Did Christianity help give rise to Science?

[AgnosticBoy]

A common view from some atheists is that Christianity goes against reason and evidence. But there is this view I keep coming across now and then that attributes the rise of science, or some aspects of it, to Christianity. Like this point for instance (from Wiki),

Some scholars have noted a direct tie between "particular aspects of traditional Christianity" and the rise of science. Other scholars and historians have credited Christianity with laying the foundation for the Scientific Revolution.

Oxford University historian and theologian John Hedley Brooke wrote that "when natural philosophers referred to laws of nature, they were not glibly choosing that metaphor. Laws were the result of legislation by an intelligent deity. Thus, the philosopher René Descartes (1596–1650) insisted that he was discovering the "laws that God has put into nature." Later Newton would declare that the regulation of the solar system presupposed the "counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. Historian Ronald L. Numbers stated that this thesis "received a boost" from mathematician and philosopher Alfred North Whitehead's Science and the Modern World (1925). Numbers has also argued, "Despite the manifest shortcomings of the claim that Christianity gave birth to science—most glaringly, it ignores or minimizes the contributions of ancient Greeks and medieval Muslims—it too, refuses to succumb to the death it deserves."The sociologist Rodney Stark of Baylor University, argued in contrast that "Christian theology was essential for the rise of science."

For Discussion:
What's your view on this? Do you think Christianity help create science? If so, in what way or how?

Perhaps there's some philosophical foundations in science that come from Christianity?

 

[Scooter]

I don't know that I would say Christianity gave rise to science, but I would offer that science is dependent upon God. God has revealed things to mankind through scientific discoveries that has helped civilization tremendously. There are still things God has hidden from mankind so far. The cure for the common cold for instance.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Ooh, found this article from one Christian apologist I used to listen to all the time - here's from his platform, the Christian Research Institute:

A central tenet of the new atheism is that Christianity and reason are antithetical, and that throughout history Christians have held back progress in science. Atheist historian Dr. Richard Carrier has promoted similar views in his contributions to essay collections such as The Christian Delusion and Christianity Is Not Great. He suggests that, but for the rise of Christianity, the ancient Greeks would have enjoyed a scientific revolution so that the “Dark Ages” never would have happened. However, the truth is very different. The science of the ancient Greek pagans was intended to reinforce their ethical and philosophical positions, rather than to be an objective study of nature. Admittedly, when Christians came to develop their own science in the Middle Ages, they were not being objective either. For them, science was the study of God’s creation. But the metaphysical assumptions of Christianity, unlike those of the Greeks or even Muslims, turned out to be extremely conducive to uncovering true knowledge about nature. They weren’t trying to, but it was Christians who laid the foundations for modern science.

But no one in the classical world was doing science objectively to study nature as an entity in its own right. They were all seeking to understand the natural background to their overarching philosophies.

Christians have always used science as a way to understand the natural world’s part in a bigger picture, which, in Christianity’s case, includes the Trinity and salvation. Medieval theologians studied God’s creation without any inkling or wish to produce the comprehensive account of the material universe provided by modern science. Nonetheless, their activity uniquely led to the incredible successes enjoyed by physics, chemistry, and biology, not to mention medicine, over the last couple of centuries. To believing Christians, it is hardly surprising that theologically conditioned natural philosophy should be better at leading to true knowledge about nature than rival systems of thought. However, the historian must tread carefully to understand the factors that Christianity brought to the study of the material universe.

The Bible has relatively little to say about the natural world, but at least the book of Genesis makes it clear where the universe came from. It is not eternal but created by God at the beginning of time. In the fourth century, St. Augustine clarified the doctrine that the world was created ex nihilo, out of nothing.19 God did not use preexisting material whose properties He had to work with. Thus, as Genesis affirms, creation was “good” and as God wished it to be.

From the twelfth century, Christian theologians began to explore what this meant in practice. One consequence was that nature was separate from God and followed the laws He had ordained for it. William of Conches (1085–c. 1154), one of the most important of the twelfth century’s thinkers, explained, “I take nothing away from God. All things that are in the world were made by God, except evil. But He made other things through the operation of nature which is the instrument of divine operation.”20 Various Greek philosophies had accepted the rationality of the laws of nature, but for Christians, nature’s laws were God’s laws rather than the laws of logic. God was free to do as He pleased, so it was impossible to work out the laws of nature by using reason alone. To be sure, not everyone accepted this. A group of philosophers in thirteenth-century Paris, called the Averroists after a Muslim philosopher from Spain named Averroes (1126–1198), took the extreme view that everything, including God, was subject to logically necessary rules.21 This meant that rational philosophy alone was enough to comprehend all of existence, even the divine mind. Orthodox Christians rejected this doctrine and insisted that God was not subject to any limits, except perhaps the law of noncontradiction. The principle of God’s freedom and absolute power was the subject of a decree by the bishop of Paris in 1277. He stated that because God could do as He pleased, He could do things that philosophers said were impossible, like creating a vacuum or more than one universe.22 This opened up a world of possibility that Christian natural philosophers were quick to exploit.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

I also found this quote on a site that either does not believe or at least doubts that Christianity gave rise to science:

“. . . the very notion of physical law is a theological one in the first place, a fact that makes many scientists squirm. Isaac Newton first got the idea of absolute, universal, perfect, immutable laws from the Christian doctrine that God created the world and ordered it in a rational way. Christians envisage God as upholding the natural order from beyond the universe, while physicists think of their laws as inhabiting an abstract transcendent realm of perfect mathematical relationships.”—Paul Davies, “Taking Science on Faith“, New York Times.

Quote was posted on this site...https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2013/10/18/did-christianity-and-other-religions-promote-the-rise-of-science/

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Does the information in posts 3 and 4 convinces anyone more?

Personally, I think some aspects of Christianity probably gave rise to some aspects of science, like the laws of nature. Some would also say that Christianity has hindered science in other ways, like not accepting scientific views that went against the religion.