Essay Grade

PHIL 3010 –PHIL3010_W05
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“The Quest for Meaning”
Page 1
RECORDING BEGINS
[00:00:00] – MUSIC
[00:00:02] – A
VOICEOVER : This week’s topic is “The Quest for Meaning.” Dr. Sharpe
shares the impetus behind his current project, which is a two-part
book on the nature of meaning. In this discussion, he explores the
nature of religion in relation to the nature of science.
[00:00:25] – B
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: This week we look at Dr. Sharpe’s current
projects, which deal with a two-part series on the nature of meaning
and what meaning means to humans. Can you talk a little bit about
what you see as that need for meaning as being most essentially
human, and how does the quest for meaning bridge the realms of
science and spirit for you?
[00:00:50] – C
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: This is a, I don’t know whether the listeners
to this, know that I have terminal cancer, and I may have only a
couple of months left to live, or I may have years and years and
years. No one knows as yet. There’s certainly no sign of the end at
this point. But that’s a, a type of situation where most people like
to think of their lives and, and, and seek the meaning in their lives
and so forth. [00:01:18] – At this point in my life, I’m certainly
focused on meaning. I’m focused on creating as much as I can and a
better sense of wellbeing for both my wife, my family and myself. And
in my own thinking trying to round out, trying to close off, if you
like, at least partially close, finish off (CHUCKLES) some of the
work I’ve been doing and has been my whole life’s work. Both the
archaeological stuff and the philosophical stuff. [00:02:02] – And
trying to get those in order, but it’s a bit different when your
brain’s not functioning too well, but you know, one can try.
[00:02:12] – D
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: You spent over 30 years in this subject,
exploring it from all angles. The work of David Baum, Baum as a
physicist and a mathematician, and a very strong inspiration for you
early on in trying to marry science and spirit and he was a model to
you. And to many others. As you’ve moved on in your own life, is pat
of your story, in the end, where do you see your last work, if you
can think about, if you, if you could finish your last work, and
PHIL 3010 –PHIL3010_W05
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“The Quest for Meaning”
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hopefully you will, and hopefully there’s always another last work
(Mm-hmm.) what’s the central questions that’s driving you right now?
[00:02:56] – E
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: I think it’s really basically the nature of
religion, and the nature of religion in relation to the nature of
science. I’m right back to the initial questions. And the realization
that all of this, all of these are – are examples of systems of
meaning that we create for our, for our living, for our life, for
being human beings. [00:03:27] – And the problem is that they
conflict because they aren’t all coherent with each other. And my
attempt at the moment is to first of all create a base theory, if you
like, on the nature one meaning for us human beings and how it
relates to happiness and so forth and so on. And, and then to look
more if I get a chance, to – and to develop it – to try and create a
proposal which will be both fulfilling as a, a spiritual system of
meaning and as a physical system being in that it’s, in other words
one system of meaning which can have either emphasis. [00:04:18] But to create that system would be my overall goal. Actually it’s a
bit of a harebrain because I’ve already done it, but it’s a something that you can’t just write and, you know, changes the world.
So something that is very much a social thing that gets looked at.
[00:04:36] – MUSIC
[00:04:49] – RECORDING ENDS
PHIL 3010 – PHIL3010_W04
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“The Role of Wonder”
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RECORDING BEGINS
[00:00:00] – MUSIC
[00:00:02] – A
VOICEOVER : The topic of this week’s interview is the role of wonder.
In this segment, Dr. Sharpe looks at the ways in which science and
the spiritual world can coexist and co-support each other. He also
introduces the concept of the God spot: the human need for meaning.
[00:00:27] – B
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: This week we’re talking about the
questions of how science and the spiritual world coexist and cosupport each other. Dr. Sharpe, what’s the role of wonder in the
realms of both the spiritual and the scientific?
[00:00:43] – C
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: Hmm! What a wonderful question! I think wonder
is an essential human characteristic which relates to other things
like inquiry and, and so forth, and inspiration and, and such like.
