Scientific and religious in the context of modern culture

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Scientific and religious in the context of modern culture

Yu. Sabadash, S. Panchenko

The article is devoted to the study of the peculiarities of scientific and religious worldviews, focusing on the culturological aspect. Emphasis is placed on the need to develop theories to overcome the crisis of man-made civilization. Namely, the development of certain criteria that allow to generalize and organize the accumulated experience of human attitude to nature and space, knowledge and faith, to their personal and collective responsibility, using scientific and religious worldviews not as antagonistic, but as two fundamental cultural arrays that complement one one.

Knowledge or faith? It is stated that science, with all its achievements and achievements, will not protect us from social upheavals or calamities, and its guidelines and recommendations may require situational ethical or social adjustments (for example, the invention of nuclear energy by scientists and its application - atomic bombs or nuclear power plants).). Science is a rational powerful tool for the creative improvement of human living space, but at the same time a dangerous destroyer in the hands of mankind.

Keywords: worldview, science, culture, religion, faith, secularization.

Ю.С. Сабадаш, С.А. Панченко

НАУКОВЕ ТА РЕЛІГІЙНЕ У КОНТЕКСТІ КУЛЬТУРИ СУЧАСНОСТІ

Стаття присвячена дослідженню особливості наукового та релігійного світоглядів, сфокусувавши увагу на культурологічному аспекті. Наголошено на необхідності вироблення теорій щодо подолання кризи техногенної цивілізації. А саме напрацювання певних критеріїв, що дозволяють узагальнювати та впорядковувати накопичений досвід ставлення людини до природи й космосу, знання й віри, до своєї особистої й колективної відповідальності, використовуючи науковий та релігійний світогляди не як антагоністичні, а як два фундаментальні масиви культури, що доповнюють один одного.

Знання чи віра? Зазначено, що наука, з усіма її здобутками та досягненнями, не захистить нас від суспільних потрясінь чи лихоліть, а її настанови і рекомендації можуть потребувати ситуативних етичних або соціальних коректив (наприклад, винайдення вченими атомної енергії та варіанти її застосування - атомні бомби чи атомні електростанції). Наука - це раціональний потужний інструмент творчого вдосконалення життєвого простору людини, але водночас і небезпечний руйнівник в руках людства.

ХХІ ст. відкрило новий рахунок у взаєминах людини з природою: освоєння космосу, роботизації, ІТ-мережі. При цьому ХХІ ст. не обіцяє стати епохою розквіту релігійних громад і культового зодчества. Наука випереджає релігію, маємо надію, що то на користь культурі. Але ж, наука й релігія, на нашу думку, - дві чаші терезів, і їхня рівновага як баланс знання й віри - необхідна.

Наголошено, що наукові й релігійні джерела - органічні складові частини загальнолюдської культурної цілісності, і людство сьогодні має шукати ознаки єдності філософії, моралі, духовності й мистецтва, в той же час невігластво й неуцтво повинні бути об'єктами конструктивної критики і з боку релігії і на науковому рівні. Світське й релігійне в культурі покликане об'єднати служіння ідеалам гуманності, милосердя, ненасильства.

Осмислення трагічних сторінок історії, прагнення кращої національної долі, пошуки виходу з кризових економічних, політичних, ідеологічних ситуацій, вирішення екологічних проблем - ось пріоритети найбільш важливі в усі часи і для всіх людей, незалежно від їхнього особистого ставлення до релігії чи науки. Тільки якісний дискурс веде до порозуміння, зміни застарілих парадигм, до креативного співробітництва і, в результаті, свідомого збереження, поцінування й динамічного розвитку культури.

Ключові слова: світогляд, наука, культура, релігія, віра, секуляризація.

The crisis of nature, society and personality has challenged a number of values formed and established in the twentieth century, both from the standpoint of science itself and in other spheres of public life.

It turned out that science is not a panacea for all problems, and its researches and recommendations require some updating and supplements, say ethical or aesthetic ones. Science is at the same time a creative and destructive tool in the hands of enlightened humanity.

Religion can also help to form an honest, decent, benevolent personality, resolve conflicts, or, conversely, ignite them. That is why the opposition of knowledge and faith is losing its uniqueness, becoming an extremely interesting and relevant dilemma today.

The questions of formation of different worldviews were the subject of research of scientists of different branches of knowledge. These questions aroused interest of philosophers, psychologists, theologians, physicists, mathematicians, ethics, and so on. The most fundamental works were written by such researchers as J. Condorse, Y. Tchaikovsky, M. Weber, D. Didro, P. Golbach, A. Tenase, G. Spensar, K. Jaspers, N. Bagdasaryan, E. Fromm, P. Sorokin, N. Bora, B. Pascal, Dalai Lama, O. Men, P. Gurevich and others.

