The Face of God – the French version

This is a weekly post by Nidhal Guessoum (see his earlier posts here). Nidhal is an astrophysicist and Professor of Physics atAmerican University of Sharjah.

In a recent post, I decried the exaggerated usage of God metaphors by scientists or writers each time some (presumed) breakthrough or important result or idea is communicated to the public. And I specifically mentioned the recent references to “God’s toe” and to “the face of God”.

Now, when I got a moment to take a look at the French scene (of Science, Religion, and Media), I was stunned to find a book, fresh out of the presses, titled… you guessed it… “The Face of God” (Le Visage de Dieu).

I haven’t read the book, and I don’t intend to, so this is not a review; it is a commentary on side issues raised by this book, its authors, its title, etc.

The first thing that should be mentioned is that the book has been given unprecedented exposure in the French media, especially considering its overt spiritual tone. Indeed, the Bogdanov twins (more on them in a minute) state clearly that they believe that the Creator conclusion is inescapable from the results of modern Cosmology. They themselves are not particularly religious, in the sense that they do not relate to any specific affiliation, but they insist on the divine inference. What “cosmological results” are they basing themselves on to make that “divine inference”? Simply put: the anthropic principle, or more precisely, the fine tuning of the universe. (For those who are not very familiar with this concept, it is – in a nutshell – the fact that many/most of the fundamental properties of the universe, from the charge of the electron to the speed of light, and the total content and rate of expansion of the universe have values that could not have been even slightly different if life, intelligence, and consciousness, like humans and other such creatures, were to exist. Needless to say, many have concluded that a Creator must be behind such “fine tuning”, and this whole “anthropic principle” has for the past few decades become a very controversial topic. More on this some other time, if you wish…) In a recent TV interview, the Bogdanovs referred to this fine tuning of the universe as the “cosmic code” and said that it must have been written by a Creator.

The second thing that must be noted is the fact that three (not just one) illustrious scientists have endorsed the book by writing a preface and two post-faces. This, in itself, is notable, but not overly surprising, as oftentimes authors seek the support of heavyweights in the field to give credence to their work and help increase its sales. But in this case the feat is simply extraordinary. Why? Because of the huge asymmetry between the authors (who are very lightweight and even controversial) and the three endorsers (who are very heavy weights)! The latter are: Robert Wilson, who (with Arno Penzias) discovered the microwave cosmological background in the 60’s and received the Nobel Prize in 1978; John Mather, who (with George Smoot) in 2006 received the Nobel Prize for the variations they found in the microwave cosmological background, which Smoot likened to "seeing the face of God"; Jim Peebles, a renowned cosmologist who has received half a dozen medals, awards, and honors (though not the Nobel Prize). Needless to say, any author would dream of having such people preface his/her book or even write a short blurb. Now, don’t the Bogdanovs deserve that? How do I know that their book is not superb enough to receive such accolades (since I haven’t read it)?

Well, the Bogdanovs started their careers in France as presenters of science-fiction TV shows. But their shows, while futuristic and avant-garde, were always loaded with science material and often raising “metaphysical” issues. Then in 1991, they published a book from a series of interviews with the French philosopher Jean Guitton under the title “God and Science” (Dieu et la Science), and it became a best-seller. But soon the “Bogdanov Affair” exploded when the astrophysicist Trinh Xuan Thuan (TXT) accused them of having plagiarized from his best-selling book “The Secret Melody” (La Mélodie Secrète), where indeed he makes the same “creator inference” from the fine tuning of the universe; they later settled out of court. (Full disclosure: TXT is a friend of mine, though one can easily show objectively that he is a great scientist and author.) The Bogdanovs later sought to beef up their scientific credentials and obtained doctorates (after great difficulties) and published a couple of papers, which the scientific community duly ignored. They then turned to writing more science-and-God books, including “Before the Big Bang (Avant le Big Bang, 2004), “Voyage to the initial instant” (Voyage vers l'Instant Zéro, 2006), “We are not alone in the universe” (Nous ne sommes pas seuls dans l'Univers, 2007), and “At the beginning of time” (Au commencement du temps, 2009); they have been very productive, as you can see…

Success in book writing has always been a mystery: why some authors achieve astronomical sales figures while often not deserving it and others remain obscure – if they get published at all – depends on many factors, mainly sociological. Why the media latch on to some authors much more than others, even when they expound views that the “intelligentsia” doesn’t quite like (e.g. the “divine inference”) is also something that few people have figured. And why some heavyweights accept to write prefaces to books by controversial authors is totally puzzling to me. If one of them had been Smoot, we could have related it to the “face of God” metaphor (the authors having borrowed it from him), but he’s not even one of the three; besides, some (like Peebles) are known to be atheists…

Can somebody help me understand some of these phenomena?