Physicist Wins Spirituality Prize
Thu Mar 10, 7:55 AM ET
By Larry B. Stammer Times Staff Writer
Charles Townes, the UC Berkeley professor who shared the 1964 Nobel Prize in physics for his work in quantum electronics and then startled the scientific world by suggesting that religion and science were converging, was awarded the $1.5-million Templeton Prize on Wednesday for progress in spiritual knowledge.
The prize, the proceeds of which Townes said he planned to largely donate to academic and religious institutions, recognized his groundbreaking and controversial leadership in the mid-1960s in bridging science and religion.
The co-inventor of the laser, Townes, 89, said no greater question faced humankind than discovering the purpose and meaning of life — and why there was something rather than nothing in the cosmos.
"If you look at what religion is all about, it's trying to understand the purpose and meaning of our universe," he said in a telephone interview from New York this week. "Science tries to understand function and structures. If there is any meaning, structure will have a lot to do with any meaning. In the long run they must come together."
Townes said that it was "extremely unlikely" that the laws of physics that led to life on Earth were accidental.
Some scientists, he conceded, had suggested that if there were an almost infinite number of universes, each with different laws, one of them was bound by chance to hit upon the right combination to support life.
"I think one has to consider that seriously," Townes told The Times. But he said such an assumption could not currently be tested. Even if there were a multitude of universes, he said, we do not know why the laws of physics would vary from one universe to another.
Townes said science was increasingly discovering how special our universe was, raising questions as to whether it was planned. To raise such a question is the work of scientists and theologians alike, said Townes, who grew up in a Baptist household that embraced "an open-minded approach" to biblical interpretation. He is a member of the First Congregational Church in Berkeley and prays twice daily.
In 1964, while a professor at Columbia University, Townes delivered a talk at Riverside Church in New York that became the basis for an article, "The Convergence of Science and Religion," which put him at odds with some scientists.
In the article, Townes said science and religion should find common ground, noting "their differences are largely superficial, and … the two become almost indistinguishable if we look at the real nature of each." When MIT published the article, a prominent alumnus threatened to break ties with the institution.
In a 1996 interview with The Times, Townes said that new findings in astronomy had opened people's minds to religion. Before the 1960s, the Big Bang was just an idea that was hotly debated. Today, there is so much evidence supporting the theory that most cosmologists take it for granted.
"The fact that the universe had a beginning is a very striking thing," Townes said. "How do you explain that unique event" without God?
Townes this week spoke of his interest in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. The sheer number of stars and planets, he said, would likely increase the probability of intelligent life elsewhere. But for life to get started on even one planet is "highly improbable. It might not have started more than two or three times," he said. "It would be fascinating to find somebody out there."
Born in Greenville, S.C., in 1915, Townes received a bachelor's degree in physics, summa cum laude, from Furman University in Greenville when he was 19. Two years later he received a master's in physics from Duke University, and in 1939 a doctorate in physics from Caltech with a thesis on isotope separation and nuclear spins.
During World War II he helped develop radar systems that functioned in the humid conditions of the South Pacific.
His research led to the development of the maser in 1954, which amplifies electromagnetic waves, and later co-invented the laser. His work, for which he shared the 1964 Nobel in physics, led to a wide variety of inventions and discoveries in medicine, telecommunications, electronics, computers and other areas.
He was named provost and professor of physics at MIT in 1961, director of the Enrico Fermi International School of Physics in 1963, and, in 1967, professor of physics at UC Berkeley, a post he held until 1986.
The Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities was established in 1972 by Sir John Templeton, a global investor and philanthropist. Past winners include Mother Teresa; evangelist Billy Graham; Holmes Rolston III, a philosopher, clergyman and scientist whose explorations of biology and faith have helped foster religious interest in the environment; and John C. Polkinghorne, a British mathematical physicist and Anglican priest.
The Duke of Edinburgh is to present the prize to Townes in a private ceremony at Buckingham Palace in April.
- Re: Physicist Wins Spirituality Prizeposted on 03/10/2005
I heard this on NPR this morning.
I agree with him on one thing: science and religion are not ememies. They are just two different camps working toward the same goal -- to understand who we are, where we come from, and where we are going.
