50 Renowned Academics Speaking About God (Part 1)
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- Опубліковано 24 лип 2011
- Link for Part 2: • Another 50 Renowned Ac...
Link for Part 3: • A Further 50 Renowned ...
I do not claim that this video demonstrates there is no God. It is not an argument against God in itself, so there is no argument from popularity or authority. I claim that the more scientifically and philosophically literate a person, the less likely they are to believe in a deity. If you think the concept of a God has nothing to do with the universe, logic, metaphysics, epistemology, human beings, etc., then this video is not for you. If you think it does have something to do with such subjects, then you might want to consider why the best experts on those subjects usually fail to see reason to believe in a deity.
The more scientifically literate, intellectually honest and objectively sceptical a person is, the more likely they are to disbelieve in anything supernatural, including god. These films are part of a compilation of some of the best examples of such individuals, and their thoughts on the divine. All the speakers featured are elite academics and professors at top institutions, some of whom are also Nobel Laureates.
Speakers in order of appearance:
1. Lawrence Krauss, World-Renowned Physicist
2. Robert Coleman Richardson, Nobel Laureate in Physics
3. Richard Feynman, World-Renowned Physicist, Nobel Laureate in Physics
4. Simon Blackburn, Cambridge Professor of Philosophy
5. Colin Blakemore, World-Renowned Oxford Professor of Neuroscience
6. Steven Pinker, World-Renowned Harvard Professor of Psychology
7. Alan Guth, World-Renowned MIT Professor of Physics
8. Noam Chomsky, World-Renowned MIT Professor of Linguistics
9. Nicolaas Bloembergen, Nobel Laureate in Physics
10. Peter Atkins, World-Renowned Oxford Professor of Chemistry
11. Oliver Sacks, World-Renowned Neurologist, Columbia University
12. Lord Martin Rees, Astronomer Royal
13. Sir John Gurdon, Pioneering Developmental Biologist, Cambridge
14. Sir Bertrand Russell, World-Renowned Philosopher, Nobel Laureate
15. Stephen Hawking, World-Renowned Cambridge Theoretical Physicist
16. Riccardo Giacconi, Nobel Laureate in Physics
17. Ned Block, NYU Professor of Philosophy
18. Gerard 't Hooft, Nobel Laureate in Physics
19. Marcus du Sautoy, Oxford Professor of Mathematics
20. James Watson, Co-discoverer of DNA, Nobel Laureate
21. Colin McGinn, Professor of Philosophy, Miami University
22. Sir Patrick Bateson, Cambridge Professor of Ethology
23. Sir David Attenborough, World-Renowned Broadcaster and Naturalist
24. Martinus Veltman, Nobel Laureate in Physics
25. Pascal Boyer, Professor of Anthropology
26. Partha Dasgupta, Cambridge Professor of Economics
27. AC Grayling, Birkbeck Professor of Philosophy
28. Ivar Giaever, Nobel Laureate in Physics
29. John Searle, Berkeley Professor of Philosophy
30. Brian Cox, Particle Physicist (Large Hadron Collider, CERN)
31. Herbert Kroemer, Nobel Laureate in Physics
32. Rebecca Goldstein, Professor of Philosophy
33. Michael Tooley, Professor of Philosophy, Colorado
34. Sir Harold Kroto, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry
35. Leonard Susskind, Stanford Professor of Theoretical Physics
36. Quentin Skinner, Professor of History (Cambridge)
37. Theodor W. Hänsch, Nobel Laureate in Physics
38. Mark Balaguer, CSU Professor of Philosophy
39. Richard Ernst, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry
40. Alan Macfarlane, Cambridge Professor of Anthropology
41. Professor Neil deGrasse Tyson, Princeton Research Scientist
42. Douglas Osheroff, Nobel Laureate in Physics
43. Hubert Dreyfus, Berkeley Professor of Philosophy
44. Lord Colin Renfrew, World-Renowned Archaeologist, Cambridge
45. Carl Sagan, World-Renowned Astronomer
46. Peter Singer, World-Renowned Bioethicist, Princeton
47. Rudolph Marcus, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry
48. Robert Foley, Cambridge Professor of Human Evolution
