09 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Bryan Would Lose His Religion if He Studied Evolution
Direct observation of the testimony of the earth ... is a matter of the laboratory, of the field naturalist, of indefatigable digging among the ancient archives of the earth's history. If Mr. Bryan, with an open heart and mind, would drop all his books and all the disputations among the doctors and study first hand the simple archives of Nature, all his doubts would disappear; he would not lose his religion; he would become an evolutionist. 1 
notes
notesFor the evidence is so overwhelming in the book of nature.
25 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
Gains and Loses in Man's Empirical View
I may hand over to men their fortunes, now their understanding is emancipated and come as it were of age; whence there cannot but follow an improvement in man's estate and an enlargement of his power over nature. For man by the fall fell at the same time from his state of innocency and from his dominion over creation. Both of these losses however can even in this life be in some part repaired; the former by religion and faith, the latter by arts and sciences. For creation was not by the curse...Folksonomies: nature empiricism
Folksonomies: nature empiricism
1 notes
notesMan loses his innocence and dominion over creation, but gains in his estate and power over nature.
25 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
The Greatest Greeks Did Not Set Up Schools
Now the wisdom of the Greeks was professorial and much given to disputations, a kind of wisdom most adverse to the inquisition of truth. Thus that name of Sophists, which by those who would be thought philosophers was in contempt cast back upon and so transferred to the ancient rhetoricians, Gorgias, Protagoras, Hippias, Polus, does indeed suit the entire class: Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, Epicurus, Theophrastus, and their successors Chrysippus, Carneades, and the rest. There was this difference ... 1 notes
notesThey were too busy doing science to produce useful knowledge than to waste time profiting on their ideas.
25 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
The Greatest Greek Minds Did Not Prosthletize
Now the wisdom of the Greeks was professorial and much given to disputations, a kind of wisdom most adverse to the inquisition of truth. Thus that name of Sophists, which by those who would be thought philosophers was in contempt cast back upon and so transferred to the ancient rhetoricians, Gorgias, Protagoras, Hippias, Polus, does indeed suit the entire class: Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, Epicurus, Theophrastus, and their successors Chrysippus, Carneades, and the rest. There was this difference ...They observed quietly and documented their observations and their truth survives the ages more concretely than the rhetoric of Plato or Aristotle.
25 JUL 2011 by ideonexus
The Platonic School Believed Nothing Was Knowable
A caution must also be given to the understanding against the intemperance which systems of philosophy manifest in giving or withholding assent, because intemperance of this kind seems to establish idols and in some sort to perpetuate them, leaving no way open to reach and dislodge them.
This excess is of two kinds: the first being manifest in those who are ready in deciding, and render sciences dogmatic and magisterial; the other in those who deny that we can know anything, and so introduce... 1 notes
notesThey believed science and nature were simply shadows, mere reflections of a reality we could never hope to truly know.
