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Old 22nd December 2018, 12:45 PM   #321
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Most scientific discoveries are relevant contributions toward making religions and god beliefs increasingly irrelevant.
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Old 23rd December 2018, 01:46 AM   #322
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Originally Posted by GDon View Post
It's not difficult to say what O'Neill thinks. I quoted him on the topic in my post to you! But I am asking you about something that you are claiming. Can you quote O'Neill to the effect that he denies that there was a religious conflict between the Church and Galileo, please?
I can't because the lines you quoted are ambiguous. When I wanted to clarify them, he began to insult. If you re-examine my attempt of dialogue, you will see that my objections have never been answered.
Therefore, I chose to go to his sources (Lindberg and Numbers) which are more qualified, less hysterical... and equally wrong.
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Old 23rd December 2018, 02:15 AM   #323
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Originally Posted by GDon View Post
(...)
The physical and mathematical arguments [against heliocentrism] were of uneven quality, but many of them came directly from the writings of Tycho Brahe, and Ingoli repeatedly cited Brahe, the leading astronomer of the era. These included arguments about the effect of a moving earth on the trajectory of projectiles, and about parallax and Brahe's argument that the Copernican theory required that stars be absurdly large.
The difference between how Galileo and Copernicus were treated is that Copernicus didn't try to attack the Church's position on Scripture. Galileo did, and apparently insulted the Pope (intentionally or unintentionally) for good measure. But the science -- heliocentrism -- could still be read about, as long as it was framed as a theory.

This is supported in the Wiki entry on Galileo:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galile..._heliocentrism
Pope Paul V instructed Cardinal Bellarmine to deliver this finding to Galileo, and to order him to abandon the opinion that heliocentrism was physically true...

Bellarmine's instructions did not prohibit Galileo from discussing heliocentrism as a mathematical and philosophic idea, so long as he did not advocate for its physical truth.
It's as I wrote to you in an earlier post: the idea that "science conflicts with religion" in any general way is prima facie absurd. Why would the Church oppose any science that didn't conflict with 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" in any general way is so demonstrably wrong: most scientific discoveries are irrelevant to religion.

Your thoughts?
Your theory has some serious deficiencies.

The Church did not attack only Galileo's interference in the interpretation of the Bible. It would have been enough for the Church to condemn these interferences. The Church (and Luther before it) condemned heliocentrism before Galileo (Bruno), with Galileo and after Galileo (Inquisition). The problem was the clash between heliocentrism and religious dogma.

By demanding that heliocentrism be interpreted as hypothesis, not truth, the Church attributed to itself the power to tell science what it should think in the name of religion. This was repeated again with other theories and supposes an interference of religion in the scientific field that has lasted centuries.

It is not true that the opposition to Galileo was "scientific" and that it was "absurd" to defend heliocentrism in Galileo's time. Geocentrism had more problems than heliocentrism and its objection was based only on the subject of parallax (I said this based on Hull and others and Liundberg recognizes it). The rest of the objections were dogmatic: heliocentrism contradicted Aristotle and the Bible. The problem of parallax disappeared if the distance to the stars was increased, as it really is. Galileo's observations with the telescope, although not definitive, clearly pointed in that direction. Bruno also had intuited it and paid with his life.

What the Church did was to send against Galileo the mob of its "scientists", who were but an appendix of Catholicism and the Church. It cannot be said that Galileo's conflict was between scientists. This is to deform things so that they exonerate the church from a conflict in which it was primarily responsible.

The clash between Galileo and the Church is a peak in the conflict with religion and science. It was so spectacular because the Church was losing its totalitarian power on culture and science. After that, it began a process of slow decline of this power that lasted centuries. Now is in its lower point. Bu it continues in its borders.
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Old 23rd December 2018, 03:11 AM   #324
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Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
I can't because the lines you quoted are ambiguous.
I didn't find them ambiguous. But still, I am asking about YOUR claim. You said that:
O'Neill knows things but integrates them poorly into a theory because of ideological biases. What I call the “negationists” thesis is to deny that there was a religious conflict between the Church and Galileo and to try to present it as a scientific conflict.
Did O'Neill ever deny that there was a religious conflict there? Because he obviously claimed that there were religious elements as well as scientific elements involved, as per the very quote I gave from him earlier. If you found that quote ambiguous, then what are you basing your claim on?

This is important because part of your objection to him is that he denies that there was a religious conflict. I believe you have strawmanned his argument, thus much of your response is irrelevant.

Can you confirm that you are claiming that Tim O'Neill denies that there was a religious conflict between the Church and Galileo?

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Old 23rd December 2018, 03:39 AM   #325
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Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
Your theory has some serious deficiencies.
My theory is that the idea that there is a conflict between science and religion generally is wrong.

If it was correct, then should you plot "growth in scientific knowledge over time" against "conflicts with religion", you would expect to see the number of conflicts rise as scientific knowledge grows.

But you don't. You see basically a straight line with a number of blips, representing "the usual suspects" of Galileo, Darwin and a few others. (Even you note that there was a peak in Galileo's time, suggesting a decline or a levelling out of the number of conflicts after Galileo rather than an increase.)

Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
The Church did not attack only Galileo's interference in the interpretation of the Bible. It would have been enough for the Church to condemn these interferences. The Church (and Luther before it) condemned heliocentrism before Galileo (Bruno)...
Was Bruno condemned for promoting heliocentrism? Can you provide a source please? According to Wiki, the charges of heresy laid against him didn't include teaching heliocentrism. And if he had held to heliocentrism before Galileo, but wasn't charged for heresy for holding that view, that is additional data for my argument.

Tim O'Neill has a lengthy article on Giordano Bruno on his excellent "History for Atheists" website, where he investigates whether Bruno was condemned for promoting heliocentrism. Well worth a look! https://historyforatheists.com/2017/...r-for-science/

A source supporting your view that Bruno was condemned by the Church for holding to heliocentrism would be useful. Thanks.

Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
It is not true that the opposition to Galileo was "scientific" and that it was "absurd" to defend heliocentrism in Galileo's time.
Wasn't one of the people opposed to heliocentrism Tycho Bache, leading astronomer of his time? He argued against it using the science of his time, did he not? So how can you say that the opposition to Galileo was not "scientific"? As Tim O'Neill correctly pointed out to you, opposition was both scientific (that is, for the science of that time) and religious.

