The dear Templeton Foundation itself knows why it gave the gong to Martin Rees. It’s because he is
a theoretical astrophysicist whose profound insights on the cosmos have provoked vital questions that speak to humanity’s highest hopes and worst fears, has won the 2011 Templeton Prize.
Insights, which are more spiritual than research, or equations, especially when they’re profound insights. And if they speak to (what? what does that mean?) humanity’s highest hopes and worst fears (what do they say when they speak to them?) then those insights are a red-hot ticket to Templeton’s version of the genius grant.
But what does it actually mean? How do his “profound insights” about the universe speak to our hopes and fears? Is it just…you know…the universe is very big and full of surprises so…well that’s it really – ? Or is it something more…definite. If anybody knows, fill us in.
In turn, the “big questions” he raises – such as “How large is physical reality?” – are reshaping crucial philosophical and theological considerations that strike at the core of life, fostering the spiritual progress that the Templeton Prize has long sought to recognize.
What theological considerations? How are the questions reshaping them? How do the considerations “strike at the core of life”? How does that striking “foster spiritual progress”? What is “spiritual progress”?
This all looks, to the untutored observer like me, like pure bullshitting. It looks like empty word-spinning that means simply nothing at all. I think if it actually meant something they would have managed to say a little about what that was.
Sean Carroll is not bowled over.
Comments
23 responses to “Profound insights vital questions spiritual progress”
Talking about “profound insights” sounds a bit more noble than “he gave us just what we wanted so now we’re showering him with cash, with the expectation that other prominent scientists will take note and give us just what we want in the future.”
Right – bullshitting. Just what I said! :- )
Translation: Martin Rees does Great Science, so by giving him a million pounds the Templeton Foundation is connected to Great Science. The material connection of money disproves the conceptual disconnect, despite religion being extraneous to science at best.
I think I figured it out: Physical reality is way big, ergo God is way way way big.
Let’s at least acknowledge that, for someone who’s just accepted a million pounds, Martin Rees is not especially deferential to his benefactors. From the Ian Sample interview:
IS: Do you think science and religion can have a constructive dialogue?
MR: I’m sceptical about that. I tend to avoid getting into these sorts of debates, because I’m not sure how much productive interaction there can be between them.
Good on.
Let’s translate this into Internet meme-speak:
Yes, “spiritual progress” – the ultimate oxymoron!
“Bullshitting” is the right word. Synonymous with “Templetoning.”
‘…[T]he “big questions” he raises – such as “How large is physical reality?” – are reshaping crucial philosophical and theological considerations that strike at the core of life…’
So if Rees has been reshaping theological considerations, the Templetonians should be able to point out some theologians or religious bodies who have changed stance based on Rees’ published work.
Mystic crystal revelations?
Remember that last years winner, Francisco J. Ayala, won the prize “for his opposition to the entanglement of science and religion while also calling for mutual respect between the two.”
Now as far as I can recall Ayala, while being proclaimed for winning the prize for an “opposition to the entanglement of science and religion” promptly forgot about that and started attacking the incompatiblist position (which is, by definition, “an opposition to the entanglement of science and religion”).
I fully expect Rees to soon begin singing from the same hymsheet.
Yes, that’s precisely what it is — bullshitting! What gets me about it is that Templeton has happened upon a very cagey strategy. Give the prize to an eminent scientist — and they don’t get much more eminent than Rees in Britain — whatever his accomplishments in the area of spirituality and the so-called ‘big questions’, and then use that eminence to rub off on their quite obviously proselytising work. The really angry-making part of this is that Templeton — as well as all the religious fellow-travellers like Rees — ignores completely the really disastrous role that religion is playing in the world today. It’s a Christian organisation selling the Christian story, not just the big questions, and there’s a lot of religion that is not only polite and academic, like Kings College Chapel and its famous choir, but really down and dirty and dangerous, subverting the lives of children and setting adults at each others’ throats. It’s a bad business when a man like Rees can’t see these aspects of religion, and supposes that real religion is the pro forma comfortable religion of an Anglican chapel at a great university.
I’d be less tempted (hum, tempted, templeton …) to call BS too if they actually bothered to give an example or two of the “theological considerations that strike at the core of life”, but …
@Philosopher
That would go a long way to assuaging (at least for me) fears of this just being a bribe. If there were a specific body of work (paper, series of studies, ect) then this would be just another award for a job well done. There’d be no future compromise of principles because you were getting it something you did instead of advancing the foundation’s goals.
I think the piece is exploiting two different ideas at the same time. The first is the philosophical concept founded a couple dozen centuries ago, where the ultimate answers in the world (the universe didn’t exist then, it’s a recent invention) could be puzzled out merely by thinking hard about them. Human brains are that impressive, doncha know.
And the second is the idea that religious feelings are profound, so every idiot who gets spiritual about whatever pet idea they like can be considered wise in their own way. “Profound,” “spiritual,” “deep,” and “meaning” are all endorphin words, indications of esteem and insight, but attainable by anyone anywhere – actual intelligence not required. In many cases it’s actually shunned, an elitism from those damn ivory tower academics who concern themselves with chemicals and physics and all those other things that nobody needs.
Eventually, somebody will hit on a way to make a third-grade education and cars on cinder blocks in the front yard sound like indications of insight and profundity, and make a shitload of money.
Hmmmmm…
What Sigmund said. I always meant to do a detailed thingy about that contradiction in what Ayala was saying, but I never got around to it. It’s incredibly annoying. NOMA therefore compatible in the sense of mixable. Puleeze.
Of *course* Templeton luves Sir Martin– in his “Just Six Numbers” he gave us Fine-Tuning… which has in turn allowed William Lane Craig to fine-tune his Cosmological Argument for Jebus.
That’s as far as he can go without giving the money back. It puts him in substantial agreement with critics who say that there has been no progress towards accommodation, no reshaping, no fostering, nothing but vaporous proclamations. In essence Rees was awarded for being willing to accept the award, and for being a prize catch. Why don’t the more astute political commentators see that this is the equivalent of getting the coal producers Environmentalist of the Year Prize? Give the Templetonians credit for discovering a blind spot they can exploit.
Anyone without much of a career care to set a coupla years aside to Sokaling the Templetards?
Haven’t you guys heard? Profound spiritual insights are just a hair-breadth away from demonstrating the Higgs boson. That’ll change everything, you see.
Sili – well what do you think I’ve been doing all this time?!
:- )
what eric said is a sardonic truth. In the village were a live, you see the real face of christianity. They spy each other like enemies and when they see something they don’t like they tell the pastor like little children. But these children are the ground of a perverse system of anonymous betraying who was the base of inquisition in the middleages.
Sorry, Benson, not nearly conciliatory enough.