Please excuse me the incredible hubris of deigning to disagree with René Descartes: the heart of science is NOT doubt, it is doubt's opposite--faith. The scientific method describes the process of learning any empirical truth as beginning with enough curiosity to ask a question, then to doubt your own intuitions or the established "truth" enough to force yourself to experiment and prove whether your hypothesis is correct or incorrect. It's the self-doubt, or doubt of intuition, or even previous explanations (doubt of which leads to curiosity) that is meant when scientists talk about scientific skepticism. The problem, for me, is that I think it is falsely labeling the desire to find out for certain if something is true as a doubt, rather than as a form of faith. Is faith not the evidence of things not seen, the substance of things hoped for? If you hope to know something, and invest thought and effort into designing an experiment that would reveal your hypothesis as either true or false, is that not an exercise of faith in the hope you have of knowing?
In this sense, challenges to established authorities, questions about the truth, or the true history of a thing MAY be an essential component to discovering a truth for oneself. So let's experiment and imagine the possibilities together. Let's say you want to know if heavier things fall faster than lighter things. I know, it doesn't really fire up the curiosity--we've already settled that back in Galileo's time, right? But follow me here for a minute in your mind. If the current explanation is that the effect of gravity is proportional to weight, then to challenge that assumption in the face of centuries of received notions and official state and religious dogma on the matter takes great courage, right? And if you prove it WRONG, then you're a hero and a great scientist. The perspective of hindsight grants Galileo prominent place among history's great thinkers for this very exercise of faith. Did he have to doubt received notions in order to develop this faith? Yes. Do we celebrate his courage in doubting the establishment and their "facts"? Of course. But it was nevertheless a desire to know the truth EVEN IF it might mean the tradition was proven wrong that produced his now fabled experiment of dropping two unequal weights from the tower of Pisa.
But that's not the current explanation, is it? We now understand a lot more about how gravity operates. It's pretty common knowledge now that the acceleration produced by gravity is a constant no matter the mass of the falling object, right? If you were to challenge that authority now, would it be courageous genius? Or just stubborn stupidity?
Not all challenges to authority, not all questioning of history is equally valid, or equally based in true curiosity. In the PBS special The Mormons, there is much false emphasis put on the idea that LDS leaders are dogmatic and opposed to "ANY questioning of authority" (emphasis mine). Do they REALLY believe that? ANY questioning of authority? Do you really think the leaders would allow themselves to be interviewed by PBS on camera if they were opposed to ANY questioning of their authority? I think they most emphatically demonstrated beyond the accusatory words of their challengers that they were in fact quite open to almost any examination of their authority at all, even one so manifestly biased against them as run by the producers of this documentary. Of course there are some possible challenges to their authority from within that can be baseless, disingenuous, or harmful to the faith or progress of others. These should rightly not be tolerated in the same way as a similar attack from an outsider over whom the leader's authority does not claim to stretch. The truth is that the Church will allow any individual to hold any opinion they want, whether it be defamatory, untrue, hurtful, or otherwise. It is only when such an individual undertakes to publish or communicate such divisive charges that leaders must take action to rectify the situation. If the charges are true, the accuser has recourse to a procedure by which evidence can be examined and an accused leader can be brought to judgment. But if the charges are found to be false, and the accuser cannot be convinced to recant, then the Church has an obligation to bring to bear its sole means of punishment: removal of privileges to serve. When considered from outside, this should appear quite fair and not excessive (the Church does not confiscate possessions, promote legal action, or even call for social pressure to bear down on even an excommunicated individual). Of course I have not described the actual procedures and structure of the tribunals (which I can describe in comments if anyone wishes), so an outsider might rightfully suspend judgment on fairness pending more examination there. But the general principles should seem sound, and it should be quite predictable that some challenges to authority would need to be dealt with in this manner. From inside the belief system--which holds that individuals are eternal beings whose time in mortality is a test for which there will be a final judgment of all deeds done in the flesh--excommunication for a public act of subversion is seen not a punishment, but rather as a tragedy, as a necessarily painful but ultimately merciful act preventing the offending individual from racking up more and more just judgments from God upon them, for God would justifiably hold to higher account those who have the truth and still deny it and seek to destroy the faith of others.
