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Prespacetime Journal Vol 2, No 12 (2011): Higgs at 125 GeV? OPERA Anomaly, Nonlinear Theory & GR Solutions

Table of Contents (http://prespacetime.com/index.php/pst/issue/view/22)

Special Reports -------- OPERA Fail to Find Error in Faster Than Light Measurement Philip E. Gibbs

BSM CPV in LHCb at HCP11 and New Higgs Combinations Released Philip E. Gibbs

Seminar Watch (Higgs Special), Rumoured Higgs at 125 GeV and What Would a Higgs at 125 GeV Tell Us? Philip E. Gibbs

Articles
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Expected LHC Higgs Significance at 5/fb+5/fb and Where Does Higgs Fit Best? Philip E. Gibbs

Higgsless Symmetry Breaking from Renormalization Group Theory Ervin Goldfain

Nonlinear Theory of Elementary Particles Part XV: On Calculation of Elementary Particles’ Masses Alexander G. Kyriakos

Nonlinear Theory of Elementary Particles Part XVI:The Non-linear Theory as String Theory of Compton Wavelength Scale Alexander G. Kyriakos

GR Articles -------- Extra Dimensional FRW Cosmology with Variable G and ? Shivdas D. Katore

Generalized Line Element for Z=t/z-Type Plane Gravitational Waves SANJAY R BHOYAR, A. M. Metkar, Vilas R. Chirde, A. G. Deshmukh

Kaluza-Klein Universe with Wet Dark Fluid in General Relativity Manish M. Sambhe, S. D. Tade

Five Dimensional Plane Wave-like Solutions of Field Equations of Buchdahl in Generalized Peres Space-time Jyotsna K. Jumale, D. P. Teltumbade, R. K. Jumale, K. D. Thengane

Essays
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An Alternative to the Quantum Leap Paradigm Paul A. Kannapell

News
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LHC Luminosity Predictions for 2012 Philip E. Gibbs

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December 8, 2011

SIGRID UNDSET – NOBEL LAUREATE IN LITERATURE

Nobel Prize: Sigrid Undset (1882–1949) was granted the 1928 Nobel Prize in Literature “principally for her powerful descriptions of Scandinavian life during the Middle Ages.” Undset donated the prize money to charity.

Nationality: Danish; later Norwegian citizen

Education: Schooling at Kalundborg (Denmark) and Christiania (now Oslo)

Occupation: Novelist and essayist

1. In her famous article “Catholic Propaganda” (February 28, 1927), Sigrid Undset wrote:

“There is no room in the Catholic Church for different concepts about the being of God or about the divine-human nature of Jesus Christ or about the motherhood of the Virgin Mary; because Christ himself is the way to God’s kingdom and because his death on the Cross is the secret which opens God’s kingdom to the descendants of Adam, his blood truly cleanses the sinner from all his sin, his body is truly the food which is the life of believers.” (Undset 1993, in Sigrid Undset: On Saints and Sinners. Proceedings of the Wethersfield Institute. Deal W. Hudson – Editor. Volume 6, pp. 232-272. Ignatius Press).

2. In the same article Sigrid Undset wrote about Jesus Christ:

“ ‘He came to his own, and his own did not receive him. But as many as received him, to them he gave power to be the children of God.’ This is the Catholic faith, that an act of the will on the part of man is unconditionally necessary before he can be saved.

By his will, man turned from God; with his will he turns back to him. God pours out his saving grace for us because of love alone and not because in the least measure we have deserved or earned it; the Catholic Church teaches nothing else.” (Undset 1993).

3. In her article “Finding Faith” Undset said: “When people stubbornly hold on to the hope that it is impossible to find any absolute truth, it is because they fancy that life would lose its excitement, would have no freedom, if there really existed one truth – one alone in which all other truths are contained. In this world we can only attain one kind of freedom, that which our Lord spoke of when he said: ‘The truth shall make you free.’ ” (Undset 1999, Vol. 13).

