@M3J @g01
I have a very different opinion than you both on that topic.
I think for every ideology or any medium, it is largely irrelevant what individuals do with it but what is relevant is the state of society (which is more than just a bunch of individuals) and the nature of said ideology or medium.
There is often the point made that 'guns dont kill people, humans do', but the nature of guns combined with the nature of the society in which they are usable does completely imply its effects on said society.
There are individual cases for everything, but at large, the effect of a thing like an ideology or a medium or any technology does not depend on individuals, because it is clear that the state of the society implies the usage and effect of the thing.
This is a somewhat broader approach to a theory about media and technology which was first formulated by marshall mc luhan.
Let's concentrate on ideologies:
There is often the point made that an ideology is not inherently bad or good but the individuals which live it.
However, that would be an absolutely moot point because it would imply that ideology has no deep effects on society which can be desirable and undesirable.
And it is often MUCH more important how the nature of that ideology is than what its content is.
For example, communism itself could be formulated (and was formulated by some people) as an ideology which wants equal rights of participation for everyone and thus goes more into an anarchistic form of society building in which people organize themselves after certain guidelines.
However, the thing we saw it delve into as stalinism was built on the notion of a strong party and a strong leader who handled the state affairs and was not to be questioned.
It is definitely both communism as a content of the economical ideas of communism, but the nature of those ideologies vastly differs because one of them has the effect of 'questioning is unwelcome' and the other has the effect of 'you should participate and voice your opinion'.
The same can be said about catholicism and evangelicism.
Both are christianity with almost identical belief systems (same bible, same jesus, even most prayers are the same), but their nature, at least traditionally was largely different.
Catholicism was built, a bit like islam, on rituals. You should confess your sins regularly. You should after that do what you are told to make good with your sins. You should pray in the morning and in the evening (i know almost no catholic does that nowadays, but you will see later why it is important), and in general there are many little rituals like that you should do, like praying to saints and stuff like that.
This lead to the catholic church being built largely on uniformism and people who wanted to differ from those guidelines were judged or even persecuted.
Now let's compare it with evangelical teachings, which have the same content, basically, but with another nature of how they are tought.
Evangelism is formulated in a way that puts your PERSONAL relationship to god above almost anything else.
You should not confess your sins in a church, but just to god personally and then let him guide you about how you can make good of them.
It , even today, invites questioning (even questioning the bible and parts of it as metaphorical or downright inaccurate) and generally invites to make up your own mind.
This is because the nature of this ideology does not see a normative, unifrom society or group as the goal but takes a more personal approach.
(be aware that i am talking about european evangelism, not what we know as 'evangelicals' from the US. The nature of that ideology is very different to both catholicism and european evangelism).
And i think that ideologies who put individualism above uniformism are good for science while the other ones hinder it (with some exceptions, like for example when the uniformist ideology does explicitly puts scientific developement into its priorities, like in arms races.).
And Islam, as it is formulated in the quran, is a VERY unfirmist ideology.
Even people who don't really belief at all often adhere to the rituals of islam if they are from islamic countries or even immigrants in western countries, because these partially religious and partially cultural uniform ideas are so strong.
These are things you might interpret a bit more sloppy when you are at home, but, depending on the region and how strong these norms are there, you are aware that you can be judged by others for downright ignoring them, even if those rules have no real sense.
You always know they are a thing, some kind of ideal, which may be bent, but is usually not completely questioned as nonsense.
Now, i know that even in the islamic world, exspecially in turkey, islam is often lived moderately and is not seen as the most important thing.
Societies and cultures are not only shaped by one ideology, but by many of them.
However, i do think that the effect on a society of an ideology can only be understood if we strop the content of the ideology and just concentrate on its nature and on what it wants people to do and what it makes people to do. Exspecially what it would make people do if they actually followed it thouroughly.
If we concentrate on the fact that a scientist might not actually be fundamentally religious but rather 'well i do believe in god and i believe in the rules but i dont always do it', then that would be the same as saying that TV has no propaganda aspects to it because some people do not watch it a lot.
Natures of ideologies can change, and islam can to, but the way modern and historical muslims which actually indulged themselves in religion and wanted to really follow it understood it, it puts following the rules above anything else.
And that ultimately did shape uniform and hierarchic societies.
And in those societies, science is usually nothing more but a tool for the powerful to get more power.
It is no coincidence that most islamic science back then was focussed on astronomy, math and medicine, since all of those are skills very necessary for maintaining fleets of trading- and warships.
The same way, in christian regions, engineering skills were things actually encouraged to study for monks, because it was needed.
Those things can work in unfiform societies (that is what i meant with arms races).
However, big ideas like evolution, psychology, relativity, theory of knowledge or the idea of causality and lack of free will could never see the light of day in societies like that (at least not establish themselves), because science done in them is first and foremost done to further the ideology itself.
And ideas which change beliefsystems are actually a pretty big part of the social sciences, you cannot do them if you may not question existing normative rules.
This is why even the most autocratic nations are usually fine with math but will never support any social sciences or philosophy.
The degrees of how strong this uniformist ideologies affect a society very, but the direction of the effect seems quite clear to me.
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