A mistaken perception among many is that people who tend to be logical, rational or scientific (henceforth abbreviated and referred to as LRS, in alphabetical order, not in order of importance, and will also be used to refer to logic, rationalism and science) in their thinking, lack in the finer sense of aesthetics, appreciation for art, humour, or are incapable of feeling human emotions like love, passion, fantasy, faith etc. This view is erroneous and a myth. Not only can they show all these human emotional sensitivity but even have a belief in something not provable by science (This may not have ever occurred to many, will be clarified later). Thinking logical and rational is a way of organizing our thoughts and actions to avoid unnecessary fallacies and misunderstandings that result from careless or cavalier thinking or reasoning. It is of practical significance, intellectual aside, and is mutually exclusive of, yet compatible with purely "natural" human emotions like love, (com)passion, imaginations, daydreaming, fear etc. Appreciating logic and insisting on it in speech and actions that are of impersonal nature does not prevent one from appreciating a piece of artwork, or to hug someone or hold someone's hand and look into their eyes with admiration. So one should not immediately jump to such an impression about anyone by his/her logical remarks or insistence on logic. Often remarks like "Logic or reason cannot apply to emotions, love, beauty etc", "science ruins the beauty and mystery by trying to explain it" etc are commonly heard, the classic example being of the English poet Keats who accused Newton of ruining the beauty of rainbow by explaining it with the laws of optics. It is not just a coincidence that this kind of remarks are never made by those who understand science truly, i.e the scientists or science literates. This allegation that trying to explain or underatsnd beauty ruins it could be tested by asking those who make this statement to read themselves how rainbows are formed and see if the beauty of the rainbow is dimisnished to them. The common response is "I don't want to underdtand it", reflecting a closed mindedness in this regard. Besides these remarks sound like answering a question that was never asked, or refuting a conclusion that was never made. No one ever says or suggests that Logic or science "applies TO" emotions, beauty etc. Science or logic does not have any relevance to the experience of the "feeling" of love or beauty. But that does not by any means imply that logic and reasoning cannot be of any help to understand the origin of such experience of love, appreciation of beauty etc. Such understanding is within the domain of modern science specially the new field of "Sociobiology" or more specifically "Evolutionary Psychology" where usual human traits like selfishness, aggression, altruism, love etc are explained based on the fundamental lessons of Biological Evolution in terms of the workings of gene and hormones. There have been a good number of books published by scholars and research workers explaining the evolutionary biological basis of human emotions and perceptions, like "Why We Feel: The Science of Human Emotion" by Victor S. Johnston, "The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness" by Antonio R. Damasio, "Emblems of Mind: the inner life of music and mathematics" by Edward Rothstein (see http://www.maa.org/reviews/emblems.html), and "Math and Music : Harmonious Connections" by Trudi Hammel Garland et al, are just to name a few. Trying to understand the origin of emotions in terms of a more basic underlying natural principle through scientific reasoning does not mean that science or logic negates or belittle those emotions themselves. Then why so many harp on this defensive statement when no such contrary statements are made by scientists? The reason may be rooted in the inherent fear of the truth. For many the truth may destroy the idealistic mental images that their romantic imaginations create and inspire them in a personal way. There is a propensity among most humans to live with wishful thinking providing a sense of purpose, security and inspiration to move on in life. But a mature insight into the truth should not interfere with these personal images but should complement it instead. First let me tackle the issue of LRS vs. beauty, passion, mystery etc. Those who choose intuitive OVER rational approach in thoughts and actions and are critical of LRS (henceforth to be referred to as NLRS), are heard to pass comments like "LRSs kill the beauty by trying to explain or understand beauty". I must clarify that dividing people into LRS and NLSR does not mean there is an inherent difference between them. All humans have similar potentials and attributes in varying degrees that are manifested and expressed in varying degree by a combination of gene and environment. Anyway, the NLRS are making a subjective judgment in the comment above. I should also point out that intuitive approach is not discounted by LRS totally. To LRS intuive approach is also importajnt, but complementary to LRS, but LRS is primary. No what does kills the beauty mean? Does it mean it kills the capacity of the LRSs or NLRSs to appreciate art or beauty? How can an NLRS judge the pure subjective qualia of artistic sense in the minds of an LRS, who may not at all agree with that statement? And how can the attempt to explain by LRSs have an effect on the mind of NLRSs so that they will cease to appreciate beauty, love due to that attempt by LRS? There does not seem to be any connection. Many NLRS may also think that LRSs feel less of the qualia of love and other human emotions due to their effort to understand those feelings rationally. For all we know many scientists have a quite a bit of sense of beauty, and they feel that their appreciation of beauty is enhanced by knowing the object or phenomenon of beauty at a deeper level. Just as trying to understand the working of the brain does not rob the neurologists of their own brain or stops it from functioning, the act of trying to understand the deeper meaning of love and beauty does not rob the LRS of their inherent sense of beauty and ability to appreciate it. An astronomer is not less appreciative of the wonders of night sky than a poet, but may instead be more appreciative, because an astronomer may already possess an inherent poetic frame of mind and also an additional passion to understand the mystery behind the formation of stars and galaxies in terms of the principles of Physics. What possibly can make it impossible for an LRS not to be moved by the beauty or charm of a flower, a charming woman (for a male LRS) or a charming man (for a female LRS)? I tend to believe that I am an LRS. But why is it that I am attracted to surrealism in visual and aural art, why am I touched by hauntingly beautiful music, poetry etc? These are not explainable nor demanded by LRS thinking. Of course which music or poetry appears to reflect beauty to an individual is purely subjective. But we all are equipped with the potential to feel and experience beauty. An LRS has the same genetic structure and capability to appreciate and enjoy beauty as an NLRS, despite the fact an LRS follows the valid argument forms of Modus Ponens, Modus Tollens, Hypothetical Syllogism or Disjunctive Syllogism!.

