19 Apr 06
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Originally posted by lucifershammerGive it up with your pseudo-logic. That post was not made in isolation and I've given a whole slew of your statements all saying the same thing in different ways. I follow standard rules of interpretation which involve reading a quote in the full context. You ridiculed Bruno's philosophy and said it was worthless in many different places in many different ways. Your backpedalling now is ridiculous; I'm sure if you had an eraser that worked on the internet you'd put it to use getting rid of your prior posts.
"Bruno is not a man."
"Bruno is made of wood."
"Bruno is not a doctor."
All of these statements can also be construed as the "logical import" of my statement. Do you want to assert that I claimed any of these as well?
If you really want to do Scribbles-style nitpicking, go back over my statements - I said "Bruno is", not "Bruno [i/]was[/ e in was the third of those, would you credit me with being "visionary"?
Your last paragraph is ridiculous; what observations could Bruno have made before the invention of the telescope to support his cosmology?? Bruno got it right while prevailing opinion was wrong; in that, he was a visionary as most people concede. You refuse to concede it to justify his murder as no big loss to humanity. That's contemptible.
19 Apr 06
Originally posted by lucifershammerPathetic. No, I realized it right away but there were other fallacies and nonsense of yours I had to deal with.
Whatever the case, it took him nearly four days and a 100-odd posts to realise that I was "claiming Bruno's contribution to philosophy equals [b]zero".
I wonder why that is.[/b]
19 Apr 06
Originally posted by lucifershammerYou specifically claimed Bruno's cosmology was derived from Gnosticism, not merely his general philosophy. The backpedalling continues unabated.
Gnosticism is a wide-ranging set of beliefs - not all gnostic schools held to the emanation theory you are referring to here (which is more particularly neo-Platonist). The basic feature of gnostic thought is the idea of gnosis or special/mystical and experiental knowledge available only to a select few who achieve it through long years of myst ...[text shortened]... is technically called Gnosticism that originated around the same time and places as Gnosticism.
19 Apr 06
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Originally posted by no1marauderYou can read all of my statements in context and you will still not be able to get to your "zero" interpretation without "pseudo-logic" (as you call it). The most reasonable interpretation (which Hal gets but you obstinately refuse to see in order to score brownie points with the invisible jury) is that I'm asserting Bruno had little significant contributions to philosophy, mathematics, science etc. etc.
Give it up with your pseudo-logic. That post was not made in isolation and I've given a whole slew of your statements all saying the same thing in different ways. I follow standard rules of interpretation which involve reading a quote in the full context. You ridiculed Bruno's philosophy and said it was worthless in many different places in many differen refuse to concede it to justify his murder as no big loss to humanity. That's contemptible.
There's a world of difference between "little" and "no"/"zero". If you can't see that, I can't help you.
Go ahead now - claim I'm backpedaling.
That said, I will admit that I was exaggerating a bit when I said the whole "footnote ... on mediaeval esoteria" bit.
Your last paragraph is ridiculous; what observations could Bruno have made before the invention of the telescope to support his cosmology?? Bruno got it right while prevailing opinion was wrong; in that, he was a visionary as most people concede.
My last paragraph, though a parody, is a good illustration of the difference between what Bruno was actually saying and what people think he was saying. That his Hermetic cosmology let him stumble on to something we might recognise in modern astronomy makes him no more a visionary than my unicorns allowing me to figure out the number of planets makes me a visionary.
EDIT: Besides, the whole point about telescopes is fallacious. Copernicus didn't need telescopes, did he?
If you want a real [scientific] visionary, I'd suggest you look at someone like Mendeleev (for the Periodic Table), or Einstein (for Relativity).
19 Apr 06
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Originally posted by lucifershammerNo, Copernicius didn't need telescopes to have a more primitive cosmology than Bruno's as the two historians I cited on the prior page point out.
You can read all of my statements in context and you will still not be able to get to your "zero" interpretation without "pseudo-logic" (as you call it). The most reasonable interpretation (which Hal gets but you obstinately refuse to see in order to score brownie points with the invisible jury) is that I'm asserting Bruno had little significan omeone like Mendeleev (for the Periodic Table), or Einstein (for Relativity).
Kristeller: he developed the implications of the Copernican system much further than Copernicus himself had done.
Singer: To Bruno and to Bruno alone the suggestion of Copernicus entered into the pattern of a completely new cosmological order. In this sense Bruno not only anticipated Galileo and Kepler, but he passed beyond them into an entirely new world which had shed all the dross of tradition. It was a great vision which, from the very nature of the case, could be shared in full neither by his own nor by the succeeding generation.
19 Apr 06
Originally posted by no1marauderClearly, if I refer to both Bruno and the Inquisition (including St. Bellarmine - whom you treat as though he tortured you personally) as "superstitious louts" in the same sentence, then clearly I cannot be "attacking" one without attacking the other, can I?
And that's relevant to your attack on Bruno how??? One of the main "superstitious louts" who had Bruno killed is now a saint, ain't he?
Jesus, for a guy who picks up satire in the writings of 17th century scientists, I thought it would be obvious in this case. I was mistaken.
19 Apr 06
Originally posted by lucifershammerThe fact that I express moral outrage that a man was viciously murdered for his thoughts and you don't shows merely your extreme lack of human feeling for victims of your Church. You've expressed the same sentiments many times before.
