Theology Matters 2

Reflection Questions

1. The video talks about some of the differences between the view of the world espoused by classical Newtonian physics (e.g., mechanistic, perfect, timeless, unchanging, etc.) and the worldview necessitated by thermodynamics (e.g., changing, decaying, dying, etc.) How do you think these different understandings of physics have affected the the incidence of faith or belief? Does one view seem to "fit" better with the idea of God (or with the idea of no god) than the other?

A new generation of mathematicians and philosophers were convinced if only they could solve the problems and paradoxes that had defeated Cantor, maths could be made perfect again. The most prominent among them, Hilbert, declared: "the definitive clarification of the nature of the infinite has become necessary for the honor of human understanding itself." They were so concerned to find some kind of certainty. They had come to believe that the only kind of understanding that was really worth anything was the logical and the provable.

2. What do you think of Hilbert's declaration?

3. What's so bad about believing that the only kind of understanding worth anything is the logical and the provable?

Cantor had dislodged the pebble which would, one day, start a landslide. For him, it had all been held together the—paradoxes resolved—in God. But what holds our ideas together when God is dead? Without God, the pebble is dislodged and the avalanche is unleashed; And World War I had killed God.

4. Is it necessary for our ideas to hold together?

5. The claim that "World War I...killed God" is certainly not new. I'd like to know what you think of that claim. What do you think it means? Is it valid or not?