good evening. i am pleased and honored to be able to present to you tonight speaker. a longtime friend and one of the remarkable group of people that i 1st met about 30 years ago as a young graduate student at the university of arizona which is the part-time home of the jazz with astronomers of the vatican observatory. brother.

brother guy has had a long history with us for. he has taught classes, given public lectures and is also on video upstairs in our the universe, walked through space and time gallery piece that not even brother guy is seen yet. for those of you who are not quite sure what to expect tonight i can tell you this won't be an apologetic talk for science and religion. don't expect to hear science used to refute or promote a particular religious view. rather, expect to here how scientific and religious views of the cosmos cannot only coexist without diminishing the integrity of either but i ways of thinking about the world and one can often enrich the other earned undergraduate

and master's degrees from mit and a phd in planetary sciences from the university of arizona. he has worked at harvard and mit, the us peace corps in kenya and that college before entering the jesuit order in 1989's research explores connections between meteorites and asteroids and the evolution of small solar system bodies. in 1996 be given excellent talk about this. in 2000 he was honored by the international astronomical union for the contributions to the study of meteorites and asteroids with the naming of asteroid 4597,, the author of more than 200 scientific papers as well as a a number of books including the one you will hear about tonight

would you baptize and exit terrestrial and other questions from the astronomers and box at the vatican observatory. co-authored with father paul moment. appear selling copies of this book in our store. they will be available after brother guy's presentation as well. brother guy we will be signing copies of the book at the main entrance afterwards. last week brother guy was awarded the 2014 carl sagan medal at the division for planetary sciences in tucson for his decades long record of communicating planetary science to the public while maintaining an active science career. his unique position with in our profession as a credible a credible spokesperson for scientific honesty within the context of religious beliefs and for being a rational spokesperson who can convey exceptionally well how religion and science can coexist for believers, please join me in

welcoming brother dr. dr. brother to, guy counsel mike now. [applause] >> thank you, everybody. the real star of the show. what we we will do is start with a short film that tells you a little bit about the vatican observatory where i work. i work. i will do a presentation based on the question and then have a short reading from early on in the book and then we can have a few questions and answers. among other things, this is being recorded by c-span which means if you're going to ask questions please wait for the microphone or people we will not hear your question. let's start with the film. >> both science and religion, a conversation about the universe, ways of learning how we interact with this universe not simply a question of his there a god but there is a god now what do we do.

not just a question of their are a bunch of stars rather why are there stars, how do we work, how does that tell us how things work here on earth. the interaction that i see in my own life is that religion gives me the reason to do the science. >> back in the papacy before francis was benedict and one of his lines was go to the frontiers. >> they start off by having telescopes. as the city let's go in as

the italian government gives them back in the territory territory, in the 30s the building telescopes by the 1980s light pollution makes those telescopes unusual. we we build a knew one in arizona. >> i am working. the 1st one near earth

object. the 2nd what we call the shooting stars. and the 3rd project the earth atmosphere. >> this advanced technology telescope was the 1st of the new technology telescopes that has been considered pretty much the norm. we have we have the advantage of bringing them directly into our telescope. it is almost like a living machine.

>> still very important to maintain not out here trying to improve the existence of god if we wanted to obtain reasonable results we need to do it embracing a certain work ethic the same that the bible itself tells us to embrace. >> they look at the stars and wonder. how do i fit in?

to hear about the moon landing and want to no what it was like. if you part of the human race your part of the race they went to the moon part of a species that looked at the stars is more. if you believe in a universe that god so loved he sent his son. not only are you going to want to study the universe because of the school, it is an act of worship and active getting closer to the creator and getting closer to the universe 1500 years ago quickened by the information in doing science is an act of worship.

