lpetrich

Opera Nut:
"The Catholic Church barbecued Giordano Bruno."

Bede:
Not for his scientific views but for trying to start a new religion.

So what? Did he deserve to be burned at the stake for that?

Kepler's inspiration was his Christianity as he states over and over again in his writings.

If you call Neoplatonic number mysticism "Christianity". By that standard, someone like Jesus-myther Robert Price is a completely orthodox Episcopalian (yes, he's a practicing one).

At the time of his trial, Galileo lost the scientific argument.

Which is absolutely absurd revisionism. Galileo ultimately WON. Simply consider which is closer to the Solar System's barycenter: the Earth or the Sun?

* When Galileo constructed a telescope for himself, he looked first at the Earth, noticing how distant places appeared much closer. He could then extrapolate to what he saw in the sky with it.

* The Moon has mountains, making it much more like the Earth than anyone had expected. This made the celestial realm seem much more like the terrestrial realm.

* The Sun's spots had a similar suggestive effect.

* The phases of Venus demonstrate that its orbit is centered on the Sun. This ruled out Ptolemy's idea of a strict order, though it could not decide between the Tychonic and Copernican systems.

* The moons of Jupiter are a counterexample to the proposition that everything must move around the Earth, though this is still consistent with geocentrism.

Ipetrich has learnt something from his time here so have a look at his post.

I'm not concluding that the Church ought to have made Galileo recant; far from it. And I don't think that the Church looks any good if its top officials make a serious decision out of pique.

And its position that heliocentrism was "only a theory" was not exactly something to be proud of.

Augustine condemned magicians not mathematicians as anyone with the slightest knowledge of Latin would tell you.

But he believed that sorcery had real effects, meaning that he likely expected to be seriously injured if someone stuck pins in a St. Augustine doll.

lpetrich

Tyler Durden seems to think that the Greek concept of fate was essentially chaos.

However, from here:

For Homer, the world was not governed by caprice, whim or chance ? what governed the world was "Moira" (fate, fortune, destiny). Fate was a system of regulations that control the unfolding of all life, all men and women, all things of the natural world, and all gods and goddesses. Fate was not only a system of regulations but a fundamental law that maintained the world. It is Moira that gives men and women their place and function in Greek society. That is, it is Moira that determines who shall be slave or master, peasant or warrior, citizen or non-citizen, Greek or barbarian. It is Moira that fixed the rhythm of human life ? from childhood through youth to old age and finally death, it was Fate that regulated the personal growth of the individual. Even the gods had their destinies determined by Moira. From the Iliad, the goddess Athena expounds on this principle of Fate to Telemachus when she says the gods may help mortals but "Death is the law for all: the gods themselves/Cannot avert it from the man they cherish when baneful Moira has pronounced his doom."

And here:

Let us see how such a vision may have come about. We have seen that the gods in Homer are assigned provinces. We have seen that the gods are subject to an older power MOIRA -- a power which they did not make and against which they cannot stand. Zeus himself laments that it is fate that his human son Sarpedon must die. Even the gods cannot avoid what fate has ordained. Suppose that either gods or humans were to overstep their allotted share. This would be hubris -- a kind of ridiculous pride -- and would be punished by nemesis -- the agents of fate. Notice that there is a force or pattern -- MOIRA -- which is above the individual powers of the individuals gods. MOIRA is not spoken of in personal terms. To assert MOIRA is simply to say that there is a given order in the world and to add that this order is both necessary and just.

In effect, fate is a completely impersonal natural and moral order that rules the Universe.

In effect, natural laws.

Which makes fate VERY different from those capricious, anthropomorphic Olympians.

Daggah

And why should we? You're misrepresenting Jefferson's views on Christianity here, and I think we (including you) all know it, because it's been pointed out to you time and again. We all know that Jefferson wasn't a Christian, and I can recall you yourself admitting that. The quotes you posted are consistent with a Jefferson who went through the NT and ripped out all references to superstition so that he could focus only on Jesus' moral teachings.

Cute, but unfortunately, all of Jesus' good ones were hardly original. But that's a whole other debate, isn't it?

Daggah

And why would I do that? I remember when you referred to the Constitution as legalistic pedantry myself.

Daggah

I've commented on this very thing too, lpetrich...it's amusing to observe Radorth's definition of "Christian" change when it suits him. He did this exact thing in debates on church-state separation and the founding fathers.

Bede

Originally posted by lpetrich

"So what? Did he deserve to be burned at the stake for that?"

No, but it has nothing to do with science so does not belong in this argument.

"If you call Neoplatonic number mysticism "Christianity". By that standard, someone like Jesus-myther Robert Price is a completely orthodox Episcopalian (yes, he's a practicing one)."