The argument he uses to support "creation" is too religious itself. He says: "the laws of physics are too perfect to be accidental".
Anyone who does not believe accidents probably will end up believing in God. - Re: Physicist Wins Spirituality Prizeposted on 03/10/2005
科学家千辛万苦抵达的地方都发现宗教早已安坐在那里。 - Re: Physicist Wins Spirituality Prizeposted on 03/10/2005
玛雅 wrote:
科学家千辛万苦抵达的地方都发现宗教早已安坐在那里。
没有吧?愿闻其详。 - posted on 03/10/2005
八十一子 wrote:
玛雅 wrote:没有吧?愿闻其详。
科学家千辛万苦抵达的地方都发现宗教早已安坐在那里。
有了吧!
再抄一篇。
US scientists battle over anti-Darwin "Intelligent design" theory
Sun Mar 6, 7:18 PM ET
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US science community is embroiled in a caustic fight over the theory that a higher intelligence and not Darwinist evolution is largely responsible for life on Earth.
Intelligent design, which holds that only an unspecified superior intellect can account for the complexity of life forms, is increasingly appearing in science forums and journals as an alternative to evolution theory.
Evolution has been widely accepted ever since Charles Darwin's "Origin of Species" revolutionized biological sciences 145 years ago.
But the new theory's support by a handful of biologists and non-scientists has put Darwinists on the defensive, while encouraging conservative Christian groups who consider evolution hostile to Biblical teachings.
Pro-evolutionists brand the new idea an unscientific melange of politics and religion.
"It is at its bottom a Christian religious movement," said Barbara Forrest, a professor of philosophy at Southeastern Louisiana University and a leading critic of the intelligent design movement.
But supporters argue that evolutionary theory cannot answer some large questions on how certain life forms developed.
"Science doesn't progress by ignoring something that is staring you in the face," counters Michael Behe, a Lehigh University professor of biochemistry and an intelligent design advocate.
Essentially, intelligent design holds that certain structures found in living things, such as the flagella of bacteria or extra wings on certain fruit flies, cannot be explained by Darwinian concepts of natural selection and random variation.
Behe argues that the complexity of the flagella and various "machines" inside cells could not have evolved from other life forms. Like a mousetrap or a wristwatch, he says, it is evident that these were designed, though by whom he is reticent to say.
Darwinists, who still comprise the large majority of scientists, say that Behe and others are simply appropriating what is yet unknown to conclude that it must be created by a higher intelligence.
The debate has become more rancorous in recent months.
In one incident, biologist Richard Sternberg filed a legal complaint against Washington's Smithsonian Museum of Natural History for branding him a religious fundamentalist and denying him access to facilities, due to his editorial role in the 2003 publication of a scientific paper by intelligent design advocate Stephen Meyer.
While he has neither endorsed nor denied the theory, intelligent design advocates have compared Sternberg to 16th century astronomer Galileo Galilei, branded a heretic for challenging Roman Catholic dogma with his scientific discoveries.
Spearheading the intelligent design movement is the Discovery Institute, a conservative think-tank in Seattle in the US northwest.
Jonathan Wells, a senior Discovery fellow with doctorates in both cell biology and religious studies, said the debate is mainly about the "limits of Darwinism".
Scientists can conclude intelligent design exists through empirical evidence, he said. But defining the "intelligent designer" is "beyond the scope of science," he said.
Wells rejected critics' branding intelligent design as "new creationism", referring to a Bible-based explanation of life.
However, creationists in several states have cited intelligent design in trying to introduce their teachings into public schoolrooms. In November, school officials in Dover, Pennsylvania ordered teachers to include intelligent design in ninth-grade biology courses.
Wells criticized the Dover action, saying: "We are not pushing intelligent design in high school classrooms."
Forrest points out, however, that a 1999 Discovery fund-raising document specifically endorses the conservative Christian agenda.
"Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions," the document reads.
Intelligent design advocates have also been encouraged by a statement made in 1999 by then-Texas governor, now President George W. Bush (news - web sites) that he believed that "children ought to be exposed to different theories about how the world started."
Yet in February Bush's science advisor John Marburger reportedly told a group of science journalists that "I don't regard intelligent design as a scientific topic."
Amid growing animosity, both sides agree that proving intelligent design in traditional scientific terms is next to impossible. "Can science show you whether God exists? No," said Wells.