>> that gives you an idea of who we are where we come from. the subtitle was changed. we went through various incarnations. other strange questions in the inbox of the observatory just the other questions. the idea that the book came out of the experience that paul and i and many other people at the observatory have a people coming to us with the same questions over and over and over again and

not only are we kind of tired of answering them, but you realize the answers you have been giving really weren't codifying, otherwise they wouldn't keep asking them. and them. and a lot of cases the questions that are being asked are not really the questions that they're talking about but the questions that are being assumed before they ask. i want to give an example of what i'm talking about. in in september of 2012 in birmingham, england, there to give an astronomy talk. you can't read the t-shirt. god god said and then there was equations and there was light. as it turned out, the day of my talk in birmingham, england happens to coincide exactly with the visit of pope benedict england and facts to birmingham. so british journalists are all their to cover the pope, and i agreed to be interviewed in order to publicize the science festival but obviously all they want wanted to do was asked me questions about the

pope except the questions were things like so like so, when was the last time the pope and different with your work and what is your biggest conflict with the pope and continuing out of left field because for one thing there were assuming there was a conflict that we had never experienced. in fact the pope and supported is quite a bit. they were not happy, not not getting the story that they wanted and so finally one of them asks me so would you baptize extraterrestrial i answered only if she asks got a good laugh. that is what i wanted. they all laughed. and then the next day they reported in the paper as if it was some big vatican pronouncement about aliens. harry was. they did at least get that part right. so, why that reaction? for that matter, matter, why did they have to question the 1st place? certainly a popular question but why?

why do people ask is that question so often? i think in the case of the journalists it was meant to be a trick question a trap question. consider the context, they're looking they're looking for ways to make the pope look bad. pretty aggressive. the report is, we're looking for a juicy story for ways to make me look stupid or at least to make my church that stupid. so for them, would you baptize an extraterrestrial was a trick question because consider if i had said yes i will baptize et i i would have looked cosmically naïve. i have something to tell people who are bright enough that they can send spaceships across space and time. yeah, right. on the other hand, if i had said no i would not baptize

et, than i would be admitting that, you know christianity has no universal significance and i would be saying that it is just for a stupid yokels back on planet earth not really significant in the grand scheme of things. either way they thought they had me. so when i just blurted out the 1st thing i could think of, only if she asks thought i actually wound up turning the tables on them because i'm i made baptism not my decision but et's. if et put all of her superior technology decided freely to ask for baptism if et with all of her advanced knowledge accepted that argument savior had something of importance to her, the journalists would look pretty stupid for having pretty skepticism. the question of whether or not extraterrestrials would be involved in our religion is not a new question.

people on both sides of the issue have addressed it. the theologian joseph paul writes that the glory of god demands that the universe be filled with intelligent beings, not just us. theologically assure that. on the other hand, the american radical, spain use the inevitability of life elsewhere to make fun of christianity in the age of reason. he reason. he said that christianity other demands the unlikely proposition that of all the worlds of the universe god chose to be incarnated only in hours because some guy and some girl decided to eat an apple or else their were so many incarnations that the person i am quoting, the person who is irreverently called the son of god would have nothing else to do than travel from world to world in an endless succession of death. yet.

actually, that argument, though crude, deserves an answer. it is answer. it is not outside the possibility that we are unique in the universe. it is not outside the possibility that the 2nd person of the trinity who was indeed present john st. john says this in the beginning was the word and the word is the 2nd. that word can be expressed in more than one language as it were. so you know, if you are catholic and you believe in the mass the sacrifice of christ, it does happen a million times everyday. more to the point who is to say that any race and salvation story has to parallel offers? just think of our legends about the fall of the angels, completely different certainly for going to appreciate god is the creator of the universe big enough to contain his billions and billions of

galaxies you can either say earth is so big, our planet so tiny, and i am so insignificant how could god pay attention to me. or you could say the earth is so, plan is so small, so insignificant. the fact that he does pay attention tells me just how incredibly big that god must be. contemplating what it will mean for humans to encounter aliens does something else it forces us to ask what it is to be human. human in comparison to what. speculating on how christ salvation might work for other beings makes you look a little bit at what

salvation is supposed to be about anyway. in some ways it is summed up by this wonderful cartoon. the porcupine, the philosopher people have been speculating either one is a sobering thought. we also have to recognize there's another reason why a lot of people are not just curious but actually hundred they hope that any race advanced enough to cross the stars ought to be advanced

enough to figure out how to overcome those human ills two weeks ago i got one of those e-mails demanding that i tell pope francis the next time i see him that i get pope francis to tell us the truth about et's and i quote et life is likely to be more ethically involve endless satanic that humans being more ethically evolved i love how he knows all about what they we will be like. think back to the atheists

the fact that we have not found them is not caused other side to doubt their faith. i don't see why landing them should convince anyone it is a sobering thought. maybe they are less satanic consider that alien it came to earth to save humankind.

