Who can defend the autonomy of science? Mystery of faith

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To my astonishment expressed at the position taken by the Pontifical Academy on the subject of freedom of research , I must add that which occurred to me when reading on the website of Uccr - Unione Cristiani Cattolici Razionali - that the persecution of science by the Church would never have existed and that there would be nothing to be surprised about if today it is a Pontifical Academy that indicates the path towards free research . Since I am accustomed to seeking the advice of experts when I am not moving in the fields of my expertise, I turned to my friend Gilberto Corbellini, philosopher and historian of science, for enlightenment.

Together, it seems useful to remember that that Academy is the emanation of a religious institution that, for centuries, imposed a system of preventive licenses that forced every scholar of natural philosophy, astronomy, medicine or anything else to ask for the consent of the theologian on duty and the local bishop: the nihil obstat and the imprimatur were true stamps of conformity, and without them not a single line was published . When in 1616 the Congregation of the Index branded Copernicanism as “false and contrary to the Holy Scriptures”, it was certainly not an isolated episode or a misunderstanding: it was the practice established by Paul IV and consecrated by the Council of Trent, which forbade the faithful any book deemed heretical or “superstitious”. A decade later, Galileo Galilei was tried, forced to recant and confined to house arrest, also because his “observation of sunspots and the satellites of Jupiter” went beyond the limits that the Inquisition considered admissible. And forgive us, but to assert that at the time the rejection of what Galileo described was rational does not at all imply that the response should have been a trial for possible heresy , with the related risks of imprisonment and condemnation; it is laughable to maintain that the Church did not act differently at the time than any scientific institution would do. It would be like saying that, instead of anonymous review, one of our articles should be judged by the ecclesiastical court, with the related risks. If John Paul II defined that trial as an “error”, it seems useless to climb on the weak Feyerabend to clear one’s conscience . Not for nothing, shortly before Galileo, in 1600, Giordano Bruno was burned at Campo de' Fiori: not only for pantheism, but because his vision of an infinite universe undermined the dogma of the creation of a single and finite world.

The Uccr says that it is a fairy tale that scientists were persecuted by the Inquisition, citing the studies of historian Ada Palmer, who claims that only a dozen of them were prosecuted and some condemned, but to light sentences (not all acquitted!) and that the Church was not against science, but only defended theological dogmas from heretical drifts or behaviors, like that of Galileo, that could favor heresies. Whether or not the Catholic Church was against science is a question of splitting hairs, because it is in any case against the scientific method, as it assumes that theological hermeneutics is superior . So superior that it had to be defended with trials, torture, imprisonment and sometimes burning at the stake.

We must be happier, or less saddened, now that we know that twelve scientists were not burned, but that as non-scientists, however, between 5,000 and 10,000 people were killed by the Inquisition, according to the most plausible estimates. Not including those tortured, imprisoned, publicly humiliated, fined, etc. because they did not conform to religious beliefs. The fact of having acquitted (almost) twelve scientists does not absolve the Catholic Church from the evil it perpetrated.

Nor can it be argued, as Uccr does, that the problems existed only in a century, or even in a more limited period: already in 415 AD the Neoplatonic philosophy of Hypatia of Alexandria was crushed in an act of blind religious violence, the first symbol of a conflict between scientific thought and fanaticism. In 1115 Arnold of Brescia was hanged and his body burned as a heretic, while his teacher Abelard narrowly escaped. In 1210, in Paris, the ecclesiastical authorities banned entire works of Aristotle on physics and cosmology, and in 1277 Bishop Étienne Tempier prohibited 219 Aristotelian and Averroist propositions ― from the denial of creation to the rejection of the void ― paralyzing free discussion of nature. At the beginning of the fourteenth century, the physician and astrologer Pietro d'Abano was accused of heresy and, after dying in prison, even saw his effigy burned in public; a few years later, in 1327, Cecco d'Ascoli was the only medieval university professor burned alive for astrological doctrines considered incompatible with free will.

Even after Galileo, the Church continued for centuries to interfere with the freedom of teaching and the formulation of new theories. Kepler 's works remained on the Index of Prohibited Books until 1835, Descartes ' from 1664 until decades later, while Lazzaro Spallanzani and other eighteenth-century naturalists saw their studies of physiology and chemistry scrutinized or banned by religious authorities. In 1817 Erasmus Darwin was placed on the Index for his proto-evolutionist theories; in 1860 a synod of German bishops condemned wholesale the evolution of man from animal progenitors, while two years later the Syllabus of Pius IX struck down naturalism and rationalism that dared to do without Revelation . In 1907 Pius X launched his anti-modernist crusade, stifling every cloud of theological or scientific criticism; and again in 1962 the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith officially admonished the works of Teilhard de Chardin for their evolutionist and pantheistic interpretations.

