Balancing Skepticism and Faith
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David Mo
Philosopher
Thank you again for your thoughtful response. One of the things that makes me doubt that you are the real Tim O'Neill is that here you have been presented as an expert (amateur, but expert) and your interventions do not seem it for two reasons: because the tone seems more like someone who wants to turn this into Capulets and Montagues, but in the internet, which has much less charm. Secondly because you seem hooked on discussing details rather than looking at the overall comments I've tried to make.
As for the former, I suggest you relax. No one is more right because he insults his opponent more.
As for the details: you know perfectly well that Copernicus wrote a single work with his complete theory: Revolutionibus orbium coelestium. You know that what he had written before were manuscripts (Comentariolus or letters) or treatises on partial subjects (only three texts in total, if I am not mistaken). You know perfectly well that the Revolutions were only edited with a prologue that disavowed the real scope of Copernicus' work. Whether or not he authorized this stratagem, we don't know because he received the edition on his deathbed. Anyway this implies an involutntary autocensure. You know, or you should know, that the relative indulgence of the Catholic Church was practically from the beginning conditioned to the presentation of heliocentrism as a speculative (mathematical) hypothesis with no real value (just what the prologue attributed to Osiander said). And you know that years after Copernicus' death the Catholic Church joined with the Lutheran Church to actively pursue everything that sounded like Copernicanism. Do you deny that the churches actively pursued the New Science because it undermined the principles of your authority over faith and scientific knowledge? This is what must be made clear first and foremost. Then let us demystify everything you want.
Regarding Hypatia: to say that Hypatia was persecuted by the band of violent monks of Cyril for political reasons is like saying nothing. The whole culture of antiquity and of the Christian Empire in particular is an amalgam of politics, philosophy and religion. Hypatia was not the goddess of paganism that some like to recreate. It is not clear whether or not she was pagan and her philosophy was rather an esoteric school than what we understand by philosophy after the Enlightenment. It happened to many like Socrates, Plato or the Pythagoreans. But it is clearthat it represented a circle in which pagans and educated Christians gathered in search of a common wisdom and this is what the band of fanatical monks who bloodily tored her could not tolerate. Because the policy she defended was not that of the power of intolerance of the Church. That's why Hypatia can still be seen as a symbol of independence of thought in the face of fanaticism and Christian violence, in this case. Do you agree with this?
Now the more general question: do you agree that the Christian churches, in this case, have played a regressive role against science during the centuries of their political dominance in Europe? I am interested in that and not in your task of demystification of what you want.
attempt5001
Muse
Thanks. I guess if you believe your Jesus is a material version of your immaterial God then I can see it kinda making some sense (at a very loooong stretch). Not sure if it’s correct, but I’ve assumed you were born and indoctrinated into your religious beliefs, so I guess we’re talking about you being in a position of questioning and retaining those beliefs rather than how they were first formed. In the process I trust (have faith
I realise that your purpose is to evaluate and not necessarily to abandon, but I’ve been amazed how long it takes some to abandon their god belief (10 years plus in some cases). Another thing that has amazed me is that even when some stop believing in their god they’re still frighten as hell by the prospect of going to a hell. A form of reverse cognitive dissonance, the residual power of strong belief, or an irrational phobia?
ETA – I guess another question that follows from my previous is – If there was no bible at all, would you still believe? I guess this question is purely rhetorical as it’s impossible to say what might have happened in different circumstances. These are the types of questions I would ask myself if I was in your position however.
My pleasure ynot. I appreciate you considering and trying to understand my responses, even though its not easy. And yes, "born and raised", so even recognizing the word "indoctrination" as accurate, rather than offensive has taken some time and effort. (Some of the glasses have darker tints it turns out, but I'll try to set those aside along with the rosy ones). Thanks for the encouragement.
Per your second point, I think kellyb's description of "neural networks" is both figuratively and literally true and can explain a lot of the the pace and struggle associated with change. I'm actually sometimes surprised by how quickly and extremely some people change their thinking. And I'm sometimes a bit skeptical as to whether some haven't swapped one form of indoctrination for another, (although seeing someone "break free" from a damaging mind-set is fantastic). I think it's a lot easier to change what you say you believe than to change your reactions and default behaviours, especially under stress. I.e., your conscious mind is a lot easier to change than your subconscious.
