Einstein and Buddha: The Parallel Sayings by Thomas J. McFarlane | Goodreads

Einstein and Buddha: The Parallel Sayings by Thomas J. McFarlane | Goodreads

 

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Einstein and Buddha: The Parallel Sayings

by 

Thomas J. McFarlane (Editor),

 

Thomas J. McFarlane (Editor)

 3.89  ·   Rating details ·  71 ratings  ·  7 reviews

Provocative, stimulating, and insightful, Einstein and Buddha points to the far-reaching and profound parallels between Western scientific thought and Eastern religion. These remarkably similar disciplines touch on the essential nature of energy and matter, the relationship between subject and object, and the limits of language in understanding and describing reality. The shared understandings communicate a deep common ground on both the nature of the universe and our place in it. (less)

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Paperback, 192 pages

Published December 20th 2002 by Seastone Press (first published November 28th 2001)

Original Title

Einstein and Buddha: The Parallel Sayings

ISBN

1569753377 (ISBN13: 9781569753378)

Edition Language

English

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Jan 23, 2014David rated it it was amazing

A must-have book for anyone interested in the convergence between quantum science and Buddhist/more broadly Eastern spiritual thought.

The book is divided into different sections, each of which contains parallel sayings by scientists and the wisdom traditions of the East. In many cases, the two come to almost identical conclusions, such as:
'It is a primitive form of thought that things either exist or do not exist' - Sir Arthur Eddington.

'To say "it is' is to grasp for permanence. To say "it is ...more

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Jan 28, 2021Hope Waters rated it it was amazing

Super thought provoking. Included parallel sayings from history's leading physicists and metaphysical thinkers. ...more

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Aug 02, 2011Bill rated it it was ok

A very promising title drew me to this book. Albert Einstein and the Buddha are two of my favorite people, and certainly two of the "smartest" (whatever that means) ever to grace our fair planet.

The book compares and contrasts, on each page, sayings by a scientist and an Eastern Mystic within a variety of topics such as "The Human Experience" and "Time and Space," intended to demonstrate the similarity between the hard science and the soft philosophy of the two pursuits. And it does, and it works, by and large.

The problem with the book (at least for someone uneducated like me) is that there is absolutely no context to the short quotations and often it at least appears as though quotes were chosen because of the existence of a word or two in them, to make them appear as though they are addressing the topic at hand when in fact they may have been intended for something else altogether. An example:

sir Arthur Eddington: "The concept of substance has disappeared from fundamental physics."
Yeshe Tsogyel: "I have seen nothing in the world that is ultimately real."

I'm not convinced that the second quote, in particular, refers to anything remotely like what Eddington was talking about (he is referring to the duality of the particle/wave state of everything...not that it wasn't "real" like the typical person would use that word).

Again, I ain't that smart, or well-read, so I could be wrong, but even if I am, it seems obvious that one would be far better off reading some more focused works by these amazing folks to better understand what they're really getting at. Then, maybe, this book serves as a proper capstone for that.

Not bad, just a bit pointless... (less)

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Jul 07, 2010Yasmina rated it really liked it

پس از آنکه اندیشمندان تحقیقات گسترده ای رادر زمینه تفکرات مشابه میان فیزیک نوین وعرفان شرق آغاز کرده انددیگر این تشابه تنها به عنوان اطلاعات نگرشی انحصاری و محرمانه تلقی نمیشود وصحت آن را میتوان در این کتاب به وضوح مشاهده کرد. نویسنده با گرداوری مطالب ونظایر ونیز موارد قیاسپذیر موجود در این میان سعی در اثبات یگانگی اهداف فیزیک وعرفان میکند ومایه پیدایش تاثیری حیرت انگیز در شناخت این دو میشود و نیز تصدیق فیزیکدانان در تطابق میان فیزیک جدید بودیسم و تائو ئسم را به همراه دارد
نویسنده که از شخصیتهای ...more

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May 21, 2009Stef rated it liked it

Thought-provoking, yes, but in reading this book, I felt as if the editor's agenda to "prove" that modern physics is just catching up to the revelations of Buddhism is a bit heavy-handed, and quoted out of context to the point of being misquoted. Identification of quote sources within the text would have been appreciated.

