I read your book. I wish it was recommended reading in high school...for the teachers, at least. I've shared much of it with my teen daughter to help her counteract the rampant anti-Catholic attitude at her school.

I would recommend your book to anybody.

It's clear your interlocutor wishes to not know in order to justify, and be emotionally comfortable with, his rejection of Catholic morality. I can engage the man who says, "I think you're flat wrong and here are the reasons why." But those who extrapolate from any uncertainty to deny the possibility of true judgments about morality (or anything else) are best left alone. Life will one day shake him hard enough to clear his mind of such nonsense.

Dr Woods, what Galileo viewed for the first time that became the biggest hole in the heliocentric theory were the major satellites of Jupiter orbiting their planet, not the Earth or even the sun. He didn't prove heliocentrism so much as disproved everything revolved around the Earth.

Human beings have short memories--probably what caused them to forget the ancient understanding of heliocentrism in the first place. In the same mode, today's American scientists are well aware of attempts by religious groups to subvert the teaching of science. That some of these same scientists choose to circle the wagons and lash out at religion in general isn't really surprising. Catholics have been lumped in with evangelicals by others; it is not new either. In fact, some Catholics welcome it.

We should also realize that unlike the situation in politics, the stumbles and errors of scientists do not sink theories, models, and truths discovered--unless the fault lies in the experimental methodologies. Church leaders have erred. Scientists have erred. Some errors have been non-malicious, some not. Some have been in respect to people skills, and both scientists and people of faith have failed to persuade, not because of any defect in the truth as they knew it.

Bad-mouthing Galileo gets you pretty much the same reaction as if you had decided to diss JPII on EWTN. You'll pretty much turn off your audience from the get-go. If you want to take at scientists rather than with them, I advise the same procedure for Galileo ... or any hero, really. If the purpose is to stand on a soapbox and cite talking points, go ahead and bash.

If instead, the aim is to persuade and widen the reach of Christ's Gospel, then a different strategy is called for rather than this trash-n-burn mentality.

The fact that Mr. Monkey needs to confront is that it took many decades after Galileo formulated his theory before its usefulness (e.g. accuracy of calculation and support for little things like navigation)exceeded the extremely intricate Ptolemaic calculations. I would guess that Dr. Woods well knows Professor Gerald Holton at Harvard and his delightful (although dauntingly titled) "Thematic Origins of Scientific Thought." Holton, the first person given access to Einstein's personal archives, presents a lucid and entertaining view of "science the process." He pays particular attention to the Ptolemaic-Galilean comparison, as well as Einstein's theories versus the ether-based views of electromagnetic wave propagation from the nineteenth century. It amazes me that Thomas Kuhn's good but not great work has such currency, while Gerald Holton's far more powerful (and well written work) languishes.

Nick, actually it was Nicholaus Copernicus who advanced the first European heliocentric theory, not Galileo. All Galileo needed was one example to shoot down conventional knowledge on the Earth-centered universe. Thanks to his use of the telescope (not his invention, by the way) he was able to determine many things that flew in the face of accepted knowledge: sunspots, mountains on the moon, and those Jovian satellites.

I'd be interested to hear more of Holton's work on its own merits rather than as an alternative to an attacked and discredited source. What you describe is not unknown in the sociology of science.

Last, I think we can dispense with the insults on Dr Woods' critic. Chimps are apes, not monkeys--an important difference, even one uses one or the other to call names.

Todd,
Galileo needed more than one example and he certainly gave more than one, the problem is that he missed the point on gravity and was mistaken on the tides. He dropped more than a few balls, metaphorically speaking.
Prior to Copernicus, Aristarchus of Samos (4th c. BC) was one of the first to posit heliocentrism. He used the measurements of Eratosthenes who measured the circumference of the earth, used full lunar eclipses and reached startling conclusions about the earth, moon and sun via empirical measurement.
Galileo too tried realized the importance of the earth, while he used the Jovian moons to justify his argument he also tried to show the importance of the tides in his heliocentric theory. For 20 years he argued that no experiment on earth could show the 2-fold movements of the earth (around the sun and the moon around the earth) because experiments and apparatus were themselves involved in the same motion. Concerning the tides as caused by heliocentrism, Galileo tailored his data to fit the theory of the tides. On this, we know him to be wrong. In defending heliocentrism, Galileo did not insist on the fall of bodies fall toward the earth as proof of his theory. He did insist on the explanation of the tides, as a physicist he should have been aware that the proof of theories lies in measurements. He did provide indirect evidence of heliocentrism by observing via a telescope that the surface of the moon had mountains. His argument also included the phases of Venus, Jupiter’s moons which rotate around it and which depicts a mini solar system, stars were seen in the sky in numbers displaying a variety of colors. All of this contradicted the Aristotelian view that there is an ethereal substance that constituted everything from the moon’s orbit to the sphere of fixed stars. But, it was still not enough to overturn geocentrism, heliocentrism was not proven empirically until the 19th century.
Overall, the Church chose to err on the side of caution in the face of the Protestant Reformation and the lack of certainty provided by Galileo. The case itself is very complicated, but I think that Thomas Woods does very good job of stating the case from all sides.

Rick, thanks for your detailed answer. I have no reason to quibble on your points of history, but I'd like to reemphasize:

Moons orbiting Jupiter sink the notion outright that "everything" off planet is geocentric.

Geocentrism can explain retrograde motion of the outer planets, but only with extra constructions. Heliocentrism was acknowledged as the best model from the time of Kepler, whose deduction of elliptical orbits matched the deviations from circular orbits around the sun.

It may have been the last doubters were not convinced (or all died) until the 19th century, but Herschel, Cassini, Huygens, Flamsteed, and all the other astronomers of the 16th and 17th century would pretty much endorse heliocentrism as the best model to match observation.

"The case itself is very complicated, but I think that Thomas Woods does very good job of stating the case from all sides."

Well ... Dr Woods may find himself in a losing battle on this one. It is very difficult to wade into the camp of the adversary, take pokes at the heroes there, and think one can argue from quality alone to get a hearing. Is he preaching to the choir on this one? He's not convincing anybody outside.

Todd,
Thanks for your response. You are correct, heliocentrism had long become the accepted system before it was proven, I am remiss for leaving that out. There was a shift from the instrumentalism of Bellarmine and his consults toward realism and also a shift beginning around the time of Galileo toward a mathematical formalism to reach quantitative conclusions that could be empirically verified in a great many of the cases. Perhaps history taught the Church an important lesson since the Church was rather silent when Darwin's theories were introduced.
But, I can't help but wonder how much did Galileo bring on himself. He mocked Kepler and the idea of elliptical orbits, portrayed the pope as a dunce in Dialogue, angered many for his actions of portraying himself as a martyr. One professor I had for a course on science and relgiion stated "Galileo got what he deserved," and he is a Protestant. I must admit that remark threw me, but in addition to the above the professor also mentioned that Galileo was openly living with a mistress at the time. If that is the case, then in his hubris Galileo was certainly pushing all the wrong buttons. At least recent studies on the case have shown that there need not be any adversity between science and religion, and that there are social factors that must be considered when examining the case.

The conflict between faith and reason was not a conflict between atheism and theism. I think you're making the same mistake here as your critic.

Many of the thinkers and scientists who helped create the Scientific Revolution were theists of one sort or another. This is absolutely true. And most of the early "humanists" were actually churchmen.

But that does not provide a defense for the churches. What was the conflict between faith and reason about, if it wasn't about atheism vs. theism? It was about the use of evidence vs. the use of revelation and authority. It was a basic epistemological conflict - one that was so basic it can often escape us today. It was a conflict between men who thought the way to gain knowledge about the world was by examining the world, and men who thought the way to gain knowledge about the world was either through revelation or through the study of approved authoritative sources.

This conflict took place not only in the scientific world, but in the religious world - the core aspect of Protestantism relative to Catholicism is its insistence on the individual's right to form his own interpretation of scripture. While this still kept in place an authoritative source [the Bible itself] it was still a step away from Authority in general, since it moved the right to interpret that source away from a central church hierarchy.

This is why Galileo is the hero and the Catholic Church is the villain in this story. It really has nothing to do with atheism, but with Galileo's method. He pointed a telescope at the sky and then stood by what he saw there. The Church, as you note, "hesitated to reinterpret biblical verses along heliocentric lines" - and then tried to use force to make sure no one else would, either. But this is hardly the "one stock argument" or instance of the Church behaving this way: it's the same impulse the Church demonstrated in the Albigensian Crusade or in its attempts to suppress Protestantism - applied to a scientific field.

Brian states, "It was a conflict between men who thought the way to gain knowledge about the world was by examining the world, and men who thought the way to gain knowledge about the world was either through revelation or through the study of approved authoritative sources."

Brian, I would have to disagree with that statement which I think set the tone for your argument and seems to create and either/or situation in the Galileo case. For centuries, men who served the Church also recognized that the study of nature was good. Augustine set forth a way of interpreting Scripture vs. nature in his Literal Commentary on Genesis. Philoponus, Buridan and Oresme all recognized that God gave nature a relative autonomy, Duhem and Jaki point out Buridan's ideas on impetus had a major influence on Copernicus, Descartes, Galileo and later Newton's first two laws. They also argue that Buridan's idea begins the influenced the study of empirical science in general, his idea swept through Europe like wildfire and transcripts of his work could be found at all the major European universitities in the time of Copernicus and later Galileo. The point is this, the Church had a long history of scientific study of nature, principles were laid out for proper exigesis of texts in the time of Augustine. Bellarmine was willing to follow the principles, he stated in a letter to Foscarini, written prior to the Galileo case, that heliocentrism could be used as a hypothesis. The same was said to Galileo. Bellarmine also stated that Copernicanism laid out a more elegant mathematical explanation, he recognized the relative autonomy of nature and Scripture/Tradition as sources of knowledge. As you state, Galileo offered no definitive proof, the trend in the science of the time was instrumentalism, Galileo too recognized that Scripture needed proper interpretation. The conflict itself was more than "evidence." If you read or have read the the work of Fr. Artigas/Shea, Jaki or Finocchario, all point out in one way or another that social factors were involved in the case, which I mentioned above.

Thank you Rick for your clear comments and your defense of James Woods essay.

One can only sympathize with Bellarmine's position. As I understand it, Galileo was imposing a dramatic rule change in what it means to confirm a theory. The scientific world until that time had understood that a mathematical model to "save the phenomena," i.e., the goodness of fit of a mathematical model to the empirical measurements, was a very different thing than establishing by demonstration that this is how things are in reality.

If that's true, it clarifies the meaning of Bellarmine's statement in his letter to Foscarini:



From my reading of this letter, it seems that Cardinal Bellarmine gave Galileo full credit for the substance of his hypothesis, and admitted that the theory might well be proven true. But in my opinion, he rightly stood his ground in upholding what I believe at that time was a reasonable desire for certain demonstration before embarking on a re-interpretation of the Bible passage in question, which would have played badly into the Protestants' hands at that time.

To reduce this affair to Good Galileo vs. Bad Church is a grotesque caricature. I agree with you that Woods gives an evenhanded account.

Thanks, all, for a calm and reasoned discussion. I confess I have not read Dr Woods' work. I have heard from friends in science that Galileo was something of a curmudgeon. Reminiscing of college professors, some of mine flew in that same flock.

Before I get out of the way, I'll point out that in the modern scientific approach, frequently researchers will debunk a model or theory and offer nothing to fill the breach. Galileo may have erred in particulars, but he pretty much sunk geocentrism on the basis of astronomy alone.

It has happened often that a scientist in his shoes might grasp at a replacement notion, and fail.

I don't know that a historian is the best messenger to bring news of Galileo to scientists. He may well be right about everything, but would we listen to a Presbyterian criticize the pope? A Muslim or Buddhist revising what we believe about Jesus? I sure wouldn't want to tread into a mosque and even politely say, "Pardon me, guys, but has it occurred to you ..."

... and with that, I'm outta here.

Rick wrote of Galileo:
>He mocked Kepler and the idea of elliptical orbits, portrayed the pope as a dunce in Dialogue, angered many for his actions of portraying himself as a martyr.

So what?

Rick, those of us on the “pro-Galileo” side of the debate are not suggesting that Galileo was a quiet, modest, retiring little choir boy. Our point is precisely that the sort of vigorous, confrontational, even abrasive behavior in which Galileo engaged must be legally protected, not only to preserve individual rights (we do have a natural right to freedom of speech, you know!) but also if science is to thrive.

The problem is not that the Church was wrong scientifically in this case, but rather that the Church considered itself entitled to use force to impose its views concerning science, or proper scientific conduct, on Galileo.

That does in fact make the Church “anti-science.”

If the Church had merely happened to argue for the wrong scientific position, without imperiling anyone’s freedom as a scientist, the Church would have been merely mistaken, not anti-scientific.

You also wrote:
>One professor I had for a course on science and relgiion stated "Galileo got what he deserved," and he is a Protestant.

What a monstrously evil human being! One can disagree with the details of Galileo’s behavior without concluding that forceful punishment is “what he deserved.” I find it hard to believe that such a man would become a professor at any serious university, but perhaps academic standards have slipped even further than I had thought.

You also wrote:
>Bellarmine was willing to follow the principles, he stated in a letter to Foscarini, written prior to the Galileo case, that heliocentrism could be used as a hypothesis. The same was said to Galileo.

Again, I fear, you miss the point of those of us who criticize the Church. The whole problem is that Bellarmine thought he was entitled to decide what “could be used” as a hypothesis, and, even more than that, that he thought he was entitled to limit the heliocentric theory to being a mere hypothesis, rather than an actual statement of truth, which, of course, it actually is.

The two sides here seem to be talking past each other simply because you do not realize that a Church which considers itself entitled to use force to restrict intellectual freedom is, to those of us on the “pro-science” side, therefore “anti-scientific.” It is not enough that the Church did not always choose to exercise this power, that it sometimes favored the investigation of nature, etc. Any institution that asserts the right to use force to restrict scientific freedom, when it feels doing so to be appropriate, is, ipso facto, anti-scientific.

(I am not claiming that Tom Woods is taking this position – I’m pretty sure he’s not, since I know he is a libertarian. But the Church did take that position with Galileo.)

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Tom,

I apologize for the double submission above – I did not think I clicked twice! Hopefully you can delete one of them.

For the last couple years, I’ve been casually asking acquaintances if they know what the really conclusive evidence for the heliocentric theory is: only one person, a Swedish guy on the Web, knew the answer (stellar parallax, of course). I think this is an interesting sign of the lamentably poor education most Americans now receive (the Swedish guy did not learn it in school, by the way, either).

You’re of course quite correct that being a geocentrist in the early seventeenth century did not prove one to be moron. And, of course, it’s also true that while the overwhelming majority of top scientists today are atheists or agnostics (various studies show over ninety percent), historically a huge number of scientists in earlier centuries were Christian of one sort or another.

