God in the Equation: How Einstein Transformed Religion

Corey S. Powell

The author does a great job of taking the reader through the progression of how, beginning with the insights of Einstein and continuing throughout the 20th century, the scientific community has discovered that the mechanical, Newtonian based model of the universe does not tell the real story, and that reality has more to do with unseen forces (dark matter, cosmological constants etc.) that seem to be more consciousness based than matter based. If I had to take one statement from this book that made the book exciting and worthwhile, it was this revealing statement about the nature of time. I don't have the exact quote, but this is a pretty accurate paraphrase: If you were present just after the big bang occurred, and you called that moment today, it would be the only today without a yesterday. I can't explain why I found this statement so illuminating, but for me it created an understanding of how time is a relative fourth dimension. The author chose the following for the book jacket: He wanted to know where our world comes from and where it was going. He wanted to understand how the remote stillness of the heavens relates to the erratic, ever–changing events here on earth. Above all, he wanted to know if the answers to these questions would bring him closer to a higher authority. So Einstein put GOD IN THE EQUATION.

If you have any interest at all in quantum physics, cosmology, and how the world's greatest scientific minds in the 20th Century tried to approach God and the questions of why we are here and what is reality, you must read this book!!

Review by Len Oppenheim.