11.29.05
Galileo’s Daughter
I just read the fascinating and well written short book Galileo’s Daughter, a historical account of the life, work and trial of Galileo Galilei during the early 1600s told mostly through the letters sent to the renown scientist by his cloistered daughter translated for the first from the original Italian. The book is worth reading in part for the concise yet thorough account of Galileo’s life as well as for the quality and poetry of the language, both in the modern text and in the transcription of the antiquated correspondence. What struck me as particularly poignant though is the similarity of language used by the Catholic church that opposed Galileo’s support for the Copernican view of celestial manners and the arguments being currently made for ‘Intelligent Design’ as a method of opposing evolution and promoting creationism in US schools. Galileo’s design and manufacture of early telescopes allowed him to see a level of detail that convinced him Copernicus was right in supposing the earth revolves around the sun, an observation that was vehemently opposed by the Catholic Church on the grounds it contradicts the literal interpretation of the Bible and considered heretical. At the time scientific findings were subject to religious oversight and censorship and Galileo, a devout Catholic, worried the holy church he held with absolute love and respect would be humiliated if it continued to uphold an order of the universe he believed would come to be disproven. Progressive elements in the church softened their stance by allowing scientists to theorize under the strict requirement they admonish non-endorsed opinions as being ‘only theories’ and ‘unproven’, much as the ‘intelligent design’ cadre is attempting to force doubt over scientific knowledge by legislating doubt over evolution. Compromising a position as this may seem it is little more than a desperate attempt to force an unlikely myth based belief over a logical scientific based one in an attempt to maintain control and a semblance of infallibility over an increasingly sophisticated public. In the case of the motion of the planets, the mounting evidence that the universe did not revolve around the earth on celestial spheres continued to be subdued by the Catholic Church until 1822 when Galileo’s Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems and other scientific texts were finally removed from the list of banned books. It amazes me how little people today seem to have learned from the mistakes that have been made for centuries.