Comment on atheism quote

I found a tattered scrap of paper in my purse with a quotation I'd apparently copied down in some waiting room:

"A recurring theme in atheist writing is that in the competition of worldviews, science is at a disadvantage to religion, because it does not meet the universal human need for fellowship and the comfort of familiar ritual." (Smithsonian, Jan. 2014, p. 44)

Any comment?

This quote takes for granted any number of dubious assertions, and then weakens them further by bracketing them as "a recurring theme in atheist writing." Perhaps most basically, it is a mistake to posit such a thing as "the scientific worldview" to contrast with "the religious worldview." There are many worldviews, each incorporating both science and religion in different ways and to different degrees.

Whether science provides fellowship and/or ritual is simply irrelevant. There are many ways outside of religion to get those things (assuming, arguendo, that they are "universal human needs"), so why should it matter whether they are obtained through science or some other method?

It's a false comparison.

I should have mentioned that this line was extracted from a full-length article and that I didn't have time in the waiting room to read the whole article. So it may not be the case that a view was simply posited or that those assertions were taken for granted; the author might have backed them up.

How about the second half of the sentence, though? Any merit to that point? That's the part that interested me enough to copy it down.

DNA is a pretty powerful illustration of the interconnectedness of all life, frankly.

This quote just seems full of category errors to me. An analogy would be:

A recurring theme in Italian leatherwork is that in the competition of coutures, shoes are at a disadvantage to handbags, because they do not meet meet the universal nightlife need for holding keys and compacts.

(And for all I know, the article may have attacked that view on the same grounds.)

I think the quote is mixing apples and oranges - science is a tool, not a worldview. As for the atheist not having access to fellowship and ritual, there are ways of getting both outside of religion for those that want them. You just need to put a little more effort into finding them.

I suppose we can consider them universal needs in general as long as we acknowledge the inevitable exceptions. For instance, while I certainly enjoy getting together with other atheists I've always found rituals of any kind annoying at best.