IS SCIENCE GOD?

Or the question can be asked the other way: Is God Science?

This thought came to me while reading a recent NewScientist article,"Creationism rift opens within the Vatican" http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn7801 where the Vatican's chief astronomer, George Coyne, responds to a comment by Cardinal Christoph Schonborn, "that evolution is incompatible with a belief in God." President George Bush had also said regarding teaching "intelligent design", that it is part of education to be exposed to different ideas. The late Pope John Paul II leaned towards the Church accepting evolution, but with the understanding that the science has ample evidence of intelligent design in biology and the cosmos, so should not ideologically explain it away.

Science traditionally had not lent much support to religion. The parting of the seas by Moses, or walking on water by Jesus, for example, have no scientific explanation. And to most, science places itself above religion, though many great scientists in their personal lives did not discount a belief in God. Einstein, perhaps our most famous scientist, said "God does not play dice." In the life sciences, there is no scientific explanation either for why life began, what sparked the first combination of carbon molecules and amino acids into living cells. How did life start from inert matter, and what keeps it going? The underlying idea of all scientific investigations is that there is no chaotic randomness to the universe, but rather there is intelligent design in how it is put together, even if this intelligent evolution originated in some random fashion to become the intelligible universe we see today. Modern science recognizes the interrelated web of connections in systems, whether vast cosmic relationships, or inside the atom, or those of our living planet, of the cells in our body; and even that life itself somehow molded the planet to its needs by creating oxygen in the early Earth, later moderating carbon dioxide into some form of planetary re-balancing for life to continue, or Gaia. Clearly, there is design, but whether it is God's design or some inherent structure to how the universe evolved into an understandable system, is perhaps at the center of this debate. Is it God? Or is it Science?

What makes science different from religion is that it is impersonal. Rather, religion is personal, it reaches into our soul, into each one of us through our personal belief in something greater than our own existence. Through religious belief, we defer our being to a Creation that made us in the image of God, for example, and totally transcends us. This is both a comfort within an otherwise impersonal existence, as well as a philosophical idea that we are connected to something much greater than our very small existence here on this small planet. God is in everything. But it is this everything that science wants to identify, catalog, theorize, and ultimately understand. So is science looking for God? Most would say not, because science is not searching for the essence of a personal creator, but rather for the essence of an impersonal existence. Cosmologically, this existence is immense, immensely impersonal, though currently accepted theory of a universal origin in a Big Bang some fifteen billion years ago has the earmarks of a "neo-creationism". But it remains impersonal to the point that this universal creation, even if life is found to be common throughout the universe, it nevertheless is something the universe is, has not been in some personified way created. Existence is not personified. Science, unlike religion, does not connect the personified soul to a personal God, but rather seeks the soul of knowledge in an impersonal universe. So science places itself above religion, in a manner of speaking, by arbitrating impersonally through pure reason what it is all about. God then becomes a personal choice of belief, if that is what the person, layman or scientist, chooses to believe.

However, seen this way, science when it is raised to the ultimate impersonal arbiter of understanding, of all in the cosmos, becomes a de facto God, with the ultimate goal of complete total understanding of all that is in existence. And it is for this reason that religion may at times feel threatened by scientific theory, such as evolution for example, because the scientific explanations, which happen to be very good, supersede the religions ones, which now seem rather outdated. Earth was not made in six days, and Eve was not made from Adam's rib, we can be quite certain. If understood scientifically, their science was bad, and makes no sense. In fact, it may be nearly impossible for us to relate to what the writers of biblical text were thinking thousands of years ago, so must accept the written word such as it is, without necessarily giving it modern interpretation. Religious text is that, and that pretty much ends the science there. But scientific text changes all the time, or at least it should change, as each new layer of understanding builds upon previous errors. So in this way, science reaches for God, or the universe, or ultimate understanding, in a progressively dynamic way, whereas religion tends to remain extremely conservative in its views. The Church of Rome burned alive Giordano Bruno http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/john_kessler/giordano_bruno.html , a sixteenth century philosopher, because he believed in an infinite universe which had no boundaries and no center, that life was likely on many planets, and that souls could transmigrate. This label of heresy, today seen as unfair and absurd, the Church has not yet removed, since Bruno's heresy http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03016a.htm was so threatening to it in the early days of modern science, that it remains unforgivable today. Copernicus and Galileo treaded lightly, so were spared the pyre, but Bruno spoke his mind. So religion looks backwards intensely, but towards the future only timidly, and perhaps even suspiciously, while science embraces the future openly.

