NAME: The Great God Science   SYMBOLS: Light Bulb, Beaker filled with some mysterious liquid, Microscope, Gears meshing, Test Tubes, E = MC², the Atom, which is shown as a larger circle around a smaller circle "orbiting" about it, a model completely out of date as a map of the atom, that still remains popular, showing that even those who follow the Lord of all that is Bright, New & Shiny can't let some things go.   USUAL IMAGE: If not ineffable at least darn hard to pin down, best guess probably a lot like either Isaac Newton, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein Or Doc Savage   HOLY BOOKS: Too many to name, two of the biggies however are Newton's Principia Mathematica & Darwin's The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life.   HOLY DAYS: A short selection Jan. 7 - Old Rocks Day Jan. 8 - Galileo Day & Stephen Hawking Day Feb 12 - Charles Darwin Day Feb 17 - Giordano Bruno Remembrance Day & National Public Science Day Feb 19 - Nicolaus Copernicus Day March 14 - Albert Einstein Day March 31 - Bunsen Burner April 3 - Scientifiction Day (First magazine devoted exclusively to science fiction, Amazing Stories, premiers in 1926) April 24 - Universe Day (Hubble Telescope comes on line 1990) April 26 - Richter Scale Day May 18 - Bertrand Russell Day May   27 - Rachel Carson Day (Silent Spring) June 12 - Machine Day June 30 - Meteor Day July 16 Atomic Day July 20 - Moon Landing Day Aug. 28 - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Day Sept. 8 - Feast of the First Stardate Oct. 28 - Chemistry day Nov. 9 - Carl Sagan Day Dec, 25 - Isaac Newton Day   RELATIVES: Necessity (mother, under his birth name Invention), & either Imagination, Desperation, or Wonder (father) though there are other contenders.   SYNODEITIES: Hephaestus (Greek), Sarasvati (Hindu), Pranidhanavasita (Buddhism) Goddess of Control of Abstract Contemplation, Mahakala (Tibetan Buddhist) God of Tents & Science - not to be confused with the Hindu god of the same name also known as The Great Death -

DETAILS: Claude Bernard (1813 - 1878) France's most famous physiologist said that "Art is I, science is we." The Great God Science is the I of science. There are religions whose gods are part of pantheisms, and gods that have monotheistic institutions. The Great God Science is rare in that he the godhead, not of a monotheism, but of a no monotheism. Declaring there are no gods and he is the only one. If not a jealous god he is at least a stuck-up one. Cold eyed and yet passionate & powerful, it was the Great God Science who laid the railroad tracks across the world, that in America the Indian's called the Iron Snake, built for his `perhaps´ mother, Manifest Destiny, they ended up serving his needs of conquest, industry and information. It was as the 20th century was born that the G. G. S. truly came into his own and started to reformulate the world into his well measured, calibrated and cataloged image. As he grew in the last century, so too did his avatars manifest, multiply and spread. At first showing up as nameless, or at least forgettable everymen in the works of H. G. Wells & Jules Verne he later gained many other names and images for himself from the mythalized shadows of real people to avataric "fictional" manifestations such as Charles Darwin, Sherlock Holmes, Thomas Edison, Tom Swift, Tom Swift Jr, Crag Kennedy, Doctor Thorndike, Adam Link, Doc Savage, Albert Einstein, Captain Future, Steven Hawking, Dr. Who, Mr. Spock, Carl Sagan, Dexter, Bill Nye the Science Guy, Data, Jimmy Neutron and many, many other thousands of heroes and advocates of the G. G. S. who appeared in his personal sacred texts that, while called science fiction, was in fact one of the purest founts of his true worship. The Great God Science transformed the 20th century with his webs of communication from the telegraph to the radio to the Web while at the same time his bolts of power changed war, art, medicine & all aspects of life. If of old such small things as warm west winds or bread ovens can be granted gods or goddesses how then can the force that reshaped a world in less than 100 years be left out? After all he has his priests & priestesses known to most others as nerds, his fundamentalists known more widely as debunkers & even heretics such as the Creationists who don't even know they're worshiping another god altogether from the one they think they are. Such is the power of the Great God Science! - Terry McCombs magentashadow@webtv.net