So wonder can play an essential role in both science and in spiritual
thought, and in the relationship between, between any, anything
actually, any, any investigation. Wonder could be a root for
continuing that investigation, can be a raison d’être for doing all
this.
[00:01:31] – D
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: How do you see the work of science serving
if you will a spiritual function?
[00:01:39] – E
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: Science has a spiritual function in a couple of
ways. One is the, it creates knowledge or theory as well. Which
inspires wonder. You think of some of the, the photographs taken by
the satellites of nebulae being formed and so forth and how
beautiful, beautiful they are, and what a sense of wonder we can get
from that. In that way, science can create a sense of wonder and, and
which drives it forward and drives our spiritual aesthetic and
spiritual aspirations forward as well. [00:02:27] – But there are
other ways in which science can assist, if you like, the spiritual
quest and, and that is by – scientific method is a, a fairly – shall
we say, harsh way of going about gaining knowledge, which is what
science is about. It’s harsh because it requires the, the data and
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Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“The Role of Wonder”
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the theories and the predictions and all the rest of it to be rooted
in the reality of our world. In other words not just some stuff we
dream up. [00:03:16] – It’s stuff that has to be replicable or
potentially refutable, those sort of things. And that can be a very
very harsh hammer, as we’re finding out in many religious ideas, that
just did not stack up to the world that science is unfolding for us.
And so the science is also helping to mold and guide our spiritual
knowledge by our using its methodologies. And then it, then the
whole, the, the, the spiritual theories need to tie in. If we’re
going to create a holistic system of knowledge, the spiritual
theories need to tie in to the scientific theories and vice versa.
[00:04:23] – F
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: You talk about a concept of humans
possessing almost a God spot, that there’s something evolved into us
that gives us a desire to create divinity or to strive towards
understanding a big picture. Can you talk a little bit about what you
perceive of that, and how that’s shaped your thinking about human
development and really human happiness?
[00:04:47] – G
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: It’s actually ongoing thinking. I would use the
words God spot or God hole, but God spot’s a bit better. (CHUCKLES)
But now I, I would think of it more as, we have a, as human beings we
have a need to have meaning and in fact having meaning is often for
me what it is to be a human being. And to strive toward meaning and
to heaven. The God spot is a, a – well, the word God in this, this
context is a overall sense of, or a focus if you like, but I’m probably better – for a sense of meaning for our lives. [00:05:35] And that as I said is essential, I think, for human life. Now, that’s
what I’m exploring at the moment is the, how that tends to, how that
operates, how it comes, comes about evolutionarily. And even maybe
some pointers from our biological past and, and cultural past as to
how the God spot might get filled. But it’s essential to do,
essentially to do with humans having meaning.
[00:06:11] – MUSIC
[00:06:20] –
RECORDING ENDS
PHIL 3010 – PHIL3010_W03
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“Monisms and Dualisms in Science and Religion”
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RECORDING BEGINS
[00:00:00] – MUSIC
[00:00:05] – A
VOICEOVER : The topic of this week’s interview is “Monisms and
Dualisms in Science and Religion.” Dr. Sharpe discusses the concepts
of monism and dualism in relation to a concept of two worlds: heaven,
and the world in which we inhabit.
[00:00:29] – B
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: This week we’re looking at the topics of
dualisms and monisms, and how they related to science and religion.
It, they’re very complex subjects and, and you’ve spent a long time
in your book discussing the work of four of your colleagues as well
as your own. I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about
the fundamental difference between dualisms and monisms as they
relate to the subject of science and spirituality.
[00:00:55] – C
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: It’s interesting that you should ask me that
because what I feel are dualisms, if I talk to my colleagues about
what I see as their dualism, they do not see that they have any
dualism. They see everything as monistic and everything merges into
each other and there isn’t a separation. Dualism of course is
different from duality, it’s not just two, but having two things
which are opposed to each other and ne’er the twain should meet.
