It happened on OCTOBER 18

1859

In 1859, Henry Bergson was born in Paris. He was a French philosopher who was an exponent of spiritualism and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1927. He developed a philosophy that interpreted the evolutionary development of the universe in terms of a spiritualistic point of view open toward transcendence.

1871
In 1871, Charles Babbage died in London. He was an English mathematician, physician, engineer, and inventor. In particular, he worked on probabilistic calculations, laying the foundation for the eventual construction of calculating machines. In 1824, he was offered the chance to manage a life insurance company; however, noting that, based on probabilistic calculations, the profitability of the undertaking would favor the clients, he turned it down. He then published his findings regarding his calculations as applied to the insurance industry. He also wrote an apologetic work and studied the miracles in the Bible.
1902

Pascual Jordan was born in Hannover. He was a German theoretical physicist who collaborated with Werner Heisenberg, and he also worked on biophysics. He wrote works on the relationship between religion and science, among them Der Naturwissenschaftler vor der religiösen Frage (1963).

INTERS.org

On the International Year of Quantum Science and Technology


Readings on Quantum Mechanics: An Introduction, by Gabiele Coci

Matter and Light. The New Physics (1937), by Louis de Broglie

The Meaning of Beauty in Exact Natural Science (1970), by Werner Heisenberg

Quantum Mechanics (2002), by John Polkinghorne, from INTERS 

Faith and Quantum Theory (2007), by Stephen Barr

Quantum Mechanics. Philosophical and Theological Implications (2019), by Javier Sánchez Cañizares, from INTERS


Articles of Historical Interest

Can Quantum-Mechanical Description of Physical Reality Be Considered Complete? (1935), by A. Einstein, B. Podolski, N. Rosen

On the Einstein Podolsky Rosen Paradox (1964), by J.S. Bell

Experimental Realization of Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm Gedankenexperiment: A New Violation of Bell's Inequalities (1982), by A. Aspect, P. Grangier and G. Roger

Moreover…

Pursuing Scientific Humanism. Letters Between Werner Heisenberg and Enrico Cantore, 1967-1976, a forthcoming book edited by Claudio Tagliapietra, INTERS staff

    

Interdisciplinary Encyclopedia of Religion and Science

The Encyclopedia, published by the Centro di Documentazione Interdisciplinare di Scienza e Fede operating at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome, provides new, scholarly articles in the rapidly growing international field of Religion and Science (ISSN: 2037-2329). INTERS is a free online encyclopedia.

Anthology and Documents

To emphasize and spread relevant documents within the scientific community, this section provides key materials concerning the dialogue among science, philosophy and theology.

   

Special Issues

We offer here a selection of comments and documents on special issues in Religion and Science, collected for anniversaries and/or for the relevance of the topics.