Non-crackpot physicist wins Templeton prize - Darwinist Jerry Coyne isn't happy

Uncommon Descent
Tue, 19 Mar 2019 18:16 UTC

© Eli Burakian/Dartmouth College

Marcelo Gleiser

Marcelo Gleiser sounds as though he thinks that the great mysteries of physics are about this universe, not space aliens, computer sim universes, cyborgs, and so forth (on that score, see 2011 Templeton winner Sir Martin Rees).

More on Gleiser:

"There is all this stuff that science has discovered, but there are so many questions we still have no clue about. Because nature is so much smarter than we are, we're always playing this game of catch-up," he says. "So I look at science as this kind of flirt with the unknown, and what motivates this spirit of discovery is awe and the joy of being part of this process." --Colin Dwyer, "Marcelo Gleiser Wins Templeton Prize For Quest To Confront 'Mystery Of Who We Are'" at NPR

Darwinian evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne is not pleased:

Well, once again the canny John Templeton Foundation has awarded its million-pound Templeton Prize to someone who's not a religious figure but a scientist who enables religion and criticizes materialism and atheism. This time the Big Dosh went to Marcelo Gleiser, a professor of Physics and Astronomy at Dartmouth College. He's a theoretical physicist and also a prolific popular writer, having produced six books, some of which seem to emphasize the limits of science. And that's apparently what he got he Prize for: for adhering to Sir John Templeton's program that science and spirituality (aka religion) were both required to apprehend the "ultimate truths" about the Universe and answer the "Big Questions." --Jerry Coyne, March 19, 2019, "Templeton Prize awarded to physicist for blending science and woo" at Why Evolution Is True

But then, in Jerry's books, Templeton can do wrong just doing its job.

See also (Marcelo Gleiser):

• Cosmologist: Parallel universes are pushing physics too far?
• Science sometimes needs to fail so as to advance
• Theoretical physicist: Consciousness is what makes the universe exist
• Marcelo Gleiser On "Absence Of Evidence Is Not Evidence Of Absence."

Comment: How dare a scientist criticize materialism and atheism, which are philosophical belief systems. The true orthodoxy must uphold and maintain the dogmas of materialism and atheism, and not allow any criticism. Because criticism shows them to be dogmas, and nothing more. What is it about Gleiser that rubs Coyne the wrong way? Something like this perhaps:

A physics and astronomy professor whose specializations include cosmology, 60-year-old Gleiser was born in Rio de Janeiro, and has been in the United States since 1986.

An agnostic, he doesn't believe in God - but refuses to write off the possibility of God's existence completely.

"Atheism is inconsistent with the scientific method," Gleiser told AFP Monday from Dartmouth College, the New Hampshire university where he has taught since 1991.

"Atheism is a belief in non-belief. So you categorically deny something you have no evidence against."

"I'll keep an open mind because I understand that human knowledge is limited," he added. --AFP, "Physicist Marcelo Gleiser: 'Science does not kill God'" at Phys.org

Sounds like a sane approach, which is precisely why true believers like Coyne are upset.