Science, Religion, History

[cheeseprophet]

Religion should be kept out of science classes. Science should probably be kept out of religion classes. Can you tell the difference though between a scientific claim, a religious claim and a historical claim? How about the following (remember it doesn't matter if the claim is true, just what type of claim it is

Comments

[duoraven]

1. Religious and non-religious claim (if you include Terry Pratchett's Discworld, which is a flat planet on the back of 4 elephants on the back of a giant space turtle

[foobooy]

NO the cheesy sci fi flick evildoer would be Gravitron!

[fair_e]

I should get this right, because we've talked about this, but I'm probably going to get them all wrong ...

1) R
2) S
3) H
4) R
5) R
6) H
7) R
8) S
9) R
10)R

Religious is revealed truth, believed by faith.
Historic is past events, recorded for posterity.
Scientific is observable truth, through scientific experimentation.

Though I don't think these statements by themselves are enough to categorize them. What matters is the context. I can try to make the Earth resting on a turtle a scientific claim and offer my evidence, but that doesn't make it a scientific fact. I'd almost argue that none of these can be scientific claims because they don't give enough detail. Religious and historic claims don't need detail, they're just the way they are. You either believe them or you don't, or they happened or not. Scientific claims are trickier, because by their very nature they require proof.