Today’s “Christianity: Enemy of Science and Reason” Moment

From Mike Flynn, who has forgotten more about medieval philosophy, science and technology than most of us will ever know:

Robert Grosseteste (1175-1253), rector of Oxford and Bishop of Lincoln, in his ‘Treatise on Light’ (De luce), wrote that out of nothing pre-existing, God had created a single point from which the entire physical order emerged by way of extension or expansion. The first dimensionless point was light which was one and simple, “containing matter implicitly in the form of light.” If only he had known of the singularity, the big bang, and the convertability of mass and energy, poor dude. Oh, wait…

Grossteste does not appear to provide strong evidence for the postmodern conviction that medievals were nine centuries stupider than highly evolved specimens of our own time such as Snooki Polizzi, Jerry Springer, Paris Hilton, Jerry Coyne and Richard Dawkins.