Stanley Jaki

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The Reverend Father Professor Stanley L. Jaki OSB (b. Győr, Hungary 1924) is a Benedictine priest and Distinguished Professor of Physics at Seton Hall University, New Jersey since 1975. He is a leading thinker in philosophy of science, theology and on issues where the two disciplines meet and diverge. After completing undergraduate training in philosophy, theology and mathematics, Father Jaki did graduate work in theology and physics and holds doctorates in theology from the Pontifical Institute in Rome (1950), and in physics from Fordham University (1958). He also did post-doctoral research in Philosophy of Science at Stanford University, UC Berkeley, Princeton University and Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. After post-doctoral research, Father Jaki was Gifford Lecturer at Edinburgh University(1974–76), Fremantle Lecturer at Balliol College, Oxford(1977), Hoyt Fellow at Yale University(1980) and Farmington Institute Lecturer at Oxford University(1988-1989). He was awarded the Templeton Prize for furthering understanding of science and religion in 1987.

Father Jaki is the author of more than two dozen books on the differences and similarities between science and religion. He was also among the first to recognize the significance of Godel's theorem for theories of everything (TOE) in theoretical physics. Godel's theorem states that any non-trivial mathematical theory will be either incomplete or inconsistent. Since any 'theory of everything' will certainly be a non-trivial mathematical theory, it must be either incomplete or inconsistent, thus dooming searches for a deterministic theory of everything in which all the parameters are defined internally and consistently. This position was later supported by Stephen Hawking in his lecture "Gödel and the end of physics"[1].

[edit] Bibliography

1966. The Relevance of Physics. University of Chicago Press.
1969. Brain, Mind and Computers. Herder & Herder.
1969. The Paradox of Olbers' Paradox. Herder & Herder.
1973. The Milky Way: an Elusive Road for Science. New York: Science History Publications.
1974. Science and Creation: From Eternal Cycles to an Oscillating Univers. Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press.
1978. Planets and Planetarians. A History of Theories of the Origin of Planetary Systems. John Wiley & Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press.
1978. The Road of Science and the Ways to God. Univ. of Chicago Press, and Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press. ISBN 0-226-39145-0
1978. The Origin of Science and the Science of its Origins. Scottish Academic Press.
1980. Cosmos and Creator. Scottish Academic Press. ISBN 0-7073-0285-4
1983. Angels, Apes and Men. La Salle IL: Sherwood, Sugden & Co. ISBN 0-89385-017-9
1984. Uneasy Genius. The Life and Work of Pierre Duhem. The Hague: Nyhoff.
1986. Chesterton, a Seer of Science. University of Illinois Press.
1986. Lord Gifford and His Lectures. A Centenary Retrospective. Edinburgh: Scottish Academis Press, and Macon, GA.: Mercer University Press.
1986. Chance or Reality and Other Essays. Lanham, MD: University Press of America & Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
1988. The Absolute Beneath the Relative and Other Essays. Lanham, MD: University Press of America & Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
2000 (1988). The Savior of Science. W. B. Eerdmans. ISBN 0-8028-4772-2
1989. Miracles and Physics. Front Royal. VA.: Christendom Press. ISBN 0-931888-70-0
1989. God and the Cosmologists. Regnery Gateway Inc.; Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press.
- The Purpose of it All (alternate title for God and the Cosmologists)
1990. The Only Chaos and Other Essays. Lanham MD: University Press of America & Intercollegiate Studies Institute.
1991. Scientist and Catholic, An Essay on Pierre Duhem. Front Royal, VA.: Christendom Press.
1996. Bible And Science. Front Royal, VA: Christendom Press. ISBN 0-931888-63-8
2000. The Limits of a Limitless Science and Other Essays. Intercollegiate Studies Institute. ISBN 1-882926-46-3