Stephen Hawking and the Mind of God (Postmodern Encounters) [Paperback]

Peter Coles (Author)

Book Description

Series: Postmodern Encounters | Publication Date: May 1996

Stephen Hawking has achieved a unique position in contemporary culture, combining eminence in the rarefied world of theoretical physics with the popular fame usually reserved for film stars and rock musicians. Yet Hawking's technical work is so challenging, both in its conceptual scope and in its mathematical detail, that proper understanding of its significance lies beyond the grasp of all but a few specialists. How, then, did Hawking-the-scientist become Hawking-the-icon? Hawking's theories often take him into the intellectual territory that has traditionally been the province of religion rather than science. He acknowledges this explicitly in the closing sentence of his bestseller, "A Brief History of Time", where he says that his ultimate aim is the "know the Mind of God". "Hawking and the Mind of God" examines the pseudo-religious connotations of some of the key themes in Hawking's work, and how these shed light not only on the Hawking cult itself, but also on the wider issue of how scientists represent themselves in the media.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Peter Coles is Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Nottingham, where he works on problems connected with the origin of galaxies and large-scale structure in the universe.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The Hawking Phenomenon

The British theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking is one of the few scientists ever to have become a media celebrity. His book ‘A Brief History of Time’ was a world-wide bestseller, and he has made many appearances on television, not – as with most scientists – restricted to science documentaries, but also in commercials and elsewhere. He is instantly recognisable through the constraints imposed on him by grievous illness. Suffering from the progressive effects of motor neurone disease (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) since his early twenties, when he was a student at Cambridge, he is confined to a wheelchair and virtually unable to move except to control the computer attached to his wheelchair. As a result of a tracheotomy in the mid-1980s, he is unable to speak. He talks through an eerily mechanical voice produced by a speech synthesizer.

It is remarkable that a man trapped in a tortured body and deprived of the most basic means of communication could have achieved such fame. And more remarkable still, that he has been able to overcome the immense obstacles placed before him to pursue a spectacular career as one of the most imaginative and influential scientists of modern times.

But there is much more to the Hawking phenomenon than his scientific endeavours. The story of 20th-century physics contains many great intellectual achievements by men such as Paul Dirac, Richard Feynman, Erwin Schrödinger and, of course, Albert Einstein. Of this array of geniuses, Albert Einstein is the only household name. In 1998 ‘The Observer’ newspaper named him the 68th most powerful man in Great Britain, as a measure of his impact on people’s daily lives. As far as the media and, perhaps, popular consciousness are concerned, Hawking and Einstein rank at a similar level in the physicists’ hall of fame. Indeed, when Stephen Hawking appeared in ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation’ (playing himself), it was alongside Sir Isaac Newton and Einstein.

What I want to do in this book is to try to find a proper perspective in which to view the work of Stephen Hawking and his place in wider society. My argument is that there is much more to the Hawking phenomenon than either his scientific achievements or the sympathy engendered by his illness, or even a combination of these two. The extra ingredient can only be seen by viewing Hawking in the context of the tremendous changes not only in science itself, but also in the relationship between man and nature, that have taken place in the last 100 years or so.

The title comes from the last sentence of ‘A Brief History of Time’ (1988), in which Hawking writes of his desire to ‘know the Mind of God’. This phrase is key to understanding the wider role of Hawking beyond the rarefied world of abstract mathematical theory. To see why, we have to explore the development of physics from the beginning of the modern era.

Product Details

• Paperback: 80 pages
• Publisher: Totem Books (May 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1840461241
• ISBN-13: 978-1840461244
• Product Dimensions: 6.9 x 4.4 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,634,872 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Much too short, September 7, 2001

By 

Edward Bosnar - See all my reviews

This review is from: Stephen Hawking and the Mind of God (Postmodern Encounters) (Paperback)

The text in this little booklet is much too short, but since it is part of a series of pamphlets called Postmodern Encounters, I suppose its brevity was a requirement set down by the publisher. Basically it is an examination of why theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking has become such a widely recognized cultural icon, even though his field of research (astrophysics and cosmology) is hardly understood by most people. Coles even speculates, correctly I think, that vast majority of those who bought his best-selling Brief History of Time probably did not even bother reading it. Even though Coles never implies that Hawking is anything but a brilliant scientist and top-notch researcher, he also points out that Hawking can hardly be placed in the company of such revolutionary physicists as Galileo, Newton or Einstein  even though is how he is now perceived in the popular mind. Coles thus explores how this assignment of an almost guru-like status for Hawking came about. Along the way, Coles also provides a summary of the basic ideas underlying relativity theory and quantum physics, geared toward compleat idiots such as myself. This section actually accounts for the bulk of the text, and makes his rather brief investigation of the Hawking phenomenon all the more tantalizing. This subject matter deserves a much more detailed study  hopefully Coles is working on a more comprehensive book.

4.0 out of 5 stars Misleading Title, December 28, 2008

By 

Ric Warner (New York) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Stephen Hawking and the Mind of God (Postmodern Encounters) (Paperback)

This was a very informative booklet and Coles presented the facts about Stephen Hawking. Coles started out with a quick overview on Hawking, the phenomenon surrounding this great physicist, he touches on the history of physics, and an implied connection of Hawking birth to Galileo's death, exactly 300 years ago.

he middle section of the book build up to the connection of the three primary theory, the need of finding a link with the laws of gravity, and the work Hawking did regarding Black Holes being no so black.

The downside of the book are; i) I expected Hawking's spiel on the Mind of God or even god, ii) the brevity iii) the comments about the celebrity of Hawking due to modern media coverage.

I recommend reading the book and then getting a copy of A Brief History of Time (1988) by Stephen Hawking