Can you at least confirm that Tycho Bache, leading astronomer for his time, provided reasons based on the science of his time against heliocentrism, please?

Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
What the Church did was to send against Galileo the mob of its "scientists", who were but an appendix of Catholicism and the Church. It cannot be said that Galileo's conflict was between scientists. This is to deform things so that they exonerate the church from a conflict in which it was primarily responsible.
So, to be clear: are you claiming that there were no scientific arguments (for that time) against Galileo at all? Or are you claiming that there were some scientific and religious arguments against Galileo?

The former is demonstrably wrong. The latter is what O'Neill is claiming. Which one do you think it is?

Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
The clash between Galileo and the Church is a peak in the conflict with religion and science.
If that was the peak, then that implies that the growth of science in the four hundred years since Galileo shows no increase in conflict with religion. How do you explain that, if science generally conflicts with religion? Shouldn't the peak be NOW?

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Old 23rd December 2018, 04:00 AM   #326
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Originally Posted by qayak View Post
Originally Posted by GDon
It's as I wrote to you in an earlier post: the idea that "science conflicts with religion" in any general way is prima facie absurd. Why would the Church oppose any science that didn't conflict with 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" in any general way is so demonstrably wrong: most scientific discoveries are irrelevant to religion.
That maybe true today but not so true when many discoveries were made.
Right, and if most scientific discoveries today are irrelevant to religion, then that shows that an inherent conflict between science and religion doesn't exist. Otherwise there would be MORE conflicts as scientific knowledge grows, rather than the peak being in the past.

Originally Posted by qayak View Post
Religions and "the Church" also have no trouble jumping in and influencing what scientists are allowed to study. Stem cell research as an example.
No religious groups are against stem cell research as far as I know. Some are against embryonic stem cell research: not because of the science, but on how embryos are used.

Certainly that still constitutes an influence on what scientists can do. But unless science has a position on the morality of the use of embryos, it isn't a clash in the same way as heliocentrism and evolution clashed with religion. Still, admittedly it is a clash, in the same way as some groups don't want the North Koreans to do further research into building nuclear weapons.

Originally Posted by qayak View Post
The church has simply been forced to be more subtle because of a lack of KGB equivalent and scientists being spread even outside their sphere of control
What scientific research is the Church trying to subtly repress at the moment, in your view? Other than embryonic stem cell research.

Last edited by GDon; 23rd December 2018 at 04:06 AM.
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Old 23rd December 2018, 11:22 AM   #327
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Originally Posted by GDon View Post
Right, and if most scientific discoveries today are irrelevant to religion, then that shows that an inherent conflict between science and religion doesn't exist. Otherwise there would be MORE conflicts as scientific knowledge grows, rather than the peak being in the past.
One issue being that philosophy and religion moves incredibly slowly compared to science. Religion doesn't debate the facts of Evolution which is 150 years old, they debate the ickiness of it and how their dogma feels better and use that as a basis to have it removed from schools even today.

Another issue is that science isn't simple like it used to be and with religious people having great difficulty understanding the simpler concepts they have no hope of understanding what is going on as science progresses. They still think Evolution is cutting edge and will believe any religious organization that claims dinosaur fossils are 6000 years old.

Quote:
No religious groups are against stem cell research as far as I know. Some are against embryonic stem cell research: not because of the science, but on how embryos are used.
There's the ick factor and the claim of moral high ground interfering with science again.

Quote:
Certainly that still constitutes an influence on what scientists can do. But unless science has a position on the morality of the use of embryos, it isn't a clash in the same way as heliocentrism and evolution clashed with religion.
Science does have a position. Ethics in science is a whole other branch of science. It's why there is severe limits on even the most mundane human experiments and universities have science ethics committees.

Quote:
Still, admittedly it is a clash, in the same way as some groups don't want the North Koreans to do further research into building nuclear weapons.
No, nothing like that. The groups you mention who don't want N. Korea advancing nuclear research are hypocrites. They don't try to end all nuclear weapons, just the ones certain countries have. At least religions want all embryonic stem cell research stopped and not just that done at certain labs.

Quote:
What scientific research is the Church trying to subtly repress at the moment, in your view? Other than embryonic stem cell research.
They are still trying to stop scientific research done by students in high schools. They lobby to have parents allowed to pull children out of classes they disagree with, namely biology. The are still pushing for teaching intelligent design as science. The preach against the science of glbal warming and against protection of the environment.
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Old 23rd December 2018, 12:51 PM   #328
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Originally Posted by qayak View Post
The preach against the science of glbal warming and against protection of the environment.

The way the religious tend to be the frontmen of the global warming deniers has been evident for some time. Surprising how this fact just seems to wash over so many. I have my own ideas as to why this is so and it is quite obvious, what are yours?
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Old 23rd December 2018, 11:19 PM   #329
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Originally Posted by GDon View Post

Can you confirm that you are claiming that Tim O'Neill denies that there was a religious conflict between the Church and Galileo?
Why do you ask me something I've already answered? I don't care what O'Neill thinks if he doesn't accept a civilized debate. I'm talking about his sources, which I think are more serious than him.
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Old 24th December 2018, 12:08 AM   #330
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Originally Posted by GDon View Post
My theory is that the idea that there is a conflict between science and religion generally is wrong.

If it was correct, then should you plot "growth in scientific knowledge over time" against "conflicts with religion", you would expect to see the number of conflicts rise as scientific knowledge grows.

But you don't. You see basically a straight line with a number of blips, representing "the usual suspects" of Galileo, Darwin and a few others. (Even you note that there was a peak in Galileo's time, suggesting a decline or a levelling out of the number of conflicts after Galileo rather than an increase.)


Was Bruno condemned for promoting heliocentrism? Can you provide a source please? (...)

(...)Can you at least confirm that Tycho Bache, leading astronomer for his time, provided reasons based on the science of his time against heliocentrism, please?


So, to be clear: are you claiming that there were no scientific arguments (for that time) against Galileo at all? Or are you claiming that there were some scientific and religious arguments against Galileo?

The former is demonstrably wrong. The latter is what O'Neill is claiming. Which one do you think it is?


If that was the peak, then that implies that the growth of science in the four hundred years since Galileo shows no increase in conflict with religion. How do you explain that, if science generally conflicts with religion? Shouldn't the peak be NOW?
If you ask so many questions, I can't answer them all. Shortly:

The terms of Bruno's conviction are not known with certainty. The documents were burned. Sources cite the theory of infinite worlds which, in Bruno’s case, implied heliocentrism.

