Haven’t had a chance to read through this all. I am now writing from my lab, and some of these posts are rather disturbing to say the least.
A few prefaces:
A) There is clearly nothing wroing with studying science, and today it may be the greatest method of understanding niflaos haborei that we have.
B) Studying science is possibly the greatest chesed there is, as one who suffers from a disease wants nothing other than some relief.
C) I don’t believe that evolution has been proven for reasons I may discuss in another post, as it is long. However, we must learn to take what scientists have proven and separate from what is speculation. The differences are often subtle. But we must learn the art of critical thinking. In gemara terms, is something muchrach or not. Every single line one reads or writes in science must constantly be filtered this way.
Now for the direct issues:
1) Joseph, you brought Chazal’s knowledge of the rakia as a proof to their expertise. Kindly define what the rakia is and what it was that chazal added to our understanding of this astronomical entity that we did not know before.
2) Somebody wrote that one shouyld not study science from science books, but rather from the briyah. That is rather silly, and in your whole lifetime you will probably only gain the most simple and superficial understanding if you try to reinvent the whole wheel on your own. As Newton said, if we have seen further, it is because we have stood on the shoulders of giants. We can’t get anywhere new in science without understanding all that has preceded us to the best of our ability.
3) Tha gemara Pesachim clearly states that Chazal felt that non-Jews knew better than we did about astronomy. So all these arguments saying that they knew more than the scientists contradict an explicit gemara. Chazal were men of humility and emes, and did not hesitate to credit others. The same with Kibud Av which is learned from a Non-Jew in Kiddushin. Chazal searched for emes no matter what the source, as they had such integrity and intellectual honesty.
4) The Rambam Kiddush Hachodesh (17,24) similarly says that anything proven scientifically or mathematically has the status of divrei neviim.
5) The Rambam also says that the reason Chizkiya buried the Sefer HaRefuos was because it didn’t work.
6) As much as the astounding amount that scientists know now, it is just a drop in the ocean of what there is to know. This does not mean scientists are stupid or arrogant. It means there is plenty more work ahead of them.
7) As was discussed in another thread on this topic, I proved that chazal could not have known modern science, since if they did, they would have had a mitzvah de’oraisa of lo saamod al dam rayecha to launch an airplane at the advancing Roman horsemen at the time of the churban. One cannonball probably would have made all the horses and fighters retreat in panic. Since chazal did not do so, it means they were unable to. Similarly, if today’s gedolim had knowledge of how to cure cancer, they would be mechuyav to share that knowledge. Since they don’t, it means they do not know how.
8) Reb Moshe and Reb Shlom Zalman freely acknowledge that when they need to know how something works in order to pasken, they ask the scientists or engineers. They admit they they would not know on their own.
9) If you believe gedolim know more science than the scientists, kindly find me one who is willing to sit for a graduate level science exam on things we clearly know. Such as how to design a GPS system, or organic chemistry. (Noncontroversial and straightforward things.)
10) If our gedolim do not know, then as was raised before, exactly what generation did this stop. When Joseph quotes the Rama about science, did he know these things? If he did, when in the last 300 years did gedolim suddenly lose this ability?