And there are, indeed, still a few very good scientists who consider themselves Christians.

However, those of us (at least those of us with any sense) who criticize the Church’s historical relationship with science are not claiming that it is impossible to be both a Christian and a scientist.

We are merely making the narrower point that any institution that holds itself up as having the authority to dictate, by the use of force, the conclusions or scientific conduct of scientists, as the Church did with Galileo, is showing itself to be anti-scientific (not to mention violating natural rights).

I suspect you agree with us on that.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Sir, must I remind you that a chimpansee is not a monkey?

Dave,

You stated, "The problem is not that the Church was wrong scientifically in this case, but rather that the Church considered itself entitled to use force to impose its views concerning science, or proper scientific conduct, on Galileo...That does in fact make the Church “anti-science.”" In logic, that is called the fallacy of a hasty generalization. So, based on your logic, since the Curie's were treated rather badly by the French scientific establishment, that would make science is "anti-science?" I can name a few other cases where scientists were and are treated rather shabbily by the scientific establishment, you might want to read how Pierre Duhem was treated by the French scientific establishment as well, talk about censorship! It has been granted that Church made mistakes in the Galileo case, but your argument goes to an extreme.

First, the Church is not anti-science. You can't be serious in making that claim! If you hold that you be true, then how come so many great scientists like Copernicus, Galileo, Grossteste, Albert Magnus, were men of the Church? Read historians of science like Lindberg, Edward Grant, Ronald, Numbers and you’ll see the Church is greatly responsible for the growth of science, as Whitehead claimed. Galileo's freedom was restricted, but not because of heliocentrism, but because he violated his agreement with Bellarmine that he had signed. Also, Galileo (and Foscarini) violated “intellectual turf” by claiming that his biblical interpretations were superior to those of theologians, especially while he told theologians to stay out of natural philosophy. Bellarmine conceded that a sound demonstration of the Earth’s motion would lead to reinterpretation, but Galileo had no such proof. Galileo telescopic “proofs”-the Jovian satellites and the phases of Venus, etc. at that time were inconclusive, also Galileo’s favored proof-that the tides are cause by motion of the Earth-is completely wrong. Although Galileo was ultimately correct about heliocentrism, he was wrong to claim he had empirical proof of it.

You entire argument appears to stems from the fact that you think that Galileo’s freedom was inhibited and that the Church is anti-science because it did this. Well, if you read the historical sources, you will see he received a fair trial and spent his “sentence” in a palatial estate while still being able to practice science. So, how was his freedom inhibited? Again, his was sentenced because he had violated an agreement, he was free to hold heliocentrism as a hypothesis but went beyond that. If you promise to pay alimony to your wife and children, sign an agreement to do so, and then fail to do it you would be prosecuted. Your notion of the “freedom and rights” of scientists must me some Platonic form because in reality it does not exist. You called the professor I cited above a “monster,” ad hominem’s do nothing to support your argument, as a professor who held doctorates in Philosophy and Chemistry, he is entitled to his opinion, he was merely arguing that Galileo’s trial and sentence were just based on the facts of the case.

Frankly your argument is rather poor, IMO, when you make statements like “Any institution that asserts the right to use force to restrict scientific freedom, when it feels doing so to be appropriate, is, ipso facto, anti-scientific” which renders your own profession anti-science at times. How do you justify the treatment of those scientists who argued for Intelligent Design by the scientific establishment? They lost jobs, were denied tenure, etc. which seems to constitute a use of force, albeit non-physical. Again, your criterion is the use of force to restrict freedom, the issue is not ID as a science, since many who lost jobs never advocated for ID openly in the classroom/lab, but “academic freedom.” Based on your own criteria, how are those things justified by an establishment that claims to be so “enlightened?” Your argument basically renders your own kettle black, ipso facto!

Rick wrote to me:
>How do you justify the treatment of those scientists who argued for Intelligent Design by the scientific establishment? They lost jobs, were denied tenure, etc. which seems to constitute a use of force, albeit non-physical.

You make my case for me, Rick.

Denying someone tenure is not what is normally referred to as “a use of force,” whereas forcibly restricting someone’s freedom, even by house arrest, usually is.

I strongly support denying jobs, tenure, etc. to advocates of Intelligent Design. I’ve looked into their “science” myself: some of their claims fall into my own areas of expertise. For example, they commonly make erroneous claims based on information theory. I hold some patents based on applications of information theory to computer and communication systems, so I actually know this stuff, and I know their claims in this area are nonsense.

Given that there are a finite number of jobs, tenured positions, etc. in any given field, we must necessarily deny them to some people: we can either do so blindly, or we can try to make intelligent decisions in doing so. To call this a “use of force” strikes me as bizarre. It also lamentably blurs the line between normal and necessary activities of social life (did that cute cheerleader engage in the “use of force” when she denied your request for a date?) vs. truly criminal and repressive actions such as those taken against Galileo.

You also wrote:
> Galileo's freedom was restricted, but not because of heliocentrism, but because he violated his agreement with Bellarmine that he had signed. <cut> Again, his was sentenced because he had violated an agreement, he was free to hold heliocentrism as a hypothesis but went beyond that.

That “agreement” was extracted under duress and is therefore neither morally nor legally binding. At any rate, in free countries, people who violate an agreement (i.e., a contract) may be liable for civil damages if actual damages can be proven, but they are not subject to criminal penalties.

The Church’s behavior was barbaric, Rick. Galileo’s violating of his agreement, even if that agreement had not been extracted under duress, might have justified a “tut, tut”: it did not justify criminal penalties.

The positions that you are taking (and thank you for beings so clear and upfront) demonstrate the huge gulf between scientists and defenders of the Church such as yourself. You are enunciating the views that we fear that many Christians hold, and we do indeed find those views to be horrifying.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Rick,

On the more general point under debate here, you wrote:
> First, the Church is not anti-science. You can't be serious in making that claim! If you hold that you be true, then how come so many great scientists like Copernicus, Galileo, Grossteste, Albert Magnus, were men of the Church? Read historians of science like Lindberg, Edward Grant, Ronald, Numbers and you’ll see the Church is greatly responsible for the growth of science…

Yes, I am serious, though I perhaps should have made clearer that I am referring to the Church of the 1600s. I do think that the positions you yourself have presented do indeed clearly make you anti-science, but I am doubtful that your views are shared by, for example, the current pontiff, whom I actually admire, or by Tom Woods.

I do not consider Albertus Magnus to be a “great scientist,” and I know no scientist who does. (The Wikipedia says of Albertus, “He did believe that stones had occult properties, as he related in his work De mineralibus. However, there is scant evidence that he personally performed alchemical experiments… Magnus does not confirm he discovered the [philosopher’s] stone in his writings, but he did record that he witnessed the creation of gold by "transmutation."” That is not encouraging in terms of Albertus’ being a great scientist.)

Of course, Galileo and Copernicus were indeed both Christians and great scientists, as I freely conceded in my earlier post.

So what?

Sakharov was a great scientist and also a Communist, but Communism (vide Lysenkoism) was anti-science. Several great scientists supported Nazism, but Nazism was anti-science.

Early European scientists were generally Christians because pretty much everyone in early Europe was a Christian (except for Jews in the ghettos). There is no “control group” here. If half of Europe had been Christian and half atheist, and almost all scientists had been from the Christian half, you might have a point.

Nowadays, when the West is indeed split between Christians and non-believers, the overwhelming majority of top scientists are indeed non-believers. This suggests that your proposed link between Christianity and science is a fantasy.

I am well aware of the claim by some revisionist historians that Christianity was key to the development of science. I, and most scientists I know of, find their arguments awfully weak. On the other hand, the fact that the Church considered itself entitled to move against Galileo is not in dispute.

To move the debate forward, why don’t you suggest one book by one of the authors you mention that you think makes the clearest and best case for the key importance of Christianity in the development of science? Then I could address your claims in more detail.

As it stands, I am afraid we have some revisionist historians, who have failed to convince scientists, vs. your own admissions of your approval of the use of force against scientists, which most scientists would consider clearly “anti-scientific.”

Thank you again for being so upfront in your views. One of the problems in this debate is that people on my side are often accused of attacking “straw men.” You have shown us all that there really are people, still living today, such as yourself and your former professor, who do indeed approve of the sorts of actions taken against Galileo. I will be directing others to read this exchange when they claim I am attacking a “straw man” when I deplore attacks by religion on science.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Dave,

I can't keep playing games, look, your argument is not coherent regarding the Church being anti-science. I have to question if you even read Thomas Woods’ post regarding the history of the Church and science. Ask yourself why science developed so in Europe when other cultures were more advanced prior to the Enlightenment? Read the works of Buridan and Oresme and their views on impetus, if you think that the ideas of Copernicus, Galileo and Newtown appeared out of a vacuum, then you are blinded by your own hubris. Better yet, read Woods book before you decide to speak for him because you are not representing his views. Nothing I write is going to convince you, the fact that you can insinuate that Grant or the authors I cited are revisionist historians is laughable and only shows ignorance and disrespect toward the history of science.

You argue against any injustice done to Galileo, than say that is alright in other cases, be it ID or anything else. It doesn't bother you that people can be fired unjustly or that have families to feed. Who is the monster now? You didn't respond to how the Curie's or Duhem were treated. Then again, maybe that wasn’t on Wikipedia. The fact that you went to Wikipedia to look something does not bode well for someone you uses the moniker "physicist..." and claims to hold patents. To use your terms, SO WHAT? What does that have to with anything? If you had bothered to go to a decent source like The Sanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy you would read this “He made contributions to logic, psychology, metaphysics, meteorology, mineralogy, and zoology.” Also, don’t believe those fables about the Philosopher’s Stone, they were debunked by Albert’s biographers long ago. Though, I am sure you will call that revisionist history as well. You demonstrated not one shred of evidence of any knowledge of the Galileo case or the history of science for that matter. If you research something, check out the development of impetus theory in the Middle Ages, but read Grant, ‘cause you won’t find it in Wikipedia.

You argument, which is really just your opinion, would reflect only a small portion of the science community, not the whole. You deem yourself fit to speak for science as a self-proclaimed high priest. Don’t worry, I won’t tell Richard Dawkins.

You opine that Galileo was treated unjustly, therefore the Church is anti-science. You cite one case and one case only. This type of generalization is absurd, based on this logic if you are a racist, then someone could call your entire family a racist. You reason from one particular case, which is very controversial, to a generalization that the Church is anti-science. WHAT? You choose to ignore the great history of science that was fostered in Christian universities. Yes Dave, it was the Church that fostered that great tradition of learning in which science developed. Yes, direct readers to this blog and that fine argument you presented, and show them the disservice you have done to history, science and logic.

At this point, I am bowing out. If you think that the Church is still anti-science, then take it up with the physicists and astronomers at the Vatican Observatory!

Readers of this forum should know that a more recent and more mendaciously represented historical event is being used to demonstrate that, "...religious people are stupid, and skeptics and atheists are the great avatars of Western progress." That is the complete fabrication that Roman Catholic priests "roamed the streets" in the wake of the great Lisbon earthquake of 1755, grabbing suspected heretics and publicly hanging or burning them for having caused the catastrophe. George Will repeated this vicious lie in an article in the October 11, 2005, Washington Post

This writer was successful in getting historian and Furman University President David Shi to retract the allegation that he had made in an article in a Greenville, SC, newspaper. My unsuccessful effort with Will's source, Oxford educated British writer, Simon Winchester, is chronicled at http://www.dcdave.com/article4/051117.htm.

As I have recently discovered, I was actually not completely successful with Dr. Shi. Doing Web research in preparation for this posting, just today I found this statement in an article that Dr. Shi has on his Furman University site:

"At the same time, many Christians were convinced that the earthquake was not a natural disaster but a vengeful act of God against a sinful city. A Franciscan preacher argued that the quake was a form of divine mercy.

"After all, he explained, Portugal deserved much worse. In the turbulent days after the terrible events, priests roamed the streets, hanging heretics on sight."

Professor Woods is to be congratulated for the contribution he has made toward setting the record straight on the Catholic Church and science, but from my own experience I can tell him that it is a tough, uphill battle, and it will take a lot more than his book to overcome decades of indoctrination by unprincipled opinion molders with an agenda.

Rick,

Well, I had a feeling you’d get upset!

You wrote:
> I can't keep playing games, look, your argument is not coherent regarding the Church being anti-science. I have to question if you even read Thomas Woods’ post regarding the history of the Church and science.

You’re just being gratuitously insulting here. Why would I not bother to read the post? It’s rather brief, you know.

You also wrote:
> Better yet, read Woods book before you decide to speak for him because you are not representing his views.

Tom can speak for himself. Since he is a libertarian, I think it is a fair assumption that Tom does not share your view that it was okay for the Church to use force against Galileo to try to shut him up. I merely wished to point out that in referring to your views I wanted to make clear that I am aware of the fact that Tom most likely does not share the views that I was specifically criticizing.

If I am mistaken and Tom does think the Church had a right to subject Galileo to house arrest, then I would have to retract my opinion that Tom is a libertarian and would urge other libertarians to see that he is not a libertarian. But I very much doubt that is his view – I’d really bet that on that specific issue he agrees with me and all civilized people: the Church was completely wrong in using force to shut up Galileo. Tom and I certainly do disagree on some other issues, of course: libertarians are a rather disputatious bunch!

You wrote:
> You argue against any injustice done to Galileo, than say that is alright in other cases, be it ID or anything else. It doesn't bother you that people can be fired unjustly or that have families to feed. Who is the monster now?

It is not unjust for people who are manifestly incompetent, such as the Intelligent Design crowd, to not be hired for a job, or to be fired. No one has a natural right to a job.

On the other hand, it is manifestly unjust for someone to be imprisoned (yes, even house arrest) for expressing views that are disapproved by the authorities, as happened to Galileo. There is a natural right to freedom of speech.

I have no desire to prevent the Intelligent Design crowd from feeding their families. I am sure that some of them would make excellent janitors, garbage collectors, checkout clerks, etc. Those are perfectly honorable jobs, and I urge the Intelligent Designers to seek out that sort of job, for which they are well qualified.

I do not even wish to pass a law to prevent the IDers from being university professors or high-school science teachers. I simply urge schools and universities to exercise their clear right to decline to hire IDers and to fire any that they have inadvertently hired in the past, on the grounds of the IDers’ obvious scientific incompetence. (And, Rick, I know that the IDers incompetence is not obvious to you. But it truly is obvious to anyone who has received a decent scientific education.)

That you are unwilling to acknowledge the difference here, between declining to hire unqualified people for specific jobs vs. imprisoning someone (yes, house arrest) to punish him for spreading unpopular views, speaks volumes about your conceptions of science and human rights.

Again, you make my case for me. Anyone whom I wish to address and anyone for whom I could have any respect will reach a pretty clear conclusion on the simple basis of the fact that you defend the Church’s right to subject Galileo to house arrest because Galileo broke his agreement with Bellarmine, rejected the teaching authority of the Church, made fun of the Pope, etc.

We have a clear-cut and very obvious difference here. Fortunately, most Americans and all serious scientists are on my side of the fence on this one.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Rick,

You also wrote to me:
> Nothing I write is going to convince you, the fact that you can insinuate that Grant or the authors I cited are revisionist historians is laughable and only shows ignorance and disrespect toward the history of science.

As it happens, I read Grant’s “The Foundations of Modern Science in the Middle Ages” way back in ’98, and I do not agree with your characterization of Grant’s views. But it really did not seem worth arguing with you about: I did not think a discussion with you would prove productive.

You also wrote:
> You choose to ignore the great history of science that was fostered in Christian universities. Yes Dave, it was the Church that fostered that great tradition of learning in which science developed.

No, Rick, really it was not. Copernicus had his masterpiece published on his deathbed: publishing it earlier could have caused him some real problems with the Church (as Galileo found out!). The Catholic universities were not, and still generally are not, the key sources for modern science.

It is certainly true that the record of Christianity towards science is mixed: no sensible person claims that every single Christian has been anti-science, or that the Church has been anti-science in every single case. As I said, I admire Benedict XVI, and I know of no one who calls him anti-science. Indeed, the Vatican is now much less hostile to evolutionary science than many Protestant sects.

But, in the Galileo affair, the Church, by claiming a right to use force to control scientific conduct, was indeed anti-science. And, I know of no one who seriously claims that this was the only case in which the Church asserted that claim: as you know, for centuries, Copernicus’ book was on the Index of prohibited books.

You also wrote to me:
>Ask yourself why science developed so in Europe when other cultures were more advanced prior to the Enlightenment? Read the works of Buridan and Oresme and their views on impetus, if you think that the ideas of Copernicus, Galileo and Newtown appeared out of a vacuum, then you are blinded by your own hubris.

Okay, I’ll ask myself.

As you say, other cultures were indeed “more advanced prior to the Enlightenment” (or at least the Renaissance). The Enlightenment is essentially the name given to the breaking of Christianity as the dominant cultural force in the West. So, yes, I do see a connection here: the birth of modern thought and the flourishing of modern science do indeed seem to be part and parcel of the Enlightenment, i.e., the end of Christian intellectual hegemony in the West.

Is it really quite that simple? No, of course not: as I have said repeatedly, some great scientists have been serious Christians (though not many are nowadays). But, yes, I do see a clear connection between science and the Enlightenment.

As to Buridan and Oresme, well, I’m afraid they simply seem less relevant to a lot of us who have Ph.D.s in science than to some people who do not have Ph.D.s in science. I suppose we will have to leave it at that: anyone can judge for himself whether scientists or non-scientists are the best judges of what is good science.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Rick,

You also wrote to me:
> The fact that you went to Wikipedia to look something does not bode well for someone you uses the moniker "physicist..." and claims to hold patents.

Oh, c’mon, Rick! Ph.D.: Stanford, 1983 -- check with the university if you do not believe me. I’ll point you to the patents if you wish. I cited the Wikipedia because it is a fast and simple way to point out simple facts to others: Wikipedia is usually good on raw facts, though often quite bad on broad interpretations. Of course, like any educated person, I myself already knew that Albertus Magnus was not a “great scientist.” This is, as they say, common knowledge. I just thought it more polite to point to the Wikipedia than to say bluntly to you that anyone but a fool knows that you were wrong to characterize him as a “great scientist.”

You also wrote:
>You argument, which is really just your opinion, would reflect only a small portion of the science community, not the whole.

Hmmmm… Rick, how many top-flight scientists have you known (Nobel laureates, say)? My wife and I both have bachelors and doctorates from elite universities and have known a number of Nobel laureates ourselves, as well as a host of more ordinary scientists.

So… which of us, you or I, is really in a better position to judge the opinion of the scientific community on the whole?

For what it’s worth, all scientists I know well, every single one, would indeed be appalled at your position that authoritarian institutions have a right to lock up scientists who are not sufficiently respectful in challenging religious authority (well, okay, some scientists would just laugh it off and not take you seriously).

Beyond my personal knowledge, I trust you are aware of all the research that shows that elite scientists in the US are overwhelmingly non-believers in traditional religion.

For example, Professor Elaine Ecklund, in a study reported last year, found:
>When asked their beliefs about God, nearly 34 percent of academic scientists answer “I do not believe in God” and about 30 percent answer “I do not know if there is a God and there is no way to find out,” the classic agnostic response. This means that over 60 percent of professors in these natural and social science disciplines describe themselves as either atheist or religiously agnostic. In comparison, among those in the general U.S. population, about 3 percent claim to be atheists and about 5 percent are religiously agnostic. (http://religion.ssrc.org/reforum/Ecklund.pdf )

Ecklund’s study broadly covered faculty at twenty-one major universities.

This confirms the earlier 1998 Larson-Witham study, as reported in the New York Times:
( http://ffrf.org/timely/angier.php ) :

>What's more, in some quarters, atheism, far from being rare, is the norm -- among scientists, for example, particularly high-level scientists who populate academia. Recently, Edward J. Larson, a science historian at the University of Georgia, and Larry Witham, a writer, polled scientists listed in American Men and Women of Science on their religious beliefs. Among this general group, a reasonably high proportion, 40 percent, claimed to believe in a "personal God" who would listen to their prayers. But when the researchers next targeted members of the National Academy of Sciences, an elite coterie if ever there was one, belief in a personal God was 7 percent, the flip of the American public at large.

Note that elite scientists (NAS members) are highly irreligious, even more irreligious than the scientific community as a whole. See http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/news/file002.html for the original study as published in “Nature.”

I hope this shows that my personal perceptions are not aberrant: scientists are not that favorably disposed towards religion, especially not top scientists, such as NAS members.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Rick,

Whew! I think I have now responded to every single point that you made that I was able to make sense of! It’s a thankless task, but someone had to do it.

I hope everyone will note that I have not disputed your (or Tom’s) characterization of the facts of the Galileo affair. Your and my real point of debate is simply whether the Church was justified, given those facts, in imprisoning Galileo (house arrest). I am happy to stipulate that Galileo broke his promise to treat the Copernican theory only as a hypothesis, that he challenged the teaching authority of the Church, and that he ridiculed the Pope. Indeed, it is precisely because he did these things that he is a great hero to me and so many other scientists and to rationalists in general.

Indeed, I, and every scientist whose opinion on the matter I know, are strongly committed to the proposition that any scientist (indeed anyone at all) should be completely free to “mouth off” as Galileo did without facing any legal consequences at all. To be sure, do it to your boss and you may be (deservedly) fired; treat your wife that way and you are unlikely to have domestic harmony: no one has a natural right to either a job or conjugal harmony. But everyone does have a natural right to freedom of speech, and the Church’s behavior towards Galileo, given his heroic “mouthing off” to the authorities of the Church, was a despicable violation of his natural right to freedom of speech.

Let me add that I am not being facetious in thanking you for this lengthy exchange. While I really do find the moral values (or lack thereof) that you have revealed to be truly horrifying, I do nonetheless appreciate your willingness to be forthright in presenting those values. Many people who share your views are rather coy in revealing their views in public and I appreciate your willingness to be so candid.

I hope our exchange his revealed the dramatic, obviously unbridgeable, gulf between scientists such as myself and religious believers such as yourself. Thanks again for providing this publicly documented example of this unbridgeable gulf.

I know of course that many (perhaps the vast majority) of Christians do not share your views. But I hope your open willingness to endorse the proposition that authoritarian institutions have a right to actually use force to shut up scientists who show insufficient deference to religious views will make clear to everyone why so many of us scientists are wary of, and indeed rather hostile towards, Christianity.

I’m sure that you know of Phil Jenkins’ claim that Christianity is dying in the West and is becoming primarily a religion of the Third World. While I know that there are a number of decent, tolerant Christians like Tom Woods who are willing to respect the natural rights of all human beings, I cannot help breathing a sigh of relief, given the openly-expressed values of Christians such as yourself, when I think about the fact that the West will eventually be free of the institution of Christianity.

David H. Miller, Ph.D. (Physics, Stanford, 1983)

The dramatization of the Galileo case is quite similar to that done with Christopher Columbus. We need to have our heros and will stand nothing to lessen them.

I will never forget being told 50 years ago by my 2nd grade teachers that Columbus believed the world was round and nobody else, including especially the establishment ("Church") taught otherwise. People would see in the distance a ship seeming to fall off the edge of the world because they could only make out the top of the sails.

The truth is of course that most knew the world was round and the scholars more of less knew how big it was from the ancient Greeks. The arugement Columbus had with the Churchmen was on how big it was. Columbus assumed a smaller diameter, but he was wrong. If the landmass of the Western Hemisphere were not there, he and his men would have perished. But no one wants to dimish Columbus and give credibility to the Domincans he argued with so the Enlightenment created this warped myth about people in 1492 thinking the world was flat!!

Same for Galileo. In many one-liners in movies and TV Galileo was "condemned to death by the Inquisition". More balderdash. If Galileo had tempered his yet to be proven teachings and not mixed theological arguements with his theories there would have been less controversy with the Church which was the caretaker of learning at the time. Believe it or not the Catholic Church was far more receptive to things like Galileo's heliocentracism that the fire-brand Biblical literists Reformers like Luther who raved against Copornicus (sp?) a century earlier. This Galileo event took place in the fierst time of the Reformation-Counter Reformation struggle, and the Church took a more caution position on this than it would have taken a century or so earlier or later.

Michael wrote:

>In many one-liners in movies and TV Galileo was "condemned to death by the Inquisition".

Good Heavens, Michael! Where on earth did you hear that???

Galileo has been my hero since I was a young kid (about ten years old), and I’ve never before heard anything such as you quoted in my entire life (and I’m in my mid-fifties)!

Could you give us an example of this?

As to old Chris, you must have had some awfully dumb schoolteachers. The truth about Columbus is indeed as you said, but all educated people have known this for a very long time. The people who believe in the “falling off the edge of the world” nonsense are the same sort who believe in the Bermuda Triangle.

I am beginning to get the feeling from this discussion that some Catholics suffer from a bit of a martyr complex. My family is split more or less equally among Catholics, Protestant fundamentalists, and, of course, us atheists, so I have seen all three sides. I have indeed seen some real prejudice against Catholics (thought not as great as against atheists), but I have not heard from even the most prejudiced of the fundamentalists (or atheists) the kind of anti-Catholic statements you guys are bringing up.

A real persecution complex, I fear.

You wrote:
>More balderdash. If Galileo had tempered his yet to be proven teachings and not mixed theological arguements with his theories there would have been less controversy with the Church which was the caretaker of learning at the time.

And who anointed the Catholic Church “the caretaker of learning at the time”? I am quite sure it was not the Protestants, much less the members of the budding scientific community who certainly were not looking to be “caretaken” in the way the Church proposed!

The attempt by you guys to paint the Church as the victim in the Galileo affair is absolutely stunning! After all, it was Galileo who was imprisoned (yes, I know, house arrest), not any member of the Church hierarchy.

I bet someday there will be a little sect of Communists complaining about how the Communists have been wrongfully maligned in the whole Solzhenitsyn affair! After all, to use your words, the Communist Party “was the caretaker of learning at the time” and if only Solzhenitsyn “had tempered his yet to be proven teachings” and not mixed politics with his literature, there would have been no problem at all.

Right?

I used to think the Communists and Socialists were a bigger threat to humanity than you Christians. I’m beginning to wonder about that.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

#######
#######

The Roman Catholic Church must be
credited for re-discovering and
advancing the seeds of discovery
and knowledge planted by Greek
nation-states.

So let's credit the Greeks from the
get-go.

If you supplant "Hebrew" in here with
"Christianity," you'll have a far better
understanding of what separates religion
from science. EMOTIONALISM:

“Love of reason and of life, delight in
the use of mind and body, distinguished
the Greek Way...the East had led through
suffering and by the abnegation of the
intellect to the supremacy of the
spirit...Hebrew and Greek are poles
apart. Hebrew poetry is directed to the
emotions; it is designed to make the
hearer feel, not think...The Greeks were
pre-eminently realists. The temper of
mind that made them carve their statues
and paint their pictures from the living
human beings around them, that kept
their poetry within the sober limits of
the possible, made them hard-headed men
in the world of everyday affairs. They
were not tempted to evade facts. It is
we ourselves who are the sentimentalists.
We, to whom poetry, all art, is only a
superficial decoration of life, make
a refuge from a world that is too hard
for us to face by sentimentalizing it.
The Greeks looked straight at it. They
were completely unsentimental. It was
a Roman who said it was sweet to die
for one’s country. The Greeks never
said it was sweet to die for anything.
They had no vital lies.”

–Edith Hamilton, The Greek Way (1930)

#######
#######

#######


Correction:

Supplant "Hewbrew" with the term, "Christian,"
in my above post.


#######

I just ordered your book a few days ago with my earnings from a chapter I wrote for <a href="http://tiny.cc/TnE5Z">Ron Paul: A Life</a>, my first professional piece of writing, and I look frward to reading your book.

I live in South Korea and was happy to see your book was translated into that country's language. I teach English at one of Asia's top science and technology universities, where, much to the suprise perhaps of many in the West, there are a large number of Christians among the faculty and students, and I will steer those interested to your book.

I've written before that Eucharist-and-Qu'ran-desecrator P.Z. Myers could never get a job here in South Korea both because such juvenile antics are below the Confucian concept of "teacher" and this is a multi-religious society that takes the idea of "tolerance" seriously in its original meaning.

How many scientists have burned people at the stake for not believing scientific theory? Even the possibility would squelch scientific inquiry. The church taught that bathing was evil, followed by the Black Plague. Coincidence? I think not.

Inquisition? Witch trials? Albigensian Crusade in the south of France? The Framing, torture, and burning at the stake of the Templers?

suppression of thought by torture and killing is not free exchange of information

Christianity could not have gotten the teachings of Christ more backwards, if they'd tried

There is one issue that Rick touched on obliquely that Dave largely ducked by justifying the abusers: the tendancy of the scientific "establishment" to defend "orthodoxy" not with debate or proof but with blackballing, defunding and firing. One might almost call such fervent defenses of orthodoxy "religious" in nature (at least if one was being malicious).

