The French philosophe André Compte-Sponville has introduced the concept of atheist spirituality. It is far broader than described in this article.

Ecklund further discredits herself and Templeton. Here a mere 20 % of responders becomes “spirituality among even the most secular scientists … pervades”.

Also self-reporting interviews becomes evidence for “nonspiritual colleagues might focus on their own research at the expense of student interaction, spiritual scientists’ sense of spirituality provides nonnegotiable reasons”, either here or with her.

Jerry Coyne said it best: “Elaine Ecklund’s Templeton-funded book, Science vs. Religion: What Scientists Really Think, was a prime example of how to frame disagreeable data by distorting it, Faced with data showing that scientists, especially at “elite” universities, are largely atheistic, she talked repeatedly about “spirituality,” hoping that readers would unconsciously make the elision between “spiritual” and “religious.””

I look at it this way. Spirituality is a natural function of a sentient mind. It is the sum of all emotional states in a person. The problem is that man has tended to misinterpret human spiritual experiences and place upon them supernatural constructs that led to religions.

“This challenges the idea that scientists, and other groups we typically deem as secular, are devoid of those big ‘Why am I here?’ questions. They too have these basic human questions and a desire to find meaning.”

Huh, I thought this more of philosophical question not a spiritual one for an atheist. As an atheist, I have these questions — I just don’t believe in the supernatural and so I don’t find the answers provided by religion to be all that compelling. Are you telling me that I’m “spiritual”, even though I don’t believe in spirits, souls, or any of that stuff? That’s news to me…

I thought spirituality required the belief in a spirit, a soul, or some sort of supernatural something-or-other.

We sure could use some precisely defined terms here…

I don’t get it. @_@

Having spent considerable time in diverse cultures I have developed my own ideas concerning spirituallity. Luckely, my religion requires I follow where my mind leads me. I find great comfort in religion since I sense something there beyond what we currently know. I also ask questions that some others consider very strange.

JESUS: true / false

buddha true / false

Allah: true / false

Sun-god: true / false

GOD GODS GOOOODS have been replaced by Spiritual.

Spiritual is New Marketing word for false belief in little Man/Woman in the sky…..

ie.. There is No god

As someone who both strongly believes in both science and God I am both amused and saddened by the number of intelligent, informed people who can believe/ understand only one or the other, but who fail to see that the two are not mutually exclusive but for those willing to be truly open minded are in fact complimentary in many ways. Both groups have been ill served by the extremists among them who think their world view has an exclusive hold on the truth and all others are either heretics or lunatics. The Bible was never meant to be a scientific explanation of the actual way God created the universe, and was not viewed this way in ancient times, this is a more modern mistake made by those who also misunderstand many of the spiritual truths contained within it, which is and always has been its purpose, to teach spiritual truth and morality. (Westboro church is the poster child of our time for this type of complete ignorance on every level.) (The same goes for extremists of other faiths)
Those on the “religious” side who deny the evidence of science fail to live up to the potentiality of our being made “in the image of God” , which means we have the ability to think , discern and understand the world we live in, as well as control it to a great degree, both for good or ill. Those on the aetheistic side who deny the existence of God or any thing they cannot see or measure “scientifically or logically” also fail to live up to our potentiality as beings who have a soul or spiritual nature that allows us to “peak behind the curtain” of objective reality to catch sight of , commune with and recieve power from “the underlying ground of being” as some modern theologians have put it, but who in fact is a loving, involved, personal God, whose ultimate representation and revelation came in Christ Jesus.
The ironic part is that both sides display the same type of misplaced faith in the exclusive “correctness” or truth of their opinions, and display the same type of closed-mindedness regarding each other. The fundamentalists on the religious side are hung up on taking something literally that is meant to be metaphorical (the Old Testament creation story) while the aetheist position in the end boils down to “I have never experienced God, therefore he does not exist” , although they like to wrap this belief up in a lot of fancy rhetoric and “logic” , but in the end, it is just their belief, without any proof. “Knowing” and experiencing God is something that only comes from belief, from a sincere desire to know and be known by Him, by being willing to take “a leap of faith” out of the confines of the objective world of our five senses. beyond the ordinary and mundane. Without that faith and desire you are highly unlikely to ever experience “the Otherness” behind the visible world. This unwillingness or inability by aetheists is just as ill-informed and self destructive as is the foolish belief of religious fundamentalists to reject modern medicine to cure their children of physical disease. Both live an incomplete form of life, though both would deny this. Both fail to avail themselves of the fullness of God’s gifts.
Its no wonder that many scientists, particularly physicists, are admitting to a degree of spirituality as the more we discern and understand the incredible complexity of sub-atomic structure and the delicate balance between the forces that allow matter to exist at all, much less form complex molecules, it becomes increasingly obvious that random chance is unsustainable as an explanation for the universe.

Stephen Wheeley:
Years ago, before I settled in to being actively opposed to religion, I would have agreed with your sentiment — even though I’ve never been a believer. Reconciling science and religion doesn’t appear to be too hard for those who are inclined to try. I know several religious people who have succeeded beautifully.

However, when one of my siblings came out of the closet, I was forced to look at religion with fresh eyes from the outside, rather than through the lens of what religion is supposed to be. That was a shock, even to my atheist/agnostic self. The nuts control enough of the narrative that my religious relatives have permission to hate a member of the family, just because she happened to have been born queer. The creationists control the religious narrative on science to those of us on the outside in much the same way. Even if you’ve personally been able to reconcile science and religion, the crazies have won the battle control the message, and there just aren’t enough moderate theists out there caring for the less fortunate and loving their neighbors to compete. The crazy theists must give up on their holy quests to legislate discrimination against my family and my profession before I can go back to wondering if there is a god or not. There’s not much point revisiting my beliefs, because I’m pretty sure I’d rather go to hell rather than risk being stuck with that lot for all eternity. Yes, that’s the inverse of Pascal’s Wager.

BTW, did you ever read Contact by Carl Sagan? The entire book is about how Sagan wanted to reconcile science and religion. The movie has almost nothing to do with the book beyond a couple of plot-points — what little bit of Sagan’s philosophy is left in the movie is twisted beyond recognition. The book is quite thought provoking, though, and I suspect you would enjoy it as much as I did.