> There is an undeniable conflict between religious belief and the scientific process.
How? I pray and do hypothesis testing, recording experiments that lead to independently reproducible results. I don't see why I couldn't even follow the scientific method for religious reasons.
> The scientific process has answered [questions about nature] well enough that today's religious beliefs have shrunk in size
But the scientific process doesn't answer "why" they happen. It explains mechanisms, but not why they exist. An atheist and/or agnostic answer is "There's no 'why' to be had. Cause and effect plus time eventually lead to hurricanes", but that's actually circular reasoning, since the scientific process presumes a materialist perspective, partly so that theists and atheists can learn about nature without arguing about theology.
"Why", therefore, is a metaphysical, philosophical, and theological question and outside the scope of reproducible and reasoned-through hypothesis testing and observation of material things like matter and energy.
> They claim the universe was created by an all knowing God, without a definition of what the God is, and stonewalling further enquiry into the topic.
Some do. Some don't. Lots of theists are more than happy to talk about these issues in a candid, honest, and reasonable way. They may seem to be hard to find, but part of that is religion is considered uncivil conversation these days, even if the tone of the conversation is benignly analytical.
There is a lot of upvote/downvote see-saw going on for my comment, so I appreciate you taking the time to actually respond.
I think there is a strawman in claiming atheists answer that "there is not a why".
We've already discovered reasons for a lot of natural phenomena, but that is an ongoing process: the why of the why of the why... and that line of questioning often ends up at universal physical constants and mathematical axioms. The good news is that we've been able to dig deeper into constants that we thought were impenetrable in the past, and go one more level deeper. The bad news is that there are still things that we don't know, and we don't even know whether we'll ever be able to unravel them. That is unfortunately the pain and pleasure of the scientific process.
Anyone who is curious about things by definition accepts that there are things that they don't know, but holds out hope that they might be able to figure it out.
> "Why", therefore, is a metaphysical, philosophical, and theological question and outside the scope of reproducible and reasoned-through hypothesis testing and observation of material things like matter and energy.
This is precisely why I think religious doctrine is antithetical to the scientific process. The moment we accept that some questions are ultimately un-answerable and settle for un-verifiable religious theology, we have effectively put a stop to the scientific process. The theology doesn't even add any more meaning to the discussion, yet it orders us to stop looking.
What if we kept on being curious we could figure out the ultimate nature of reality?
> I think there is a strawman in claiming atheists answer that "there is not a why".
Again, "why" as in purpose, not "why" as in mechanisms. People don't ask "Why did my kid drown?" to get an answer about the respiratory system or the importance of proper fencing around pools.
I think science is a great way to explore the physical mechanisms of things. I think it has limits when complexity, observability, or reproducibility are concerned.
> The theology doesn't even add any more meaning to the discussion, yet it orders us to stop looking.
So I think the disconnect here is about what counts as rational reasoning. There's a different kind of logic not taught very often called abductive reasoning (1). It's not any kind of scientific method, but it's hardly irrational. In fact, it's more or less what juries do when they deliberate on charges. So there's more to explore outside the realm of testing hypotheses in laboratories. It's unverifiable in a scientific sense, but it's not a dead end or even the end of a discussion.
For example, Isaiah 53 (2) was written by a Jew hundreds of years before Jesus was crucified, but it sounds a lot like a psalm about Christ written after his death. It's not scientifically verifiable whether it's a prophecy, coincidence, or misinterpretation, but it raises a lot of interesting questions that can be explored rationally.
How? I pray and do hypothesis testing, recording experiments that lead to independently reproducible results. I don't see why I couldn't even follow the scientific method for religious reasons.
> The scientific process has answered [questions about nature] well enough that today's religious beliefs have shrunk in size
But the scientific process doesn't answer "why" they happen. It explains mechanisms, but not why they exist. An atheist and/or agnostic answer is "There's no 'why' to be had. Cause and effect plus time eventually lead to hurricanes", but that's actually circular reasoning, since the scientific process presumes a materialist perspective, partly so that theists and atheists can learn about nature without arguing about theology.
"Why", therefore, is a metaphysical, philosophical, and theological question and outside the scope of reproducible and reasoned-through hypothesis testing and observation of material things like matter and energy.
> They claim the universe was created by an all knowing God, without a definition of what the God is, and stonewalling further enquiry into the topic.
Some do. Some don't. Lots of theists are more than happy to talk about these issues in a candid, honest, and reasonable way. They may seem to be hard to find, but part of that is religion is considered uncivil conversation these days, even if the tone of the conversation is benignly analytical.