[Scott Bakker]

Somehow your reply slipped beneath my radar, Gary. And here I was thinking that I had farted or something... :D

Intolerance is not an adjunct of religion but rather a necessary and self-preservative aspect of it.

When reason and evidence aren't enough to command consensus, then we humans tend to resort to other means - largely through appeals to authority and self-interest.

Self-righteousness almost becomes inevitable. Submit to God and become one of his favourites - our hard-wired vanity takes care of the rest.

[Leiali]

I have just spent a while going through this thread, which I had found intimidating before, but was determined to go through. I think it went off the beaten track a little, as I thought it was going to be an exploration of the influence of the biblical era, not science vs religion; but here are some of my thoughts on what you are all arguing about!

Firstly, I think Biblical Israel is a starting point for fantasy because of its social significance. The three major religions began here, and because of the global significance of that, I think Biblical Israel permeates the imagination of us all. If you think how many people as children would have been taught about the Bible/Quran/Talmud in the world, even if we grow up not being religious, it probably still sinks in. I remember going to arab lessons at school and really hated going, except when it came to the history lessons, the stories of the prophet being fascinating, and the period also.
Also, the less we know about a subject, the more mysticism it holds. You don't have to stick to Biblical Israel to get that sense of the mythical or fantastic, where anything is possible because nothing is determined....

Secondly, No one has mentioned the fact that a lot of earlier scientists were alchemists? I find this information quite interesting as it suggests that pioneers of modern science still believed in combining the mystical with what you can measure.

And thirdly, there was a fascinating series on Channel 4 before Christmas tackling big issues in science led by the royal astronomer, and one of them was whether religion and science can mix....What I found fascinating was the apparant existence of a formula which is so precise that it seemed to many scientists there to be either proof of a higher life form, or troubling evidence of something unexplainable to those who shied away from that idea.


Oops - fourth point. Poetry vs Philosophy, Bakker, are you trying to get us to explore the Republic?