The Christian Scientist

Apparently, one of the world's preeminent physicists is also an ardent and outspoken Christian. And a Berkeley professor to boot. The San Francisco Chronicle is reporting that Charles Townes, a long time professor of physics at Berkeley and co-inventor of the laser and the maser for which he won a Nobel Prize, was just awarded the $1.5 million Templeton Prize, known as the world's richest annual prize, for his lifelong attempts to reconcile science and religion (link here and here). One excerpt from the article: "Townes said that, with findings of modern physics, it 'seems extremely unlikely' that the existence of life and humanity are 'just accidental,' which inevitably raises religious questions about whether the universe was planned." He plans to donate the vast majority of the prize to a handful of local religious and charitable organizations including the First Congregational Church of Berkeley and the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley. Inspiring life to say the least. The seemingly futile issue of reconciling science and religion is strangely reminiscent of the assumption, taught to me in my sophomore physics class at Berkeley, that is made in quantum physics that at the atomic level, all things are both particles and waves (i.e., in science speak, "simultaneously exhibiting localized and distributed properties"). The "duality principle" of quantum theory is ultimately an act of faith made by physicists since it has never been observed or proven in an experiment. Ironic that the same scientists who blast their Christian peers including Townes for their unscientific beliefs are the same ones who oftentimes make similar "leaps of faith" in science that defy observation or even logic.