Mythbusting: Are Science and Religion Really at War?

Mythbusting
Are science and religion really at war?

Galileo Goes
to Jail
and other Myths about
science and religion

edited by Dr. Ronald Numbers, (Hilldale
Professor of the History of Science and
Medicine at the University of Wisconsin,
Madison)

Dr. Numbers’ Goal
To confront “The
greatest myth in the
history of science and
religion . . . that they
have been in a state of
constant conﬂict.”
— Ronald Numbers

Genesis of a Myth
In 1874, American polemicist
John William Draper wrote:
“The antagonism we thus
witness between Religion and
Science is the continuation of
a struggle that commenced
when Christianity began to
attain political power...”
(History of the Conﬂict Between
Science and Religion, 1874)

Why is this important to Bahá’ís?

The polarities this “battle” creates is of vital
importance to Bahá’ís because
Our own faith—born three decades before
Draper made the above claim—has as a primary
principle the harmony of science and religion.
The scriptures of the Bahá’í Faith state clearly
that if science and religion seem to disagree,
then we have misunderstood what one or the
other (or perhaps both) are telling us.

The oneness of religion and science
“Any religious belief which is not
conformable with scientiﬁc proof and
investigation is superstition, for true science
is reason and reality, and religion is
essentially reality and pure reason; therefore,
the two must correspond. Religious teaching
which is at variance with science and reason
is human invention and imagination
unworthy of acceptance, for the antithesis
and opposite of knowledge is superstition
born of the ignorance of man. If we say
religion is opposed to science, we lack
knowledge of either true science or true
religion, for both are founded upon the
premises and conclusions of reason, and
both must bear its test.”
— Abdu’l-Bahá

Is Draper’s contention true?

Has science been at war with faith since the dawn of
Christianity?

Christianity?
Dr. Numbers notes that the discussion of the
relationship between science and religion heated up in
the early 19th century when the word “science” came
into vogue to replace the terms “natural philosophy”
and “natural history”.

Christianity?
Dr. Numbers notes that the discussion of the
relationship between science and religion heated up in
the early 19th century when the word “science” came
into vogue to replace the terms “natural philosophy”
and “natural history”.
Up until this point, while there had been some dialogue
around the subject of the roles of faith and reason, no
one was pitting an entity called Religion against a
second entity called Science.

The Christian Philosopher
The ﬁrst English-language book linking science
and religion was the 1823 volume THE
CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER (The Connection of
Science and Philosophy with Religion) by Thomas
Dick.

Dick.
As Bahá’u’lláh was establishing His faith in
Persia with its emphasis on the harmony of
science and faith, there were programs in
several American colleges and seminaries
“demonstrating the harmony of science and
revealed religion” (Numbers).

Dick.
It wasn’t uncommon at this point for men of
science to engage in discourse on scripture (the
Bible, in the West) and for seminarians to
consider scientiﬁc themes.

Dick.
It wasn’t uncommon at this point for men of
science to engage in discourse on scripture (the
Bible, in the West) and for seminarians to
consider scientiﬁc themes.
Science was, to the believer, a way of knowing
God and appreciating His activities in the
universe.

Nicolai
William of Kopernik,
Occam Catholic
Catholic clergyman,
monk, astronomer Moses ben
philosopher
Maimon,
Jewish
rabbinical
scholar,
physician

The involvement of religious Sir Isaac Newton,
Ibn Firnas, astronomer, Anglican theologian,
meteorologist, aviator believers in the work of physicist

science goes back millennia.

al-Khwārizmī,
Muslim.
father of
algebra

Food for Thought
There are religious people who fear and
distrust science, or who see it as being
dangerous and in conﬂict with their
beliefs.

Food for Thought
beliefs.
There are non-religious people who fear
and distrust religion and who see it as
being dangerous and in conﬂict with
their beliefs.

Food for Thought
beliefs.
There are non-religious people who fear
and distrust religion and who see it as
being dangerous and in conﬂict with
their beliefs.
Surprise fact: recent surveys and polls
about religion and science have shown
that, while there is an unhealthy
percentage of people worldwide who
do not accept any theory of evolution as
fact, not all of them are religious or reject
evolution for religious reasons.

