Ben Stein to take on Darwinism on April 18

[Kasz216]

rocketpig said:

Kasz216 said:

rocketpig said:
Not everything the church has done is bad, let's not go down that path... In that vein of thought, Copernicus originally set out to prove that the Sun revolved around the Earth and we all know how that turned out. The church didn't exactly appreciate his findings and it led to several fiercely fought battles over the next two centuries.

The church may have funded science in some forms during the dark ages but often times if the discoveries didn't agree with their teachings, the knowledge was squashed and the person called a heretic. After all, during that time, the church was really the only establishment that had the kind of power and money to fund the arts or science. Some of the results were good but many, many were bad.

So how can you claim the Church held back science when they were the only ones who could fund it? Had they not funded it at all would it not have been in a worse state?

Had we not had such strong religious institutions it seems rather dubious that anywhere near the amount of progress that was made would have been made.

Because much of the information learned was tossed to the side by the church. In some cases if scientists were acting outside of their sphere of influence, they brought the hammer down on them. Research what the church wants and find the results the church wants to see or face the consequences.

Regardless it seems without the church and religion none of this knowledge including the stuff that was kept would of been found in the first place. Most books that fueled the renisanse came from religious sources.

So while they did do some bad acts... it seems like they scored a net gain for scientific advancement.

Had it not been for them, there likely wouldn't have been a renaissance and instead everything would have been relearned the hard way. The really hard way.

Much how Nixon is punnished for his wrong doings but is still seen better then being bad for the country due to all the good he did. (In a historical context)

I think religion during these periods also gets the pass for having more of a positive influence then it has a negative.

Everything it did in regards to science wasn't good... nor was it bad... but as a whole it helped the furthering of science more then hurt it.