49. Daniel Dennett, Tufts Professor of Philosophy
50. Steven Weinberg, Nobel Laureate in Physics
FEATURED MUSIC:
Mozart - Requiem Mass In D Minor K 626 - 1. Introitus 00:03
Massive Attack - Two Rocks And A Cup Of Water 02:28, 19:14
Max Richter - Embers 05:13
Ludovico Einaudi - Andare 09:27, 24:30, 26:31
Ludovico Einaudi - Nuvole Bianche 13:13
Max Richter - Vladimir's Blues 29:21
Ludovico Einaudi - Eni 30 Percento (The Earth Prelude) 33:16
CLIP SOURCES:
The vast majority of the clips have been taken from the following sources:
Professor Alan Macfarlane: www.alanmacfarlane.com
Closer To Truth (Dr Robert Lawrence Kuhn): www.closertotruth.com
The Science Network (Roger Bingham): thesciencenetwork.org
The Vega Science Trust (Sir Harold Kroto): vega.org.uk
Copyright disclaimer--"Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."
So beautifully put together! I get goosebumps only by listening to them ...
This is beautiful! I absolutely loved every second of this video. Thank you!
i see zero beauty in this
This I feel should be played in every school in the world. I have to show our children that they cannot make the same mistakes that we and our forefathers made when we believed in religion. And tell them it is time to move on and create a better world that we have left them.
Did you make sure you wiped after spilling out that diarrhea of a comment?
IIICASEIII Please explain why you viewed what he said as diarrhea.
Scott Winney As a former religious follower myself you have to understand that their base position form the indoctrination is that they have the truth and every other point of view is very wrong if it does not include god. If it does carry god they are open for discussion. But if you throw it out straight away. There is nothing there that they understand or able to discuss.
This is unsettling to them as they are taught to express their belief as much as they can but if you pull away the carpet there is nothing left.
Philip Mc Adam That's because there is TRUTH and there are LIES. There is ONLY 1 TRUTH. Talking of anything other than the existence of GOD is for the FOOLS who think the world revolves around them.
Thank you for your kind words
Thanks for compiling this. I watch it regularly.
If you could have only one of these great minds be your lone professor, who would it be? It would be a very difficult choice, but for me, it would have to be Richard Feynman. From my experience, which includes having read pretty much all his books and listened to almost all of his lectures, and in my own personal opinion, he is one of, if not THE, greatest problem solver to have ever lived in my own lifetime. And although I never got to personally meet him, he has given me a gift that I am eternally grateful for. It is because of Feynman, and others, that I have learned how to view the world from not just one, but many, many, other points of view. I now know that without a solid application of the Scientific method in my everyday life, my understanding of the Universe had been extremely limited. However, now that I am able to "stand on the shoulders of giants", my view of reality is so much greater than I could have ever previously imagined. So much in fact, that in a single lifetime, I would never be able to thank these men enough!
Thank you for this inspiring video! Unlike another viewer who claimed this video ruined his night, it actually "MADE" my night. Please keep up the fantastic work in spreading the wisdom of all the great men and women in this video.
Can you even imagine Willie Craig trying to match wits with Feynman? How about Dinesh? Ken Hambone? Cardinal Pell? LOL! ahahahahah!
Simply an awesome video! Going to favourites!
Utterly beautiful compilation!
Creates what some might call a spiritual experience.
Thank you for putting all important info together
This is a great video. Thank you so much for putting it together. let's hope that reason and logic spreads all over the Earth and mankind can move past supernatural beliefs.