Tycho Brahe was a "medieval" scientist. A mere data compiler. As far as I know, he rejected basically the heliocentrism for theological and dogmatic reasons. His theory was unsuccessful and had nothing to do with Galileo's condemnation.

The scientists involved in the Galileo case were priests at the service of the Catholic Church or members of church-controlled universities. Above all, they gave "Aristotelian" reasons, which were those according the Catholic doctrine. The only scientific reason Lindberg mentions was the problem of parallax. I agree with him. It was the only objection that had any weight. In the rest, Galileo was ahead of them, above all by his method.

Your personal argument seems wrong to me. It is not that the more science, the more conflict, but the more science, the less religion. This indicates the superiority of science in the conflict, but this depends on particular circumstances. For example, it seems that Catholic religion holds up better among intellectuals in countries with religious plurality than in others where it has been imposed for centuries as an obligatory belief.

But they are parameters that are not easy to measure. I would not rush to conclusions at this point.

The conflict between science and religion is most clearly observed at times and places where religion has sought to supplant or impose itself on science. Galileo is a paradigmatic case because the Catholic religion was threatened in its totalitarian power (Protestantism and Nuova Scienza together) and responded harshly. That is why it is a high point. As it has been losing power, it has been giving in to its pressure until it hides in specific issues such as creationism or morality.

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Old 24th December 2018, 12:12 AM   #331
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Originally Posted by GDon View Post
Right, and if most scientific discoveries today are irrelevant to religion, then that shows that an inherent conflict between science and religion doesn't exist. Otherwise there would be MORE conflicts as scientific knowledge grows, rather than the peak being in the past.
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Old 24th December 2018, 03:41 AM   #332
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Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
Why do you ask me something I've already answered? I don't care what O'Neill thinks if he doesn't accept a civilized debate.
You can't make a claim about what someone is arguing, and then say you don't care what he thinks. Tim O'Neill did NOT deny that there were religious objections to Galileo, only that there were scientific ones as well. You have strawmanned him, and based your responses on that strawman.

Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
The terms of Bruno's conviction are not known with certainty. The documents were burned. Sources cite the theory of infinite worlds which, in Bruno’s case, implied heliocentrism.
"The terms of Bruno's conviction are not known with certainty." But YOU are the one to claim that Bruno was persecuted for promoting heliocentrism. There is no evidence for that. Bruno's idea of infinite worlds does not support heliocentrism. Roman-era philosophers like Plutarch proposed something similar, without the need to invoke heliocentrism.

David, this does seem to be a pattern with you, I'm sorry to say. You throw out something, then say it can't be known with certainty, and then ignore evidence against the idea. Again, read Tim O'Neill's article on Bruno, where he cites scholars to build his conclusion.

If Bruno believed in heliocentrism, and he wasn't charged with heresy for this (and that seems to be the case), then it adds support to the idea that Copernicus's theory wasn't overly controversial until Galileo.

Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
The scientists involved in the Galileo case were priests at the service of the Catholic Church or members of church-controlled universities. Above all, they gave "Aristotelian" reasons, which were those according the Catholic doctrine. The only scientific reason Lindberg mentions was the problem of parallax. I agree with him. It was the only objection that had any weight. In the rest, Galileo was ahead of them, above all by his method.
Yes, the problem of parallax. And yet you claimed just earlier 'It is not true that the opposition to Galileo was "scientific"'.

But there were more non-theological reasons than just parallax, including:
(1) Stars would have to be incredibly huge
(2) The model of a rotating earth was disputed due to the lack of then-observable eastward deflections in falling bodies (though this objection came a few years after Galileo)
(3) Galileo proposed that the tides were physical proof that the earth rotated. His contemporary Johannes Kepler believed that it was the moon that caused the tides. Galileo's theory was shown to be wrong because there were two tides a day rather than one (which was implied if a rotating earth was the cause of the tides.)

Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
Your personal argument seems wrong to me. It is not that the more science, the more conflict, but the more science, the less religion.
Then you have conceded the point as far as I can see. I have been arguing against the idea that more scientific knowledge results in more religious conflicts. My argument isn't wrong because you want to argue something else!

It has been very frustrating trying to argue with you, David. Evidence gets ignored and the goal posts moved. You strawmanned Tim O'Neill's points and my "personal argument". I'll make this my last post to you on this topic in this thread.

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Old 24th December 2018, 08:25 AM   #333
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Originally Posted by Thor 2 View Post
The way the religious tend to be the frontmen of the global warming deniers has been evident for some time. Surprising how this fact just seems to wash over so many. I have my own ideas as to why this is so and it is quite obvious, what are yours?
The way you stated it is not a fact. You'll find "the religious" on both sides of the debate. It would be more accurate stated the other way around, so that: the frontmen of the global warming deniers tend to be religious (or at least make a point of claiming to be to garner support - I suspect most of the real "frontmen" run energy companies).
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Old 24th December 2018, 12:46 PM   #334
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Originally Posted by Egg View Post
The way you stated it is not a fact. You'll find "the religious" on both sides of the debate. It would be more accurate stated the other way around, so that: the frontmen of the global warming deniers tend to be religious (or at least make a point of claiming to be to garner support - I suspect most of the real "frontmen" run energy companies).

A confusing post - must be an egg thing.

That energy companies, (the fossil fuel burning ones that is), are climate change deniers is a given of course. That however is beside the point I am making here and a smoke screen. You might as well throw in a few others who have a financial benefit from things warming up a bit. Air conditioner manufacturers also perhaps?

The religious I suspect imagine their god is in control, hands firmly on the helm so to speak. Some of the more extreme think we are in end times, and welcome what appears to be a catastrophic climax.
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Old 24th December 2018, 01:08 PM   #335
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Personally I think the problem wasn't even as much the scriptures or the church as just Galileo. Yes, there were a couple of blowhard cardinals, but I think the church as a whole, and especially the Jesuits, were a lot more ready to accept new ideas at the time.

And defending the church may sound weird from an antitheist like me. But bear with me.

For a start, most of the problem with Copernicus was that his theory didn't match the data. His circular orbits didn't actually predict the movement of the planets, whereas the old epicycles did. In fact to make it even work at all, Copernicus basically made a hash of it to keep using the old epicycles and a reference frame centered on Earth.