Inherent sense of beauty or sense of awe and appreciation are mostly genetic traits in humans in various degrees and are not affected by any other genetic traits like propensities to understand or explain things at a deeper level. They are mutually exclusive. In other words if sense of beauty, compassion, love etc are determined by one genetic factor (say gene-1) and the propensity to understand and search for deeper answer through LRS way is determined by a second genetic factor (say gene-2) then gene-1 and gene-2 are mutually independent, not affecting each other. My reasoning using gene-1,2 etc is for heuristic purpose. Things may be more complicated than that. In the book "ORIGINS: Cosmos, Earth and  Mankind" by Hubert Reeves et al, leading biologist Yves Coppens has traced the origin of the emotion "love" to the gradual increase in the gestation period of women of the early hominids (Australopithecus Afransis), houndreds of thousands years ago.

Einstein saw beauty in the laws of nature. Beauty is symmetry. And it is by believing in the beauty of nature that Einstein, Dirac and numerous other physicists came to the most insightful realizations of the secrets of nature. Behind their profound discoveries lie the motivation from a sheer metaphysical sense of beauty and mystery of the universe. But Einstein was also moved by music. he used to play violin. Nobel laureate Feynman was an accomplished Bongo player. The Nobel laureate Physicist Chandrasekhar who wrote a 650 page mathematical tome "The Mathematical Theory of Black Holes" also wrote a book called "Truth and Beauty" in which he emphasized the role of sense of beauty behind the motivation of scientific thinking. To him, art, seen from this scientist's point of view, seems to be all the richer for it, contrary to popular belief that rationality strips Art of its elemental passion. He drew the parallel between the works of Shakespeare, Beethoven, Shelley etc with the beauty inspired approach of scientists for the search of the truth. A very fascinating marriage of beauty and mathematics can be seen in the works of mathematician/artist Escher (http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Museum/3828/air.html). The renowned British astronomer and prolific author John Barrow also has shown how beauty and truths of natural laws are closely related (not antagonistic) in Part 6 Titled "Aesthetics" in chapters 23 24 of his fascinating book: "Between Inner Space and Outer Space" (see http://hallsciences.com/astronomy/871.shtml). He discusses the evoutionary origin of sense of beauty among early hominids. Those primitive senses of beauty had adaptive value like all other evolutionary traits. But today that primitive sense has reached an elegant level beyond any adaptive value.

