Jerry Coyne - Find Quotes

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The methodological conflicts between science and religion cannot be brokered, for faith has no reliable way to find truth.

Jerry Coyne
Religion may be a quest for the truth, but it has no way of finding the truth, or verifying what it claims to find. Our knowledge of what God is like has not advanced one iota over the ideas of the 1500s.
And insofar as theological interpretation has changed, it's done so not as a result of faith's quest for truth, but of pressure from science and secular morality. Really, can any theologian, philosopher, or scientist tell me anything about God now that we didn't know 500 years ago? Then ask a scientist what we know now about science that we didn't know in 1500.

Jerry Coyne
In the end, religious investigations of truth, unlike those of science, are deeply dependent on confirmation bias. You start with what you were taught to believe, or what you want to believe, and then accept only those facts that support your prejudices. This is the basis for the theological practice of apologetics, designed to defend religion against counterarguments and disconfirming evidence.... In contrast, science has no apologetics, for we test our conclusions by trying to find counterevidence.

Jerry Coyne
You can find some religions without creationism, but you can't find creationism without religion.

Jerry Coyne
Science in fact has a lot to say about the supernatural. It can and has tested it, and so far has found no evidence for it.... Indeed, over its history science has repeatedly investigated supernatural claims and, in principle, could find strong evidence for them. But that evidence hasn't appeared.

Jerry Coyne
If you spend your life looking in vain for the Loch Ness Monster, stalking the lake with a camera, sounding it with sonar, and sending submersibles into its depths, and yet still find nothing, what is the more sensible view: to conclude provisionally that the monster simply isn't there, or to throw up your hands and say, It might be there; I'm not sure? Most people would give the first response—unless they're talking about God.

Jerry Coyne
One can meet all the emotional requisites of a human—except for the assurance that you'll find a life after death—without the superstitions of religion.

Jerry Coyne
Above all, religion, faith healing, and alternative medicine all show the diagnostic feature of faith: an agenda not to find the truth, but to support one's biases, emotions, and personal beliefs.

Jerry Coyne
In the end theologians are jealous of science, for they are aware that it has greater authority than do their own ways of finding truth : dogma, authority, and revelation. Science does find truth, faith does not.

Jerry Coyne
In the end, why isn't it better to find out how the world really works instead of making up stories about it, or accepting stories concocted centuries ago?

Jerry Coyne
It's clear that this resistance stems largely from religion. You can find religions without creationism, but you never find creationism without religion.

Jerry Coyne
I have to say that I find Ali's argument truly revolting—not just because it's intellectually weak and actually deceptive, but because it debases the entire realm of university scholarship of which I'm a member. When I see pieces like hers—lame apologetics that are meant from the outset to reinforce an opinion already held—I thank Ceiling Cat that I am a scientist: a member of the guild in which using your scholarship to reinforce emotional commitments is considered a sin.

Jerry Coyne
While our view of the world is filtered through our senses, evolution has, by and large, molded those senses to perceive the world accurately, for there's a severe penalty to be paid for seeing things wrongly. That holds not only for the external environment, but also for the character of others. Without accurate perceptions, we couldn't find food, avoid predators and other dangers, or form harmonious social groups. And following those perceptions is indeed the pursuit of true beliefs : beliefs based on evidence. Natural selection doesn't mold true beliefs; it molds the sensory and neural apparatus that, in general, promotes the formation of true beliefs.

Jerry Coyne