[00:01:30] – I think every aspect of the world that’s – every aspect
of the world that includes the physical, the spiritual, the mental,
whatever, is related, interrelated to everything else, and it forms a
colossal whole where nothing really is in isolation. That’s for a me
a, the, the basis of my monism. And so if I were to, or no, say, I
will not take an aspect of that or a part of that be it, say, love,
and say that is the essence of it, because that then separates it and
breaks the monism, the holism, of it, so that it, if I was a science
religion person and, and advocated very firmly that the spiritual,
namely love, say for instance, is just by far the most important
thing. [00:02:45] – And nothing else is, is, comes up to it at all or
has any place really (and they’re all one), I, I would, I, I, I’d
disavow that type of view because I think it, it distorts things. I
think the, the chemistry of it is just as important as the spiritual
experience of it.
PHIL 3010 – PHIL3010_W03
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“Monisms and Dualisms in Science and Religion”
Page 2
[00:03:09] – D
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: When you talk about the work of, of some
of your colleagues in your field, you’ve said that they would
perceive that they are monist but in, from your point of view you see
them much more as dualists. Could you talk a little bit about what
that means or how they might respond to that?
[00:03:31] – E
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: Over my little life, my short life, I’ve seen
people’s dualisms change. And, and the, left, the four people down
here are, are actually fairly modern and very liberal versions of
what was a traditional dualistic point of view. If you’ll remember it
wasn’t so long ago and probably still isn’t in many fields, in many
people’s views, that there are two worlds. There’s a world of heaven
and God and all that sort of stuff, and then there’s the world that
we inhabit. And that dualism there was espoused in, in language, so
we would talk about holy spirits, holy ghosts, and all sorts of
things like that. [00:04:23] – And – the language itself that we had,
that I had 30 years ago I don’t have any more and I don’t even start
to think in that way any more. Whereas a lot of these people who are
still I would say pretty liberal people have interesting dualisms
that have developed from the ones 30 years ago, but are still there
in there rudiment.
[00:05:03] – F
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: Do you think there’s a natural progression
or evolution from dualistic thinking to monist thinking? Or do you
think the two by their natures are fundamentally different, and those
who think dualistically are likely to stay thinking dualistically,
and those who think monistly don’t tend to return to thinking
dualistically?
[00:05:26] – G
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: You know I really don’t know. I don’t know,
how, whether, I know people do slip between one type of outlook and
another type, the other type of outlook. I would say it’s actually,
in times of trouble it’s much easier to – ha, I’m just guessing slip into a dualism where things might be somewhere set and
protected. I, I think the monistic view of looking at things is far
more vulnerable in many ways.
[00:06:02] – MUSIC
PHIL 3010 – PHIL3010_W03
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“Monisms and Dualisms in Science and Religion”
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[00:06:07] – RECORDING ENDS
PHIL 3010 – PHIL3010_W02
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“Love, Science and Spiritual Traditions”
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RECORDING BEGINS
[00:00:00] – MUSIC
[00:00:04] – A
VOICEOVER : This week’s interview is entitled “Love, Science and
Spiritual Traditions.” Dr. Sharpe talks about the challenges that
arise between the belief that love and happiness are solely concepts
of the spiritual and religious domains, and what happens when these
concepts are challenged by new and emerging scientific research.
[00:00:27] – B
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: This week we’re focusing on the subjects
of love, science and spiritual traditions. Dr. Sharpe, why is it
assumed that love is a concept that’s solely in the domain of the
spiritual?
[00:00:40] – C
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: Um, depends how you define the spiritual of
course. But love is associated much more with the spiritual because
it’s experiential as opposed to the physical as in the hard sciences.
It, I think it’s just the way the concepts have fallen. It’s been a
real challenge to associate a concept like love with the physical,
namely chemicals or something like that. And when I’ve talked about
this stuff at conferences and so forth, I usually get met with a very
hard wall which says they really have nothing to do with each other.
