14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting fellow, interesting times, interesting intersection of science and religion., January 15, 2007
This fairly short (216 pages) book centers around the central dilemma of Blaise Pascal's, the 17th century math prodigy's, life philosophy: How to reconcile his austere view of life as should be lived by a creation of God with his obvious love of math, science, and worldly ideas. Another hundred pages could have been used to flesh out Pascal's writings and scientific ideas so that the reader could make more of his own decision about him. Instead the author has chosen to present his own thesis for acceptance or rejection. There is considerable interesting background provided on the France of Pascal's time and on Jansenism, the ascetic (Augustinian) form of deterministic (Calvinistic) Catholicism that Pascal ultimately accepted.
There are several descriptions of the discoveries of Pascal and his peers but nothing that requires a math or science background. The last chapter is a musing by the author that uses the probabilistic view of modern life that Pascal originated by his seminal work in probability theory. The author's dividing of people into climbers and sprawlers is insightful especially if you're inunudated with amazing coincidence \ God's providence spam e-mails as I seem to be. Recommended if you're Roman Catholic, definitely recommended if you're a fan of the Jesuits (the author is a former Jesuit). The book reads fast and is divided into short chapters; useful if, as I do, you like to finish a chapter before getting off the mass transit. Well recommended.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A wonderful little book about physics and faith, October 5, 2007
As an engineer I had studied all about Pascal's products, the conic sections, the vacuum, and the probability studies. However, until I read this book never could have imagined the sad and inspirational story behind the genius, Blaise Pascal. It is written in short readable chapters that give you a vivid picture on the 17th century in which he lived. The book gives a spectacular vision of the beginning of science as we know it in the 21st century. It also examines the conflict of one man between his faith and his passion for science. I won't tell you how it comes out that for you to read. The only thing I will tell you is that it is not the usual science is good and religion is bad that you find in many book today. Read this book, and if you have children interested in science have them read it too, or better read it to them.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Great Mind Looking for a Heart, April 30, 2008
PASCAL'S WAGER: The Man Who Played Dice With God.
By James A. Connor, Harper Collins Publishers, 2006]
James Connor has given us the opportunity to enter the physical space and place of 1588-1670 France. He brings classic and substantive insight into the provincial and fomenting social mores of these times: the militancy and corruption of the papacy; the intrusive and diminishing ideology of Aristotelian philosophy; and, the deepening schism in the Catholic Church and monarchies of Pascal's times. Through the lens of Blaise Pascal's tightly-knit family, we enter the inordinate emotional sibling reliance (addiction) of children who have been raised in the isolated, dominating, and cloistered world of a widowed father suddenly thrust into self-survival and the salt of erudition. Through his infancy and childhood years Blaise Pascal was afflicted with an abnormality which forced him to shift into a shrieking knot of psychic pain whenever he was with more than one parent at a time. From the beginning of his days Pascal was labeled a dark angel. Caught in the polemic of the adamancy of original sin and simultaneously possessed with the fomenting dreams of a scientist, Pascal's heart and mind joined the tight rope of his life-long pain stricken body in total accommodation. The essential terror of this dilemma necessitated a sort of "doubling phenomenon" as a protective shield against the continuous threats to his spiritual identity and intelligence.
"When I think about the shortness of my life," Pascal said, "melted into the eternity that came before me, and into the eternity that will come after...and the insignificance of the space I fill and even see, I'm lost in the infinite vastness of that space that lies beyond, that space of which I am ignorant and which has no knowledge or care of me. I'm frightened and astonished to awaken in this place rather than that and I see no reason why I should be here and not there, now and not then. Who put me here? By whose order and direction have this place and time come to me?" (Connor: 179)
Living in these polemics eventually brought Pascal into conceiving a rationality of faith based on gambling. Miraculously, Pascal's lifelong physical and emotional pain coupled with the Faustian delight of formulating mathematical theories resulted in the genius birth of the science of probability. Further, his piercing insights into the "law of big vs. the law of averages" and his brilliant staging of a new metaphysics embodied in quantum mechanics; his prideful invention of the first computing machine, the Pascaline are primo among the collective hallmarks of his extraordinary life. Connor's case study of Pascal's divided psyche exposes a tightly leashed self-will evolving into a theology of moral powerlessness. Pointing out that, in 1658, with the return of signaling pain, Pascal had taken to wearing "an iron girdle full of sharp points, which he put next to his skin." Any time Pascal had a prideful thought, or felt pulled toward some diversion, he pushed on the girdle, driving the points into his flesh. He wore that girdle until the day he died. Connor's biography of Blaise Pascal provides a curved mirror adroitly exposing the primal desire of mortals as they seek to decipher the Immortal; and, to discover the veracity of that great spiritual river running between the heart and the soul. He beautifully illustrates Pascal's scientific mind as influencing today's inquiries into cybernetics, physics, nanotechnology; advanced theories of relativity, space stations, and, yes, "the truth and the comics" imbedded in blasting beyond Disney's Black Hole. Within the context of our stumbling steps at the cusp of the 21st century, Connor offers a beguiling interpolative rendition of the facts during Pascal's life and times: How do we reconcile the scientist and the mystic? How do we formulate true questions, questions that ask a question and continue to ask another after that? Perhaps Blaise is whispering to us today, reminding that the ancient hawk of peril, courage, and creativity of his times coincide with the "new age" inquiry of our own. James A. Connor whispers back:
"Personally, this one universe is enough for me. I find it to be as weird as I can handle. Weirdness is a value in and of itself, for in weirdness lies poetry, and in poetry lies beauty, and in beauty lies truth, weird as it is. Pascal would appreciate this. (Connor: 215)
Jess Maghan Chester, CT
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