Clearly, if I refer to both Bruno and the Inquisition (including St. Bellarmine - whom you treat as though he tortured you personally) as "superstitious louts" in the same sentence, then clearly I cannot be "attacking" one without attacking the other, can I?
Jesus, for a guy who picks up satire in the writings of 17th century scientists, I thought it would be obvious in this case. I was mistaken.
Since it was you who brought up the supposed inconsequential nature of Bruno's philosophy and impact, your comments about others is unimportant. It is insulting to compare Bruno to his murderers.
19 Apr 06
Bruno's perspective and its ramifications for science, philosophy, religion and theology.
here are some of the links
http://www.dimaggio.org/Heroes/giordano_bruno_-_courageous_and_complex_person.htm
http://www.newpara.com/bruno.htm
http://altreligion.about.com/library/bl_bruno.htm
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/john_kessler/giordano_bruno.html
He was a martyr for both free thought and critical inquiry.
gil
19 Apr 06
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Originally posted by no1marauderYates (p.174):
No, Copernicius didn't need telescopes to have a more primitive cosmology than Bruno's as the two historians I cited on the prior page point out.
Kristeller: he developed the implications of the Copernican system much further than Copernicus himself had done.
Singer: To Bruno and to Bruno alone the suggestion of Copernicus entered into the pattern ...[text shortened]... ture of the case, could be shared in full neither by his own nor by the succeeding generation.
The analyses which I shall make in later chapters will show that Bruno was an intense religious Hermetist, a believer in the magical religion of the Egyptians as described in the Asclepius, the imminent return of which he prophesied in England, taking the Copernican sun as a portent in the sky of this imminent return. He patronises Copernicus for having understood his theory only as a mathematician, whereas he (Bruno) has seen its more profound religious and magical meanings. The reader must wait for the other chapters for proof of these statements which I anticipate here for a moment, because Bruno's use of Copernicanism shows most strikingly how shifting and uncertain were the borders between genuine science and Hermetism in the Renaissance. Copernicus, though not uninfluenced by Hermetic mysticism about the sun, is completely free of Hermetism in his mathematics. Bruno pushes Copernicus' scientific work back into a prescientific stage, back into Hermetism, interpreting the Copernican diagram as a hieroglyph of divine mysteries.
Singer's book was published nearly a decade and a half before Yates's, and Yates was familiar with her work.
The funny thing about citing Kristeller is that Kristeller agreed that Bruno was essentially following in the Hermetic tradition. Yates's statement on the influence of Hermetism on Copernicus is, in fact, derived from Kristeller's work on the extent of Hermetic influence on Renaissance science and philosophy*.
---
*EDIT: Does anyone else see the irony here?
19 Apr 06
Originally posted by no1marauderGo back and read the "superstitious lout" post again. Here's the relevant part:
The fact that I express moral outrage that a man was viciously murdered for his thoughts and you don't shows merely your extreme lack of human feeling for victims of your Church. You've expressed the same sentiments many times before.
Since it was you who brought up the supposed inconsequential nature of Bruno's philosophy and impact, your comments about others is unimportant. It is insulting to compare Bruno to his murderers.
The real question is - why does it bother you so much? So Bruno was a superstitious philosopher whose so-called "visionary ideas" derived more from his mysticism and belief in magic than they did from actual astronomy (if at all). Does it make the crime of the Inquisition in executing him any less heinous? Of course not.
I think the reason it bothers you is this - if Bruno was just another superstitious lout (okay - smarter than most) who got burnt by yet another bunch of superstitious louts because his superstitions did not match theirs, then he's not exactly Enlightenment pin-up material, is he? Not exactly the soul of rationality, is he? Not exactly a martyr for science and progress, is he?
Well? It's true, isn't it?
19 Apr 06
Originally posted by lucifershammerIs there a point lurking somewhere, anywhere?? All three historians seem to disagree with your assessment of the inconsequential nature of Bruno's impact. Since you're big on Appeals to Authority, you're batting zero. Singer wrote after Yates' views on Bruno had already been expressed in the 1930's and Singer cites Yates' prior work favorably. There doesn't seem to be that much of a difference in thier views: Bruno was an important figure and not just because the RCC murdered him (which was your claim).
Yates (p.174): [quote]The analyses which I shall make in later chapters will show that Bruno was an intense religious Hermetist, a believer in the magical religion of the Egyptians as described in the Asclepius, the imminent return of which he prophesied in England, taking the Copernican sun as a portent in the sky of this imminent return. He patronis ...[text shortened]... isteller's work on the extent of Hermetic influence on Renaissance science and philosophy.
The boundary between science and philosophy in the 1500's was virtually non-existent. Bruno had many different influences including Lucretius, Nicholas of Cusa and others. He came up with an all-embracing explanation of the universe. If you want to call that "mysticism", so be it.
19 Apr 06
Originally posted by Bosse de NageBecause no1 keeps trying to brush them under the carpet.
That doesn't sound right. Why do you keep emphasising them if they mean nothing to you?
I see that, of the two participants in this debate, you're asking just me. Why don't you ask no1 the same question - what's it to him?
What's it to you?