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Pope Advised Hawking Not to Study Origin of Universe
BlueCup submits a link to an Associated Press article running in the Northwest Florida Daily News which begins "Famous astrophysicist Stephen Hawking said Thursday that the late Pope John Paul II once told scientists they should not study the beginning of the universe because it was the work of God. The British author, who wrote the best-seller 'A Brief History of Time,' said that the pope made the comments at a cosmology conference at the Vatican."
According to the article, "The scientist then joked during a lecture in Hong Kong, 'I was glad he didn't realize I had presented a paper at the conference suggesting how the universe began. I didn't fancy the thought of being handed over to the Inquisition like Galileo.'"
Church versus Science. Not exactly a new story.
But, I'm surprised to hear the Pope said this. I'd thought the Catholic church was relatively progressive in terms of creationism. A few hundred years ago, it might have made a difference what they thought.
These days, this kind of comment makes the church look archaic rather than actually discouraging scientists. At least in Europe.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
I know a couple of scientists who are religious (Christian) and none of them understand what the deal is with the fundamentalists who insist on a literal interpretation of the Bible. As far as they're concerned, they're using their God given brain to study how God does His thing. A very classic way of thinking about science. IIRC, Newton, Galileo, Copernicus, etc... all thought of their scientific work as a way to worship Him.
The Pope doesn't represent all of Chistianity or religion for that matter. Hawkings should study and theorize the origin of the universe as much as he wants. He probably will never determine if a higher being actually flipped the switch that made it happen, though. Science explains how, what, where, and when. Religion explains who and why.
Tired of being "punished" by the Slashdot $rtbl since 2002. I'm now over at http://soylentnews.org/ .
Funny how they only do this with the sciences that threaten their beliefs.
Huh? What? Threatens their beliefs? The Big Bang? Are you reading the same theory I am? The Big Bang is litterally a religious persons DREAM scientific theory. They couldn't have written it any better themselves. Not only is it the perfect theory explaining the moment of creation, but it also predicts that not only does everything happen, all of creation, in a single moment, at a single point, but it even predicts that our laws and rules and science cannot touch anything that happened before it. It, literally, points to a single moment/point and says the entire universe came from this point, at this time, and we can never hope to know what happened before that.
If that's not "biblical" in it's details, then nothing is.
That's my thought. Why shouldn't we study everything so we can bask in the full glory of God's work?
of course with knowledge comes the fact that most religions are just social engineering scams designed to control the population and make people feel better about themselves at the expense of others^H^H non-believers.
Oh well I have my beliefs and I don't care if no one else believes what I do. A good life involves giving to others, for in the end only kindness matters.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
If you look at all of the other statements that JPII made regarding science and faith, this would immediately strike you as out of character. Add that to the fact that I've never seen someone actually produce proof that he ever said it, like a transcription or something. So, I think Hawking either misquoted, misunderstood(given JPII's accent, understandable) or made up the quote. After all, it makes a good joke, right?
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
Just think about what a pathetic concept of divinity that is: a supposedly almighty God who dislikes it when his creation looks at his works. That's in addition to all the smighting, shame, pain, and torture that Catholicism says God inflicts on the world.
I'm agnostic about whether there is some higher power. But a world created and ruled by the kind of schizophrenic and conflicted being that the Catholic church postulates makes no sense to me, and my faith tells me that they are wrong; no omnipotent being could sensibly be as petty and hateful towards mankind as the Catholic church claims God is.
I was raised Baptist but am not religious these days. Many many scientists have a deep spirituality or faith and feel that science just gets you closer to the creation. I've never had a problem with science versus faith: to put it into religious terms, I presume that science is our attempt at explaining "how," and spirituality is our attempt at explaining "why." There's no disconnect here.
The bible doesn't explain how the universe was created, and explicitly says that God's timeline is nothing like man's timeline, so there's no point in parsing "six days" as meaning anything in particular to us. If I feel like parsing it at all, I'd say the seventh day of rest aligns quite nicely with the future era of calmness mentioned in Revelations, so maybe we're still in the sixth day as far as God is concerned. I've subsequently heard some Israeli theologians have put forth the same conjecture. But I don't parse the bible that much, as I already figured out what I want to figure out with regards to my own spirituality: do less harm than good, and the world will be alright.
