by Michael Greaney

Created on: June 08, 2009

Once upon a time (meaning that mythical period prior to last week) Galileo was taking a carriage ride with his good friend, Cardinal Baronius of the Roman Curia (the Papal Court). Galileo was expounding his ideas about the heliocentric theory as opposed to the prevailing Ptolemaic (geocentric) theory of how the solar system was arranged. Galileo's point was that the official interpretation of the Bible would have to be changed to accommodate to his discoveries. Cardinal Baronius listened carefully, and then reminded his friend of a fact that the great scientist seemed to have overlooked: "The Bible tells us how to go to heaven . . . not how the heavens go."

Cardinal Baronius' point was that, contrary to some of the claims emanating from people who worship science instead of God (as opposed to real scientists, who usually know what has been proved and what has not), there can never be any conflict between science and religion, or (as it is often stated) between reason and faith. Each has its sphere of competence, and, being true, can never contradict one another, regardless how our understanding of science or religion may come into conflict.

The problem is that many people don't realize that, while that which is true is as true, and true in the same way as everything else that is true, we reach our conclusions about what is true in different ways. The scientific method (which, by the way, was developed by medieval monks applying the science of philosophy to natural law principles) is based on deductive reasoning. That is, you make a statement or state a hypothesis. You then subject it to tests in order to determine its validity. If your statement or hypothesis is true, you develop other statements or hypotheses, test them, and so advance scientific knowledge.

What confuses many people is that religious truths are subject to a different type of logic: inductive reasoning, not deductive. This (despite his claims to the contrary) is what the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes used. Thus, we find evidence that something has happened, whether cigarette ash or a universe. From this we induce (not deduce) that something caused the evidence to exist, whether it is a man or woman smoking a certain kind of tobacco, or a Creator exercising His creative power.

Having proved that something or someone caused something else to happen (as is logical through the process of induction: every effect has a cause), we can then examine the evidence and develop a theory

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