I'd recommend a book by James Hogan, "Kicking the Sacred Cow". Hogan is neither a scientist nor in any way religious, and his scepticism is refreshing. It's a popular book not scientific, and the orthodoxies he tackles may or may not be false, but I find it very suspicious when the defenders of the "faith" leave off debate, reason and experimentation for political action.

Like Hogan I'm now very suspicious of any and all scientists, and anyone who quotes a scientist, because I'm all too aware of how easily outcomes are governed by money and politics.

From the forward:

"Such high-flying fancy either attains escape velocity and departs from the realities of Earth totally, or it comes back to ground sometime. My descent from orbit was started by the controversy over nuclear energy. It wasn't just political activists with causes, and journalists cooking a story who were telling the public things that the physicists and engineers I knew in the nuclear field insisted were not so. Other scientists were telling them too. So either scientists were being knowingly dishonest and distorting facts to promote political views; or they were sincere, but ideology or some other kind of bias affected what they were willing to accept as fact; or vested interests and professional blinkers were preventing the people whom I was talking to from seeing things as they were. Whichever way, the ideal of science as an immutable standard of truth where all parties applied the same rules and would be obliged to agree on the same conclusion was in trouble.

"I quickly discovered that this was so in other fields too. Atmospheric scientists whom I knew deplored the things being said about ozone holes. Chemists scoffed at the hysteria over carcinogens. A curious thing I noticed, however, was that specialists quick to denounce the misinformation and sensationalized reporting concerning their own field would accept uncritically what the same information sources and media said with regard to other fields. Nuclear engineers exasperated by the scares about radiation nevertheless believed that lakes formed in some of the most acidic rock on the continent had been denuded of fish (that had never lived there) by acid rain; climatologists who pointed out that nothing could be happening to the ozone layer since surface ultraviolet was not increasing signed petitions to ban DDT; biologists who knew that bird populations had thrived during the DDT years showed up to picket nuclear plants; and so it went on. Clearly, other factors could outweigh the objective criteria that are supposed to be capable of deciding a purely scientific question. ...

"Whatever science might be as an ideal, scientists turn out to be as human as anyone else, and they can be as obstinate as anyone else when comfortable beliefs solidify into dogma. Scientists have emotions—often expressed passionately, despite the myths—and can be as ingenious as any senator at rationalizing when a reputation or a lifetime's work is perceived to be threatened. They value prestige and security no less than anyone else, which inevitably fosters convergences of interests with political agendas that control where the money and the jobs come from. And far from least, scientists are members of a social structure with its own system of accepted norms and rewards, commanding loyalties that at times can approach fanaticism, and with rejection and ostracism being the ultimate unthinkable."

“So, why does the fable of the Catholic Church’s ignorance and opposition to the truth persist? Because the claim of an inevitable and bitter warfare between religion and science has, for more than three centuries, been the primary polemical device used in the atheist attack on faith. From Thomas Hobbes and Andrew Dickson White through Carl Sagan and Richard Dawkins, false claims about religion and science have been used as weapons in the battle to “free” the human mind from the “fetters of faith.”

The truth is, there is no inherent conflict between religion and science. Indeed, the fundamental reality is that Christian theology was essential for the rise of science--a fact little appreciated outside the ranks of academic specialists.
Recent historical research has debunked the idea of a “Dark Ages” after the “fall” of Rome. In fact, this was an era of profound and rapid technological progress, by the end of which Europe had surpassed the rest of the world. Moreover, the so-called “Scientific Revolution” of the sixteenth century was a result of developments begun by religious scholars starting in the eleventh century. In my own academic research I have asked why these religious scholastics were interested in science at all. Why did science develop in Europe at this time? Why did it not develop anywhere else? I find answers to those questions in unique features of Christian theology.”

“The progress achieved during the “Dark Ages” was not merely technological. Medieval Europe excelled in philosophy and science. The term “Scientific Revolution” is in many ways as misleading as “Dark Ages.” Both were coined to discredit the medieval Church. The notion of a “Scientific Revolution” has been used to claim that science suddenly burst forth when a weakened Christianity could no longer prevent it, and as the recovery of classical learning made it possible. Both claims are as false as those concerning Columbus and the flat earth.”

“Within just the last generation there has come a flood of books establishing that long before the end of the Middle Ages, before any “Renaissance,” “Enlightenment,” or “Scientific Revolution,” Europe’s technology advanced far beyond anything achieved by the ancients: effective waterwheels, mills, camshafts, mechanical clocks, the compass, and so on.
Not all of these were original inventions. Consider gunpowder. The Chinese were the first to use an explosive powder, but it is a misnomer to call it gunpowder since the Chinese did not develop guns, limiting its use to fireworks. When knowledge of this Chinese explosive arrived in Europe, probably during the first decade of the fourteenth century, the application to gunnery was immediate--cannon probably were first used in battle during a seige of Metz in 1324. What is certain is that by 1325 cannon existed across all of Western Europe.
The rapid adoption of the compass is another compelling example. The claim that the magnetic compass reached Europe from China through Islam is false. Apparently, it was invented independently in both China and Europe around the eleventh century. The Chinese were satisfied with a very crude compass involving a magnetized needle floating in a liquid which enabled them to determine the North-South axis, which was primarily of magical concern. In contrast, soon after discovering the floating needle compass, medieval Europeans added the compass card and then the sight which allowed mariners not only to know which way was North, but to set accurate courses in any direction. It spread among sailors from Italy to Norway in only a few years.”

“Far from Christianity plunging Europe into an era of ignorance and backwardness, so much technical progress took place during this era that by no later than the thirteenth century, European technology surpassed anything to be found elsewhere in the world. This did not occur because of the “rediscovery” of classical knowledge. There is no more misleading account of Western civilization than the one that starts with classical culture and proceeds directly to the “Renaissance,” dismissing the millennium in between as an unfortunate and irrelevant interlude. Western civilization is not the direct descendant of Greco-Roman culture. It is the product of centuries of interaction between the cultures of the Germanic “barbarians” who superseded the Romans (who had far more sophisticated cultures than had been acknowledged) and Christianity. The subsequent addition of Greco-Roman learning was more decorative than fundamental.”
"Nor were these devout scholars intimidated by classical learning. Scholastics such as Jean Buridan and Nicole d’Oresme rejected many erroneous claims made by classical writers. Albertus Magnus (1205-1280) supplemented and corrected Aristotle, putting his empirical claims to observational testing and frequently finding them to be in error. Along the way he instituted a tradition of research that led directly to the breakthroughs in biology and physiology of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries."
"It was the Christian scholastics, not the Greeks, Romans, Muslims, or Chinese, who built up the field of physiology based on human dissections. Once again, hardly anyone knows the truth about dissection and the medieval Church. Human dissection was not permitted in the classical world (“the dignity of the human body” forbade it), which is why Greco-Roman works on anatomy are so faulty. Aristotle’s studies were limited entirely to animal dissections, as were those of Celsius and Galen. Human dissection also was prohibited in Islam. With the Christian universities came a new outlook on dissection. The starting assumption was that what is unique to humans is a soul, not a physiology. Dissections of the human body, therefore, have no theological implications. Dissection soon became a customary part of anatomy classes. “Made without serious objection from the Church,” the introduction of human dissection into the Latin West “was a momentous occurrence,” summarizes historian Edward Grant.”
"The rise of science was not an extension of classical learning. It was the natural outgrowth of Christian doctrine: Nature exists because it was created by God. In order to love and honor God, it is necessary to fully appreciate the wonders of his handiwork. Moreover, because God is perfect, his handiwork functions in accord with immutable principles. By the full use of our God-given powers of reason and observation it ought to be possible to discover these principles. These crucial religious ideas were why the rise of science occurred in Christian Europe, not somewhere else."

"The identification of the era beginning around 1600 as the “Enlightenment” is as inappropriate as the identification of the millennium before it as the “Dark Ages.” And both imputations were made by the same people--intellectuals who wished to associate faith with darkness and secular humanism with light. One of the first steps in this effort was to designate their own era as the “Enlightenment,” and to claim it a sudden and complete disjuncture with the past. Voltaire (1694-1778) described medieval Europe as hopelessly morassed in “decay and degeneracy.” Rousseau (1712-1778) referred to a “relapse into barbarism” and “centuries…in a condition worse than ignorance.” When Jacob Burckhardt popularized the idea of the “Renaissance” a hundred years later, the “Dark Ages” were an historical certitude, not to be shaken until late in the twentieth century."

"It was not enough to blame the “Dark Ages” on Christianity; religion also had to be denied any credit for the rise of science. Hence, it was necessary to discredit the achievements of the scholastic era. One after another of the philosophes condemned Catholic scholarship until the word “scholastic” became an epithet--defined as “pedantic and dogmatic” according to any edition of Webster’s."

"With the past out of the way, David Hume, Voltaire, and their associates wrapped themselves in the achievements of science in order to authenticate their condemnation of religion. Their hope, in the words of Peter Gay, was that “science could [supply] the deists and atheists…with what they wanted--Newton’s physics without Newton’s God.” In 1802, the French philosophe Claude-Henri de Saint-Simon (1760-1825) actually founded a Godless religion to be led by scientist-priests and called it the Religion of Newton. (His pupil Auguste Comte renamed it “sociology.”)"
"…the “Enlightenment” became more outspokenly atheistic and more determined to establish the incompatibility of science and religion…."
“The real Isaac Newton was the quintessential student of God’s handiwork, believing not only in the existence of divine physical laws, but that similar divine laws governed history as well. Two centuries of efforts to depict Isaac Newton as having been much too sophisticated to believe in God were motivated by precisely the same biases as the false stories about Columbus, about Vesalius, about the “Dark Ages,” about the “Enlightenment,” and about the scholastics: that science stands in opposition to religion; that no important scientific work can be achieved or even fully understood by minds dominated by “superstition”; that the “Scientific Revolution” made it impossible for an intelligent person to be religious. These are the slogans of one of the longest-running and most effective polemical campaigns in Western history.”

"Probably the first-ever survey of scientists was conducted by Francis Galton in 1872. Galton, who was Charles Darwin’s cousin and one of the founders of quantitative psychology, mailed questionnaires to about 190 “English men of science.” One of his inquiries asked: “Has the religion taught in your youth had any deterrent effect on the freedom of your researches?” When Charles Darwin filled out the questionnaire he simply responded “No.” That answer greatly surprised Galton. A militant atheist, Galton had expected that nearly every respondent would answer “Yes.” To his amazement, more than 90 of the 100 scientists who filled out his questionnaire answered “No” to the question of religion deterring research. To his dismay, Galton also discovered that almost every respondent claimed a church affiliation. Trying to explain away a result he disliked, Galton admitted that many respondents expressed strong religious views but insisted these scientists must surely be 'careless of dogma and exempt from mysterious terror.'”

"In 1914, the American psychologist James Leuba sent questionnaires to a random sample of people listed in American Men of Science. Each was asked to select one of the following statements “concerning belief in God.”
I believe in a God to whom one may pray in the expectation of receiving an answer. By “answer,” I mean more than the subjective, psychological effect of prayer.
I do not believe in God as defined above.
I have no definite belief regarding this question."

"Leuba’s standard for belief in God is so stringent it would exclude a substantial portion of “mainline” clergy, and that obviously was intentional on his part. He wanted to show that men of science were irreligious. To his great disappointment, Leuba found that 42 percent of his sample of prominent scientists selected option one, thereby taking a position many would regard as “fundamentalist.” When Leuba’s study was exactly repeated in 1996, the results were unchanged. Over an 82-year period, there was no decline among scientists in a very literal belief in God."

"The most extensive evidence on the religious views of scientists comes from a massive survey of more than 60,000 professors (approximately one fourth of all the college faculty in America) conducted in 1969 by the Carnegie Commission. The survey centered on academic issues and political-social attitudes, but also included questions like: “How religious do you consider yourself?” “How often do you attend religious services?” “What is your present religion?” and “Do you consider yourself religiously conservative?”

"The table above summarizes responses from scientists in various fields. Two rather striking findings challenge claims about the incompatibility of religion and science. First, levels of religiosity are relatively high. A majority of hard scientists think of themselves as deeply or moderately religious--only among social scientists (45 percent) is this a minority response. Nor do scientists restrict themselves to tepid faiths--close to four out of ten faculty members in the hard sciences characterized themselves as “religiously conservative.” Moreover, scientists attend church at the same level of regularity as the general population--47 percent of mathematicians and statisticians reported attending services two or three times a month or more, as did 43 percent of physical scientists and 42 percent of professors in the life sciences."

Joel,

I should have added that there are of course some scientists, who are liars, frauds, crooks, con artists, etc., just as the same is true for clergymen, politicians, lawyers, business mangers, and, I am sure, garbage collectors. I am not suggesting for a minute that scientists are, on the whole, morally superior to the rest of humanity. Believe me, I could provide a long list of individual scientists whose appallingly unethical behavior I have seen for myself (anyone interested in pursuing this should look at Nick Wade’s classic “Betrayers of the Truth”).

But the supremacy of scientific truth over all other forms of "truth" is not based on any moral superiority of scientists. It is based on the fact that the reasoning and evidence for scientific truth is publicly available: you can go out and observe the movement of the planets, or sequence DNA, or whatever, for yourself if you wish and find out if we scientists are all lying. It is based on the fact that scientists go to a great deal of trouble to prove that our colleagues’ ideas are wrong – believe me, I would like nothing better than to prove that Einstein, Schrodinger, or some other famous physicist completely missed the boat, and I have gone to some effort in such pursuits (not much luck, yet, alas!). And, of course, it is based on the fact that, because science does not require membership in any religious, ethnic, or ideological group, science is the same in India and in Spain, the same in capitalist countries as in communist countries: whenever anyone tries to create a distinctly “Aryan” or “Muslim” or “Marxist” science, they have always only ended up producing nonsense.

This is ultimately why science is displacing religion across the world. Few people find Catholicism plausible unless they were raised in a community, or at least family, of Catholics. Very few people find Catholicism plausible solely on the basis of evidence and reason: “faith” is almost always a necessary ingredient.

That is not true of science: you do not need “faith” in DNA or plate tectonics or the atomic theory: you can check out the evidence, redo the experiments, etc. yourself.

This is a revolutionary development in human history, as the anthropologist and philosopher Ernest Gellner pointed out in many books (e.g., “The Legitimation of Belief”). There has never before been a belief system such as science that has swept across the human race without regard for ethnic, political, or cultural boundaries.

Science is systematically destroying the traditionally comforting belief systems humans have held around the world. Europe is now largely de-Christianized; Hinduism is now a bit of a sad joke to intelligent educated Indians; etc.

Science is the great destroyer that annihilates the core of all traditional human cultures.

I really like this. Many people do not.

It makes no difference. Science will replace traditional belief systems whether anyone likes it or not.