So basically we had a new theory that matched the data far less well than the old theory. I think even in modern science that wouldn't fly very far. That the learned men at the time -- which, yes, most were in the church or universities run by the church -- let it fly even as a hypothesis, is actually more generous than it deserved, IMHO.

It wasn't until 1621 that Kepler published a corrected Copernican theory that actually matched the data. Which really should have been when it started deserving any consideration at all.

Incidentally, just to make it clear, to the bitter end Galileo was NOT proposing Kepler's theories. In fact, he systematically was against EVERYTHING by Kepler, down to Kepler's theory that the moon causes the tides. But his conflict with the church started before 1621 anyway, so Galileo was not proposing the theory that worked, but Copernicus's original theory which was flat out wrong.

The problem was specifically Galileo, and the biggest problem was his troll personality. He'd feel right at home on Reddit, is all I'm saying.

Galileo couldn't just argue science. He had to mock or outright insult anyone who had any other argument than his. And it wasn't confined his heliocentrism book.

E.g., although Galileo himself didn't have any better theory of comets, he viciously attacked Orazio Grassi, the author of a theory about a comet recently observed, the Jesuit Collegio Romano where Grassi was a professor of maths, Christopher Scheiner (a German astronomer and Jesuit whose only fault was claiming to have discovered sun spots before Galileo; Galileo hated him for that), and the quality of professors at the Collegio Romano. In fact, the whole text is more trolling with constant disparaging remarks about those than making its own case. Incidentally, Grassi was more right than Galileo there, and had the maths to prove it.

Galileo also wasn't above using sockpuppets. E.g., he published a subsequent (and even more insulting) article under the name of one of his disciples, although now the consensus is that it's mostly written by Galileo himself.

But let's get back to the heliocentrism dispute. Pope Urban VIII was actually quite favourable to Galileo at the start. He actually talked to him, asked some questions from the position of the science at the time (which meant Aristotelian), and actually encouraged him to write a book comparing the two systems and showing what the new theory does better than the old. Which, frankly, would be the scientific position even today.

What Galileo did was make the representative of the Aristotelian system be an idiotic buffoon called Simplicio, i.e., the simpleton. And he put the Pope's words in his mouth, sometimes distorted to make the argument more stupid. Basically he flamed the pope, to put it in modern vernacular.

The Pope, unfortunately, took it badly. And that's when the biblical arguments came out, because without them, the Inquisition would have no jurisdiction to try the case.
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Old 24th December 2018, 01:19 PM   #336
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Originally Posted by Thor 2 View Post
Some of the more extreme think we are in end times, and welcome what appears to be a catastrophic climax.
Oh, the end times are almost upon us. As I calculated in another thread, Ragnarök is only *ahem* over a billion years away
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Old 24th December 2018, 01:48 PM   #337
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Originally Posted by Egg View Post
The way you stated it is not a fact. You'll find "the religious" on both sides of the debate. It would be more accurate stated the other way around, so that: the frontmen of the global warming deniers tend to be religious (or at least make a point of claiming to be to garner support - I suspect most of the real "frontmen" run energy companies).
I disagree. Pat Robertson is not an oil frontman, he is a religious leader who tells his millions of followers global warming is a lie. He also has had the ear of many U.S. presidents. He's not the only one.

I think the reason is simple. The religious right has an agenda that is simply anti-"liberal". Their supporters tend to be uninformed on most things, they just regurgitate what they hear from the pulpit. "Liberals" are the devil incarnate so everything they do, or say, is evil. Therefore global warming is a direct lie from the devil's, to "liberals", mouths'
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Old 24th December 2018, 03:21 PM   #338
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Originally Posted by Thor 2 View Post
A confusing post - must be an egg thing.
I'm not sure what would be confusing. When you talk about "the religious", you're referring to the majority of the world's population, covering a vast range of philosophies, traditions, beliefs and practices. While a certain amount of generalization when discussing religion is inevitable and probably just practical, to suggest this enormous group tends to be the climate denier frontmen is not a fact, it's nonsense.

Originally Posted by Thor 2 View Post
That energy companies, (the fossil fuel burning ones that is), are climate change deniers is a given of course. That however is beside the point I am making here and a smoke screen. You might as well throw in a few others who have a financial benefit from things warming up a bit. Air conditioner manufacturers also perhaps?

The religious I suspect imagine their god is in control, hands firmly on the helm so to speak. Some of the more extreme think we are in end times, and welcome what appears to be a catastrophic climax.
I think with climate denial, we're actually really only talking about a very small subset of a subset of "the religious". Are you aware of any particular denial movement in any major religions other than Christianity? Within Christianity, it would seem to mostly only be prevalent in the more fundamentalist denominations and generally in the US (although those US denominations do have some global influence).

So, I don't think this is an attitude or belief we can describe as representative of the religious or even an accurate representation of the church The current pope, for example, has been an outspoken proponent for fighting climate change.

Originally Posted by qayak View Post
I disagree. Pat Robertson is not an oil frontman, he is a religious leader who tells his millions of followers global warming is a lie. He also has had the ear of many U.S. presidents. He's not the only one.

I think the reason is simple. The religious right has an agenda that is simply anti-"liberal". Their supporters tend to be uninformed on most things, they just regurgitate what they hear from the pulpit. "Liberals" are the devil incarnate so everything they do, or say, is evil. Therefore global warming is a direct lie from the devil's, to "liberals", mouths'
I wouldn't be so sure that Robertson isn't an oil frontman, albeit indirectly. There's a political/religious deal for money and influence and the agendas have become blurred.
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Old 24th December 2018, 04:02 PM   #339
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Originally Posted by Egg View Post
I'm not sure what would be confusing. When you talk about "the religious", you're referring to the majority of the world's population, covering a vast range of philosophies, traditions, beliefs and practices. While a certain amount of generalization when discussing religion is inevitable and probably just practical, to suggest this enormous group tends to be the climate denier frontmen is not a fact, it's nonsense.
Yea that makes sense.

You know I lived in Thailand for over 6 years and found 100% of the people had never heard of global warming. They are virtually all Buddhist. One has to wonder how conversant many of the folk in Africa and South America are with the subject.

I am not talking about these folk, (you knew that didn't you), but the religious in the West. We had a prime minister in Australia during a dark time in our recent history. A Catholic and a climate change denier, surprise, surprise.