4. “Fear and hope drive the soul forward; they teach it to watch and pray and thus gain a growing knowledge of God – and as a consequence more and more to lose its egoistic concern for itself and to become unselfish, with adoring love for God: this is the fruit which the soul may bring forth at last.” (Undset 1993).

5. “Floating in the infinite personality of God, the human personality rests, an infinitesimal speck in infinity just as the earth is a speck in the part of the universe which our knowledge can comprehend. The earth, men, atoms, become almost equally small when measured against infinity – and each person is as complex as a planet or an atom.” (Undset 1993).

6. “Christianity explains – in unity with other religions – that the invisible infinity is God. He has created all things visible and invisible out of himself and all rests in him. By a special act he has created man in his image – in Catholic theology that means, as white light is broken up by a prism, God’s uncompounded being is broken into human properties.” (Undset 1993).

7. “For Catholics, grace is a medicine which sinners may ever inhale and bathe in, that they might grow up rightly – become saints, be perfect as their heavenly Father is perfect. Only when we are as good as God are we good enough.” (Undset 1993).

“However, there are probably only a few converts who are prepared to explain their own conversion, why their resistance to one who calls himself the Way, the Truth, and the Life, a resistance dictated by fear and mistrust, has been overcome. It does not happen without the cooperation of the mystical and supernatural power that theologians call grace.” (Undset 1999, Vol. 13).

8. “As is well known, no one can be received into the Church without basic instructions – it is not enough to have ‘everyone who wants to be saved, raise your hands’, as I have had the experience of hearing at a revival meeting. The Church does not receive capitulations who only join, after having been momentarily stirred either by intoxicating feelings or emotional worship services; she demands that the convert should know what she teaches and understand what she says. The convert has months, years if he will, to think things over before he takes the step.” (Undset 1993).

“We believe in complete seriousness that the peace of Christ cannot be advanced in the world unless we confess with Peter, literally and without interpretations: ‘Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God!’, and therefore, accept all His words as the word of God.” (Undset 1993).

9. “There is a kind of modern, confused deism, more or less Christian sounding, colored by a kind of Jesus worship that is not worship of God but of a hero. It is prepared all too willingly to enter into company with whatever kind of altruistically colored materialism, without understanding that the Christian and materialistic ideals are incommensurate, even when outwardly they look exactly alike.” (Undset 1993).

10. “By degrees my knowledge of history convinced me that the only thoroughly sane people, of our civilization at least, seemed to be those queer men and women the Catholic Church calls Saints. They seemed to know the true explanation of man’s undying hunger for happiness – his tragically insufficient love of peace, justice, and goodwill to his fellow men, his everlasting fall from grace. Now it occurred to me that there might possibly be some truth in the original Christianity.

But if you desire to know the truth about anything, you always run the risk of finding it. And in a way we do not want to find the Truth – we prefer to seek and keep our illusions.

But I had ventured too near the abode of truth in my researches about ‘God’s friends,’ as the Saints are called in the Old Norse texts of Catholic times. So I had to submit. And on the first of November, 1924, I was received into the Catholic Church.” (Undset, as cited in Grenier 1999).

SIR MICHAEL FARADAY (1791-1867), founder of Electronics and Electro-magnetics

1. “I bow before Him who is Lord of all, and hope to be kept waiting patiently for His time and mode of releasing me according to His Divine Word and the great and precious promises whereby His people are made partakers of the Divine nature.” (Faraday, as cited in Jones 1870, Vol. II, 471).

2. “The book of nature which we have to read is written by the finger of God.” (Faraday, as cited in Seeger 1983, 101).

3. In one of his sermons (London, 7 July 1861), Faraday stated: “And therefore, brethren, we ought to value the privilege of knowing God’s truth far beyond anything we can have in this world. The more we see the perfection of God’s law fulfilled in Christ, the more we ought to thank God for His unspeakable gift.” (Faraday, as cited in Eichman 1993, 93-94).

