Science in Christian Perspective

Letter to the Editor

I should like to direct attention to The American Behavioral Scientist, September 1963. The entire issue is devoted to the "Politics of Science and Dr. Velikovsky" and includes three papers. The first, by Ralph Juergens, recounts the story of Dr. Velikovsky from the beginning to the present day. The second, by Livio Stecchini, analyzes the roots of the controversy in the history of science. The third, by Alfred DeGrazia, publisher and editor of the journal, searches out the means by which new science is brought into the corpus of science and offers suggestions for reforms.

I believe that Dr. Velikovsky's work and the issues presented in this particular issue of the Journal are of immense importance to the Christian scholar and the social sciendsL Inadvertently, Dr. Velikovsky has probably done more to provide a rational basis f9r the connection between Old Testament phenomena and science than any modern day author. His major works, Worlds in Collision and Ages in Chaos, need be analyzed carefully by the physical scientist, social scientist, and theologian.

Of particular interest to me as a social scientist is the interesting and well-documented thesis that the natural sciences, claiming themselves to be the only objective sciences, in fact are not so, but are agitated and strongly influenced by clique behavior, power networks, ideologies, public opinion, social controls and professional sanctions.

I trust that in some way this controversy might be made known in the Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation in the near future.

Ronald Stuckey N. Y. State Research Foundation Children's Hospital, Buffalo, N. Y.