Freethought & Rationalism Archive

demoninho · 08-29-2003, 05:19 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Supergirl
Evolution v Creationism is not a conflict between science and religion??

Nah, they got creation scientists, no conflicts there.

lpetrich · 08-29-2003, 05:31 AM

Bede:
Bruno was not a scientist but a magus trying to found a new neo-Platonic religion. He was only made into a martyr for science due to the lack of real ones when the conflict myth got going.

He was not much different from Kepler and Newton in this regard. And did he really deserve being burned at the stake?

Also, Bede seems to want us to believe that the Catholic and Protestant clergy were squarely on the side of heliocentrism and that only bigoted God-haters were geocentrists -- and were geocentrists because they were God-haters.

Hitler was not a Christian. ...

However, he never left the Church, he referred to Jesus Christ as "the Lord" in Mein Kampf, he considered JC's actions exemplary, he believed that "the Lord gave man his shape and form", etc.

Maybe Hitler did not subscribe to Bedianity, however.

Family Man · 08-29-2003, 08:38 AM

Quote:

Family Man,

Hitler was not a Christian. As you actually seem to believe one of my myths you can hardly accuse me of trolling. Besides it is not necessary for an OP to go into enormous detail but simply stimulate discussion - as I have not cut and run I am clearly not a troll and would be grateful for a retraction of that remark.

As I pointed out, to say that Hitler was not a Christian is a great oversimplification of the issue. He was clearly a Christian early in his life and there is no clear evidence that he renounced his Christian beliefs -- only that he feared the church. Not the same thing at all. It is possible that, in his own mind, he stopped being a Christian, but that isn't at all clear from the record. That you choose to believe the religious myth that he wasn't a Christian is your problem, not mine. The historical record does not support your myth hypothesis.

At any rate, the real question with Hitler isn't whether or not he was Christian or not. The substansive issues are how much it influenced his thought (probably less than most atheists would like to believe) and how much he used it to advance his purposes (probably more than theists would feel comfortable with). Whether or not he was a Christian, imo, is unimportant.

Most of the time you're not a troll, but the entire purpose of this thread is trollish. What you have done is to take some serious historical issues, describe them in cartoonish style, then declare victory. No, you haven't "cut and run", but trolls don't necessarily cut and run. The salient point is that you haven't engaged in any substansive discussion of the issues either, as your response to the Hitler issue demonstrates. The point of your OP wasn't to generate discussion -- you've been avoiding it -- but to generate a reaction, a fact that you earler admitted to. That is the definition of a troll. Sorry, Bede, but I feel no need to retract that statement until you actually discuss something other than your opinion that you're right and everyone else is wrong.

Family Man · 08-29-2003, 08:45 AM

Bede --

Read your article that "settles" the conflict issues. Nice bit of religious correctness. I suspect you haven't framed the debate in such a way to make it easy for you to win, but I want to read up on the subject first before I make a response. It'll probably be a couple of months.

David Bowden · 08-29-2003, 08:53 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Bede
Likewise Bowden rewriting my own statements and refuting the re-written version. That defines the strawman argument and should be preserved for posterity.

Preserve away. I don't believe I strawmanned you, Bede. Note that for every point I allegedly strawmanned you on, I quoted your original point verbatim. I could hardly have been aiming at misrepresenting you. In reply, I merely stated what seems to me to be the most likely (to me) alternative statement to the assertions in your "atheist myth" list, since you didn't provide any such alternative in your OP.

For instance, you claim "That Hitler was a Christian" is an atheist myth. So I asked whether we should then believe that "Hitler was never a Christian." Perhaps there's some middle ground between "having been a Christian" and "not having been a Christian" that I've never heard of. If so, please define it. Otherwise, it seems "Hitler was never a Christian" must actually represent the belief you'd prefer us to have concerning the issue. And therefore I did not strawman you on that point.

Likewise, you state that it is a myth "That there has been a historical conflict between science and religion." So I raised the clearest alternative: "There has never been a conflict between science and religion." If this doesn't represent your position, please forgive me and please clarify. I just couldn't identify any ground left over between there having been a conflict and there not having been one. But perhaps you see what I cannot see. If not, I did not strawman you on this point.

The third point I took issue with was "That the inquisition was unusually brutal for its time." I did not claim that it was or wasn't; what my reply indicates is that atheists like myself are not so concerned about the extent of the brutality, but rather the use of any brutality in the name of God/"Love" by the Church. (I do not suspect that you believe that the Inquisition was not brutal at all, and I would be surprised if you believe that the Inquisition was notably restrained in its brutality for its time, so all I had to go on was your statement of the atheist myth.)

I'm concerned about what seems to be an underlying assumption in your (and other Christians') ease with making such a point as you made: that the "usual" brutality was somehow an excusable activity of the agents of the God who allegedly is "Love." Perhaps you do not believe it is excusable at all. In which case, I have no disagreement with you on this point, and my post will live on for posterity to look upon as a testimony against any apologists who do seek to excuse the brutality of the Inquisition (I've known some).

