http://shaneleavy.blogspot.com/2012/08/how-religion-created-science-liberalism.html
Recently I listened to a BBC History Extra interview with historian Michael Hunter on the great 17th century scientist Robert Boyle, one of founders of the scientific method. Boyle, a pioneer of scientific experimentation, was motivated by a religious zeal – for religion. He was a devout Christian, and was concerned by an apparently godless movement rallying around philosophers like Thomas Hobbes. Boyle created the foundations of modern science not despite his faith, but because of it: he believed that his discoveries of a deeply complex scientific reality were evidence of God's design.
This does not fit with those anti-religious narratives I encounter. In those views it was the destruction of Christian power following the Reformation that led to the growth of science. As Christianity fell away, Enlightenment ideals prospered, irreligious humanism emerged, and old ills like slavery and sexism were overthrown.
Yet the Enlightenment period was one of fierce religious passion and its greatest thinkers were mostly devout believers. Modern people may look back and perceive a linear progression from the darkness of religious superstition to the light of secular knowledge, but this is anachronistic. The heroes of science and liberalism took religion for granted; it was a spur for discovery, not an inhibitor. Today we talk about Newtonian physics; Isaac Newton wrote seriously about witchcraft, magic and alchemy. Today anti-religious commentators talk about the illiberalism of Christianity; John Locke – the Father of Liberalism – was a passionate Christian who saw reason as a God-given trait that could only bring humanity to a belief in Jesus.
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How religion created science, liberalism, and peace
Recently I listened to a BBC History Extra interview with historian Michael Hunter on the great 17th century scientist Robert Boyle, one of founders of the scientific method. Boyle, a pioneer of scien…
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James Clark
September 4, 2012 at 1:10 am
I haven't read the article yet but this is always a tough thing for me. I was raised Southern Baptist (sent to private school and everything) and for the most part it was an OK experience. I didn't drink the hateful kool-aid but did sort of enjoy the spiritualness of it, I guess. I was really inspired when I learned about figures from history like Newton and especially Gregor Mendel who had been a monk and is essentially the father of genetics. It was wonderful to me that as a monk he lived a life separate from others, presumably dedicated to a higher purpose, and was conducting research in his garden, broadening all of human understanding. I think I would have loved to have continued in a tradition like this. THAT is uplifting. THAT is what having purpose can be like. THAT is what I took away from my initial Southern Baptist education (K-8th).
What has always disturbed me is that what I learned of figures from history and what I feel inspired to achieve by that initial spark of admitted brainwashing is very different from how people act out their religions in the world.
Instead of feeling happy, a true sense of inner peace, and perceiving broadening horizons for themselves and everyone, people seem to twist it back on itself and turn it into projected hate and restrictiveness. Seeing that kind of behavior I can only come to the conclusion that I am not religious, certainly not how most people are with their hearts filled with hate of all kinds. Self hate, hate of the other, hate of the unknown, fear, jealousy, vindictiveness, etc.
Going farther though, I don't feel it's necessary to claim any kind of religion or belief. Not when I can use my best abilities, those of evaluating evidence and reason. All the gods humanity has ever imagined may exist, but all indications are there is no supernatural interference in the world, so their possible existence is pointless. We live in the world and universe we see around us, we have to deal with it on its terms and with eachother as humans and with our environment as the most-able species to shepherd it to the next generation.
Ken Foreman
September 4, 2012 at 6:17 am
That was a good reply, and deserving of a better response than one I could give at 6:05 AM on a Tuesday morning when I should be getting ready for work…
I was raised Lutheran, and I became Catholic after marriage. I respect and admire the tenants of any respectful religion, but often found that people who said they were followers of a holy figure were followers in word but not action. The people that they claim to venerate behaved nothing like them.
I respect Thomas More, Thomas Aquinas, Francis of Assisi, and Christ. It's these people I wish to emulate. I do not always agree with and respect the Catholic Church, particularly when it behaves shamefully or worse (see Boston Catholic Church scandal).
It's difficult trying to reconcile faith with people's actions, but it doesn't take a religion to find that hardship. Look at how Democrats and Republicans behave, it doesn't take a religion to be a hypocrite, politics and society produce them as well.
We are at our best shepherding ourselves and the next generation when we are acting selflessly. We are at our best when we act without concern for ourselves, but our society. Unfortunately, this may actually be contrary to human nature. We seem predisposed to be selfish, spiteful, and desiring more control over others than we'd have over ourselves.