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Re: lic

By: wavydog in ALEA | Recommend this post (0)
Mon, 07 May 12 6:06 AM | 52 view(s)
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Msg. 07656 of 54959
(This msg. is a reply to 07655 by Cactus Flower)

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C flower, just wanted you to know that I love to have these kind of conversations and if I sound angry it's only that email thing that happens. I think that people who would consider arrogant anyone who would wish to understand the world through science would be the same sort of fool who would wish to silence Galileo. You will notice that both sets of fools are operating on their own. I would also hope that because one believes in God he or she is not automatically assumed a fool. You would have to throw a lot of great scientists in that basket. Have you ever read any of Newton's bible commentaries?


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The above is a reply to the following message:
Re: lic
By: Cactus Flower
in ALEA
Mon, 07 May 12 5:51 AM
Msg. 07655 of 54959

Hi wavydog,

I don't think either side intended it. But I think it was the consequence of, on the one hand, a set of beliefs based on fixed and eternal truths written down in a book, and on the other, an ever-changing set of observations about the book of nature.

Structurally, those two ways of thinking are bound to come into conflict. One is all about permanence. The other is all about change.

The result - when the church was in its pomp - was that scientists were either burned (eg Giordano Bruno) or silenced (eg Galileo).

In the long run, this resulted in a loss of prestige for the church as a source of wisdom. Nowadays, outside the USA, it is fairly rare to find folks who dispute science using the bible as a tool. Religion tends to inhabit a different space: one which science cannot discuss with authority - stuff about morality, virtue, compassion, guilt, afterlife etc. Whereas scientists study nature.

That makes for a peaceful state of affairs. No one needs to call folks who think science is valuable arrogant. Instead, they might see them as contributing to our understanding of the world we inhabit.


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