Then comes the main obstacle to science, of not merely understanding how things work in the universe, but how they relate to our personal individual existence. Can science transcend reason into the domain of our soul, that which keeps us alive and gives us reason, gives us a sense of who we are, and which perhaps connects us to all of existence? Perhaps not, and philosophy is the default here. But religion is philosophy, if for no other reason that it was created by men, and sometimes women, who expressed their beliefs as they saw them in their innermost feelings, and all of existence. In ways still mysterious to us, did they have some special intuitive knowledge of God? We know from history that their sense of scientific inquiry was limited, and they knew little of how worked the universe. Earth was then mostly at the center of the solar system, likely flat, the sun and planets going around it, and the stars fixed in their orb of heaven. We know now that this is not true, so our science progressed dramatically, and our bullock and donkey carts are replaced with automobiles and jet travel, our fire signal towers with celluar phone towers. But this does not mean science made any real progress into understanding realms greater than what is readily observe in reality. What ties it all together, gives it intelligent design, and ultimately gave it life with the ability to look back upon itself with wonder, and be who it is, is beyond science. What do we really know? The best we can hope for is to give it a human voice.

Personally, I am a believer in God, and think that my feeble understandings of all things can never reach into the infinitely rich realms of being, that my reason is too feeble to reach far enough into an infinitely intelligent state of being, of love. For that, I must transcend reason into some deep intuitive feeling of a universe so fabulous that my reason fails to understand it. Can science ever bridge that gap? Perhaps not, since that realm of being is beyond the material and the rational, and steps off into something so big that even at the emotional level I stumble. God is too big for me to understand, yet it is not too big for me to feel a connection to that infinite bigness, because I live. And when I am to die, it will not be to science I will turn to answer the questions of my being, but to God. So in this respect, science is superseded by something much greater than itself, something that cannot be explained by scientific inquiry alone, and reaches out into infinity, my life. I am alive, a thinking being, a feeling being, and one infinitely curious to the best of my mental and emotional abilities, which makes me into a philosophical being. That I can also related to an existence that, at least to me, is an infinite love of being, of transferring that infinity into each living cell, is awesome beyond reason. So I turn my face towards belief, not necessarily any one religion's belief since I find them all curious, but into an inward belief that defines my being within all of existence. And when I look into that being, I see an infinite love from the universe, and for it. In my beliefs I am closer to Giordano Bruno than the Church, because the universe has no center and no end, and it is infinitely, totally, interrelated with the life essence, right down to the waves lapping pebbles at my feet. That to me is God.

So what makes science God, and God science? If I could somehow encompass all of possible knowledge scientifically, deduced what is reality and our universe, all of it, I would be immensely awed, perhaps even driven to insanity. But if I could somehow reach into the very essence of all being, a living universe, into the infiniteness of being so rich in life and care, with life given to every cell in existence throughout our universe, I would break down like a child and cry, and fall totally in love. That is the difference between religion and science. On a scientific level, I am in mind; but on a religious level, I am in soul. There is almost no way for the two to meet, except through me as a living and feeling human being. Then I bring together my knowledge, internalized, into my belief on a greatest level of all, my being, to some minimal level understanding God, a whole universe, a creation so great that my tears are called upon to answer. There is nothing impersonal about God, and in some ways, neither is science an impersonal arbiter of understanding, edited for emotional content; since both are human creations. The intelligent design behind both is that at one end we have human understanding, but at the other end we have what is humanly understandable. And the understandable is still far greater, always, so science must falter when it comes up against this ultimate challenge. All in the universe is still more mysterious and wonderful. And by default, we call it God.

