• Question: Do you believe in God? If not would a loss of a family member affect your ambitions?

    Asked by uchihasasukepat to Emma, Jen, Joseph, Michael, Mona on 13 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by aqibrehman, anita, kanedale, joshuamshughes.
    • Photo: Mona Gharaie

      Mona Gharaie answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      I do believe in God.

    • Photo: Michael Taggart

      Michael Taggart answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      I’m an agnostic. As a scientist we teach students to veer away from proposing theories that cannot be tested and so in that spirit I cannot claim to know that there isn’t a God nor that there is.
      I don’t, however, think that one needs to hold a particular religious belief in order to appreciate the emotional turmoil that might affect all aspects of your life if a family member dies.

    • Photo: Joseph Finlayson

      Joseph Finlayson answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      So I gather your logic in asking this question is because you believe that if we didn’t believe in God we’d have a greater amount of emotional turmoil because we wouldn’t believe that our loved ones were going to a better place. Is this correct?

      I think that maybe those with faith might be able to recover more quickly from tragedy, because they believe in heaven but I still think that even with committed religious belief it would be the case that the loss of a loved one would affect your ambitions.

      I’m also an agnostic, and I’m been fortunate enough not to lose a close family member so far, so I can’t be sure how it would affect me. However, I believe that if any close family members did pass, they wouldn’t want me to grieve them for too long – instead they’d want me to eventually get on with my life, and pursue my ambitions.

    • Photo: Jen Gupta

      Jen Gupta answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      I do believe in God. It’s sometimes tough to bring together my faith and my work studying the universe but I don’t think that in order to be a scientist you have to reject religion.

Comments

  • Photo: Michael

    Michael commented on :

    Joe wrote: So I gather your logic in asking this question is because you believe that if we didn’t believe in God we’d have a greater amount of emotional turmoil because we wouldn’t believe that our loved ones were going to a better place. Is this correct?

    I took it the other way, that maybe if one didn’t believe in God then they’d be unemotional and reductionist to the point of not caring very much! Oh oh. What does that say about me?
    Well, I don’t think I’m less emotional for being an agnostic – I did actually lose a family member suddenly and wholly unexpectedly and it did swiftly alter my ambitions. Fairly soon thereafter I turned down the offer of a tenured post in the UK and took the chance to experience working in science in America – it was a “you never know the minute” kind of response – whereas before I probably would have hummed and hawed and worried about how detrimental it might have been to my career ambitions.

  • Photo: elliemariepearson

    elliemariepearson commented on :

    have you ever had acid on your hand?

  • Photo: Joseph

    Joseph commented on :

    Yes.
    Vinegar contains an acid (acetic acid) – as it has a fairly high pH for an acid (about 3-4 if I recall correctly) it doesn’t cause burns.

  • Photo: jasmine1998

    jasmine1998 commented on :

    science is fun