Dworkin's Religion Without God Chapter in The New York Review of Books
What does it mean when you say " I don't believe in God?"
Einstein states: "To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms--this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong in the ranks of devoutly religious men."
So, how is Einstein using the term "religious" here? Not belief in God but believing in something we can't know and is this something we can't know necessarily something "outside" of us, which would imply that there is something else?
If you agree that there are parts of our world that we can not penetrate, does that make you religious?
Deutsch, in the Beginning of Infinity, states that we CAN know everything we just don't yet. If you believe that, does that mean you are not religious?
(This is very related to The Information and Godel, Escher Bach and the question--can math explain everything or put another way is everything reducible to math? Would Godel agree that there are parts of the world we cannot penetrate--the unprovable formulas in math? Or are these a different object of knowing?See posts on these topics)
Margaret Fuller wrote, "we reach heaven by transcending the painful sense of the inadequacy of our nature. . That there would be . . . A sense of the fullness of being".
In some ways Fuller and Einstein could be speaking of the same thing, just with a different mood. Fuller seems a bit overwhelmed by the feeling of inadequacy that comes from just being while Einstein seems to be glorying in the fact that knowing our inadequacy and that we can't ever know it all is supremely exciting.
Einstein states: "To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive forms--this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong in the ranks of devoutly religious men."
So, how is Einstein using the term "religious" here? Not belief in God but believing in something we can't know and is this something we can't know necessarily something "outside" of us, which would imply that there is something else?
If you agree that there are parts of our world that we can not penetrate, does that make you religious?
Deutsch, in the Beginning of Infinity, states that we CAN know everything we just don't yet. If you believe that, does that mean you are not religious?
(This is very related to The Information and Godel, Escher Bach and the question--can math explain everything or put another way is everything reducible to math? Would Godel agree that there are parts of the world we cannot penetrate--the unprovable formulas in math? Or are these a different object of knowing?See posts on these topics)
Margaret Fuller wrote, "we reach heaven by transcending the painful sense of the inadequacy of our nature. . That there would be . . . A sense of the fullness of being".
In some ways Fuller and Einstein could be speaking of the same thing, just with a different mood. Fuller seems a bit overwhelmed by the feeling of inadequacy that comes from just being while Einstein seems to be glorying in the fact that knowing our inadequacy and that we can't ever know it all is supremely exciting.
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