Thus, between science and God is an infinite gulf, for God is infinitely greater. Short of infinity, there is no way to bridge this gulf, there is no way to understand this, thus to bring the two on equal grounds. God as we understand religiously, is on hallowed ground, so it is not science. Likewise, science as applied to knowledge, is on more solid ground, but it is not God. We may take an infinity of steps to understand God scientifically, and yet still fail. God is what makes science possible, but not the other way around, though it may give us insights into what it is all about. So science is only a tool, but God is all of existence, right down to each individual living cell's being. To reach that God, science is on an infinite timeline, and when that time is finally met, it may very well be the "end of times". Then, perhaps, the game of the eons will start all over again, and in some infinite distance, in some mysterious way, we are all born again. Science cannot be that. That is God.

Ivan

In Commemoration of the Burning Death of the Great
Philosopher Biordano Bruno, four hundred years ago
on February 17, 1600, in Rome, Italy, at the
piazza Campo dei Fiori.

The following entries are taken from the
PeoplesBook2000 at HumanCafe.com. Please see the
PeoplesBook2000 for actual links:
--------------------------------------------------
***********************************************

30 Jan 1999

Said by Giordano Bruno (2000):
"And I declare two things: first, that one must
not kill a foreign doctor (tropical-rainforest),
because he attempts
those cures (herbal medicines) that the native
doctors (bio-chemists) do not attempt; second, I
say, that for the true
philosopher (awakened shaman) every land is his
country."
--adapted from "The Expulsion of the Triumphant
Beast, by Giordano Bruno" ed. by A. D. Imerti.


07 Mar 1999

From "The Infinite in Giordano Bruno" by Sidney
Breenberg, (1950, King'sCrownPress, NY.) pp:
154-163; Bruno writes:
"Everything is one; and the knowledge of this
unity is the object and term of all philosophies
and all natural contemplations...
"Being one and the same (infinity), it has not one
being and another being...
"Unity and identity, I say (is) the same being..."
These ideas are not so far removed from those of
Habeas Mentem, whereby unity and inifnity are
expressed in the identity of all beings within
this infinite unity. Bruno further writes, (Opere
Italiane) pg. 71:
" That which is the universe, in relation to the
universe, is throughout all, according to the
modes of its
capacity (interrelationship?) in whatever relation
it may be to the other particular bodies; because
it is above,
below, innermost, right, left, and according to
all local differences; and because in the in
infinite, there are
all these differences, and no one of them."
So Bruno, more a man of our times than of his,
was very close to creating a philosophy of
interrelationship
where infinites define each and every part within
themselves, and thus give them identity. To read
more about
Giordano Bruno, please refer to the web page
listed below. "In the end, it is all one." ID
Alexander.
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Atlantis/1457/index.html

--------------------------------------------------



10 Apr 1999

Girodano Bruno: Sophia: "...I want that man to be
great who in his poverty is rich because he is
content; and I want that man to be a cowardly
slave who in his wealth is poor because he is not
satisfied." Second Dialogue, Second Part; "Spaccio
de la Bestia Trionfante,1584."
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Atlantis/1457/biblio10.html
(taken from:"The Expulsion of the Triumphant
Beast" BisonBook,1992-pg.162)


--------------------------------------------------

14 Jul 1999


On Pleiades, Atlas' seven daughters, Jove answers:
"Let them go with their seven lamps to give light to that nocturnal and midnight holy wedding... And to this region which they leave let Conversation, Companionship, Marriage, Confraternity, Church, Society, Agreement, Covenant, and Confederation come to establish their residences. And let them there be joined to Friendship, because where she is not, there are instead, Contamination, Confusion, Disorder. And unless they are guided, they are not themselves, because they never find themselves in truth among wicked people, but posses the nature of Monopoly, Conventicle, Sect, Conspiracy, Mob, Plot, or something with another detestable name and being."
-Giordano Bruno, "The Expulsion of the Trimphant Beast"- ibid