And yeah, it's hard to answer hypotheticals with much confidence, though it's interesting to contemplate them. I think in general terms though that mankind's efforts to explain a sense of the divine exists outside of (and predates) religious texts. Maybe I'd have been a star-gazing neanderthal many thousands of years ago
attempt5001
Muse
Thanks for sharing the link. I've assumed there are lots of forums like this, but have been hesitant to seek them out. Funny maybe that I chose this forum to open up this discussion, but I didn't want to presume an endpoint (e.g. ex-Christian) before getting started (not assuming that's what all the posters there are doing, it was just helpful for myself).
TimONeill2
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What a tangled non-sequitur. You yourself have already noted that I do not claim to be any kind of "expert", just someone with a very good knowledge of the work of those who are. Secondly, my tone has never risen above some mildly amused sarcasm in the face of someone who keeps making statements about history that are either demonstrably wrong or contradicted by the both the evidence and the professional consensus of scholars. Finally, your "overall comments" are wrong precisely because your "details" are wrong. Laughably so. So this "doubt that you are the real Tim O'Neill" schtick makes zero sense.
I'm perfectly "relaxed" thanks. Mildly amused, in fact. I usually find people resort to this weak tone policing when they know they have lost the argument. It's doubly amusing that this is how you ... began.
I know perfectly well (and, it seems, better than you) that the whole point of the Commentariolus , the later the Narratio Prima were, like Widmanstadt 's presentation to Pope Clement VII, meant to be careful and detailed summaries of the whole thesis, though without the full mathematical calculating material required to allow an astronomer use it in the place of Ptolemy's Almagest. So someone could only claim these were "treatises on partial subjects" if (a) they didn't have the faintest idea what they were talking about, (b) they did, but were trying to twist the facts and deceive people or (c) a combination of the two. I'll be kind and assume (a).
This doesn't matter given that, as I detailed in the article that you clearly didn't read, Osiander proposed such a preface only to get resistent Aristotelians to begin reading the book and argued that as they did so they would see that its thesis wasn't just a calculating device, but was a full cosmological model. And everyone understood that it wasn't just a calculating device from the beginning anyway - partially thanks to the Commentariolus and the Narratio Prima (these people didn't work in a contextual vacuum) and partially because ... this was clear from the text. So, again, you simply don't understand the material. Or rather, you refuse to do so.
Garbage. The the Commentariolus made it clear this was a cosmological system. So did Widmanstadt. Cardinal von Schönberg was quite clear on that point. As was the Narratio Prima. You can't maintain this stupid fantasy that no-one knew this until after 1543 given the mass of evidence this is nonsense. You are simply wrong. Deal with it.
Yes, after Galileo wandered into the interpretation of scripture at precisely the stage where that was a political sore point for the Papacy, and thus entangled heliocentrism with the politics of the Council of Trent and the Counter Reformation. Before that the Church did not care.
"MY authority"? What? And yes, I do deny that the Church persecuted "the New Science" generally, because that is total garbage.
Yes, that's usually the weak gambit used by people who want to prop up the "Hypatia as martyr" myth. If you had actually read any scholarly work on the subject (such the book by Dzielska that you reocommened but clearly have not read) you'll see that both factions in the dispute were made up of Christians and it was a struggle between and old and new political guards fighting for dominance.
Yawn. Please keep telling me things I've known for decades.
That one faction was Christian and aristocratic and included some aristocratic non-Christians as well and it was challenged by another faction of Christians over dominance, yes. That this had anything to do with the "intolerance of the Church" no - that is total fantasy that you are projecting onto events you don't understand
No. That idea has been rejected by historians of science for about a century. Please try to catch up (though I doubt your fundamentalist biases will let you - fanatics are always hampered by their emotions).
TimONeill2
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Glad you found it useful Dann. Thankfully some here are more rational than some others, who seem more emotionally-driven than many fundamentalist Christians.
Fundamentalist philosophers?
TimONeill2
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There doesn't seem to be much philosophy involved, just emotions and irrational bigotry.
