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History and Evolution:
By William E. Steinman:
Part 46, A Glimmer of light:
February 9, 2004:
This superstitious madness based in fundamentalist nonsensical religious concepts, which gripped Europe in the dark ages did not end with the last crusades. There was more evil in the works. This was the insistence that everyone be Christian according to the rules of the church. Out of that came the madness of the inquisitions. Europe continued to be held in primitive savagery. It was like a cancer that grew in the minds of men. This insanity carried all the way over to Salem in early American history.
Before we get into these things, let us look at a glimmer of light and hope that also came forth as the dark ages came to a close. Somewhere in or near 1400 a giant was born. The name of this giant was Johannes Gutenberg. We could easily make the case that Johannes Gutenberg was the most important person in Western history. He was more important than Hannibal with his elephants. In fact, Johannes was more important than any general who ever lived.
In about 1455, according to most accounts, Gutenberg invented the movable type press and printed the Mazarin Bible, the first book ever printed in Europe using movable type. This guy had the genius to cross many technical disciplines so as to create his printing press. He had to master a kind of die making and also metal alloying and metal casting. He then developed a printing press based on the presses used in other industries like wine making. In addition he had to understand the chemistry of oil based inks.
We have skipped over a lot of other technical developments, but this one is to important to skip. This invention of the moveable type press was among the most profound events in human history. There is evidence to indicate that type casting and printing were used in Korea about 50 years previous to Gutenberg's work. However, Gutenberg developed his press without knowledge of what took place in the East. As always, Eastern history and development were either ignored or poorly recorded in the Western world.
In Europe, prior to Gutenberg, documents were created almost entirely by hand using pen and ink. Much of this work was religious in nature and was done in monasteries by monks. There was also a form of printing using carved wood blocks for some work. This was hardly a high production technique and was used mostly for embellishment of hand wrought documents. The blocks were elaborate hand carved capital letters.
What is most important for our history is Gutenberg put the control of information into the public domain. His work spawned the modern communications industry and forever changed how we interact, as individuals and as nations. This was a gradual change to be sure, but it began here. Information could no longer be the exclusive property of Kings, Emperors, and the church. The power of the press would prove to be the deciding factor, first in England and later in Europe during the enlightenment.
If only the popes and potentates had known. Instead of bringing astronomers and scientists before the inquisition they should have dealt with this humble German technician. The should have smashed his press and burned him at the stake to preserve their control of information or at least delay the loss of control. Instead, they ignored this profound development and foolishly went after people like Galileo. The truth is, then as now, most of the rabble could have cared less about where the center of the universe was. It was not the controversy over planetary motion that destroyed the power of the church, it was the printed word bringing a revolution in information.
By the time Galileo came along it was already to late. Though they didn't realize it at the time the church had already lost. Even so, the atrocities in the name of Christ continued. Galileo came a full century later than Gutenberg when scientists were beginning to investigate the universe. They began to discover and publish contradictions to the orthodox views of the church.
Galileo was a scientist who lived from 1564 to 1642 in the middle of the so called enlightenment. He made many discoveries and one serious mistake. His big mistake came with the publication of his "Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems." This work supported the Copernican theory of planetary motions wherein the sun was the center of the universe. To support his work, Galileo constructed the first astronomical telescope and used it to discover the facts about planetary motion. Until then the church had clung stubbornly to the old position that placed the earth at the center of the universe.
Now, for sure, Galileo's discoveries and writings annoyed pope Urban VIII and his henchmen in Rome. They had only one fixed response to that kind of challenge. In 1633 Galileo was brought before an inquisition in Rome. There was a bit of argument and bargaining and Galileo was condemned to life in prison. In fact he never served a day, but he did recant and abjure formally. His treatment was remarkably mild compared to what was done to many others.
For the church, that bit of arrogance and nonsense with Galileo
was of no help. A new world was aborning and Galileo was just
one of many who lead the way into it. Though the church continued
the struggle the dark ages had passed. the renaissance was under
way. More and better was to come.
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