4. Concerning the nature of the contemporary Church in one of his sermons (7 June 1863), Faraday said: “Think for a moment, brethren, of the Church of Christ, what it means and what it ought to be. Where the Word of God has sounded, there His people are drawn together; in small companies (and we may consider there are many such scattered over the world of whom we know nothing), gathered out of the world, to the obedience of all things that Christ has commanded.” (Faraday, as cited in Eichman 1993, 94-95).

5. “And though the thought of death brings the thought of judgement, which is far above all the trouble that arises from the breaking of mere earthly ties, it also brings to the Christian the thought of Him who died, was judged and who rose again for the justification of those who believe in Him.” (Faraday, as cited in Jones 1870, Vol. II, 424).

ALBERT SCHWEITZER – NOBEL PEACE PRIZE LAUREATE

Nobel Prize: Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965) won the 1952 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in behalf of “the Brotherhood of Nations.” He was mission doctor in Africa for 52 years. Schweitzer used the prize money to modernize his hospital in Africa and to build a leper colony. Over the years he expanded the hospital to seventy buildings that served thousands of Africans. Schweitzer is an author of scholarly books on Philosophy and Theology.

Nationality: German; later French resident

Education: University of Strasbourg, France: Doctorate in Philosophy (1899); Doctorate in Theology (1901); Doctorate in Musicology (1905); Doctorate in Medicine with a specialization in Tropical Medicine and Surgery (1913)

Occupation: Physician, philosopher, theologian, musicologist and organist; Principal of Theological College, University of Strasbourg (1901-12); missionary surgeon and founder of Schweitzer Hospital, Gabon, West Africa (1913-1965)

1. In his sermon given at Lambarene in 1947 on the Sunday following the Feast of Saint John, Dr. Schweitzer said:

“If there should come a man who was king of all the world – Europe, America, Asia, Africa – he would not be the greatest of men. The true grandeur of a man is to understand the heart of God. John had spoken the words of God when he said that now is the time when the kingdom of God should come. He was greater than any of the prophets because his heart was filled with the spirit of God.

O God, we can never thank you enough for the great preacher of the kingdom of God whom you have sent, the man who gave us an example, the man who had strength to put into our hearts, the man who was the servant of God. May he make us servants of God. We thank you for all the riches that you have put within us. Give us to understand these riches. May we desire to have your strength within us. Give us then the will to be thy children. Amen!” (Schweitzer, as cited in The Africa of Albert Schweitzer, by Charles Joy and Melvin Arnold, chapter “The Feast of Saint John”, Boston, The Beacon Press, 1948).

2. In his book Reverence for Life Dr. Schweitzer wrote: “Those who thank God much are the truly wealthy. So our inner happiness depends not on what we experience but on the degree of our gratitude to God, whatever the experience. Your life is something opaque, not transparent, as long as you look at it in an ordinary human way. But if you hold it up against the light of God’s goodness, it shines and turns transparent, radiant and bright. And then you ask yourself in amazement: Is this really my own life I see before me?” (Albert Schweitzer, Reverence for Life, Ulrich Neuenschwander - editor, Harper & Row, 1969, 39-40).

3. In his autobiography Out of My Life and Thought Dr. Schweitzer wrote: “The essential element in Christianity as it was preached by Jesus and as it is comprehended by thought, is this, that it is only through love that we can attain to communion with God. All living knowledge of God rests upon this foundation: that we experience Him in our lives as Will-to-Love.” (Schweitzer 1933, 277).

4. “God’s love speaks to us in our hearts and tries to work through us in the world. We must listen to that voice; we must listen to it as a pure and distant melody that comes to us across the noise of the world’s doings...” (Schweitzer, as cited in Albert Schweitzer: The Man and His Mind by George Seaver, Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1947, 133).

5. “What Christianity needs is that it shall be filled to overflowing with the spirit of Jesus, and in the strength of that shall spiritualize itself into a living religion of inwardness and love, such as its destined purpose should make it.

