It's not unusual to hear about conflicts between science and religion -- there's evolution & creationism, stem-cell research, cloning, the nature of the mind, and the list can just keep going on and on. But is there a real conflict between science and religion and, if so, is it getting worse or better? I think that the conflict is real, though it lies primarily on the level of methodology than any particular conclusion on any issue, and that it is probably getting worse over time.
Science and religion rely upon very different and incompatible sets of assumptions -- you can't do good science on the assumptions used by religion and there don't appear to be any religions interested in adopting the assumptions and methodology of science. The two sets of assumptions are not, however, equally valuable. The assumptions and methodology of science produce clear, unambiguous, and incontrovertible gains in knowledge, understanding, and quality of life. Science certainly isn't perfect, but it does about as well as any human system of investigation possibly could. Religion, on the other hand, hasn't produced anything close to what we have gained from science.
Faith, religion, and dogma are not "ways" of acquiring knowledge about the world around us. Once a system openly and explicitly declares a willingness to ignore or abandon logic, then it forfeits any claim for authority over empirical studies of nature and the universe. This is how dogmatic systems work, though not just religious ones -- we can find the same thing occurring in a wide variety of ideologies.
Why does such an extreme difference exist? Science's success depends upon the scientific method and upon methodological naturalism. The scientific method ensures that new ideas are thoroughly tested and vetted before being accepted. Methodological naturalism ensures that science conforms to the boundaries of the natural world rather than the boundaries of wishful thinking. Religions neither incorporate nor value either of these methods. The diversity of religion prevents us making many generalizations about all religions, but I am unaware of any that develop and test their claims on the scientific method or rely upon methodological naturalism when examining the world.
Thus, not only are the foundations of religion and science incompatible, but the fruits of one are clearly superior to the fruits of the other. The only way to salvage some compromise is to insist that science and religion deal with different spheres of existence, but that's a difficult position to maintain. It's a rare religion that doesn't purport to make any empirical claims about our world, but efforts to exempt such claims from scientific investigation effectively admits that science and religion are incompatible.
This doesn't require the conclusion that religion is valueless because not everything in life can, does, or needs to incorporate the principles of science to be worth anything. What we can conclude, however, is that in the past couple of centuries science has done far more to improve the basic living and survival standards of humanity than religion has in the past several millennia. Religious leaders like to claim that we need more religion in order to solve our problems, but with most problems we could probably benefit from more science instead.
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