Science and religion are two fundamental arrays of culture, each of which, complementary to one another, are distinct types of worldview. Each epoch has its dominants, along with background types of outlook, background types of cultural subsystems, which play a significant role in the development of society.

So, if in the Middle Ages Christian religiosity prevailed in the European tradition - both officially and at the level of mass consciousness, then New time in the same European tradition, starting from the XVII century, shows us a model of dynamic rise of the domination of the scientific type of world outlook.

The perception and existence of science in the Middle Ages is mainly characterized by a background, mostly elitist, type of worldview. This does not mean, however, that the new form of outlook is changing another, completely displacing the previous one from human culture.

Although the history of culture shows that in the era of the dominance of religious systems and forms of knowledge of the world, as structures of mass consciousness, science is suppressed and subjected to ostracism or destruction, including methods of force. In the era of the domination of science as a means of exploration and form of knowledge of the world and as an orientation of mass consciousness, religion is suppressed by the same methods. In fact, the relationship between the scientific and religious types of worldview is, in principle, much more complicated.

A practical slice of the statement about the dominance and periphery of this or that worldview confirms the conclusions of Pitirim Sorokin's research, which showed this on the basis of a rich statistical material, studying the history of painting, sculpture, music, fiction and architecture.

He has studied more than 100 thousand works on painting and sculpture of eight leading European countries from the beginning of the Middle Ages and up to 1930. According to him, the specific weight of religious paintings and sculptures in the XII-XIII centuries amounted to 97%, in the XIV-XV centuries. - 85%, 16th c. - 64,7%, 17th c. - 50,2%, 18th c. - 24,1%, XIX century. - 10%, XX century just 3.9 percent. The rest are secular subjects [5].

A similar transformation is evident in music: almost all music works of medieval Europe is represented by cantos, chorals and other genres of religious content. Between 1090 and 1290 secular music began to appear - songs by troubadours, trumpeters and miners. For the period XVII-XVIII centuries in the music space, the proportion of religious works is noticeably decreasing - up to 42% by the beginning of the XIX century - up to 21%, and at the turn of the twentieth century - up to 5 percent [5].

In the literature of the Middle Ages, religious themes are still noticeable and there are practically no secular masterpieces. In the period from XI to the beginning XII c. there are some semi-secular, semi-religious works of art, and since the second half of the XII century truly secular literature is formed. And only in the XVIII-XIX centuries the proportion of secular works of art increases to 80-90% [9]. Such statistics concerning the most accessible to an individual type of art undoubtedly testify to the prevalence of secular science ideas over religiosity.

In the architecture of the Middle Ages, cathedrals, churches and monasteries were the most outstanding buildings and constructions, which were supposed to have a sacred appearance and internal content. Beginning in modern times, the vast majority of architectural sites are impressive palaces of rulers, mansions of the rich, official town halls, offices, houses of stations, museums, theaters and other secular buildings. Skyscrapers have already dared to substitute the cathedrals that used to rise above the architectural landscape [8].

We are far from believing that religious faith holds back creative inspiration. The history of painting, music, sculpture and other arts, for example, testifies to the continuing significance of inspired creations in biblical subjects filled with true religiosity. The high religious vocation in our complex world inspires talented masters of art to create unique artistic values of spiritual purpose.

Secularization contributed to the advancement of culture and the arts, not by supplanting religious faith, but by eliminating scholasticism, restricting church custody and censorship, eliminating bans on unorthodox and secular topics, plots, ideas, and ideals.

Such a weakening of the religious subordination of human interests expanded the fullness of the horizons of cultivation, the richness of motives of inspiration and creativity. Strengthening secular positions removed the scholastic shackles of philosophy and science, and at the same time the shakiness of worldview and worldview disappeared.

Secularization debunked the myth, devaluing the traditional paradigm of unknowability of the secret and the extraterrestrial. Thus, it intensified the research initiative of the scientist, vastly diversified the field of scientific research, widened the range of problems studied, improved methods of rational study of phenomena and processes.

The tremendous impetus in the development of the natural sciences of modern and contemporary times is largely due to the awakening of free thinking as one of the leading tendencies of secular culture, which combines religious and secular principles.

Of course, the concept of faith also exists in the modern computerized perception of the world: science, which reveals mysteries and creates miracles, today has not rejected religious forms of irrational interpretation, has not deprived the Bible of its historiosophical role. It merely pushed the theological theory to the sidelines of the strategic highway of worldview and outlook in the structures of the mass worldview of society.

Of course, scientific belief, as a belief in the self-evidentness of certain scientific principles and provisions, is not at all the belief that is in religious systems. But religious systems are not only certain provisions that appeal primarily to human faith, but also certain generalized constructs, guidelines, and beliefs that are not devoid of the logic of argumentation and evidence.