Quote:
I think with climate denial, we're actually really only talking about a very small subset of a subset of "the religious". Are you aware of any particular denial movement in any major religions other than Christianity? Within Christianity, it would seem to mostly only be prevalent in the more fundamentalist denominations and generally in the US (although those US denominations do have some global influence).

So, I don't think this is an attitude or belief we can describe as representative of the religious or even an accurate representation of the church The current pope, for example, has been an outspoken proponent for fighting climate change.



I wouldn't be so sure that Robertson isn't an oil frontman, albeit indirectly. There's a political/religious deal for money and influence and the agendas have become blurred.

A very small subset yes sure.

A very small subset that vote for Trump, (most here know he is in the climate change denier camp but this may be news to you), who somehow appeals to the religious.

As qayak said Pat Robertson is right up there, waving the denial banner. He has quite a following does Pat. That's why he's got so much cash.
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Old 24th December 2018, 05:57 PM   #340
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Originally Posted by Thor 2 View Post
Yea that makes sense.

You know I lived in Thailand for over 6 years and found 100% of the people had never heard of global warming. They are virtually all Buddhist. One has to wonder how conversant many of the folk in Africa and South America are with the subject.

I am not talking about these folk, (you knew that didn't you), but the religious in the West. We had a prime minister in Australia during a dark time in our recent history. A Catholic and a climate change denier, surprise, surprise.


A very small subset yes sure.

A very small subset that vote for Trump, (most here know he is in the climate change denier camp but this may be news to you), who somehow appeals to the religious.

As qayak said Pat Robertson is right up there, waving the denial banner. He has quite a following does Pat. That's why he's got so much cash.
So, should I take from this that when you say "the religious", you are specifically referring to white western evangelicals and maybe some of the more conservative Catholics? A bit like the folks who talk about "immigrants" when they really mean terrorists and gang members?

I guess that makes sense of your statement about Trump's appeal, since this.
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Old 24th December 2018, 11:49 PM   #341
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Originally Posted by Egg View Post
So, should I take from this that when you say "the religious", you are specifically referring to white western evangelicals and maybe some of the more conservative Catholics? A bit like the folks who talk about "immigrants" when they really mean terrorists and gang members?

I guess that makes sense of your statement about Trump's appeal, since this.

I am really having trouble putting my finger on exactly what you are trying to say Egg. Terrorists and gang members?
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Old 25th December 2018, 12:15 AM   #342
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Tromp had stated several times that among the migrants there were criminals and possible ( Muslims ) terrorist types. And for a change he would be right.

Many folks see all immigrants legal or not as they worst among them and treat all equally bad. It is a small portion really but not knowing how to spot the bad guy in a group just condemn them all.

I hear about it from good folks returning home to Mexico how the distrust and fear made them feel unwelcome. Inversely some think of me as being the same mind as the rest .

It cannot be so. Two older Germans and myself are the immigrant population in this town. It would be stupid to think any tiny minority better.
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Old 25th December 2018, 01:01 AM   #343
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Originally Posted by GDon View Post
You can't make a claim about what someone is arguing, and then say you don't care what he thinks. Tim O'Neill did NOT deny that there were religious objections to Galileo, only that there were scientific ones as well. You have strawmanned him, and based your responses on that strawman.


"The terms of Bruno's conviction are not known with certainty." But YOU are the one to claim that Bruno was persecuted for promoting heliocentrism. There is no evidence for that. Bruno's idea of infinite worlds does not support heliocentrism. Roman-era philosophers like Plutarch proposed something similar, without the need to invoke heliocentrism.

David, this does seem to be a pattern with you, I'm sorry to say. You throw out something, then say it can't be known with certainty, and then ignore evidence against the idea. Again, read Tim O'Neill's article on Bruno, where he cites scholars to build his conclusion.

If Bruno believed in heliocentrism, and he wasn't charged with heresy for this (and that seems to be the case), then it adds support to the idea that Copernicus's theory wasn't overly controversial until Galileo.


Yes, the problem of parallax. And yet you claimed just earlier 'It is not true that the opposition to Galileo was "scientific"'.

But there were more non-theological reasons than just parallax, including:
(1) Stars would have to be incredibly huge
(2) The model of a rotating earth was disputed due to the lack of then-observable eastward deflections in falling bodies (though this objection came a few years after Galileo)
(3) Galileo proposed that the tides were physical proof that the earth rotated. His contemporary Johannes Kepler believed that it was the moon that caused the tides. Galileo's theory was shown to be wrong because there were two tides a day rather than one (which was implied if a rotating earth was the cause of the tides.)


Then you have conceded the point as far as I can see. I have been arguing against the idea that more scientific knowledge results in more religious conflicts. My argument isn't wrong because you want to argue something else!

It has been very frustrating trying to argue with you, David. Evidence gets ignored and the goal posts moved. You strawmanned Tim O'Neill's points and my "personal argument". I'll make this my last post to you on this topic in this thread.
Originally Posted by GDon View Post
You can't make a claim about what someone is arguing, and then say you don't care what he thinks. Tim O'Neill did NOT deny that there were religious objections to Galileo, only that there were scientific ones as well. You have strawmanned him, and based your responses on that strawman.
I think I am justified in not wanting a debate with someone who does not behave properly. Not just because he simply insults, but because he does not follow the rules of logic. An example:
MY QUESTION: Now the more general question: do you agree that the Christian churches, in this case, haveplayed 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.

ANSWER: No. That idea has been rejected by historians of science for about a century.

Do you deny that the churches actively pursued the New Science because it undermined the principles of*your*its*authority over faith and scientific knowledge?

[Not answered].

MQ: What I don't know is how you have the cheek to deny that the papacy and the Holy Office's action against Galileo is one of the most savage attacks against the independence of science

A: Where did I say this? Quote me. This should be funny to watch..
What is he saying? Yes or no? Can it be said that the church did not attack the independence of science and then attacked it? If you are willing to present O'Neill's ideas and explain them - as seems to be the case - I will gladly discuss them.

