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Conflict thesis

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For a socio-historical theory with a similar name, see Conflict theory.
Conflict: Galileo before the Holy Office, by Joseph-Nicolas Robert-Fleury, a 19th century depiction of the Galileo Affair, religion suppressing heliocentric science.

The conflict thesis is the proposition that there is an intrinsic intellectual conflict between religion and science and that the relationship between religion and science inevitably leads to public hostility. The thesis, refined beyond its most simplistic original forms, remains generally popular. However, historians of science no longer support it. [1][2][3][4]

The historical conflict thesis

John William Draper
Andrew Dickson White

The scientist John William Draper and the intellectual Andrew Dickson White were the most influential exponents of the Conflict Thesis between religion and science. In the early 1870s, Draper was invited to write a History of the Conflict between Religion and Science (1874), a book replying to contemporary issues in Roman Catholicism, such as the doctrine of papal infallibility, and mostly criticising what he claimed to be anti-intellectualism in the Catholic tradition,[5] yet assessing that Islam and Protestantism had little conflict with science. Draper’s preface summarises the conflict thesis:

The history of Science is not a mere record of isolated discoveries; it is a narrative of the conflict of two contending powers, the expansive force of the human intellect on one side, and the compression arising from traditionary faith and human interests on the other.[6]

In 1896, White published the History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom, the culmination of over thirty years of research and publication on the subject, criticizing what he saw as restrictive, dogmatic forms of Christianity. In the introduction, White emphasized he arrived at his position after the difficulties of assisting Ezra Cornell in establishing a university without any official religious affiliation.

James Joseph Walsh, M.D., criticized White’s scientific perspective as anti-historical in The Popes and Science; the History of the Papal Relations to Science During the Middle Ages and Down to Our Own Time (1908), [7] a book dedicated to Pope Pius X, the historian of medicine:

. . . the story of the supposed opposition of the Church and the Popes and the ecclesiastical authorities to science in any of its branches, is founded entirely on mistaken notions. Most of it is quite imaginary. Much of it is due to the exaggeration of the significance of the Galileo incident. Only those who know nothing about the history of medicine and of science continue to harbor it. That Dr. White’s book, contradicted as it is so directly by all serious histories of medicine and of science, should have been read by so many thousands in this country, and should have been taken seriously by educated men, physicians, teachers, and even professors of science who want to know the history of their own sciences, only shows how easily even supposedly educated men may be led to follow their prejudices rather than their mental faculties, and emphasizes the fact that the tradition that there is no good that can possibly come out of the Nazareth of the times before the reformation, still dominates the intellects of many educated people who think that they are far from prejudice and have minds perfectly open to conviction. . . .[8]

In God and Nature (1986), David Lindberg and Ronald Numbers report that "White's Warfare apparently did not sell as briskly as Draper's Conflict, but in the end it proved more influential, partly, it seems, because Draper's strident anti-Catholicism soon dated his work and because White's impressive documentation gave the appearance of sound scholarship".[9] During the 20th century, historians’ acceptance of the Conflict Thesis declined until rejected in the 1970s, David B. Wilson notes:

Despite the growing number of scholarly modifications and rejections of the conflict model from the 1950's . . . in the 1970s leading historians of the nineteenth century still felt required to attack it. . . . Whatever the reason for the continued survival of the conflict thesis, two other books on the nineteenth century that were published in the 1970s hastened its final demise among historians of science. . . 1974. . . Frank Turner. . . Between Science and Religion . . . Even more decisive was the penetrating critique "Historians and Historiography" . . . [by] James Moore . . . at the beginning of his Post-Darwinian Controversies (1979). [10]

Contemporary views

Academic

Contemporary scholarship does not support the Conflict Thesis. Biologist Stephen Jay Gould said: "White’s and Draper’s accounts of the actual interaction between science and religion in Western history do not differ greatly. Both tell a tale of bright progress continually sparked by science. And both develop and utilize the same myths to support their narrative, the flat-earth legend prominently among them". [11] In a summary of the historiography of the Conflict Thesis, Colin Russell said that "Draper takes such liberty with history, perpetuating legends as fact that he is rightly avoided today in serious historical study. The same is nearly as true of White, though his prominent apparatus of prolific footnotes may create a misleading impression of meticulous scholarship”.[12]

In Science & Religion, Gary Ferngren proposes a complex relationship between religion and science:

