A theory of everything (that matters): A short guide to Einstein, Relativity and the Future of Faith
by Alister McGrath (Hodder and Stoughton, £14.99)
Christopher Moriarty
Last year saw the celebration of the centenary of the validation of Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity. An event of the utmost importance to science, the observations of 1919 received universal coverage in the press – in spite of being comprehensible only to a small minority of human beings. While of no apparent importance in terms of the day-to-day living of anyone, the theory is central to the understanding of how the universe – and hence ourselves being part of it – evolved and operates. At a mundane level, aspects of relativity are essential to the understanding and development of the maps on our mobile phones and an array of other familiar applications.
Remarkable career
The author, Alister McGrath – Professor of Science and Religion at Oxford – has had a remarkable career, first in science and subsequently in philosophy and religion. His books aim, above all, to demonstrate that science and religion are complementary rather than antagonistic. The underlying aim of this one, first published in 2019 for the centenary and now made available in paperback, is to continue the author’s championship of this unity, but his method is to present a very readable and largely comprehensible account of the life and thinking of Dr Einstein. This leads him to expand on the feeling which he shares with the latter, that religious belief is as valid as scientific observation – but has a different purpose.
Outline
The book begins with an outline of the state of scientific thought at the end of the 19th Century when Dr Einstein, a rather undistinguished graduate with an important but almost unrelated post in the patent office of Switzerland, was thinking at a higher level than perhaps any other human being.
His thoughts resulted in the publication in 1905 of three epoch-making papers in theoretical physics. Prof. McGrath traces the dazzling career that followed from these and also paints a portrait of the warm-hearted individual whose name and features became familiar to thinking people throughout the world.
Dr Einstein failed in his pursuit of the ‘Holy Grail’ of a single mathematical theory that would explain the workings of the entire physical universe.
He did not believe that such a theory would do anything more than that. In his mind the reason for why the same universe existed was a matter, not for science but for spiritual contemplation.
Prof. McGrath expands on this, leading to a conclusion on how Christianity provides a basis for such thought. His book is short, inspirational and a perfect Christmas present.