Posted on 12/19/2022 8:01:56 AM PST by elpadre
Governments have learnt that fear works – and that is truly terrifying
We have returned to the world of Galileo vs the Vatican. Scientific dissidents are again silenced and ostracised for their opinions
As the year in which life officially returned to normal comes to an end, we must ask an uncomfortable question. What on earth just happened? We have lived through a period of what would once have been the unthinkable suspension of basic freedoms: interventions by the state into personal life that even most totalitarian governments would not have dared to impose. And we, along with most (not all) of the democratic societies of the West, accepted it. Before that era slips into the fog of convenient forgetfulness, it is absolutely imperative that we – the country as a whole – hold a thorough post hoc examination, because our governing classes have certainly learnt something they will remember.
The critical lesson that has been indelibly absorbed by people in power, and those who advise them, is that fear works. There is, it turns out, almost nothing that a population (even one as brave and insouciant as Britain’s) will not give up if they are systematically, relentlessly frightened.
The Covid phenomenon has provided an invaluable training session in public mind-control techniques: the formula was refined – with the assistance of sophisticated advertising and opinion-forming advice – to an astonishingly successful blend of mass anxiety (your life is in danger) and moral coercion (you are putting other people’s lives in danger). But it was not just the endless repetition of that message that accomplished the almost universal, and quite unexpected, compliance. It was the comprehensive suppression of dissent even when it came from expert sources – and the prohibition on argument even when it was accompanied by counter-evidence – that
(Excerpt) Read more at theautomaticearth.com ...
conclusion:
“...What intelligence and innovation rely on above all is criticism and disputation. That is the nature of the thing. It should be what education is for. We cannot, must not, stop fighting for the right to disagree. It is appalling that it has become necessary to legislate to enforce this freedom on academic institutions that were once dedicated to free discussion. The imperatives that must be taught to the young have not changed since Plato’s day. Argue. Question. Disagree. Expose received ideas to rigorous interrogation. Express doubt when you are unpersuaded. Seek truth through endless dialogue. Certainly some mistakes will be made in the name of liberty, but they can only be corrected if we do not, literally, lose our minds in the name of safety. The lines by Dylan Thomas, which were intended to be about physical death, could just as easily be applied to the death of Reason:
“Do not go gentle into that good night,
“Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”
Just like the fall of Rome - we the people are decadent and divided, with a rapidly decaying culture and being led by corrupt fascists that are consolidating their power daily.
This will not go back to “normal times”. This only goes forward into full fascism and the loss of everything.
Fun fact: the Vatican’s objections to Galileo were spot on the money. He had made correct observations, but the Vatican had also made correct refutals. Ironically, Cardinal Nicolas Di Cusa had already correctly supposed how to reconcile the apparent contradictions (and published them asserting that they represented Catholic thought): The universe was so massive that any point within the universe was the center of the universe.
Einstein came up with something which even more radically affirmed the ancient Catholic position, but which was ignored because it gave the win to the Catholic Church: that wherever an observer is IS the EXACT center of the universe, from that observer’s perspective.
God really did devise the universe so that the whole universe revolves around each of us. That’s pretty awesome.
Galileo, despite multiple warnings, persisted in declaring his (at the time) unproven theories to be fact, so he was tried, convicted, and sentenced to house arrest in his luxury apartment with all his equipment to further his research.
the omnipotence of an almighty God is beyond man’s ability to comprehend.
>> This will not go back to “normal times”. This only goes forward into full fascism and the loss of everything. <<
Justinian revived the Roman Empire very effectively for a time. In the end, the Empire fell, but “the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” paints an outrageously anti-Christian picture. The truth is that rather than descending into utter chaos, an “invisible” empire retained those laws of the Empire which were just, while liberating the 99.99% of the Romans who were oppressed by the aristocracy of Rome.
The great collapse of civilization wasn’t the Fall of Rome, even though we lost the secret of the enduring roadways and viaducts. The great collapse was the enlightenment, during which time the average lifespan (at least of someone who survived infancy) plunged, and the great festivals and community celebrations were replaced by unrelenting drudgery.
Personally, I do not believe that life as “returned to normal.”
In fact, things seem to be getting more and more bizarre and... unsettling, to say the least.
Any infant knows that.
“..it is difficult to take seriously an article which begins in ignorance. ..”
I think the author was using the story to set up his discussion. The crux of which is: “... We cannot, must not, stop fighting for the right to disagree. It is appalling that it has become necessary to legislate to enforce this freedom on academic institutions that were once dedicated to free discussion. The imperatives that must be taught to the young have not changed since Plato’s day. Argue. Question. Disagree. Expose received ideas to rigorous interrogation…..”
Yes. In fact, (as I’m sure you know) what I referred to as “Galileo’s correct observations” were made, in fact, by Father Copernicus. Now, the Church did take a dim view of Copernicus in light of Galileo’s belligerent, demeaning, illogical and counter-productive defense of it. But had it been combined with Cardinal Nicolas Di Cusa’s “Cosmologia,” the world’s knowledge of cosmology would have been 500 years ahead itself.
(I just read that secularists insist Copernicus was not a priest, despite the fact that not only was he canon and collegiate prelate, but the documents exist where he was proposed for the episcopacy of Warmia. Edward’s Rosen’s claim that Galileo’s [and later Polish] claims that Copernicus was not a priest only establish that Galileo felt no need to prove this point. Despite being taken as gospel, Rosen provides no evidence to believe he was not a priest, and fails to consider the very obvious evidence that he was one.)
Above all, It must be plainly stated that all within the Church of Rome were totally ignorant of the subjecet raised by Copernicus and Galileo.
The relied on the Bible that gave no clue of the cosmological reality
In Galileo’s day the power of the government was supported by the clerical hierarchy through the use of fear preached from the pulpit.
Today the power of the government is supported by the intelligentsia hierarchy through the use of fear promoted via the media.
There is some difference in that then the opinions of ordinary individuals holding forth in the alehouse or on the street corner were largely ignored. Now, the same sort of individual holding forth on social media may become influential enough to invite official suppression.
“Yes. In fact, (as I’m sure you know) what I referred to as “Galileo’s correct observations” were made, in fact, by Father Copernicus.”
Galileo’s observation could only be seen with a telescope which Copernicus did not have.
Any infant knows that.
Ummm, wouldn't that be egocentric, rather than geocentric? /runs for exit, ducking for cover>
That's just silly. The Church was a lavish sponsor of the arts and sciences, and many clergy were themselves scientists.
The Roman Empire ends with the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453.
Ha Ha
Whatta laff
This thread devolves into a bunch of Catolico apologists regurgitating papal propaganda about how “The Church” (always capitalized) was Really Right and Galileo was just a confused old coot.
Cancel The Enlightenment! Let’s go back to Papal Infallibility and Monarchs picked by the Divine Right of Kings!
And just remember, the Inquisition was really a gentle little affair, the massacres of the Albigensians and the Huguenots was No Big Deal, and secretly, Jefferson was the Pope’s Emissary!!
Sorry. Made the last one up. But since the “Nation of Immigrants” crowd here makes crap up out of whole cloth, why can’t I?
Go home to Italy. Lotsa nice villas in Tuscany for cheap.
That’s the point. The reference is to an observer, not an entire planet.
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