It is not the political power or moral character of scientists that is bringing this about. It is the discovery of a novel, truly reliable method for discovering and verifying truths that transcend religion, politics, cultural divides, etc.

The scientific method is destroying human culture as it has hitherto existed. We are, for better or for worse, entering a whole new world.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Sahadeva are you serious? The Black plague started when ships came into the ports of Constantinople carrying rats. Nobody in Europe had any immunity to this disease and the urban conditions in the city, which still subscribed to the Roman ideas of bathing, allowed them to breed. Since trade was necessary and the way disease was spread was still unknown (until the 1860s) the rats and their fleas naturally spread across Europe. The Church had no problem with bathing, but since the average person at the time was very busy trying to grow food, and much of Europe was marshy, and the Roman aquaducts were no longer serviceable, there wasn't much opportunity. Show some real documentation that shows the Church forbid bathing.

That reminds me of another point about Galileo. The ridiculous mystique that grew up during the enlightenment regarding all these conspiracies and oppressions the Church supposedly committed. There were detailed records kept, people. There are letters, files, court reports, personal diaries, all of which make quite transparent what happened to Galileo. He published as fact what was a theory. The first people who called him on it were scientists, some of whom were heliocentrists. The Church told him to present it as a theory. There were many heliocentrists before and after Galileo who had no problems with the Church. They let him off with a warning. With his bruised ego and goading by various rivals, he published his famous "Dialogue Concerning Two World Systems". In it were scathing caricatures of other scientists, and the very Cardinal who had helped get Galileo out of trouble. By the time the book was published, that Cardinal was the Pope, and the Church arrested Galileo, not for his science, but for his disregard for the rules he agreed to and his insult. Was it fair? no. Does it mean the Church was then or ever has been against science? Of course not. This story is about human failings on both sides, not about doctrine. Notice that the Church's doctrines did not change - they remained open to reinterpreting scripture when scientific evidence came in (which Galileo only had a small amount of.) It was enough for a theory, and most scientists after that believed the theory, but it wasn't PROVEN until the 19th century.

Science is going to save humanity, sounds like an eschatological prophecy! Anyone with common sense knows that science doesn't get off the grand without philosophy, its quantitative methods can't even prove that the matter it studies is real or why it should be studied. Today, science is largely about profit and power, it does great things for humanity, but scientists are no more ethical than any other profession.

I have evangelical atheist teachers who speak of science as if it is this grand unified social enigma and it is going to save the world. They ignore the travesties done in name of science, any concentration camp will witness to this-Mengele was a scientist-if any jackass says that the Nazi's were anti-science then he should be slapped in the face with a cold dose of reality by spending some time visiting those camps. Research the history of bioethics, the Tuskegee and other experiments performed on the poor and disabled in our country not to mention the millions of lives lost due to abortion-all done in the name of science to better humanity!

Science must be tempered with reason and ethics, and the latter certainly lies outside the empirical boundaries of science!

PS-Anyone want to ask Dave why religion is exploding in the 3rd world? He'll probably appeal to a lack of technology/education which is just another way of saying they aren't as intelligent as his ilk are!

DP asked me:
>Anyone want to ask Dave why religion is exploding in the 3rd world? He'll probably appeal to a lack of technology/education which is just another way of saying they aren't as intelligent as his ilk are!

Actually, my wife’s family are immigrants from the “Third World” (China) and few of them are religious. Over the years, I’ve had friends, co-workers, a roommate, etc. from India, and none of them were religious believers, either.

But most of the people I have just mentioned were indeed well-educated, generally in science or engineering. So, yes, as you suggest, just as people with a good scientific education in the US tend to be agnostics or atheists, the same, understandably, does seem to be the case in the Third World. As I noted above, less than ten percent of the members of the National Academy of Sciences believe in God (the 1998 Larson-Witham study published in Nature). Smart, scientifically well-educated people do tend to be atheists.

I know it is considered “snobbish,” “elitist,” etc. in the contemporary United States to point out this fact, even though it is well-established and well-documented. But it is a fact, nonetheless, and a glaringly obvious fact to anyone with much contact with top-flight scientists.

Incidentally, I strongly doubt that it is true that “religion is exploding in the 3rd world.” What does seem to be happening is that very old religions are changing their style and form in response to Western imperialism, modern technology, etc.: hence “Islamic fundamentalism,” “Hindu fundamentalism,” the Pentecostal turn in formerly Catholic countries in Latin America, etc.

Personally, I welcome all this. Just as the Protestant Reformation was a necessary first step in the de-Christianization of Western civilization, so also I think that these new modernist (misnamed “fundamentalist”) movements in the Third World are the first stage in the destruction of the religious heritage of other civilizations.

As I said, all human cultures are being annihilated by science. We will be left only with the uncomforting, inhuman truths uncovered by the scientific method.

I don’t think you will like the future very much. I think I will.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Henry,

I’ve been familiar with Rod Stark’s work for well over twenty years.

Rod is not a scientist. Rod is not a historian of science. Rod is not a historian of any sort.

He is a sociologist.

This is not good.

In his declining years, Rod has turned to trying to prove that Christianity was actually good for science.

I do not know of any scientist who has been impressed by Rod’s work. And, I hear the historians rather snigger over it.

I’ll point to just a couple of the howlers in your references to Rod (I can’t tell, the way you’ve punctuated it, if these are all verbatim quotes from Rod or your own paraphrases):
>Recent historical research has debunked the idea of a “Dark Ages” after the “fall” of Rome. In fact, this was an era of profound and rapid technological progress, by the end of which Europe had surpassed the rest of the world.

The Dark Ages are conventionally dated c. 500 AD to circa 1000 AD. The view that by 1000 AD, “Europe had surpassed the rest of the world.” is, I’ll be polite, eccentric. Surpassed the Islamic world, India, China?

Read about Gerbert’s (later Pope Sylvester II) attempt shortly before 1000 AD to learn a little bit of math from the much more advanced Muslims of Spain and you’ll get the point. For his efforts, Gerbert was reportedly accused by some Europeans of sorcery and of working with the devil!

Gerbert was of course a great guy and one of many examples that proves that not all Catholics were anti-science. He was, sadly, a noble exception, especially during the Dark Ages.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Henry,

Here’s another howler from Rod Stark (or your paraphrase of him):
> "The identification of the era beginning around 1600 as the “Enlightenment” is as inappropriate as the identification of the millennium before it as the “Dark Ages.”

The first half of the 1600s is the period of the Thirty Years War. I have seen no competent historian who includes this as part of the Enlightenment.

Or:
> It was not enough to blame the “Dark Ages” on Christianity; religion also had to be denied any credit for the rise of science. Hence, it was necessary to discredit the achievements of the scholastic era. One after another of the philosophes condemned Catholic scholarship until the word “scholastic” became an epithet--defined as “pedantic and dogmatic” according to any edition of Webster’s.

Well, yeah. The Scholastics did not produce much useful science at all: indeed, I’d be hard-pressed to think of any result in science now recognized as significant and correct that goes back to the Scholastics.

No, the Scholastics were not complete idiots, but science really was not their forte.

One of the biggest problems with your and Stark’s approach is a confusion between basic technology and science.

The collapse of the ancient world nearly wiped out knowledge of mathematics, science, and many other areas of abstract knowledge in Western Europe. But, of course, farmers continued to farm, blacksmiths to smith, and so on, and, inevitably, being humans, these guys sometimes figured out better ways to do what they were doing. But figuring out a better way to build a plow is not science.

I know that there is a group of revisionists who are trying to alter the historical record on the relationship between science and religion, and Rod is part of that group.

That group is simply a laughingstock to anyone who actually knows science and has some familiarity with its history. Yes, many early scientists were Christians: pretty much everyone in Europe (except for Jews in ghettos) was Christian back then. Yes, not all Christians opposed science; only some of the most powerful ones.

But the Church really did place Copernicus’ book on the Index of prohibited books for a very long time. The Church did claim the right to tell scientists such as Galileo what he could teach and how he could teach it (e.g., the truth about celestial mechanics as only a hypothesis).

That is anti-science, just as surely as Lysenkoism or Intelligent Design or naïve creationism is anti-science, and it was not a momentary aberration: check out how long Copernicus’ book was on the Index!

The Vatican has indeed learned from the past, and Catholicism is now much less hostile to science than fundamentalist Protestantism.

But still.. start asking obvious scientific questions about how Jesus could have had no biological father and still have been male (where did he get the Y chromosome from?), or about conservation of matter, increasing entropy, and the “loaves and fishes” episode, or, of course, transubstantiation (!), and traditionalist Catholics end up not that far from the fundamentalists.

Of course, liberal Catholics who are willing to view the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection, the Incarnation, the Creation, etc. as purely metaphorical matters need have no problem with science at all. There are such people, and, if their views are “religion,” well, it’s easy to see how some scientists can call themselves, in that sense, “religious.”

As an outspoken, upfront atheist, even I can claim to be, in that sense, a “spiritual,” “religious” fellow!

But I do not think most people here are trying to engage in that sort of abuse of language.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

P.S. If you do not want to embarrass yourself in front of educated people, I would stop quoting Rod Stark.

DP wrote:
> Anyone with common sense knows that science doesn't get off the grand [sic] without philosophy…

Really? Exactly which philosophy would it be that is generally shared by scientists? Marxism? Thomism? Existentialism? Platonism?

I know of none.

I’ve heard this claim from lots of people over a very long time – it’s a common cliche, but it simply seems to be false. It’s fascinating how people with no knowledge of science keep repeating it as if everyone knows it is true.

Science does not start from philosophy; it starts from everyday human experience; it questions that experience and seeks out new data that provides further insights into reality.

Philosophy… well, can you name any principle established by philosophy that is accepted by most philosophers today? Notoriously, there are quite a few philosophers who even deny the basic principles of logic as enunciated by Aristotle!

No, I think any serious philosophy (if there is such a thing – I have my doubts) has to be based on the truths proven by science. As much as people like you like to claim that something else is superior to science, I’d bet that you depend on scientific medicine if you get really sick! And it is simply a fact that anyone who denies the basic truths uncovered by science – the atomic theory, evolution, the heliocentric theory, etc. – is viewed by all sane people as a crackpot. The same is not true of various ideas in philosophy, religion, etc.

Let’s be honest: science is the only source of knowledge that wins acceptance among all sane people of normal intelligence. No religion, no philosophy, has ever gained the assent of most intelligent human beings.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Dave stated: "Science does not start from philosophy; it starts from everyday human experience; it questions that experience and seeks out new data that provides further insights into reality."

Realist philosophy begins from experience as well. But, if science does not begin from philosophy, then you first must tell us what experience is? Better yet, what is reality or science for that matter? How do you quantify those? You admit that science relies on measurement but the term science itself and its method lie outside such measurement. You’re assuming much in that little quote above, but you indicate that science doesn’t assume anything. When you define or classify things you can't help but philosophize, you are a closet metaphysician. Thanks for proving the point!

DP wrote to me:
>But, if science does not begin from philosophy, then you first must tell us what experience is? Better yet, what is reality or science for that matter? How do you quantify those? You admit that science relies on measurement but the term science itself and its method lie outside such measurement.

DP, I hope you are man enough to admit that you made a real mistake here.

I did *not* “admit” that science “relies on measurement.” I said nothing of the sort. Use the “search” function on the string “measure” on this page and you’ll find out as much.

In fact, I do not agree with your proposition, which you falsely attribute to me.

Before you criticize others, you might try reading what they have actually written, instead of falsely attributing your own (wrong!) conclusions to others!

Dave

DP,

Now that I’ve pointed out that you attributed to me a position I do not hold, let me address your other points.

You wrote:
> But, if science does not begin from philosophy, then you first must tell us what experience is?

No, I need not tell you that. If you are a normal speaker of English, you already know what experience is – I needn’t tell you.

Not only do I not need to tell you this, but, as a matter of fact, scientists simply do not do this.

It is simply not true that scientists (or historians or carpenters or garbage collectors) sit down and work out a philosophy before they can go out and actually do science, historiography, carpentry, or garbage collecting.

I realize that some philosophers (not all!) have claimed otherwise, but, if they would get out of their armchairs and actually interact with other human beings (or even reflect honestly on their own experience), they would realize how absurd such claims are.

Let me remind you that you started this topic by claiming
> Anyone with common sense knows that science doesn't get off the grand [sic] without philosophy…

Taken as a statement about what scientists do and have done, you are simply, factually mistaken on that. As I pointed out, if you really believe this, tell us what the philosophy is that scientists hold in common!

You also wrote:
>Better yet, what is reality or science for that matter? How do you quantify those?

The belief that science is only quantification is your belief, not mine. Yes. I will grant you, your belief is indeed wrong.

You also wrote:
> When you define or classify things you can't help but philosophize, you are a closet metaphysician.

Hmmm… that is not what most people mean by the word “philosophy”!

You also wrote:
> Realist philosophy begins from experience as well.

Well… I suppose every philosopher believes that in some sense *his* philosophy is “realist philosophy”! “Realism” is often used to refer to Platonism, and, I think, it is fair to say that Platonism in some forms denies that philosophy is properly grounded in experience (you know, the “ideal forms” that transcend mundane experience and all that).

Your real problem, DP, is that you are just making up stuff that agrees with your own belief system but not with the real world. Your claims about what scientists really do, again and again, are simply wrong.

Your other problem is one of infinite regress: if science must be grounded in philosophy, then what is philosophy grounded in? I know the answer is that philosophy is self-grounded, but if philosophy is self-grounded, why cannot science itself be self-grounded and simply eschew a philosophical foundation?

Indeed, that is what scientists have actually done.

You have also ignored the practical point that philosophy is a very weak reed to rely upon, given the incredible inability of philosophers to agree on anything. Science, on the other hand, is universally agreed to be a very dependable support indeed – no sane person, in practice, rely denies the basic findings of science.

It would therefore be quite absurd for scientists to try to base the firm edifice of science on the squishy foundation of philosophy.

Fortunately, we don’t.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Platonism is more thought of more as a form of idealism and not a strict realism since he held ideas to be more real than things. Realism is the mind's conformity with reality, depending who is using the term it would most likely follow the tradition of Aristotle. But, we could hold Plato to be a realist in a certain sense since Whitehead argued that all philosophy is but a footnote to him and the forms do exist apart from the mind though I fear idealism leaves one a solipsist. I suppose that is something one should not expect a scientist to know. The basic problem with many scientists such as the Brights is an "ich bin gott" megalomaniacal ego, the only thing that they admit to not knowing is that there is nothing that they do not know. Dave, at times you do that same thing here, though you appear more gracious than the Brights!