13 Jun 1999

GIORDANO BRUNO: Why is it still Heresy? I think it
is time the Church reverse's its prejudice
against a free thinking human being who saw into
the Infinite.
"Welcome Freethinkers! We want to propagate the
"Nolana philosophy". FraÕ GiordanoÕs
transmigrating soul still wait for his just
homage. The man was so great that also intimidate
all noble spirits that recognized his value:
Galileo, Spinoza, Cartesio, Leibniz, Goethe,
Schiller, and we can continue...!"
http://
www.geocities.com/Athens/Atlantis/1457/index.html

Thursday, February 17, 2000 - 01:46 am:
THIRD MILLENNIUM, OR 'UN.MILLENNIUM'

Some feel the third millennium starts in 2001,
others 2000. If one thinks that the first
millennium started in zero, and the second in
1000, then the third millennium is already here.
If instead, on thinks the first starts at one, and
the second started at 1001, then we're still
waiting. But then, what does that make from zero
to one? the "un-millennium"? You figure.

Bruno

Today, 17 Febbraio, 2000, in Rome at Campo de'
Fiori, is the 400th anniversary of the burning of
the body of Giordano Bruno by the then Holy
Fathers of their most Catholic Church. Though the
body burned and a great mind was taken away, his
soul lives.


http://
www.geocities.com/Athens/Atlantis/1457/index.html


07 Oct 1999 (see original above by date)
GIORDANO BRUNO
Si sente la vicinanza dell'evento. Perché fu fatta
tanta crudeltà? Giordano. Subisti in silenzio, ed
in silenzio verrai ricordato da ogni uomo che ama
la Justizia e la Verità, da coloro che Cercano.
Non riuscirò mai a comprendere. E le lacrime non
bastano.
mailto:giuscrea@tin.it


...............................................

--------------------------------------------------
----------------------
By Anonymous on Friday, February 18, 2000 - 12:40
am:
BRUNO: Da "Il Messaggero" Roma

Venerdì 18 Febbraio 2000 Il Papa chiede scusa per
Giordano Bruno. Ma ne condanna la dottrina
«Peccato il rogo, ma non lo riabilito»

CITTÀ DEL VATICANO - Il «profondo rammarico» della
Chiesa per il rogo che, 400 anni fa, arse vivo
Giordano Bruno, è stato espresso ieri, a nome del
Papa, dal cardinale Angelo Sodano in una lettera
ad un convegno organizzato a Napoli. Il filosofo
non viene riabilitato perché il suo pensiero
ritenuto «incompatibile» con la fede cristiana.
Non sono condannati i giudici ma le procedure
dell’Inquisizione perché «la verità non può essere
imposta con la forza».

http://
www.ilmessaggero.it

----------------------------------
=============================

By Ivan on Tuesday, March 7, 2000 - 09:47 am:
HABEAS MENTEM, the basic premise:

If there is a basic premise to Habeas Mentem, it
is this, that Freedom is a cosmic force powered by
a living being's Consciousness.

ivan alexander, author


27 Dec 1998

Siamo decisamente fortunati noi che viviamo in
un'era e, in alcuni paesi, dove non siamo uccisi
per le nostre opinioni.
------------------------------------------------
27 Dec 1998

Ma per questo dobbiamo ringraziare chi, prima di
noi, ha sacrificato la propria vita per affermare
le proprie idee, che erano troppo avanzate per i
tempi in cui venivano presentate, e contrarie a
chi non voleva che avanzassero, cercando cosi' di
tenere sotto controllo la naturale evoluzione del
pensiero collettivo. Giordano Bruno e' solo uno
tra i molti, sacrificati per questo. Celsia (Roma)
Italy
-----------------------------------------------

