Ziqi Yin - Week 5

Ziqi Yin - Week 5

After reading the "Article: Combining Indian and Western Spiritual Psychology: Applications to Health and Social Renewal". I think that different antagonistic forces influence the direction of science and religion; one relies on empirical teaching while the other depends on a metaphysical understanding of the world. For the longest time, the differences motivated the dismissive attitude towards religion and religious practice. However, according to the findings by Oman and Singh, the negative perceptions of psychology towards religions are diminishing. Now science is turning to religion and spirituality, in particular traditional Indian philosophies, to find solutions and a cure for human mental ailments. The collaboration between religion and science aims to expand the current pool of available and accessible knowledge. As the authors of the article note, using collective approaches like theoretical, empirical, and experiential methods can create new knowledge.  However, the researchers fail to acknowledge that human volition alone is insufficient to derive meaning from the calamities happening in the world today.