Originally Posted by GDon View Post
"The terms of Bruno's conviction are not known with certainty." But YOU are the one to claim that Bruno was persecuted for promoting heliocentrism. There is no evidence for that. Bruno's idea of infinite worlds does not support heliocentrism. Roman-era philosophers like Plutarch proposed something similar, without the need to invoke heliocentrism.
Just because we don't know something firsthand doesn't mean we don't have other references. Based on the same sources O'Neill cited here and I have consulted, we know that Bruno was condemned for asserting the existence of innumerable worlds and believed firmly in the Copernican system. These are points that no one disputes. Some conclusions can be drawn from this.


Originally Posted by GDon View Post
If Bruno believed in heliocentrism, and he wasn't charged with heresy for this (and that seems to be the case), then it adds support to the idea that Copernicus's theory wasn't overly controversial until Galileo.
Don't try to draw "logical" conclusions on insufficient data. Astrology was condemned by the fathers of the Church (Augustine), some occasional councils (Toledo) and papal bulls and yet many of the kings, nobles, cardinals and popes came to it. The existence of a rule does not mean that it was always fulfilled to the letter. We know that Bruno was condemned for something others had said before (the theory of the infinitude of the universe), but not why or how. One possible cause is that Bruno, as with Galileo, claimed that what he believed was true and not pure hypothesis. It is a relevant fact, because it was this that unleashed in many cases the repressive fury of the religious tribunals and the Holy Inquisition in particular. This is the reason given by Prof. Alberto A. Martinez of the University of Texas. It seems very plausible to me.

Originally Posted by GDon View Post
Yes, the problem of parallax. And yet you claimed just earlier 'It is not true that the opposition to Galileo was "scientific"'.

But there were more non-theological reasons than just parallax, including:
(1) Stars would have to be incredibly huge
(2) The model of a rotating earth was disputed due to the lack of then-observable eastward deflections in falling bodies (though this objection came a few years after Galileo)
(3) Galileo proposed that the tides were physical proof that the earth rotated. His contemporary Johannes Kepler believed that it was the moon that caused the tides. Galileo's theory was shown to be wrong because there were two tides a day rather than one (which was implied if a rotating earth was the cause of the tides.)
I said that the opposition to Galileo was scientifically weaker than yourshim and was not exercised by independent scientists.

Indeed. The stars were infinitely farther away --as some like Bruno had supposed. It was not impossible.

The error with tides was solved with another heliocentric theory, not with Aristotle's concepts of natural place.

The objection of free fall within a moving subsystem was solved by Galileo with a simple observation that Mersenne and Gassendi carried out in the form of a a controled experiment shortly after: dropping an object from the mast of a ship and other moving objects.It was very simple, wasn't it? Well, that's what the Church's scientists didn't know how to do: To devise a controlled experiment.

The disadvantages of the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic theory were worse than its objections to Galileo: they had no solution without a change of paradigm. It was becoming unmanageable. And their difficulties were not subject to experiments -as Galileo-, but to Aristotelian and Thomistic dogmas. In other words, they did not defend a science free of religious dogma.

Originally Posted by GDon View Post
Then you have conceded the point as far as I can see. I have been arguing against the idea that more scientific knowledge results in more religious conflicts. My argument isn't wrong because you want to argue something else!
I'm not arguing anything different. I'm explaining why your argument doesn't work. You have artificially isolated two factors of opposition: more-less and conflict-not conflict. That's not how thing work in history.

This requires a little more explanation. I go by parts:

As I said in a previous post in the subject we are dealing with two different things are mixed: whether there is conflict between religion and science as systems of thought and what manifestations of conflict there has been in history.

I think the answer is "yes" in both cases, but I am going to refer to the second.

The historical development of the science-religion conflict does not follow a linear development. This happens in any historical problem. This development is due to circumstances of the social and cultural environment. In the case of the conflict between Christianity and free science, in the Renaissance the science without ecclesiastical tutelage had all the advantages because it was necessary for the development of emerging commercial and industrial classes. That is what made the science-religion conflict sharpen in countries where the rentier aristocracy held power (Spain and Italy) and religion took steps backwards where it developed flourishing trade and manufacturing (England, Holland and, to a lesser extent, France). This explains why the conflict did not have a uniform result throughout Europe. That is why in countries where science could not flourish, religion maintained the conflict in repressive forms (Inquisition, index of forbidden books, autocratic regimes) well into the 19th century.

I hope that this brief historical analysis will allow you to understand why your example was badly posed.
The conclusion is that with all this the Church has learned to keep its mouth shut when scientists say things that affect the religious beliefs, because if churches speak too much they endanger the foundations of their religion. This is the much praised "tolerance" of the Church today.

To said it in another way: this is why there is not a strong conflict between religion and science nowadays. Because the force of religion has become weaker.

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Old 25th December 2018, 01:16 AM   #344
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
Personally I think the problem wasn't even as much the scriptures or the church as just Galileo.
You should read my previous comment.

A preliminary consideration: it does not seem possible to me that because of Galileo's bad character all the ecclesiastics who were anxious to move to the New Science were repressing it for several centuries. I am referring to the Inquisition and the index of forbidden books, among other things.

Such a small cause does not cause a cataclysm whose effects last for centuries.
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Old 25th December 2018, 12:46 PM   #345
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It might, if trying to open the door results in personal attacks on the Pope himself. Remember that it was at a time when the church struggled to stay in control, and was fighting internal fires everywhere. It doesn't take much more than that to give ammo to the conservative blowhards and tip the balance in their favour.

I submit as evidence that Kepler's equally heliocentric view was NOT on the index, but was actually accepted by the Jesuits, even at the same time as Copernicus made that list. But Kepler's work didn't have the misfortune of being put on their battle flag by the likes of Bruno or Galileo.
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Old 25th December 2018, 12:56 PM   #346
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BTW, speaking of Bruno, he's another interesting character. The guy basically rejected pretty much EVERYTHING about the Catholic faith, most of which he had exactly zero scientific base for. Copernican heliocentrism (which, again, in 1610 when the conflict began was not even matching observed data, so its rejection had not that much to do with science vs religion) was just a footnote in his list of charges. MUCH more important were things like rejecting the virginity of Mary (which the Catholics are STILL obsessed with, and were even more so at the time), denying transsubstantiation, denying that Jesus is the messiah, preaching reincarnation, etc.

The even bigger problems in his case were that:

1. He was a priest. The church took a MUCH harder line when policing its own ranks. Which leads us to...

2. The inquisition was not going to leave a priest get away with anything less than a FULL recantation. ESPECIALLY since before even being brought before Bellarmine, Bruno had already trolled the Inquisition in Venice by insisting on keeping his own doubts about actual matters of faith.

