[gjm11]

Einstein did not convert to any kind of deism as a result of seeing the great Intelligence inside Nature and concluding that there must be a Supreme Intelligence. More specifically, (1) he did not believe in a Supreme Intelligence (he explicitly disclaimed belief in a personal God, and likened his view to that of Spinoza who more or less used "God" as a synonym for "Nature"), and (2) there was no "conversion".

Antony Flew is not one of "the best scientists" for the simple reason that he was never a scientist at all. He is a philosopher. Also, there is much reason (entirely independent of his conversion to deism) to believe that his mental faculties are in pretty bad shape. Which is fair enough for someone in his eighties, of course, but the argument "this must make sense if an eminent philosopher is convinced by it" -- which is a pretty hopeless argument in any case, considering some of the things eminent philosophers have been convinced by -- really doesn't work at all when the eminent philosopher no longer has the sharp mind that made him an eminent philosopher in the first place.

[lst]

Einstein explicitly stated to believe in God (but not in the christian or hebrew one), and he explicitly derived this from the supreme intelligence which he found in natural laws.

And philosophy is science, but it's no natural science. And Flews book "There is a God" seems written in a really intelligent way, no signs of "brain damage".

Many many good scientists convert from atheism to some kind of deism. Yes, they convert, because it's a radical change of the very base of our thinking.

[gravitycop]

Einstein explicitly stated to believe in God

Source? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein#Religious_views

In 1929, Einstein told Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein "I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God Who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind." In a 1950 letter to M. Berkowitz, Einstein stated that "My position concerning God is that of an agnostic. I am convinced that a vivid consciousness of the primary importance of moral principles for the betterment and ennoblement of life does not need the idea of a law-giver, especially a law-giver who works on the basis of reward and punishment." Einstein also stated: "I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God is a childlike one. You may call me an agnostic, but I do not share the crusading spirit of the professional atheist whose fervor is mostly due to a painful act of liberation from the fetters of religious indoctrination received in youth." [...] Einstein clarified his religious views in a letter he wrote in response to those who claimed that he worshipped a Judeo-Christian god: "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.

[lst]

You cite from 1929? There are many many citations, and often contradictory ones.

He certainly changed his opinion during his lifetime.

My source is a book (here in Europe, from 2008, not english). If you google a bit, you can find any kind of contradictory stuff, so internet and truth are not always friends (and we all know this).

[gravitycop]

>> Source?

> My source is a book

What is the name? Who is the author?

[lst]

Do you know Italian? If yes, it's a book I'd recommend to everybody:

Author: Antonio Socci (a really good and meticulous italian journalist)

Name: "Indagine su Gesù"

It's a plain scientific research about the life of Jesus (with many many citations from every direction, including many atheists).

The book sells very well these days...

[gravitycop]

Author: Antonio Socci

Name: "Indagine su Gesù"

Thank you.

Do you know Italian?

No. I know Google Translate. http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fpaparat...

Socci continues in this introductory chapter showing the positions of the greatest contemporary scientists, from Einstein to Hawking, by scholars of the Big Bang to those of DNA: all agree that the most reasonable answer to the mystery and the great dell'infinitamente 'infinitely small, as well as in front of the surprise at the amazing complexity of even the most minute living organism, is to admit a Creator. In short, something we call God But if science and reason - more and more, contrary to what one wants to believe - leads to the recognition of the existence of a God, the more dense is the enigma if we try to go down ' existence the essence.

Could you please provide the evidence (quotes, etc.) that Socci cites?

[gravitycop]

Here is, apparently, Antonio Socci's blog: http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.goo...

[Original Italian text sentences alternating with translated English sentences:]

Nel microscopico la grandezza della carica dell’elettrone ei rapporti col protone: “i valori di questi numeri” scrive Hawking “sembrano essere stati esattamente coordinati per rendere possibile lo sviluppo della vita”. In the microscopic size of the charge of electronics and proton relations with "the values of these numbers," Hawking writes, "seem to have been exactly coordinated to enable the development of life." E poi la velocità di espansione dell’universo: se un secondo dopo il Big Bang fosse stata un pochino superiore o appena inferiore sarebbe accaduta la catastrofe. And then the speed of expansion of the universe: if a second after the Big Bang had been slightly higher or lower would be just the disaster happened. Diceva Albert Einstein che nelle leggi della natura “si rivela una ragione così superiore che tutta la razionalità del pensiero e degli ordinamenti umani è al confronto un riflesso assolutamente insignificante”. Albert Einstein said that in the laws of nature "is one reason so superior that all rational thought and human systems is a reflection of a comparison is absolutely insignificant."

The rest of the blogpost is standard "the world is too perfect to be of natural origin" ID stuff. Are the quotes above what were in the book (Indagine su Gesù) regarding Einstein's and Hawking's alleged beliefs in God?

Apparently, the original Einstein quote in English was: http://www.google.com/search?q=einstein+%22utterly+insignifi...

But the scientist is possessed by the sense of universal causation. The future, to him, is every whit as necessary and determined as the past. There is nothing divine about morality, it is a purely human affair. His religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection.

This page http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/einstein_religion.html says the quote is from:

Albert Einstein, The World as I See It, Secaucus, New Jersey: The Citadel Press, 1999, pp. 24-29.

That page includes the book's preceding 11 paragraphs, in which Einstein states that belief in God is naive and childish.

[lst]

...and sorry for this annotation:

The US certainly suffers 'superficiality' more than any other country. If you want to find really scientific stuff about religion, you often need to go back to good old Europe...

[gjm11]

Flew's book "There is a God" may or may not be written really intelligently, but it doesn't appear to have been written by Flew. His comment on this: "My name is on the book and it represents exactly my opinions. I would not have a book issued in my name that I do not 100 per cent agree with. I needed someone to do the actual writing because I’m 84 and that was Roy Varghese’s role. The idea that someone manipulated me because I’m old is exactly wrong. I may be old but it is hard to manipulate me. That is my book and it represents my thinking." I don't see any credible way to interpret that other than as admitting that he didn't actually write the book.

You may define "science" in such a way as to make every philosopher a "scientist" if you wish. For that matter, you may define it so as to make every banana a "scientist". However, if you want to communicate with other people then I recommend that you use words in something like the same sense as others do. Antony Flew is not a scientist.

[lst]

I seem to recognize the pattern:

Everybody seems to encourage (even in a contradictory way) the proper opinion, and refutes quite absolutely the proper change of it...

Poor humanity, if everybody thinks like this...