"It is difficult to reconcile science with Christian philosophical questions," said Vittorio Maestro of Natural History magazine. "We aren't going to convince them and they aren't going to convince us."
- posted on 03/11/2005
There's a story a few months ago in Newsweek on this Discovery Institute and the Intelligent Design theory (a new version of Creationism in essence) they are pushing to the public.
So, let's say all is pre-designed and pre-determined, and all we are left to do is to find out this intelligent designer's plan for us, to find out our pre-determinded fate, boy, does that make you feel below-human? One would feel like a pre-designed robot, wouldn't he? Will he be disassembled later or will he be thrown into fire to produce a new piece of iron?
Like I said before, accepting an above-all God/intelligent designer is simply a dead end to any human intellectual endeavors. How boring. How depressing.
Why not leave science alone doing what it's been doing in discovering laws in the physical world, and leave religion to the metaphysical adventures in people's mind? Telling scientists what they ought to find is indeed an insult to their intellect. - posted on 03/11/2005
adagio wrote:
So, let's say all is pre-designed and pre-determined, and all we are left to do is to find out this intelligent designer's plan for us, to find out our pre-determinded fate, boy, does that make you feel below-human? One would feel like a pre-designed robot, wouldn't he? Will he be disassembled later or will he be thrown into fire to produce a new piece of iron?
Like I said before, accepting an above-all God/intelligent designer is simply a dead end to any human intellectual endeavors. How boring. How depressing.
Your mistake is to think that we are separated from this Intelligent Designer, and there is a "He" outside and beyond each of "us". Of course you would feel boring and depressing. But this is simply not true. I'd think that the path is to find the God in each of us, and to marvel how intelligent we are. And in admiring the design, we are admiring ourselves, and this leads to eternal love. Religions also teach us that we are all God.
I think, knowing that we are the designer and then set out to discover the plan, is the most exciting, inspiring and rewarding human intellectual endeavor one can possibly take.
Why not leave science alone doing what it's been doing in discovering laws in the physical world, and leave religion to the metaphysical adventures in people's mind? Telling scientists what they ought to find is indeed an insult to their intellect.
Only when science recognizes its proper position in the universe, physical and metaphysical, can we leave it alone to do its own discovery. Otherwise science hurts, especially those weak-minded people.
不知道为什么我对今天的科学这么反感。:( 刚才下午跟老板吵架,我说我恨死现在做的科学研究了。 - posted on 03/11/2005
An Shan sounds like a pantheist (sometimes I feel some pantheist traits in myself too), I wouldn't argue with you on what you have said, yet I will have to say it's too bad those Discovery Institute people probably don't think in your way. Their intention is clear - to resurrect the long-dead Creationism in the scientific world by denying evolution all together. They label themselves "conservatives", this alone can turn me off for it reminds me of those self-righteous Christian rightist hardliners.
I understand your frustration over today's scientific research ... today science has gone too far along a materialist road and has somehow lost the spiritual inspiration that brought us wonderful discoveries a few centuries ago, and many sicence workers have become rather narrow-minded ... But science is science, it's an honest enterprise with the empirical spirit, thus it should calmly shrug off any influence from the thoughts/hypotheses of the religion side (it may be inspired by some ideas of these hypotheses, yet a simple acceptance is not acceptable), and focus on discovering things not yet known to us on its own. - Re: Physicist Wins Spirituality Prizeposted on 03/11/2005
阿姗wrote:
我对今天的科学这么反感
如果还会反感,说明你对科学还有信念和希冀。Someone's two cents - Science and religion are part of the physical world. Physical world and spiritual world are two totally different worlds, kind of difficult to live in both at the same time. - Re: Physicist Wins Spirituality Prizeposted on 03/11/2005
Aliens intervened with the evolution process, there's no doubt about it :)
IMHO, what's dangerous about religion is not what it tells, is how it can limit and harden the human soul which has a great potential to be free, be it by design or by evolution. Human beings are too stupid to understand religion as a metaphor, instead we take it literally by words. - posted on 03/12/2005
It is hardly anything new for a scientist to believe in God. The two greatest science giants: Isaac Newton and A. Einstein, both believed in God to some extent, but their convictions are subject to interpretations (see extracts and quotes below). really, it's something to do with the definitions.