Thank you
I consider myself to be a scientist and would not provide rational support for any man made "religion" but "Belief" is supernatural. We either
1) believe because of material determinism in which case we have no reason to trust that our beliefs are rational and not a deterministic delusion of physics on one level and evolution on another, and also in which case, calling our beliefs rational, or presupposing that they line up with an underlying reality is a logically superfluous, faith-based claim that can not be justified by any materialistic scientific or logical process, or
3) come to our beliefs because we have freedom to do so, in which case we have to appeal to a super natural mechanism that enables true not-deterministic free will.
Carl Sagan died far too young. Such an amazing man. May your name live forever.
"The values of science and the values of democracy are concordant, in many cases indistinguishable. Science and democracy began - in their civilized incarnations - in the same time and place, Greece in the seventh and sixth centuries BC. Science confers power on anyone who takes the trouble to learn it (although too many have been systematically prevented from doing so). Science thrives on, indeed requires, the free exchange of ideas; its values are antithetical to secrecy. Science holds to no special vantage points or privileged positions. Both science and democracy encourage unconventional opinions and vigorous debate. Both demand adequate reason, coherent argument, rigorous standards of evidence and honesty. Science is a way to call the bluff of those who only pretend to knowledge. It is a bulwark against mysticism, against superstition, against religion misapplied to where it has no business being. If we're true to its values, it can tell us when we're being lied to. It provides a mid-course correction to our mistakes. The more widespread its language, rules and methods, the better chance we have of preserving what Thomas Jefferson and his colleagues had in mind. But democracy can also be subverted more thoroughly through the products of science than any pre-industrial demagogue ever dreamed." ~CS
Even a casual scrutiny of history reveals that we humans have a sad tendency to make the same mistakes again and again. We're afraid of strangers or anybody who's a little different from us. When we get scared, we start pushing people around. We have readily accessible buttons that release powerful emotions when pressed. We can be manipulated into utter senselessness by clever politicians. Give us the right kind of leader and, like the most suggestible subjects of the hypnotherapists, we'll gladly do just about anything he wants - even things we know to be wrong. The framers of the Constitution were students of history. In recognition of the human condition, they sought to invent a means that would keep us free in spite of ourselves.
Some of the opponents of the US Constitution insisted that it would never work; that a republican form of government spanning a land with 'such dissimilar climates, economies, morals, politics, and peoples,' as Governor George Clinton of New York said, was impossible; that such a government and such a Constitution, as Patrick Henry of Virginia declared, 'contradicts all the experience of the world'. The experiment was tried anyway. Scientific findings and attitudes were common in those who invented the United States. The supreme authority, outranking any personal opinion, any book, any revelation, was - as the Declaration of Independence puts it - 'the laws of nature and of nature's GOD'. Dr Benjamin Franklin was revered in Europe and America as the founder of the new field of electrical physics. At the Constitutional Convention of 1789 John Adams repeatedly appealed to the analogy of mechanical balance in machines; others to William Harvey's discovery of the circulation of the blood. Late in life Adams wrote, 'All mankind are chemists from their cradles to their graves . . . The Material Universe is a chemical experiment.' James Madison used chemical and biological metaphors in The Federalist Papers. The American revolutionaries were creatures of the European Enlightenment which provides an essential background for understanding the origins and purpose of the United States.
Thomas Jefferson was a scientist. That's how he described himself. When you visit his home at Monticello, Virginia, the moment you enter its portals you find ample evidence of his scientific interests - not just in his immense and varied library, but in copying machines, automatic doors, telescopes and other instruments, some at the cutting edge of early nineteenth-century technology. Some he invented, some he copied, some he purchased. He compared the plants and animals in America with Europe's, uncovered fossils, used the calculus in the design of a new plough. He mastered Newtonian physics. Nature destined him, he said, to be a scientist, but there were no opportunities for scientists in prerevolutionary Virginia. Other, more urgent, needs took precedence. He threw himself into the historic events that were transpiring around him. Once independence was won, he said, later generations could devote themselves to science and scholarship.
