CHRISTIANITY: A CAUSE OF MODERN SCIENCE?
by Eric V. Snow*
The Duhem-Jaki and Merton Theses Explained
Did Christianity hinder the development of science? Most intellectuals these days
believe it did, citing as evidence the showdown between Galileo and the Inquisition in
the seventeenth century over geocentrism, and Thomas Huxley embarrassing Bishop
Wilberforce in a climactic debate about evolution in 1860. But is this stereotype
historically accurate? Scholars affirm that modern science arose among the
theologians, monks, and professors of Medieval and Renaissance Catholic universities
and monasteries. But if Christianity and science are supposedly so incompatible, how
did science gradually arise during the Medieval and Renaissance periods in Europe?
After all, neither Galileo nor Copernicus (who maintained the sun was at the center
of the solar system), were unbelievers. Remarkably, as shown by the historical
research of Pierre Duhem, Stanley Jaki, and (partially) Robert Merton, the worldview
of Christianity was necessary for the rise of modern science.
Technological Advance Does Not Equal Science
In order to deny Christianity's role in the rise of science, skeptics make it seem that
all cultures developed "science" by using a weak definition of it. But the inventions
affecting daily life in the pre-modern world were "empirical" discoveries by
craftsmen, not scientists meditating on the laws of nature. Although the Greeks,
Chinese, Indians, and Arabs all had what could be called "science," their science soon
fizzled out, clearly lacking the rigor and vigor that characterized Christendom's
science from Galileo onwards.
The Duhem-Jaki thesis denies that sociological, materialist, externalist causes are
sufficient conditions to create modern science. As Jaki (1988, p.35) says:
This historiography of science has still to face up honestly to the
problem of why three great ancient cultures (China, India, and Egypt)
display, independently of one another, a similar pattern vis-a-vis
science. The pattern is the stillbirth of science in each of them in spite
of the availability of talents, social organization, and peace—the
standard explanatory devices furnished by all-knowing sociologies of
science on which that historiography relies ever more heavily.
Although all of these conditions may be necessary to allow a civilization to develop
science, they are not sufficient. To explain why only one particular civilization
generated a self-sustaining, modern science and not another, we must also look at
their intellectual and philosophical climates.
The Philosophical Ideas a Culture Needs to Develop Science
According to Duhem and Jaki, a civilization must have certain ideas to keep science
self-sustaining, instead of dying out after a few centuries of progress. First, time
should be conceived as linear and potentially quantifiable. This understanding of time
allows the cause-effect relationships of nature to be much more readily noticed since
it clearly distinguishes past, present, and future. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, this
idea stems from the act of God in creating the material universe from nothing at
some specific moment in the past. Time is seen as then marching forward through
the present on into the future to the day of judgment. The alternative pagan view
sees time as repeating itself. The concept of the "Great Year" maintained that
centuries-long time cycles exist. Making permanent progress of any kind theoretically
impossible, the ancient world's conception of time believed the future repeated the
past. This bred a sense of complacency, hindering the development of science. Both
reincarnation and the transmigration of souls reflect this view of time.
Second, if science is to exist, explanations of natural phenomena must avoid a
priori, pseudo-scientific "explanations" that really do not describe the actual causes
of events. Third, the organismic view of nature hinders the development of science.
Believing the whole universe is alive, it perceives the world as one huge organism
that undergoes the above mentioned cyclical process of birth, maturity, death, and
rebirth. Its tie to pantheism—believing everything is God, a view common in
Hinduism (and "New Age" environmentalism!)—is obvious. Today, most Westerners
consider rocks, stars, oceans, etc. to be inanimate objects; the organismic view
regards them as having intelligences of their own. Fourth, denying the reality and
basic orderliness of the universe hampers the development of science. Humans
seldom will investigate carefully what they don't think really exists, or what the gods
or nature herself will change unpredictably at whim.
Fifth, as a subset of the organismic view of nature issue, a scientific astronomy can
only develop if the heavens are not believed to be alive or divine. Sixth, a balance
between reason and faith is necessary. The religious people must not totally reject
natural laws while the scientists must not deny the possibility of religious truth. And
seventh, man needs to be seen as fundamentally different from the rest of nature,
having a mind that makes him qualitatively different from the animals. In the JudeoChristian worldview, Genesis implicitly makes this point, since man and woman were
made in God's image and were given dominion over the animals (Genesis 1:26-29).
Reincarnation denies this by claiming the souls of animals enter humans and vice
versa as they die and are reborn.