after all haven't we already had a savior on earth? incidentally the savior goes around and causes of mr. carpenter. any creature of this universe seem to be subject to law and to the same laws of physics and chemistry with the same laws of right and wrong and you no that they have the freedom to send and should anybody think that technical advances actually mean moral advances you know, 20th century with all its

technology also give us world war i and world war ii technology is cumulative. the more you have the more you can build on what you've got. hart, beauty ethics. we have better paint. we have we have better plaster than michelangelo did. we don't have better artists and the fact that we have got better plaster does not make what michelangelo did obsolete. we can rely on technological advances without actually having to do the trial under we cannot let them make moral decisions for us. we would no longer be free.

worse than that looking for et so that we we will all become better behaved little children is the wrong way to think about the problem, a kind of baptizing the universe by imposing our own preconceptions unto the universe. i think everyone here agrees there is a reason to be wary of imposing our view of religion or against on to any aliens remind me. we might also be wary of imposing our view of religion onto the way we do the science that might find those aliens. you know, one that can set of baptizing the aliens in the baptizing the science. it is like looking at the big pain. saying, the universe started by light just like genesis said.

it does it does not work that way. it is like looking at the origin of the universe as a possible quantum fluctuation in the gravity field and saying, you see, there is no need for god to start the universe anyway. in both cases you want up with a circular argument proving the assumption he made. that idea that god is what started the universe quantum fluctuations of gravity therefore there is no god, that doesn't prove that. all that proves is that if that what you think god is god must be gravity which of course explains why catholics celebrate mass. [laughter] more to the. that game mousetrap we have all the pieces and you wind up with

this incredibly complicated thing and at in at the end of the game somebody does to roll the ball. that idea saying god is the guy you start the ball rolling. funny as to tease of extraterrestrial intelligence will confirm there belief in god already imposing the answers they expect to see. when you baptize et can be heard in a couple of different ways. his et somebody want to baptize or who are you to

decide who gets in and who stays out? the early christians had to deal with the same ambiguity. paul argues with james. that is that is what the pope was talking about earlier this year. idea of letting martians become christians. trying to make the.and it's a good a good one. the.without an answer. he is saying, think about the question. because the question makes you think more about what does baptism mean. of course when the pope said that they immediately determined that he endorsed extraterrestrial baptism.

the onion for catholics. [laughter] benatar is in crack and is where i draw the line. raises an important. all religions do have some sort of right of passage for you: with you: baptism or something else. once you are in the club then you appear, then appear, then you are equal, then you have the rights new privileges. but presumably but presumably life within a religion is about more than just rights and privileges. you should not have to run across the street alone. those dogs should be helping you. maybe when they are asking that question that is not really the question they should be asking. are you willing to share a

meal? are you willing to let et share a meal with you? if you saw atc were wounded by the side of the road when you stop and tends to its needs? would et do the same for you? are you willing to suffer and die for et? is et willing to suffer and die for you? and if you can answer yes to those questions then maybe you are already both in the kingdom of god. religion exists to try to foster a relationship between us and god such a relationship, you hope, is based on love, presumes that we find something special in god and god find something special in us. usually it is presented that the idea that humanity is at the center of god's love god's love is taken to mean

that god finds humanity different from how god loves the rest of the universe. if humanity is at the center of god's love them too bad for the rest of the universe but think about your own experience of love. love. that is not how love works. when someone falls in love the treat everybody better. when god falls in love with us he treats all universe better everything in the universe as if he has fallen in love with. if we are at the center of god's love and concern, you, me and et maybe there is something about us that god loves. what if whatever that thing that god loves about us is not something that separates us about something that is characteristic of the human race the universe

something that is typical of the humorous, universe. we human beings are material, feeling, thinking, willing, free, loving. and us the universe has become self-aware. all of us, the universe has become self-aware. all of us, whatever plan or place space bar time all of us are the bearers of the purpose for which this universe exists. that means we are all at the center of this universe. coral sega and once made the claim that we are all star stuff. maybe it is equally true to say that the stars are also us stuff.

