The American Crisis: Defined
Journal Entry #15
Democratic institutions require that citizens think for themselves…and decide issues on the basis of deliberation and the weighing of evidence. – Irving M. Copi; Introduction to Logic; Sixth Edition; Preface.
We concluded the previous journal entry with a crucial question based upon James Burke’s insightful explanation of the historical formation of Western knowledge, presented in his acclaimed book The Day The Universe Changed.
Insofar as our knowledge is formed by the accumulation of empirical evidence (that gained from external experience and observation) it becomes of crucial importance that we avoid the pitfalls of erroneous thinking and the wrong interpretation of the evidence. Such is essential to the integrity and reliability of the reasoning process generally, and to the scientific method particularly.
Mr. Burke tells us that the ‘knowledge’ we possess structures quite literally everything we subsequently do and think- “architecture, music, literature, science, economics, art, politics”- because it tells us the truth. Over time, however, as a result of scientific discovery or technological advancement the widely accepted truth changes and with it, what is ‘known’ about the universe.
As understanding of the universe and of earth advanced and new truths were discovered- which affected our ‘knowledge’- the question arose whether it was possible for the intellect to declare something true that really is not? Is such a thing conceivable in the context of our modern notion of intellectual progress, achieved through the positive methods of a vigorously advancing science?
We do not refer here to the occasional lapse in thinking, which is quite common, easily recognized and soon corrected. Rather, we are concerned with the “latest version of how the universe functions.” And whether, as we observe nature, “like the people of the past…we see what we want to see, according to what we believe we know about it at the time.” That is to say, by means of a preconceived notion or view about nature, man and God we determine prematurely what is real and what is not: “Like our ancestors, we know the real truth.”
The answer to our crucial question is most definitely yes, the possibility exists of an ill-conceived and erroneously established ‘truth’ in Western thought. The wrongly established truth that has gained dominance and subsequently misdirected modern thought goes by the name of materialism, which simply is defined as the tendency to regard the material world as the ultimate reality.
Originally, the philosophical tendency that emerged in the Renaissance to look to more naturalistic explanations to describe and understand nature and mankind, was greatly enhanced by the perspective that said “all the measurable objects of the universe are material objects”. Gaining ever greater prestige and authority by the time of the European Enlightenment, this perspective was enlarged to state that “all the objects of the universe are material objects”.
The latest version of truth about the universe by which we now live got its systematic start in 1687, with the publication of Isaac Newton’s Principia Mathematica. In it were enunciated his differential and integral calculus- for measuring inertia and gravitational force involved in planetary dynamics- as well as his formulation of the theory of universal gravitation.
In essence, Isaac Newton’s Principia “gave rise to a mechanical philosophy in which nature was conceived as a law-bound system of matter in motion, every state of the system proceeding from previous states by mathematical rule” according to Professor John Greene, in Darwin and The Modern World View.
James Burke observes that with the advent of Newtonian science, “the theory of universal gravity…destroyed the medieval picture of the world as a structure moved by the unseen but ever-present hand of God…There seemed, for the first time, no place in the cosmos for the providential involvement of God in the affairs of mankind.”
Today all human thought and behavior, along with every object and process in nature is reduced to a materialist view of the universe, something we term reductionism. It’s not the case that science declares only material objects necessarily exist; but certainly that only matter and its various processes, interactions and associations have any relevance and bearing on our physical realm.
It is here that our crucial- indeed, essential question enters into our discussion. Should science revisit and reconsider a strictly materialist perspective, in the possibility that it might be wrong? Or, does science consider itself above error? Further, because science hasn’t yet asked this question about its conclusions, and therefore has imposed no order upon its method, are we justified in saying that science operates arbitrarily?
And how would science reconcile its conclusions with the decidedly nonmaterial statement from the Protestant Reformation which asserted that “Christianity is the immortal seed of freedom of the world”.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
The American Crisis: Defined
Journal Entry #14
You are what you know. Fifteenth-century Europeans ‘knew’ that the sky was made of closed concentric crystal spheres, rotating around a central earth and carrying the stars and planets. That ‘knowledge’ structured everything they did and thought, because it told them the truth. Then Galileo’s telescope changed the truth.
