Ep. 417 | Originally aired: November 3, 2018
The tension between faith and reason is an ancient one, made even more distinct in the West by the scientific revolution that preceded the era of the Enlightenment. Alan Lightman is a scientist whose personal transcendent experience shapes his view of spirituality today.
Alan Lightman is an American writer, physicist, and social entrepreneur. Born in 1948, he was educated at Princeton and at the California Institute of Technology, where he received a PhD in theoretical physics. He has received five honorary doctoral degrees. Lightman has served on the faculties of Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and was the first person at MIT to receive dual faculty appointments in science and in the humanities.