Change Blindness—Part 1

The 19^th century saw a major shift in how humans viewed their planet and our place on it. That shift stemmed from the many scientific discoveries that were rapidly occurring at the time, as Western science began to blossom. Prior to this time, science and religion were mostly in harmony; with a few exceptions such as Galileo, when the Roman Catholic Church found him guilty of the heresy that proclaimed a helio-centric universe (rather than Earth-centered) and confined him to house arrest. 

The majority of scientists in those times held beliefs that did not conflict with the churches' teachings, since the view of most people was that the world indeed had been created by God, as the Bible describes. What's more, that world was perfect and unchanging. Most scientists—many of whom were also clergy—were convinced that the world would continue to be very much as it was at the time.

Human understanding of the cosmos then was quite limited—especially as to its age. Some had suspicions that Earth was maybe a few million years old, but nothing like over four billion years old. They also had no idea that the planet had settled into a benevolent climate in the last 12,000 years or so, and had often been inhospitable, prior to that time. Humans had had but the tiniest slice of the historical record to interpret the world's nature, with no understanding of how historically unrepresentative that slice was.

Then Charles Darwin published his bombshell treatise on evolution and natural selection in 1859. His book shook both the scientific and religious communities, by starkly refuting both of their belief systems. Darwin showed that nature was not immutable, but had been in a state of metamorphosis for a long time—and was continuing to transform. He demonstrated that all life, as well as the climate, had once been very different from what they saw in the mid-1800s. 

Completely aside from the fact that many people's belief in God was challenged by these statements of Darwin, it was the evidence of nature's mutability that rattled many believers. How could God's creation not be perfect and changeless? Was God not perfect? Some even questioned, did God exist? The church fathers (and they were exclusively men) felt threatened. They dug in their heels and ferociously defended their erroneous beliefs. They set up an opposition that continues today among religious fundamentalists.

It should be emphasized that most religious leaders today have accepted the theory of evolution and its implications for change. Furthermore, science's understanding of the natural world now is far greater than in Darwin's time. We now are very confident of the age of the Earth and its past geological eras.

Yet today we are once again experiencing another battle between science and a powerful group that puts doubts in the minds of the populace; this time it’s made up of industrial and corporate moguls, political leaders, and fundamentalist religious clerics. 

Contemporary science has offered irrefutable evidence that Earth's climate is once again experiencing another change—definitely one for the worse. Our climate is becoming dangerously warmer and will become periodically more menacing. Why are so many people complacent or in denial of the truth? We no longer can hide behind the ignorance of 19^th century knowledge. We know it's coming, and yet we dither. 

More change blindness next time…