Jefferson was an early hero of mine, not because of his scientific interests (although they very much helped to mould his political philosophy), but because he, almost more than anyone else, was responsible for the spread of democracy throughout the world. The idea - breathtaking, radical and revolutionary at the time (in many places in the world, it still is) is that not kings, not priests, not big city bosses, not dictators, not a military cabal, not a de facto conspiracy of the wealthy, but ordinary people, working together, are to rule the nations. Not only was Jefferson a leading theoretician of this cause; he was also involved in the most practical way, helping to bring about the great American political experiment that has, all over the world, been admired and emulated since.
He died at Monticello on 4 July 1826, fifty years to the day after the colonies issued that stirring document, written by Jefferson, called the Declaration of Independence. It was denounced by conservatives worldwide. Monarchy, aristocracy and state-supported religion - that's what conservatives were defending then. In a letter composed a few days before his death, he wrote that it was the 'light of science' that had demonstrated that 'the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs', nor were a favoured few born 'booted and spurred'. He had written in the Declaration of Independence that we all must have the same opportunities, the same 'unalienable' rights. And if the definition of 'all' was disgracefully incomplete in 1776, the spirit of the Declaration was generous enough that today 'all' is far more inclusive.
This is the very best of youtube. Thank you
Thanks for this great compilation.
This video teaches us that academics may be very dull-minded when they speak of subjects beyond their field of expertise, such as religion.
Religion, (if it can even be considered an academic subject conferring expertise from its alleged mastery), is the one subject of which no man can legitimately claim superior knowledge.
+Lawrence E. Alba seriously, you sound like a dumbass. "conferring expertise from its alleged mastery" ...A. how about you stick to simple words before you choke trying to sound more intelligent than you actually are? And B. you can in fact be highly knowledgeable and an expert in religion as the study of world religions is an academic pursuit for many. What you mean to say is no one can claim to be an expert in the subject of God.
Cher Ree
Nobody's choking on anything here.
I'm a retired editor with more education than I care to admit and 50 years experience in copy editing and even some teaching in journalism. Do you mind if I use the words and style that I like? Or would you prefer that I write especially for you? Send me a check and I will. Otherwise, relax. You're reacting like a rube.
+Lawrence E. Alba You're an editor but made the error using an incorrect relative clause. You may want to use the following relative clauses: of which, in which, from which, or by which. There is no relative clause like about which. So, there's that. And do you understand why I say what I said in my first comment? Because it makes no sense. If I have to explain why then why bother. Good luck.
You're right. I edited it...that's what editors do; they aren't perfect. Still...writing is my trade.
Pararajasingham,
people come here to hear scientists say interesting stuff about religion and God, not by definition positive stuff but, all kind of stuff because that is what the title suggests . Instead of that one gets a cold shower of negativity which is very unpleasant. Scientists telling how stupid religion is and that God does not exists. What is wrong with you dude?
It is Obvious that you have hatred in your heart. You probably come from a muslim world, i kind of understand, still it is not ok what you are doing here, it is quite discusting. Take your hatred elsewere, go see a shrink would my suggestion be.
Lots of us in the west grew up with milds forms of christianity in the partly atheist liberal democratic states. Most of us have no reason to be full of hate. We do not have such problems like you have. If you want to hurt people go post this stuff in arabic and leave us alone.
“people come here to hear scientists say interesting stuff about religion and God”
The thousands of likes and positive comments is plain evidence against your unfounded assumption. Good start.
“that is what the title suggests”
There is no “rule” for titles that you can point to, so I can title my video how I wish. This is youtube, not the news. I used the title to emphasise the point that if you ask elite academics about god, you’re likely to hear expressions of disbelief. Now if you couldn’t cope with that, the introduction itself would stop people like yourself, too weak and frail to hear the unpleasantness of a point of view contrary to your own, from watching the actual video content. But you chose to carry on despite the warning. I can only assume the reason that happened was because you’re a tad thick?