I think this book has put me off of my resolution to read "The Quantum and the Lotus" and "The Tao of Physics." It all feels just a bit too contrived for me.

But maybe that's why I'm not a Buddhist. (less)

Albert Einstein: Science and religion

Albert Einstein: Science and religion

Science and Religion

By Albert Einstein

This article is taken from:

Science, Philosophy and Religion, A Symposium,

The Conference on Science, Philosophy and Religion

in Their Relation to the Democratic Way of Life, Inc.,

New York, 1941.

It would not be difficult to come to an agreement as to what we understand by science. Science is the century-old endeavor to bring together by means of systematic thought the perceptible phenomena of this world into as thoroughgoing an association as possible. To put it boldly, it is the attempt at the posterior reconstruction of existence by the process of conceptualization. But when asking myself what religion is I cannot think of the answer so easily. And even after finding an answer which may satisfy me at this particular moment, I still remain convinced that I can never under any circumstances bring together, even to a slight extent, the thoughts of all those who have given this question serious consideration.

At first, then, instead of asking what religion is I should prefer to ask what characterizes the aspirations of a person who gives me the impression of being religious: a person who is religiously enlightened appears to me to be one who has, to the best of his ability, liberated himself from the fetters of his selfish desires and is preoccupied with thoughts, feelings, and aspirations to which he clings because of their superpersonalvalue. It seems to me that what is important is the force of this superpersonal content and the depth of the conviction concerning its overpowering meaningfulness, regardless of whether any attempt is made to unite this content with a divine Being, for otherwise it would not be possible to count Buddha and Spinoza as religious personalities. Accordingly, a religious person is devout in the sense that he has no doubt of the significance and loftiness of those superpersonal objects and goals which neither require nor are capable of rational foundation. They exist with the same necessity and matter-of-factness as he himself. In this sense religion is the age-old endeavor of mankind to become clearly and completely conscious of these values and goals and constantly to strengthen and extend their effect. If one conceives of religion and science according to these definitions then a conflict between them appears impossible. For science can only ascertain what is, but not what should be, and outside of its domain value judgments of all kinds remain necessary. Religion, on the other hand, deals only with evaluations of human thought and action: it cannot justifiably speak of facts and relationships between facts. According to this interpretation the well-known conflicts between religion and science in the past must all be ascribed to a misapprehension of the situation which has been described.

For example, a conflict arises when a religious community insists on the absolute truthfulness of all statements recorded in the Bible. This means an intervention on the part of religion into the sphere of science; this is where the struggle of the Church against the doctrines of Galileo and Darwin belongs. On the other hand, representatives of science have often made an attempt to arrive at fundamental judgments with respect to values and ends on the basis of scientific method, and in this way have set themselves in opposition to religion. These conflicts have all sprung from fatal errors.

Now, even though the realms of religion and science in themselves are clearly marked off from each other, nevertheless there exist between the two strong reciprocal relationships and dependencies. Though religion may be that which determines the goal, it has, nevertheless, learned from science, in the broadest sense, what means will contribute to the attainment of the goals it has set up. 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.

Though I have asserted above that in truth a legitimate conflict between religion and science cannot exist, I must nevertheless qualify this assertion once again on an essential point, with reference to the actual content of historical religions. This qualification has to do with the concept of God. During the youthful period of mankind's spiritual evolution human fantasy created gods in man's own image, who, by the operations of their will were supposed to determine, or at any rate to influence, the phenomenal world. Man sought to alter the disposition of these gods in his own favor by means of magic and prayer. The idea of God in the religions taught at present is a sublimation of that old concept of the gods. Its anthropomorphic character is shown, for instance, by the fact that men appeal to the Divine Being in prayers and plead for the fulfillment of their wishes.