One thing that you appear to not know is that arguments from authority are the weakest, something most high school freshmen learn. You consistently assert your authority as a scientist in areas that you have no competence such as the history and philosophy. Why is it that atheists deny God and then make themselves out to be quasi-divine? You claim to perceive reality so clearer than all here because you’re a scientist delegating everything from who is intelligent to moral. All those who you quote are genuine authorities and those quoted by others are often labeled revisionist or unintelligent because they hold views contrary to yours.

Every argument you have made here is a form of philosophy, logic right-premises and conclusions! Your assertions regarding science are in fact not scientific at all unless you can tell us how the basic rules of grammar and syntax can be quantified. Science is great, it does many great and wonderful things for humanity, but its greatness lies in measurement and quantification alone. What kind of theory can you have without these? Science deals with matter in its many realities, when a scientist starts making claims that science can disprove the existence of things it can’t quantify or measure, such as God or the soul, the scientist has stepped far beyond his method and into the realm of philosophy and metaphysics. From the moment you started proclaiming the gospel of scientism you may have claimed to be a scientist but were certainly playing the role of the philosopher as well. Philosophers will no more agree on a common philosophy than scientists will agree on the primacy of any one discipline in science, but you can’t escape basic common sense. Systems of philosophy are often self-refuting, like logical positivism which stood on a principle of verification that itself could not be verified. We could say the same for scientism, naturalism and materialism-none can be proven by the scientific method-to claim that they are true they must be expressed in a propositional format which is a matter for logic, to argue for the reality of any or all one must do philosophy, but all are self-refuting in that they all claim to be scientific but stand outside of the very method of science. They, like you, fall prey to what Whitehead termed the fallacy of “misplaced concreteness” by denying the truth or correctness of any approach that is not scientific but failing to see that their own truth claims lie outside of science as well.

Look at this on a positive note, you may not be a philosopher but you at least get to play one on the internet!

May God bless you and your family!

Dr Miller:

I appreciate your comments here and your excellent explanations of science, however I must question some of your (seemingly obvious) biases.

You contend that the Church in her treatment of GG shows her to be anti-scientific. That seems peculiarly revisionistic, given that the 16th/17th century did not enjoy the benefits of widespread peer review to establish a conventional body of knowledge to be taught. The clear lines we hold today between empirical science and scientia in general simply did not exist.

While we today find the treatment of GG to be draconian, it must be admitted that the scientists of the day were in fact doing science as then understood (and essentially not different from the way it is understood today -- the "scientific method" in some form well predates Descartes).

Any scientist running off the reservation as did GG (asserting fact when it was not empirically demonstrable) would likewise incur scorn and academic censure. I suspect you would join the academy in that censure if a colleague's work could not be replicated or demonstrated, or if they asserted more than could be sustained.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD

DP,

It’s a little hard to respond to your rambling and rather incoherent posting, but I’ll try.

First, most of what you wrote is simply an attack on me: I have made a number of very specific points -- for example, the fact that you attributed to me a very specific claim that I did not in fact make.

You have not responded to any of those specific points.

I know, and everyone knows, that is because you can’t.

I doubted that you were man enough to admit that you made a mistake when you wrote of me:
>You admit that science relies on measurement…

Anyone reading this page can easily check that this is simply not true.

But you seem unable to bring yourself to admit that you were wrong, even though everyone can easily check that you were.

You wrote:
>Every argument you have made here is a form of philosophy, logic right-premises and conclusions!

Oh, c’mon, DP! Philosophy is not the only discipline that uses logic! Indeed, there is precious little logic in most philosophical writing, which is one reason philosophers have so much trouble agreeing with each other.

It’s hard to think of anyone less logical, for example, than Hegel! And, have you ever tried to actually read any of St. Thomas’ philosophical musings? Anyone who thinks that that is logic is likely to have real trouble in an advanced math class.

You wrote:
> Platonism is more thought of more as a form of idealism and not a strict realism since he held ideas to be more real than things. Realism is the mind's conformity with reality, depending who is using the term it would most likely follow the tradition of Aristotle
<snip>
> I suppose that is something one should not expect a scientist to know.

DP, have you ever bothered to take a class in philosophy? At a real university?

You may prefer Aristotle to Plato (so do I). But whether you or I like it or not “realism” is the name long used to refer to Plato’s system: see the wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platonic_realism ) or the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/realism/ ) or a host of other hard-copy references.

Anyone who has any kind of education in philosophy at all knows this, DP.

One of the things that makes conversation with you difficult is that you assert with such certainty things that everyone with any real education knows are nonsense, such as your lack of familiarity with the term “Platonic realism.”

I am not asserting this, as you claim, on the basis of an argument from authority – that is your modus operandi. Anyone reading this, for example, can check out for himself that you were untruthful when you claimed of me that
>You admit that science relies on measurement…

and anyone who has taken both an advanced math class and any philosophy class knows that use of “premises-conclusions” is hardly the monopoly of philosophy.

You are saying things that all educated people know are false: it is not an argument from authority for me to point this out.

Are you perchance a middle-school student?

You wrote:
>Why is it that atheists deny God and then make themselves out to be quasi-divine?

Well… we deny God for the same reason you deny the Tooth Fairy: in both cases, we have good reason for doubting that the entity in question exists.

It really is as simple as that, you know.

I know of no atheist who makes himself out to be “quasi-divine”! What on earth do you mean by that? Presumably, you are just gratuitously trying to insult atheists.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

DP,

To sum up:

Christianity is dying in the advanced world. I assume that you know that Europe is nearly de-Christianized (I’m happy to provide you with references if you do not know this). The massive ARIS survey showed that, in the USA, adherence to Christianity slipped from 86 % to 77 % from 1990 to 2001, great news of course ( see pp. 10-11 in http://www.gc.cuny.edu/faculty/research_briefs/aris.pdf ).

According to the Larson-Witham study, which I cited earlier, less than ten percent of top scientists in America (NAS members) believe in God.

Christianity survives largely among the uneducated, the unintelligent, and the poor – it is becoming a Third World religion.

You and I know that the death of Christianity is largely due to science. Science has proved that many of the specific claims of Christianity (e.g., Creationism) are simply false and has created a way of viewing the world that is incompatible with Christianity.

And even most Christians have more faith in science than in Christianity, as shown by the reliance they place on scientific medicine vs. prayer.

You can spit out as many insults as you wish accusing us scientists of claiming to be “quasi-divine.”

But the fact is we scientists have succeeded in de-Christianizing most of the civilization that is the historic home of Christianity, Western European civilization.

I admit this quite openly: many of us scientists have been planning this for centuries, this is one of the main reasons many of us became scientists, and our victory is now nearly complete.

The Kingdom of God is dying; the Day of Humanity is dawning.

Yes, science is most assuredly a replacement for religion, and science is winning. You may spew out all the personal insults you like against us scientists, but, in the end, there is nothing you can do to stop us. Religion and philosophy are dying; science is triumphant.

I do not think you will wish to live in the new world that is a-dawning.

Galileo still lives.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Dr. Miller:

The preceding was a rather minor quibble to your more serious point. You contend that Church's error was to violate GG's "natural right to freedom of speech".

On what basis as a physicist can you possibly predicate "natural rights" of any sort? There is no such thing as "nature" apart the material world. All we can really say with scientific certainty is that there is material stuff that acts in certain predictable ways (and "material science" is the categorization of that knowledge). Anything else is ontology -- and I think you will join me in realizing that metaphysics is not admissible in scientific discourse.

Nor is there such thing as "human nature" (which must be predicated to sustain "natural rights"). There is only a certain observable and empirically knowable biosystems (assemblages of atoms, molecules, electrochemical reactions, etc) that we categorize as "human". Yet it would be a serious though common error to speak of a common "humanity" unified by "human nature" as some sort of immutable state of "being". Again, the problem of ontology rears its ugly head.

What we can say is that this human biosystem has the capacity for self awareness, self direction, rational thought, etc which distinguishes it from other biosystems and nonbiological matter. In shorthand, we can call this capacity "mind".

It is an interesting capacity of the electrochemical process that produces what we call "mind" to value things, but these values must not be confused with real things, which can only be material.

This might seem fundamental to you, but it is necessary to get to the heart of my concerns about your position: all "rights" of any sort can only be understood coherently as constructs of mind -- where mind can only be some (as yet unexplained) byproduct of certain electrochemical reactions in a particular type of biosystem we call "human". Therefore, "rights" are not real (they don't adhere in "nature", but are conventionally or politically ascribed).

I suspect that if you follow the logic, you will deduce that "natural rights" are a meme of sorts, one in which we take comfort in and which do in fact help us to organize communal life and find existential meaning -- but in reality no different from the "God" meme in which primitive humanity took comfort and helped to organize communal life and find existential meaning. But for the materialist, we must see it as a false (if politically useful) construct to define reality.

From the scientific perspective there is only matter -- atoms and molecules and reactions and electrochemical activity and such -- some of which has the interesting property of consciousness (interiority, self reflection, knowledge of its own existence and of the existence of other things) that has fabricated God, ethics, natural rights, human dignity, and all other values as a way of making sense of our lived experience.

My point is that you want to charge the Church with violating an ethical standard (failure to respect GG's dignity as a human being through suppressing his natural right to free speech). Yet from a coherent atheistic/materialist worldview this is a fiction. It seems to me that you are doing philosophy to arrive at this judgment, not science.

Perhaps you have some other Archimedean vantage from which to make such an objective statement as: "But everyone does have a natural right to freedom of speech, and the Church’s behavior towards Galileo, given his heroic “mouthing off” to the authorities of the Church, was a despicable violation of his natural right to freedom of speech," But I suspect that contrary to your denials you are in fact doing philosophy (ethics and ontology) here instead of science.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD.

Steve,

You wrote:
>Any scientist running off the reservation as did GG (asserting fact when it was not empirically demonstrable) would likewise incur scorn and academic censure.

Ummm…. Steve, do you have much experience with academic science? As dismayed as the colleagues of Michael Behe (the infamous “Intelligent Designer”) at Lehigh University are (see http://www.lehigh.edu/bio/news/evolution.htm ), they have not actually done anything to him professionally. Personally, I think his ID con games prove scientific incompetence that justify terminating him, but they have not done so. (I’m strongly opposed to the tenure system – I’d like to see academic scientists fired on a routine basis, just as can happen to normal human beings.)

And, if you wish to see a certain disconnection from empirically demonstrable fact, check out the current status of superstring theory (the “landscape scenario,” in particular) in my own field of theoretical physics!

You’re just factually wrong here. Scientists who are far, far less empirical than Galileo do not at all “incur academic scorn and censure.”

I made quite clear in my earlier postings that there is an enormous amount of unethical, inappropriate, and just plain dumb behavior among scientists (as, indeed, in any other profession). I hold no brief for the saintliness of scientists!

The scientific method does, however, protect science from being damaged by that sort of loathsome behavior over the long run – eventually, it uncovers the frauds and con artists and exposes them for what they are.

Frankly, I am mystified as to why you and others here keep maintaining that Galileo engaged in misconduct. He was simply wrong on some matters, of course – everyone is, now and then. But his behavior seems to me exemplary – I particularly admire his rejection of the teaching authority of the Church, his justified ridiculing of the Pope, etc.

The most important point is that the Church did not simply censure, denounce, etc. Galileo: they imprisoned him (yes, house arrest). It is that which constitutes the denial of scientific freedom (and freedom in general). As much as I despise Mike Behe and hope he is fired, I would never seriously advocate that he be imprisoned: that would be a violation of scientific freedom (and the Bill of Rights and a few other things).

I find it rather disturbing that so many here cannot manage to make that simple distinction.

You also wrote:
>You contend that the Church in her treatment of GG shows her to be anti-scientific. That seems peculiarly revisionistic, given that the 16th/17th century did not enjoy the benefits of widespread peer review to establish a conventional body of knowledge to be taught.

Personally, I am strongly opposed to peer review: I think it encourages group-think. In that respect, we have gone downhill since the seventeenth century.

Nothing I said about Galileo hinged on the presence or absence of peer review. The Church restricted his freedom in order to shut him up. That is barbaric – peer review or no peer review.

That so many present-day Catholics in this discussion are eager to deny this convinces me that, fundamentally, Catholicism has not really changed in the last four centuries.

But we already knew that, didn’t we?

By the way, what field is your Ph.D. in, since you mentioned it?

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Steve,

You wrote:
>There is no such thing as "nature" apart the material world. All we can really say with scientific certainty is that there is material stuff that acts in certain predictable ways (and "material science" is the categorization of that knowledge).

I simply disagree with you.

We are obviously conscious (at least I am conscious, and I am willing to give you the benefit of the doubt!). The empirical data on which science is based is presented to us in our consciousness, and to deny that we are conscious (as some philosophers have tried to do – one more proof of the idiocy of philosophy) would therefore be anti-scientific in the extreme (not to mention quite ridiculous).

Various areas of science (e.g., neuropsychology) do study consciousness, so it is in the area of scientific study.

It is my professional opinion as a physicist that physics as we now know it cannot explain consciousness: many physicists and philosophers agree with me on this. If you want to see my detailed reasons, see my review of Colin McGinn’s “The Mysterious Flame” on amazon.com, or, better yet, read Colin’s book. (Incidentally, Colin, like me, is an atheist.)

Now, of course, Colin and I might be wrong, but the fact that he and I and many other (atheist) physicists and philosophers hold this view means that you cannot simply assume that science is limited to material stuff. You have to argue for that, which means making a case for materialism, for the proposition that mind can be reduced to matter.

I doubt that you can make a good case for that: people have tried for centuries, and no one has yet succeeded. I don’t think anyone ever will, but I’m open to being proven wrong.

You also wrote:
>There is only a certain observable and empirically knowable biosystems (assemblages of atoms, molecules, electrochemical reactions, etc) that we categorize as "human".
<snip>
>What we can say is that this human biosystem has the capacity for self awareness, self direction, rational thought, etc which distinguishes it from other biosystems and nonbiological matter. In shorthand, we can call this capacity "mind".
<snip>
>It is an interesting capacity of the electrochemical process that produces what we call "mind" to value things, but these values must not be confused with real things, which can only be material.

I disagree with all of this: this is the sort of high-flying unsubstantiated philosophical nonsense for which I have no respect.

To say, as you do, that “real things…can only be material” is to endorse the philosophical position known as “materialism,” which, I’ll be diplomatic, is an unproven hypothesis, and, in my opinion, absurd, just like most philosophical positions.

It is, indeed, quite as absurd, and quite as unproven, as other philosophical positions such as Platonic idealism, theism, etc.

Sorry, but if you wish to try to convince anyone of the truth of such ridiculous ideas, you will get no approval or agreement from me.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Steve,

You wrote:
>On what basis as a physicist can you possibly predicate "natural rights" of any sort?

It’s not very complicated, you know, though it is not a part of physics of course (lots of things aren’t – physics does not talk about evolution or supply and demand or how to synthesize quinine or how to make an omelette, to give just a few examples).

