Would you say there is some truth to this notion regarding Christianity?

[Beaudreaux]

I believe that when the Gospel was restored, God began to open the heavens and to reveal knowledge. He called prophets and revealed truth through revelation. God also opened the minds of men and women to make scientific inquiry and to make great discoveries and inventions. Mankind is better off with scientific discovery and God gave this to the world as a blessing. Part of the reason, but not all, for the advancement of communication and transportation was to facilitate spreading the restored gospel throughout the world.

I see. Was God also responsible for developments like atomic weapons, sarin gas and DNC Abortions? Since they came from His Church, I can assume he gave man insights into the thumbscrew, the Iron Maiden and the dunking chair, but I'm talking about those technological innovations that are not directly produced by the Church.

 

[Quagmire]

I'm sure Islam made advancement and progress grind to a halt in that part of the world, and it was the Spanish Catholic Conquistadors who wiped out the Mayans.

You're no being fair here, FH; during the Middle ages Muslim Spain was the only part of Europe where culture/education/the sciences /math/classic literature---basically every component of classical civilization flourished, was preserved, and made advances.

It was also one of the few places anywhere where it was safe to be Jewish throughout the Middle Ages. For that matter, once the Muslims where driven out of Iberia one of the things all of the above was immediately replaced with was the Inquisition.

 

[Quagmire]

I think it's rather Euro-centric. Scientific growth and discovery didn't stop through the Dark Ages... it just moved. The Muslim world really did help to safeguard scientific knowledge throughout this period, and as the Dark Ages ended, this knowledge permeated back into Europe through the interaction between Christian and Muslim cultures.

Fun fact: one such bit of knowledge was a treatise by the Persian astronomer Al-Farghani, which commented on other previous astronomers and geographers, and described a fair bit of his own work. This was translated to Latin (at which time his name was Romanized to "Alfraganus") and eventually found its way into the hands of Christopher Columbus. He rather naively assumed that a mile was a mile was a mile, and his confusion between the Arabian mile (about 2 km) that Al-Farghani used to report his findings and the Spanish mile (about 1 km) with which Columbus was familiar was a large part of his mistaken notion that he would have been able to sail straight from Europe to Asia without dying of dehydration and starvation halfway across when his food and fresh water ran out.

Ooops! didn't see this.

What he said.

 

[Daemon Sophic]

I believe that when the Gospel was restored, God began to open the heavens and to reveal knowledge. He called prophets and revealed truth through revelation. God also opened the minds of men and women to make scientific inquiry and to make great discoveries and inventions. Mankind is better off with scientific discovery and God gave this to the world as a blessing. Part of the reason, but not all, for the advancement of communication and transportation was to facilitate spreading the restored gospel throughout the world.

1. Could you provide the quotes from the Book of Mormon that state that God's "revealing knowledge" included information other than Mormon scripture?
2. You are aware that you are implying that pre-1820 human brains were incapable of making reasonable scientific inquiries, hypotheses, and experiments (including humans in the Middle East, India, China, etc.... Right?

Actually, my understanding is that the Church played a vital role in preserving what little science and philosophy was left in Europe after the fall of Rome.

The monks were instrumental in copying much of the previously existing texts. But ongoing scientific questioning and experimentation was greatly supressed by the Christian church in this time period. Thus, mathematics and other sciences "took off" relativistically speaking in nations outside of Europe, but didn't evolve much in the western world. When the Renaissance (sp?) and "the Age of Enlightenment" finally dawned in Europe, it was a lot of catching up done by reading what non-European scientists had already done, starting from what was done by the Romans. So really, the "Dark Ages" was a period of stagnation for knowledge/science/truth in the Western world, rather than steps backward.
Still hurts though.

I found this image macro a while back:....snip....
...and I think it raises an interesting point. discuss.

Cute graph. But as I've just said, I would have drawn the graph to show a plateau (not a dip) in the Dark Ages. However, what I find sadder to consider is how we are not growing scientifically or socialogically, not due to 500 years of obscene depravity against good people a millenium ago. Rather look no further than the last century/50 years/decade/week to know that the curve is even now being held down. :bonk:

 

[logician]

Consider the graph starting with the Renaissance, a time of Christian re-awakening. Then, consider the graph starting in 1820, when the gospel of Jesus Christ was restored to the earth. It's remarkable how knowledge from heaven, both spiritual and scientific, have flooded the earth since the beginning of the Restoration of the Gospel.

Please explain how these are statistically connected.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Please explain how these are statistically connected.

One of my longstanding observations is that the inability to differentiate correlation from causation, is one of mankind's biggest weaknesses and the root of countless problems.

 

[Scott C.]

Please explain how these are statistically connected.

I can't prove these are statistically connected. I also didn't say that before the restoration, there were no scientific advancements. I also recognize that scientific advancements can be used for good and evil. I also did not say that the only reason for scientific advancement is to help the Restored Church to grow.

Nevertheless, I believe that scientific advancement is a blessing from God which mankind SHOULD use for good. Evil men will always find a way to use it for evil and destruction.

