Posted on 02/04/2006 1:27:38 PM PST by Lorianne
In a column late last month in the Catholic Church's official newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, Italian biologist Fiorenzo Facchini scolded intelligent design advocates for "pretending to do science." It was the Vatican's signal that the church had jumped ship on ID. That will no doubt rankle creationists who hoped for a potential ally in Rome. But there's a bright side for them: The church's rejection could help the ID-ers identify with their favorite scientist, Galileo Galilei.
In opinion pieces, speeches, and interviews, ID advocates commonly cite the 17th-century Italian astronomer and physicist as a forebear. It's not his views on biology they want a piece of, but rather his plight as a man before his time. "In my opinion, we must train students in the 21st century to do exactly as Galileo did … think outside the box," says William Harris, one of the key players in Kansas' rebellion against evolution last year. In his 1996 book Darwin's Black Box, leading ID-er Michael Behe calls the idea of a heliocentric universe, proposed by Copernicus and backed by Galileo, a prescient "assault on the senses."
Last fall, an interviewer for the British newspaper the Guardian asked Behe if the criticism of ID he faces brings Galileo to mind. The self-appointed science rebel had a simple answer: "Yeah. In a way it's flattery."
Welcome to creationism's absurdist history of science. During the inquisition, the Catholic Church put Galileo on trial in 1633 and forced him under threat of torture to recant his belief, presented unapologetically in the Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, that the earth revolved around the sun. Galileo's story has nuances—Pope Urban VIII tolerated his ideas more than hard-line cardinals—but it is unquestionably a tale of science squelched by organized religion.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
Oh, that's mature.
The Catholic Church's only official stance on Darwinism is that Catholics are allowed to study it.
Thanks for proving my point. If Darwinism were contrary to the Catholic faith, then we would not be allowed to study it.
However, it's not 1950 anymore. There have been some developments since then, most notably the 2004 theological commission, which you seem to want to ignore. It explicitly authorized by JP2 and presided over by the present pope. Its findings were officilly endorsed by the Vatican. While this does not make it infallible, it is clearly part of the orindary magisterium. Here's what it said:
Many neo-Darwinian scientists, as well as some of their critics, have concluded that, if evolution is a radically contingent materialistic process driven by natural selection and random genetic variation, then there can be no place in it for divine providential causality. A growing body of scientific critics of neo-Darwinism point to evidence of design (e.g., biological structures that exhibit specified complexity) that, in their view, cannot be explained in terms of a purely contingent process and that neo-Darwinians have ignored or misinterpreted. The nub of this currently lively disagreement involves scientific observation and generalization concerning whether the available data support inferences of design or chance, and cannot be settled by theology. But it is important to note that, according to the Catholic understanding of divine causality, true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence. Divine causality and created causality radically differ in kind and not only in degree. Thus, even the outcome of a truly contingent natural process can nonetheless fall within God’s providential plan for creation.
The comission also said this:
While there is little consensus among scientists about how the origin of this first microscopic life is to be explained, there is general agreement among them that the first organism dwelt on this planet about 3.5-4 billion years ago. Since it has been demonstrated that all living organisms on earth are genetically related, it is virtually certain that all living organisms have descended from this first organism. Converging evidence from many studies in the physical and biological sciences furnishes mounting support for some theory of evolution to account for the development and diversification of life on earth, while controversy continues over the pace and mechanisms of evolution. While the story of human origins is complex and subject to revision, physical anthropology and molecular biology combine to make a convincing case for the origin of the human species in Africa about 150,000 years ago in a humanoid population of common genetic lineage.
True, but it is undeniable that mother Church overreacted. There was absolutely no justification for putting Copernicus and Kepler on the index, as well as keeping on the index a blanket prohibition of all heliocentric books until 1758.
Link please.
Right, which means that evolution could not be heretical. Otherwise, Catholics would not be allowed to even entertain the theory.
But a lot has happened since 1950. See post 21.
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20040723_communion-stewardship_en.html
This isn't the greatest of articles, but we there's an interesting discussion going on. Please join in.
Junior, you may want to archive this.
If that was true, why didn't the Church admit its mistake when the evidence was clear? How long did it take for the Church to admit it was wrong about him, again?
Answer: it wasn't about any lack of evidence. It was about contradicting Church dogma. Fortunately, the men currently at the head of the Church aren't so anti-science as their forerunners.
That's correct, but the blanket condemnation of heliocentric books, as well as Kepler and Copernicus were removed in 1758.
I think Galileo's dialogues stayed on it longer for personal reasons; they insulted a pope, after all.
The _Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems_ has a preface in which Galileo carefully observes the formality of deferring to the Church's judgement:
"I hope from these considerations the world will come to know that if other nations have navigated more, we have not theorized less. It is not from failing to take count of what others have thought that we have yielded to asserting that the earth is motionless, and holding the contrary to be a mere mathematical caprice, but ( if for nothing else ) for those reasons that are supplied by piety, religion, the knowledge of Divine Omnipotence, and a consciousness of the limitations of the human mind."
But among the "textual points offensive to the church was, "That the preface was printed in different type and thus vitiated, ..."
This would be not to mention the screaming insincerity of it. Note his appeal to national pride - a virtual, "Aw, c'mon! We don't want to look like rubes do we?"
Galileo was convinced that he was on the inside, having counted the Pope himself as personal friend, and that he was allowed free rein, short of open defiance. As it turned out, of course, he was mistaken.
Well, yeah. Quite understandable. Shoulda shot the creep. He got off easy.
It did, sort of, in 1758, removing Copernicus and Kepler from the index and allowing free dissemination of all heliocentric books except Galileo's. That remained on the index longer, probably because of sour grapes. It is a pretty arogant and insulting work.
Answer: it wasn't about any lack of evidence. It was about contradicting Church dogma.
Sorry, but that doesn't square with the historical data either. Copernicus presented his model in Rome, to clerics, several times and sufferend no repercussions. Until Galileo's time, his book received no censure, and his Bishop was the one encouraging him to publish it.
Fortunately, the men currently at the head of the Church aren't so anti-science as their forerunners.
The Church was never anti-science. It overreacted in response to Galileo, but that's about the only example in which the Church even comes close to being anti-science.
Look, I'm not defending the action. I'm just pointing out that it's as clear-cut as what people make it out to be. The Galileo affiar is more about personal grudges and delicate egos than about science and/or hostility to it.
Giordano Bruno. Yes, his case can be argued both ways, but still ...
If the Church were dogmatically opposed to heliocentrism, why didn't it burn Copernicus when he presented his model in Rome? And no, he did not wait until his death to present it. He held off publishing it, but he presented it numerous times before his death.
Copernicus presented only a mathematical model. No problem. Galileo had some very persuasive evidence.
Yes, but no one started giving him trouble until he started saying that the Bible had to be reinterpreted in light of his evidence.
Even after his trial, and the placing of his book on the index, no one was prohibited from doing further research into the Copernican model. The reading of Galileo's books was even allowed, so long as the edition was modified to express the Copernican model as a hypothesis, and his evidence as less than definitive (which it was).
And I might add, Copernicus did not think his model was just a model. He thought it represented physical reality.
Again, I'm not defending Galileo's treatment (or the actions of the Congregation on the Index in 1616). At the very least, the placing of Copernicus and Kepler on the index was aboslutely indefensible.
I'm just pointing out that the historical reality is different from what most people think it is.
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