Because I am devoted to Christianity in deep affection, I am trying to serve it with loyalty and sincerity.” (Schweitzer 1933, 278-279).

6. In his letter to the music critic Gustav von Lupke, Dr. Schweitzer explained his decision to found a hospital in Africa:

“For me the whole of religion is at stake. For me religion means to be human, plainly human in the sense in which Jesus was.

In the colonies things are pretty hopeless and comfortless. We – the Christian nations – send out there the mere dregs of our people; we think only of what we can get out of the natives, in short what is happening there is a mockery of humanity and Christianity.

If this wrong is in some measure to be atoned for, we must send out there men who will do good in the name of Jesus, not simply proselytising missionaries, but men who will help the distressed as they must be helped if the Sermon on the Mount and the words of Jesus are valid and right.

Now we sit here and study Theology, and then compete for the best ecclesiastical posts, write thick learned books in order to become Professors of Theology, and what is going on out there where the honour and the name of Jesus are at stake, does not concern us at all. And I am supposed to devote my life to making ever fresh critical discoveries, that I might become famous as a theologian, and go on training pastors who will also sit at home, and will not have the right to send them out to this vital work. I cannot do so.

For years I have turned these matters over in my mind, this way and that. At last it became clear to me that the meaning of my life does not consist in knowledge or art but simply in being human and doing some little thing in the spirit of Jesus – ‘what you have done to the least of these my brethren you have done to me.’ Just as the wind is driven to spend its force in the big empty spaces so must the men who know the laws of the spirit go where men are most needed.” (Schweitzer, as cited in Albert Schweitzer: The Story of His Life by Jean Pierhal, Philosophical Library Inc., NY, 1957, 59).

7. In Out of My Life and Thought Schweitzer wrote: “The true understanding of Jesus is the understanding of will acting on will. The true relation to Him is to be taken possession of by Him. Christian piety of any and every sort is valuable only so far as it means the surrender of our will to His.” (Schweitzer 1933, 71).

8. Albert Schweitzer wrote in his book A Place For Revelation: “And reason discovers the connecting link between love for God and love for man: love for all creatures, reverence for all being, a compassionate sharing of experiences with all of life, no matter how externally dissimilar to our own.” (Schweitzer 1988, 11).

9. “The importance of Jesus Christ to mankind does not lie in the rituals people have made out of his teaching, but in the example of his life. His love and compassion and his willingness to die for the conviction that his death would redeem all men from suffering and sin, these are the deeds that have been remembered throughout time.” (Schweitzer, as cited in Jilek-Aall 1990).

10. In Reverence for Life Schweitzer stated:

“To hope, to keep silent, and to work alone – that is what we must learn to do if we really want to labor in the true spirit.

But what exactly does it involve, this plowing? The plowman does not pull the plow. He does not push it. He only directs it. That is just how events move in our lives. We can do nothing but guide them straight in the direction which leads to our Lord Jesus Christ, striving toward him in all we do and experience. Strive toward him, and the furrow will plow itself.” (Schweitzer 1969, 47).

11. In his book Christianity and the Religions of the World Albert Schweitzer wrote: “For ten years, before I left for Africa, I prepared boys in the parish of St. Nicholas, in Strassburg, for confirmation. After the First World War some of them came to me and thanked me for having taught them so definitely that religion was not a formula for explaining everything. They said it had been that teaching that kept them from discarding Christianity, whereas so many others in the trenches discarded it, not being prepared to meet the inexplicable. When you preach, you must lead men out of the desire to know everything to the knowledge of the one thing that is needful, to the desire to be in God, and thus no more to conform to the world but to rise above all mysteries as those who are redeemed from the world.” (Schweitzer, as cited in Ratter 1950, 24).

In Out of My Life and Thought Dr. Schweitzer said: “To me preaching was a necessity of my being. I felt it as something wonderful that I was allowed to address a congregation every Sunday about the deepest questions of life.” (Schweitzer 1933, 36).