LRSs feel that the mystery even deepens and becomes more interesting as they understand more. Actually the truth is that a mystery is honoured and elevated by the pursuit of its explanation and understanding, not diminished or ruined. Providing a simplistic answer like it is the work of GOD, or only GOD knows, or that only the mystics, theologians or psychics can grasp the ultimate reality it doesn't really recognize the mystery but kills it by closing all the doors of a better understanding through a disciplined mental efforts via scientific metaphysics. All scientists at the bottom of their heart appreciate more so deeply about the unknown than anyone else. After all, one can only appreciate the unknown best by knowing all that can be known first. The mystery of the universe is best appreciated in the secret code of nature that has been cracked by science so far and is constantly being cracked as an ongoing process. Also LRSs admit that there exists an ultimate mystery that is unexplainable. For example one can start asking why to each phenomenon (As Nobel laureate Weinberg does in his famous "Dreams of a Final Theory"), say starting with a phenomenon "D". LRS:

• D. Why D? because C.
• Why C? Because B.
• Why B? because A.
• Why A? "I don;t know. But I will to search for the answer."

NLRS:

• Why D? Well maybe, its the work of "GOD" or some "Spiritual force", anyway why bother, isn't it better to leave the mystery as it is instead of ruining it by trying to use logic everyhere?"
• Why C? Same answer as above
• Why B? Same answer as above
• Why A? Same answer as above

Now lets stare at the two. Who was showing more humility? One who acknowledges ignorance at some deeper level when no answer is possible, or the one who at any level, has some predetermined answer of some divine or spiritual "force" being behind all, whether it is A,B,C, D, and makes a judgemental statement that it ruins the mystery or beauty in trying to understand it?. Who really is ruining the mystery and who is keeping it alive? Points to ponder.

For example, for LRSs "A" now = the Standard model of particle Physics, or potentially in future, the M-Theory version of Superstrings. In other words:

Standard Model(or M-Theory)->All of Physics->All of Chemistry->All of Biology->Life->Economics..

Of course the details in some arrows are lost in the laws of emergent phenomenon like complexity, chaos that are almost impossible to know but are in principle traceable to the Standard model or can be added as a supplementary rules along with it. But no LRS can claims to know what the origin or explanation for the existence of the standard model or M-theory is. That is the end point of human ken.

Next take the case of love, (com)passion etc. NLRS often pass comments like "Love, kindness, human emotions" are not rationalizable. Its beyond logic or science. What are they really trying to say? Scientists do try to find a layer of reality underneath each human traits including that of sense of beauty, love (As the example of Yves Coppens mentioned earlier), etc which are supervenient on those lower phenomenon and appear as epiphenomena. But does that really imply rationalizing the subjective feeling (qualia) of love itself that we all human (LRS or NLRS) feel? Does it even make any sense to say that? Then why such comments are made? I will get to it later. NLRSs often pass the remarks that logic is cold, lacks compassion. To assign an emotion or lack of emotion to logic is a fallacy. One can be logical and still be compassionate. Judges are known to be stickler for logic. But they are also known to be compassionate. A judge convicts a person based on logic and evidence, but can use compassion to grant pardon in some situations. No conflict their between logic and compassion. But logic had to be used to distinguish a pardon from an aquittal. A logical person does not cease to be logical by donating to food bank or to poverty/hunger alleviation projects, and logic does not prevent one from doing that. On the other hand some of the cruel punishments on women and writers have been meted out by those who do not rely on logic and rationality, but on faith and intuition.