We routinely, in English, make a distinction between “natural” = “not made by humans” and “artificial” = “made by humans.”

The right that I will have to get Social Security and Medicare in a few years is clearly, in that sense, not a “natural” right: it was created by certain human beings (i.e., the US government).

On the other hand, if I were Robinson Crusoe stranded on a desert island, while I would certainly not enjoy a right to Social Security or free medical care or a host of other “artificial” rights (often called “welfare rights” in the poli sci literature), I would, by obvious default still have certain rights naturally – the right to walk around, the right to breathe, the right to think, worship, etc. as I wished, and so on.

Since none of these were created by other human beings and continue to exist unless other human beings deprive me of them, they have, for several hundred years, been referred to as “natural rights.”

There is nothing mysterious or profoundly metaphysical here: it is just a shorthand way of noting the stunningly obvious fact that humans are able to do some things without the participation or assistance of other humans, unless and until other humans interfere.

Incidentally, one sign of American decadence is that very, very few Americans any longer understand this idea that the Founding Fathers, in Jefferson’s words, rightly labelled “self-evident.”

If you think about it a bit, you should be able to see that the only way to give one person “welfare rights” is to take away the natural rights of some other person: someone will have to pay for those welfare rights, and he would not have to do so if he were Robinson Crusoe.

Personally, I think, as the Founders thought, that we would all live happier lives if we lived in a society that respected everyone’s natural rights. Sadly, most contemporary Americans disagree with me.

Fortunately, there are a few natural rights that most Americans still do support, such as freedom of speech, which is why most Americans disapprove of how the Church treated Galileo.

You also wrote:
>Nor is there such thing as "human nature"

That’s silly, philosophical nonsense. Of course, there is such a thing as human nature, mouse nature, electron nature, etc. – it’s just what those things are. Discovering what those things are is one of the main activities of science (e.g., the nature of iron is to be made up of atoms with 26 protons in the atomic nucleus). The idea that recognizing this requires some sort of convoluted philosophical superstructure is one more example of the idiocy of philosophy.

You wrote:
>Perhaps you have some other Archimedean vantage from which to make such an objective statement as: "But everyone does have a natural right to freedom of speech…”

You don’t need a special vantage point: as I explained above, understanding the phrase “natural rights” just requires recognizing certain facts that are obvious to any human being of normal intelligence.

Sadly, many human beings make the choice – as the Church did with Galileo and which many posters here have praised – to oppose the natural rights of their fellow human beings. I can only do my best to fight against such evil people. Sometimes the good guys win; sometimes not.

The fact that most Americans disagree with many of the posters here on the Galileo affair gives me some hope that respect for natural rights will see a resurgence in the USA.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Dr Miller:

You seem to miss the point entirely in your appeal to string theory. String theory is conventionally understood as part of "theoretical physics". There is wide berth given in theoretical physics since it is, well, "theoretical". There is no such material measurement (yet) possible. You must be aware that you are comparing apples and oranges.

You are actually making the point for the Church here. The more abstract the topic "Scientists who are far, far less empirical" the more tolerance can be admitted. Which is precisely why GG violated the academic and intellectual norms of his time and incurred censure. I have no problem though 21st century eyes thinking the Church overreacted in her treatment of GG, but again you are being entirely revisionistic in claiming that people should have been judged with modern, late 20th century sensibilities 400 years ago.

(and of course, you must also appreciate the irony that you have claimed philosophy to be squishy since there is not universal consensus on everything -- you actually wrote "anything" which is quite a howler -- when in your own field there is not universal consensus on everything).


Yes it does, and again you are being revisionistic in holding the Church to a standard in academic disciplines that simply did not exist at the time. Quite regardless of how his case was prudentially handled (indeed a sad case), you seem to think that completely late 20th century notions of "academic freedom" should be retroactively applied in judging historical events. That comes across as axe-grinding, not authentic and scholarly, dispassionate research.

By your own judgment, do you honestly think that GG was "entitled" to claim the fact of heliocentricism far beyond the commonly accepted hypothesis of the time???? Remember, we are not discussing a matter of theoretical physics here, but material science.



That to me is most puzzling. How can you possibly publish a journal of (any academic discipline) without peer review? Why on earth would anyone bother reading some article that might well have been crafted by a madman in a trailer outside of Bozeman?

My doctorate is in theology and architecture.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD

What are disagreeing with? Do you think that there is something more than materiality? What would that be? Are you claiming that there is a non-material = "spiritual" realm of existence?

Or do you think that material science is not the categorization of knowledge about the material world?

I am not sure what you disagree with.


I have made no such claims -- in fact I acknowledge that the human biosystem has consciousness. You seem curiously fallacious in claiming that because some philosophers have tried to deny consciousness that philosophy is idiotic. That is a hasty generalization. A corrupt policeman or judge does not make the legal system erroneous.

I have no idea why you are taking exception to what I wrote.

Yes, it is. Again, what that has to do with my point is unclear.



Thank you for directing me to that. I read it with great interest. You seem to be some sort of dualist. That is problematic: is the mind a byproduct of matter (materialism) or is matter a byproduct (or product) of Mind (shorthand = God or some non material being,etc)? If these are two distinct realms, how can their obvious convergence be explained if not one proceeding from or derivative of the other?



Well, we do know that without the brain matter there is no mind. That is not reductivistic. It is material science, which you seem curiously to be denying. Non material stuff (being itself, essences, accidents, valuation, prudence, justice, telos, person, etc) is the purview of philosophy (metaphysics) which you have already discounted as being valid inquiry into the non material world. So please excuse me if I find you in conflict with your own principles.

You already claim that we perhaps have "souls", but you don't think they are necessarily immortal. Given that you cannot measure a soul, nor locate it, nor define it, how is it that you can know that these souls are not in fact immortal? If there are no "parts" subject to physical forces, why should they not endure? Still, it seems like you are punting here – it seems more likely (Occam’s razor and all that) that “mind” is simply an unexplained byproduct of matter. No dualism is required.

I am not trying to make a case for it. I am accepting the terms of atheistic, material science. If you admit to non material reality, then why not "God = non material being” as the source of that? It seem obvious that the only way you can be consistent is to decide that all ideation is a byproduct of consciousness, which is some yet unexplained property of matter. Everything else -- God, human dignity, natural rights, love, justice, virtue, ethics, etc -- is a byproduct of consciousness as well, and has no objective reality and no objective meanings (and therefore does not admit of objective judgment).

Nothing I wrote in what you quoted has anything to do with philosophy -- I am just cataloging what we can positively say about the mind and the human biosystem.

What are you disagreeing with? That a human body is a living assemblage of atoms and molecules with electrochemical activity? How else would you define it?

That the human biosystem has the capacity for self awareness, self direction, rational thought, etc which distinguishes it from other biosystems and nonbiological matter? How else would you define it?

That the material human brain has some electrochemical process that produces what we call "mind"? What else could it be?

Again, I simply do not understand your objection to this, nor why you think it philosophizing.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD

Dr Miller:

You are just being inconsistent here. All we can positively say is that there is matter. We all know this to be true. It is empirical and self evident. We can measure it. Even if someone were to posit that there is not matter, that it is all illusion, they would still look both ways to cross the street, and would not drink motor oil. To say that all we *know* is that there is matter is not a philosophical position (unless you want to categorize it under "epistemology").

I would like to see your refutation of this. What else do we objectively know apart from the obvious fact that there is matter, and that we can perceive and on some level understand it by the device of our material brain?

I am utterly uncertain of what you disagree with. You seem very sure that I am wrong, but you offer nothing in lieu of a material explanation to reality that satisfies the conditions of existence. You have a priori discarded metaphysics and all philosophy as a way of inquiring into non material reality yet you offer no structure of thought for doing so.

If you have something else in mind – something beyond dispute and other than your conjecture about what reality really is – I would be most interested to hear it. Otherwise, you seem to be doing the sort of speculative philosophizing that you attack.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD

The problem with your definition is that unless there is some way of adhering natural rights to the "nature" of a thing, this is a misnomer, and rather that natural rights are conventionally granted (made by humans, enshrined in documents such as the Declaration of Independence, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, etc).

We (generally) only ascribe natural rights to human biosystems. Singer might want to grant them to dolphins etc but no sane person thinks a dolphin is being held captive at Sea World.

Such rights are accorded by reason of humanity --- look closely at that sentence. They are "accorded" "by reason", therefore are by your own terms "artificial". All abstraction is artifice.

"Natural rights" were predicated on an antiquated anthropology and cosmology. There is no God, no "human perfection", no "telos", no immutable human nature, no objective reality that determines how we must order our lives. You are just suffering from the vestiges of classical and medieval memes about "natural rights", "justice", etc. You are in the same condition as those who are caught in the God meme, or the spirituality meme.

The founding fathers were working in a pre positivistic world view. They were mostly deistic (not atheistic as we today understand that term). So your point is not evident. Granted that is the house of cards upon which our country was founded, but I doubt that you hold to the notion (which you elided) that
For the Founding Fathers, natural rights were endowed by the Creator, and thus adhered in the nature of man by design. I seriously doubt that you hold such anthropology.

No, all we can really say is that there are certain forms of material things that act in certain predictable ways.

"Nature" is a metaphysical term -- it is a taxonomic category -- it does not exist apart from the mind.

Your appeal to it is simply sloppy thinking, and scientifically untenable. Stop doing the philosophy that you deride in others.

You have demonstrated nothing apart from the fact that you sentimentally hold on to certain memes from past ages that thought the Creator endowed the human being with rights. You certainly don't hold that world view, but take comfort in the view of the human person (dignity, natural rights, justice, etc) that are the products of a transcendental view of the human person developed by religion.

I applaud your kind thoughts about fair play and natural rights. I hope these memes, which are quite pragmatically useful in politics, endure. They certainly make for a nice existence. But in the end for the modern materialist the hang on nothing but conventional agreement -- they are indeed artificial.

Steve,

Your posts are so lengthy that I cannot possibly respond in detail to all of them. And, frankly, they are so incredibly ill-informed about science that I doubt that my replying in detail would do any good.

For example, you wrote
>Remember, we are not discussing a matter of theoretical physics here, but material science.

Steve, physicists do not draw a distinction between “theoretical physics” and “material science”: indeed, I have never before seen anyone try to draw such a distinction in my entire life! What you have said is senseless. Galileo was a theoretical physicist, one of the greatest in history (and, also, of course, an experimentalist).

You also wrote:
>By your own judgment, do you honestly think that GG was "entitled" to claim the fact of heliocentricism far beyond the commonly accepted hypothesis of the time????

I’m not quite sure how I can make this clearer: by my scientific judgment and the judgment of all competent scientists I know of whose opinion on the subject I know, Galileo was correct, as a scientist, based on the evidence he had, to draw the conclusion that the heliocentric theory was true.

Is that clear?

I do not share the bizarrely eccentric view that you and some others here seem to hold that Galileo was somehow scientifically irresponsible in pointing out that it is true that the earth moves around the sun.

There is of course even more evidence for that today than there was in his time – stellar parallax, radar ranging, satellite flybys, etc. Someone who denies the heliocentric theory today is either a moron, woefully uneducated, or insane. That was not quite true in the early seventeenth century.

But I think it quite obvious that there was sufficient evidence in Galileo’s time to conclude that the heliocentric theory was true.

I have not emphasized this fact quite so strongly before, because it is, after all, the conventional wisdom about Galileo, and I think it is obvious. Furthermore, I think it is largely beside the point.

The important issue is that the Church felt justified in imprisoning Galileo (yes, house arrest): as I have said, again and again, that is my indictment against the Church. To imprison a scientist for expressing his opinions, whether or not those opinions are justified, is a grotesque attack on science.

I am again bemused that so many posters here keep evading that point.

I have concluded that it must be because you oppose science and do indeed condone the barbarism that has characterized the Church throughout most of its history.

Is anyone here willing to acknowledge that the Church was indeed anti-science in imprisoning Galileo (I know that all the scientists except for me have long left).

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Steve,

You wrote to me:
>How can you possibly publish a journal of (any academic discipline) without peer review?

Isn’t that really obvious? Let the editor publish what he feels like. Various scholarly journals have been run that way in the past, you know, and it’s still how many book publishers decide what to publish.

Of course, lots of garbage would get in that way, but lots of garbage gets in under the current system

Paper journals are obsolete nowadays anyway, everyone gets stuff over the (non-peer-reviewed) Internet.

Be real, Steve – the world does not have to be just as it used to be when you were a kid.

I don’t recall ever meeting any physicist who admitted to actually reading the journals in my own field – we all know that, peer-reviewed though they are, they are filled with false claims and outright nonsense. My thesis advisor, when I was a doctoral student at Stanford, specifically told me not to read the journals.

The pre-eminent journal in my own field is “Physical Review Letters.” Once, when I was in grad school, I sent in a letter pointing out that something they published was completely wrong -- the authors had divided by an expression which could be proved to equal zero, which of course you’re taught is a mistake even in high-school algebra. The faculty members thought it was pretty funny that I would try to correct an error like that – that’s the norm in the physics journals. Utterly worthless.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Steve,

You wrote:
> you must also appreciate the irony that you have claimed philosophy to be squishy since there is not universal consensus on everything -- you actually wrote "anything" which is quite a howler…

No, Steve, I meant what I wrote.

I have challenged people here to give a single proposition on which philosophers generally agree: no one has come up with anything at all.

As you know, numerous philosophers (e.g., the po-mo crowd) even reject the elementary propositions of Aristotelian logic!

Two thousands years of work, and philosophers do not seem to have reached agreement on, quite literally, anything.

Squishy indeed.

Read “The Plato Cult and Other Philosophical Follies” by the late philosopher Dave Stove. Stove maintains, quite convincingly in my opinion, that most of his fellow philosophers have been quite insane. He has some plausible explanations for this, too: part of his explanation is that many philosophers were intelligent enough to realize that the traditional religion of their society was false, but lacked the courage to simply reject religion outright. So, they tried to save some of the central features of religion by coming up with (obviously insane) philosophical systems such as Platonism, Hegelianism, dialectical materialism, etc.

As an insider himself, Stove makes an awfully convincing case.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Dr, Miler:

Of course GG was "right" about heliocentricism, but he could not prove that he was right through any sort of a rigorous scientific method. And in fact the method and supporting data he used was flawed. So?

What ever we can say about that, it was not "good science" to arrive at a hasty conclusion without substantiation. Perhaps you have some further insights into the scientific method that would allow that.

It is ok that you are willing to give him a pass because his prediction much later was verified -- after all he seems to be a sort of poster boy for you regarding free thinking against authority. But in his day that whole part about verifiability, and repeatability (and falsifiability) simply was not possible. Therefore, by our understanding of good science, he was not entitled to make the claims with the degree of certainty that he did.

