Humanists Memorialize Giordano Bruno (tags)
The San Diego Humanist Fellowship commemorated the 410th anniversary of the execution of Giordano Bruno at their February 14 meeting. Bruno, a 16th century philosopher, monk and scientific scholar, was killed by the Holy Inquisition for denying the Trinity, the divinity of Jesus, the virginity of Mary and the dogma that the earth was the center of the universe.
Humanists Memorialize Giordano Bruno (tags)
The San Diego Humanist Fellowship held a program on February 14 to commemorate the life and death of Giordano Bruno, the 16th century Italian philosopher and scientific theorist who was burned at the stake by the Holy Inquisition in 1600 for (among other things) arguing that the earth orbited the sun and there was an infinite universe.
Former Prof Speaks on Religion/Science/Democracy Conflicts (tags)
Former UCSD professor Lew Perry spoke to the Humanist Fellowship of San Diego November 16 on the conflicts between religion, science and democracy. He said that conflicts are inevitable because when religion makes statements about the physical world -- like the Bible's claim that the earth is fixed in space -- scientists can and must challenge the religious understanding of physical reality.
We Are Our Biochemistry, Says George Riddle (tags)
George Riddle gave a lecture to the Humanist Fellowship of San Diego containing some provocative — and frightening — ideas about the human genome and the possibility of manipulating it. Drawing on the research of his uncle Oscar Riddle, a pioneering genetic scientist who made the cover of Time magazine in 1939 and died in 1952, as well as other, more recent scientists, George painted a picture of a brave new world in which diseases like cancer and diabetes have ceased to exist — and largely ignored the racist and classist applilcations of the knowledge he described so enthusiastically.