[nethunters]

In the Islamic empire it was mostly due to the economic and political conditions that caused the decline of scientific study. However in the modern world, people of science generally view religious folks with distrust and they have the mindset that you can't be religious and a person of science yet historically most scientists were religious as well. Take Isaac Newton as an example who was a scientist and a theologian and had even written multiple literary works on the Bible.

With the moon sighting issue you presented this is similar in other countries too. However it isn't predominantly due to a distrust of science; sometimes certain scholars and groups will not adapt their rulings due to the fact that their parents and previous generations did this and they won't change not because they hate science.

The view in the UK on the moon-sighting debacle is that viewing the moon is necessary to commence the month as it was mentioned to the nearest meaning by the Prophet Muhammad (s.a.w) himself that we do not rely on calculations and the month is sometimes 29 and sometimes 30 (not 29 and a fraction of day as is the scientific view). The most correct and accepted view is that this isn't prohibiting or belittling astronomical calculations in deciding the month, rather it is a lessening of the burden to calculate and act upon exact calculations.

However the consensus is that astronomical calculations can be used to negate impossible viewings of the moon.