Believing in Science

One of the comments that popped up more than once in the back and forth around the "climategate" discussion was the claim, by those who deny global warming,  that those who support the science of global climate change are like those people who, a few centuries ago, refused to believe that the earth is round or that the earth revolves around the sun.

As absurd as this claim is on its face -- that those who were guided by the science in one case would ignore it in the other -- there is an even more significant insight that comes from thinking about the relationship between that earlier debate and this one.

Most of us know that the polymath Galileo was forced to recant the results of his observations of the cosmos, which he had published in 1632 in Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems.  Galileo built a powerful case for the Copernican view of the cosmos -- that the earth, like the other planets,  orbits around the sun, and the stars exist outside those orbits -- as opposed the Ptolemaic view -- that the earth is at the center and everything else rotates around that.

Galileo was well aware that just 32 years earlier the brilliant Giordano Bruno had been burned alive at the stake by the Inquisition for making the same argument. To the church, it didn't matter that the Copernican cosmology was the only way to account for observed phenomena; to deny the earth's central, fixed position in the universe was to deny what had become a foundational element of religious belief. Just before the fire was lit, Bruno was offered the chance to recant: "I should not say that, so I will not."

In its early history, the christian church was riven by the claims of two rival schools of thought. One, following the teachings of Arius, a priest in Alexandria, held that while God existed outside of time, the Son (Jesus) was created later, as was the Holy Ghost. Representing what he knew as traditional doctrine in his church, Arius argued against Athanasius, a fellow Alexandrine churchman, who taught that God was three in one: the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost were the same, begotten before time, equally divine and eternal.

At a time when the church had become intimately entwined with the political ambitions of Rome and Byzantium, these rival views, which probably dated to the earliest days of the church, demanded resolution if the church was to act as a unified power. The Council of Nicea, in 325 endorsed Athanasius' view. After a few more decades of struggle the eternal trinity was firmly established as doctrine, and Arianism as heresy. That's why, in my Lutheran church, we recited the Nicene Creed as a kind of pledge of allegiance every Sunday:

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds (æons), Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father ....

One of the positions implicit in the Athanasian view was that Earth, where Adam and Eve first sinned, was the one part of creation blemished by death and decay. God had placed Earth at the center of his creation as kind of petri dish of sin and redemption, but everything else was set in perfect motion at creation, and was beyond the reach of sinful mankind, and beyond change. As this view became dogma, any reports of imperfection in God's celestial creation would have to be debunked, and the reporters treated as heretics. In the official view, science had no meaning beyond what God revealed to us. If a star appeared in the East, it must be God sending some kind of message to us.

The danger of Arianism to the Church was that it suggested that the divine order was itself changeable, not eternal and unchangeable:

But those who say: 'There was a time when he was not;' and 'He was not before he was made;' and 'He was made out of nothing,' or 'He is of another substance' or 'essence,' or 'The Son of God is created,' or 'changeable,' or 'alterable'—they are condemned by the holy catholic and apostolic Church.

By choosing the Athanasian path, the Church was committed to the dogma of an unchanging, unchangeable God, and the Church's role as protector of an absolute moral order and authority, which included an earth-centric universe and perfectly circular orbits for the planets and the celestial dome, now and always.

While the earliest observers of the heavens knew that things were not that tidy, they were forced to keep their views to themselves, or to find other ways to rationalize them, or risk being condemned as heretics. With the establishment of universities and the general sharing of knowledge that accompanied the Renaissance it became harder for the church to keep the lid on. Of course, by then the Church had the Reformation to worry about, as well.

As the growth of the middle class meant that learning in all areas was not solely the property of a small elite, the Church responded to this challenge to old rigid moral orders and authorities by trying to deny the emerging reality. Enter the Inquisition. It is illuminating that the Roman Inquisition dates to 1542, the year before Copernicus book on the cosmos, On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres, was published.

In a rational world, the revanchist forces protecting an irrelevant, inaccurate version of the moral order would have been replaced, suddenly or gradually, by the demonstrable realities being unveiled by scientists from every culture. So why hasn't it worked like that?

The obvious answer is that the ruthless application of power works. An organization like the Church, founded on belief and submission, and willing to use a tool like the Inquisition,  can keep enough of its flock in line to hold on at least some of its position. And the Church has altered some areas of doctrine to align itself with new realities, although the pragmatists have now been largely supplanted by the dogmatists.

However, I think there is something else operating here, something that goes beyond the Church to all social life. In its simplest form, I see it as a dialectic of human psychology, with human beings demonstrating either one of two competing ways to comprehend and interact with reality.

On the one hand, the individual sees him- or her-self locked in an adversarial relationship with a world that can, at any moment, overwhelm them. For most, it becomes clear that there are certain hierarchies and authorities that must be recognized and leveraged for survival. You make alliances with the powers that you think can protect the existing order and your precarious place in it. And the ultimate power is supernatural, including the Church. There is a certain paranoid quality to this -- assuming that others are out to get you is the smart move. In terms of communication, this viewpoint is most comfortable with appeals to authority and belief.

On the other hand, some individuals see existence as enhanced by collaboration and teamwork rather than combat: we're all in this together. These individuals are a little more comfortable with change and heuristic logic, knowing that the future can't be entirely known and is constantly being altered by the choices we make in the present. Individual skepticism and curiosity are good things. This viewpoint aligns with a humanist emphasis on the scientific method and rational processes.

In every culture, even at the height of the Inquisition, there were humanists. By the same token, during every period of enlightenment there have been those who rely on faith and authority, and reject human reason. It may very well be that there's some kind of hardwiring at play, synaptical networks and brain chemistry interactions that dispose one to faith or to reason.

The downside of all this may be that there is little to be gained by talking through our issues. If that is true, climate deniers will never be swayed by scientific evidence, and rationalists are not going to be persuaded by appeals to faith. Nonetheless, almost all of us now agree we live in a world that is not at the center of the universe. And that's a start.