I got this book of essays, published in 2009 by Harvard U. Press, from the library because what ant was saying about the myth of the religion/science conflict sounded interesting. I haven't gotten beyond skimming the table of contents, but from the titles I can see that a lot of the essays do attempt to refute the conflict thesis, and at least one discusses the religious contribution to science. However, myths about science and religion can go both ways, and one of the myths discussed is "That Christianity Gave Birth to Modern Science," which sounds like the Jaki thesis and is. Jaki is quoted at the head of the essay. Another myth addressed is "That 'Intelligent Design' Represents a Scientific Challenge to Evolution." One that ant might like is "That Giordano Bruno Was the First Martyr of Modern Science."

Looks as though it'll be interesting, if I can get around to reading the darn thing.

That sounds interesting. The academic community is always looking for new ways to approach old material, and it seems to have found one with respect to the old conflict between science and religion. I would especially like to read how Galileo's case is presented.

That book has been on my list for a while now.
A good book which i am nearly half way through is "The Beginnings of Western Science"
It frames the the development of science in the proper philosophical, religious, and institutional context.

The Conflict Thesis that is so popular today is largely the work of John Draper and Andrew Wright. The thesis is a shody work that is politically, professionally, and racially motivated. It is filled with methodological errors and numerous fallacies. No serious historian supports fhe conflict thesis. It is dismissed as a true account of history.

It is unfortunate that lazy biased minds buy into it.

The dicerning mind's task is to always analyze specific episodes contextually and avoid oversimplified soundbites.
It amazes me how some people who claim a monopoly on rationality are eager to avoid the true historical record so regularly.
History is without question a source of knowledge
Many people are not conscious of the cultural, political, and institutional influences of the past that gave birth to their personal bias.
The many Richard Dawkins apologists of today included.

ant wrote:No serious historian supports fhe conflict thesis. It is dismissed as a true account of history.

It is unfortunate that lazy biased minds buy into it.

I'm curious, what is this "conflict thesis" and what lazy biased minds are buying into it?

geo wrote:

ant wrote:No serious historian supports fhe conflict thesis. It is dismissed as a true account of history.

It is unfortunate that lazy biased minds buy into it.

What is the "conflict thesis" and what lazy biased minds buy into it? Specifics please.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_thesis

Nobody buys into the idea that religion and science have always been at odds, Geo.
That's just a myth.
Everyone now rejects this ahistorical gibberish and there are no longer discussions that frame science and religion as natural enemies. We are indebted to all non believers for this.

ant wrote:Nobody buys into the idea that religion and science have always been at odds, Geo.
That's just a myth.

Exactly my point. I've never heard anyone ever say "that religion and science have always been at odds." That does seem extreme.

My other point is I had never heard of the "conflict thesis" in my life until you brought it up. My goodness, there's even a Wikipedia entry on it now. That must mean something.

But “conflict thesis” aside, are you saying there is not now and never has been a conflict between science and religion?

I see conflict between science and religion everyday.

I was watching Cosmos episode one last night, and kept seeing Bruno portraying his idea as the result of god's will. Wasn't Galileo in much the same position? It's not as if their ideas were contradictory to religion, which has very little to say about the structure of the universe. Up until there was some solid disagreement, Evolution, there wasn't any real conflict intrinsic to the ideas being presented that we see as scientific. The only actual conflicting worldviews at the time were other religions, and the Inquisitions dealt with them. If Galileo, a friend of the pope, was put under house arrest for pushing an idea that wasn't all that conflicting, imagine what they would have done to Darwin, if he lived in those times.

Interbane wrote:imagine what they would have done to Darwin, if he lived in those times.

yeah good thing he wasn't gay and looking to marry as well

geo, you asked about the essay on Galileo. That's Myth 8: "Galileo Was Imprisoned and Tortured for Advocating Copernicanism," by Maurice A Finocchiaro. The author sifts the evidence and finds that Galileo wasn't imprisoned with the possible exception of three days (probably in the prosecutor's apartment). The author concludes that the available evidence suggests that Galileo was never tortured, but that he underwent interrogation with the threat of torture. He served years of house arrest as well. The author says that this contradicts the widely held belief that Galileo was imprisoned for a lengthy period and physically tortured.

This is not an incident that would be pointed to when disproving the conflict thesis, obviously. The Inquisition was very concerned with Galileo's unbiblical support of Copernicus. I believe that the writers in this book are saying not that there were never attempts by the Church to stifle or censure knowledge, but that when looked at over the span of centuries and the whole of Europe, Christianity was not, overall, acting in hostile ways toward examining nature, and that the Church can be credited indirectly and even directly with sometimes helping natural philosophy or science.

I imagine the Church is an entity that could be compared to the U.S. government. We can't say that over the last 230 years the government has acted in a particular way toward any movement over that span of time. The picture always changes. We may think of the Church as a monolith that controlled life over a vast territory in a uniform way for hundreds of years, but that isn't likely to have been the case.

A corollary to this is that the Church didn't plunge Europe into a Dark Ages during which learning was largely extinguished. In fact, there were no Dark Ages.

Great post, DWill

But also recall that during the G Affair the Church as a governing body was fighting for its life in the 30 Year War. Urban was under extreme duress and was some might say provoked by Galileo by his characyerization of him as "Simplicio."

The Church had reauired Galileo to present heliocentrism as a hypothesis because of the lack of evidence for it at the time (it ran completley contrary to experience, Galileo was wrong about what caused the tides, etc etc).

Galileo was NOT tortured. Thats just plain bullshit, of course. Actually, he had been a good friend to Pope Urban, who had to "save face" in light of Galileo's surprising mockery of him.

And there's much more to the trial, of course. much more.

Thanks for posting about this and sharing some of your opinions with us.