Thermodynamics is fine as far as it goes.
Physics is also fine . . . as far as it goes.
Among all the "random" data that eddies about us, there are those data to which we cleave and use to stabilize all the other -- apparently random -- data.
I, too, have such data.
One datum of which I am completely certain is that the human condition extends beyond what is physical. Said differently, there is an aspect of humanity that cannot be explained by physics (and, consequently, thermodynamics), and that aspect is non-physical, non-mortal, and directly affects the physical world.
Physics is a science developed in the absence -- one might say the denial -- of this datum. Physics is not alone in this, as the other "hard" sciences share this attribute.
Consequently, there will be failures to predict in the world of physics (yeah, I'm picking on physics, 'cuz it's the most obvious). Also there will be derivations that depend on assumptions made in the absence (denial?) of this datum. The "Big Bang" comes to mind. We're willing to suspend the laws of physics so that we can have a theoretical starting point. It's kind of a, "look, we have to start somewhere, and these orbital calculations won't wait while we solve the 'angels-per-pinhead' problem, so let's just start with a Big Bang, okay? Can we just take that as read, and get on with the math?"
And I'm okay with that, as far as it goes.
It is, however, rather too easy to forget that humanity is not some great algae experiment gone wrong.
There is somebody home. Individually. For everyone.
And until physics can address that, we're gonna have assumptions that we know are broken but we use them anyway, and from time to time we will get results that don't map to anything we already think we understand. And those results will be largely dismissed and relegated to some knowledge scrap heap, until decades later when Olaf Sauerkrautsson goes, "Hey, you guys remember that anomaly back in 1997, with the unpredicted field measurements? Well, you won't believe this, but . . ."
And so it goes.
Religion? It does a good job, generally, as the carrier for morality, but it also carries clues to aspects of humanity and reality that science is loathe to contemplate.
I mean, here you are, a scientist, and some crackpot wants you to take into account something that can't be seen, can't be weighed, can't be measured, but which can directly impinge on the physical world. Right. That's sure gonna happen.
Hey, I have an idea! Let's call it magic! 'Cuz that's kind of what you're asking this poor scientist to do.
And yet . . .
There is something there.
There is somebody home.
And science still hasn't been able to deal with it.
So I guess, for the time being, we're gonna have religion.
Who knows? Once science figures out how to account for this "spirit" thing (call it a soul if you prefer), we may still have religion.
Maybe religion will look a lot different.
Meanwhile, I say that we attempt to eliminate religion at our peril.