[00:01:35] – That the, the physical science stuff of chemistry or
biology or so on has nothing to do with the everyday life type things
of love and happiness and so forth. And that’s a very strong
defensive move by many religionists. However, I, I’m a great believer
for crossing boundaries and looking at the implications of one side
for the other side. And I, and I think in this case we have
implications from the scientific to the spiritual, and from the
spiritual to the scientific. There’s a crossing over of the two sides
into hopefully developing a more holistic, more whole, more accurate
therefore, picture of what these things are. [00:02:34] – Because
goodness knows we human beings are as much physical as we are
spiritual, and as much spiritual as we are physical.
[00:02:43] – D
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: So, for example. Happiness itself has many
aspects. It has a genetic aspect for instance that we, this is from
the research, that we tend to be born so that our levels of happiness
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Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“Love, Science and Spiritual Traditions”
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fall between very fixed points. They tend to, and, and if they escape
from that then they come back to those set points, as they’re called,
set range. And those are genetically defined for each of us.
[00:03:20] – So you don’t go – there is only one little example of
the hard sciences if you like affecting the religious stuff. Because
we would normally think, okay, we won’t be happy, we strive to be
happy and so forth and so on, and we just go and do it. It, it, you
know, it’s endless, you can get to be as happy as you can possibly
be. But that’s not true. Traditionally we would think, we might think
that we do have an endless array or unfettered array of where we can
be happy (wise). [00:03:58] – Whether we’re going to be very unhappy
or very happy. And just a continuum of levels and, and it’s not there’s some biological control but not much. But the set point stuff
coming out of genetics is just one little part of it. Each of these
states, spiritual states I’d call them, and I call them spiritual
states, of love, happiness and so forth, are, each of them has a
chemical components to them. [00:04:36] – And the chemical components
if there is, you know, if there is, chemical components are missing,
then we tend not to feel love, and we tend not to feel happiness. And
those chemical components usually involve neurotransmitters in the
brain and various other parts of the body. So there’s, there’s a
whole influence from that side, from that neurochemical side as well
as the genetic side which helps us to feel love, helps us to love,
helps us to say how we’re going to carry out that love, what does
that love entail?
[00:05:22] – E
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: You know it, it’s not just a happy feeling.
Love is not just a happy feeling. Love is being in a certain
condition and doing certain things, in, that, espouse that love. And
that can be also influenced by the biological side of ourselves. Not
just a book like the Bible telling us how we love, but there’s also,
in-built things in us as human beings that help tell us what we do to
love. For example.
[00:06:05] – F
DR. LESLIE VAN GELDER
: One of the challenges that comes out of
discussing love, both in a spiritual and scientific context is it
raises the question of if your theological beliefs are that God is
love, if you will, what happens if love is chemical?
[00:06:22] – G
DR. KEVIN SHARPE
: Well that’s a great question. (LAUGHS) It’s one
PHIL 3010 – PHIL3010_W02
Dr. Kevin Sharpe
“Love, Science and Spiritual Traditions”
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I’d like to ask. Well, obviously God doesn’t have those – it, it
depends what you mean by God of course but you, the usual perception
of God doesn’t have God with hormones and an evolutionary biology and
all that sort of stuff. So it’s, it’s impossible to talk reasonably
about love and so forth as being part of God when they are, when love
and so forth is associated with these biological states. [00:07:01] I’ve thought long and hard about this and fought with many people
about it, and I hear lots of different solutions, some saying for
instance that God evolved us to be in particular states. Love and so
forth to have those states. Evolved us, God evolved us to have those
even if God didn’t evolve himself or (herself). My conclusions now
are that really they are very human phenomena, love, happiness, so
forth, very human phenomena and are probably ill associated with God.
Now that’s a whole huge, huge question. And I’ll spend the rest of my
life struggling with that.
[00:07:55] – MUSIC
[00:08:05] – RECORDING ENDS

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