02 Jul 1999

TOLERANCE is a high art. It is a detachment from worldly concerns, a vision of a higher order, an act of forgiveness. Like patience, it is seeing the world from a different perspective, one where events, or persons attached to those events, or their beliefs, is part of a greater destiny than the one controlled by our will or understanding. Think how intolerant have been ideas in the past: Communism seemed so perfect an ideology, but all who disagreed with it were persecuted, even put to death. The Church of the Middle Ages exercised absolute power and the same intolerance. People were tortured or burned at the stake for their beliefs. So is it in modern times, where some religions or ideologies will not tolerate dissent, and the unbelievers will be punished or stoned to death. This can be true even for the world's most progressive ideas: Democracy, human rights, equality, all are great ideas, but to disagree with any of these doctrines is to court persecution and punishment. So there needs to always be an exit, an escape from the inescapable, a forgiveness. Free speech is one such escape, as is the right to not incriminate oneself, or another. They are illogical in the face of reason, of complete proof of one's guilt. And yet, to let a tolerance exist even against logic is a necessary condition for human existence. Does one forgive the criminal, the unfaithful spouse, the wayward child, misgjuided believer, the drug addict, the insane? Yes. We do not empower them, may guide them in their error, but nor do we condemn them. Theirs is a path that makes no sense to us, but one which they must follow until they themselves can see their errors, and lift up. There is no one absolute way to see the truth. It is different for each one of us. If we can learn to live in agreement with this, and with each other even in our differences, then we are being tolerant. Then ours is a higher vision. It is a difficult path to follow, to live with tolerance and forgiveness, but it is the highest art.
-Bruno.


24 Jul 1999


THE PRINCE, Ch. 15:
"A man who wishes to make a profession of goodness in everything must necessarily come to grief among so many who are not good. Therefore it is necessary for a prince, who wishes to maintain himself, to learn how not to be good, and to use this knowledge and not to use it, according to the necessity of the case." --Machiavelli --a "contemporary" of G. Bruno

(this is a regretable reality, though to do otherwise is to sacrifice for a higher cause than Earthly princedom)
-------------------------------------------------------

FOR ADDITIONAL LINKS TO GIORDANO BRUNO:

http://utenti.tripod.it/up38/altrilinks.htm
Links su Giordano Bruno

http://jull.supere
va.it
Jull/Giordano Bruno Forum

GIORDANO BRUNO

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Atlantis/1457/inde
x.html

delgiud@libero.it

Bruno - Cristo
DUE DIVERSI SACRIFICI
In questa pagina, non si intende assolutamente,
mettere a confronto i due diversi tipi di
sacrificio. Si vogliono soltanto mettere in luce i
diversi aspetti che li caratterizzano, sotto la
luce delle rispettive e differenti Fedi.
A ciascuno trarre delle conclusioni in merito... 
Giordano, stretto sotto accusa e processato dal S.
Uffizio, decide, dopo ben otto anni di carcere e
torture, di non abiurare e di morire per le sue
idee. Cristo catturato dai romani, viene
processato e condannato dalla sua stessa gente.
Pilato: "Chi dei due volete che vi rilasci?". Essi
risposero: "Barabba!".
                          Matteo 27,21
Bruno crede fermamente in una vita dopo la morte e
quella che segue, credo sia la migliore delle
spiegazioni che egli da della sua fede nella
reincarnazione. Dice riferendosi alla materia in
senso assoluto e in senso circoscritto (creature):
"Quella è insieme tutto, ed essendo che possiede
tutto, non ha in che mutarsi; ma questa, con certa
vicissitudine per le parti, si fa tutto, e a tempi
e tempi si fa cosa e cosa: però sempre sotto
diversità, alterazione e moto. Cossì dunque mai è
informe quella materia, come nè anco questa,
benchè differentemente quella e questa; quella ne
l'istante de l'eternità, questa negli istanti del
tempo; quella insieme, questa successivamente;
quella esplicatamente, questa complicatamente;
quella come molti, questa come uno; quella per
ciascuno e cosa per cosa, questa come tutto e ogni
cosa". Cristo crede nella vita dopo la morte.
Definendosi figlio di Dio, dirà più volte di
salire in cielo e sedere "alla destra del Padre".
Non solo, prevedendo il suo "assassinio", dirà ai
Giudei:
"Distruggete questo santuario e in tre giorni lo
farò risorgere". Dissero i Giudei: "In quarantasei
anni fu costruito questo santuario, e tu in tre
giorni lo farai risorgere?". Egli però parlava del
santuario del suo corpo. Perciò, quando risuscitò
dai morti, i suoi discepoli si ricordarono che
egli aveva detto questo e credettero alla
Scrittura e alle parole che aveva pronunciato
Gesù.
                          Giovanni 2,19-22