Bahá’ís may ﬁnd themselves
in the position of having to
grapple with both scientiﬁc
and religious illiteracy in the
people they interact with.

This means it’s critical that
Bahá’ís have a good grasp of
both science and religion!

Abdu’l-Bahá wrote:
Scientiﬁc knowledge is the highest
attainment upon the human plane, for
science is the discoverer of realities. It is of
two kinds: material and spiritual. Material
science is the investigation of natural
phenomena; divine science is the discovery
and realization of spiritual verities. The
world of humanity must acquire both. A
bird has two wings; it cannot ﬂy with one.
Material and spiritual science are the two
wings of human uplift and attainment.
Both are necessary...

— Abdu’l-Bahá, Promulgation of Universal
Peace, p. 138 (23 May 1912, Cambridge,
MA)

The Scientiﬁc
Mystic:
“Science is an effulgence of the
Sun of Reality, the power of
investigating and discovering the
verities of the universe, the means
by which man ﬁnds a pathway to
God.” — Abdu’l-Bahá

The Mystical
Scientist:
“Do not be afraid of being free
thinkers. If you think strongly
enough you will be forced by science
to the belief in God, which is the
foundation of all Religion. You will
ﬁnd science not antagonistic, but
helpful to Religion.” — Lord Kelvin

A Look at Some Myths
The rise of Christianity began the
demise of science.

The medieval church stifled scientific
thought.

Medieval Christians taught that the
world was flat.

Islam is, and has always been, anti-
science.

Myth: The rise of Christianity
began the demise of science.

Hypatia and Orestes
Hypatia was a 5th Century pagan
mathematician.
When in her sixties, she was torn from her
chariot and slaughtered in an Alexandrian
church by a mob of fanatical Christians.
The story was featured in a 1720 pamphlet
written by John Toland: The History of a Most
Beautiful Lady; Who Was Torn to Pieces by the
Clergy of Alexandria to Gratify the Pride,
Emulation, and Cruelty of the Archbishop,
Commonly but Undeservedly titled Saint Cyril.
Some authorities view Hypatia’s martyrdom as
the “the beginning of the Christian Dark
Ages” (Martin) and the death of science and
math in Alexandria, and hold the story up as
an example of what happens when ignorant
religion conﬂicts with enlightened science.

Hypatia and Orestes
According to a recent biography of
Hypatia by Maria Dzielska:
Hypatia’s work with mathematics
had nothing to do with her death.
She was friends with Orestes, the
regional Roman Prefect, who was
in a political struggle with Cyril
the Not-So-Saintly (Dzielska calls
him “an ambitious and ruthless
churchman eager to extend his
authority”.)
Cyril used Orestes’ friendship with
the pagan Hypatia to blacken his
reputation, even going so far as to
charge the poor old woman with
witchcraft.

Hypatia and Orestes
What evidence do we have that this is
so?

Hypatia and Orestes
so?

Some years after he’d disposed of
Orestes, Cyril went on a campaign
against pagans—NOT natural
philosophers like Hypatia. Those, he
left alone.

Hypatia and Orestes
so?

left alone.

Science and mathematics ﬂourished in
Alexandria for decades to come.

Hypatia and Orestes
so?

left alone.

Science and mathematics ﬂourished in
Alexandria for decades to come.

In other words, the historical record
does not bear out the claim that the
rise of Christianity as a faith tolled the
death knell of science.

Myth: The medieval church
stiﬂed scientiﬁc thought.

“What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?”
—Tertullian

—Tertullian
This question forms the basis of the
myth that the medieval church
actively suppressed the growth of
science.

—Tertullian
This question forms the basis of the
myth that the medieval church
actively suppressed the growth of
science.
“The Church . . . set herself forth as
the depository and arbiter of
knowledge . . . She thus took a
course that determined her whole
future career; she became a
stumbling block in the intellectual
advancement of Europe for more
than a thousand years.” — John
Draper, The History of Conﬂict
Between Religion and Science, (1874)

100 years of lost opportunity?
Carl Sagan’s 1980 book
Cosmos contains a chart of
astronomical progress that
leaves a 1000 year gap
between mathematician
Hypatia (and her
contemporaries) and
Copernicus and DaVinci.
The caption: “a poignant
lost opportunity for
mankind”.

