Louisville Process Theology Network

Einstein and Eternity

See American Public Media for an

interesting discussion of Albert Einstein's religion between physicists Freeman Dyson and Paul Davies. A few excerpts:

Einstein on Eternity -- "I cannot conceive of a God who rewards and punishes his creatures, or has a will of the type of which we are concious ourselves. Enough for me, the mystery of the eternity of life and the inkling of the marvelous structure of reality, together with the single-hearted endeavor to comprehend a portion, be it ever so tiny, of the reason that manifests itself in nature."

On Atheism and Pantheism -- "I am not an atheist and I don't think I can call myself a pantheist. We are in the position of the little child entering a huge library filled with books in many different languages. The child knows someone has written those books. It does not know how.

The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn't know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent being towards God."

On Spinoza -- "I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with the fates and actions of human beings."

On Science and Religion -- "Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."

Freeman Dyson on Science and Religion -- "The world is full of mysteries... Every time we discover something, we find two more questions to ask, and so there is no end of the mysteries in science. That's what it's all about. And the same is true for religion."