By John Mark Reynolds
Scriptorium Daily
The question is: “What is true?”, not what fits my preconceived philosophy of science or theology.
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In the Medieval West, design and the involvement of supernatural Intelligence were widely accepted, and they helped justify the idea that we live in a creation that can be studied and in which truths can be grasped beyond the surface appearances of things. Contrary to the stereotype of the period as a time of intellectual stagnation and dogmatism, philosophy of science continued to develop during the Middle Ages. Such men as Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, and William of Ockham made important advances of the Greco-Roman understandings of the natural world and philosophy.
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Many people were horrified by the societal ills brought on by the secularism they had embrace. One of these men was the prototypical Englishman, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The creator of the arch-rationalist Sherlock Holmes was horrified at the decline in public morals. Darwinism had destroyed the Creator God of the Jews and Christians, but left no way to maintain the England that Doyle loved. Doyle gradually became convinced that the occult was the salvation of England. Wallace and many distinguished scientists gave him the intellectual cover that he needed. Soon the creator of Holmes was dedicating most of his time and considerable fortune to mediums, table tipping, and the fortunes of the growing Spiritualist religion.
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Darwinism freed them from traditional religion. Most of their scientific friends embraced the secularist dogma of men like Darwin. The literary types would not go that far, however. They wanted to provide room for a “scientific religion.” They hoped spiritualist activity could be studied. Soon, in the generation that followed Doyle, fraud and frequent disappointment sent most the humanities professors in the direction of the irrational. The “new age” movement and post-modernity are symptoms of this difficulty. Where Doyle wanted “evidence” and the supernatural, the new humanities gurus abandoned reason altogether. (more)