You seem willing to judge the Church by 21st century standards of "natural rights" but are curiously averse to judging GG by 21st century standards of what constitutes proper science. That's ok as well. It seems from your aggressiveness that such lack of intellectual rigor does not trouble you in the least.

As for the Church's handling of that episode, I am already in agreement with you that it was poorly handled, so I am not sure why you continue that screechy polemic.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD

Dr. Miller:


I am sorry but that is a transparently fallacious argument. If I were to try to argue that the inclusion of IDers or creationists showed that science has no commonly accepted scientific principles, you would rightly call me on such obvious bunk.

I am calling you on such obvious bunk for trying to wedge in pomo decons as evidence that philosophy is wrong as an intellectual discipline. Again, corrupt police and judges do not negate the justice system.

You have already admitted that your own field is hardly monolithic, yet you seem to claim it as a valid field of inquiry when you discard other fields for not being monolithic.

I search in vain for your internal consistency.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD

Steve wrote:

>Of course GG was "right" about heliocentricism, but he could not prove that he was right through any sort of a rigorous scientific method. And in fact the method and supporting data he used was flawed.
>What ever we can say about that, it was not "good science" to arrive at a hasty conclusion without substantiation.
<snip>
>But in his day that whole part about verifiability, and repeatability (and falsifiability) simply was not possible. Therefore, by our understanding of good science, he was not entitled to make the claims with the degree of certainty that he did.

Steve, how can I make any clearer than I already have that I do not agree with the statements I have just quoted from you????????

I think Galileo did have good substantiation. By my understanding of good science, yes, he was indeed entitled to make the claims with the degree of certainty he did.

In fact, I think he was a bit too wishy-washy, but given the evil men he was dealing with, I can understand that.

I know of no competent scientist who would endorse the view you enunciated.

Is that clear now????????

You do not have to agree with me, but it would be really nice if you would realize that I actually mean what I have said.

I have concluded that you are playing a game on purpose here. No one can be that dumb.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Steve,

You wrote:
> That is problematic: is the mind a byproduct of matter (materialism) or is matter a byproduct (or product) of Mind (shorthand = God or some non material being,etc)? If these are two distinct realms, how can their obvious convergence be explained if not one proceeding from or derivative of the other?

Steve, this is of course the common objection to dualism made in sophomore philosophy books and one of the many reasons I have less than zero respect for most philosophers.

As a physicist, I know that electrons have both mass and charge. No one has ever explained how mass causes charge or vice versa; no one has ever explained how their “obvious convergence” can be explained.

It’s just a brute fact of reality.

The fact that no one can (yet) explain how mind and body interact is just a fact. The fact that no one can explain how this works does not change the fact that we do have both a mind and a body and that no one has ever succeeded in reducing mind to matter. I am confident no one ever will succeed in reducing mind to matter, but perhaps someone will prove me wrong.

If you want to pursue this further, try not only McGinn’s book but also Dave Chalmers’ classic “The Conscious Mind: In Search of a Fundamental Theory” which seems to have been seminal in getting philosophers to really understand the patent falsity of materialism.

Chalmers inclines towards panpsychism, and I have some sympathy with a sort of Cartesian dualism, but both of us are honest enough to admit that we do not know what the actual answer is. My best guess is that the truth will turn out to be something no human being has yet imagined. After all, that is quite common: no one for example ever envisaged a theory as strange as quantum mechanics until the theory was actually worked out.

Incidentally, I hope it is clear that I do not think that all philosophers are fools, just the vast majority. I do notice that most of the philosophers who have done honest work – Stove, Chalmers, McGinn, Gellner, et al. – seem to be either pointing out the obvious errors and nonsense of their fellow philosophers or simply tying together the different strands of knowledge provided by science, history, etc.

I do doubt that there is an actual discipline of philosophy that has any solid content, for the simple reason that I have yet to find any substantive principle of philosophy on which all philosophers agree.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Steve,

I have decided to stop reading your postings. You have repeatedly told me that I do not mean what I have written, and I am simply getting tired of replying to your lies and reiterating that I do indeed mean what I have written.

We all know how to play silly verbal games like this; I am unwilling to play them with people who are both unintelligent and liars.

I will offer a final comment on your and my interaction here. There is an old “high culture” in the West, which has been critiqued by both Gellner and Stove and which prides itself on its abilities to play games with words without being constrained by external contact with reality. Hegel exemplified that culture, as did the logical positivists and their successors such as Wittgenstein, the linguistic analysts, etc. It has also been the culture that has always prevailed in theology, literary studies, etc.

People who were experts in that high culture often managed to get themselves cushy positions – in the Church, in humanities departments in universities, etc. – where they could obtain a decent income without having to work for a living.

I can play that game as well as anyone, but I have limited patience for it.

Some years ago, I explained to a friend of mine, also a physicist, Anselm’s famous “ontological argument” for the existence of God. My friend was skeptical that anyone had ever proposed such an idiotic argument. He was even more skeptical that over the centuries numerous philosophers had devoted real effort to considering that argument.

He had a point.

Almost everything you have posted here makes far less sense than Anselm’s argument. I am unwilling to give you remedial tutoring to bring you up to a minimal level of education.

I will leave the other things you have written here simply as an intelligence test for any reader who happens by: anyone who cannot see what is wrong with everything you have written flunks the test.

I will close by saying that the old verbal culture you represent is happily being destroyed by science. People like you used to have real power and influence in society. That is changing: most of you know have trouble even getting a job.

You have become objects of scorn and derision among educated people.

One more reason I am happy that science is destroying human civilization as it has existed up to this time.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

DP,

Watching the magnificent Games in Beijing last evening (and for the last week) reminds me of a subtext to our earlier discussion that is worth stating explicitly.

Christianity is, historically, the religion of Western civilization. I have already pointed out that the triumph of science over Christianity is one of the great events of the new century we are in. Another of those historic events is the coming triumph of China over the United States of America, and, thereby, over Western civilization.

The two events are linked: just as Christianity and Western civilization were so closely joined for so many centuries, so also the decline of Christianity and the West are linked. For many years, many people in the Third World could see that the West was rich and powerful: since Christianity was the religion of the West, it made sense to many of them to adopt Christianity if they too wished to be rich and powerful. (Chinese call such people “rice Christians.”)

But as China ascends and the West declines, that logic fades. As I mentioned, I married into a Chinese immigrant family. It is notorious that only a small fraction of Chinese have much interest in Christianity, but, of course, Chinese have a huge interest and respect for natural science.

The defeat of Christianity by science will be facilitated by the rise of China to world dominance.

For almost two millennia, you Christians have been preaching a creed that informs human beings that we are all wretched sinners who deserve eternal torment in Hell and can be saved only by unearned divine Grace, by the Vicarious Atonement.

Most of us scientists have, if you will, too much “spiritual pride” to accept that teaching: we view it as degrading to the human spirit. Chinese, in my experience, seem to have a similar perspective.

The great historic contests of the last century involved the dominance of the European periphery (Russia and the US) over Old Europe and the rivalry between socialism and capitalism (happily, won by capitalism).

The contests of the new millennium involve the destruction of all of the traditional religions and cultures by science and the rise of China to world dominance.

I’m homeschooling our kids. Aside from teaching them enough about science and religion that they will know that science proves that Christianity is false, we are also working together to learn Mandarin.

My kids will be well-adapted to the new world that is dawning.

I think that everyone here will find that new world pretty much unlivable.
Dave Miller in Sacramento

Dr Miller:

I see you would rather not have anyone challenge your world view (some sort of hybrid dualism as far as I can make out: yes there is a soul or some other such nonmaterial stuff but it cannot be immortal, it cannot be eternal, it cannot be God, it has no objective ethical import on our existence, etc...)

I am not trying to distort your ideas -- I have asked you to clarify on numerous occasions and you have not done so. That to me suggests that you have not really worked out your world view, and you would rather simply assert your position than demonstrate its validity. That's ok, not my problem.

The fact the you have to resort to ad hominem arguments shows who has lost credibility. I honestly do think that you earnestly believe that what you wrote is true. I just have no idea how you got there given the glaring inconsistencies, to which you seem entirely blind.

It does not matter to me if you read or reply or not. I have tried to engage you on your ideas in a dispassionate manner and you can only attack those who deign to disagree with you.

I doubt that tactic will be convincing to anyone here or elsewhere, but good luck with that.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD

BTW, Dr. Miller, given your laudable advocacy of natural rights, I somehow doubt that you will find the ascendancy of China to world dominance particular conducive to that idealism -- not in your lifetime or your children's lifetime.

But again, good luck with that.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD.

Steve,

You are a pathological liar.

Anyone can google you and will find out that you do not actually believe the things that you have been posting here. To make statements that you yourself know are false and do not believe, as you have done, is simply lying.

Of course, that was reasonably obvious from fairly early on.

I know there is a long tradition among you Christians of “lying for God.”

I have run across it again and again.

Anyone who doubts the widespread Christian pattern of mendacity, especially among those of you with theological degrees, needs to read Jack Good’s “The Dishonest Church,” a painfully honest expose of “lying for God” by an ordained Christian clergyman. Your behavior only adds further evidence to what Good has to say.

And, no, I did not actually read through your posting, but I did notice your signature, so I am posting this to urge anyone who doubts me to google you and find out the truth.

You have been lying here.

The one thing I suppose you have been truthful on is that you really cannot bring yourself to admit that the Church behaved in an evil manner when it violated Galileo’s freedom of speech.

I’m still willing to give Tom Woods the benefit of the doubt, but clearly the “smirking chimp” was right about you folks in general.

I sincerely hope that all of you who condone the Church’s treatment of Galileo undergo a similar experience in your own lives: I hope you are unjustly imprisoned for the remainder of your life, as happened to Galileo. Perhaps, that might teach you some sense of right and wrong.

Probably it wouldn’t: I think you are all immune to any ethical feelings of any sort.

I have learned something about Catholicism here: I had not thought that it still inspired such evil.

What a bunch of contemptible lying thug!

Tom, if you do read this, I hope you can show you are not one with these thugs by indicating that you do condemn the Church’s imprisonment of Galileo as truly wrong.

Dave Miller in Sacramento

Dr Miller:

You have no idea of what you speak. What I "know" intellectually about the material world is quite different from what I have been taught to believe.

I can live my life as a Catholic, or I can live my life as a nihilist. Nothing in between makes much sense for me. I constantly vacillate in my faith, and constantly test my faith. I am quite willing to adopt the posture of atheistic materialism and see how congruent it is with the lived human experience. So far, it seems impoverished, even if it might ultimately be the reality.

From that perspective, I have found nothing on which to hang a coherent ethic framework. All the language of ethics must be considered anew as if Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas never existed. You use the memes given by a religious consciousness, yet want to discard the very intellectual foundations of philosophy, anthropology, cosmology and theology through which these were engendered and apart from which they make no coherent sense. I am unwilling to do such sloppy thinking.

I am really sorry if that bothers you, but again that is not my problem. I live my life with integrity, and I seek to be intellectually scrupulous and consistent. That is all I can do. That you have to equate that to "lying" is your issue, not mine.

You seem incapable of following any real argument, to wit When I have already stated that the Church treated GG poorly. You want to fulminate against the Church and invoke all sorts of antiquated language such as "evil", which seems to be the sole purpose you are here. I have simply pointed out that by your own principles such a judgment cannot be objectively made. You seem dense to that, but again not my problem.

Respectfully,

Steven Schloeder, PhD.

I know this thread is a few months old, but I figure someone else may come upon it just as I have. My background is in Astrophysics. Regardless of one's belief in the validity of Christianity or religion in general, it is disheartening to see a 'scientist' show the sort of attitude that Dave exhibits. It shows a lack of both discipline and ability to put forth coherent arguments that a scientist must maintain to put forth productive research. Dave seems to rely on personal attacks and inconsistent points.

It was obvious in Dr. Schloeder's beginning posts that he knew he was dealing with an atheist, and so dealt with Dave on Dave's own terms refraining from any religious argument that would be beyond the scientific realm. I applaud Dr. Schloeder's understanding of what science really is. It certainly isn't supposed to be a pseudo-religion with fanatics as Dave unwittingly portends, but a tool to better our understanding of the universe around us. It is admirable that Dave has chosen to stay home to home school his children, but it also could indicate that he may not be very entrenched in the scientific community.

As for the existence of God: science will never be able to disprove a God whose being extends outside of the realm of the universe, multiverse, or whatever, and hence that of science. As for such arguments as that of the conservation of mass during Jesus' increasing a small amount of food to larger amounts: ignoring the possibility of a being with technology beyond that of our current level or other explanation (for someone who doesn't believe in God), creating more mass from nothingness (or moving it from anywhere else) by a God who created everything seen and unseen from nothingness would be no feat of concern. Even though most atheists would disagree, atheism is as much of a religion as theism is. Competent scientists know that a lack of evidence is not proof of anything that may be or not be.

I came upon this review by Dave for a children's book titled "Born With a Bang: The Universe Tells Our Cosmic Story" on Amazon. I thought it was interesting in view of some of the posts on this thread. Here's a partial quote:

I have a Ph.D. in theoretical physics from Stanford, and I looked through the book carefully for any scientific errors.

I found none.

I do wish Morgan had discussed the "inflationary scenario," now generally favored by cosmologists, that suggests that the Big Bang was precipitated out of the frenetic expansion of a much larger super-universe. But, Morgan might reasonably object that the inflationary theory is still speculative, whereas the information she presents in this book is solidly established science.

Some parents might also object that treating the Universe as a person reeks too much of New Age nature-worship pantheism. Such a criticism would be unwarranted - Morgan, after all, knows that the Universe is not actually a human being, and even young readers should be able to see this as simply an engaging storytelling device. Any child who enjoys watching talking planes or a purple dinosaur on TV, while knowing that neither is real, can appreciate Morgan's narrative approach. This book should be of value to any family, regardless of religious or philosophical orientation, who possess a serious interest in science or nature.

The educational theorist Kieran Egan has argued that the best way to educate children is to center their education around grand stories. It is hard to imagine any story grander than the birth and development of the universe.

Our kids learn all sorts of stories in school and through popular culture. But too few of those stories serve one of the central needs of education - encouraging the student to transcend his own childish egocentrism and acquire a broader, transcendent perspective. To become an educated person, indeed to become a mature adult, requires such a perspective, but our society and our educational system too rarely nurture it, despite the fact that children are hungry for grand and exotic stories that transcend their own narrow lives.

It is all too easy to graduate even from a prestigious university in America with no comprehension of the stupendous discoveries human beings have made during the last hundred years concerning the nature of our universe.

That is horribly sad - we are depriving our children of grand and exciting truths.