Was the Church right about Galileo after all?

Galileo could have written that the earth revolves around the sun with impunity, if only he had argued for a probability he was unable to prove rather than for a certainty, believes Dr Peter Crane
Tiff: Gion.E0 affair's malign influence upon the relation
ship between science and religion persists after almost 400 years. The Church's condemnation of Galileo's claim that earth is not stationary, but in orbit round the sun, is viewed now with the infallible wisdom of hindsight but, too often, in ignorance of the facts and circumstances applying at the time.
The key fact underlying the whole matter, and in the light of which the Church's part should be judged, is that Galileo did not at any time give a proof of earth's motion. His telescope revealed features of the solar system that were inconsistent with the prevailing earth-centred (Ptolemaic) concept of the universe. Copernicus had advanced a purely theoretical sun-centred concept. and Galileo saw his telescopic findings as support for this system, in which earth moves. He could thus have reasonably claimed a probability, short of proof, for his assertion. Much of modern science is indeed taught in terms of probability rather than of proof, but in Galileo's day actual proofs were expected of science, and he had no such thing.
Moreover, another formidable fact at the time weighed heavily against Galileo. For the assumed Ptolemaic universe was tiny, stretching too little beyond Saturn. And earth's motion in an orbit many millions of miles wide would this have caused the bearings of the stars in relation to earth to vary appreciably through the year. No such aviation was apparent. Many scientists were accordingly unable to accept Galileo's claim.
It is also a fact that an Inquisition member. Cardinal Bellarmine, assured Galileo that the Church would abandon traditional readings of relevant passages of Scripture. given proof of earth's motion. This held to an ancient Catholic principle, accepted both, that reli gion and science could not be in conflict. This point is crucial: Galileo was never ordered to choose between science and faith. The controversy centred not on dogma but on discipline; Galileo was instructed in 1616 not to defend the Copernican idea in the absence of proof of earth's motion. This canon teaching what the Church held to be heretical was surely neither surprisingly nor particularly blameworthy.
In fact, Galileo broke his promise not to promulgate the doctrine and in 1632 was charged with abusing the good faith of the Church. Galileo was evidently headstrong, impatient and somewhat short on tact and diplomacy with those who did not share his opinions. He went on to publish these opinions in a
"Dialogue" in which he also ridiculed the authority of the Church. But still he was treated with much indulgence. He was unable to appreciate, so it seems, the Church's concern to avoid revising long held interpretation of Scripture, and thereby undermining tradition.Theology, too, was seen as Queen of the Sciences (Aquinas).
The Pope of the time, Urban VIII, never himself taught that the sun-centred concept was heretical: he did not believe it to be so, only that the theory as it stood was rash and "unsettling to simple minds".
Fr Baldigiani at that time summed up the affair he (Galileo) had been more prudent; if he had preserved the ideas of Copernicus in all their integrity, and if he had altered his mode of procedure, he would never have met the opposition he did." And in recent times Dampier wrote that "Galileo's "persecution" has been exaggerated he only suffered mild up! inland and detention".
Finally, some modern wisdom with hindsight. The Relativity theory does not allow the sun or anything else to be stationary; neither absolute motion nor absolute stationary has physical meaning. Sir Fred Hoyle, on the rival
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remarked: "Tuday we cannot say one is right and the other wrong in a meaningful physical sense."
Maybe after all theology is secure on her queenly throne.Supporters of evolution theory have been seen as "Galileos"and opponents as present-day "inquisitors". Well, great advances in molecular biology have shed much light on the evolution/creation dispute, resulting in not a few scientists believing the theory to be seriously flawed.
However that may be, evolution, as an explanation of the existence of species in scientific terms, is fatally flawed as a stick with which to heat religion. The ultimate building-brick of the entire, comprehensive, living world is the living cell, an entity of immense complexity and sophistication. Thorpe (Purpose in a World of Chance) asserts that there exists not even an outline of a theory of evolution of the living cell. As for its accidental arrival, here is Hoyle again: "The likelihood of life being formed by chance from inanimate matter is one over a figure with 40,000 noughts after it — enough to bury Darwin and the whole theory of evolution; and if the beginnings of life were not random, they were the product of purposeful intelligence."
A teacher at a Catholic school complained that their sixth formers' doubts about Catholic beliefs were inspired by 19th century scientific ideas. A wholly deplorable and unnecessary state of affairs.
THESE 6TH FURRIERS had problems with miracles; it is true that science 100 years ago could not accommodate the miraculous. But the two main objections to a miracle, still held evidently, are that it offends common-sense, and that it is impossible anyway because it would break scientific law. Modern physics has blown these objections away for ever.
Many concepts in physics are utterly alien to our common-sense perceptions; one example is from particle physics. Atomic particles "spin", about which we can only say that the particle turns twice before presenting its face again, and that all particles are like waves ... sometimes.
Science is a progressive revelation, and a law is a relationship found to hold between two variables, so far,. Next week a test under new conditions may contradict that law. which is then broken; it has happened. The law is no longer universal.
The progress of science has been tnarked by the breaking of laws. Examples abound and one only must suffice now. As a young person I learnt that the simple law of Ohm, for electric circuits, was always and everywhere dependable. And so it seems. But very many years later that law was broken at very low temperatures; superconductivity.
Laws tend to be broken in unprecedented conditions and the occasion of a miracle is surely such. Our sixth formers, and many others more senior, do not need more than some awareness of today's science.