The religious commitments of the great scientists of history are now frequently dismissed as just idiosyncrasies. Their beliefs are considered regrettable if clear blemishes, the incidental flaws of great minds who helped improve culture out of primitivism yet couldn’t completely escape it. After all, isn’t science designed to aspire to an awareness of the universe that is independent of the beliefs and opinions of scientists, whether spiritual, political, social, or aesthetic?
Yet, science will not exist in a vacuum, and studies in the sociology, history, and philosophy of science often highlight how scientists’ more extensive beliefs and practices influence their work, and therefore the way that science develops. Some scholars even argue (if not entirely convincingly) that scientists’ beliefs sway science’s settled content.