The truth of the matter is that the Church owns the largest private university in the US (BYU), whose satellite branches in Jerusalem, Hawai'i, and Idaho are also quite large (BYU-Idaho was formerly the largest 2-year institution in the States). They regularly rank quite highly in the US News and World Report rankings. It's simply ludicrous to suggest that the scholars who teach at such fine universities are somehow all either of clouded mind, or are all under such terrible coercion that they lack any of the curiosity that should come with true intellectualism. Could they lose their jobs? I guess so, but then doesn't that make the frequency of challenge from the university all the more evidence that challenges are tolerated and even encouraged? (Probably the most cited scholar on LDS doctrine is the late Hugh Nibley, who was notorious for calling out Apostles for their doctrinal and historical inaccuracies). When challenge is done in the spirit of contribution in the pursuit of truth it is welcome unequivocally.
And yes I said TRUE intellectualism, and there IS a FALSE kind. Challenging authority or official history is sometimes simply a partisan attack, and NOT an exercise of curiosity--NOT based on an experiment to discover the truth, but based on the desire to fit facts into an agenda. Sometimes challenging the truth, even using high-fallutin' words, is not brave--it's stupid. And when it goes beyond personally stupid to become publicly destructive, leaders and partisans of the truth should unite in acting against it.
The examples PBS brings to bear about this false opposition between intellectualism and faith are obviously cases where the academics wanted to have their cake (to "challenge authority", which really meant publish lies) and eat it too (remain upstanding members). And Elder Oaks comments on intellectualISM were on EXTREME intellectualISM--let's understand them for what they MEAN and not be alarmed by the frame in which they were placed: the sort of intellectualISM that doubts things for the sake of doubting them, which confuses curiosity and baseless challenge of the established order, which twists facts to fit agendas and couches them as critically thought through--all of that is a threat to faith AND to the academic community, science, and TRUE, NON-EXTREME intellectualISM. Elder Oaks himself IS an intellectual, having published scholarly works and practiced law many years before becoming and apostle and publishing even more scholarly works on religious topics. His argument is NOT CONTRA the curiosity that leads to the discovery of truth, it is contra the mistake of thinking all attacks against the establishment are equally valid, and equally intent on even being open to truth. He's PRO truth, PRO critical thinking, and contra false revisionism.
And as for the gentleman who claims there's secret central oppressive, Gestapo-like control over all things local in the church: I've got my little file on you--keep a sharp eye out, you'll never know who's been feeding me your secrets…
But seriously--any outside observer who understands the organization of the Church would be amazed by the amount of LOCAL control there is on administrative issues. There's always accountability upwards, as there should be, but for a Church based on the precept of personal revelation wouldn't you think the leadership would be interested in allowing people to decide things for themselves, and analogously making leadership decisions for their own spheres of influence? There's no need or motive for any central file-keeping on troublemakers, unless the troublemakers you are talking about have some deep, dark evil purpose (I mean REALLY: can you even in your wildest imaginings come up with an idea of something someone could do to the Church that would be so dastardly? Bomb a building? Hold hostages?--Those would be handled by LAW enforcement authorities, not Church authorities--What kind of threat to the Church would be so dastardly? I honestly can't think of one), or somehow cross administrative jurisdictions and therefore require more central handling. And what do you mean by files anyway? There are records kept on EVERY Church member: they know when I was baptized, how much tithing I've paid, what callings I've held. Any local clerk can access that data. Do you mean more like a KGB-type file? That's the insinuation. Is it REALLY reasonable to suggest that the Church would have ANY interest in keeping such a file? I honestly have no idea if that's true, but I also honestly cannot imagine it. Maybe someone out there actually knows and can clear this up, but until then, I think we can all agree that the framework of the proposition is quite ludicrous, and based on everything else in the documentary, probably quite out of context and warped.
And then there's the issue of feminism. I think I need another post for that one.
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