than Newton’s. Does this mean that Einstein’s General Relativity is The Truth? Who knows? For the sake of the point I am trying to make here, it does not matter. What matters is, that Einstein’s theory comes with better arguments than Newton’s.

It seems to be this evolution of ideas, however, that tempts many religious people to argue that science is itself a religion. The argument is that, because scientists used to think this, but now think that, they are fallible and what is to stop them from being wrong again? They are right in a way, but it takes a very specific interpretation of “being wrong.” Regardless, I think that if arguments to the effect that science is itself a religion only support the idea that scientists have the right to be offended. The next flyer that lands in my mailbox may very well be answered by a subpoena.

Filed under: Politics by Philip Hölzenspies | Social tagging: Freedom of Religion > Freedom of Speech