He seemed to be under the impression that he can bargain with the inqusition, like in a flea market. You know, I let one thing go, you let another go, and meet each other in the middle. That's not how the inquisition worked. And Bellarmine didn't think it worked like that either.

So I would venture a guess that it didn't even matter which point on the list Bruno chose to stick to. What mattered is that he was still trying to barter with those points, for lack of a better word, even when given an ultimatum to drop them all or else.
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Old 25th December 2018, 11:23 PM   #347
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
It might, if trying to open the door results in personal attacks on the Pope himself.
The condemnation of Copernicanism dates from 1616 and the book of Galileo in which the pope is alluded to, from 1632. The dates do not fit.

Other than that, the condemnation of Copernicanism was an act of transcendental importance to modern history that lasted centuries. It is impossible that such a thing was due to the personal mania of a pope for a person. Individuals don't make history with trivialities.

If you want say that Pope's adversion influenced Galileo's particular case, I agree.
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Old 26th December 2018, 12:10 AM   #348
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
BTW, speaking of Bruno, he's another interesting character. The guy basically rejected pretty much EVERYTHING about the Catholic faith, most of which he had exactly zero scientific base for. Copernican heliocentrism (which, again, in 1610 when the conflict began was not even matching observed data, so its rejection had not that much to do with science vs religion) was just a footnote in his list of charges. MUCH more important were things like rejecting the virginity of Mary (which the Catholics are STILL obsessed with, and were even more so at the time), denying transsubstantiation, denying that Jesus is the messiah, preaching reincarnation, etc.

The even bigger problems in his case were that:

1. He was a priest. The church took a MUCH harder line when policing its own ranks. Which leads us to...

2. The inquisition was not going to leave a priest get away with anything less than a FULL recantation. ESPECIALLY since before even being brought before Bellarmine, Bruno had already trolled the Inquisition in Venice by insisting on keeping his own doubts about actual matters of faith.

He seemed to be under the impression that he can bargain with the inqusition, like in a flea market. You know, I let one thing go, you let another go, and meet each other in the middle. That's not how the inquisition worked. And Bellarmine didn't think it worked like that either.

So I would venture a guess that it didn't even matter which point on the list Bruno chose to stick to. What mattered is that he was still trying to barter with those points, for lack of a better word, even when given an ultimatum to drop them all or else.
A footnote? Bruno was the first philosopher in studying and praise Copernicus in Europe. One chapter of The Ash Wednesday Supper is dedicated to him, among other works. He places Copernicus over the other classical astronomers. Copernicanism is the basis of his theory of infinitude and homogeneity of Cosmos, which led him to the stake.

It was not a footnote.

I don’t know what you mean “bargain with the Inquisition”. Eight years in Inquisition prisons wasn't a joke. An atrocious death was at stake, and he knew it.

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Old 26th December 2018, 06:25 AM   #349
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Actually, the date fits very well with Bruno's championing it among a merry cocktail of wanton heresies, which got him in direct conflict with the church in 1610. Galileo too had been trolling the church with Copernicus since 1609, and his writings were already 'studied' by the Inquisition in 1615.

The more damning fact is that before that, nobody in the church had a problem with Copernicus. In fact, have you heard that we're now using a 'Gregorian' calendar? Yeah, that's based on Copernicus. Pope Gregory XIII himself used Copernicus's work to reform the calendar in 1582. You can't get more endorsement than that.

That's how uncontroversial it was, until twits like Bruno and Galileo went trololololol with it.
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Old 26th December 2018, 11:37 AM   #350
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
Actually, the date fits very well with Bruno's championing it among a merry cocktail of wanton heresies, which got him in direct conflict with the church in 1610. Galileo too had been trolling the church with Copernicus since 1609, and his writings were already 'studied' by the Inquisition in 1615.

The more damning fact is that before that, nobody in the church had a problem with Copernicus. In fact, have you heard that we're now using a 'Gregorian' calendar? Yeah, that's based on Copernicus. Pope Gregory XIII himself used Copernicus's work to reform the calendar in 1582. You can't get more endorsement than that.

That's how uncontroversial it was, until twits like Bruno and Galileo went trololololol with it.
I'm not sure of the point you were trying to make but I do know the point you have succeeded in making: The Inquisition isn't guilty of its own crimes, Galileo, Bruno, and all the other victims are.
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Old 26th December 2018, 12:26 PM   #351
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Actually, my point was simply that heliocentrism is a bad example of science-vs-religion. If you just want to say that the inquisition is bad, sure, it was bad, but that's a different topic.
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Old 26th December 2018, 11:59 PM   #352
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
Actually, my point was simply that heliocentrism is a bad example of science-vs-religion. If you just want to say that the inquisition is bad, sure, it was bad, but that's a different topic.
Sure. It is an example of religion defending itself from trolls and impolite people.
People burning alive and the persecution of heliocentrism during centuries were trivial things.

I beg your pardon, but this is a strange way to defend science.

What the Church was unable to bear was that someone cast doubts on its total power over truth, be a philosopher, a necromancer, a magician or a scientist. Religion clashed with science because science questioned the literal interpretation of the Bible. Heliocentrism or infinitude of the world was tolerated as long they remained simple hypotesis. When people as Bruno or Galileo began to say that it was scientific truth, tolerance ended.

Religion clashed with magic, philosophy, atomism, heliocentrism, Darwinism, etc. by the same reason. And the question continues: are religious people able to endure a superior authority than their sacred books? Can science correct what is written? These are the roots of the conflict.

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Old 27th December 2018, 12:37 AM   #353
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Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
Sure. It is an example of the religion defending itself from trolls and impolite people.
People burning alive and the persecution of heliocentrism during centuries were trivial things.

I beg your pardon, but this is a strange way to defend science.

What the Church was unable to bear was that someone cast doubts on its total power over truth, be a philosopher, a necromancer, a magician or a scientist. Religion clashed with science because science questioned the literal interpretation of the Bible. Heliocentrism or infinitude of the world was tolerated as long they remained simple hypotesis. When people as Bruno or Galileo began to say that it was scientific truth, tolerance ended.

Religion clashed with magic, philosophy, atomism, heliocentrism, Darwinism, etc. by the same reason. And the question continues: are religious people able to endure a superior authority than their sacred books? Can science correct what is written? These are the roots of the conflict.