the existence of all these other self-aware entities risen interesting challenge to each of us. we willing to accept the presence of some other software? maybe somebody else we are people of intelligence, but intelligence, but intelligence only make sense of ferrous someone else to share that intelligence with we only grow and stretch ourselves when we are challenged to rely the others. the ability to be self-aware and the free will to act on that awareness the basic definition of the soul implies, maybe it even the man's the existence of another entity in this universe also self-aware from we can choose to love or choose to ignore.

that that is why i would be surprised if their were not but i have no data. so to put it in words that relate to my own christianity that means admitting that it was for all of us that car start, for all of us that the universe was born. the search for life outside the earth is an exercise of the imagination. it it is speculation better served by science fiction or poetry than the definition of science archaeology. with that in mind, i would like to close this part to read a poem written nearly 100 years a hundred years ago by the englishwoman and the roman catholic convert

him was published in collected works in 1917 which incidentally was ten ten years before the 1st science fiction pulp magazine. i will read it. with this ambiguous dealings have been told us, these abide, the signal to amaze, the human birth the the human birth, the lesson, and the young man crucified but not a a star of all the innumerable host of stars how he administers, race has kept our lords eternal word a secret cherished perilous terrible scene. now in our little they play his devices with the heavens biggest his pilgrimage to thread the milky way pistol , but in the

attorneys doubtless we shall compare together here a million alien gospels in what guys see charles. be prepared muscle, to read the any conceivable, the million forms of god those stars in rural women are turned we show to them a man. i would like to finish. a reading from the book according to. >> if i myself and written as a dialogue. i will have to play two roles. this is this is actually from the 1st day. we have six days and six questions.

what about the story of bethlehem. the end of the universe and how that works. in each dialogue it is set in a particular place. i chose this one because it is set at the art history institute of chicago. in the gallery of the early 20th century paul begins today we're going to talk about the beginning of all things, creation itself. it is appropriate that we here in chicago since each of us had a personal beginning

here in the windy city. you did philosophy studies at loyola university shortly after you became a jazz with an iron my doctorate in history and philosophy of science at the university of chicago to which i had when i read the opening verse of genesis where i went from god's word over the face of the waters i always pictured myself standing by the shore of the stormy lake huron where i come from. lake michigan and the windy city it is tough for this but i love chicago. and this area the museum campus the lakeshore it is like heaven, how many places of mine are favorites, the planetarium, the shedd aquarium. so if we are going talk about the beginning of the universe while we here? should we be at the planetarium where we can watch a show that illustrates the big bang? maybe we could be at the field museum of natural history with its collection of fossils and meteorites. paul says think of all those people who are always asking us about science and religion in the beginning of the universe.

oh, yeah. the ones who want us to choose between genesis and the big bang most of them aren't scientists. i am not sure that addressing the questions that a scientific place like a planetarium for the field museum would be all that useful. so often we divide up our time into separate camps, separate buildings, if you would aquarium versus planetarium workforce's play, science planetarium, workforce is play science versus religion and so forth. sometimes it is hard to move from one to the other. i want to start out today in a place where science and religion can overlap year in the art institute. it can't help seeing here that there is more than one way to present reality, more than one style of painting if you would. humor me for a moment. but but look at some of my favorite paintings.

isn't that american gothic? the weatherbeaten couple standing in front of the white clapboard house the man holding a pitchfork staring out of the canvas, the woman giving him a dirty look. i remember that one. the painting may be a a little bit of a cliché, but i like it. though it is as realistic as a photograph still it seems to tell you something about the two people that a photo would not be able to do. head down the hallway here to the european section and compare american gothic with this painting. i see. picasso's picassos the old to tears. the old man. it's pretty abstract. the guitar is realistic enough but the old man with weird lines and angles and this funky blue color scheme. it's a whole different take on the human form. it looks more modern than american gothic. it was painted about 30 years earlier.