Il che vuol dire che la materia infinita
dell'Universo e di Dio, non muterà mai forma nella
sua infinità perchè già tutto essa contiene. A
differenza del tutto, le singole parti, le
"forme", noi, le creature, mutiamo continuamente
aspetto nei diversi istanti del tempo. Come
preciserà lo stesso Giovanni, Gesù parlando di
tempio, non si riferì all'edificio ma ad egli
stesso.
Dunque Bruno sapeva che sarebbe tornato in vita e
ne era fermamente convinto, ma sapeva che non
sarebbe mai più tornato in vita come Giordano
Bruno... e questo comportava tutte le
complicazioni del caso. Tutte le rinunce alle
quali andava incontro Bruno rifiutando l'abiura.
Gesù sapeva che sarebbe tornato in vita dopo il
suo "sacrificio" in soli TRE giorni. Ma non solo:
sarebbe tornato in vita come Gesù Cristo, con la
sua solita identità, senza rinunce e senza
perdite.
Ma c'è un'altra cosa che salta all'occhio. Ed è
abbastanza particolare.
Dopo vari tentativi per cercare un compromesso che
rendesse l'abiura meno pesante alla propria
coscienza, e comunque, soddisfacesse i giudici,
Bruno scrive un'epistola indirizzata a papa
Clemente VIII. Un testo del quale non si conoscono
i contenuti, ma che presumibilmente, conteneva un
ennesimo tentativo di spiegare la natura delle
dichiarazioni di Bruno, e cioè, prettamente
filosofica. I giudici di Giordano, interpretarono
male l'ennesimo tentativo dell'imputato, e il 10
settembre del 1599, venne pronunciato un
ultimatum. In 40 giorni Bruno avrebbe dovuto
decidere fra un'abiura completa e senza eccezioni,
o la condanna per eresia. Anche Gesù, si trovò in
difficoltà per 40 giorni. Nel deserto, tentato dal
demonio. Come Bruno, anche Gesù si trovò a
decidere tra il Padre e le lusinghe di Satana.
Per commenti o altro:

