> On Sep 8, 1:24 pm, doug xx.com> wrote:
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>> tadams...@yahoo.com wrote:

>>> On Sep 2, 10:49 am, Jerry Kraus yahoo.com> wrote:

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>>>>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.

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>>>>http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0801299.htm

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>>>>...
>>>>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.

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>>>>"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.

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>>>>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."

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>>>>...

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>>>>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?

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>>>>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?

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>>> If I understand Jerry correctly, he is just saying that the Church use
>>> to put a high penalty on exposing a scientific theory with inadequate
>>> proof.

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>>> Standards have certainly declined since the 17th Century.  These days,
>>> a scientist would get nothing more than a rejection letter for his
>>> paper if proof was substandard.

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>>> Contrast this with the treatment of Giordano Bruno.  Unlike Galileo,
>>> Bruno refused to fully recant on his support of Copernicus'
>>> Heliocentric Theory and he claimed that the Sun was just another star
>>> in infinite space.  After his conviction at the Inquisition in Rome,
>>> his jaw was clamped shut with a iron gag, his tongue was pierced with
>>> an iron spike, and another was driven into his palate.  Then he was
>>> burned at the stake.

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>> According to Jerry, this probably because he misspelled something and
>> that, of course, justified his treatment and he should have been
>> happy that they treated him so leniently.- Hide quoted text -

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>> - Show quoted text -

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> Seriously, I have read that Peter Waldo (founder of the Waldesians)
> was condemned in his Inquisition because he used the wrong verb tense!- Hide quoted text -
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> - Show quoted text -