While some historians had always regarded the Draper-White thesis as oversimplifying and distorting a complex relationship, in the late twentieth century it underwent a more systematic reevaluation. The result is the growing recognition among historians of science that the relationship of religion and science has been much more positive than is sometimes thought. Although popular images of controversy continue to exemplify the supposed hostility of Christianity to new scientific theories, studies have shown that Christianity has often nurtured and encouraged scientific endeavour, while at other times the two have co-existed without either tension or attempts at harmonization. If Galileo and the Scopes trial come to mind as examples of conflict, they were the exceptions rather than the rule.[13]

Some contemporary historians of science, such as Peter Barker, Bernard R. Goldstein, and Crosbie Smith propose that scientific discoveries, such as Kepler's laws of planetary motion in the 17th century, and the reformulation of physics in terms of energy, in the 19th century, were driven by religion.[14] Religious organizations and clerics figure prominently in the broad histories of science, until the professionalization of the scientific enterprise, in the 19th century, led to tensions between scholars taking religious and secular approaches to nature.[15] Even the prominent examples of religion’s anti-intellectualism, the Galileo affair (1614) and the Scopes trial (1925), were not pure instances of conflict between science and religion, but included personal and political facts in the development of each conflict.[16]

Richard H. Jones has recently proposed a "control" model that incorporates elements of both the conflict thesis and also the idea that religion can support science.[17] Under the control model, religion will provide tacit or explicit support for scientific theories and research as long as scientific findings support religious doctrines. Religion can support science by making suggestions for research and by offering a cultural "legitimation" for a theory or for science in general. But religious institutions will attempt to assert religious "control beliefs" over any scientific theories that appear to conflict with a core religious doctrine. The Galileo affair and the conflict over evolution are prime examples. To support his thesis, Jones has written a history of Christian ideas in science illuminated from this point of view.[18]

Popular, scientific, and religious views

Science historian Ronald Numbers suggests the conflict theory lingers in a popular belief, inclusive of scientists and clerics alike, that history reflects an intrinsic and inevitable anti-intellectual conflict between (Judeo-Christian) religion and science, a misconception perpetuated by the polemics surrounding controversies like creation–evolution, stem cells, and birth control.[19] Some scholars, such as Brian Stanley and Denis Alexander propose that mass media is partly responsible for popularizing conflict theory,[20] most notably the Flat-earth myth that prior to Columbus people believed the Earth was flat.[21] David C. Lindberg and Numbers point out that “there was scarcely a Christian scholar of the Middle Ages who did not acknowledge Earth's sphericity and even know its approximate circumference".[21][22] Numbers gives the following as mistakes arising from conflict theory that have gained widespread currency: "the Church prohibited autopsies and dissections during the Middle Ages", "the rise of Christianity killed off ancient science", and "the medieval Christian church suppressed the growth of the natural sciences".[19]