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attempt5001
Muse
Hi P.J. Thanks for the reply. I'll have to do a little more experimenting with the quoting tools here to get the hang of it better. Once I've finished this reply, I'll (respectfully) trim the quoted portion from yours for ease of others reading the thread.
I'm really enjoying the thoughts and perspectives being shared in the thread and am glad others are finding it engaging and interesting too.
I agree with your assessment that what I'm describing needn't necessarily be theistic. I suppose the fact that it is not unequivocally so is precisely where the faith aspect comes in. And I agree many people and communities (both theistic and atheistic) demonstrate these traits we both appreciate. So religious affiliation (or lack thereof) is not a reliable predictor of character. We are agreed also that not every part of the NT fits well into my tidy summary
... sorry, gotta run here. I'll get back to your questions shortly. Am pondering definitions of both "supernatural" and "heaven". Back soon I hope.
xjx388
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I think you will find that there will always be tension between skepticism and faith. They are impossible to reconcile, especially for a Christian. If you explore skepticism, you will always hit an idea that challenges Christian belief. You will hear your pastor/priest/whatever say something in their sermon that will make you internally chuckle, "OK, I know that isn't true." Your friend will tell you about how their prayers saved their loved one from some health scare and you will ask yourself, "And the doctors, what . . . just twiddled their thumbs?" You will begin to doubt.
The question will become: Can I keep my relationships with the faithful friends and communities intact even though I don't really believe what they do? I think in this day and age it's easier because so many people have begun to cast aside all the inconvenient bits of religious lore in favor of a practical kind of Spirituality, "OK, the Catholic Church is against birth control and pre-marital sex and they think the bread and wine physically become the body and blood of Christ. I don't really believe any of that. I still love God though, and that's what counts!" It's a pantomime, IOW, that most people act out in order to remain part of a socio-cultural construct that has been a big part of their life up until that point while still living their lives as they see fit.
Maybe you can do that forever. I'd wager, though, that at some point one of two things will happen: 1)You will find the pantomime becomes tedious to keep up and slowly drop the faithful or 2)You will find skepticism spiritually unsatisfying and re-embrace the faith communities you love -not that you will become unskeptical in most aspects of though, you will just cease to question faith because it feels better emotionally than the alternative.
For me, I went down path 1. I could never reconcile my Catholic upbringing with the reality science and critical thought lead me to.
The question will become: Can I keep my relationships with the faithful friends and communities intact even though I don't really believe what they do? I think in this day and age it's easier because so many people have begun to cast aside all the inconvenient bits of religious lore in favor of a practical kind of Spirituality, "OK, the Catholic Church is against birth control and pre-marital sex and they think the bread and wine physically become the body and blood of Christ. I don't really believe any of that. I still love God though, and that's what counts!" It's a pantomime, IOW, that most people act out in order to remain part of a socio-cultural construct that has been a big part of their life up until that point while still living their lives as they see fit.
Maybe you can do that forever. I'd wager, though, that at some point one of two things will happen: 1)You will find the pantomime becomes tedious to keep up and slowly drop the faithful or 2)You will find skepticism spiritually unsatisfying and re-embrace the faith communities you love -not that you will become unskeptical in most aspects of though, you will just cease to question faith because it feels better emotionally than the alternative.
For me, I went down path 1. I could never reconcile my Catholic upbringing with the reality science and critical thought lead me to.
David Mo
Philosopher
Sorry. A lapsus linguae.
"Do you deny that the churches actively pursued the New Science because it undermined the principles of
I be glad to know your answer.
David Mo
Philosopher
I get it. According to you, the Catholic Church was rather more stupid than Luther. He had realized the implications of heliocentrism for Christian dogma. The papacy did not. Suddenly, Galileo puts the subject on the table and the Church pursues the heliocentric theory with fire and blood for centuries - all because of this damned Galileo! It is the same thing that the precautions Osiander takes to camouflage Copernicus' message have nothing to do with Luther's accusations. It was only to deceive the Aristotelians. (By the way, I remind you that Aristotelianism, via Thomas Aquinas, was the official doctrine of the Catholic Church and its acceptance depended on its granting the venia docendi and the nihil obstat). And coincidentally, only coincidentally, they coincide with the clause that the Church tried to impose on Galileo in order to admit the publication of his theses. Forgive me for saying that I find your interpretation terribly naive or better biased.
