|
|
|
|
dschrepel
New Member
USA
2 Posts |
 Posted - 02/07/2002 : 16:54:24
|
A co-worker presented me with this quote attributed to Albert Einstein: "Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind." I doubt that he said this but wondered if anyone knows if this is a true quote and if they have any reference to support it.
|
|
|
Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
 Posted - 02/07/2002 : 17:50:58 [Permalink]
|
No, it is not a true quote.
But this is. From 1954, he is quoted in the biography Albert Einstein- The Human Side as saying...
quote:
It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly.
-------
The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain. Only evil will come from it. |
 |
|
|
Lars_H
SFN Regular
Germany
630 Posts |
Posted - 02/07/2002 : 19:03:05 [Permalink]
|
Actuall the quotation appears to be genuine.
I have seen it in an article in an excerpt from Science, Philosophy and Religion, A Symposium, published by the Conference on Science, Philosophy and Religion in Their Relation to the Democratic Way of Life, Inc., New York, 1941.
This quotaion makes more sense when on understands what Einstein considered to be religion it was certainly not the personal God whom he was rather opposed to. By giving the quote in a bit more context it becomes a little bit clearer:
quote:
But science can only be created by those who are thoroughly imbued with the aspiration toward truth and understanding. This source of feeling, however, springs from the sphere of religion. To this there also belongs the faith in the possibility that the regulations valid for the world of existence are rational, that is, comprehensible to reason. I cannot conceive of a genuine scientist without that profound faith. The situation may be expressed by an image: science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.
A longer version of this escerpt can be found at:
http://www.stcloudstate.edu/~lesikar/einstein/Einstein2b.html
|
|
|
|
Xev
Skeptic Friend
USA
329 Posts |
Posted - 02/07/2002 : 19:08:04 [Permalink]
|
Really? Not only an argument to authority, but false?
Damn, I wish I'd known that a week ago!
Slater, what is your source for saying it is false? I just checked Snopes, nothing there.
Edited to add: Eeee! And now Lars is claiming it's true.
Xev -Ad astra!- Bellringer
Edited by - Xev on 02/07/2002 19:09:51 |
|
|
|
Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
Posted - 02/07/2002 : 19:26:12 [Permalink]
|
Einstein was an Agnostic, more than likely an Atheist, who at the urging of his wife kept quiet about it. It is said that it was she who gave him the line "God doesn't play dice." that the Xians jump on. He was talking about Spinozas God--which is no god at all, just the laws of physics.
During his life Xians came up with many "quotes" to show what a Godly - man our resident genius was. He did his best to refute this nonsense and still retain his standing in the public eye.
Xians are desperate to show that top scientists are believers, but life just doesn't work out that way. So they take matters into their own hands.
-------
The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain. Only evil will come from it.
Edited by - slater on 02/07/2002 19:32:22 |
|
|
|
Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
Posted - 02/07/2002 : 19:47:30 [Permalink]
|
quote:
It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously
A.E. "Religion & Science" NY Times Magazine, 9, Nov. 1930
quote:
I cannot concieve of a God who rewards and punishes his creatures, or has a will of the kind that we experience in ourselves. Neither can I nor would I want to conceive of an individual that survives his physical death; let feeble souls, from fear or absurd egoism, cherish such thoughts.
A.E. The World As I See It 1936
-------
The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain. Only evil will come from it. |
|
|
|
Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
Posted - 02/07/2002 : 19:54:09 [Permalink]
|
Becoming a Freethinker and a Scientist
The following is an excerpt Albert Einstein's Autobiographical Notes, Open Court Publishing Company, LaSalle and Chicago, Illinois, 1979. These paragraphs appear on pp 3 & 5.
When I was a fairly precocious young man I became thoroughly impressed with the futility of the hopes and strivings that chase most men restlessly through life. Moreover, I soon discovered the cruelty of that chase, which in those years was much more carefully covered up by hypocrisy and glittering words than is the case today. By the mere existence of his stomach everyone was condemned to participate in that chase. The stomach might well be satisfied by such participation, but not man insofar as he is a thinking and feeling being.
As the first way out there was religion, which is implanted into every child by way of the traditional education-machine. Thus I came - though the child of entirely irreligious (Jewish) parents -to a deep religiousness, which, however, reached an abrupt end at the age of twelve. Through the reading of popular scientific books I soon reached the conviction that much in the stories of the Bible could not be true. The consequence was a positively fanatic orgy of freethinking coupled with the impression that youth is intentionally being deceived by the state through lies; it was a crushing impression. Mistrust of every kind of authority grew out of this experience, a skeptical attitude toward the convictions that were alive in any specific social environment-an attitude that has never again left me, even though, later on, it has been tempered by a better insight into the causal connections. It is quite clear to me that the religious paradise of youth, which was thus lost, was a first attempt to free myself from the chains of the "merely personal," from an existence dominated by wishes, hopes, and primitive feelings. Out yonder there was this huge world, which exists independently of us human beings and which stands before us like a great, eternal riddle, at least partially accessible to our inspection and thinking. The contemplation of this world beckoned as a liberation, and I soon noticed that many a man whom I had learned to esteem and to admire had found inner freedom and security in its pursuit. The mental grasp of this extra-personal world within the frame of our capabilities presented itself to my mind, half consciously, half unconsciously, as a supreme goal. Similarly motivated men of the present and of the past, as well as the insights they had achieved, were the friends who could not be lost. The road to this paradise was not as comfortable and alluring as the road to the religious paradise; but it has shown itself reliable, and I have never regretted having chosen it.
(Emphasis mine, JPS)
-------
The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain. Only evil will come from it. |
|
|
|
dschrepel
New Member
USA
2 Posts |
Posted - 02/08/2002 : 08:43:31 [Permalink]
|
Thanks for everyone's input. Out of context quotes seldom convey accurate meaning.
|
|
|
|
Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
Posted - 02/08/2002 : 09:28:58 [Permalink]
|
Yes, thanks Slater. I've always been confused by this, as any definition I've found of god means a personal god, and here we have these people using it to express the idea of a non-god. I understand that some people use the word that way to please those who are afraid of atheists.
Then the concept of religion is used by many to mean a thousand different things. Tim Gorski (M.D) of some Atheist Church in Texas says that religion simply means an individual's world view. (this is from memory, I may be over-simplifying)
"Not one human life should be expended in this reckless violence called a war against terrorism." - Howard Zinn |
|
|
|
Slater
SFN Regular
USA
1668 Posts |
Posted - 02/08/2002 : 10:27:13 [Permalink]
|
I think all the references to Spinozas God and an unknowable God can be traced back to Mrs Einstein, who many say was the brains of the outfit.
'Albert, we've got a good thing going for us here in New Jersey don't you blow it with that freethinking talk.'
In the 30's and even the early 40's he could have been open about Atheism. But by the time of Truman it would have been social suicide.
It must have been very frustrating for him because from the time he reached celebrity status Xians started printing pieces about him being a believer. As you can see from dschrepel's co-worker they are still at it. Why they should want this is beyond me. What is even more beyond me is why, when it's obvious from his writings that the guy says the believer's claims aren't true, do they keep at it. Knowing it is a lie, and an easily refuted lie at that. Xians seem to rely on their listeners not only being ignorant but never checking the truth of what they are told.
What could theists possibly gain from saying that Einstein was one of them?
-------
The brain that was stolen from my laboratory was a criminal brain. Only evil will come from it. |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
Topic Locked