Ipetrich, please read something that isn't on the internet. Kepler was a devout Lutheran all his life who insisted that God was the reason the world had order and hence he could find it. These are facts accepted by all Kepler scholars.

"Which is absolutely absurd revisionism. Galileo ultimately WON."

<flame deleted - liv> At the time he lost the argument. You now know this so stop the childish anachronism.

"* When Galileo constructed a telescope for himself, he looked first at the Earth, noticing how distant places appeared much closer. He could then extrapolate to what he saw in the sky with it.

* The Moon has mountains, making it much more like the Earth than anyone had expected. This made the celestial realm seem much more like the terrestrial realm.

* The Sun's spots had a similar suggestive effect.

* The phases of Venus demonstrate that its orbit is centered on the Sun. This ruled out Ptolemy's idea of a strict order, though it could not decide between the Tychonic and Copernican systems.

* The moons of Jupiter are a counterexample to the proposition that everything must move around the Earth, though this is still consistent with geocentrism."

Galileo's sums didn't work, he was wrong about the tides, his data was suspect. And on top of all that even what you put above is not evidence the earth moves. How many times do we have to explain this stuff to you? It's like arguing with a YEC.

"And its position that heliocentrism was "only a theory" was not exactly something to be proud of."

Why not? It was an accurate description at the time.

"But he believed that sorcery had real effects, meaning that he likely expected to be seriously injured if someone stuck pins in a St. Augustine doll."

So Wade W was wrong as I said. Given your beloved Greeks practically all believed in magic I fear you are tying yourself in knots. Ever wonder how the classical Latin for magician came to be 'mathematicus'?

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

Hugo Holbling

And so the headbanging continues. *sigh*

I wonder how many more times we can repeat ourselves? The conflict hypothesis is dead, as is the reading of the Galileo incident as a paradigm example of religious hindrance of scientific thought. The methodological case whereby Christianity is intrinsically opposed to critical thinking is so hopeless that it can no longer be found in any scholarly literature. I suppose it would be otiose to comment on the chances of using a particular to demonstrate a generality, in any case.

To summarize: if you want to claim that Christianity has been a hindrance (in the sense that Bill Sneddon so nicely explained) then it's an issue for the history of science. If you want to wheel out the tired old Galileo story as an example, it's again an issue for the history and also the philosophy of science. If you want to suppose that Christainity is methodologically in opposition to critical thinking or science, it's once more an issue for the both. Anyone who wishes to make such claims is more than welcome to start a thread on each wherein Bede or i will be happy to pull these ideas to pieces - ideas that are no longer taken seriously by any scholar. If not, then i hope this embarrassing demonstration of fundamentalist atheism will end, since it can hardly be what the SecWeb hopes to promote. If i am mistaken and an Administrator cares to set me straight, i'll withdraw this last point.

:banghead:

Stephen T-B

Extreme positions won't do here.
First off, distinctions need to be drawn between Christianity and the Church, and between Science and Intellectual Accomplishment.

The pre-Reformation Church regarded itself as the seat of all authority, knowledge and power (the three things being interrelated,) and since it had adopted the Aristotelian view of the universe, to challenge that view was to challenge the Church’s pre-eminence. Not allowed.
On the other hand, some monasteries were great centres of Intellectual Accomplishment; indeed, for several centuries, they were the only centres of it in Europe.

The Jesuits, of course, were renowned for their learning.

When the Protestants came along, outside some of the Germanic (and a few other European) states where they didn’t need to sustain a pretence of being the source of all authority, knowledge and power, scientific inquiry and intellectual accomplishment flourished. It did particularly well in Scotland; and in England, studying Theology and going into the Church were often the precursors to a fruitful scientific career. Darwin had thought of being ordained, and I confidently assert that very many of those who helped to establish a central role for the scientific method during the 18th and 19th centuries were churchmen.

Fundamentalists, on the other hand, are deeply hostile to Science and Intellectual Accomplishment because they are incompatible with the beliefs they hold. They would suppress them if they could, and do when they can.

Gurdur

Adding my voice to Hugo holbling and Stephen T-B here in full agreement with them.

And I'm a hardline atheist (and have been one for longer than some people on this board have been alive), and a scientist by training.

Charlie

Yes, Christianity is a hindrance to science! An atheist scientist has no belief! He/She merely accept the facts and evidence and are not bias one way or the other. In fact, atheist, rationalists and the like, would gladly accept a god if there was real proof.

On the other hand, a christian scientist has a "belief". (Note: that because there is no proof, they must therefore "believe" in their god). Therefore, a christian scientist is by default bias and will have a very hard time accepting reality as the truth. All christians have this same bias and are unable to accept reality as the truth. They would rather "believe" in something that comforts them, than to know truth and face reality head on!

This is why christianity will always be a hindrance to science!
Charlie