Galileo's Mistake: A New Look at the Epic Confrontation between Galileo and the Church

Wade Roland tries to debunk what he calls the myth that Galileo ["G"] was condemned by the Catholic Church for promulgating the truth of the Copernican hypothesis. The book contains a pretty good recounting of the procedure leading up to G's censure. It argues that the Church found G guilty of disobeying an injunction to avoid teaching the Copernican theory as the truth, irrespective of anything in Scripture. Specifically, the controversy involved a dispute over the nature of truth.The Church, through Cardinal Bellarmine [a pretty smart guy] argued that science was not the only source of truth. Bellarmine had the good sense to say that where the Scriptures appeared to say something that reason would seem to contravene, the interpretation of Scripture should take that information into account. However, he wanted to preserve the Chursh's Aristotilian teleological perspective, and was very much against any attempt [like G's] to make God subject to laws.More than a decade after being warned by Bellarmine to be careful about asserting that science was the only way of ascertaining truth, Galileo published "Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems" in the form of a discussion among three interlocutors, one espousing the Copernican system, one [aptly named "Simplicio"] espousing the Ptolemaic system, and a third acting as a sort of referee. The "Dialogue" did not take the form of a scholarly scientific paper, but rather, was directed to the intelligent lay man.The author mimics G by having much of his book take the form of a discussion among three interlocutors: (1) an atheist, Berkowitz; (2) a very clever and extremely knowledgeable nun, Sister Celeste [the same name as G's favorite daughter]; and the author as referee. The author is as clearly in favor of Sister Celeste as G was in favor of the Copernican system.The author correctly points out that there was no solid proof in G's time that Copernicus was right. In fact, the Copernican system was flawed because it attempted to describe all planetary motion as circular. The Copernican planets moved in perfect circles, but not around the same center. Only after Kepler formulated his three laws that science was able to describe the planetary orbits as ellipses with the sun at one of the two foci.The author claims Kepler was a superior scientist to Galileo because he first formulated the elliptical orbits. In that, the author is innaccurate. Kepler formulated three laws that implied that the orbits were elliptical, but did not expressly say so. Newton was the first to show the orbits were ellipses, and even came up with a theory of why that was so. To say Kepler was a superior scientist to Galileo seems absurd to me. Kepler came to his conclusions through a number of rationales, some of which were quite mystical and anything but scientific. He happened to get the right [or, to be more precise, more elegant] answer about planetary orbits partly because he had access to Tyco Brahe's remarkable data. Kepler made no other significant scientific discoveries. Galileo made many, among others setting up the foundations of kinematics. G remained a real scientist in his method and conclusions, even though he was mistaken about the cogency of oceanic tides as evidence of the Copernican theory.Galileo got into hot water because he rather clearly implied [through the structure of the "Dialogue"] that reason and observation were superior to Scripture in determining truth. Incidently, he later recanted that assertion by reinterpreting the "Dialogue" to say that was not his intention. I rather doubt the sincerity of G's recantation.Rowland's principal fault is that he presumes that religion is in some way "true," but [no surprise to me] never cites a single true statement coming from a religious or Scriptural source. He takes for granted that God exists and is infinitely powerful, and that therefore God is not bound by scientific laws. Thus, he concludes, that G was mistaken in asserting the primacy of reason informed by observation. Rowland mischaracterizes the nature of scientific inquiry. He points out that atomic physicists never see the sub-atomic particles that are the essential building blocks of their theories, and so act with as much [blind] faith as religious people. This is utter nonsence. He asserts that science deals only with models, not with the underlying reality of the world. He asserts that religion deals with the underlying reality. Science does make a leap of faith of sorts. The leap is that our senses give us truthful information about underlying reality. Once that leap is made, all other conclusions are based on observations and deductions made from them, assuming the observations are accurate. The fact that no one sees atoms does not belie that assertion. The theory of atoms is based on inferences ultimately drawn from observable data. All scientific propositions are theoretically falsifiable through new reasoning or new observations. Not so for religious doctrine, which is based only on authority and is not falsifiable.For his historical narrative and analysis, I give Rowland 4+ stars; for his lack of reasoning and blind support of religion, I give 1- star.(JAB)