RobH wrote:
> Einstein's 'God' letter fetches $400,000
> He dismissed belief as product of human weakness, called Bible
'childish'
>
> updated 1 hour, 7 minutes ago
>
> LONDON - A letter in which Albert Einstein dismissed the idea of God as
the
> product of human weakness and the Bible as "pretty childish" has sold at
> auction for more than $400,000.
>
> Bloomsbury Auctions said Friday that the handwritten letter sold to an
> overseas collector after frenetic bidding late Thursday in London. The
sale
> price of $404,000, including the buyer's premium, was more than 25 times
> the pre-sale estimate.
>
> Bloomsbury did not identify the buyer, but managing director Rupert
Powell
> said it was someone with "a passion for theoretical physics and all that
> that entails."
>
> "This extraordinary letter seemed to strike a chord, and it gave a deep
> personal insight one of the greatest minds of the 20th century," Powell
> said.
>
> The letter was written to philosopher Eric Gutkind in January 1954, a
year
> before Einstein's death. In it, the Einstein said that "the word God is
for
> me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the
> Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends which are
> nevertheless pretty childish."
>
> "For me," he added, "the Jewish religion like all other religions is an
> incarnation of the most childish superstitions."
>
> Addressing the idea that the Jews are God's chosen people, Einstein
wrote
> that "the Jewish people to whom I gladly belong and with whose mentality
I
> have a deep affinity have no different quality for me than all other
> people. As far as my experience goes, they are also no better than other
> human groups, although they are protected from the worst cancers by a
lack
> of power. Otherwise I cannot see anything 'chosen' about them."
>
> Bloomsbury spokesman Richard Caton said the auction house was "100
percent
> certain" of the letter's authenticity. It was offered at auction for the
> first time, by a private vendor.
>
> Einstein experts say the letter sup****ts the argument that the physicist
> held complex, agnostic views on religion. He rejected organized faith
but
> often spoke of a spiritual force at work in the universe.
>
> John Brooke, emeritus professor of science and religion at Oxford
> University, said the letter lends weight to the notion that "Einstein
was
> not a conventional theist" — although he was not an atheist, either.
>
> "Like many great scientists of the past, he is rather quirky about
> religion, and not always consistent from one period to another," Brooke
> said.
>
> Born to a Jewish family in Germany in 1879, Einstein said he went
through a
> devout phase as a child before beginning to question conventional
religion
> at the age of 12.
>
> In later life, he expressed a sense of wonder at the universe and its
> mysteries — what he called a "cosmic religious feeling" — and famously
> said: "Science without religion is lame, religion without science is
> blind."
>
> But he also said: "I do not believe in the God of theology who rewards
good
> and punishes evil. My God created laws that take care of that. His
universe
> is not ruled by wishful thinking, but by immutable laws."
>
> Brooke said Einstein believed that "there is some kind of intelligence
> working its way through nature. But it is certainly not a conventional
> Christian or Judaic religious view."
>
> Einstein's most famous legacy is the special theory of relativity, which
> makes the point that a large amount of energy could be released from a
tiny
> amount of matter, as expressed in the equation e=mc2 (energy equals mass
> times the speed of light squared). The theory changed the face of
physics,
> allowing scientists to make predictions about space and paving the way
for
> nuclear power and the atomic bomb.
>
> Einstein's musings on science, war, peace and God helped make him world
> famous, and his scientific legacy prompted Time magazine to name him its
> Person of the 20th Century.
Too bad God fearing people don't believe in science in the real world.
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