I don’t think of Truth (a synonym for God) itself as “an ongoing process,” but I do believe that our increasing understanding of it is an ongoing process (from the human point of view).

I find this quote (from this week’s lesson) interesting in regard to this thread:

“Sin and sickness will abate and seem less real as we approach the scientific period, in which mortal sense is subdued and all that is unlike the true likeness disappears.”

What stood out to me was the term “scientific period.” We obviously haven’t reached this period yet in human history, because not everything unlike the true likeness has disappeared yet. But divine Science gives us the tools to unfold the understanding that will inevitably bring about this scientific period. To me, this indicates that what we call “science” today isn’t really science at all, but educated reasoning laced with liberal amounts of “scientific guessing.” It is in a constant state of change and flux, unlike the laws of God, which are unchanging and eternal.

Its nice to see more people joining the discussion and presenting their own perspectives.

On the idea of “finite/limited human thinking” I would like to again quote some of the interesting and relevant passages from Bertrand’s essay :

“..on its theoretical side, philosophy consists, at least in part, in the framing of large general hypotheses which science is not yet in a position to test; but when it becomes possible to test the hypotheses they become, if verified, a part of science, and cease to count as ‘philosophy’.

…On the other hand, those who pooh-pooh science revert, as a rule, to some ancient and pernicious superstition, and refuse to admit the immense increase of human happiness which scientific technique, if widely used, would make possible. Both these attitudes are to be deplored, and it is philosophy that shows the right attitude, by making clear at once the scope and the limitations of scientific knowledge. ”

I think its tricky to use the words “finite/limited human thinking” not only because of the difficulty in expressing concretely what that means but also because of the different interpretations each follower of CS will make of these terms in their own journey of unfoldment of the spiritual Life. To me, this is related to Mrs. Eddy’s idea of the concept of mortal mind which I have come to understand, was her way of describing something which she later claimed to prove as nothing – seems linguistically and philosophically a bit challenging to grasp!

I appreciate the comments in this thread and I think that they are interesting to consider. I believe that everyone will have differing perspectives on life based on their own personal experience, so I would not expect this discussion to reach any specific consensus. I say this as a preface because although I have many questions about life and experiences with CS I do not really expect any specific answers to them. But at times it is interesting to hear the various different thoughts that people have coming from their own perspective.

In regards to the question of “finite” I would agree that it is a fairly well understood term. And to a certain extent I think the concept of “finite/limited human thinking” is also well understood. It seems to me that it refers to the observations that are made through the use of material senses and the conclusions that we can draw from these observations. And it is indeed limited, it is limited to what we can cognize with the physical senses.

But the question that comes to my mind, is how do we know that Science and Health and the other writings of Mrs. Eddy weren’t an outgrowth of observations that she made about her limited human experience? Certainly the text of Science and Health draws heavily on her life experience in explaining the concepts which is teaches. And S&H also seems to presuppose that much of Biblical mythology is literally true. Furthermore S&H is written in English, which is a human language and draws on human concepts to express a variety of different ideas. Fundamentally, it seems to me, language is a representation of a limited human idea. It’s limited to how we cognize things based on our life experience. If we think about the concepts of “the absolute” and “the relative” that CS often teaches about in which category would we place most of the words which appear in S&H? Or if we think about the process of writing S&H we know that it was extensively revised during Mrs. Eddy’s lifetime and that there were many (hundreds?) of editions published. Was the final edition a perfect statement of an infinite idea unconnected from the limitations of Mrs. Eddy’s human experience?

My point is that while I agree with statements about limitations of human knowledge, I don’t see why these very same limitations would not have applied to Mrs. Eddy’s lifework. After all during her time on this earth she was human was she not?

Some of the comments in this thread have pointed out that within the limited framework of human thinking it is impossible to have a complete understanding of reality. I don’t think that many scientists would argue with this viewpoint, but at the same time the general approach of science is to explain and understand what we can within the context of our own experience in this world. It seems to me that at times religion encourages people to question the validity of the conclusions of human science on false grounds. For instance the Catholic church did not accept Galileo’s observations about astronomy because it differed with their own interpretation of the Bible.

When we think about relationship between medical science and Christian Science it seems to me that this has been one of the most contentious issues for the CS church as a whole in its own conflict between modern science and religious theology. And while I do agree that medical science has many limitations in its understanding of human health, I think that the reluctance of CS to apply any sort of scientific methodology to analyzing its own healing record is something that makes it difficult to use testimonies of healing as proof of some general scientific law.

Again these are some of my thoughts about the relationship between CS and science as a whole. I do think that CS has some interesting ideas, but I don’t think that it is a complete theory of everything and I think that everything we experience in this word, including the reading and interpretation of S&H, occurs within the context of human thinking and thus suffers from the same limitations that lead some people to doubt the contributions of human science.

Mary Baker Eddy claimed that the basic nature of the universe and its laws had been revealed to her and that this “revelation” could be progressively demonstrated to be true. She was well aware that final confirmation of its truth could only come if people practicing Christian Science over the centuries to come could completely demonstrate its ultimate claims about the nature of the universe. So her claim that Christian Science is the “final revelation” means, it seems to me, that she felt she had discovered basic facts of existence that could potentially be shown to be completely true. Both she and the early Christian Scientists who did such radically outstanding healing work by practicing her teachings really had no reason to intellectualize over whether or not Christian Science is really the final revelation. They were too busy actually, in specific instances, getting results that seemed to them to illustrate, at least to a degree, what they felt were the truths about life and the universe they were reading about in Science and Health. Intellectualizing about whether or not Christian Science is really a science or whether it is final were of little interest to them when they frequently experienced in their practice of Christian Science quick healings of terminal illnesses, lives radically transformed, and even occasionally people being restored who appeared to have died. The question of whether or not the historical Jesus actually performed healings like those described in the gospels was also of little interest to them, since they felt they were frequently witnessing similar healings in their lives and the lives of others.

