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| Father Robert Spitzer, SJ |
Larry King led a discussion about Stephen Hawking's latest creation theory by starting with a pre-recorded interview with Hawking, then turning to a panel consisting of Hawking's co-author Leonard Mlodinow, New Age author Deepak Chopra, and Father Robert Spitzer, SJ, (founder of Healing the Culture).
It was a frustrating experience seeing Father Spitzer forced to compete for air time against extended Hawking quotes plastered on the tube, elaborated on by Mlodinow, with an abundance of Deep Chopraisms not worth pondering for anyone outside his fan club.
Maybe Father Spitzer realized he was the only one with heavy artillery at this pea-shooting contest, but his reticence to engage the nonsense being thrown about left him playing second fiddle.
I've seen Father Spitzer blow away a room full of lawyers with his discourse on law and the faith. Come on, Father, you're a Jesuit! Next time, take no prisoners.
In a discussion between a guy with degrees in Philosophy, Divinity, and Theology, and two Physicists from Cambridge and Caltech, it's pretty obvious who has the heavy artillery and who has the pea shooter.
ReplyDeleteI think Father did as much as he could given the limitations of Larry King's format and moderations. Father has nothing to gain by abandoning his manners (and he is a fine Christian gentleman, of that there is no doubt).
ReplyDeleteI heard at least two concessions from the Hawking team that "God may exist". Hawking conceded before Father Spitzer even spoke!
TO ANONYMOUS:
ReplyDeleteActuall Fr. Spitzer is a physicist wilth also graduate degrees in theology and philosophy. Actually I found Larry King to be not the good facilitor he usually is... allowing each speaker to have "their time". Yet when one position (Spitzer) had two adversaries, Larry failed to give equal time to the two positions by allowing all three to have "equal" time. Thus the discussion was not at all equal.
You were expecting maybe fairness? Intellectual honesty, perhaps?
ReplyDeleteI found it amazing that not even Mlodinow challenged Hawking on his opening playback line: "The scientific account is complete. Theology is unnecessary."
If "The scientific account is complete" then how is Mlodinow going to get another book deal?
So there's no more science left? Hawking and Mlodinow have used it all up? And it's "unnecessary" to ask anything after that?
Rude, perhaps?
That's Hawking's message?
How anti-science is that?
To "Anonymous" poster number 1, and anyone who read it and huffed "booyeah!"
ReplyDeleteI've met and spoken with Father Spitzer in his office. "it's pretty obvious" to me that you would not decently pretend the convictions you claim about the worth of his qualifications if you'd done the same.
You must have more books available through Amazon.com about astrophysics than Father Spitzer has, to make that implication credibly. But, can't check - didn't catch your name.
But you're right. It is "pretty obvious" "who has the pea shooter."
If you, Anonymous #1 agree with Steven Hawking that "the scientific account is complete" then it means all scientists are out of a job FOREVER.
Who cares, right?
But if all science is now over, as Dr. Hawking evidently claims, Fr. Spitzer can just take off his astrophysicist hat and put on his theologian hat, roll up his sleeves and get back to work, no matter how much foot-stamping or outright banning of certain thought-crimes any faceless, commercial evangelical atheist corporate frontman might darkly hint at.
A scene at a tall window occurs:
All Publishers Everywhere (stroking their beards pensively):
"Hmmm. Mlodinow DID turn from Fr Spitzer's question about the wisdom of proving a rule from an exception 180 and drop into a dead run like a little girl surprised by a prize bullfrog. That Spitzer fellow never claimed that anything was "complete," either. Hmmm. (beard stroking intensifies) Since our top scientists have now announced the end of science, I wonder if he can write a book about why?" Oh, wait. He's already written a bunch.
Yup. It sure is "pretty obvious" "who has the pea shooter."
Let's have an Ellsworth/Duell award* for most ridiculously ironic claim about the state of human advancement, and nominate Hawking as inaugural recipient for his jaw-droppingly abject failure to connect the intellectual dots in "The scientific account is complete. Theology is unnecessary."
NOTE TO DR HAWKING: Gravity, randomness, whatever you want to call it and however many digital ball bearings you want to roll on the dining hall floor or apples to shake out of your tree on Discovery Channel specials, ironically titled "Steven Hawking Explains Everything"... still doesn't explain..
WHAT STARTED EVERYTHING?
Sheesh. Even Carl Sagan didn't pretend to know that one.
Quit trying to pull a Galileo, drop a couple of hat sizes and stick to your knitting. The universe can't be beginning and endless because nighttime exists. It's all well and fine to pat yourself on the back, but all scientists still have a LOT more work to do. Perhaps the real ones will actually never run out of work.
That the Universe came equipped with gravity as standard is cause for scientific investigation, no? Oh, right. The scientific account is complete. All used up. No more for anyone else.
Pea shooter, indeed.
*That Ellsworth and Duell, both US patent office heads in 1843 and 1899 respectively, are continually and erroneously attributed with insisting that the US Patent office be closed because there was no need for any further inventions, only adds an ironic coloration to the haze of irony surrounding the award recipients' ironies, which is what the award is about, ironically. Good luck with that.
I thought Fr. Spitzer did a pretty good job given the format of the Larry King Show. For an excellent rebuttal to Hawking's new book, see also Peter McKnight's column in Vancouver Sun, Sept 11 (Google: Peter McKnight, God and Philosophy in Hawking's Universe).
ReplyDeleteDr. Chris Morrissey is giving a talk on Fr. Spitzer’s new book at Christ the Redeemer parish in West Vancouver on Oct 8th. No doubt, the great quest for a theory of everything will ultimately lead to a helping of humble pie. However, given the state of physics at the moment (String Theory's multiple "theories of everything", the huge unsolved mysteries of dark energy and dark matter etc.), is it really wise to attempt to prove God's existence with physics? Isn't that playing the same game as Hawkings, Dawkins et al.? Neither religious nor naturalistic beliefs can be proven scientifically. One can only say that not even a Hawkings or a Dawkins could have predicted the emergence of life, consciousness and mind by viewing the universe at the time of its birth; and no one can predict what wonders might emerge out of the universe in the future.
Dr Chris Morrissey's talk in West Vancouver is cancelled for now. It will be rescheduled in the Spring. Check out
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nscdg.ca/ for current schedule
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