How is another life to be imagined? About that there are of course only conjectures. But it is interesting that modern science is the very thing that provides support for them. For it shows that this world of ours, with all the stars and planets that are in it, had a beginning and, in all probability, will have an end. But why then should there be only this one world? And since we one day found ourselves in this world, without knowing how [we got here] and whither [we are going], the same thing can be repeated in the same way in another [world] too. In any case, science confirms the end of the world prophesied in the last book of the Bible and allows room for what follows next: “And God created a new heaven and a new earth.” Kurt Gödel: Collected Works: Volume IV: Selected Correspondence, A-G (Oxford 2006), 431.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Kurt Gödel on eschatology
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Any hints or inkling that Godel was a Christian?
ReplyDeleteBTW, this excerpt doesn't mean that he affirmed a multiverse hypothesis, does it?
I don't know if he took it that far. He was shy and guarded about his theological beliefs, which were disreputable by the standards of his Princeton colleagues.
ReplyDeleteIn addition, his perfectionism limited his theological output. He wanted to be able to argue for theology with the same rigor as his mathematical proofs.
Likewise, he only published when he had something original and fundamental to contribute.
I don't think the multiverse was on the horizon back them. His statement is probably more influenced by Leibniz's possible worlds framework.
"Likewise, he only published when he had something original and fundamental to contribute."
ReplyDeleteIf only more scientists (and the culture of academia in general) today took this view about publications...
If publication wasn't a requirement of every idiot who wants to continue working in Academia, maybe such a view would be possible.
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