12. Albert Schweitzer wrote in his book On the Edge of the Primeval Forest and More from the Primeval Forest: “For the first time since I came to Africa my patients are housed as human beings should be. How I have suffered during these years from having to pen them together in stifling, dark rooms! Full of gratitude I look up to God who has allowed me to experience such a joy.” (Schweitzer 1948).

13. In a letter to his future wife Helene Bresslau, written in 1905, Albert Schweitzer stated:

“We found each other, and nothing on this earth could be more beautiful than that. To do, each in his sphere, or together if destiny wills it, to comprehend life and, together, walk the high peaks, to be indebted to each other and to give to each other. We are rich through each other!

Us, and our relationship I only understand correctly when I think of Him, our Lord. It is He who brought us together, not in any wrong or mystical way, but as two laborers whom He met in the morning on the street and whom He sent into His vineyards. We are on that road.” (Schweitzer, as cited in Albert Schweitzer: A Biography by James Brabazon, Syracuse University Press, NY, 2000).

RONALD ROSS – NOBEL LAUREATE IN MEDICINE AND PHYSIOLOGY

Nobel Prize: Sir Ronald Ross (1857-1932) received the 1902 Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for his remarkable work on malaria.

Nationality: British

Education: From 1874 to 1881 he studied medicine at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital (London) and the Army Medical School.

Occupation: Professor of Tropical Medicine at Liverpool University (1902-1912); Vice-President of the Royal Society (1911-1913)

1. On August 20, 1897, Sir Ronald Ross made his landmark discovery that malaria is transmitted to people by Anopheles mosquitoes. On that day of discovery he wrote the following poetic words in his Journal:

“This day relenting God

Hath placed within my hand

A wondrous thing; and God

Be praised. At His command,

Seeking His secret deeds

With tears and toiling breath,

I find thy cunning seeds,

O million-murdering Death.

I know this little thing

A myriad men will save.

O Death, where is thy sting?

Thy victory, O Grave?”

(Ronald Ross, Memoirs, London, John Murray, 1923, 226).

Lord, who made high my fate;

For in the mighty small

Thou showed’st the mighty great.

Henceforth I will resound

But praises unto Thee;

Tho’ I was beat and bound,

Thou gavest me victory.”

(Ronald Ross, as cited in the Dictionary of Scientific Biography, 1975, vol. XI, p. 557, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons).

FRANCOIS MAURIAC – NOBEL LAUREATE IN LITERATURE

Nobel Prize: Francois Mauriac (1885–1970) was awarded the 1952 Nobel Prize in Literature “for the deep spiritual insight and the artistic intensity with which he has in his novels penetrated the drama of human life.”

Nationality: French

Education: Licence es Lettres (M.A. in Literature), University of Bordeaux, France, 1905

Occupation: Novelist, playwright, poet, and journalist

1. Francois Mauriac wrote in his book Anguish and Joy of the Christian Life (1931):

“Today, in the evening of my life, I know the final answer. It is Jesus Christ alone who quiets the radical anguish that is in us – an anguish which is so consubstantial with the human condition that it is cruelly manifest from childhood to the grave. The torment of loneliness, the vacillating shadows of those we love as they leave us in the horrible mysteries of death, the secret and permanent thirst we have for the limitless gratification of our ego.

Our hearts remain full of unseen idols until we are stretched on the wood of the Cross with Christ, until we cease trying to nourish ourselves and our desires, and give ourselves completely to the poor, to the needy, to the suffering members of Christ’s body throughout the world.” (Mauriac 1964, Notre Dame).

2. “God does not give Himself totally except to the person who has annihilated all things, everything, whatever is in himself and in the world that stands in the way of divine love.” (Mauriac 1964, 43, Notre Dame).

