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US-BRAZIL-RELIGION-SCIENCE-PRIZE-INTERVIEW
Physicist Marcelo Gleiser: ‘Science does not kill God’
WASHINGTON, March 19, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – The annual Templeton Prize, which
recognizes outstanding contributions to “affirming life’s spiritual
dimension,” was awarded Tuesday to Brazilian Marcelo Gleiser — a theoretical
physicist dedicated to demonstrating science and religion are not enemies.
A physics and astronomy professor whose specializations include cosmology,
60-year-old Gleiser was born in Rio de Janeiro, and has been in the United
States since 1986.
An agnostic, he doesn’t believe in God — but refuses to write off the
possibility of God’s existence completely.
“Atheism is inconsistent with the scientific method,” Gleiser told AFP
Monday from Dartmouth College, the New Hampshire university where he has
taught since 1991.
“Atheism is a belief in non-belief. So you categorically deny something
you have no evidence against.”
“I’ll keep an open mind because I understand that human knowledge is
limited,” he added.
The prize is funded by the John Templeton Foundation — a philanthropic
organization named after the American Presbyterian who made his fortune on
Wall Street, and who set on “seeking proofs of divine agency in every branch
of science”, as The Economist put it.
Gleiser joins Desmond Tutu, the Dalai Lama and dissident Soviet author
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn as recipients of the prize, first awarded in 1973. At
o1.1 million ($1.5 million), the prize money well surpasses that of the
Nobels.
The physicist focuses on at making complex subjects accessible. He has
written on climate change, Einstein, hurricanes, black holes, the human
conscience — tracing the links between the sciences and the humanities,
including philosophy.
The author of five English-language books and hundreds of blog and press
articles in the US and Brazil, Gleiser has also explored in depth how science
and religion both try to respond to questions on the origins of life and the
universe.
“The first thing you see in the Bible is a story of creation,” he said.
Whatever your religion, “everybody wants to know how the world came to be.”
This fundamental curiosity unites science and religion, though each
provides very different answers: science has a methodology, where hypotheses
are eliminated.
“Science can give answers to certain questions, up to a point,” Gleiser
pointed out.
“This has been known for a very long time in philosophy, it’s called the
problem of the first cause: we get stuck,” the physicist, a father of five,
said.
“We should have the humility to accept that there’s mystery around us.”
– Scientific arrogance –
So, what does he think of people who believe that the Earth was created in
seven days?
“They position science as the enemy … because they have a very
antiquated way of thinking about science and religion in which all scientists
try to kill God,” he said.
“Science does not kill God.”
On the other hand, he accuses the “new atheists” of doing a disservice to
science by making an enemy out of religion: notably British scientist Richard
Dawkins — who called for the arrest of Pope Benedict XVI over pedophilia in
the Catholic Church — and the late journalist Christopher Hitchens, who
criticized Mother Theresa.
For Gleiser, who grew up in Rio’s Jewish community, religion is not just
about believing in God: it provides a sense of identity and community
“At least half of the world population is that way,” he said.
“It’s extremely arrogant from scientists to come down from the ivory
towers and make these declarations without understanding the social
importance of belief systems.”
“When you hear very famous scientists making pronouncements like …
cosmology has explained the origin of the universe and the whole, and we
don’t need God anymore. That’s complete nonsense,” he added.
“Because we have not explained the origin of the universe at all.”
BSS/AFP/MR/ 1507 hrs