Given the limited information in your original post and my desire to point out the apparent and disgraceful underlying assumption, I asked whether we should believe that "Inquisitional brutality shouldn't be scorned by atheists since it wasn't unusual for its time," and provided my response to such an notion. If that's absolutely not your own underlying attitude, then forgive me for bringing it to light here.

For my part, I cannot fathom following to a Shepherd, whether the term refer to "God" or "pope," who would lead his flock into committing the "usual brutal" acts of any era. I do not know whether the Church has ever stated that God and the Pope or anyone else was in tragic error for subscribing to the brutality of that period; if so, then they did well to do so, and one hopes that future Church activity will eschew the brutalities of all ages.

The other two points follow suit; I have a Rationalism & Empiricism class now and have already made my overall point, so I let those stand for posterity as non-strawmen along with the points I have already discussed. My conclusion still holds: "It seems possible that a reasonable and informed person is warranted to give credence to at least some of these "atheist myths."

And I would add, for posterity's sake, that some of these "atheist myths" themselves seem like strawmen, given the experiences I've had with atheists. But I'll leave it to posterity to apply logic and history, and to pick out which ones those are.

-David

Vorkosigan · 08-29-2003, 09:15 AM

Otherwise, it seems "Hitler was never a Christian" must actually represent the belief you'd prefer us to have concerning the issue. And therefore I did not strawman you on that point.

Well said! Hitler was obviously a Christian once. Whether he was a Christian during his period of power is a separate issue from whether he was ever a Christian. There is no question about the latter being true.

Vorkosigan

Sauron · 08-29-2003, 10:39 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Bede
Sauron,

One post will do....

Remind me: how many posts did you make? 5? 6? 7?

That's what I thought.

Quote:

You are wrong about human dissection being allowed by the Arabs. Have a look at Lindberg's Beginnings of Western Science.

Actually, you're wrong about it. From the National Institute of Health:

Quote:

Catalogue: Medical Monographs
Anatomy and Physiology

Systematic human anatomical dissection was no more a pursuit of medieval Islamic society than it was of medieval Christendom. It seems clear from the available evidence, however, that there were no explicit legal or religious strictures banning it. Indeed, many scholars in Islam lauded the study of anatomy, primarily as a way of demonstrating the design and wisdom of God, and there are some references in medical writings to dissection, though to what extent these reflect actual practice is problematic.

Knowledge of human anatomy in medieval Islam was firmly based on the anatomical writings of Galen, who flourished in the 2nd century AD, and who to a large extent argued from analogy with animal structures. Galen's writings were available in the Islamic world through the translation of Hunayn ibn Ishaq and his collaborators. Galen presented the material in a highly teleological manner, with constant emphasis on structure and function demonstrating the design of the Creator, and this approach found a receptive audience amongst Islamic physicians and philosopher. NLM has an important copy of the Arabic translation of Galen's most important treatise on physiology, On the Usefulness of the Parts, (MS A 30.1). In addition, NLM has copies of the Arabic versions of Galen's treatise On Bones for Beginners and On the Anatomy of Muscles (MS P 26, item 3) (MS P 26, item 4).

There were two noteworthy contributions made to the history of anatomy and physiology by medieval Islamic writers: One was the result of chance observation: for �Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi (d. 1231/629) was able to improve the description of the bones of the lower jaw and sacrum following the discovery of some skeletons during a famine in Egypt in 1200. The second was the description of the movement of blood through the pulmonary transit by the Syrian physician Ibn al-Nafis (d. 1288/678). Ibn al-Nafis composed a very popular epitome of the Canon of Medicine by Ibn Sina (Avicenna) which he called the Mujiz. In addition, however, Ibn al-Nafis also wrote a commentary on the Canon in which he criticized Ibn Sina for spreading his discussion of the anatomy over several different sections of the Canon. Ibn al-Nafis subsequently prepared a separate commentary on just the anatomical portions, and it was in this latter commentary that he explicitly stated that the blood in the right ventricle of the heart must reach the left ventricle by way of the lungs and not through a passage connecting the ventricles, as Galen had maintained. This formulation of the pulmonary circulation, sometimes called the 'lesser circulation', was made three centuries before Michael Servetus (d. 1553) and Realdo Colombo (d. 1559), the first Europeans to describe the pulmonary circulation. A subject of debate amongst historians is whether Ibn al-Nafis's commentary on the anatomy in the Canon was available through translation to European physicians. It is known that Ibn al-Nafis's commentary on the last part of the Canon, concerned with compound remedies, was translated into Latin by the Renaissance physician Andrea Alpago (d. 1522) and published posthumously in 1547. The possibility remains that Ibn al-Nafis's commentary on the anatomy might have been transmitted through unpublished translations.

Secondly, Islam obviously did permit such dissection; the topic of which is discussed in Savage-Smith, Emilie. "Attitudes Towards Dissection in Medieval Islam." Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 50 (1995): 67-110. This is also part of the required coursework at the History of Medicine class at Standford University. Had dissection not been practiced in the Islamic world, or had it been understood to be explicitly banned by religious belief, then this would have been a very short paper indeed. Clearly it is not.

Thirdly, this same point (about dissection) was brought up in the PBS special "Islam: Empire of Faith" as well as in the companion book.

