God Does Not Play Dice

Max Born¹

A Google Doodle, virtually always a facsimile of some dead person epitomizing the "spirit of this age," recently caught my attention.

Hovering, over the scribble revealed a field to which I once aspired, and a name — physicist "Max Born."
Born's bio reads like the "Who's Who" of the glory days of German theoretical physics. The better known of his affiliates include Werner Heisenberg, Max Planck, Edward Teller, Enrico Fermi, Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein.



 Although best known for his contribution to the quantum mechanics, Heisenberg, Born's assistant once familiar with quantum phenomena, eclipsed his master by compiling and publishing a theory in 1925 for which he [Heisenberg] was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics "for the creation of quantum mechanics."

In a letter to Born on 4 December 1926, Einstein expressed his reservations:

"Quantum mechanics is certainly imposing. But an inner voice tells me that it is not yet the real thing. The theory says a lot, but does not really bring us any closer to the secret of the 'old one'. I, at any rate, am convinced that He is not playing at dice."

Einstein, an early founder of quantum theory, did not accept Born's "philosophical" implementation of quantum mechanics that rejected the Newtonian fundamentals of "determinism" and "causality" that underlie essentially every credible scientific theory, with the "once singular" exception of quantum mechanics! Thus, Einstein appropriately reminded Born that God does not play dice!

In 1954, Born was belatedly recognized for "fundamental research" in quantum mechanics. In his Nobel acceptance he "transgressed" the scientific context by presenting a polemic on the ideas of "absolute certitude," "absolute exactness," "final truth," and "belief in a single truth."

"I believe that ideas such as absolute certitude, absolute exactness, final truth, etc. are figments of the imagination which should not be admissible in any field of science. ... This loosening of thinking (Lockerung des Denkens) seems to me to be the greatest blessing which modern science has given to us. For the belief in a single truth and in being the possessor thereof is the root cause of all evil in the world."

Both Einstein and Born knew there was a God, "because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse" (Rom 1:19-20).

Yet, Einstein's restless contemplation of the "subtle, intangible, and inexplicable" caused him to search for Him in all the wrong places, while Born, consistent with Google Doodle, in his Nobel "testimony" essentially declared God "the root cause of all evil in the world."



¹Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=137838

©2017 Christian. Textual content may be copied and distributed, but it may not be sold.