It is also a mistaken conclusion that a scientific and skeptical mind cannot have any belief. Let us be careful with terms now. Faith is an unquestioning belief in anything, even if that belief contradicts logic or scientific evidence. But not all beliefs are faith. Some beliefs are based on evidence and/or logic, like belief in the theory of relativity, or belief that earth is round. Some beliefs are not based on evidence or logic but also do not contradict them either, like a belief in extraterrestrial life. Then there are beliefs in objects or notions that are ill-defined, reflecting ignorance at some deeper level, which may or may not contradict logic or evidence depending on how those notions or defintions are formulated. A belief in a such a GOD in some of its versions (not a personal God of revealed religion, but as an abstract concept or belief in immortality in some abstract sense) is not inconsistent with a skeptical and rational thinking, because a vague notion of a GOD and an equally vague notion of immoratlity makes it impossible to subject such beliefs to logical or scientific or logical analysis. Belief in an abstract God and life after death are the kind of inborn instincts in human that are not amenable to logic and logic is not contradicted if one FEELS this instinct. The term "God" reflects two aspects of human nature:

1. An ignorance about the ultimate cause or nature of the origin of the universe. existence of the universe
2. A desire for immortality, i.e a fear or reluctance to face the inevitable truth of end of one's own life and one's near and dear ones.

A good example of a skeptic rational philosopher who believes in such a GOD and immortality but otherwise doesn't believe in any existing religion or faith is the eminent Philosopher of 20th century, Martin Gardner. (See his book "The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener"). Martin Gardner is a rigid skeptic and logician/ mathematician who has been a regular critic of pseudoscience and new age mystics debunking myths through the columns of The Skeptical Inquirer magazine of the "Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal" (CSICOP) but also believes in Immortality and his own concept of GOD. Why? He plainly admits that in his book, because he wants to believe in immortality and GOD, and since logic/science is not violated by this belief (But God of the traditional religious IS contradicted by logic and evidence) he can happily believe in it! It is important to keep in mind that Gardner does not CLAIM that God exists or that immortality is true, and is not an avowed theist. His personal instinctual belief in God and immortality is probably better described as a wishful thinking.

A second example is that a scientifically inclined person may believe in the "Omega Point" concept of GOD (cf. "Physics of Immortality" by Frank Tipler). Since the existence of Omega Point cannot be observationally tested (At least at the current time) believing in it cannot be a truly scientific act but nevertheless a physicist would not be violating scientific principles by believing in it either, since it is consistent with Physics and certainly plausible in Physics terms and provides the best concept of GOD as a "belief". Physicist Frank Tipler not only believes in Omega Point, but also goes a step further to prove that such a GOD is an end result of the evolution of life and universe and will become an omniscient, omnipotent entity that purely arises out of a consequence of the natural laws. Although some premises have to be true (which are not known at this time if they are) for Omega Point to become a reality, Tipler chooses to "believe" that the premises are true because it doesn't violate any known scientific laws to believe in those premises. This is a clear example of believing in "God", resurrection, immortality etc, although is a very special sense, while still adhering to the strict principles of Physics and LRS, because Omega Point Theory is falsifiable in principle. If the ideas of Tipler sound Intriguing, check more at http://niazi.com/resurrec.htm or http://www.doesgodexist.org/JanFeb96/PhysicsOfImmorality.html Tipler is a Global general relativist, a formidably mathematical field and his work comparable to that of Hawking. He can be taken as a prototype of an LRS.

In fact while it is true that most scientists don't subscribe to the traditional beliefs in personal GOD and the revelations of a book as the word of the GOD, many are in fact deists, where the deity for many are just the "Laws of Physics". From a traditional theistic point of view that is not much different from atheism. Einstein believed in a Cosmic Consciousness which he identified as Nature (Called Spinozza's God). These scientists refer to their vague beliefs mostly to avoid being looked upon as atheists or due to the two reasons mentioned earlier. I already mentioned Omega Point. Its just that they don't believe in the usual personal concept of God as a father figure somewhere up in the heavens monitoring the day to day activities of each mortal, talks to them through the revelations of a book written in a certain language, who demands daily worship by the mortals and gets angry if they don't , and prepare a ledger for final rewards and punishment for not following the revelations. Since scientists admit that the very source or origin of natural principles are not explainable by the natural laws themselves, there will remain an ultimate mystery of the unknown. Scientists usually don't label that unknown with any term, although some do use the word GOD metaphorically like Hawking, and Einstein as mentioned above.