Nobody, certainly, will deny that the idea of the existence of an omnipotent, just, and omnibeneficent personal God is able to accord man solace, help, and guidance; also, by virtue of its simplicity it is accessible to the most undeveloped mind. But, on the other hand, there are decisive weaknesses attached to this idea in itself, which have been painfully felt since the beginning of history. That is, if this being is omnipotent, then every occurrence, including every human action, every human thought, and every human feeling and aspiration is also His work; how is it possible to think of holding men responsible for their deeds and thoughts before such an almighty Being? In giving out punishment and rewards He would to a certain extent be passing judgment on Himself. How can this be combined with the goodness and righteousness ascribed to Him?

The main source of the present-day conflicts between the spheres of religion and of science lies in this concept of a personal God. It is the aim of science to establish general rules which determine the reciprocal connection of objects and events in time and space. For these rules, or laws of nature, absolutely general validity is required--not proven. It is mainly a program, and faith in the possibility of its accomplishment in principle is only founded on partial successes. But hardly anyone could be found who would deny these partial successes and ascribe them to human self-deception. The fact that on the basis of such laws we are able to predict the temporal behavior of phenomena in certain domains with great precision and certainty is deeply embedded in the consciousness of the modern man, even though he may have grasped very little of the contents of those laws. He need only consider that planetary courses within the solar system may be calculated in advance with great exactitude on the basis of a limited number of simple laws. In a similar way, though not with the same precision, it is possible to calculate in advance the mode of operation of an electric motor, a transmission system, or of a wireless apparatus, even when dealing with a novel development.

To be sure, when the number of factors coming into play in a phenomenological complex is too large, scientific method in most cases fails us. One need only think of the weather, in which case prediction even for a few days ahead is impossible. Nevertheless no one doubts that we are confronted with a causal connection whose causal components are in the main known to us. Occurrences in this domain are beyond the reach of exact prediction because of the variety of factors in operation, not because of any lack of order in nature.

We have penetrated far less deeply into the regularities obtaining within the realm of living things, but deeply enough nevertheless to sense at least the rule of fixed necessity. One need only think of the systematic order in heredity, and in the effect of poisons, as for instance alcohol, on the behavior of organic beings. What is still lacking here is a grasp of connections of profound generality, but not a knowledge of order in itself.

The more a man is imbued with the ordered regularity of all events the firmer becomes his conviction that there is no room left by the side of this ordered regularity for causes of a different nature. For him neither the rule of human nor the rule of divine will exists as an independent cause of natural events. To be sure, the doctrine of a personal God interfering with natural events could never be refuted, in the real sense, by science, for this doctrine can always take refuge in those domains in which scientific knowledge has not yet been able to set foot.

But I am persuaded that such behavior on the part of the representatives of religion would not only be unworthy but also fatal. For a doctrine which is able to maintain itself not in clear light but only in the dark, will of necessity lose its effect on mankind, with incalculable harm to human progress. In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal God, that is, give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vast power in the hands of priests. In their labors they will have to avail themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself. This is, to be sure, a more difficult but an incomparably more worthy task. (This thought is convincingly presented in Herbert Samuel's book, Belief and Action.) After religious teachers accomplish the refining process indicated they will surely recognize with joy that true religion has been ennobled and made more profound by scientific knowledge.

If it is one of the goals of religion to liberate mankind as far as possible from the bondage of egocentric cravings, desires, and fears, scientific reasoning can aid religion in yet another sense. Although it is true that it is the goal of science to discover rules which permit the association and foretelling of facts, this is not its only aim. It also seeks to reduce the connections discovered to the smallest possible number of mutually independent conceptual elements. It is in this striving after the rational unification of the manifold that it encounters its greatest successes, even though it is precisely this attempt which causes it to run the greatest risk of falling a prey to illusions. But whoever has undergone the intense experience of successful advances made in this domain is moved by profound reverence for the rationality made manifest in existence. By way of the understanding he achieves a far-reaching emancipation from the shackles of personal hopes and desires, and thereby attains that humble attitude of mind toward the grandeur of reason incarnate in existence, and which, in its profoundest depths, is inaccessible to man. This attitude, however, appears to me to be religious, in the highest sense of the word. And so it seems to me that science not only purifies the religious impulse of the dross of its anthropomorphism but also contributes to a religious spiritualization of our understanding of life.

The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge. In this sense I believe that the priest must become a teacher if he wishes to do justice to his lofty educational mission.