How Dark Was It?
Accomplishments from this scientiﬁcally
“dark” era in Europe include:

How Dark Was It?
William of Saint-Cloud’s work on solar
eclipses,

How Dark Was It?
eclipses,
Dominican friar Dietrich von Freiberg’s
discoveries about rainbows,

How Dark Was It?
eclipses,
Jean Buridan’s application of impetus
theory to explain projectile motion, free-
fall acceleration, and the rotation of the
night sky.

How Dark Was It?
eclipses,
night sky.
Bishop Nicole Oresme’s arguments for
the rotation of the earth,

How Dark Was It?
eclipses,
night sky.
Bishop Nicole Oresme’s arguments for
the rotation of the earth,
Oxford’s natural philosophers application
of mathematics to the study of motion.

How Dark Was It?
We now know that science was
happening in the Middle Ages.
Universities were founded at
Oxford, Bologna, and Paris
before 1200 CE.
By 1500, there were about 60 of
these institutions seeded
around Europe, with about
30% of the curricula dedicated
to the study of the natural
world.

Mythbuster
The organization most
supportive of the ﬁnancial
and educational development
of these institutions was . . .

Mythbuster
The organization most
supportive of the ﬁnancial
and educational development
of these institutions was . . .

. . . the Catholic Church.

Role of the Church
“The Roman Catholic Church
gave more ﬁnancial and social
support to the study of
astronomy for over six centuries,
from the recovery of ancient data
in the late Middle Ages to the
Enlightenment, than any other,
and probably all, other
institutions.” — Science historian
John Heilbron in The Sun in the Church,
Harvard University Press, 1999

Curriculum
The curriculum of these Universities
included:
Theology (the “Queen of
Sciences”)—taught only by
ordained professors to students
who had taken vows.
Natural history
Mathematics
Astronomy
Medicine
All of this with the encouragement
and blessing of the Church.

Let me sum up:
If the Catholic Church
intended to quash the
sciences, its methods were
darned peculiar.

Myth: Medieval Christians
taught that the world was ﬂat.

Why We Should Not Celebrate Columbus Day.


In school, I learned that “everyone” believed
the Earth was ﬂat until the brave Cristobal
Colonne (aka, Christopher Columbus)
argued the point with Isabella and
Ferdinand and sailed off to prove otherwise,
discovering the new world in the process.



How do we know this was a myth?




Because people in the middle ages wrote
things down: few people believed the world
was ﬂat.




Because people in the middle ages wrote
things down: few people believed the world
was ﬂat.

So, why do so many of us today believe they
did?

Columbus & the Flat Earth
The idea that Columbus’ discovered the
Americas, proved the world was a
globe, and ushered in the age of
modernity was introduced in 1828 by
storyteller Washington Irving (Rip van
Winkle) in The Life and Voyages of
Christopher Columbus.

The idea that Columbus’ discovered the
Americas, proved the world was a
globe, and ushered in the age of
modernity was introduced in 1828 by
storyteller Washington Irving (Rip van
Winkle) in The Life and Voyages of
Christopher Columbus.
Almost fifty years later, John Draper
expressed the myth this way: “. . . the
question of the shape of the earth was
finally settled by three sailors,
Columbus, da Gama and, above all,
Ferdinand Magellan.” — History of the
Conflict Between Religion and Science, 1874

According to the reports of
Fernando Colonne, and Father
Bartolome de las Casas, Columbus’
argument with the crowned
heads of Spain was not about the
shape of the planet, but its size.
According to his own diaries and
logs, far from ﬂouting authority,
Columbus was a devout Catholic
who thought he was doing
God’s work by providing the
Church and Crown with riches
and slaves.

Remember the Universities?
University curriculum included Aristotle’s
mathematical proof of the sphericity of the
world.
Natural philosophers whose work supports a
spherical earth include:
Ambrose (d. 420),
Augustine (d. 430),
Aquinus (d. 1274),
Bacon (d. 1294),
Magnus (d. 1280).
Jean de Sacrobosco (d. 1410), archbishop of
Cambrai and author of De Sphera, which
demonstrated the sphericity of the Earth
and which was used as a textbook in
universities throughout the Middle Ages.

