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March 21, 2005 
VOL.
43, NO. 6Oakland,
CA
for science-theology dialogue
Charles Townes, a Nobel laureate who helped invent
the laser and was an early pioneer in merging science and religion, has
won the 2005 Templeton Prize and the more than $1.5 million that comes
with it.
The UC Berkeley physics professor said he will donate a major portion
of his prize money to Furman University in Greenville, S.C., and four
institutions in Berkeley: the Pacific School of Religion, the Center for
Theology and the Natural Sciences, the Berkeley Ecumenical Chaplaincy
to the Homeless and First Congregational Church.
“Charles Townes helped to create and sustain the dialogue between
science and theology,” David Shi, the president of Furman University,
Townes’ undergraduate alma mater, said in nominating Townes for
the honor.
A South Carolina native who grew up as a progressive Baptist, the 89-year-old
Townes said he would accept the award—the full title of which is
the Templeton Prize for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries About
Spiritual Realities—with humility. He described himself as a “minor
figure” in an area that has grown increasingly prominent in recent
years.
Others would disagree. For decades he has been among the most fervent
advocates for dialogue between scientists and theologians.
Townes has done so from a position of major renown in 20th century science,
having won the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physics. His work studying the properties
of microwaves had two practical results: the development of the maser,
a device that amplifies electromagnetic waves, and later the laser, which
amplifies and directs light waves into parallel direct beams.
That work resulted in the now-common use of lasers in the fields of medicine,
telecommunications, electronics and computer science.
In 1964, while a professor at Columbia University in New York City, Townes
delivered a talk at the city’s Riverside Church that became the
basis for a groundbreaking and seminal article, “The Convergence
of Science and Religion,” which appeared in an IBM journal.
In the article, Townes said it was time for the seemingly irreconcilable
fields of science and religion to find common ground, noting “their
differences are largely superficial, and ... the two become almost indistinguishable
if we look at the real nature of each.”
A Massachusetts Institute of Technology magazine eventually published
the article, too—prompting one alumnus to declare that “he
would never have anything more to do with MIT” if an article on
religion appeared again, Townes said in his prepared
remarks.
That, Townes said, “reflected a common view at the time among many
scientists that one could not be a scientist and religiously oriented.
There was an antipathy towards discussion of spirituality.”
“Science and religion have so many similarities,” Townes said
in an interview prior to the award’s announcement. He said he regrets
that there are still scientists who are as “rigidly fundamentalist”
as some religionists.
Charles Townes
VOICE FILE PHOTO