As a matter of faith and not as a matter than I can scientifically prove, I see the events as happening roughly as follows:

The world is in the dark ages. God looks down on the world and says the time has come to make some changes in preparation for the Second Coming. Mankind starts to seek for more religious and scientific knowledge. The world starts pulling out of the dark ages through the renaissance. The Protestant movement prepares the minds of Christians for a coming restoration. The gospel is restored in the early 1800's. Scientific advancements continue to be made. The Restored Church is able to use these advances to spread the word in a remarkable manner that could not be imagined when the church was first restored. The clock continues to tick closer to the Second Coming...we don't know when that will happen...all of the technological advances that good people, including the Church of Christ, use for good purposes, are corrupted by Satan and used to destroy peoples hearts, minds, bodies, and souls. The work is unfolding on God's timetable and according to plan...God is working great miracles on the planet to aid the work of good, wherever its found...Satan is fevorishly doing his work...I can't prove it...he who hath ears to hear, let him hear.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

As a matter of faith and not as a matter than I can scientifically prove, I see the events as happening roughly as follows:

The world is in the dark ages. God looks down on the world and says the time has come to make some changes in preparation for the Second Coming. Mankind starts to seek for more religious and scientific knowledge. The world starts pulling out of the dark ages through the renaissance. The Protestant movement prepares the minds of Christians for a coming restoration. The gospel is restored in the early 1800's. Scientific advancements continue to be made. The Restored Church is able to use these advances to spread the word in a remarkable manner that could not be imagined when the church was first restored. The clock continues to tick closer to the Second Coming...we don't know when that will happen...all of the technological advances that good people, including the Church of Christ, use for good purposes, are corrupted by Satan and used to destroy peoples hearts, minds, bodies, and souls. The work is unfolding on God's timetable and according to plan...God is working great miracles on the planet to aid the work of good, wherever its found...Satan is fevorishly doing his work...I can't prove it...he who hath ears to hear, let him hear.

Any reason why we should assume that the "Restored Church" you mention is the LDS Church and not one of the other myriad religious movements that sprung up around the same time?

 

[Elessar]

The coming of the Dark Ages to Europe had nothing to do with the rise of Christianity. The Dark Ages were caused by a climatic shift throughout Eurasia which led to the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and the Germanic tribal wars throughout the former Western Empire lasting until the end of the Dark Ages.

However, scientific development did continue forward during the Dark Ages - just not in Western Europe. The Eastern Roman Empire continued to flourish for centuries after the beginning of the Dark Ages, and, even through the wars between the Romans and the Muslims, both sides continued to be centers of culture and philosophy through the end of the so-called Dark Ages, when Western Europe started to pull itself back together in the 14th century.

 

[Valjean]

The graph, as has been pointed out. reflects only Europe.
Eastern Christendom flourished much longer than the Western empire. Byzantium continued as a cosmopolitan civilization long after 410, and after it was overrun Islamic civilization was flourishing.
Christian monasteries did serve as a repository of knowledge, particularly after the crusaders began bring Eastern ideas back, but the Church itself did not generally support free thought or innovation.

The potential for an industrial revolution existed for millenia, but the few "engines" and labor-saving devices developed remained only curiosities.
As long as those in power had slaves to do their work for them there was little incentive for industrial innovation.

Personally, I think we may be on the brink of a second dark age. Our various support systems are in accelerating decline, while our demand and dependence on them is ever increasing.

 

[Diederick]

Why, we all want to live in a better future. If we would be living in a better future we would still want to live in an even better future..

There are different ways to look at this, I am commonly squeamish about using the word 'perfection', but it seems fit for this task.

If we imagine perfection, we can establish our place in an approach to that 100%, in a percentage. If we were at 25% before the Dark Age (of reaching perfection), and which postponed or actually degraded that percentage, we could conclude that we are less now than we could have been if we simply continued from 25% all the way. In short, if we are now at 75%, we might have been up to 90% if it wasn't for Christianity (read: the Dark Age).

The sooner we reach greater perfection, the better. Mainly to reduce suffering, secondarily to increase pleasure of all life. Besides, we have to start thinking about our future beyond this planet in a millennium or two; and to establish a worthwhile solution to our dying planet, world peace would be very helpful - something religion is not helping in, embodying the wedge it is.

 

[madhatter85]

Any reason why we should assume that the "Restored Church" you mention is the LDS Church and not one of the other myriad religious movements that sprung up around the same time?

Like he said,

we cannot prove this point, this is only our own observations and understanding of the gospel plan.

MSC tends to villify science as some sort of evil, heathen thing that will destory our future. To us, this is complete nonsense. Science has given and will continue to give great advancements for humanity. We believe all source of knowlege and truth has come from God. I believe all fields of science, and great Scientific researchers, even Charles Darwin was inspired of God to do the research they did. It was not until later that people began to misconstrue thier research and findings. I would bet money that Charles Dawrin is rolling in his grave right now over what academia has done to his work.

Why would scientific discovery backslide during the dark ages? why do they call it the dark ages? why were there very few and far between advancements in scientific knowlege then?

to us, this is proof of the "Great Apostasy." Without the Light of Christ on the earth, mankind dwindles and perishes in unbelief.