I think that those today who raise questions such as those being discussed in this thread would be a lot less likely to spend their time doing this if they were having the same kind of healing and other experiences that Mary Baker Eddy and other early Christian Scientists had. Mrs. Eddy’s whole approach to Christian Science was one of tangible demonstration of its teachings, instead of viewing it as only an intellectual system that one can prove or disprove by exercising only intellectual analysis.

I would also say that Mrs. Eddy certainly believed there was no limit to new insights into Christian Science that one could gain by studying and practicing it, but she did not believe that there would be any need for any new revelations of basic truth. I think that if someone accepts Christian Science as truth but then claims to get a new revelation of basic truth, it would have the effect of wiping out Christian Science. Let’s say that someone has a revelation that what Christian Science teaches about God being infinite Love is true, but that God has created an illusion of matter and given His children the opportunity to dream that they are living in this illusion in order to grow spiritually and appreciate more of what they have in their lives with Him. Matter, in this new revelation, although illusory, has an underlying spiritual purpose. Well, with this new revelation, you would not have Christian Science at all — you’d have something else that might use some of the words and concepts of Christian Science but it would not be Christian Science. For the kind of God who could create matter for His children to learn from would not be infinite Love as defined in Christian Science. Matter is, after all, the matrix of of the more unspeakable horrors and tragedies of mortal existence — something that most human fathers would not wish for their children to even momentarily experience. And it seems obvious to me that the potential for real healing in such a system would certainly be limited at best.

• This reply was modified 121 days ago by  MikeDavis.

Although I have many thoughts on the general topics of philosophy and intellectual reasoning I will first add one comment regarding Pacifist’s assertion that the claims of CS can be tested through human analysis of healing. In my view whatever the healing record of CS may be, analyzing it from a material perspective cannot serve to prove the truth of CS. Mrs. Eddy acknowledges an argument made on this subject in S&H xi:1:

Many imagine that the phenomena of physical healing in Christian Science present only a phase of the action of the human mind, which action in some unexplained way results in the cure of disease. On the contrary, Christian Science rationally explains that all other pathological methods are the fruits of human faith in matter,–faith in the workings, not of Spirit, but of the fleshly mind which must yield to Science.

The confirmed skeptic will dispute the claim that CS treatment contributed to healing a patient no matter what the outcome of any set of scientific tests may be. Although I do think that a methodical analysis of CS healing could be interesting from an academic standpoint, I will also acknowledge that the healing record stands as a point of interests on it’s own. Of course the cases where healing seems to be less forthcoming are also interesting, but CS culture tends to downplay these cases as it does the effectiveness of medical science, and so this is not something that is discussed all that much though I think most CSists are aware of it.

Regardless, from a philosophical standpoint I maintain that looking for alternative explanation of CS healing only serves to cast doubt on CS. So for someone who is convinced that CS is true there is little motivation to do so. It’s not necessarily an avoidance of the scientific methodology, it’s simply that this methodology alone cannot prove the CS is true.

As an illustration of this idea in a different field, namely computer science, there is a famous quote from Edsger Dijkstra where he says: “Program testing can be used to show the presence of bugs, but never to show their absence!” What he is saying is that tests can only find problems in a computer program, but it does not prove that the program is problem free (because the tests are limited, there are ways of trying to prove correctness using formal methods, although even then testing is required when the system is actually implemented because there are differences between a real system and the idealized assumptions used in the abstract language of formal methods). Of course even though testing does not prove anything from an absolute standpoint, it is still an important and widely used technique in software engineering.

So testing the claims of CS from a human perspective will not end up proving anything one way or the other in the general case. But testing is still important, but it is more likely to occur at an individual level where each person has to test how CS seems relevant in their own lives.

For me intellectual analysis of the teachings of CS and the history of the CS movement is still of interest. In part because, as Mike noted in the general case, I personally have not seen the claims of CS to be verified as correct in my own life or the lives of many people I know. So without that personal sense of confirmation I am more interested generally in the differing ways that religion, and CS in particular, seems to effect people’s human experience. But I am also willing to acknowledge that other people have had different experiences and different perspectives and each person is on their own individual path in the search for truth.

@Spoon Daniel Cowan is an author that was recommended to me by a good friend. I don’t know a lot about him but do know that he has a BA of Science degree, and a MA in the philosophy of science with a minor in mathematical logic. He’s also a Christian Scientist. You can check out an excerpt of his book on the website http://www.josephacademicpublishing.com

@pacifist – not to complicate things too much: you say “At one point he remarks that its not possible to prove a vague theory wrong. – It is my contention that CS is an example of such a theory.” then go on “before claiming the result as a consequence of CS treatment, first trying to disprove all other possible factors that could have led to that particular result?”

I think what I’m hearing here is something surrounding specificity, and I think this is very important in spiritual healing. And I think anyone who deeply cares about Christian Science would agree that we need to understand specifics.

Thing is, a vague science, one that is wafty or unpredictable is possibly the scariest thing. And I think you’re correct that many people struggle with this sense of discomfort in their spiritual journey.

But at the root, Divine Science – true spirituality expressed – does have it’s proof. Mrs. Eddy expresses this: “…for every scientific statement in Christianity has its proof.”

I think there’s room for growth – for all scientists – in better understanding these specifics!

Ben

• This reply was modified 112 days ago by  Benjamin.