3. “The God of the Christians does not wish simply to be loved. He wishes to be the sole object of our love. He will not allow us to turn aside a single sigh from Him; all other love is to Him nothing but a form of idolatry unless it is expressed in His name. It is this demand that seems utterly unreasonable. For it is impossible to love a creature without deifying it; yet we are also obliged to love everyone and everything. The creature thus becomes a necessity usurping the place of God: the heaven of His presence, the hell of His absence.” (Mauriac 1964, 26; Section 1 ‘Anguish’, Dimension Books).

4. “Impurity separates us from God. The spiritual life obeys laws as verifiable as those of the physical world. Purity is the condition for a higher love – for a possession superior to all possessions: that of God. Yes, this is what is at stake, and nothing less.” (Mauriac 1963, 51-52).

5. In his book Life of Jesus (1936), Mauriac claimed: “If there is one part of the Christian message that people have rejected with incomparable obstinacy, it is faith in the equal worth of all souls and races before the Father who is in Heaven.” (Mauriac 1978).

6. “The majority of Christians never get beyond the letter of the catechism. They have had no knowledge of God. It is a word which, for them, has never had any real content. They deny, yet do not deny. Christ has never been in their lives.” (Mauriac 1970).

7. “We are therefore wrong to think of the mystics as exceptional Christians. On the contrary, they are the only real Christians. They wear themselves out in the pursuit of God, as sensualists do in the pursuit of the flesh. They unceasingly desire to possess Him; to be possessed by Him, to love Him. Here love is understood to mean embracing God with the whole heart, of giving oneself to Him completely and searching to be possessed wholly by Him in return.” (Mauriac 1964, 26-27, Dimension Books).

8. In Holy Thursday: An Intimate Remembrance (1931) Mauriac described the ethical aspects of the Christian faith: “One must first hate one’s sin, a prerequisite which, in certain cases, is very difficult to achieve. Next, we must resolve never to sin again – and this is not only a matter of words but an inner determination of which God is the only judge. Last, the fear of punishment does not suffice if it is not inspired by love of God. No one can be forgiven without a beginning of love.” (Mauriac 1999, Ch. 5).

GEORGE BERKELEY (1685-1753), Irish philosopher and mathematician, founder of modern idealism, famous as “the precursor of Mach and Einstein”

Dr. Berkeley’s philosophy of science anticipated Ernst Mach’s physics and Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. Two centuries before Einstein, Berkeley rejected the theory of absolute space, time, and motion, in his treatise De Motu (On Motion, 1721). Berkeley’s major mathematical work The Analyst (1734) comprises numerous objections to the doctrine of fluxions and the concept of infinitesimals. (See Sir Karl Popper, “A Note on Berkeley as Precursor of Mach and Einstein,” in Conjectures and Refutations, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1992; see also K. Popper, “Berkeley’s Anticipation of Mach and Einstein,” in Locke and Berkeley, ed. C. B. Martin & D. M. Armstrong, London: Macmillan, 1968).

1. “Raise now your thoughts from this ball of earth to all those glorious luminaries that adorn the high arch of heaven. The motion and situation of the planets, are they not admirable for use and order? Were those (miscalled erratic) globes once known to stray, in their repeated journeys through the pathless void? Do they not measure areas round the sun ever proportioned to the times? So fixed, so immutable are the laws by which the unseen Author of nature actuates the universe.” (Berkeley 1910, 2nd Dial.)

2. “When I say the being of a God, I do not mean an obscure general Cause of things, whereof we have no conception, but God, in the strict and proper sense of the word. A Being whose spirituality, omnipresence, providence, omniscience, infinite power and goodness, are as conspicuous as the existence of sensible things, of which (notwithstanding the fallacious pretences and affected scruples of Sceptics) there is no more reason to doubt than of our own being.” (Berkeley 1910, 3rd Dial.)