I agree these are the roots of the conflict.

How do modern day, science accepting Christians, blend the two? With great difficulty and scooting over the detail I suggest. "Yes we are cool with evolution as the way God made us" they say. "OK' I say, "How do you blend original sin into this gruel." "Oh well, mumble mumble." shuffling of feet. "next question?"

This is the way it goes on when you examine virtually the entire text of the holy scriptures, till you come to the solution that it is all allegorical, and as it has been suggested by others, you can interpret it as you like.

Those such as Ken Ham have an easier solution to the whole dilemma as they just thumb their nose at science.
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Old 27th December 2018, 03:16 AM   #354
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Originally Posted by David Mo View Post
Sure. It is an example of religion defending itself from trolls and impolite people.
People burning alive and the persecution of heliocentrism during centuries were trivial things.

I beg your pardon, but this is a strange way to defend science.

What the Church was unable to bear was that someone cast doubts on its total power over truth, be a philosopher, a necromancer, a magician or a scientist. Religion clashed with science because science questioned the literal interpretation of the Bible. Heliocentrism or infinitude of the world was tolerated as long they remained simple hypotesis. When people as Bruno or Galileo began to say that it was scientific truth, tolerance ended.

Religion clashed with magic, philosophy, atomism, heliocentrism, Darwinism, etc. by the same reason. And the question continues: are religious people able to endure a superior authority than their sacred books? Can science correct what is written? These are the roots of the conflict.
Well, see, I even agree with your last two paragraphs. I just think that heliocentrism -- or rather, mis-representing it as THE problem the RCC had with Bruno or Galileo -- is a bad example. And much as I have a bit of a chip on my shoulder about religion, I have a whole plank on the shoulder about rewriting history to make some ideological point, even when that point is against religion.
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Old 29th December 2018, 11:33 AM   #355
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
Well, see, I even agree with your last two paragraphs. I just think that heliocentrism -- or rather, mis-representing it as THE problem the RCC had with Bruno or Galileo -- is a bad example. And much as I have a bit of a chip on my shoulder about religion, I have a whole plank on the shoulder about rewriting history to make some ideological point, even when that point is against religion.
Except that heliocentrism was one of the charges.There were many others, and the Pope wanted more added, but it was one and he did not repent and was burned alive.

So he was burned alive by the RCC for heliocentrism, believing there were other planets like ours, believing in reincarnation, believing the Earth and other planets have souls, etc . . .

There were few charges that reflect modern science but heliocentrism is one of them. Right around the time of his birth the RCC started cracking down on anything that countered the bible. Heliicentrism was counter to the bible. It doesn't matter that others who believed it were tolerated before Bruno. The RCC chose to make an example of him.

History isn't being rewritten. The RCC was, and is, a murderous organization. Bruno's death is merely another example of that fact.
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Old 29th December 2018, 12:49 PM   #356
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AGAIN, the calculations of Copernicus were used by the frikken pope himself, and are still in effect as part of the Gregorian Calendar corrections. Funnily, it stayed in effect even WHILE Copernicus's book was later on the index. You have to love the Catholic schizophrenia... err... I mean "compartmentalizing".

And actually, in the case of Bruno, heliocentrism was NOT on the list of charges. The charge was his claim about the existence of multiple earth-like planets. That was NOT a part of Copernicus's claims, nor had it any bearing on it being true or not.

Edit: While the STARS being big and distant was a possible solution to the Copernican paralax problem, exo-PLANETS were not part of the equation in any form or shape. Also not supported by any data at that time, so Bruno's claiming them as a fact had nothing science-like about it. At that point it was just a lucky guess at best.

And in fact, the idea was at least as old as Aristotle. Also had been banned for a couple of centuries by the Church. See, when people came back from the Crusades with all these old crazy old texts that had been preserved and transcribed by the Arabs, and got ideas like making universities to teach that stuff, the RCC already put some brakes on. Namely what parts of Aristotle you can't teach. Multiple worlds was one of them.

Yep. Even while Aristotle was made the official science system, there were parts of the same Aristotle that you can't teach without risking a talk with some *ahem* very inquisitive bishops. Like, you could teach Aristotle's idea of elements, but you couldn't mention the logical conclusion that Aristotle took it to, namely that there could be worlds made only of Fire and Air. (That's how they stayed up there, see? Earth and Water were heavy, so if planets were made of those, they'd fall down. )

Did I mention how I love Catholic schizophrenia?

So there you go, you already have a better example of some science that the RCC tried to suppress all along. You don't have to mis-construe heliocentrism as being it.
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Old 29th December 2018, 01:09 PM   #357
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Just to interrupt this squabble a moment, I find it interesting and irritating, the way the religious talk about TRUTH so much. It's as if they think by saying it loud and assertively, they will drum out any opposition.

On the outskirts of Melbourne there is a small church my brother used to belong to. The church was named the TLC ........ so "Tender Loving Care" I naively deduced. Wrong! TRUTH and LEARNING CENTRE!
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Old 29th December 2018, 02:34 PM   #358
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
And actually, in the case of Bruno, heliocentrism was NOT on the list of charges. The charge was his claim about the existence of multiple earth-like planets. That was NOT a part of Copernicus's claims, nor had it any bearing on it being true or not.
Actually, no one knows what was on the list of charges, there is only guessing.

Bruno did something that Copernicus didn't do, he used heliocentrism to argue that the universe was natural, man could understand everything that was in the universe, and there was no need, or place, for gods.
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Old 29th December 2018, 06:15 PM   #359
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You realize, I hope, that that doesn't exactly make your case either. If you take the position that we don't know, then you don't know either. It doesn't mean that you get to pull out of the ass that he was a martyr of heliocentrism either.
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Old 29th December 2018, 09:20 PM   #360
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Originally Posted by HansMustermann View Post
You realize, I hope, that that doesn't exactly make your case either. If you take the position that we don't know, then you don't know either. It doesn't mean that you get to pull out of the ass that he was a martyr of heliocentrism either.
Agree 100%. Combined with the shenanigans of the Inquisition we can't really be sure of anything except that he was tried and executed.

Stranger yet was that high up church officials stated in 1952 that the Inquisition was justified in murdering him and then later a Pope apologized for the violence against him. The only violence being his execution because he was not tortured.
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