The book is aiming, programmatically, at showing that both in science and religious thinking the basic space-time entity is ultimately built and defined by light. In this sense, the book is emphasizing the unique role of light in understanding the world around us. The approach is based on the belief that science and religion represent two very different modes of addressing reality, both of them being relevant to us as human beings.
The language of science and religion and the answers they each give to the same questions differ due to the elementary postulates on which they are built. A dialogue and debate in the classical sense is, therefore, meaningless. This is why the book has allowed the voice of Physics and the voice of the Philosophy of Religion to be heard in their distinctiveness and nobility. Instead of endless polemics, the work proposes to acknowledge with patience and respect the altera pars approach for the same overarching topics, highlighting the complexity of both domains, and, on a transdisciplinary level, pointing towards the complexity of our mind and reality.
The book is illustrated by Valentin Petridean. The images mirror and enrich the rigorous game of the intellect, illuminating it with sparks of vivid imagination.
Zoltán Néda is Professor of Theoretical Physics at the Department of Physics, Babeş-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca. Research fields: Statistical Physics with Interdisciplinary Applications, Collective Phenomena, Complex Systems and Computational Physics.
Madeea Axinciuc is Professor at the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Bucharest, and founding director of the interdisciplinary program in Religious Studies – Texts and Traditions. Research fields: Philosophy of Religion, Biblical Studies, Jewish Thought.
Valentin Petridean is graphic designer and illustrator. His graphic works were published in Lürzer 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide. He is the illustrator of Iv cel Naiv (16 poezii de iubire, Versez, Uibesc, Nesfârşesc) and Ion Creangă (Dănilă Prepeleac), published with Vellant Publishing House.
ISBN 978-606-697-084-6 (paperback)
ISBN 978-606-697-085-3 (ebook)
CONTENTS
- Memories from the past and the need for a new dialogue
- Experiment versus Experience [See Inside]
- The Nitty-Gritty of Light
- The Nature of Light
- Colours and Perception
- Producing and Absorbing Light
- The Speed of Light’s Propagation
- Light and Aether
- Ideal Space
- Tangible Space
- Ideal Time
- Tangible Time
- The Principle of Relativity
- The Aftermath
- Changing Paradigms: ‘Memories of the Future’
- Concluding remarks
