Download The Church and Science in the Seventeenth Century

The Church and Science
in the Seventeenth
Century
Ann T. Orlando
30 April 2007
Outline
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Background
Aristotelian Science
Galileo Affair
Example: Controversy over vacuums
Conclusion: The Enlightenment
Aristotelian Physics
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Aristotle (384-322 BC) was an empiricist; knowledge through the
sense
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But also believed that there was a well defined structure to universe,
Structure could be known
All substances made of matter and form
Matter made of four elements: earth, air, fine, water in sublunar
region; unchanging ether above the moon
The cosmos is eternal, filled with elements
All changes in substances governed by four causes: material,
formal, efficient (violent) and final
Motion is defined as being inversely proportional to density of
medium through which a body travels
The Problem with a Void
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Aristotle’s conception of matter and form was
opposed to Epicurean motion of atoms and
voids
Aristotle had been strongly opposed to the
concept of a void in nature
Argued that if a void existed it was ‘something’
but two things could not occupy the same space;
so a void could not exist
Another important Aristotelian argument
against the void was based on his definition of
motion
Church and Physics in the Thirteenth
through the Seventeenth Century
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Just as scholastic theology relied on Aristotle, so did
medieval physics
Condemnations of 1277 emphasized basic Aristotelian
physics
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No voids
Earth-centered cosmology
All substances composed of matter and form
No change to celestial spheres beyond the moon
Velocity is inversely proportional to density of medium
through which an object moves; therefore a vacuum is
impossible
New Observations in Sixteenth and
Seventeenth Centuries
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Telescope allows observations of heavens that calls
older physics into question
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New understanding of velocity
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Reveals changes in sun, moons of Jupiter
Earth revolves around the sun
Dropped balls fall at same rate, regardless of weight
Velocity of a body not defined by resistance of medium
Experiments with gasses leads to speculation about
atomic theory of matter, not matter and form
Galileo Affair
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Galileo (1564-1642) controversy; Church silences Galileo
because of his support of Copernicus
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Actually, Galileo committed the cardinal sin of making fun of his
patron (research sponsor)
Censured in 1633
But the Jesuits also supported Kepler (1571-1630) against
Protestant attackers
Part of Robert Bellarmine’s (1542-1621) argument against
Galileo was that his circular orbits were not consistent with
observations;
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Epicycles explained astronomical observations better than circular
orbits
Okay to use heliocentric system to aid calculations
Philosophical Developments
During the 17th C
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The question of the 17th C: how do we know (epistemology)
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Rationalist: Knowledge is from ideas
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Or maybe we can’t know; rise of modern skepticism
Rene Descartes (1596-1650)
Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)
Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716)
Empiricists: Knowledge is from senses
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Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
Pierre Gassendi (1597-1655)
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)
John Locke (1632-1704)
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Rationalist: Knowledge is from ideas
Rene Descartes (1596-1650)
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Mathematician and founder of analytic geometry and algebra
“I think, therefore I am”
Dualistic approach to mind and body
Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)
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C Philosophy: Rationalists
Mathematician and founder of laws of probability
Member of Jansenists: heretical Catholic group that was very
Augustinian
Pascal’s Wager on the existence of God
Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716)
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Mathematician and founder of calculus
Because God is all good, this must be the best of all possible worlds
Complex metaphysics; many similarities to Stoicism
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Empiricists: Knowledge is from senses
Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
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The modern idea of technological “progress” (in the sense of a steady,
cumulative, historical advance in applied scientific knowledge) began with Bacon’s
The Advancement of Learning
Champions inductive logic based upon extensive observation; proceed from
particular to general
Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679)
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C Philosophy: Empiricists
Atheist and materialist: does not accept natural law of God
Impressed by current scientific advances
Very pessimistic about human nature: social contract with threats of punishments
only way to control behavior
Pierre Gassendi (1597-1655)
Background on Pierre Gassendi
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Born in Champtercier, France 1592 died 1655 in
Paris
One of the most famous physicists of his day
Some beliefs out of step with other natural
philosophers
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Tried to build a philosophical system around Epicureanism
Reject mathematics as best way to describe nature; instead
relied on words and an analysis of all past words spoken on
any topic in combination with experiments
Tried to maintain unity of physics and faith
Gassendi and Christian Classics
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Tried to reconcile physics with Bible, primarily through
commentaries on Genesis, with Epicurean physics and ethics
If later Christian philosophers could ‘rehabilitate’ Aristotle,
Gassendi should be allowed to rehabilitate Epicurus:
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“The early Church Fathers were particularly opposed to Aristotle and his philosophy, and
they displayed extreme animosity against the followers of Aristotle. But when some
philosophers were converted to the faith, they began to set aside the more serious errors of
Aristotle. What remained of Aristotelian philosophy was then accommodated to religion so
successfully that it was no longer suspect and finally became the handmaid ministering to
religion. Therefore I say, just as it was possible in the case of Aristotelian philosophy, which
is now taught publicly, so it is possible with other philosophies such as the Stoic and
Epicurean. All of them have much that is of value and worthy of being learned once the
errors are eliminated and refuted in the same way as the very grave errors of Aristotle were
refuted.” Syntagma Philosophicum, Opera Omnia 1:5.
Gassendi’s Evidence for a Void
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Empirical Evidence
Chemical
 Barometric
 Dynamic
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Historical Christian Evidence
Angels
 Nemesius
 Irenaeus
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Gassendi and the Void
Space and Time
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Voids do actually exist
Space and time are not the same things as corporeal entities
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Space is Infinite and Eternal
Space and time exist independently of God
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Space and tiem may be measured by corporeal entities, but that does
not mean they are corporeal entities
God creates in space and time
Tremendous influence on Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton
Gassendi was not condemned, nor even censured by the Church
The Giant of the Scientific Age:
Isaac Newton
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The most famous man in Europe in his own day and
thereafter until Einstein
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Alexander Pope: “Nature and nature's laws lay hid by night;
God said let Newton be and all was light”
Combined techniques of rationalists and empiricists
Founder of calculus; Fundamental discoveries in optics,
mechanics, gravitation
Very deeply religious; focuses on Biblical exegesis, not
physics, at end of his life
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However he rejected Jesus as divine; considered himself an
Arian
So who thought what about a void?
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A void exists
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Does not exist
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Gassendi, Pascal, Boyle, Newton
Descartes, Hobbes, Leibniz
Belief in necessity of an ether lasts until
Michelson-Morley experiments (1887)
Development of a new secular
philosophy: Enlightenment
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Science (as we now define it) as the basis for
knowledge;
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Toleration as the basis for political-religious
relationship;
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Separation of Church and State
Individual rights, not duty, as basis for political systems
and society;
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Human reason can figure it (anything, everything) out; is
always making progress
Devalue history, tradition
Social contract not natural law as basis of legal system
Becomes an alternative to established religions