http://jull.super
eva.it/

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03016a.htm

Giordano Bruno

Italian philosopher, b. at Nola in Campania, in
the Kingdom of Naples, in 1548; d. at Rome, 1600.
At the age of eleven he went to Naples, to study
"humanity, logic, and dialectic", and, four years
later, he entered the Order of St. Dominic, giving
up his worldly name of Filippo and taking that of
Giordano. He made his novitiate at Naples and
continued to study there. In 1572 he was ordained
priest.
It seems, however, that, even as a novice, he
attracted attention by the originality of his
views and by his outspoken criticism of accepted
theological doctrines. After his ordination things
reached such a pass that, in 1576, formal
accusation of heresy was brought against him.
Thereupon he went to Rome, but, apparently, did
not mend his manner of speaking of the mysteries
of faith; for the accusations were renewed against
him at the convent of the Minerva. Within a few
months of his arrival he fled the city and cast
off all allegiance to his order.
From this point on, his life-story is the tale of
his wanderings from one country to another and of
his failure to find peace anywhere. He tarried
awhile in several Italian cities, and in 1579 went
to Geneva, where he seems to have adopted the
Calvinist faith, although afterwards, before the
ecclesiastical tribunal at Venice, he steadfastly
denied that he had ever joined the Reformed
Church. This much at least is certain; he was
excommunicated by the Calvinist Council on account
of his disrespectful attitude towards the heads of
that Church and was obliged to leave the city.
Thence he went to Toulouse, Lyons, and (in 1581)
to Paris.
At Lyons he completed his "Clavis Magna", or
"Great Key" to the art of remembering. In Paris he
published several works which further developed
his art of memory-training and revealed the
two-fold influence of Raymond Lully and the
neo-Platonists. In 1582 he published a
characteristic work, "Il candelaio", or "The
Torchbearer", a satire in which he exhibits in a
marked degree the false taste then in vogue among
the humanists, many of whom mistook obscenity for
humour. While at Paris he lectured publicly on
philosophy, under the auspices, as it seems, of
the College of Cambrai, the forerunner of the
College of France.
In 1583 he crossed over to England, and, for a
time at least, enjoyed the favour of Queen
Elizabeth and the friendship of Sir Philip Sidney.
To the latter he dedicated the most bitter of his
attacks on the Catholic Church, "Il spaccio della
bestia trionfante", "The Expulsion of the
Triumphant Beast", published in 1584. He visited
Oxford, and, on being refused the privilege of
lecturing there, he published (1584) his "Cena
delle ceneri", or "Ash-Wednesday Supper", in which
he attacked the Oxford professors, saying that
they knew more about beer than about Greek. In
1585 he returned to France, and during the year
which he spent in Paris at this time made several
attempts to become reconciled to the Catholic
Church, all of which failed because of his refusal
to accept the condition imposed, namely, that he
should return to his order.
In Germany, whither he went in 1587, he showed the
same spirit of insolent self-assertion as at
Oxford. In Helmstadt he was excommunicatcd by the
Lutherans. After some time spent in literary
activity at Frankfort, he went, in 1591, to Venice
at the invitation of Mocenigo, who professed to be
interested in his system of memory-training.
Failing to obtain from Bruno the secret of his
"natural magic", Mocenigo denounced him to the
Inquisition. Bruno was arrested, and in his trial
before the Venetian inquisitors first took refuge
in the principle of "two-fold truth", saying that
the errors imputed to him were held by him "as a
philosopher, and not as an honest Christian";
later, however, he solemnly abjured all his errors
and doubts in the matter of Catholic doctrine and
practice (Berti, Docum., XII, 22 and XIII, 45). At
this point the Roman Inquisition intervened and
requested his extradition. After some hesitation
the Venetian authorities agreed, and in February,
1593, Bruno was sent to Rome, and for six years
was kept in the prison of the Inquisition.
Historians have striven in vain to discover the
explanation of this long delay on the part of the
Roman authorities. In the spring of 1599, the
trial was begun before a commission of the Roman
Inquisition, and, after the accused had been
granted several terms of respite in which to
retract his errors, he was finally condemned
(January, 1600), handed over to the secular power
(8 February), and burned at the stake in the Campo
dei Fiori in Rome (17 February). Bruno was not
condemned for his defence of the Copernican system
of astronomy, nor for his doctrine of the
plurality of inhabited worlds, but for his
theological errors, among which were the
following: that Christ was not God but merely an
unusually skilful magician, that the Holy Ghost is
the soul of the world, that the Devil will be
saved, etc.
To the works of Bruno already mentioned the
following are to be added: "Della causa, principio
ed uno"; "Dell' infinito universo e dei mondi";
"De Compendiosâ Architecturâ"; "De Triplici
Minimo"; "De Monade, Numero et Figurâ." In these
"the Nolan" expounds a system of philosophy in
which the principal elements are neo-Platonism,
materialistic monism, rational mysticism (after
the manner of Raymond Lully), and the naturalistic
concept of the unity of the material world
(inspired by the Copernican astronomy). His
attitude towards Aristotle is best illustrated by
his reiterated assertion that the natural
philosophy of the Stagirite is vitiated by the
predominance of the dialectical over the
mathematical mode of conceiving natural phenomena.
Towards the Scholastics in general his feeling was
one of undisguised contempt; he excepted, however,
Albert tbe Great and St. Thomas, for whom he
always maintained a high degree of respect. He
wished to reform the Aristotelean philosophy, and
yet he was bitterly opposed to his contemporaries,
Ramus and Patrizzi, whose efforts were directed
towards the same obect. He was acquainted, though
only in a superficial way, with the writings of
the pre-Socratic philosophers of Greece, and with
the works of the neo-Platonists, especially with
the books falsely attributed to Iamblichus and
Plotinus. From the neo-Platonists he derived the
tendency of his thought towards monism. From the
pre-Socratic philosophers he borrowed the
materialistic interpretation of the One. From the
Copernican doctrine, which was attracting so much
attention in the century in which he lived, he
learned to identify the material One with the
visible, infinite, heliocentric universe.
To the works of Bruno already mentioned the
following are to be added: "Della causa, principio
ed uno"; "Dell' infinito universo e dei mondi";
"De Compendiosâ Architecturâ"; "De Triplici
Minimo"; "De Monade, Numero et Figurâ." In these
"the Nolan" expounds a system of philosophy in
which the principal elements are neo-Platonism,
materialistic monism, rational mysticism (after
the manner of Raymond Lully), and the naturalistic
concept of the unity of the material world
(inspired by the Copernican astronomy). His
attitude towards Aristotle is best illustrated by
his reiterated assertion that the natural
philosophy of the Stagirite is vitiated by the
predominance of the dialectical over the
mathematical mode of conceiving natural phenomena.
Towards the Scholastics in general his feeling was
one of undisguised contempt; he excepted, however,
Albert tbe Great and St. Thomas, for whom he
always maintained a high degree of respect. He
wished to reform the Aristotelean philosophy, and
yet he was bitterly opposed to his contemporaries,
Ramus and Patrizzi, whose efforts were directed
towards the same obect. He was acquainted, though
only in a superficial way, with the writings of
the pre-Socratic philosophers of Greece, and with
the works of the neo-Platonists, especially with
the books falsely attributed to Iamblichus and
Plotinus. From the neo-Platonists he derived the
tendency of his thought towards monism. From the
pre-Socratic philosophers he borrowed the
materialistic interpretation of the One. From the
Copernican doctrine, which was attracting so much
attention in the century in which he lived, he
learned to identify the material One with the
visible, infinite, heliocentric universe...
The latest edition of Bruno's works is by Tocco,
Opere latine di G. B. (Florence, 1889); Opere
inedite (Naples, 1891); (Leipzig, 1829, 1830). See
also: McIntyre, Giordano Bruno (London and New
York, 1903); Frith, Life of G. B. (London and
Boston, 1887); Adamson in Development of Modern
Philosophy (London, 1903), II, 23-44; Höffding,
Hist. of Modern Philosophy, tr. Meyer (London,
1900), I, 110 sqq.; Stöckl, Gesch. der Phil. des
Mittelalters (Mainz, 1866), III, 106 sqq.; Turner,
Hist. of Phil. (Boston, 19), 429 sqq.
WILLIAM TURNER
Transcribed by Fr. Paul-Dominique Masiclat, O.P.

