T'Pol's emotions opposed to Spock's

TAS, VOY, ENT and TSFS each made mention of religious officials, activities, or structures.

Plus I think T'Pau was present at Spock anticipated wedding to officiate the wedding ceremony (Spock said there be a ceremony), and she was there as a religious priestess.

When Tuvok's wife said she arranged for the priests at the temple to say prayers for his safe return, who were they praying too? I think the Vulcan gods.

 

Some people worship ancestors, animals and objects.

 

YMMV

 

Vulcan society is weird. Women can captain ships and T'Pau apparently ran the planet when the Syrranites overthrew the High Command. Yet T'Pring would have been the property of whoever won the kalifee (if they chose to do so). That suggests a patriarchy. In colonial America, some businesses and foundations hired single women to watch the money because they didn't want an unscrupulous husband to get his hands on it (married women couldn't own their own property). I wonder if the Vulcan treasury had something like that.

 

Trek has always excelled at being contradictory that way.

 

All religions rely on superior supernatural powers, whether they call it god or spaghetti monster is of little importance. I used the term "god" as a generic, if you want to replace it with something else, please do.

THAT IS NOT THE POINT!!!!

 

Yes, that makes little sense, then again Vulcan mythos is hardly something realistic, its relation to any kind of real society is tenuous at best. I mean they keep talking about logic as if they were some kind of rational society but in fact they're using that term, the way a moron would use a Stradivarius to swat a fly.

 

I guess not, but I still find fault with your statement

Their power comes from authority and position T'Pau managed to sweep Spock's indiscretions under the rug. So their power is more than symbolic. Leaders have power, be it religious, political or philosophical. From that position they do take on the task of speaking of the behalf of others and guiding society.

 

The thing is that in any kind of rational society, priests shouldn't have any power at all. That's what makes me say that the constant use of the word "logic" in Vulcan society is about as significant as the use of fuck in ours. It's just a word.

 

And what is a priest? Many of the men who laid the foundation for our rational society were priests. The Church in Europe produced many scientists.
Even in a rational society there will be leaders,defining what is rational and what is acceptable for society. Logic is an approach to solving problems, usually based on gathering information and evaluating it. Those at the top will probably be doing the evaluating. To this end Vulcans try to eliminate emotion as an influencing factor, with mixed results. I think emotional suppression is more important to Vulcan society than logic.

 

Some priests may have contributed to science just as some aristocrats did but that's mostly because as a group they had the time and the means to do so. Most everyone else was too busy working hard to do much else. At any rate it's not in their capacity as priests that they did so but as people who had developed a quasi unreligious like curiosity. There was a time when asking too much questions about the inner workings of nature could lead you to be burned at the stake.

 

I'm an atheist, myself. But I think it's curiosity than moved these people to explore the world around them. A curiosity spurred partially by faith.

 

Discouraged by their peers. You forget about Galileo, for example.

 

Not at all. The relationship between science and the Church has often been a seesaw. And, going back to an earlier point, often dependent on the leadership at the time.

 

However, in order to develop science needs to be free of all that crap.

 

Are you talking about Terry Farrell?

 

Yes, she was definitely self serving, but I don't think that that is a Vulcan trait.