These aspects of religious attitudes to the world are called theology. Scientific knowledge is inseparably linked to faith; moreover, it begins, to some extent, with some of the elements of adopting the beliefs of individual tenets for the basic tenets of scientific creativity. But that is all that is common between scientific and religious faith, and further significant differences continue.

When the source and foundation of scientific knowledge is the cognitive notion of reality that exists objectively-autonomously outside the consciousness of the individual, then the source of religious knowledge, experience, worldview is Revelation. Revelation is supernatural knowledge given to man by the Overmind.

The source may be either the Prophet (Moses, Mohammed) or the Absolute, the God incarnate on Earth. Revelation is not subject to rational judgment and critical judgment, because through it we receive what is the highest, absolute information that the limited mind of a person is incapable of presenting in its entirety and which is to be accepted by faith.

If we summarize the differences that objectively exist between science and religion, as between two conditionally commensurate realms of culture, then we can outline them with the following comparative conclusions: science studies the real consistent thinking being.

Religion determines the spiritual meaning of our existence. It operates on the meanings and values of human being, forming its ethical, moral and aesthetic components. Religion answers the sacred questions that approach the absolute forms of existence and worldview that are absent and unacceptable in science.

The purpose of science is to answer the questions about the origin and arrangement of the real world, its functioning, its variability and perspectives. To this end, it uncovers and formulates laws through theoretical and experimental research.

Religion is served by established knowledge and messaging, which cannot answer the questions «How?», «Why?» and «What for? - these are the questions religion deals with. «Why is this world arranged in this way and not otherwise?» «Why does a person live?» The answers to these questions lead one to the idea of God, the Absolute.

Knowledge or faith? Let's take a quick look at the essence of the dilemma. Yes, science, with all its developments and achievements, will not protect us from social upheaval or disaster, and its guidelines and recommendations may need situational ethical or social corrections (for example, the invention of nuclear energy by scientists and options for its use - atomic bombs or nuclear power plants). The absence or loss of a natural state of harmony in the perception of the world and of one's own self is dangerous to mankind with a high probability of catastrophe.

Science is a rational powerful tool for creative improvement of human space, but also a dangerous destroyer in the hands of mankind. Fantastically created and adored for decades civilization of complex technogenic comfort has been treacherously fetishizing a supernatural habitat, resorting to natural conditions only to restore its energy and arrogance.

Numerous fruits of tragic lessons of such carelessness are already noticeable and palpable today. Awareness that the self-confident short-sightedness and simplification of the problem of uncontrolled congestion of the planet destroy its beauty and reliability is gradually emerging.

Allowing violence against nature for the sake of achieving maximum material satisfaction, mankind has deprived itself of a beneficent state of parity and trustworthiness of being, and the primitivization of the spiritual needs of man has deprived him of coming into this world of deep content, limiting its meaning by the criteria of his own ego.

Therefore, it is well evident in the mirror of culture that the use of science for the benefit of mankind is only capable on the condition of not losing awareness of direct organic involvement in nature and the cosmos.

XXI century has opened a new account in the relationship of man with nature: space exploration, robotics, the growth of IT networks. Herewith, the XXI-st century does not promise to be an era of prosperity for religious communities and religious architecture. Science is ahead of religion, we hope that it is for the benefit of culture. But, in our opinion, science and religion are two bowls of scales, and their balance as a balance of knowledge and faith is necessary and decisive.

Modern science gives it the space it needs. First, the very concept of knowledge is dynamic, and if yesterday it included only rational, now it includes metatheories that study intuitive and even «supernatural.» Secondly, the argument about the priority of the mind or emotions is unfounded, because they are harmoniously combined in a person, nourish one another in their mutual conditionality.

We define the most distinctive features of science and religion as cultural phenomena:

- science (looks for the answer to the complex of questions «how is the world built?»; tries to reveal the general structure of the world; uses causal relationships; in solving problems is dominated by mental, rational means; the main value is the informative content of the sciences; progresses through constant self-renewal; is universal, unfinished, not available to many);

- religion (tries to answer the question «why does the world exist at all?»; comprehends the inner experience of man: death, evil, suffering; studies the nature of man from the standpoint of esotericism and irrationality; the main value is the experience of human experience; changes his dogma as an exception, not as a rule, tied to cultural tradition; claims absolute truth; accessible to all).

Like science, religion can be understood as a symbolic model of the world, which generalizes the experience of the relationship of man to nature, space, to himself and to society with certain principles. As Nils Bohr pointed out, «humanity has made two major discoveries: one is that God does exist, the other is that God doesn't exist».

And, it is not very important which of these points of view we follow in our worldview self-determination, but it is important to choose the guidelines that will lead us to mutual harmony in the processes of using the benefits of nature, communicating with the environment, meeting the aesthetic needs of the arts and spiritual culture.