As a result, a hundred years later everybody ‘knew’ that the universe was open and infinite, working like a giant clock. Architecture, music, literature, science, economics, art, politics- everything- changed, mirroring the new view created by the change in the knowledge.
Today we live according to the latest version of how the universe functions. This view affects our behaviour and thought, just as previous versions affected those who lived with them. Like the people of the past, we disregard phenomena which do not fit our view because they are ‘wrong’ or outdated. Like our ancestors, we know the real truth…
Somebody once observed to the eminent philosopher Wittgenstein how stupid medieval Europeans living before the time of Copernicus must have been that they could have looked at the sky and thought that the sun was circling the earth. Surely a modicum of astronomical good sense would have told them that the reverse was true. Wittgenstein is said to have replied: ‘I agree. But I wonder what it would have looked like if the sun had been circling the earth.’
The point is that it would look exactly the same. When we observe nature we see what we want to see, according to what we believe we know about it at the time. Nature is disordered, powerful and chaotic, and through fear of the chaos we impose system on it…We need to have an overall explanation of what the universe is and how it functions…we develop explanatory theories which will give structure to natural phenomena: we classify nature into a coherent system which appears to do what we say it does.
This view of the universe permeates all aspects of our life. All communities in all places at all times manifest their own view of reality in what they do. The entire culture reflects the contemporary model of reality. We are what we know. And when the body of knowledge changes, so do we. – James Burke, Preface and Chapter 1, “The Way We Are”, 1985; The Day The Universe Changed
With keen insight and unadorned eloquence James Burke- the esteemed historian of science, technology and innovation- has at once provided the reader a basic understanding of human thought as the dynamic of history, together with a secure footing upon which to analyze and appraise the subsequent philosophical threat now confronting Western Civilization, and American FREEDOM particularly.
As we proceed, we are once again reminded of the gist of my thesis, generally reflected throughout this journal: Without intellectual FREEDOM, there can be no societal FREEDOM, economic FREEDOM nor political FREEDOM. That free institutions and a stable society will become impossible to maintain as FREEDOM of thought is diminished. And that this very situation, this diminution of intellectual FREEDOM, is now at work in our country and in our civilization by our own choice and effort- not by government decree, as many would claim.
James Burke’s award-winning book and PBS television series, The Day The Universe Changed, interestingly observes the human tendency in history to formulate explanations about the content and operation of the natural world, according to what is already ‘known’. This ‘knowledge’ serves to structure everything that is done and thought in society, because it conveys the truth.
With a change in the truth comes a change in ‘knowledge’. For example, when Galileo’s telescope revealed in 1609 and 1610 the satellites circling Jupiter and the imperfections and irregularities of the moon’s surface, the ‘knowledge’ of an earth-centered universe and perfect planetary spheres began to change. And with the change in knowledge came a change in architecture, music, literature, art, science, economics and politics- that is, in civilization.
In the roughly two centuries that separated the naturalist John Ray’s (a member in the Royal Society with Isaac Newton) The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of the Creation (1691), and the naturalist Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859) and Descent of Man (1871), the truth of God’s static creation increasingly gave way to naturalism and evolutionary views of nature.
As Benjamin Wiker aptly describes it in his book The Darwin Myth, “We entered the nineteenth century with Christian assumptions for the most part intact: that we were fallen but redeemable creatures made in the image of God. We exited in a Godless cosmos, as mere animals who had managed, through much luck and struggle, to climb from unimaginably low origins to a little above the apes.”
Professor John C. Greene perceptively observes in his book The Death of Adam; Evolution And Its Impact On Western Thought; “As faith in the stability and wise design of the structures of nature declined, there was a compensating effort to find in the idea of progress a new world view which would give meaning to science and direction to human history.”
The question we need to ask ourselves is whether it is possible that a change in the truth- which directly affects what we ‘know’- can be ill-conceived and erroneously established?