As written by: Giordano Bruno
The Forgotten Philosopher

by John J. Kessler, Ph.D., Ch.E.

In his book De la Causa, Principio, et Uno, On Cause, Principle, and Unity we find prophetic phrases:
"This entire globe, this star, not being subject to death, and dissolution and annihilation being impossible anywhere in Nature, from time to time renews itself by changing and altering all its parts. There is no absolute up or down, as Aristotle taught; no absolute position in space; but the position of a body is relative to that of other bodies. Everywhere there is incessant relative change in position throughout the universe, and the observer is always at the center of things."

http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/bruno.htm

ANTICHTHON

There is an excellent novel by Chris Scott titled
"Antichthon", which is Greek for 'counter-world'.
It is a story based on the life and final years of
Giordano Bruno, philosopher, until his death by
burning at the stake in Campo de' Fiori, Rome,
Feb. 1600. He was burned by the Catholic Church
for reasons of "heresy".

This is a very hard book to find, but great
reading, if you are lucky enough to find a copy.
Scott treats the Bruno story with great
sensitivity and depth, where you feel like at
times you are in Bruno's head. It was published
1982 in Canada by Quadrant Press, Ontario, in
association with the English Dept., Concordia
University, Montreal, Canada.

From the book, the words of Bruno:

"Let him who will, think my fate cruel because it
kills in hope and revives in desire. I am
nourished by my high enterprise; and although the
soul does not attain the desired end and is
consumed by so much zeal, it is enough that it
burns in so noble a fire. It is enough that I
have been raised to the sky and delivered from the
ignoble number." --Giordano Bruno