Religion, Philosophy, And Scientific Thinking
During the seventeenth century, many philosophers formulated new ideas that would consequently change the beliefs of the common man. The “thinkers” of the Renaissance Period have the way 17th Century man to the current world. In short, the world viewed religion, philosophy, and science in a very different way by the end of the seventeenth century because of these great philosophers.
In the early 1600’s Blaise Pascal, originally from Clermont, played a dominant two areas of advanced thinking. His mathematical reputation rests more on what he might have done than on what he actually affected, a considerable part of his life he devoted wholly to religious exercises. As a background on the author of Pens?es, no one displayed greater natural genius than Pascal. In Pens?es, Pascal states how God is an almighty power to which man has no comparison. Man cannot grasp neither the concept of infinity nor the vastness of the area to which he lives in. Pascal continues by saying all things, “…meet and reunite…and find each other in God, and in God alone”. Everything in the universe is cause and effect, making it difficult to know a complete part without knowing the basic composition. If humans are composed of a “material” we will know nothing at all, according to Pascal. Going further to say that without a finite ending, man would rapidly overpopulate. Without an infinite space to nourish ones self in, man would contribute to his own downfall. To know God in all his might and infinites, man must understand his surroundings. All things created came from Him, as to be proven by an example of this sheet of paper. The paper comes from a tree, to which came from the Earth, which came the Maker. Likewise, all that surrounds man comes from God, and all that is finite is real.
Philosophy has changed dramatically over time, along with the views of non-philosophers that came to accept these new ideas. Almost one thousand seven hundred years before Pascal lived a Greek philosopher named Plato. The well-known scholar Socrates, in Athens, taught Plato in 407 B.C. In Plato’s, Allegory of the Cave, he metaphorically conveys man’s life through death. Contrarily, Plato fails in knowing that man has already seen the light to which was written about. After living in the dark for a long period of time, man will not only blink and hinder the light to which blinds him, he will also venture to find an even brighter light. Man has always searched in new horizons, and overcoming the fascinating sights of the “upper world”, man will eventually grow weary of it. That brings in another “philosopher” mind, that of John Haynes Holmes. Living in America between the 19th and 20th Centuries, John Haynes Holmes was both a minister, and social activist. Plato and Holmes are inter-related because each draws upon taking the next step after life on Earth. Immortality was preached by the minister in 1929, but he is well known for his philosophical thoughts as much as his religious views. Man’s immortality is related to evolution, according to Holmes. Humans grow older and their “materials” that they live in weaken, while the soul only grows stronger. From a scientific standpoint, the energy released at death converts to an equally willing afterlife. Where Plato fails in his views on man, Holmes does not. Men have and will always search for knowledge, venturing to extremes to reach it. Immortality must be true in order to reach the “light”. Yet at the same time man thirsts for an even brighter light and life.
A way of knowing if something is real is to conduct scientific experimentation. Because of scientific research over the centuries, this has lead to a better understanding of the always-debatable “flat Earth”, to how Earth revolves in the galaxy. Hawking begins by explaining how man has always been misleading in his ideas on these subjects. The scientists still do not know seem to know everything man cannot answer without a belief in God. A strong background in both scientific and other creation faiths will no doubt lead to questioning which is true. To know what is true in the eyes of a scientist,