Journal Entry #14
You are what you know. Fifteenth-century Europeans ‘knew’ that the sky was made of closed concentric crystal spheres, rotating around a central earth and carrying the stars and planets. That ‘knowledge’ structured everything they did and thought, because it told them the truth. Then Galileo’s telescope changed the truth.
As a result, a hundred years later everybody ‘knew’ that the universe was open and infinite, working like a giant clock. Architecture, music, literature, science, economics, art, politics- everything- changed, mirroring the new view created by the change in the knowledge.
Today we live according to the latest version of how the universe functions. This view affects our behaviour and thought, just as previous versions affected those who lived with them. Like the people of the past, we disregard phenomena which do not fit our view because they are ‘wrong’ or outdated. Like our ancestors, we know the real truth…
Somebody once observed to the eminent philosopher Wittgenstein how stupid medieval Europeans living before the time of Copernicus must have been that they could have looked at the sky and thought that the sun was circling the earth. Surely a modicum of astronomical good sense would have told them that the reverse was true. Wittgenstein is said to have replied: ‘I agree. But I wonder what it would have looked like if the sun had been circling the earth.’
The point is that it would look exactly the same. When we observe nature we see what we want to see, according to what we believe we know about it at the time. Nature is disordered, powerful and chaotic, and through fear of the chaos we impose system on it…We need to have an overall explanation of what the universe is and how it functions…we develop explanatory theories which will give structure to natural phenomena: we classify nature into a coherent system which appears to do what we say it does.
This view of the universe permeates all aspects of our life. All communities in all places at all times manifest their own view of reality in what they do. The entire culture reflects the contemporary model of reality. We are what we know. And when the body of knowledge changes, so do we. – James Burke, Preface and Chapter 1, “The Way We Are”, 1985; The Day The Universe Changed
With keen insight and unadorned eloquence James Burke- the esteemed historian of science, technology and innovation- has at once provided the reader a basic understanding of human thought as the dynamic of history, together with a secure footing upon which to analyze and appraise the subsequent philosophical threat now confronting Western Civilization, and American FREEDOM particularly.
As we proceed, we are once again reminded of the gist of my thesis, generally reflected throughout this journal: Without intellectual FREEDOM, there can be no societal FREEDOM, economic FREEDOM nor political FREEDOM. That free institutions and a stable society will become impossible to maintain as FREEDOM of thought is diminished. And that this very situation, this diminution of intellectual FREEDOM, is now at work in our country and in our civilization by our own choice and effort- not by government decree, as many would claim.
James Burke’s award-winning book and PBS television series, The Day The Universe Changed, interestingly observes the human tendency in history to formulate explanations about the content and operation of the natural world, according to what is already ‘known’. This ‘knowledge’ serves to structure everything that is done and thought in society, because it conveys the truth.
With a change in the truth comes a change in ‘knowledge’. For example, when Galileo’s telescope revealed in 1609 and 1610 the satellites circling Jupiter and the imperfections and irregularities of the moon’s surface, the ‘knowledge’ of an earth-centered universe and perfect planetary spheres began to change. And with the change in knowledge came a change in architecture, music, literature, art, science, economics and politics- that is, in civilization.
In the roughly two centuries that separated the naturalist John Ray’s (a member in the Royal Society with Isaac Newton) The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of the Creation (1691), and the naturalist Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859) and Descent of Man (1871), the truth of God’s static creation increasingly gave way to naturalism and evolutionary views of nature.
As Benjamin Wiker aptly describes it in his book The Darwin Myth, “We entered the nineteenth century with Christian assumptions for the most part intact: that we were fallen but redeemable creatures made in the image of God. We exited in a Godless cosmos, as mere animals who had managed, through much luck and struggle, to climb from unimaginably low origins to a little above the apes.”
Professor John C. Greene perceptively observes in his book The Death of Adam; Evolution And Its Impact On Western Thought; “As faith in the stability and wise design of the structures of nature declined, there was a compensating effort to find in the idea of progress a new world view which would give meaning to science and direction to human history.”
The question we need to ask ourselves is whether it is possible that a change in the truth- which directly affects what we ‘know’- can be ill-conceived and erroneously established?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
.jpg)