Have you ever stopped to think about
why modern science first arrived on the scene in Europe around the middle of
the last millennium with scientists like Newton, Galileo, Copernicus, Descartes
and Pascal? Why not from other great cultures of the past? This question is
explored with piercing detail in a book called “The Savior of Science” by Fr. Stanley Jaki.
It was recommended to me by writer and scientist, Stacy Trasancos. It’s not the easiest read in the world if one is not familiar
with certain scientists throughout history and their theories, but some parts
of the book are easy to follow.
It’s very understandable as to why some cultures would not be so concerned with the great “whys” of the physical universe if they were constantly struggling for food, water and shelter or continually fending off attacks from their neighbors. Who cares how the sun goes up and down every day if I’m just trying to stay alive every day, but what about the peoples of cultures like ancient China, Japan, India, Egypt, Babylon, Assyria, Persia, Greece and Rome? They all lived in organized societies with infrastructure; they had long periods of peace and talented citizens. They were also not greatly influenced by one another, as if we could say the superstitions about nature spread from one culture to all the rest like a virus. Of course, they had their achievements, like gun powder, papermaking and fixed-type engraved printing coming from China. How about the great architectural achievements of ancient Egypt, or the logic of the Greeks, but modern science never took root in any of these places. Why?
Like any good problem solving, one
should compare the place of interest (like Europe) and the characteristic of
interest (like the birth of modern science) to other places that lack that
characteristic. From here we can look for distinctions. By their fruits you
shall know them, provided that scientific fruit or fruitlessness is looked for.
The great non-Judeo-Christian cultures
of the past had their premises about nature, existence and the universe.
Perhaps it was the belief in eternal cycles that left a hopeless feeling when
at the bottom, or a sense of complacency when on top (learn about Fortuna). How about the view of the universe as a kind of huge
wild animal whose dangerous irrationalities needed to be appeased by some kind
of human ritual? Others kept a wall of division between celestial and
terrestrial matter that could never be penetrated. Given these kinds of
worldviews, it’s easy to see why modern science could never take root. There also
was no confidence in the abilities of a limited human mind to grasp the laws of
nature, because nature was not subject to any rational mind or lawgiver that
transcended it. King Brihadratha, the last ruler
of the Mauryan dynasty, sums it up well for his culture as well as many others
when he said “In the cycle of existence, I’m like a frog in a waterless well.”
These kinds of mind sets seem to
cry out for salvation.
Regrettably, this intellectual courage
also leads men to the sin of pride. In the book, Fr. Jaki cleverly compares the
sin of Eve in the book of Genesis to the sin of atheistic scientists today who
view the world as only material. After being tempted by the serpent, Eve became
“scientific”, looking at the tree of life in a materialistic way. “The woman
saw that the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eye, and desirable for
gaining wisdom. So she took some of its fruit and ate it…” (Gen 3:6). The illicitness
of the fruit and the tree was forgotten along with the Creator.
It’s very understandable as to why some cultures would not be so concerned with the great “whys” of the physical universe if they were constantly struggling for food, water and shelter or continually fending off attacks from their neighbors. Who cares how the sun goes up and down every day if I’m just trying to stay alive every day, but what about the peoples of cultures like ancient China, Japan, India, Egypt, Babylon, Assyria, Persia, Greece and Rome? They all lived in organized societies with infrastructure; they had long periods of peace and talented citizens. They were also not greatly influenced by one another, as if we could say the superstitions about nature spread from one culture to all the rest like a virus. Of course, they had their achievements, like gun powder, papermaking and fixed-type engraved printing coming from China. How about the great architectural achievements of ancient Egypt, or the logic of the Greeks, but modern science never took root in any of these places. Why?
So what was different about Europe? Fr.
Jaki suggests that it was Christ that saved science from yet another “stillbirth”
in Europe. The culture which grew out of Christendom was the distinction that
provided the premises by which man could finally have a rational worldview, and the premises came from Catholic
doctrine.
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| BRAIN FREEZE!!! |
Now this is a hard teaching; who could
accept it? Didn’t S.J. Gould get it right when he said, “Nothing is more dangerous than a dogmatic worldview - nothing
more constraining, more blinding to innovation, more destructive of openness to
novelty.” Isn’t the scientific progress
that we still build onto today the result of the European enlightenment? Isn’t
this when men shook-off their pious little fairy tales about god or gods? This finally
freed men to use logic & reason for the very first time to explain the
world around them, right?
Well, the Greeks and other cultures were known for their logic, but science
was stillborn in those places. Additionally, the famous forefathers of modern
science like Newton, Galileo, Copernicus, Descartes and Pascal were all
Christian. So if atheism or just raw logic does not explain the birth of
modern science, what might explain it?
Fr. Jaki argues that salvation finally
came for science because Christ and His Church built a Christian worldview with
the following types of convictions….
- God is a rational being that is orderly and reliable; therefore, his creation is also rational, orderly and reliable.
- All matter, celestial & terrestrial, can be placed on the same basic level, since it was all created out of nothing (ex nilhilo). A pebble is no different than the earth, the sun, the moon, or a cow in terms of being a created thing that can be studied and dissected.
- Man is made in the image and likeness of God, therefore we can have confidence in human rationality to understand creation because our intellect was fashioned by God in his own image.
- Man can have full trust in a rational creator. This fosters the intellectual courage that can drive us to learn more about creation.
Regrettably, this intellectual courage
also leads men to the sin of pride. In the book, Fr. Jaki cleverly compares the
sin of Eve in the book of Genesis to the sin of atheistic scientists today who
view the world as only material. After being tempted by the serpent, Eve became
“scientific”, looking at the tree of life in a materialistic way. “The woman
saw that the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eye, and desirable for
gaining wisdom. So she took some of its fruit and ate it…” (Gen 3:6). The illicitness
of the fruit and the tree was forgotten along with the Creator.
Many of today’s scientists seem to
have flipped one of the Catholic based premises on its head. The science of the
past may have said “We know the creator is intelligent, so we can go forward assuming
the universe is intelligible.” Today it’s more like “We know the universe is
intelligible, so we can go forward assuming there is no intelligence behind it.”
It’s like saying we can see sunlight, but we should assume that there is no
sun. This kind of dimming down of the intellect was expressed well using a
paradox, “we are smarter than we are”.
“We are smarter than we are” is meant
to express the notion that our minds have evolved much faster than our bodies.
The human brain appeared on the scene in a geological instant and it seems to
be evolutionary “overkill” in terms of only needing to survive and reproduce. S.J
Gould was also quoted in the book as saying, “It does reinforce an ego that we
do well to deflate.”
The statement is not about the Christian
virtue of humility; it’s more about convincing you not to look any deeper than
the material surface; we should forcibly deflate that natural part us that
looks for spiritual truth. Paradoxes are normally meant to awaken the mind; in
this case it is meant to suppress the mind. The mind’s eye is meant to see further
and deeper than the physical eye, but we are told to deflate the part of us
that cries out “There must be more!” Should
we deflate ourselves or should we continue to search for that which is more
than we are?
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| Which will you choose? |