To me, God represents an unknown part of laws of nature. There two parts in Nature: the known part to us today (only a tiny bit of the universe), and the unknown part, which occupies the vast majority of the space of Nature. We cannot draw a conclusion that there is a god with so limited knowledge of the world around and inside us. We simply are not equipped to conclude anything definite – maybe something beyond our imagination and logic to be found which will give us more clear ideas about the universe and ourselves and we should never reach the shore because in the meantime, the universe is evolving according to laws of unknown nature. The unknown is the most enchanting force to lead human being to discover more and our journey is an infinite yet facinating one.
********************
Newton's Mysticism
What is not as well understood about Newton was his deep devotion to religion--especially the more mystical variety of it. Newton considered himself a deeply devout Christian--though not of the normal sort. He was, in short, a unitarian [one who believes ... that the position of God is not shared by two other "persons," namely Jesus and the Holy Spirit; ... that Jesus is rather an adoptive "Son" of God--as we all have the potential to be--through having lived a Godly life]. Discovery of his unitarianism would have been ruinous for Newton in English society--so he kept his religious beliefs well away from public view.
In any case, he stood himself before God in great awe--great awe of the One who crafted the universe with such precision. It was this precision that so inspired Newton--that he gave his life to its uncovery for human viewing. Science and mathematics were thus for Newton virtually religious enterprises.
But in addition to this very rationalistic appreciation of the grandeur of God, there was also an aspect of his appreciation of God that today would be considered simply superstitious. While totally logical-rational in his approach to scientific theory, Newton was strangely mystical in his approach to technology. He was fascinated with the medieval practice of alchemy (the use of mystical incantations and magical formulas to change common elements into more precious ones, such as gold)--and particularly in his later years of life gave even more time to this pursuit than to science and math. (Copyright © 2000 by Miles H. Hodges.)
And here are the quotes of Estinern on religions.
"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings." Upon being asked if he believed in God by Rabbi Herbert Goldstein of the Institutional Synagogue, New York, April 24, 1921, Einstein: The Life and Times, Ronald W. Clark, Page 502.
"Our situation on this earth seems strange. Every one of us appears here involuntary and uninvited for a short stay, without knowing the whys and the wherefore. In our daily lives we only feel that man is here for the sake of others, for those whom we love and for many other beings whose fate is connected with our own." ... "The most beautiful and deepest experience a man can have is the sense of the mysterious. It is the underlying principle of religion as well as all serious endeavour in art and science. He who never had this experience seems to me, if not dead, then at least blind. To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is a something that our mind cannot grasp and whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly and as a feeble reflection, this is religiousness. In this sense I am religious. To me it suffices to wonder at these secrets and to attempt humbly to grasp with my mind a mere image of the lofty structure of all that there is." Einstein's speech 'My Credo' to the German League of Human Rights, Berlin, autumn 1932, Einstein: A Life in Science, Michael White and John Gribbin, Page 262.
And here's one that seems to speak from the grave:
"It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it." - Albert Einstein in Albert Einstein: The Human Side, edited by Helen Dukas (Einstein's secretary) and Banesh Hoffman, and published by Princeton University Press.
***********************************8
Of course, Kant says: “We cannot understand ourselves, because if we are simple enough to be understood, we will be too stupid to understand.”
At any rate, humor is always a good way to relax ourselves.
And we know the Show Must Go On.
- Re: Physicist Wins Spirituality Prizeposted on 03/12/2005
human life never will get out of tridimensions what ever how much ability you are. Can you immagine what is the life of ants who live in only towdimension, and how would be the life in sixtuple space?
- RE: 物理学家获 spirituality 奖posted on 03/10/2011
回复 阿姗Yesterday someone asked me how to define “spirituality”…My definition is...
- Re: RE: 物理学家获 spirituality 奖posted on 03/10/2011
I thought this is a new post because the first post dated 3/10, but it is 6 years ago. Where are we now? :-)
The phrase "Intelligent Design" is bad, it limits our thinking, but we should not discard the intrisic knowing of a higher existence because of that.
Please paste HTML code and press Enter.
(c) 2010 Maya Chilam Foundation