“Instead of that one gets a cold shower of negativity which is very unpleasant. Scientists telling how stupid religion is and that God does not exists.“
That’s your perception, again thousands are finding this positive and pleasant.
“It is Obvious that you have hatred in your heart. You probably come from a muslim world”
Lol, wonderful racial profiling! You’ve won first prize for the most ignorant, ill-informed comment on my channel. Congrats!
“Lots of us in the west grew up with milds forms of christianity in the partly atheist liberal democratic states. Most of us have no reason to be full of hate. We do not have such problems like you have. If you want to hurt people go post this stuff in arabic and leave us alone.”
So if I were to now tell you that I am British and born into a Christian household, where does that leave your idiotic, rambling, moronic argument? Secondly, why would you be so thick as to suggest what I should or shouldn’t post on my own channel, which you have decided to visit? This is open social media you moron, if you want content that only reinforces what you already think, jog on.
You are just narrow minded person who brainwashed himself with al sorts of nonsense.
Go see a shrink that would do you good.
Glenn Gould Your broken English is hilariously ironic after preaching about how you think I should've posted in Arabic. Are you sure you can even understand what is being said here or in the video, simpleton?
Given your comment here last week where you claim god is "irrational", I have no idea what your point is, other than perhaps being a really rubbish troll?
I like the word simpleton so at least i've got some tiny amount of positivity out of the Parajasingham experience. So there is still hope for you my friend..
Glenn Gould Ah, I do like the sound of an uncomplicated, arrogant racist whose just had the wind taken out of his sails. Almost as soothing as listening to the real Glenn Gould :)
Beautiful compilation and music :)
Great compilation! Thanks for stringing the thoughts of all these great minds together on this topic.
awesome videos...thanks for the upload and the time you spent to put this together.
Thanks for the post
Epic compilation; this was fantastic, thank you
I love these videos of yours, just a tip: You can add a compressor and limiter to the audio (the speaking) and it'll "even out" the volume throughout the videos different clips.
Yes, I see it now. Thank you for all your compilation work. It's an extraordinary chorus of voices.
Exceptional collection you've got here. Wonderful upload that more people should see, I wish I'd have though of doing this lol
Thank you for sharing this collection, it is incredibly illuminating and interesting. It gives me a sense of... hope. Thank you :)
Good job dude, thank you for putting all these together.
Very kind, thank you :)
This the start of 3 super video of the beliefs of the most learned among us. Really good food for thought.
Great video
Wonderful compilation
I love this video, I could watch it again and again.
This is awesome.
Excellent compilation
Thanks for posting it! I really don't find science by itself is on any side. I see now a little about how this scientists think, their spontaneous reactions as the questions becomes unexpected!
Thanks for this man! i have a few more people to google now! lol
great comment, very well said my friend
It's interesting to see how reactionary many of them are.
Thank you for compiling this (and subsequent videos).
Thank you for putting this video together. It has become my favorite. I like it even better than the ten minute video of Sam Harris totally exposing the silliness of the Catholic religion during a debate with William Craig.
More about the irrationality of creationism or "God" spoken by world renown scientists.
great prob one of the best vidoes on religion ive seen
Thank you!
This video is outstanding.
Good Vid. Must taken you quite a bit to put this together if it was.
Very good.
I was viewing from my iPad and the info showed on one video but not the other. When viewed from an alternate device I can see them on both. Thank you.
i just subscribed to your channel sir....love it when people do their homework...#21 pretty much sums up the irrationality of religion...thank you Socrates
Very interesting........
I noticed a link on the first of these sequences of 50 speakers that was supposed to link through to this new third collection -- but it went to the shorter video of 20 believing academics instead. I look forward to another collection like this one and the second one.
*Cool video. However IMO it would have been even more interesting to feature academics that had a variety of opinions on the subject.*
By the way THANK you J Pararajasingham for this videos!