The Index was definitively abolished by the Church only in 1966. Yet, Uccr today maintains that there is nothing surprising in an entity that is a direct emanation of the Catholic Church - already custodian of preventive censorship instruments, Indexes of prohibited books and thematic inquisitions - intervening to defend the freedom of scientists. Shouldn't we be surprised, then, if today in defense of free science there is an intervention by those who for centuries silenced, ostracized or even executed those who dared to venture outside the doctrinal boundaries? It is understandable that the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, by convening Nobel Prize winners and specialists from every discipline, wants to show that today the Church is no longer an enemy of reason ; but it is precisely the contrast with historical memory that arouses amazement: the Church, guardian of an inquisitorial legacy, resumes its role as a bulwark of research where secular institutions - often paralyzed by bureaucratic constraints, conflicts of interest and indiscriminate cuts to research funds - struggle to guarantee the full autonomy of thought.

The question of the article discussed here is not "why does the Church defend science?", but "how is it possible that our secular institutions, born to promote knowledge and defend freedom of study, are so silent in the face of economic and political interests that stifle inconvenient projects, while the Church speaks through its academy?" Uccr wants us to believe that there is nothing to be surprised about, but erasing from our consciences the history of censorship, burnings, trials and self-censorship means betraying the very meaning of academic freedom, precisely in contrast with what the Pontifical Academy has declared. If today we applaud a dialogue that leads Catholics to confront laboratories, we cannot say that it is not a recent and extraordinary fact, the result of a path in which the Church has belatedly recognized that scientific truth can no longer be judged as a theological "position".

However, the Pontifical Academy speaks of “autonomy” and not “freedom” of scientific research. By autonomy, it is meant that science is free to the extent that it recognizes that it must give itself ethical rules, which are, in this case by definition, Catholic. Now, in its “autonomy,” science must recognize that the embryo is a person from conception and therefore it is not legitimate to do research on abandoned and donated embryos or on embryonic stem cells. In the name of this dogma, that is, of an assertion that has no logical or scientific basis, suffering has been created for women and couples who have not been able to have access to assisted fertilization on the basis of good clinical practice . And the irrational ban on research on embryos and embryonic stem cells delays the advancement of embryological knowledge and the discovery of new treatments for devastating and lethal diseases. One might want to develop some theological argument regarding the thesis that life has a value, and that by giving it a falsely metaphysical value one causes suffering to real lives. But we are not theologians.

Of course, medicine must admit, in its “autonomy,” that life is a gift from God and that no one can dispose of it. Not even an atheist. Ergo, anyone who finds himself suffering intolerable physical and moral pain and asks for help in dying, based on the doctor’s ethical commitment to heal or alleviate suffering, must not be listened to. And then there are studies on conscience or free will . The Pontifical Academy has often expressed the concept, which is also in its 1976 statute, that the Catholic Church values ​​science and encourages progress but scientific knowledge must be placed in a broader metaphysical and moral context.

Let's leave aside the sad sermons on artificial intelligence that must be at the service of man and the platitudes of "algoretics". As recently as 2018, Pope Francis stated that the scientific community "must not be considered separate and independent", but at the service of humanity and its development according to values ​​of "harmony between the truth of science and the truth of faith" and in the "light of divine transcendence". This means that although the Church recognizes the biological basis of human mental functions, it considers the person as something more than his biology. Free will, for example, cannot be refuted by neuroscience, even if it is demonstrated that our choices depend on unconscious or emotional processes . The Catechism of the Catholic Church states, in paragraph 1735, that "if man is not free, how can he be responsible before God?"

Science is welcome. But on condition that it is open to metaphysical truth and respects the mystery of the person. Well, the 3000 patients in a persistent vegetative coma for years, hospitalized in approximately 5000 RSAs (12 percent managed by religious organizations) who will never wake up because the nervous structures that support consciousness are destroyed (and we know it), are they still people? Even if they are deprived of any autonomy and therefore do not enjoy participation in any metaphysics or mystery? Of course if they are embryos, which do not even have neurons. So it is predictable that the Church, which fortunately does not question brain death for now, will take a stand against the use of tools that will soon allow us to evaluate the degree of brain destruction and therefore decide, through advance directives, not to accept being kept artificially alive, in the absence of a desired amount of consciousness. How this is reconciled with the latest pronouncement of the Pontifical Academy is a mystery of faith, and, honestly, we are not interested in discussing it further.

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