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, and BTW. Bruno didn't have any evidence either. It was just a model, and the same as Copernicus. That pretty much rules out the hypothesis that he was burned for challanging geocentrism.
Kinda like Darwin? LOL.
Since all computer programs contain program code that is common, they are "genetically related" and thus as "vitually certain" that hey all descended from some First Program.
Yeah, that's the ticket. Sure.
Not really. But then that depends on "what is is", meaning what do you mean by evolution.
Ideas and designs evolve -- the evidence is universal and obvious for that assertion of a fact. But then, that kind of proven evolution is not what you mean, is it?
Galileo didn't start out to revise the interpretation of scripture. And even if he did, it was wrong to punish him. Certainly by our standards it was wrong. Anyway, he didn't start the fight. The first thing was that his work was criticized on theological grounds. It was only then, in defense of his work, that he suggested the current understanding of scripture could be wrong. That was in this famous letter:
Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina of Tuscany. Excerpt:
The reason produced for condemning the opinion that the earth moves and the sun stands still [is that] in many places in the Bible one may read that the sun moves and the earth stands still. Since the Bible cannot err; it follows as a necessary consequence that anyone takes a erroneous and heretical position who maintains that the sun is inherently motionless and the earth movable.The next paragraph must have been controversial in its day, but it is currently the position of the Church, which is why they don't oppose evolution:With regard to this argument, I think in the first place that it is very pious to say and prudent to affirm that the holy Bible can never speak untruth-whenever its true meaning is understood. But I believe nobody will deny that it is often very abstruse, and may say things which are quite different from what its bare words signify. Hence in expounding the Bible if one were always to confine oneself to the unadorned grammatical meaning, one might; fall into error. Not only contradictions and propositions far from true might thus be made to appear in the Bible, but even grave heresies and follies. Thus it would be necessary to assign to God feet, hands ...
[snip]
Now the Bible, merely to condescend to popular capacity, has not hesitated to obscure some very important pronouncements, attributing to God himself some qualities extremely remote from (and even contrary to) His essence. Who, then, would positively declare that this principle has been set aside, and the Bible has confined itself rigorously to the bare and restricted sense of its words, when speaking but casually of the earth, of water, of the sun, or of any other created thing? Especially in view of the fact that these things in no way concern the primary purpose of the sacred writings, which is the service of God and the salvation of souls - matters infinitely beyond the comprehension of the common people.
This being granted, I think that in discussions of physical problems we ought to begin not from the authority of scriptural passages but from sense experiences and necessary demonstrations ...In this way, Galileo was offering the Church a way to reconcile scripture with the new discoveries. They didn't go for it. But to blame Galileo -- even in part -- for the troubles he encountered is bizarre. What happened to him was outrageous.
Doesn't naturalistic evolution explain what happened to him? For what happened to him was all too human.
In this way, Galileo was offering the Church a way to reconcile scripture with the new discoveries. They didn't go for it. But to blame Galileo -- even in part -- for the troubles he encountered is bizarre. What happened to him was outrageous.
Exactly.
And as I said before, fortunately the stewards of the Church have a different attitude these days.
No, but it was this, along with his insistance that geocentrism was disproved, that got the attention of the Holy Office. Before he started spouting off on scriptural exegesis, the Vatican pretty much ignored him.
And even if he did, it was wrong to punish him. Certainly by our standards it was wrong.
I agree.
Anyway, he didn't start the fight. The first thing was that his work was criticized on theological grounds. It was only then, in defense of his work, that he suggested the current understanding of scripture could be wrong.
It's true that he didn't start the fight over theology, but it wasn't Church authorities who started the fight either. A few priests started preaching sermons against the Copernican system. The Holy Office and the rest of the Vatican ignored him UNTIL he started writing about theology. It was his writings on the need to revise scripture that raised the ire of the inquisition, specifically his letter to Castelli, written in 1613 and forwarded to the inquisition in 1615.
If Galileo had been content to stick with science and ignored the idiot priests, leaving them to the theologicans, the Holy Office would never have touched him. If after his 1616 trial he had contented himself with accurately discribing his evidence for Copernicanism as suggestive but definitive, he also would have been fine.
But no, instead he chooses to draw erroneous conclusions from his evidence, pontificate on theology and scriptural exegesis, an area outside his expertise, and insult the pope to boot. That's not smart.
None of this excuses what happened to him, but it does put the events in proper perspective.
In history, things are seldom black and white, and the case of Galileo is no exception. This case is more about egos and personal grudges than anything else.
That's certainly true.
... but it does put the events in proper perspective.
Well, that depends, doesn't it? From my perspective, even granting the all intemperate behavior that you attribute to Galileo, it's still pretty black and white. I guess we're not going to agree about this one.
I don't think they overreacted nearly as much as has been written by the anti-Catholic, revisionist 'historians', especially when you take into account that Galileo was countering the belief of the scientists of his day, and that of the entire Christian Church about the structure of the universe. One does not smash universally held scientific and religious beliefs without some strong degree of opposition, (especially when other renowned scientists are refuting him).