Were there Dissenters?
Two early scholars whose words on the
subject are ambiguous are Lactinius
(4th century) and Isadore of Seville
(5th century encyclopedist).
Only one medieval scholar is known
“explicitly to deny the sphericity of the
earth” (ref. Lesley B. Cormack, Dean of
Social Sciences at Simon Fraser
University):
Cosmas Indicopleustes—a
Byzantine monk who developed a
scripturally based cosmological
model that featured Earth as a table-
land.

Was Columbus’ crew afraid of going over the edge?


Nope. But they did grumble a
lot because:


lot because:

1. The voyage was taking too
long.


lot because:

long.
2. The prevailing wind was
westerly and they feared
they wouldn’t be able to
sail east.


lot because:

long.
2. The prevailing wind was
westerly and they feared
they wouldn’t be able to
sail east.
3. There wasn’t enough grog.

Myth: Islam is, and has always
been, anti-science.

Whence the Myth?
This myth has been stated and restated over
time:
“The pious Muslim . . . was expected to
avoid . . . [rational] sciences with great
care because they were considered
dangerous to his faith. . .” — Ignaz
Goldziher (1916)
“. . . possession of all this
‘enlightenment’ [of Greek thought] did
not prompt much intellectual progress
within Islam, let alone eventuate in
Islamic science.” — Rodney Stark (2003)
“Alas, Islam turned against science in the
twelfth century.” — Steve Weinberg (2007)

The Historical Record
Abu Abdullah Mohammad Ibn
Musa al-Khawarizmi—
mathematician, astronomer and
geographer.
He was he was the founder of
several branches and basic concepts
of mathematics.
His surname gives us the term
“algorithm.”
The word “algebra” was derived
from his book Al-Jabr wa-al-
Muqabilah. (The Restoration)

Abbas Ibn Firnas (810 - 887 A.D.)
Invented a water clock.
Manufactured colorless glass.
Developed an armillary to display the
motions of the planets and stars.
Created a “weather” room that mechanically
simulated stars, clouds, thunder, and
lightning.
In 852, he jumped from the minaret of the
Mezquita mosque in Córdoba using a huge
wing-like cloak to break his fall, which he
survived with minor injuries. This was the
ﬁrst example of an early parachute. In 875, at
age of 65, he made the earliest attempt at
ﬂight using a rudimentary glider. He crashed
and injured his back.

Abu Bakr Mohammad Ibn Zakariya al-
Razi (864-930 C.E.) aka Rhazes
His al-Judari wal Hasabah was the first
treatise on smallpox and chicken-pox.
Favored cure through correct and
regulated food combined with an
emphasis on the influence of
psychological factors on health.
Tried proposed remedies on animals first
to evaluate their effects and side effects.
Was also an expert surgeon and was the
first to use opium for anesthesia.

Abu Ali al-Husain ibn Abdallah ibn Sina (aka
Avicenna).
Wrote commentaries on Aristotle’, correcting
what he saw as errors in Aristotle’s logic.
Was one of the earliest pioneers of the
scientiﬁc process of peer review.
Wrote the 14-volume Canon of Medicine, a
standard medical text in Western Europe for 7
centuries. Arabic edition published at Rome
in 1593, Hebrew edition at Naples in 1491.
Correctly asserted that tuberculosis was
contagious.
Described and catalogued the symptoms of
diabetes.

Abū ‘l-Walīd Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad
ibn Rushd (1126 – 1198) (aka Averroes)
Wrote commentaries on the works of
Aristotle, including a rebuttal of The
Incoherence of Philosophers, al-Ghazali’s
polemic against Aristotelean logic.
Wrote medical encyclopedias including
Kulliyat (“Generalities”), from which we
get the European pronunciation Colliget,
possibly the parent of the word “college”.
Wrote works about celestial mechanics.
(He rejected the Ptolemaic system.)
Wrote works of physics.

Let me sum up:
Far from being inimical to
science, documentation shows
that the civilization raised on
the foundation of Muhammad’s
teachings dominated the ﬁeld
of science from roughly
800-1300 CE.

Sc
i on ien
lig ce
Re

Question: Why did religion come
to be seen as the enemy of science?

Medieval Context

Science Religion

Medieval Context
“Science” as a discipline didn’t exist.

Science Religion

Medieval Context
Its progenitor—natural philosophy—wasn’t
distinct from religion or philosophy.

