God's Laughter: Man and His Cosmos

by Gerhard Staguhn

Book Overview

In the bestselling tradition of A Brief History of Time, a dazzling account of the age-old quest to unravel the riddle of the universe, which eludes us ever more craftily the closer we think we've come to it--or as the Jewish proverb says, Man thinks, God laughs.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060190043
• ISBN13: 9780060190040
• Release Date: January 1992
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Length: 255 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 5.9" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

2 thumbs up!

this is one of the best nonfiction books i have read in a long time. it takes us on a rollercoaster ride through the history of astrophysics from Copernicus to Hawking in a breathtaking way. Very well laidout, and beautifully explained so a layman can grasp the subject matter fairly easily. never dull even for a moment it makes the whole subject seem so fascinating, and the references to philosophy/mysticism including taoism and eastern philosophy were very interesting. A mustread indeed.

Oh God, do we know this laugh?

GOD'S LAUGHTER: MAN AND HIS COSMOS by Gerhard Staguhn was originally published in German in 1990 as *Das Lachen Gottes.* While I consider this book worth reading, the contents make the most sense to me if the book is read as a prelude to the question whether God might properly be considered as a person who suffers most from the status "until then he is always condemned to comedy" as described in section 273 of BEYOND GOOD AND EVIL by Friedrich Nietzsche. GOD'S LAUGHTER is quite sophisticated about physics, which advanced in a truly spectacular fashion in the early twentieth century up to the point when further developments became secret, mostly due to Soviet and American military applications, or subject to more than the usual hypothetical doubt. The idea of Stephen Hawking that finding at least one complete theory which accounts for the creation of the universe "would be the ultimate triumph of human reason--for then we would know the mind of God," (p. 239) is subject to the conclusion, "In the end, all theory up to and including the quarks can be seen as a specific form of mythology." (p. 239). The physics of subatomic particles and high energies is at least as difficult to grasp as modern theology, or even philosophy since Kant, so the real question might be who is more adept at dealing with the usual level of confusion about things.The index of this book lists only the names of particular people, not their ideas, so it is difficult to use it to locate signs of decline like neutron bombs or the ultimate collapse of a star "into some kind of neutron slush." (p. 210). Chapter 7, "Even Stars Must Die: Red Giants, White Dwarfs, Black Holes," describes what is expected to happen in "star ovens" as their density and temperature keep climbing. The ultimate description of ourselves as previous stars is "With the exception of hydrogen, all the atoms--or rather atomic nuclei--of which we are made were once located inside stars that subsequently exploded as supernovae." (p. 209).Nietzsche is in the index, and gets credit for the desire "to regain this world after God and the next world had been lost." (p. 32). Written a hundred years after Nietzsche's books, this book is not afraid to admit that German ideas "betrayed his own life-affirming philosophy; thus providing a direct path to the nihilism of our century, which found its most terrible manifestation thus far in Nazi ideology." (p. 33). Some of the results of physics were pretty terrible in the twentieth century, too. Instead of taking such a gloomy view of reality, it is more cheerful to admit that Nietzsche had some amazing ideas that relate directly to the title of this book, and to the novel, LAUGHING WAR by Martyn Burke:*Todlachen* said Sam Senior one day when they sat together in a booth too close to the jukebox. It means laugh till it kills you. It's a German word. Oi, God too has a sense of irony. (Burke, p. 34).Nietzsche pictured that laughter most powerfully in Part Th

AN EXCELLENT PRIMER

I was flipping through the library stacks yet again on my continuous quest for knowledge. Just when I gave up, I spotted this strange,little book. I didn't think it would be much, being that it seemed to be one of those religious-type books, and anything that involves religion just turns me off. Boy, was I mistaken! "God's Laughter" turned out to be one of the most eye-opening books I have ever read. It not only gives a fascinating account of the history of metaphysics, but asks an interesting question: do the seemingly unrelated disciplines man has used to understand Ultimate Reality have more in common than we think? Are they really different points of view, or are they really pieces of an even larger puzzle? This question is at the heart of Staghun's book--to eradicate the prevailing Western prejudice that science and religion, two ways of seeing the world, are somehow mutually exclusive of each other. By finding and demonstrating commonalities in Zen Buddhism, Einstein's theory of relativity, and the discoveries of certain noted astronomers, Staghun makes a convincing argument that it is only when we combine science and religion in our search for our understanding of the universe that we will finally get any real answers. If you want a beginner's guide to metaphysics, especially one as moving and well-written as this (Staghun really wants you to see the world as beautifully as he does), get this book! It'll be worth your while!

New and interesting thought for the layman and the expert.

Staguhn writes this book specificly for people who know little or nothing about science and religion but his insights and explanations are complete and thought provoking even for one who has studied both. If you have ever doubted G-d or Einstein, you should read this book.