> Modern scientists tend to misinterpret the recent rehabilitation of
> Galileo Galilei as indicating that Church admits that they were wrong
> to prosecute him, at the time.  This is most certainly not the the
> case.  All the Church is saying is that Galileo was not a bad person,
> and that his writings, even his satires of the Church,  no longer pose
> any social threat.
>
> http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0801299.htm
>
> ...
> Jesuit Father Sabino Maffeo, the Vatican Observatory's vice director
> for administration, told CNS that Galileo ran into trouble with the
> Holy Office because he did not have proof for his claims.
>
> "Not having proof ... (the Holy Office) was forced to hold on to the
> centuries-old concept" that saw Earth as the center of the cosmos, he
> said.
>
> If he had had proof, which did not come for another 100 years with
> discoveries made by Isaac Newton, Galileo's fate could have been much
> different, Father Maffeo said. He added that Italian Cardinal Robert
> Bellarmine, who was part of the 17th-century Vatican commission that
> admonished Galileo not to hold or defend the Copernican theory, had
> told Galileo "the day in which you bring a demonstration then we will
> have to look at how sacred Scripture gets interpreted differently,
> but
> as long as there is no proof, we will continue to interpret
> (Scripture) literally as we have all along."
>
> ...
>
> What would have happened if the Church had not prosecuted or censured
> Galileo?  Would Newton have had the same incentive to develop his
> comprehensive Copernican explanation of the Universe?  Would society
> have been destabilized by lack of faith in the Church and conventional
> social order?
>
> What implications does this example have for modern Church criticisms
> of scientific theories such as Evolution and the Big Bang?  Does the
> Church, or other social institutions have some role in integating
> scientific concepts into the broader social perspective?  Was Galileo
> a kind of idiot-savant, not understanding how to fully develop his own
> ideas?  Is this a common problem among scientists in general, who are
> not holistic thinkers, however skilled they may be in their own
> speciality?