It is often maintained that Bruno was executed because of his Copernicanism and his belief in the infinity of inhabited worlds. In fact, we do not know the exact grounds on which he was declared a heretic because his file is missing from the records. Scientists such as Galileo and Johannes Kepler were not sympathetic to Bruno in their writings.
Which would rather destroy the usefulness to which the ashes of Bruno have been put, neo-atheistically.
I've got to work this afternoon so I'd ask if anyone has a link to any reputably sourced, primary source material containing what either Galileo or Kepler had to say about Bruno. If I have the time later I will see what I can find but I would rather not post something if I can't find it online and can provide a link. Not that the neo-atheists would bother to look up a citation of something that didn't go along with their mythology.
Can't help immediately with word on Galileo's opinion of Bruno, but according to New Advent Bruno was a Catholic priest who "cast off all allegiance to his order" and wandered Europe pissing people off. He went to Oxford for awhile and enjoyed the protection of Queen Elizabeth, but when Oxford wouldn't give him a job he wrote "The Ash Wednesday Supper" complaining that the Oxford dons knew more about beer than about Greek.
ReplyDeleteHe was excommunicated by the Lutherans (pissed them off, too, apparently), and wound up in Venice where he was finally extradited to Rome to face charges of heresy. New Advent says he was executed on the grounds of his theological positions, not his scientific ones. But then, we've had that discussion before.
Here's the link: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03016a.htm
He does seem to have been a man who was addicted to making himself the center of controversy. He seemed to have made that his career for several decades. I wounder how long he'd have lasted in Stalin's, Mao's, the Kim's, Pol Pot's or even the German Democratic Republic with that propensity. I'll bet he couldn't have gotten a faculty position at any American university with his beliefs, PZ and Jerry Coyne would see to it that he'd never work in the English speaking world, or at least do their best to make sure that happened. Look at what they and Sean Carroll did to Sheldrake and they had to misrepresent what he said to do it.
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