Development of the science and the Catholic Church

[Black_Rose]

I believe this merited a new thread. I invite all who are somewhat knowledgeable on the philosophy and history of science to participate in this thread.

This thread is a response to Abu:

False: science was not developed mainly due to the influence of the above.
How strange that the fact that the Catholic Church built Western Civilization is unknown especially as it was specifically shown in post #145, that “The rise of science was not an extension of classical learning. It was the natural outgrowth of Christian doctrine: nature exists because it was created by God. In order to love and honor God, it is necessary to fully appreciate his handiwork. Because God is perfect, his handiwork functions in accord with immutable principles. By the full use of our God-given powers of reason and observation, it ought to be possible to discover these principles.

“These were the crucial ideas that explain why science arose in Christian Europe and nowhere else.” The Victory of Reason, Rodney Stark, Random House, 2005, p 22-23]

I’ll post a few excerpts of some posts I made in other threads to highlight my opinion:

Are you attempting to provide a history of the development of Western epistemology, the crowning jewel of the European Enlightenment, whose legacy has brought the world numerous technology advances, a detailed understanding of various natural phenomena, and a fairly consistent view of natural history (biological and cosmological)? Based on my own analysis of the history, which admittedly is incomplete, the Catholic Church probably did lay the foundation for science, but did not significantly contribute during the secular European Enlightenment.

I do not buy the warfare thesis at all; I merely stated that the Catholic Church has not significantly contributed to modern epistemology (notably empiricism and induction). My use of the italicized “modern” shows that I could accept the thesis that Catholicism contributed to some of the foundations of modern epistemology. The warfare thesis may apply to issues such as creationism or perhaps cosmology, but typically, the non-overlapping magisteria of science and religion are not encroached by either party, enabling them to co-exist.

I never implied that atheism has a monopoly on the creation of scientific knowledge, I just said that Catholicism has not a significant contribution to modern philosophy of science. I was never a loath admit that Mendel was monk (more precisely an Augustinian friar) even when I was an atheist/agnostic. I still believe that atheism is a respectable worldview.
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Regarding science: I would say that it was mainly developed during the Enlightenment and was heavily influenced by the philosophy of empiricism. Hume, Locke, and Berkeley weren’t Catholic.

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Some links whose content is worth discussing in the context of this thread:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_in_the_Middle_Ages
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_in_Medieval_Western_Europe
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_in_the_Age_of_Enlightenment
psychology.sbc.edu/Empiricism.htm
henryckliu.com/page57.html (Discusses scholasticism)
henryckliu.com/page59.html (discusses Taoism and scientific investigation)
henryckliu.com/page61.html (discusses Islamic contributions to history)
henryckliu.com/page60.html (discusses the Enlightenment)

 

[Anselm33]

I believe this merited a new thread. I invite all who are somewhat knowledgeable on the philosophy and history of science to participate in this thread.

I have been a practicing physicist for 50 years and have done quite a bit of reading in philosophy of mathematics and science–books by Bas van Fraassen (an empiricist), Andre Kukla (a scientific realist), Robert Koons (a realist), Pierre Duhem (a Catholic empiricist), Fr. Stanley Jaki, Pierre d’Espagnat (a realist) and the series summarizing papers presented on conferences on “Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action” at Castle Gondalfo, sponsored by John Paul II, and more books on philosophical interpretations of quantum mechanics than I can list here.

I merely stated that the Catholic Church has not significantly contributed to modern epistemology (notably empiricism and induction).

 

[JohnDamian]

Scientific method was created by Catholic Friar and Theologian Roger Bacon under Papal request by Pope Clement IV.

Catholic Theologian Robert Grosseteste and Islamic Philosopher Alhazen deserve a mention in providing groundwork.

 

[Abu]

Black_Rose
….the Catholic Church probably did lay the foundation for science, but did not significantly contribute during the secular European Enlightenment… science… was mainly developed during the Enlightenment and was heavily influenced by the philosophy of empiricism. Hume, Locke, and Berkeley weren’t Catholic……Catholicism has not a significant contribution to modern philosophy of science…I still believe that atheism is a respectable worldview.

A tentative Catholic would be unclear as to fidelity to Christ’s Church – that is untenable as to faith and morals but would need to be resolved by prayer, study and the truth. Atheism would be unacceptable to a Catholic as denying a fact of life – that we are created by God and given the Way, Truth and Life to Him by His Son, Jesus of Nazareth.

Empiricism is the belief that all certified knowledge is based upon verification by sense experience and experiment, thus ruling out every other kind of knowledge by which mankind is enriched.

If “science” is defined merely to coincide with empirical science, there results a false concept of science and an impoverished idea of reality. Technical science, as distinguished from common sense, is “certified knowledge,” and some assume that only the knowledge gained from empirical science is really certified, into which they might throw historical knowledge in a broader sense. But there are other areas and levels of technical science that also give certified knowledge. Not only is there true historical science, but, in the midst of the widespread confusion and misunderstanding in the field known today as “modern philosophy,” there is still an area of true philosophical science, if one can manage to find it, and it resides in Scholastic philosophy. Again, there is still an area of theological science, and it resides today especially in Scholastic theology, and the knowledge presented in these latter two sciences is also objectively true and real. [LT123 - Anthony Rizzi, The Science Before Science / Blessed Columba Marmion, Christ, The Life Of The Soul]](LT123 - Anthony Rizzi, The Science Before Science / Blessed Columba Marmion, Christ, The Life Of The Soul])

rtforum.org/lt/lt99.html
Here we see that science is certified knowledge of reality as such. Empirical science is certified knowledge of observable reality as such. Philosophical science is certified knowledge of natural reality beyond the merely material. Historical science is certified knowledge of past reality as such. And theological science is certified knowledge of revealed reality as such.

“First of all, classical learning did not provide an appropriate model for science. Second, the rise of science was already far along by the sixteenth century, having been carefully nurtured by religiously devout scholastics. Granted, the era of scientific discovery that occurred in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was marvelous, the cultural equivalent of the blossoming of a rose. But, just as roses do not spring up overnight, and must undergo a long period of normal growth before they even bud, so too the blossoming of science was the result of centuries of intellectual progress.”
catholicleague.org/research/catholicism_and_science.htm, Catholicism and Science by Rodney Stark (from Catalyst 9/2004)].

Even Friedrich Nietzsche (‘God is dead’) wrote: “Strictly speaking there is no such thing as science ‘without any presuppositions’… a philosophy, a ‘faith’, must always be there first, so that science can acquire a direction, a meaning, a limit, a method, a right to exist… It is still a metaphysical faith that underlines our faith in science.” (Genealogy of Morals III, 23-24).

 

[colmcille1]

Michael Green, in his book ‘Runaway World’ says:
Newton wote his* Principia* in the assurance that
‘this world could originate from nothing but the perfectly free
will of God’. (p.41)