Science Religion

Medieval Context
Beliefs about nature, medicine, wellness, sickness,
natural phenomena and life in general were
Science Religion
studied and written about often with emphasis on
their relationship to God(s).

Medieval Context
Science Religion
The idea that religious folk of this period were
dullards who didn’t think of anything beyond the
pages of the Bible (which they didn’t possess as
such), is cartoonish.

Medieval Context
Science Religion
The study of creation—was seen as the province of
Christian thinkers and non-Christian thinkers
alike.

Medieval Context
Science Religion
The study of creation—was seen as the province of
Christian thinkers and non-Christian thinkers
alike.
It would be centuries before these avenues of
thought were posted with street signs that read
“Science” and “Religion”.

The Thinkers
Christian scholars such as Tertullian
and his contemporary, Tatian had some
disdain for “Athens”.

The Thinkers
“Athens” was short-hand for “pagan”.

The Thinkers
“Athens” was short-hand for “pagan”.
Tatian asked: “What noble thing have
you produced by your pursuit of
philosophy? What of your most
eminent men has been free from vain
boasting? . . . Wherefore be not led
away by the solemn assemblies of
philosophers who are no philosophers,
who dogmatize the crude fancies of the
moment.” (quoted in Galileo Goes to Jail
p. 11)

Augustine on Nonsense
Far from denigrating knowledge, the early
Christian thinkers promoted the beneﬁts of a
knowledgable congregation.
Deploring the ignorance of some Christians,
Saint Augustine wrote: “Even a non-
Christian knows something about the earth,
the heavens, and the other elements . . . about
the motion and orbit of the stars . . . and so
forth, and this knowledge he holds to, as
being certain from reason and experience.
Now it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing
for an inﬁdel [a non-Christian] to hear a
Christian . . . talking nonsense on these
topics; and we should take all means to
prevent such an embarrassing situation, in
which people show up vast ignorance in a
Christian and laugh it to scorn.”

Sound familiar…?
Bahá’u’lláh has expressed a similar sentiment:

Sound familiar…?
“Knowledge is like unto wings for the being (of man)
and is like a ladder for ascending. To acquire
knowledge is incumbent upon all, but of those sciences
which may proﬁt the people of the earth, and not such
sciences as being in mere words and end in mere
words.”

Sound familiar…?
words.”
But He adds:

Sound familiar…?
words.”
But He adds:
“The possessors of sciences and arts have a great right
among the people of the world. Indeed, the real
treasury of man is his knowledge. Knowledge is the
means of honor, prosperity, joy, gladness, happiness
and exaltation.”—The Tajallíyát.

Sound familiar…?
words.”
But He adds:
“The possessors of sciences and arts have a great right
among the people of the world. Indeed, the real
treasury of man is his knowledge. Knowledge is the
means of honor, prosperity, joy, gladness, happiness
and exaltation.”—The Tajallíyát.
Does this indicate a conﬂict with natural
philosophy (aka, science) or, as Tatian puts it,
with those who “dogmatize the crude fancies of
the moment”?

What noble
thing …?
What the Christian
philosophers were arguing,
was the purpose of knowledge,
and the appropriate attitude
toward what one could ferret
out of physical reality.

Applied Knowledge
Yet, both Christian and non-Christian
cite Tertullian to support the view that
there is a war between science and
religion.
But … the difference between the
“scientiﬁc” and “religious” ideologies
was (and is) largely one of attitude.
Christian (and Muslim) natural
philosophers advocated applied
knowledge—knowledge that did not
“begin in mere words and end in mere
words”, but was a tool to be used
toward an understanding of the
purpose of human existence.

Let me sum up:
“Scientiﬁc knowledge is the
highest attainment upon the
human plane, for science is the
discoverer of realities. It is of two
kinds: material and spiritual. ...
The world of humanity must
acquire both.”

—Abdu’l-Bahá

More myths ...
Galileo was tortured and thrown
in prison for his scientiﬁc work.
Nicolai Copernicus dethroned
the Earth.
Giordano Bruno was a martyr to
science.
Christianity gave birth to
modern science.
The “scientiﬁc revolution”
liberated science from religion.
Dogmatic belief is okay as long
as it’s not religious belief.

Mythbusting: Are Science and Religion Really at War?

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