Major organized religions (aka, Church Inc.) just don't want any explaining of either, as it impacts the bottom line. Come in, drop off your tithe, pat a homeless man on the head, and go watch your kids' soccer game. Questions come pretty close to questioning authority, and they like being the unquestioned authority. I mean, really, condoms in Africa...
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what is the pope afraid of?
Why does it matter that someone like Hawkings studies it? If god is real, then he will discover that.. If god is not real, then that will be discovered. In the end only the truth matters, regardless of which answer is 'found'. ( not that i ever expect that question to really ever be answered, there will ALWAYS be doubt.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Fundamentalist Christians are like a dog in a cage with the back of the cage wide open. There was no Garden of Eden, there was no snake, there was no apple and there's no such thing as original sin. You don't have to follow the rules of some ancient desert tribe. You are free to make your own decisions as long as they are conducive to a functioning society. Yet the fundamentalists are going oo look at this cage, look at how strong the bars are. Scientists have known that the earth is not the center of the universe for 500 years and that humans evolved from other animals for about 150 years, yet the fundamentalists still insist on living their lives racked with guilt and fear of a vengeful God. Get over it. Make your own decisions about morality and learn to live life. Hiding your head in the sand and denying the reality of science is just plain ignorance.
Oh we have a concept of "God" alright - because we invented the damn thing. Problem is - as we discover what's really going on around us it keeps invalidating the crap we invented a long time ago. And that - really - horks some people off.
Which is a pitty because I'd like to know how much more advanced the human race would be right now if it weren't towing along this massive collective social fraud that it's hobbled itself with for the last x-thousand years.
- Genesis 15:5
He took him outside and said, "Look up at the heavens and count the stars..."
- Psalm 143:5
I remember the days of long ago; I meditate on all your works and consider what your hands have done.*
- Psalm 92:4
For you make me glad by your deeds, O LORD; I sing for joy at the works of your hands*
- Proverbs 6:6
Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider its ways and be wise!
- Luke 12:24
Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds!
*Hebrews 13:7 Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
I believe that many are missing a critical point in this discussion. The universe, by definition, encompasses all events which are causally connected, and therefore observable, at least in theory. As such, studying the universe falls within the realm of science. Discussion about what preceded the universe is, by definition, a discussion about things that cannot, even in principle, be observationally confirmed or refuted. As such, it is not science, but speculation. If you want to make such speculations, go ahead, but it shouldn't be passed off as science. I believe the Pope's comments were not intended to curtail legitimate science, but philosophy disguised as science.
When you are trying to recreate an event you collect evidence. Given enough evidence you can have a high degree of certainty that it happened. My wife tells me she grew up on a farm. Her six sisters corroborate the story. I've seen pictures. Her parents live there now. That is a TON of evidence. On the other hand, if some stranger walks up to me on the street and says she grew up in the Louvre then I'm going to be skeptical because I don't know that anybody grows up in the Louvre and on the street I have no further evidence to back up her claim. There is a LOT of evidence about the French Revolution. I could touch artifacts created at that time and subject them to scientific experiments that will validate their age. The same is not true of the Garden of Eden or Noah's Ark. Fundamentalist christians are using a SINGLE, HIGHLY UNRELIABLE source to draw conclusions about SINGULAR, HIGHLY UNLIKELY events in the distant past...DESPITE the lack of scientific corroboration. That is nothing, whatsoever, like believing in the French Revolution, and you know it. I don't have faith in the French Revolution. I have seen convincing EVIDENCE of it.
>what the deal is with the fundamentalists who insist on a literal interpretation of the Bible.
These people are instructed via the leaders of their religion to not think, to not question, to not consider. They are instructed on what the word of god is, how it exactly should be interpreted.
These people have very little memory of the history of their own religion, that fundamentalism extended to the basic beliefs achieved by questioning the world they live in and realizing they needed order. However, to never question that belief again (not that using science to examine things) is rediculous in the extreme and simply means you learn a lot less about what God's intended for everyone to learn.