But, in any case, the discussion of your misinterpretations of the Hypatia case and the Galileo case interests me less than its surprising conclusion.
First of all, what are those respected historians of science that deny the pernicious influence of the church on evolution of science in Europe?
Now the more general question: do you agree that the Christian churches, in this case, have played a regressive role against science during the centuries of their political dominance in Europe? I am interested in that and not in your task of demystification of what you want.
I am sorry, but I don’t find normal that you consider “fanatic” those that don’t agree with your negationist ideas. This is true fanaticism!
That the Christian church put an end to paganism by means of edicts of intolerance seems to me that even you cannot deny it. That the Christian monks who followed Cyril were tremendously hostile to anything that sounded like pagan philosophy, is evident. That they behaved terribly violently either. That Hypatia was considered by her followers as a philosopher and conservative of the teachings of the pagan philosophers (mainly platonic) either. So, that Hypatia was a victim of fanatical fundamentalist Christians but this had nothing to do with her ideological activity seems to me to be an extremely naïve or better biased interpretation.
The antiphilosophical environment (and science was not considered anything else then) of Christian culture is perfectly reflected in the following quotation:
Good Christians should beware of mathematicians and all those who are who are accustomed to making prophecies, for there is the danger of the mathematicians have made a pact with the devil to obnubilate the spirit and to plunge men into hell (Saint Augustine of Hippo: De Genesi al 2, XVII, 37 —my personal translation).
Keep in mind that it comes from the most philosophical Christian of the time. Practically the only one who deserves this name of such in the manuals. You can imagine what the other venerable fathers of the Church were saying about pagan philosophy (Aristide, Tertulian, etc.).
By the way, You don't remember the ban on pagan philosophy by Justinian either? Wasn't it intolerance? Have you never heard of the Inquisition and the index of forbidden books? Were these not a sign of the Church's anti-scientific fanaticism either? Are we fanatics who denounce this?
You complain that I remind you of things you already know. I am seeing if you are able to draw the right consequences from the facts we know because that is your problem.
(To be continued)
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GDon
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I'm not Tim O'Neill, but since your question is relevant to our own discussion, I hope you don't mind if I respond as well. BTW, you should read O'Neill's articles. If you find problems with his sources and conclusions, then I'd love to read them.
But think about it: why would the church oppose the evolution of science in Europe if it didn't oppose dogma? Because in most cases -- physics, mathematics, medicine, architecture, engineering, etc -- there is no conflict with dogma. Advances in those fields have no affect. That's why the idea that "science conflicts with religion" is so demonstrably wrong: most scientific discoveries are irrelevant to religion. Even evolution was supported from the start by biologists who were Christians, but then an allegorical approach towards Genesis had been around for a long time. Only those who took Genesis literally had issues.
Most historians of science have rejected the "conflict model". From here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_thesis
The "conflict thesis" is a historiographical approach in the history of science which maintains that there is an intrinsic intellectual conflict between religion and science and that the relationship between religion and science inevitably leads to hostility... The thesis retains support among some scientists and in the public,[1] while all historians of science reject the thesis, especially in its original strict form...
Please look into this, if you doubt it. You are entitled to your own opinion, but not to your own facts. You are doing a disservice to the men and women in history who worked on advancing the knowledge of humanity by propagating myths about how science developed.
Copernicus's heliocentrist theory passed pretty much without controversy for 70 years until Galileo. Where Galileo started to fall afoul of the Catholic Church was when he started arguing that Scripture supported heliocentrism, leading to charges of heresy. But even after that, Copernicus's own work supporting heliocentrism was allowed to be published after minor modifications.
Really, that is your own personal translation? Because the word "mathematicians" seems to be translated as "numerologists"/"astrologers" elsewhere, which makes sense in context regarding "mathematicians and all those who are who are accustomed to making prophecies". Are you sure that "mathematicians" is the best way to translate the word there?
Seriously, you come across as very naive. PLEASE look into this yourself. Fact check O'Neill's sources! That may be useful. And perhaps double-check your own translations with other sources.
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David Mo
Philosopher
(Continued).
About Copernicus, Galileo and the Holy Church.
The anti-Copernican religious movement did not wait for Galileo. It had its own sources in the intransigence and totalitarianism of the churches, much stronger in the Catholic church for political and social reasons.
Copernicus had gotten rid of the Inquisition for several reasons. He had never directly opposed the authority of the Church. His texts were manuscripts, of limited circulation, dedicated to the Pope and with a prologue tending to diminish their effects. Finally, but not lastly, he had never developed an experimental basis for his theory. This one could be described by his opponents as a mere possibility, rather than an empirical certainty.
But when Galileo begins to carry out observations that disqualify Aristotelian-Ptolemaic astronomy (natural places, geocentrism, etc.) everything changes. Now we are not talking about possibilities, but about new science and certainty.
Niccolo Lorini, Dominican, and other religious begin their preaching against Galileo in 1612 in these terms: that it has come to their ears that a certain Galileo, following a certain Copernicus is exposing theories about the Earth and other points that contradict what the Bible says and the interpretations of the holy fathers, like Thomas Aquinas. That it is his duty to make him aware of the Holy Office, which is what he does. And the Holy Office takes it into consideration and begins to study the subject. Friends who are aware of the denunciation begin to turn away from Galileo and beg him to say that his theory is only plausible (Christof Grienberger or Cardinal Bellarmino). And let the Bible not be mentioned, because not even its claim that it can be considered allegorical - something that is in common use today - will be accepted. In other words, let it follow the path of Copernicus.
Note that Galileo has only one alternative. Either he retracts himself or he confronts the Church in the name of science. As he does not desdice -in the beginning- he ends up in the Holy Court and in domestic prison for the rest of his life, with the express prohibition of publishing anything. If he hadn't recanted, he would have ended up like Giordano Bruno for sure.
His great sin has been to oppose science to the authority of the Church, which is perfectly reflected in the self-accusation that he is forced to pronounce: He acknowledges himself to be suspected of heresy for having maintained the "false opinion that the Earth is not the center of the universe and moves". Note that it is to maintain scientific theories. It is not question to speak of the sex of angels. And that "abjures, curses and abhors the aforementioned errors" (the scientists) "and any other error, heresy or sect contrary to the Holy Church" (that is, the Church is the indisputable authority for whatever it likes to command).
In other words, Galileo's abhorrent crime was to discover that there is a scientific method to discover the truth that the Church cannot control. The church could not tolerate and that is why the Holy Inquisition fought with blood and fire until it could no longer. Of course, the church ended up recognizing that the Earth revolves around the Sun and that science cannot be contradicted by papal encyclicals even with the help of the Holy Spirit. Only four centuries later.
If this is not to hinder the path of science on the basis of superstition and intransigence, you will tell me that you understand by that.
(To be continued)
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Whilst I don't have a depth of knowledge on this topic I can read Tim's posts in this thread I can therefore see you haven't understood his posts. One would suggest a proverb containing a mote.
David Mo
Philosopher
All right, then. I've tried to read the text Tim O'Neill dedicates to vindicating Christian science and I'm still not out of my astonishment. To illustrate his thesis that the church supported science, he gives a list of philosophers and others that is a hotchpotch. Aristotelians, scholastics, fideists... And to my very amazement, some who didn't even talk about things like science. If everything he writes is like that, it was a good thing he didn't have time to read more.
"Precedents of the new science" like Nostradamus and Paracelsus or less.
David Mo
Philosopher
All right, then. I've tried to read the text Tim O'Neill dedicates to vindicating Christian science and I'm still not out of my astonishment. To illustrate his thesis that the church supported science, he gives a list of philosophers and others that is a hotchpotch. Aristotelians, scholastics, fideists... And to my very amazement, some who didn't even talk about things like science. If everything he writes is like that, it was a good thing he didn't have time to read more.
I have consulted three versions of Augustine and they all translate "mathematics". Of course, Agustín throws the child out with the water from the bathtub. You know.
Actually, Agustín didn't give a damn about science. He was influenced by neoplatonism. The only truth that interested him was in the ideas in the mind of God.
P.J. Denyer
Penultimate Amazing
Interesting though this is, it should really be in it's own thread rather than derailing this one.
GDon
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Not at all, David Mo's responses are a perfect example of trying to balance skepticism and belief.