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WORTH THINKING ABOUT: WILL THE CENTER HOLD?
"When Copernicus ousted earth and its travelers from their illusion of
a central place in the universe, his assertion went beyond physics: it
called into question our privileged relationship to God. It was as if the
status of humankind had been reduced -- from the center of creation to an
inhabitant of a speck of dust in the vastness of space. It was unthinkable,
and yet, with time, the unthinkable becomes taken for granted. This is not
just because people get used to the new idea, or get tired of fighting
against it. Something else happens as well. What happens is that ways are
found to reassert a centered view of the human within the new context.
"One such way has been described by the scientist and philosopher
Michael Polanyi. Since Copernicus, writers have exhorted us to abandon
'sentimental egoism and see ourselves objectively in the true perspective of
time and space,' but Polanyi is skeptical. 'No one -- scientists included--
looks at the universe this way, whatever lip service is given to
objectivity. Nor should this surprise us. For, as human beings, we must
inevitably see the universe from a center lying within ourselves...'
"For Polanyi, this center is the human mind. We recenter ourselves as
thinkers, at the intellectual if not the physical center of the universe."
The indicator that tells that man has shifted the center of the
universe to his mind is his exceessive reliance on rationalism
and his belief that universe should be capable of being understood
by him logically (which an act of faith for all of us scientists).