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33 of 36 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Einstein and Religion, May 22, 2001
This review is from: Einstein and Religion (Hardcover)
I bought this book because the title intrigued me. Like so many people, I had assumed Einstein had been an atheist. I have to admit to little previous knowledge of the man beyond his theory of relativity and a few charming stories about his eccentricities, many probably apocryphal. This book certainly provided a nice introduction to the man as human being, intellectual, and philosopher. One of the most impressive facets of Einstein's life made obvious in Professor Jammer's work was the impact the physicist's pronouncements, even on subjects outside of his professional expertise, had upon the public in general. It was apparent from some of his personal correspondence and from news articles in response to his papers on science and religion that the general public held the man in considerable esteem. There seemed an almost awed reverence for his intellect to the extent that his personal position on a topic as emotional and as arbitrarily individual as religion could assume an almost scientific finality, eliciting the commendations of those who agreed and an almost knee jerk response from those who disagreed. Few remained without an opinion. So potent were Einstein's mere personal, albeit well schooled, philosophical opinions that they could elicit outright attack from those who felt their cherished beliefs were under siege. A theologian as eminent as Dr. Fulton Sheen (later Bishop Sheen) attacked his position on the existence of a personal god as the "sheerest kind of stupidity and nonsense." While a private individual wrote to him suggesting he "take your crazy, fallacious theory of evolution [sic] and go back to Germany where you came from, or stop trying to break down the faith of a people who gave you a welcome...." It becomes evident when one reads some of Jammer's biographical material on Einstein that the man's impact on the people of his day lay in his character. His honesty, simplicity, and wit, for example, lent him an approachability and charm. His intellectual independence and courage in the face of the opinions of others made him both worthy of admiration and a formidable adversary, almost impervious to criticism. (When one of the propositions arising from his theory was proven correct by experimental results, he was asked what he would have said it hadn't been. His reply was that he would feel sorry for God, because the theory was correct.) Professor Jammer seems never to tire of repeating Einstein's dictum, "Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind," as though it could somehow make Einstein's position on the subject clearer for the reader. However, much of his supporting documentation, while interesting, leaves one with a nagging feeling that one is no closer to Einstein's sense of religion than one started. In fact one is left with the sense that for Einstein the mere sense of awe over the majesty of the universe and its workings was all the "religion" he needed. He required no formal institutions, no religious acts other than being true to his intellectual curiosity, had no missionary zeal to convert others to his position, and was without a personal need for immortality. If he was asked about the subject of religion he responded with customary honesty; if his response made the asker uncomfortable, that was their problem. Probably the most interesting part of the book is the final chapter. Here, the subject of Einstein on religion is transposed to religion on Einstein (or at least on his theory of relativity.) Jammer's final chapter deals with some of the more amazing attempts by physicists and theologians to elucidate the existence and character of God by means of physics, in particular by means of the theory of relativity. It certainly casts in high relief the impact of the man on modern day religious thought. The last chapter also contains philosophical and theological outgrowths of the theory of quantum physics and some of its more esoteric premises. It also looks at the theological implications of the Big Bang theory of cosmology, and mentions the books comparing Eastern religion and quantum theory that were so popular in the late 70s and early 80s (The Tao of Physics and The Dancing Wu-Li Masters among them). As a mental exercise, Jammer tries to analyze what Einstein might have thought about each of these concepts, and generally believes he would have cast a resounding "NO" vote.
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64 of 74 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
RELIGIOUS EQUATIONS, October 3, 1999
This review is from: Einstein and Religion (Hardcover)
To be honest, Max Jammer has written FAR more impressive books than this - his masterpieces that treat the varied interpretations of key physical concepts - but "Einstein and Religion", despite its regrettable repetitions and occasional obsessions (tokens of the contemptuous lack of editorial bother even at great publishers nowadays), is nevertheless a valuable piece of scholarship. Einstein's positive ideas of `religion' or a `God' are intimately Spinozan; this makes them equivalent to the inexhaustible mystery of why the cosmos is evidently rational in its construction, and to the great physicist's belief that we ourselves only know the tiniest part of this rational necessity, harmony, simplicity, and profundity of Nature - a rationality that may even be infinite. An annoyance of the book, and of Einstein's ideas (in this instance), is that so many of the words and concepts used are ultimately ambiguous. Because of this, one leaves much of the material in the form in which one found it, and many conclusions are foreclosed. Despite these criticisms, delightful flashes of insight grace the book, of the sort that were always peculiar to Albert Einstein, and the question of the essence of religion is clarified in ways that will not be found elsewhere. Much of Einstein's genius lay in his character: his extraordinary honesty and simplicity, for example, and his intellectual self-sufficiency or independence of the opinions of others. These qualities, as it happens, are especially helpful in any inquiry into the nature of religion, for emotion and arbitrariness have forever plagued the subject. - Patrick Gunkel Woods Hole, MA
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A Scholarly Description of Einstein's Religious Philosophy, December 6, 2001
This review is from: Einstein and Religion (Hardcover)
In the first chapter that deals with Einstein's personal attitude toward religion, we learn the followings: Einstein regarded science and religion as mutually depending on each other, which is evidenced by his words, "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind." However, the predominant motivations that led him to his development of the theory of relativity were purely physical considerations. Like Spinoza, Einstein denied the existence of a personal God, and used the term "cosmic religious feeling" to describe the sublimity and marvelous order in nature. Near the end of the first chapter, the author asks a question, "Did Einstein's conception of religion affect his scientific work?" and derives a positive answer. The story that Einstein's introduction of the cosmological constant was religiously motivated concludes the chapter. The second chapter discusses what Einstein has written about the nature of religion and its role in human society. Einstein's "Credo" about the cosmic religious feeling is cited repeatedly. In his essay read at a conference held in 1940, Einstein called the doctrine of a personal God not only unworthy but also fatal. The author writes about many responses Einstein got in reaction to this essay. At the end of this chapter the author analyzes Spinoza's role in the development of Einstein's religious philosophy. As can be seen from the above, topics given in the first two chapters are quite attractive, and explanations are instructive to the reader who has interest in the mental background of Einstein's academic work. The scholarly style of the author's writing is enjoyable. However, the third and final chapter that studies the influence of Einstein's scientific work on theology was not interesting to me at all. After finishing the book, I read Introduction section of the book again. To my great relief, I found the following words of the author near its end: "It is possible that [Einstein] would have rejected all of the arguments in chapter 3 if he were alive." The reason why I was not interested in the final chapter was that my thought about religion was the same as Einstein's! Thus I recommend the first two chapters to all those who have interest in Einstein or religion, but do not recommend the third chapter for those who think like Einstein.
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