I am such a nerd. At Bible study on Saturday, we talked about some of the mysteries Jewish scholars have struggled with over the years. Such as, how God can be completely unchanging and outside of time, yet interact with humans and make time-bound humans in his image. My answer? It's like the wave-particle duality of light. Physics has proven there are certain ways in which something can have two contradictory characteristics at the same time, so this is really not a mystery at all.
The mystery of when the Sabbath ends - is there a moment when it is both the Sabbath and yet not the Sabbath? Well, quantum physics says no. The revolutionary idea behind quantum physics is that time and space are quantized - divide them small enough, and you get an indivisable unit. There is a quantum of time that is Sabbath, followed by a quantum of time that is not. There is nothing in between, mystery solved.
I also had some idea about relating how humans view God to how we can construct the three-dimensional shadow of a four-dimensional hypercube, but can't actually see the hypercube itself. Disappointingly, I wasn't able to work that into the conversation.
I don't think I actually solved any enduring religious mysteries with modern physics. But it was fun to contemplate the possibilities.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Physics and religion
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
I just love your blog - you're always posing interesting questions and exploring new things. As a small thank you I've given you an award at: http://mcsmithley.blogspot.com/2009/02/these-are-few-of-my-favorite-things.html
Wow, this is really interesting. I love thinking about stuff like this. Thanks for sharing.
Post a Comment