The belief in Many Worlds/Parallel universe is another example of a belief of scientists that cannot be tested scientifically but is nevertheless quite consistent with Physics (Quantum Physics to be exact). Many physicists strongly believe in many worlds (And many other ideas of Quantum Metaphysics) and some (Like Penrose) in fact "believe" that Quantum Metaphysics and Global General Relativity are the link between tangible world and the intangible world of consciousness. It may be that paranormal phenomena, IF they exist at all, may eventually be "explained" (i.e shown to follow from natural laws). Many scientists believe in the so called Anthropic Principle.( See the link at http://www.winternet.com/~gmcdavid/html_dir/anthropic.html) which is as close a scientist can get to "GOD" (Intelligent Design) as possible, staying within the purview of scientific rationality. Notice that no explicit mention of God is there in its discussion. "God" has to be read in it by pure metaphysical extrapolation which is certainly valid to anyone rational. Indeed the Anthropic Principle which is stated as a one liner in popular books like Hawking's Brief History of Time) is really very complex and detailed. A 700 page book called "The Anthropic Cosmological Principle" (see http://home.planet.nl/~gkorthof/kortho17.htm for a review) has been devoted to it by Tipler and Barrow whose names have been mentioned earlier. If the summary review in the preceding link looks abstruse then one should wonder how much insight the 726 page original book may provide. It is my personal biased view that by understanding this 726 page book one can get the most "spiritual" feeling. But in no way the instinctive feeling of God from Anthropic principle need to be passionately preached as an absolute truth about God, that would be the fallacy of the design argument for theism. Anthropic principle itself cannot speak about a designer, only about design. But intelligent design is also not established beyond doubt, because Physics cannot rule out any other explanations for anthropic coincidences. In fact explanations do exist, like parallel universe theory, among others. The facts of Anthropic principle are objective (expressed in Physics language). The conclusion derived therefrom is just a subjective one.

A belief, therefore to be consistent with skepticism and rationalism, must fulfil two requirements: (1) It cannot contradict logic, evidence or scientifc principle. (2) It cannot be claimed as a truth with the same status as scientifically established truths and has to be held as a personal belief. It is important to realize that a belief which does not contradict science does not necessarily mean that it is explainable by science. There may exist unexplained phenomena in nature. In absence of any yet known natural explanation even a scientific mind can speculate/hypothesize a plausible cause which is not scientific (In the sense that it cannot be tested by observation), but metaphysical, which nevertheless doesn't violate the existing natural laws either. But to a skeptical mind such a belief is an ad hoc one which is subject to revision/generalization/extension if more insight is gained.

So Rationality or logic does not REQUIRE "not believing". But one has to distinguish between beliefs rooted in instincts and beliefs generated by blind belief through human indoctrinations (scriptures, prophets etc), and of course informed beliefs based on evidence.

Finally some speculations(Speculation is not inconsistent with LRS!) Why is their a sort of instinctual fear and aversion towards LRS by the NLRS? Two different plausible reasons at different level comes to mind. Is it that there is an instinctive fear of logic, rationality, science due to their potential in leading us to unpleasant truths that one wishes not to face or admit? A truth which may shake up long cherished values that we all harbor deep inside? If so then it seems natural to express that fear by dehumanizing or demonizing the LRS and rob them of these lofty human qualities by portraying them as devoid of all softer qualities like love,compassion, filial piety etc. After all, these are valued by ALL of humanity, so by cleverly manipulating popular perceptions against LRS by stripping them of these valued traits, the NLRSs can successfully marginalize the LRSs. thus minimizing the risk of facing the unpleasant truths that only LRS can expose! I am not saying this is consciously done, but may be an instinctual. The second reason at a more fundamental level may be due a evolutianry legacy. Humans in past had to rely on intuition and reflexes a lot to survive and make quick decisions, to avoid predators for example. So intuition and impulses amy have had adaptive value in past, logic and rationality were not. We are reminded of the famous fable of Buridan's ass, where an ass starved to death becasue he stood in the middle of two identical haystacks but could not decide which one to eat first! Humans still have an atavistic tendency to discredit traits that were not evolutionarily adaptive in past, even though it may be vital today.