And finally, you should check out "Cathedral, Forge and Waterwheel" by Frances and Joseph Gies for more information about the transmission of Islamic science and medicine, including dissection, to the medieval Europeans.

08-29-2003, 10:39 AM

Family man, look forward to your comments: and I tell you what - if I tone down the polemic maybe you can too?

David Bowden, if you think a general statement is the same as statement intended to exclude all contraries, you need to learn English usuage. Your strawmen remain just that as you recharactised my statements. The statement "CS Lewis was not an atheist" is true in general even though he was an atheist at some point in his life. The sort of person who challenges the statement like that is a pedent and boring. Or else they are using strawmen to try and win arguments.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

08-29-2003, 10:54 AM

Sauron,

I'll look up the Savage Smith article. As I presume you have read what you cite can you give us a quote?

In the meantime from Toby Huff "The Rise of Early Modern Science" CUP 1993 page 178:

Experts on the history of Arabic medicene assert that the dissection of human beings was strictly forbibben by religious law. As Professor Burgel puts it "Our sources do not contain the slightest indication of anybody having dared to trespass this custom. Yuhana Ibn Masawaih, a great physician of the earlier period who was a Christian and a freethinking rationalist in demeanor, dissected apes."

Perhaps there has been new evidence unearthed. I look ofrward to seeing it.

Yours

Bede

Bede's Library - faith and reason

David Bowden · 08-29-2003, 11:08 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Bede
David Bowden, if you think a general statement is the same as statement intended to exclude all contraries, you need to learn English usuage. Your strawmen remain just that as you recharactised my statements. The statement "CS Lewis was not an atheist" is true in general even though he was an atheist at some point in his life. The sort of person who challenges the statement like that is a pedent and boring. Or else they are using strawmen to try and win arguments.

I can only apologize for seeming pedantic and boring, then. If you state that it is a myth that there has been a historical conflict between science and religion, and if (to you) it is pedantic and boring to point out that it is rather absurd of you to imply the most likely contrary to that "mythical" assertion (and remember I only asked if that is what we were to believe), that there never was such a conflict, then I can only roll my eyes, and exit this discussion having had the best word (though no doubt you will try to have the last word) on the matter.

-David

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08-29-2003, 05:31 AM	#62
lpetrich Contributor Join Date: Jul 2000 Location: Lebanon, OR, USA Posts: 16,829	Bede: Bruno was not a scientist but a magus trying to found a new neo-Platonic religion. He was only made into a martyr for science due to the lack of real ones when the conflict myth got going. He was not much different from Kepler and Newton in this regard. And did he really deserve being burned at the stake? Also, Bede seems to want us to believe that the Catholic and Protestant clergy were squarely on the side of heliocentrism and that only bigoted God-haters were geocentrists -- and were geocentrists because they were God-haters. Hitler was not a Christian. ... However, he never left the Church, he referred to Jesus Christ as "the Lord" in Mein Kampf, he considered JC's actions exemplary, he believed that "the Lord gave man his shape and form", etc. Maybe Hitler did not subscribe to Bedianity, however.

08-29-2003, 08:45 AM	#64
Family Man Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2000 Location: Superior, CO USA Posts: 1,553	Bede -- Read your article that "settles" the conflict issues. Nice bit of religious correctness. I suspect you haven't framed the debate in such a way to make it easy for you to win, but I want to read up on the subject first before I make a response. It'll probably be a couple of months.

08-29-2003, 09:15 AM	#66
Vorkosigan Contributor Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Barrayar Posts: 11,866	Otherwise, it seems "Hitler was never a Christian" must actually represent the belief you'd prefer us to have concerning the issue. And therefore I did not strawman you on that point. Well said! Hitler was obviously a Christian once. Whether he was a Christian during his period of power is a separate issue from whether he was ever a Christian. There is no question about the latter being true. Vorkosigan

08-29-2003, 10:39 AM	#68
Bede Guest Posts: n/a	Family man, look forward to your comments: and I tell you what - if I tone down the polemic maybe you can too? David Bowden, if you think a general statement is the same as statement intended to exclude all contraries, you need to learn English usuage. Your strawmen remain just that as you recharactised my statements. The statement "CS Lewis was not an atheist" is true in general even though he was an atheist at some point in his life. The sort of person who challenges the statement like that is a pedent and boring. Or else they are using strawmen to try and win arguments. Yours Bede Bede's Library - faith and reason

08-29-2003, 10:54 AM	#69
Bede Guest Posts: n/a	Sauron, I'll look up the Savage Smith article. As I presume you have read what you cite can you give us a quote? In the meantime from Toby Huff "The Rise of Early Modern Science" CUP 1993 page 178: Experts on the history of Arabic medicene assert that the dissection of human beings was strictly forbibben by religious law. As Professor Burgel puts it "Our sources do not contain the slightest indication of anybody having dared to trespass this custom. Yuhana Ibn Masawaih, a great physician of the earlier period who was a Christian and a freethinking rationalist in demeanor, dissected apes." Perhaps there has been new evidence unearthed. I look ofrward to seeing it. Yours Bede Bede's Library - faith and reason

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