[Mark Lapierre]

Well, if we combine Michael's Smoke and Mirrors post (which I read but apparently didn't assimilate very well) with another of his about definitions (search for it, I'm too lazy to find the link now), and add Jim's link, we get to the core of the problem, which I see as dueling definitions distracting us (or maybe just me) from the lack of any real argument.

So John, yes, there are questions science can't answer, because the domain of those questions is not the domain in which the core of science operates. But that point is confused because, as Michael argued in Smoke and Mirrors, science, logic and faith are not mutually exclusive.

Calling those questions a question of spirituality (or faith) is relevant only in that they rely on an acceptance of key assumptions. But so does science, and logic (again, as Michael pointed out).

This is what I meant about the combination not doing "much good." It wasn't in relation to value judgments, but rather a reference to not helping in resolving the arguments that ensue when people consider the issue of right vs. wrong.

We can call it what we want, but it doesn't change the fact that as long as there is a disagreement over those key assumptions (regardless of what we're disagreeing about), there can be no satisfactory conclusion to the argument (yup, you guessed it, Micheal pointed that out too).

In this particular case, my understanding of the term "spirituality" always implies the involvement of an special force (God or otherwise named, conscious or unconscious or superconscious, collective or singular) above and beyond human nature. That's the key assumption which makes my wine glass purple and yours pink.

However, if you're proposing that we look past the colour of the wine glass and consider the question of what it's made out of, rather than what colours it, then I think we can agree.

In other words, sure, we can address questions of morals and ethics through the agreement of key assumptions, and the propositions and statements that follow from them, logical or otherwise. We can do that with any question, scientific or otherwise. But we if disagree on those key assumptions we'll get nowhere in trying to reach the same conclusion via the same path.

(ultimately I think I would have agreed with you way back at post 90176 if you hadn't included "only" when you said "These questions are only answerable by the spirit")