Foreword

by Prof Antony Hewish FRS (Nobel Laureate, Physics, 1974)

Cambridge academic eyebrows were raised in 1979 when the distinguished quantum physicist Professor John Polkinghorne resigned from his chair in order to start training as an Anglican priest. Since then he has become well known for a series of books on science and religion. Although not personally on line, his ideas have generated worldwide interest and discussion on the Internet through a Web site set up and managed by Nicholas Beale, his one-time mathematical student at Trinity College and long-standing friend and colleague. Nicholas Beale has an outstanding reputation as a management consultant with particular expertise in information technology and was elected Freeman of the City of London in 1996. He is well known for his staunch support of Christianity.

Between them, John and Nicholas have responded to the many questions and issues raised on the Web site, and their different backgrounds and perspectives combine to generate a powerful dialogue covering most aspects of contemporary faith that are of serious concern to those who seek answers to the eternal questions of what it means to be human and the purpose of our existence.

Our culture these days seems to have little room for the sacred. It is widely thought that religion is out of date and irrelevant and has no place in our scientific age; that faith is superstitious nonsense that should have been left behind in kindergarten. John Polkinghorne, on the other hand, argues that science and religion are not in conflict—they are, in fact, complementary, and both are vital for the deepest understanding of our place in the universe. I share this view, along with many other scientists, and believe that physics, perhaps the most materialistic of the pure sciences, actually conditions our thinking in such a way as to help us to be more, rather than less, receptive towards religious mysteries. If rational common sense can be a bad guide to scientific truth, how much more so might it be towards religion? For example, the simplest piece of matter, a hydrogen atom, cannot be accurately described without including the effects caused by the cloud of virtual particles with which it is surrounded. There is no such thing as truly empty space. Quantum theory predicts that even a perfect vacuum is filled with a multitude of particles that flash into and out of existence much too rapidly to be caught by any detector. Yet their existence modifies the motion of electrons orbiting protons in a calculable way that has been verified by direct observation. The ghostly presence of virtual particles defies rational common sense and is non-intuitive for those unacquainted with physics. When the most elementary physical things behave this way, we should be prepared to accept religious mysteries such as the existence of God and that God became Man around two thousand years ago.

Tony Hewish

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