Cardinal Bellarmine wrote to Galileo asking him to merely refrain from publishing and teaching this theory until the Church had the time to investigate and understand it better. Also, if anyone is going to be fair minded about the matter, it's essential to understand that the best scientists of the times (correctly) believed that Gallileo's formulas and calculations were flawed.
Scientists today of course agree with Gallileo's heliocentricity, but it's now universally agreed that the 'proof' he presented for his theory was faulty. The Church was being advised of Galileos defective formulas by the best scientists of the times.
Galileo's troubles arose in great part from his own pride, arrogance, rage, and verbal venom spewed at the Church and at some of his academic peers. He was never asked to recant or drop his heliocentricity theory, but only to develop it privately. This is extremely understandable, because at the time Galileo was propounding something akin to a 21st Century scientist suddenly claiming that the earth is still and the sun revolves around it.
Universally accepted beliefs never die easily among human beings, and the Galileo story as it's presented by modern revisionists attempts to turn that fact of HUMAN NATURE into some sort of great flaw in the Catholic Church. Well the Church on earth does have a flaw as far as its members go, they are faithful believers but they are also imperfect human beings. Old Mr. Galileo was every bit as flawed as any member of the Church of his times was.
Galileo himself was probably relieved that the Church was patient and merciful with him; his great 'torture and imprisonment' consisted of being confined to the Bishop's manse, where he continued his studies and, (as many scholars claim), was eventually released.
Milan says that Galileo did not have proof of the heliocentric theory. I think he did. Did any serious scientist, after the publication of Galileo's Dialogue, defend the geocentric idea on scientific grounds? I know of none. Grant that this was due as much to Kepler's work as Galileo's; still the point stands.
But there is a more fundamental point. What possessed the the Church to declare solemnly that physics is a matter of faith, to command that its flock should disbelieve the evidence of their eyes and their minds?
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?
You miss the point, the Church wasn't wrong about him at all. The opposition wasn't to the theory, but to the attitude and arrogance of Galelio.
>>It was about contradicting Church dogma.
By this sentence, I can tell you don't know whaht dogma means..
>>Fortunately, the men currently at the head of the Church aren't so anti-science as their forerunners.
LOL, why do you think Galelio went to Rome to present his theories? Because the Church WAS the epicenter of science during those times. Many priests were scientists, and many Bishops were very supportive of science.
I suggest you read this book: "How the Catholic Church built western civilization" by Thomas E. Woods -- you'll understand just how much the Church promoted science, despite the tired and disproven arguments of the anti-catholic movement..
Karma runs over Dogma placemark
A common insult used whenever someone points out that there have previously been men in charge of the Church who loved power more than truth.
As I keep saying, it is fortunate that the current stewards of the Church aren't so petty as to ignore their mistakes for centuries lest they admit them.
IMHO, we could have better discussions by separating the intelligent design hypothesis from the intelligent design movement.
Tycho Brhae. His model, in which the sun orbits the earth, but the rest of the planets orbit the sun, was just as consistent with Galileo's observations as was the Copernican model. It took the discovery of Newton's laws of motion and graviation to thoroughly disprove geocentrism.
At any rate, most astronomers in Galileo's time were geocentrists. Kepler and Galileo were the exceptions. It took some time for the Copernican model to take root, and it was not universally accepted until the discovery of Newton's laws.
Yes, the reference to Kepler is misleading, also because it omits the fact that his book was placed on the index in 1616.
In any case the Church couldn't threaten Kepler with excommunication, because he wasn't a Catholic in the first place; and if the Inquisition had tried to get hold of him in person, it would probably have failed.
Well, Kepler wasn't Catholic, that's true, but he did do a lot of his work while living in Catholic territories (prior to 1616). So if the Church really was dogmatically attached to geocentrism (it wasn't), then it certainly could have gotten its hands on him.
Well, I think we agree more than you think.
I probably should not have used the words "black and white." Clearly, the Galileo case is black and white in the sense that Galileo suffered a clear injustice, and that the actions of Church authorities was morally wrong.
However, what's not black and white was the Church leadership's position on geocentrism as well as their motivation for persecuting Galileo. Let me give you my interpretation of events and see how much you agree with them.
The historical record is clear that Church authoriteis did not hold geocentrism to be irreformable dogma. This is clear from Bellarmine's letters, as well as their tolerance of Copernicus and Kepler prior to the Galileo affair. However, they were reluctant to revise the official interpretation of the seemingly geocentric scripture passages, and would not do it unless they there was a definitive refutation of geocentrism, which had not come yet. They were also very annoyed that a layman, with virtually no theological training, was disseminating literature to the masses telling the Church to reinterpret the Bible on the basis of what they deemed to be insufficient proof.
Their egos could not tolerate this affront, and so they condemned Galileo and censored other heliocentric works to express the Copernican theory as a hypothesis. Again, this is not because they were dogmatically unwilling to abandon geocentrism. They just didn't think it was warranted, yet, and could not tolerate uppity laymen jumping the gun. If there was going to be a reinterpration, it should come from the Church leadership, not the masses, in their view.
You also have to remember that all this is happening with the Protestant reformation in the background, one of whose central tenants the Church was fighting was the notion that every layman is competent to interpret the Bible for himself.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.