both paintings depict all people with the tools of the trade. both were painted at roughly the same time, the early 20th century both communicate something deep and true about humanity intellectual, emotional, in ways that a book or a homily could not, but neither not, but neither painting tries to tell you everything about its subject. each painting selects and emphasizes only certain things and leaves out other stuff that is irrelevant. you know you no what, science does the same thing. science involves selective observation. science involves paying special attention to certain things while ignoring other things. oh, yeah. that reminds me of this other painting i i have seen, couple of people sitting in the city diner. you see them through the diner window from across the street.

it's late at night. you actually could never take a photograph like that because there would be parked cars and telephone wires in the way. but every time i see that painting i get hungry for fried eggs and coffee.. that is actually edward hoppers nighthawks and also here at the art institute. me i always thought you were kind of like a physicist turned philosopher. i never knew you were such a partner. well, i am no art expert. expert. but get this come back when i was in college i spent 90 minutes standing in front of the painting taking notes on a yellow legal pad.

the painting was jupiter in the form for you we will have his way with her. so i said they're taking notes. other museum visitors started asking me questions about the painting as if i were some kind of expert. i laughed it off, but i started talking to people about the painting telling them what i noticed. we got into interesting discussions about what i thought. on the other hand, if i have been at the science museum and we were looking at a demonstration of a pendulum i would not be having a discussion about our opinions. how interesting. okay. where do we go next? we go to get to the late 19th century impressionism. paul leads me to one of my favorites this same river.

he is a technique. he built built up the image by adding that colors .-dot by .-dot by .-dot. and i said wasn't that interesting was day off? yes. the the painting is the centerpiece of a pivotal scene in the movie. one of them upstairs for a long time. as he as he gazes more and more deeply into the painting with a stricken look it falls apart into a chaotic random collection of colored dots.

it is at that moment he realizes that his own life seems to be falling apart. i have a certain sympathy. i have my own share of teenage angst but what i see when i when i look at the painting is not chaos. what i see is the world being analyzed down to its smallest most basic parts. when i look at it, i keep going back and forth. seeing the little dots from which the scene is made up. that doesn't mean mean to me that the world is falling apart. it means there is more than one way to look at the picture. and there is more than one way to look at the world. one way is to see the big picture, the everyday world of common experience. the experience.

the other is to see the world as analyzed by science a world that can be described mathematically. that is one way of getting it relating science and faith, flipping back and forth. we can see the world through the eyes of science or through the eyes of faith. when you see the world through the eyes of faith you are concerned with everyday experiences of what is right and good and beautiful, beautiful concerned with how your life things together and make sense or does not. when you see the world through the eyes of science or concerns are different. the world as analyzed by science can seem disconnected to the world of everyday experience. but the trick is to get comfortable with the idea of shoving back and forth.

the trick is not to panic if one way of seeing him at something at the other includes a emphasizes something that the other neglects. you can see the painting is a collection of dots are an image of people in the park. both are true. if one is true, does it make the other one false. thank you for coming. [applause] if we can turn up the lights here so i can see the audience we have some microphones, and i guess people people are going to run aground. so if we have got questions or comments wonders about anything else feel free to ask any question. question. if i don't want to answer it, i won't. here is another microphone.

are there any questions? since i i can't see very well you we will have to make yourself known. as it turned on? no. and it takes takes a minute or two for it to warm up and told. the question was you see the penny in your interpretation, a command to be a caretaker of the world and earth that we have been given. i'm curious how would you

describe the kind of duties and responsibilities we have to care for the universe that we are in the israeli central to everything we do in science. >> you cannot do science without worrying about the ethics of what you're doing. i really really hate the idea of sending human beings to mars and uncontrolled way because i want to no if mars developed its own life. human beings league e. coli all over the place. i am afraid that sometime in the future we will find something on mars •-ellipsis i feel like earth life and will never no if it developed independently or not. but in addition we also have to recognize that nothing we do comes without a cost. something on mars, i feel so part of being a good

