“The Big Bang, Stephen Hawking, and God” – The 2019 Tony Morgan ISCAST Lecture

On October 1st, the 2019 Tony Morgan ISCAST Lecture was presented by Dr Henry Fritz Schaefer, speaking on “The Big Bang, Stephen Hawking, and God”. If you missed the lecture you can find a recording of it here, with the power point slides available as a pdf file here. Currently the lecture video is being edited and then will be posted here. In the meantime, if you’d like to see a similar lecture you can look at this one.

Lecture Abstract: “The Big Bang, Stephen Hawking, and God”

The book A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking has sold more than 20 million copies, an unheard of result for any book about science. Thus Stephen Hawking became a media figure, as well as a great scientist. Indeed, Hawking’s divorces were the source of as much intrigue as those of some Hollywood stars. A Brief History of Time centers around two main characters, Professor Hawking and God. The latter is almost always referred to in terms borrowed from a Christian worldview. What does it all mean, especially in the light of Hawking’s declaration, near the very end of his life, that he was an atheist? This lecture has very significant implications for creation, science and Christian faith.

Biosketch

Dr Henry Fritz Schaefer’s degrees include SB (Chemical Physics) Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), 1966, PhD (Chemical Physics) Stanford University, 1969.  Since 1987, Dr Schaefer has been the Graham Perdue Professor of Chemistry and Director of the Center for Computational Quantum Chemistry at the University of Georgia, USA. His scientific recognition includes numerous prestigious international awards and medals. He is the author of 1,600 scientific publications, with more than 70,000 citations. He has visited Australia more than 20 times, and gave the New College lectures in 2004.