Date: Mon, 25 Apr 2005 20:17:57 +0100 From: Paul Newall <hugoholbling-AT-gmail.com> To: feyerabend-driftline.org-AT-lists.driftline.org Subject: Re: [PKF] Feyerand and the new Pope Cc: Feyerabend List <feyerabend-AT-driftline.org>, As I understand it, Ratzinger gave an interview in the Corriere della Sera of March 30, 1990, in which he quoted from Feyerabend. The relevant passage reads: "Se qui entrambe le sfere di conoscenza vengono ancora chiaramente differenziate fra loro sotto il profilo metodologico, riconoscendone sia i limiti che i rispettivi diritti, molto pi=F9 drastico appare invece un giudizio sintetico del filosofo agnostico-scettico P. Feyerabend. Egli scrive: "La Chiesa dell'epoca di Galileo si attenne alla ragione pi=F9 che lo stesso Galileo, e prese in considerazione anche le conseguenze etiche e sociali della dottrina galileiana. La sua sentenza contro Galileo fu razionale e giusta, e solo per motivi di opportunit=E0 politica se ne pu=F2 legittimare la revisione." Here Ratzinger was quoting from the heading of chapter 13 of Feyerabend's Against Method; that is: "The Church at the time of Galileo not only kept closer to reason as defined then and, in part, even now; it also considered the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's views. Its indictment of Galileo was rational and only opportunism and a lack of perspective can demand a revision." (p125 in the Verso 2002 edition) Ratzinger's comment reads (paraphrased, with apologies for my poor Italian) "if we distinguish between methodological spheres and acknowledge their limits, we arrive at a more synthetic position like that of the agnostic-skeptic philosopher P. Feyerabend". Feyerabend himself commented on this talk of Ratzinger's in a footnote to the 13th chapter (2002 edition, n20, pp133-134), saying that Ratzinger had "formulated the problem in a way that would make a revision of the judgement [i.e. Poupard's, following the work of the Commission set up by John Paul II under his direction] anachronistic and pointless." Feyerabend added that he had responded to Ratzinger's speech in two interviews, one in Il Sabato of 12 May 1990 and the other in La Repubblica of 14 July 1990, but I have been unable thus far to read these. The idea that the Church had acted "more rationally" in its dealings with Galileo was given its most detailed defence by Feyerabend in his talk to the Crakow Conference of 24-27 May 1984, entitled "Galileo and the Tyranny of Truth" (reprinted in "Farewell to Reason"). Severe critique of Poupard's (non-)resolution can be found in Annibale Fantoli's work, particularly his "Galileo and the Catholic Church: A Critique of the "Closure" of the Galileo Commission's Work" (Specola Vaticana, 2002). I myself have discussed why Feyerabend's argument fails (http://www.galilean-library.org/galileo3.html#pos with more detail at http://www.galilean-library.org/bible.html ), but the basic point is that the interpretive principle arrived at by Bellarmine in his "Letter to Foscarini" rendered any possibility of development in the Church's attitude to heliocentrism or geokineticism impossible due to the insistence that the Bible passages ostensibly contradicting either were to be considered a matter of faith ex parte dicentis. Both Feyerabend and Ratzinger were mistaken on this issue, then, since calling this approach more rational than Galileo's is absurd. Paul Newall. P.S. I'm new to this list, so I hope I sent it to the correct address and didn't include too many deliberate typos. On 4/25/05, John Preston <j.m.preston-AT-reading.ac.uk> wrote: > Has anyone noticed Feyerabend's reference to the new pope?: > > [Around 1990?] 'Cardinal Ratzinger, the pope's expert on doctrinal > affairs, gave a talk in Parma about Galileo and mentioned me in support > of his views' (Killing Time: The Autobiography of Paul Feyerabend > (1995), p.178). > > Feyerabend doesn't mention whether he appreciated this reference, but > one of the more interesting (but perhaps not reverential?) photos in the middle pages of his > autobiography is captioned with this very quote. > > John Preston, > Department of Philosophy, > The University of Reading, > England. > > _______________________________________________ > List address: feyerabend-AT-driftline.org > Admin interface: http://lists.driftline.org/listinfo.cgi/feyerabend-driftline.org > _______________________________________________ List address: feyerabend-AT-driftline.org Admin interface: http://lists.driftline.org/listinfo.cgi/feyerabend-driftline.org
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