A very interesting collection, thanks for uploading. I think, however, (and it's probably from his broadcast and narrative background) I have rarely heard the case put more beautifully than the way Sir David Attenborough just did. When he speaks, you see.
I've attended the LaserFest event at the MIT Museum. Afterwards I had the extreme pleasure of meeting Ali Javan. He told me he had no religious beliefs.
In 1972 I was atheist. But FATHER GOD sent HOLY GHOST to touch me on CHRISTMAS EVE, when I asked Him in the name of JESUS! GLORY! I woke up CHRISTMAS MORNING, BORN AGAIN! HALLELUJAH! ❤️
Nice series. One of my viewers recommended that I give you a shoutout in a little show I produce each Sunday, called "Coffee with Claire." I shall be happy to so.
"I had no need of that hypothesis." -- Pierre Simone Marquis de Laplace
thumbs up all the way.
Praise god!!! Bless all of you!!! ,
Nice point, I agree that's indeed interesting.
Agree. Please change the title or make another video with all the scientists that do believe in God.
I've never heard of the universe starting as an 'expansion', it was always referred to as a giant explosion that then expanded and cooled into the universe we see today. I suppose it doesn't matter how you term it, it was a pretty significant event.
Well said.
You sir, are awesome.
I watched another video of yours and in the details you listed the speakers, their order and the music selections. Is it possible to get that on this video as well?
This video series has great value in that it shows it's not just Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris, Dannett and the like against the innumerable clergy and media hosts who have the bewildered masses at their disposal. It shows that there are many more people, respectable people, on this side of the argument. It certainly doesn't matter in the sense of the ultimate truth, as it would be considered an argument from authority, but it's just nice to see that atheism is not just a passing fad, a crusade, if you will, of a handful of people. It's just human nature to be more comfortable if you know you're not alone. Of course, atheism has not been just a fringe idea for quite some time, but there is a whole generation coming of age for whom if it's not on YT or WP it didn't happen.
I also love how it starts with Krauss assessing that most scientists are so far away from religious nonsense that they don't find it worthy of their time to stop and seriously consider it. They are atheists practically by default. As you would expect from an intelligent person. And the whole tone of calm and to the point reasoning most of these people give seems to support that assessment perfectly. It gives hope that this debate will also change tone very soon. From a loud and angry all out brawl to a quiet discussion for those interested in the workings of the mind, history and sociology. To why and how was this a topic of conversation anyway.
"Religious wars only came about because someone thought they had the best imaginary friend"
~PSNkilo52~
Thank you, and my pleasure :)
14:00 ... That broke my heart ...
I was viewing this video on a mobile device. I can see them from my laptop. Thanks, sorry for the delay in responding.
Meditate >> Enter in Silence >> Know, We all are God.
Howd you come up with your username ninja?
Absolute truth....Amen!
Do you have the transcript for this video?
i love marcus de sautoy he did awesome documentaries on math
"the probability of God is so high that rejecting it is only due to some emotional reason, not rationality."
Yes, that must be it. The elite scientific and philosophical community must be having a collective period.
Wow! Very good.
And, it's interesting how Tyson makes such an effective argument against god and yet will not take the step of admitting that he does not believe. That frustrates me.
Actual scientific phrase: "I see no evidence to suggest that the laws of physics cannot explain everything in nature, so why would I believe that they can't?"
Brilliant just brilliant
I cannot watch it. It says, Not available in your country. Please remove the restrictions! I am so interested to watch it. Thank you!
Carlton E. Brett, Professor of Geology at the University of Cincinnati:
"Did life on Earth change steadily and gradually through time? The fossil record emphatically says 'no.'"
You are right Gary.
You notice that there is a problem with this video there is. It does not show the other side of the argument of many scientists that do believe in God, or at least something else.
There will always be those pea brains who choose to disagree no matter how convincing and thorough the arguments are.