The Holographic Strange Attractor Model by Claudio Messori: A biophysical model to interpret biological, neurological and psychic phenomena is presented, in a quantum-relativistic key. A central role is attributed to the concept of Spin in explaining space-time geometry as well as the genesis of energetic and sub-energetic phenomena. Energy is considered in relation to both its vectorial and scalar components. The dynamic of cells, neurons and qualia is ascribed to the field of nonlinear transient systems of a chaotic kind, and explained in the light of the syntropic action of a quasi-virtual object known as a HoSA (Holographic Strange Attractor). In conclusion, an epigenetic and relativistic location is assigned to the mental fact, thought, and consciousness.

Quantum Evo-Devo Universe II: Materialists’ Metaphoric Phantoms of Matter in Mind by Graham P. Smetham:In this exploration of Ramachandran’s account of metaphor and language, taking account of the actual evidence provided by evolutionary development biology and quantum physics, we find that his naïve materialist perspective of how brain functioning creates the world of meaning is nothing more than a phantom in his brain. Yet again it will be shown that the primary process of evolution is not that which takes place over time on the material plane but, rather, it is that process of development which cascades from a deep quantum level of intentionality through a sequence of immaterial and subtle “implicate orders” of “unfoldment”, to use the terminology of David Bohm.

Gene, Brain and Behavior by D. M. R. Sekhar: This author is of the opinion that genomes not only can sense both external and internal environments but also can respond intelligently to the changes in the environment and further can construct/control their cell/genome structure due to their intelligent computing abilities. Further genome in all probability is the springhead of brain.

Huping Hu & Maoxin Wu

December 1, 2011

SIR ROBERT BOYLE (1627-1691), founder of Modern Chemistry

Boyle’s most significant religious works are Some Considerations Touching the Style of the Holy Scriptures (1661), The Excellency of Theology, Compared with Natural Philosophy (1674), and The Christian Virtuoso (1690). In his will Robert Boyle left funds for eight annual lectures (the famous Boyle Lectures, which still continue) “for proving the Christian Religion against notorious Infidels.”

1. “When with bold telescopes I survey the old and newly discovered stars and planets, when with excellent microscopes I discern the unimitable subtility of nature’s curious workmanship; and when, in a word, by the help of anatomical knives, and the light of chemical furnaces, I study the book of nature, I find myself oftentimes reduced to exclaim with the Psalmist, ‘How manifold are Thy works, O Lord! In wisdom hast Thou made them all!’ ” (Boyle, as cited in Woodall 1997, 32).

2. In The Excellency of Theology (1674), Boyle stated: “The vastness, beauty, orderliness of heavenly bodies, the excellent structure of animals and plants, and other phenomena of nature justly induce an intelligent, unprejudiced observer to conclude a supreme, powerful, just, and good Author.” (Boyle, as cited in Seeger 1985, 183-184).

3. Boyle never saw any conflict between the Christian religion and Philosophy. (By the term “Philosophy” seventeenth-century writers mean what we understand by the concept “Science” today; see Woodall 1997). Boyle wrote: “If we lay aside all the irrational opinions, that are unreasonably fathered on the Christian religion, and all erroneous conceits repugnant to Christianity, which have been groundlessly fathered upon Philosophy, the seeming contradictions betwixt Divinity and true Philosophy, will be but few, and the real ones none at all.” (Boyle, as cited in Woodall 1997, 32).

LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN (1889-1951), one of the founders of analytic philosophy

According to Encyclopedia Britannica (1997), “Wittgenstein is the greatest philosopher of the 20th century.”

1. “To believe in God means to understand the question about the meaning of life. To believe in God means to see that the facts of the world are not the end of the matter. To believe in God means to see that life has a meaning.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Arthur Allen Cohen and Paul Mendes-Flohr, Contemporary Jewish Religious Thought, New York, Free Press, 1988, 567).

2. At one time, Wittgenstein had begun each day by repeating the Lord’s prayer. Concerning this prayer, once he told his friend Maurice Drury:

“It is the most extraordinary prayer ever written. No one ever composed a prayer like it. But remember the Christian religion does not consist in saying a lot of prayers, in fact we are commanded just the opposite. If you and I are to live religious lives it must not just be that we talk a lot about religion, but that in some way our lives are different.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Ludwig Wittgenstein: Personal Recollections, editor – Rush Rhees, Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1981, 109).