Ultimately we're talking about hatred of something they do not want or feel they can't, or more importantly won't understand -- and it might be something that can potentially derail their view of the world. It's scary to them. It makes their religious leaders insecure and in turn makes them worried that science might some day effect them in some unforseen way. Ultimately these people probably don't trust God too much, or at the very least themselves.
All opinions at any rate.
"Love is like pi - natural, irrational, and very important." (Lisa Hoffman)
In a sense, JPII is actually right there: it's impossible for science to prove anything about an entity outside the observable universe.
Let me use WoW as an example. Let's say the observable universe is WoW. Even the wisest scholar living _in_ the WoW universe, even with the best gnomish instruments, can only observe and measure things that are _inside_ this universe.
What it _can't_ observe is the universe's creator: Blizzard.
Can such a scholar prove, with only the data in his universe, that Blizzard doesn't exist? No. He just doesn't have the data on which to base such a proof. The best his science can do is state that the universe can be explained well enough without this mystical "Blizzard" entity at the helm.
Same is it with RL science and God. Science _can't_ prove that God doesn't exist. All science can do is explain the universe well enough without needing some "God" entity. But that's all.
No, seriously, I know that we all love to troll and bait the christians. But put your thinking cap for a second and you'll realize the same: if a "creator" exists _outside_ the universe he created (just like Blizzard exists outside the WoW universe), science can't prove or disprove this creator in any form or shape. It just can't get any data from there. At all. Ever.
Not to mention that it's not even possible to prove a negative like that. As long as science can't know every single atom in the universe, _and_ go back in time and observe what happened at every single moment since Big Bang, you simply can't have enough proof that something _doesn't_ exist even _inside_ your universe. It's like proposing to prove that a green three-legged rabbit doesn't exist and never existed. You only need one specimen to prove that it does exist, but it's simply unfeasible to prove that nowhere in the universe such a creature ever existed.
The best science can do is apply Occam's Razor. Basically to say "well, we can explain the universe perfectly well even without some 'God' hypothesis, so we don't need such a hypothesis." But that's all.
Plus, some of the precepts of Christianity are pretty much notions, ideals or moral judgments. How do you scientifically disprove "love thy neighbour"? How would you scientifically disprove "thou shalt not kill"? No, seriously. They're moral precepts that reflect a certain set of values, not something you can run through a spectrograph or whatever other instrument.
So basically, yes, JPII was right: it's not even possible. So while it makes for some good christian-bashing material to compare the answers there, in practice it's about as relevant as asking "what would you do if gravity just suddenly disappeared?" It seems to me like "it's not even possible" is a perfectly valid answer there. Sure, it's not the most interesting or imaginative kind of an answer, but nevertheless it is a valid one.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
what does science have to do with history?
The Bible is a historic document in the same way that the Iliad is a historic document. Both are collections of myths and fables that are roughly based on actually occurences in history. Both have supernatural events that were not likely but make for a better story. Science lets us determine which parts are likely to be true (i.e. history) and which parts are likely to be nothing more than myth.
Yes, the likelihood of a group of Jewish fisherman making up a story about a Messiah figure who claimed to be God (blasphemy) and then turning the entire Roman empire upside down in the matter of a few decades is highly unlikely. It is even more unlikely that they would all suffer torture and death to protect a story that is not true. And yet, that is exactly what happened. If anything, this is a strong indication that their story was real. Would you die for something you know to be false?
By your logic, a prophet in the middle east who turned the entire regious upside down, resulting in the rapid conversion of the entire area to the same belief must be correct. ESPECIALLY since he has thousands of men and women lining up to die for his beliefs on a daily basis and receive martyrdom for their cause.
Yes... there you have it. Following your logic, both Christianity and Islam are true. And since Muhammed came afterward Jesus and plenty more people are willing to die for Muhammed, Islam must be "more true" than Christianity.
Do you see the flaws in your logic now or are you converting to Islam?
When people require absolute faith regardless of the overwhelming contrary evidence, they have already sacrificed enough of their own identity and ability to reason that sacrificing their lives is merely the next step of losing themselves to their beliefs. Welcome to the Church of Jim Jones, you'll enjoy the Kool-Aid.
And then read The Jury Is In, which carefully analyzes the infamous Evidence That Demands a Verdict.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak