[Hermlord]

Snorer,

I am doing my best to avoid these debates (finals week, you know) but I want to get this off my chest. (Everything, as always, is just my take on it).

Science and religion are not in conflict. They exist to serve different purposes. Science is the search to explain the natural world; how it works and what it's properties are. Religion is the search for meaning in that world.

Meaning is a function of consciousness, not a physical phenomenon. An analogy: almost everyone has experienced love. Maybe love is a function of pheremones, the urge to procreate, whatever. It doesn't matter because "love" is not a biological process, it is your experience of that process. Although it can and probably has been/will be correlated to biology, that will never capture the experience of the conscious agent of love.

Meaning is similar. Religion, spirituality, whatever are the search not for "proof" of God, but for the authentic and genuine belief that life has meaning. Again, meaning is something you as a conscious being give to experiences; it is not a physical property.

I agree that much of organized religion is silly. All power structures are corrupted by those in charge; most people are too obedient to doctrine; supernatural explanations for physical phenomena are usually (always?) incoherent. None of that matters. True Divinity has nothing to do with those things. As to your photos, there is 0 doubt in my mind that there is a scientific explanation. And that has 0 impact on my spiritual convictions.

OK, I could go on but schoolwork beckons. do with this what you will.