Faith is not necessarily opposed to reason and science. Max Planck believed that religion and science do not exclude, but «complement and condition each other» [4, с. 35].

In modern realities, people quite often find themselves thinking that civilization is losing interest in cultural values. The first decades of the XXI century are stepping on a planet that has just freed itself from radical atheism.

Former European socialist countries and socially-oriented countries on other continents have to deal with even more complex problems. Religious fanaticism, militant extremism, and interfaith terrorism abound there.

For the time being, our country is seeking to bring cultural and ideological convergence and cohesion into action: to reject, forget, or condemn atheism, a compromised belief in communism, and to adhere to one of the religious denominations, or to seek or invent new forms and canons for the spiritual.

Isaac Newton: In examining the dualistic coexistence of religion and science, it is advisable to turn to the opinions of scholars themselves regarding their perception of the polemical idea of belief in God. «The wonderful structure of the cosmos and the harmony in it can only be explained by the fact that the cosmos was created according to the plan of the All- seeing and Omnipotent Being. Here is my first and last word».

Charles Darwin: «I have never denied the existence of God. I think that the theory of evolution is compatible with belief, because it is impossible to prove that a beautiful, infinitely impressive universe, as well as humans in this universe, is completely accidental» [6].

Albert Einstein: «... In infinite space, an infinite Mind is opened. It is a big mistake to think of me as an atheist. If it is concluded from my scientific theories, they have been misunderstood».

It was perhaps the most difficult choice for people of the twentieth century, because it was an era of mass departure from the values produced by traditional culture. Such perturbation of spiritual orientations, that engulfed entire continents, cannot be qualified as outright atheism, but it was an attempt on the very foundations of faith. As B. Pascal noted, «it is, in principle, not merely a choice between belief and atheism, but between opposing intellectual specificities».

It is known from history that the uncontrolled extremes of religious and atheistic ideological attitudes in polemical strife are worth one another. In the context of turbulent geopolitical processes at the turn of the XX-XXI centuries there are grounds for concentrating attention on the problem of modernization of conceptual developments concerning the coexistence and interaction of three phenomena of intellectual progress of terrestrial civilization - culture, science, religion.

First of all, the three largest phenomena of the present must be taken into account - humanity is at the stage of a colossal breakthrough of IT technologies and artificial intelligence; the vast sphere of spiritual life on the planet is now subordinated in most countries to the interests of unlimited enrichment of oligarchic circles and personalities; an avalanche of waves of migrants, refugees, the poor, the sick, indifferent to any cultural values.

Against this background, there are tangible attempts to establish the existence of a direct interdependence of religion with the norms and manifestations of morality in this sense: the foundations of religious ethics affect believers in a positive way, while ignoring religious commandments and norms leads to immorality, permissiveness, crime and other defects.

Therefore, the choice between faith and unbelief in favor of faith is not only desirable but also charitable as a voluntary means of support, participation and personal contribution to the process of creating a cultural space. Such simplicity alarms its impunity: believer means moral; freethinker is immoral. The apparent sincerity of the belief of many «believers» is not a criterion of high morality, as fanatical faith usually provokes tragic events.

Man is imperfect in anger and temptation. But even the unbelief of «display», which manifests itself as an apostasy of faith, blasphemy, the sounding of religious paraphernalia and shrines, does not bring anything good except a sense of pseudo-freedom and emptiness without spiritual values.

The complete absence of values (or shrines) is dangerous for the individual and for society. But to exaggerate their role is not worth it. As noted by E. Fromm, «idols are not just images in stone and wood. Idols can be words, machines, leaders, state, government and political groups. Science and the opinion of neighbors, too, can be idols; for many God himself was an idol» [7, p. 143-221].

The thinker calls for an end to heated discussions about God and to focus on the elimination of dangerous modern forms of idolatry, whether religious or non-religious, trying to maximize the introduction of life and spiritual forms of humanity, both religiously and temporally or scientifically. Only under such conditions and approaches a culture can be successfully created, enriched and preserved.

Secular and religious sources are organic components of a universal cultural integrity, and humanity today must look for the unity of philosophy, morality, spirituality and the arts, while at the same time vanity and ignorance must be the object of constructive criticism from both religion and science level.

But most of all secular and religious in the culture are called to unite service to the ideals of humanity, charity, non-violence. Harmony, cooperation, tolerance for different types of outlook - will ensure a full-fledged modern development of culture. That is, everything that unites and satisfies believers and non-believers is far more important than what contradicts the principles of their worldviews.

Understanding the tragic pages of history, striving for a better national destiny, solving environmental problems - these are the most important priorities for people, regardless of their personal attitude to religion and free thinking.

Only qualitative discourse leads to understanding, change of outdated paradigms, to creative cooperation and, as a result, to the conscious preservation, appreciation and dynamic development of human culture.

scientific religious cultural

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