A name to conjure with
The Templeton Foundation is having more and more success at getting its message under the radar. The Times Higher for instance tells us about an upcoming lecture which will include some things we have grown familiar with in recent months.
It is often assumed that religion and science have always been locked in a life-and-death struggle…Such views would have startled the scholars, including some of the greatest names in British science, who founded what became the Royal Society 350 years ago. In a Faraday Institute public lecture, to be delivered in Cambridge this week, Peter Harrison, Andreas Idreos professor of science and religion at the University of Oxford, will challenge such arguments about the impossibility of being both scientific and religious, pointing out that they “obviously didn’t apply to the earliest fellows”.
Right…and we have learned some things in those 350 years, so what people thought 350 years ago is not necessarily a conversation-stopper now, but no matter – do go on, I’m listening.
In reality, Professor Harrison said, “almost without exception, early modern natural philosophers cherished religious convictions, although these were not invariably orthodox. Some – but by no means all – made the point that they were motivated to pursue scientific inquiry on account of these religious commitments.” Far from being militant atheists, they “believed that the disinterested study of the structures of living things could offer independent support for the truth of the Christian religion, and refute atheism”.
But that of course is not the really important part of what Professor Harrison has to say. I wonder if you can guess what is?
A historian with a first degree in zoology and “an overt religious commitment”, Professor Harrison regards the recent spate of anti-religious polemics headed by Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion as “intellectually vacuous, although their popularity is sociologically interesting”.
That’s it! It’s another deadly blow at the ‘spate’ of anti-religious books (the one that occupies two feet of shelf at most at the University Bookstore here, two feet which are embedded in long shelves packed with pro-religious polemics stretching to the horizon).
The really interesting thing about this is that the article never mentions – never mentions – the fact that the ‘Faraday Institute,’ which sounds so sciency and academicky and serious, is a creation of – wait for it – the Templeton Foundation.
Thanks to Karel De Pauw for the article.
These days whenever I hear the word “Centre” or “Institute” I think of used car salesmen. So much for peer review in the intellectual establishment.
If only the reporter had the same habit!
I have been thinking of getting into do-it-yourself electronics. Maybe I should email the Faraday Institute and ask for some tips.
All the cool kids go to the Tesla Center.
“In reality, Professor Harrison said, “almost without exception, early modern natural philosophers cherished religious convictions, although these were not invariably orthodox. Some – but by no means all – made the point that they were motivated to pursue scientific inquiry on account of these religious commitments.”
Unfortunately, these ‘religious commitments’ often interfered with proper scientific inquiries. Newton squandered decades of his life in the pursuit of the purified essence of God through alchemy.
The early Royal Society annals are a document testifying to the enormous time and effort expended fruitlessly by these early scientists because their theology informed their science. Does not Professor Harrrison remember that the Enlightenment came after the Royal Society was established?
Not to mention the 1500 years or so previous, when most any scientific endeavor was likely considered heresy and punished by very very very painful death? Something about the Sun revolving around the Earth? Did I forget to mention how painful the punishment for heresy was?
‘Almost without exception’, declared Professor Twaddle, ‘ancient astronomers believed in planets embedded in crystalline spheres being pushed round a fixed earth by magical beings. It makes for really pretty poems and art and stuff. Let’s all start believing it again. It’s fab.’
Asked about the recent spate of anti-religious books, the professor replied: ‘Fwoar, that Lalla Ward, eh? Eh?’
Amongst the religious the myth is growing, day by day, that the ‘war of science and religion’ was much less intense than AD White claimed in his great history of the warfare of science and theology. I cannot comment on any detail about the truth of falsity of that claim, though I think there was/is a lot more conflict that the religious are trying to claim. It seems to me like a massive piece of post facto whitewashing. However, it is interesting that it has now been claimed that Descartes was murdered with an – wait for it! (as Ophelia says) – arsenic impregnated communion wafer! By a missionary, no less! Since Descartes spent much of his later life avoiding the Inquisition, and refusing to publish some works for reasons of personal safety, this is at least superficially plausible. The story that he died of pneumonia apparently conflicts with some of the symptoms recorded by his physician. Professor Harrison will have to explain what he means by ‘cuddly’.
Science has a cachet that everyone wants to claim. Many are trying to use the religiousness of scientists past and present in their apologetics. Read some of Steve Fuller’s ideas or the recent book by Hannam “God’s Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science.” Francis Collins, Ken Miller and Steven Meyer have all written apologetics from differing perspectives of evolution, but all starting with Christianity is true and its truth explains what we see in nature. They are struggling to tie religious belief to what people would generally think were successes such as science – ignoring failures. The apocalyptic nature of early Christianity precludes any concern with living in this world which makes it the least interested in science of any religion – notice the lack of an ecological ethic.
“Andreas Idreos… will challenge such arguments about the impossibility of being both scientific and religious…”
There they go again, challenging arguments nobody ever made. There is nothing “impossible” about it, but to be so disposed and claim that the two positions are _compatible_ is another thing entirely.
“…pointing out that they “obviously didn’t apply to the earliest fellows””
And what follows from that exactly? Lots of things didn’t apply to the earliest fellows then that they would nonetheless consider utterly ridiculous now.
“…almost without exception, early modern natural philosophers cherished religious convictions… Some – but by no means all – made the point that they were motivated to pursue scientific inquiry on account of these religious commitments.”
A ‘cherished conviction’ can be a great motivator. Indeed, a conviction that there exists a divine creator and that your work is a glorification of his, is a cracker! Especially if, like Newton, you thought that such work would eventual _reveal_ said creator. But so what? Why should we be surprised that the early fellows held such convictions? And, once again WHAT FOLLOWS FROM THIS?
Many scientists are motivated by convictions which, in time are overturned – often as a direct result of their own efforts. The key point is that for science to advance al all such convictions, however ‘cherished’ they may be, must be continuously open to revision to the point of utter rejection.
Thankfully, they all are. Except one.