character caretaker is to make sure that the benefit we produce in the end out balances the cost which is true of everything we do in life. life. how do you guarantee that? you cannot. there are more than just centers. >> i was curious to note that can imagine what your the sort of jesus he was

because it is good so their are no particles. people that they drink about this since people of daydream. wisely so you don't read the protocols. if there are five plan if those planets managed to develop life. if that life is intelligent, is that life has been able to communicate to us and we are able to communicate it

is always dangerous to hypothesize to much. it is dangerous to believe the hypothesis. so they're actually aren't protocols like that, little committees of people making decisions. thank heavens. >> thank you for being here. i teach science. >> my condolences. [laughter] >> they are actually wonderful believe it or not. >> i am wondering what writers and thinkers in addition to your own text you would recommend for young people who are turning over these questions. >> i think the best thing would be to recommend good science fiction. science fiction stories that

force you to confront the questions and they don't have to be science fiction stories you necessarily agree with. it could be you read the story and go, but that doesn't work. but by posing it in the context of the question -- am sorry composing it in the context of the story you can relate to the characters in the story. i know people. and and that's the way people really would behave. i would say science fiction or fantasy. and you can't do better than the narnia books and lord of the rings to start with. and harry potter. there's a lot of really good, serious stuff that people miss including the fact that the hero who is

going to save everything has free play. yet he still hero. that is right start. from there you can launch into the explorations of right and wrong and who is right and who is wrong. >> thank you. >> over there. >> thank you very much. i was wondering you know with the meteors and comments the conception of water coming from commissary and the recent finding that their may be organic material how does that fit into your universal view of

life and creation? >> the interesting thing from ideas that come in and out of fashion. i i have no problem with it from a philosophical.of view god could have made the universe and made our planet in any of dozens of different ways. what he actually do it. the bible tells me god made the universe. science tells me how. have a problem was all those theories because i am not convinced you can get all the water and organics just your comments. and then the question how can emerge. the men didn't. in their ways you can with your hand around the. for a long time people were convinced it would work.

>> is too early to believe the hypothesis but is not too early to explore the publicists. >> one more question. that we will go to book signing. >> i thought your talk was very interesting. i i don't know if this is a question or an observation. while you're reading this well-written phone, i notice that the line is said boards and trusted word came out from you saying lords eternal word.

standing here and can't read it correctly. >> i meant no theological meaning. >> i was just curious. as a big a big difference between interested and eternal. >> good. not my poem, so you have to bring it up. one of the questions down here. >> how are you. you. thank you for the talk. really amazed. people just all think about that. a lot of photos of the milky way and all that. i was just curious as a man of faith what questions go through your mind, what thoughts go through your mind when you think about our look up at the stars. >> it's interesting.

i could imagine the human race has often thought that the universe is just chaos. in fact science seems to show was that the world acts in a rational way. that is amazing. the fact that the universe does have laws and that we can begin to figure them out even more than his that the universe is not only rational it's also beautiful and the laws are also beautiful. many years ago i i was teaching a class in freshman physics. i was doing the electricity of magnetism section command

we had gotten to maxwell's equations. maxwell's equations, things, things that i have a t-shirt at the beginning. until you no what each of the pieces does. the mathematical cock election, you can combine these two and those two hands. >> them altogether. i had done this in front of my class so that you have the final equation from taking the 2nd derivative and substituting terms. the kids in the front of the class go, oh go zero my god. it is a way. which it is. and it is know my my god moment and it must've been to maxwell. not only is electricity and magnetism things that can turn to travel like waves but the wave is at the speed of light. and light. and when you craft that you are overwhelmed with emotion of amazement and how beautiful it all fits together. it is not just semester.

necessary for the pieces to fit together. and it is not just a maxwell's equations are beautiful. whoever said that the universe had to be so beautiful that is the part that i will never get enough of. thank you everybody. [applause] >> thank you so much for joining us. our next lecture we will be on december 9 and it is about earth's orbit along with the sans around the galactic center, part of the conference will be holding. we invite you. i'm sure that you have further questions. please hold those questions until we get to the rainbow lobby. thank you so much. [applause]

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