3. The diaries that Wittgenstein kept during the First World War (in which he was a volunteer) reveal that he often prayed, not that he should be spared from death, but that he should meet it without cowardice and without losing control of himself:

“How will I behave when it comes to shooting? I am not afraid of being shot but of not doing my duty properly. God give me strength! Amen! If it is all over with me now, may I die a good death, mindful of myself. May I never lose myself! Now I might have the opportunity to be a decent human being, because I am face to face with death. May the spirit enlighten me.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 8-9).

4. To Drury he said: “It is my belief that only if you try to be helpful to other people will you in the end find your way to God.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 20).

5. In 1929 Wittgenstein wrote: “If something is good it is also divine. In a strange way this sums up my ethics. Only the supernatural can express the Supernatural.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 16).

6. Here is a comparison of the Gospels with Paul’s letters: “The spring which flows quietly and transparently through the Gospels seems to have foam on it in Paul’s Epistles. Or, that is how it seems to me. Perhaps it is just my own impurity which sees cloudiness in it; for why shouldn’t this impurity be able to pollute what is clear? But to me it’s as if I saw human passion here, something like pride or anger, which does not agree with the humility of the Gospels. As if there were here an emphasis on his own person, and even as a religious act, which is foreign to the Gospel. In the Gospels – so it seems to me – everything is less pretentious, humbler, simpler. There are huts; with Paul a church. There all men are equal and God himself is a man; with Paul there is already something like a hierarchy; honours and offices. That is, as it were, what my nose tells me.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 16).

7. “WITTGENSTEIN: Drury, what is your favourite Gospel? DRURY: I don’t think I have ever asked myself that question. WITTGENSTEIN: Mine is St. Matthew’s. Matthew seems to me to contain everything. Now, I can’t understand the Fourth Gospel. When I read those long discourses, it seems to me as if a different person is speaking than in the synoptic Gospels. The only incident that reminds me of the others is the story of the woman taken in adultery. ... At one time I thought that the epistles of St. Paul were a different religion to that of the Gospels. But now I see clearly that I was wrong. It is one and the same religion in both the Gospels and the Epistles.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Ludwig Wittgenstein: Personal Recollections, editor – Rush Rhees, Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1981, 177-178).

8. “The Christian religion is only for one who needs infinite help, therefore only for one who feels an infinite need. The whole planet cannot be in greater anguish than a single soul. The Christian faith – as I view it – is the refuge in this ultimate anguish. To whom it is given in this anguish to open his heart, instead of contracting it, accepts the means of salvation in his heart.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 17).

9. “Christianity is indeed the only sure way to happiness.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Monk 1991, 122).

10. “Christianity is not a doctrine; I mean, not a theory about what has happened and will happen with the human soul, but a description of an actual occurrence in human life. For ‘consciousness of sin’ is an actual occurrence, and so are despair and salvation through faith.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 16).

11. “Religious faith and superstition are entirely different. One of them springs from fear and is a kind of false science. The other is a trusting.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 18).

12. Wittgenstein’s biographer and friend, Norman Malcolm wrote: “Wittgenstein’s mature life was strongly marked by religious thought and feeling. I am inclined to think that he was more deeply religious than are many people who correctly regard themselves as religious believers.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Norman Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, London, Routledge, 1993, 21-22).

13. Two years before his death, Wittgenstein said to Drury:

“I have had a letter from an old friend in Austria, a priest. In it he says he hopes my work will go well, if it should be God’s will. Now that is all I want: if it should be God’s will. Bach wrote on the title page of his Orgelbuechlein, ‘To the glory of the most high God, and that my neighbour may be benefited thereby.’ That is what I would have liked to say about my work.” (Wittgenstein, as cited in Ludwig Wittgenstein: Personal Recollections, editor – Rush Rhees, Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1981, 181-182).