Quest for MeaningThis survey of the history and development of science shows how science has grown to fill one's consciousness in the late 1990s to the point where every person feels him- or herself to be a scientist of some sort. The author argues that science has become the "instrument for the callous disregard of man, beasts, plants, and the air we breathe. It has released untold greed for power". Examining the origins of science in a world permeated by disinterested inquiry, mathematical reason, and the view of nature as a rational whole, the text takes the reader through 500 years, surveying the achievements of Copernicus, Galilieo, Harvey, Newton, Goethe and Einstein. The author points out how science has vastly enabled humanity to gain its control of outer nature while at the same time has diminished inner vision and moral certainty. He argues that people need to wrest their sense of identity away from the cold, mechanistic, computerized world where they are merely another part of nature to be engineered and manipulated. |
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abstract animal Anthroposophy appears Arthur Eddington atoms beauty become behaviour belief body called catastrophists century colour concept consciousness Copernicus Darwin Descartes divine doctrine dualism earth Einstein Emerson College ence energy environment evolution existence experience fact feeling force freedom further Galileo geometry Goethe Goethe's Haldane heavens Heitler human Huxley idea individual inner intuition Julian Huxley kind knowledge Lamarck language laws light living mankind material materialistic mathematical matter means mechanical mental merely mind modern monism moral motion natural selection never Newton Noüy object observation organism Origin of Species outer outlook particles perceived perception personality phenomena philosophy physical planets present principle qualities quantitative quantum mechanics question reality reason regard religion Rudolf Steiner scientific scientist seems sense soul space species spiritual world Sullivan Teilhard theory Theory of Relativity things thinking thought tion truth universe vision Whitehead whole words wrote