Christian Ideas Drive Out Pagan Ideas
So long as a great majority of a given culture's intellectuals believe all or most of
these false ideas, a self-sustaining science can't arise, especially a true science of
physical objects in the external real world. Christianity's worldview contained ideas
about the nature of the universe which drove out pagan concepts that had prevented
the development of science. For these reasons, in his majestic ten-volume work, Le
Systeme du Monde, Pierre Duhem declared that the birth of science came in 1277
with the Bishop of Paris' condemnation of 219 assorted (Aristotelian) philosophical
conceptions.
Some civilizations had all or most of these false ideas (such as Hindu India), some
had fewer (China), and one or two still fewer (Islam). Correspondingly, the last
progressed further in science compared to the first two since it accepted these ideas
less, and the second more than the first. For instance, the Chinese lacked the
delusion that the heavens were divine and/or living. But this idea appears in
On the Heavens, a very influential work by the ancient Greek philosopher
Aristotle. This idea inhibited indigenous Islamic science permanently. But almost all
these faulty intellectual ideas ultimately combined to crush Hindu science: It denied
the external real world and its orderliness, it espoused eternal cycles and the
organismic view of nature, and it proclaimed the divinity of the heavens. To the
extent Hindu ideas influenced Chinese thought through Buddhism, Chinese science
was strangled in its cradle. Islamic science might have become self-sustaining, if its
holy book, the Quran, had not emphasized God's will and power above His reason,
and if Muslim scientists had not been so uncritical of Aristotle's physics while their
top theologians remained so mystical. It is vitally important to realize that new ideas
of Leonardo da Vinci and Galileo didn't just pop out of thin air. Instead, they built
upon the writings of such medieval predecessors as Buridan and Oresme. Duhem
and Jaki strongly emphasize that these two men took the first steps in forming the
conceptual foundations of modern physics by starting to break with Aristotle's
physics.
The Merton Thesis Stated
The Merton thesis sees certain seventeenth-century Puritan moral values as
encouraging scientific work. Merton lists various values that promoted science
among Puritan Englishmen. First, a Christian was to glorify God and serve Him
through doing activities of utility to the community as a whole, not the
contemplative, monastic ideal of withdrawal from the community that characterized
much of Medieval Catholicism. By emphasizing a vocation, again something
collectively useful to the community, Puritanism encouraged diligence, industry, and
hard work. Consequently, the individual chooses the vocation that best suits his
abilities. Reason and education were both praised in this context. Education,
however, was to be practical and not highly literary in content. The scientific method
needs both an empiricist ("practical") and rationalist ("theoretical") approach to
gaining knowledge to work properly, which is an issue Jaki repeatedly returns to.
Puritanism provided both while promoting empiricism by encouraging the search for
the knowledge needed to serve one's calling (i.e., "career") and to be useful to the
community as a whole.
English Puritan Scientists
It's easy to document the religious values and beliefs of many English scientists of
this period. John Ray (1627-1705), the great biologist, told a friend that time spent
investigating nature was well used: "What time you have to spare you will do well to
spend, as you are doing, in the inquisition and contemplation of the works of God
and nature." Forty-two of the 68 founding members of the Royal Society (England's
premier scientific organization) for which their religious background is known were
Puritans. Since the English population was mostly mainstream Anglican in belief, the
high proportion of Puritans in it implies their values encouraged scientific endeavors.
Sir Robert Moray, Sir William Petty, Robert Boyle, John Wilkins, John Wallis, and
Jonathan Goddard were all prominent leaders of the Royal Society—and all Puritans.
Science and Christianity are Compatible
The hard facts of history, as found in the writings of Duhem, Jaki, and Merton,
destroy the common claim of evolutionists that Christianity and science are
necessarily incompatible. Much like how German sociologist Max Weber attributed
the rise of capitalism to Protestantism's values, Merton's thesis maintains that the
values of English Puritanism promoted scientific work. More significantly, Duhem and
Jaki's research insists that the philosophical beliefs of Christianity had to drive out
the anti-scientific conceptions of paganism in order for science to be born. Far from
man's mind, the beliefs of the Bible ultimately freed him from the pagan dogmas that
prevented the expression of his reason through a self-sustaining science.
Selected References
- Stanley Jaki, The Origin of Science and the Science of Its Origin (South
Bend, IN: Regnery/Gateway, 1978).
- Stanley Jaki, The Savior of Science (Washington, DC: Regnery Gateway,
1988).
- Robert K. Merton, "Science in Seventeenth Century England," Osiris,
1938, pp. 360-632.
More specifics and further references are in my essay, "Christianity: A Cause of
Modern Science? The Duhem-Jaki and Merton Theses Explained."
Empiricism maintains knowledge is mostly gained by the senses, while rationalism maintains
knowledge is mostly gained by thinking, reasoning, and logic.
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* Eric V. Snow has a master's degree in history. "Vital Articles on Science/Creation" April 1998, Copyright ©
1998 All Rights Reserved