See also

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References

  1. ^ Russel, C.A. (2002). Ferngren, G.B. (ed.). Science & Religion: A Historical Introduction. Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 7. ISBN 0-8018-7038-0. The conflict thesis, at least in its simple form, is now widely perceived as a wholly inadequate intellectual framework within which to construct a sensible and realistic historiography of Western science
  2. ^ Shapin, S. (1996). The Scientific Revolution. University of Chicago Press. p. 195. In the late Victorian period it was common to write about the 'warfare between science and religion' and to presume that the two bodies of culture must always have been in conflict. However, it is a very long time since these attitudes have been held by historians of science.
  3. ^ Brooke, J. H. (1991). Science and Religion: Some Historical Perspectives. Cambridge University Press. p. 42. In its traditional forms, the conflict thesis has been largely discredited.
  4. ^ Ferngren, G.B. (2002). Ferngren, G.B. (ed.). Science & Religion: A Historical Introduction. Johns Hopkins University Press. p. x. ISBN 0-8018-7038-0. ... while [John] Brooke's view [of a complexity thesis rather than an historical conflict thesis] has gained widespread acceptance among professional historians of science, the traditional view remains strong elsewhere, not least in the popular mind.
  5. ^ Alexander, D (2001), Rebuilding the Matrix, Lion Publishing, ISBN 0-7459-5116-3 (pg. 217)
  6. ^ John William Draper, History of the Conflict Religion, D. Appleton and Co. (1881)
  7. ^ Fordam University Press, 1908, Kessinger Publishing, reprinted 2003. ISBN 0-7661-3646-9 Reviews: [1] [2]
  8. ^ Walsh, James Joseph, The Popes and Science; the History of the Papal Relations to Science During the Middle Ages and Down to Our Own Time, Fordam University Press, New York 1908, p. 19.
  9. ^ David C. Lindberg, Ronald L. Numbers, God & Nature: Historical Essays on the Encounter Between Christianity and Science, University of California Press (April 29, 1986)
  10. ^ Wilson, David B. The Historiography of Science and Religion in Ferngren, Gary B. (2002). Science & Religion: A Historical Introduction. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 0-8018-7038-0. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help) p. 21, 23
  11. ^ Gould, S.J. (1996). "The late birth of a flat earth". Dinosaur in a Haystack: Reflections in Natural History. New York: Crown: 38–52.
  12. ^ Russell, Colin A., “The Conflict of Science and Religion”, Encyclopedia of the History of Science and Religion, p. 15, New York 2000
  13. ^ Gary Ferngren (editor). Science & Religion: A Historical Introduction. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-8018-7038-0. (Introduction, p. ix)
  14. ^ Barker, Peter, and Goldstein, Bernard R. "Theological Foundations of Kepler's Astronomy". Osiris, Volume 16: Science in Theistic Contexts, University of Chicago Press, 2001, pp. 88–113; Smith, Crosbie. The Science of Energy: A Cultural History of Energy Physics in Victorian Britain. London: The Athlone PRess, 1998.
  15. ^ See, for example, the chapters on "Geology and Paleontology" (by Nicolaas A. Rupke), "Natural History" (by Peter M. Hess), and "Charles Darwin" (by James Moore) in Gary Ferngren (ed.), Science and Religion: A Historical Introduction.
  16. ^ Blackwell, Richard J., "Galileo Galilei", Science and Religion: A Historical Introduction; Larson, Edward J. Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America's Continuing Battle over Science and Religion. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1997.
  17. ^ Jones, Richard H., For the Glory of God: The Role of Christianity in the Rise and Development of Modern Science, vol., 1. Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 2011.
  18. ^ Jones, Richard H., For the Glory of God: The Role of Christianity in the Rise and Development of Modern Science, vol. 2. Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 2012.
  19. ^ a b Ronald Numbers (Lecturer) (May 11 2006). Myths and Truths in Science and Religion: A historical perspective (Video Lecture). University of Cambridge (Howard Building, Downing College): The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion. {{cite AV media}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  20. ^ “Templeton Foundation Post-dinner Discussion”, after the Myths and Truths in Science and Religion: A historical perspective lecture Ronald Numbers, 11 May 2006, at St Edmunds College, Cambridge; the transcript is available at http://www.st-edmunds.cam.ac.uk/faraday/CIS/Numbers/
  21. ^ a b Jeffrey Russell. Inventing the Flat Earth: Columbus and Modern Historians. Praeger Paperback; New Ed edition (30 January 1997). ISBN 0-275-95904-X; ISBN 978-0-275-95904-3.
  22. ^ Lindberg, David C.; Numbers, Ronald L. (1986). "Beyond War and Peace: A Reappraisal of the Encounter between Christianity and Science". Church History. 55 (3). Cambridge University Press: 338–354. doi:10.2307/3166822. JSTOR 3166822.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)

Further reading

  • Barbour, Ian G. When Science Meets Religion. HarperSanFrancisco, 2000.
  • Brooke, John H., Margaret Osler, and Jitse M. van der Meer, (editors). "Science in Theistic Contexts: Cognitive Dimensions," Osiris, 2nd ser., vol. 16 (2001), ISBN 0-226-07565-6.
  • Ferngren, Gary (editor). Science & Religion: A Historical Introduction. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-8018-7038-0
  • Jones, Richard H., For the Glory of God: The Role of Christianity in the Rise and Development of Modern Science. Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 2011. ISBN 978-0-7618-5566-8
  • Lindberg, David C. and Ronald L. Numbers, eds., God & Nature: Historical Essays on the Encounter Between Christianity and Science. University of California Press, 1986.
  • Lindberg and Numbers, "Beyond War and Peace: A Reappraisal of the Encounter between Christianity and Science," Perspectives on Science and Christian Faith 39 (1987):140-49. (Can be found online here
  • Merton, Robert K. Science, Technology, and Society in Seventeenth Century England. Osiris 4(1938): 360-632. Reprinted New York: Harper & Row, 1970. (Advances the thesis that Puritanism contributed to the rise of science.)
  • Westfall, Richard S. Science and Religion in Seventeenth-Century England. New Haven: Yale Univ. Pr. 1958. Reprinted Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Pr., 1973. ISBN 0-472-06190-9
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