Showing posts with label the massey lectures. Show all posts
Showing posts with label the massey lectures. Show all posts

Friday, August 2, 2013

A Battery Recharger

Still trying to get my psychic energy back, I thought I would take this opportunity to post an interview of Neil Turok conducted a few months ago by Alan Gregg. Turok, the currrent head of the Perimiter Institute, delivered this year's Massey Lectures on The Universe Within. While some of what he discussed is beyond me (the world of quantum physics) the first and last part present a man who is deeply humane, the antithesis of the kind of arrogance embodied by people like Richard Dawkins.

I especially appreciated two things about Turok: his surprising optimism ("The problems we face were created by humans, and they can be solved by humans.") and the respect he has for various pursuits of knowledge, including religion which, along with science, he acknowledges as seeking utimate answers. If you want to skip the heavy topic of quantyum physics, I would recommend you watch the first several minutes of the interview, and then skip ahead to about the 16:00 minute mark for more comprehenisble and relatatble fare as he talks about Africa's potential and his respect for a variety of disciplines, including religion.

Please note there is a slight glitch at the start of the video, with several seconds of silence.