Hello J. Para....I cant help to notice a short response to onefodderunit comment about Intelligence. I truly do question religion as much a many rational people. But the scientist in me does not question an Intelligent consciousness, positive and negative forces, a power that drives purpose that we can not described with current science. can you please provide some input on this. thanx
Here is the quote from Quine in his "Two Dogmas", one of the most respected atheist philosophers of this century:
As an empiricist I continue to think of the conceptual scheme of science as a tool, ultimately, for predicting future experience in the light of past experience. Physical objects are conceptually imported into the situation as convenient intermediaries -- not by definition in terms of experience, but simply as irreducible posits comparable, epistemologically, to the gods of Homer.
I really had to challenge myself there to only use the word moron once!!!
I am glad you have seen scientists that are believers, or believe differently from these scientists. I speak with many atheists who find this as a surprise because of the assumptions they have about science and the belief of God.
Scientific literacy and disbelief are correlated, according to the best surveys/studies we have.
could u name one of those scientists that say we use only 10 % of our brains?
its sound awesome and so great that somebody might think u just made it up.
"It is not the norm, it is the usual disposition."
Care you clarify what you think the difference is here?
Since I agree it is the "usual disposition" as well (I see no difference in the two phrases we've used), so the title makes statement of that fact. Which I'm glad you agree with.
I said nothing about your suggested title. But now that you ask, yes, your title is less truthful, because many of the speakers do not classify themselves as "atheist".
Yes I read the intro, but the title of the video says "50 Renowned Academics Speaking About God" Instead of "50 Renowned Skeptic Academics Speaking About God" So when I clicked on the video, I was expecting more than just opinions from nonbelievers
I'm sorry to criticize this video since it is actually pretty well made. I still enjoyed it and was pretty impressed that you got footage for all these academics.
Many thanks for compiling these clips! Great subject; I have not seen most of these clips before. I looh forward to watching the rest. P.S.I am not a theist, but Krauss seems disingenuous to propose that something came out of nothing, when he doesn't start with a true 'nothing'.
Einstein said:
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously."
"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..."
"The idea of a personal God is quite alien to me and seems even naïve."
"The word god is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses..."
Brilliance on display
I cant find a source od Steven Pinker speech, can you send me? I wonder why Steven is crying when he's talking about it.
Niles Eldridge: "paleontologists have been insisting that their record is consistent with slow, steady, gradual evolution where I think that privately they've known for over a hundred years that such is not the case."
I've watched that entire series. Did you watch the whole thing? Susskind explains that there is evidence of the multiverse from string theory in providing possibilities mathematically for many universes to evolve. So the theory has basis, it is not just pulled from thin air. So while still a hypothesis, it is a far better hypothesis than the unseen, invisible, magical, all-powerful sky monster that you believe in.
I wish I could hear this through headphones!
If you watch part 3 of the series, it becomes very apparent that many of the Oxbridge dons also have a reluctance to use the term atheist, believing it to be too strong/militant, and therefore default to the term agnostic when pressed to give themselves a label. Like Tyson, they'd prefer to have no label, so that they don't cause disrespect or invite criticism based on the term's baggage. It's frustrating, as you say, that the definitional accuracy of the term isn't enough.
bertrand russel said it best of all in my opinion!
If quantum physics has "falsified" materialism with such certainty, why are the vast majority of scientists and physicists materialists?
1. Incorrect
2. Incorrect
3. Incorrect
4. Incorrect
5. Claim what?
6. Incorrect
@Justin Amis, how and why are not mutually exclusive. By explaining "how" the universe works, you are also explaining why. I understand that for some people that explanation may not live up to thier grand vision, but perhaps it's not the facts that need to change but the vision. Maybe it's time to see beyond our personal beliefs and move toward something greater.
When somebody tries to make people believe something because- in his opinion- this is the view of "top" academics at "top" institutions who have won prizes, switch your mind off. The best presentation is one that invites you to think- not tell you what you ought to think- and relies solely on the intelligence of the argument, without paying attention to who expressed it.