A Brief Thought in the History of Time

pozzolane

BANNED
Banned
Recently I started reading one of Stephen Hawkings older books titled "A Brief History of Time". I'm sure most of you have heard of this book. If you like non-fiction and have ever thought it might be an interesting read, I would highly recommend it. Dr. Hawkings has a skill for explaining difficult concepts in easy to understand ways. If I can understand it, than probably most others could too.

One thing that struck me as funny, however, was in one of the earlier chapters (I think it was chapter 3 when he starts into the beginning of the universe) he mentions that when early philosophers and scientists thought of the idea of the big bang after observing the movement of the galaxies within the universe, the atheistic ones among them were slightly abject to the idea because it "smacked of divine intervention". This is because it could then be said that the universe did indeed have a "beginning". Considering the extremely vehement opposition of the big bang theory and an "old universe" from the fundamentalist right today, I find this highly ironic, and somewhat amusing.

However, I can't help but think about what must have changed over the years with this idea that led from it's move from one corner of thought directly into the other. I'm certainly not suggesting that it is evidence either for or against a theistic world-view, but I do find it quite curious non the less. I have always found it to be quite droll, even in my days as a theist, to talk with those who emphasized their faith, but yet insisted that the veracity of their supernatural claims could be verified by natural evidence.
 

Egbert

New member
I found that pretty funny too, especially the context of the scientists obstructing the research. It's an unfortunate truth that the pursuit of knowledge will always face opposition from somebody with an agenda, and all too often those people are from amongst the scientists themselves.
 
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