The Brain, A Decoded Enigma

by Dorin Teodor Moisa

But, surprise! Kepler verified Copernicus' theory and discovered that it is wrong (the positions calculated for the planets did not correspond to the experimental data). Kepler was not discouraged and he discovered that, if the orbits were to be ellyptical, and not circular as said by Copernicus, then, the calculations could be compatible with the experimental data. Later, Newton was able to find the explanation of this situation.

The problem was solved beyond any doubt in the favour of the European spirit. After many centuries, the Christian Church admitted officially the situation and rehabilitated Galileo Galilei, but not Giordano Bruno.

The above considerations suggest the essence of the European spirit: liberalism and tolerance, the desire for knowledge and the tendency to adventure.

We will say a few words about a new issue. It appears now, that a European Constitution is to be written. The problem is associated with the protests of the Christian Church generated by the non-inclusion in the Constitution draft of a phrase on the Christian origin of the European civilisation. As we have seen above, Europeans have created Christianity for Europeans. In spite of this, in many cases the European spirit clashed violently with the Christian spirit. The main reason is connected to the dynamism associated with the European spirit, which cannot accept an invariant model (religion).

The European spirit always was victorious, but the Christian Church did not succeed to evolve fast enough to sustain always the European spirit. The Church doesn't seem to have learned anything along the centuries, if, even nowadays, it opposes the European spirit in problems like the same-sex marriages, abortion or accepting women as priests. Thus, there is, up to a point, a justification to the decision not to include in the European Constitution the reference to Christianity.

We need to note that accepting same-sex marriages is not, in principle, a good thing, and I believe that many Europeans have this point of view. However, the European liberal and tolerant spirit states that, passing over any pros and cons, there should not exist, in principle, any authority to oppose to the wish of the people to search and experiment new ways of life together. European homosexuals are Europeans, and have the right to live their life as they consider it right.

Note: The fact that the Christian Church, created by Europeans for Europeans, has come at times into violent conflict with the European spirit, does not mean at all that it is a non-European Church. During the 2000 years of Christianity, the Christian Church had a very positive role in keeping the stability of the world, and gave hope to a lot of people. Leaving faith behind, created monsters (e.g. Communism). This section wants only to show to the Church, that it should be more flexible and, independent of its great merits, avoid to get into conflict with the European spirit. The European spirit has always been victorious and will always win any battle with the Christian spirit.

Let's follow however some facts. The first fundamental symbolic model is Euclid's geometry. It was created about the year 300 BC and is unmodified up to our days. The scolars of the period left us a huge amount of scientific data kept in large libraries of the Antiquity. At 415 AD, the Christian leaders destroyed the great library of Alexandria, because the books have been considered contrary to the Christian religion.

The result was that scientific knowledge has been completely destroyed for a very long time (the European civilization entered in the Dark Ages), so that the next fundamental symbolic model (Newton) appeared over 2000 years after Euclid! It is clear that the Christian Church had an active role in this unacceptable big delay, by the destruction of the books and blocking freethinking. However, it is not clear that this delay was caused by the emergence of the monotheist Christian religion or it is associated with a characteristic of the development of the brain. I mean, any monotheist religion wants the control of the thinking system of the people. The main problem is if the people accept this, or not. The Christian Church used to keep up to fifty years ago a list of forbidden books and ideas, but very few people take it in consideration. The general problem is still open.

The evolution towards symbolic models reduces more and more the influence of religion on society, and this can be seen in the increase in the number of those who ignore religion.