"The Doctor's Art" is a weekly podcast that explores what makes medicine meaningful, featuring profiles and stories from clinicians, patients, educators, leaders, and others working in healthcare. Listen and subscribe/follow on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, Google, and Podchaser.
When we gaze at the stars and wonder our place amid the expanse of the universe, or when we witness the birth of a child and marvel at the miracle of existence itself, or when we listen to music that seems to touch our soul -- there are moments in life when we feel a transcendent connection to things larger than ourselves. But how are we to make sense of these experiences in the age of science?
In perhaps their most meditative episode yet, Henry Bair and Tyler Johnson, MD, speak with Alan Lightman, PhD, a theoretical physicist and humanist who holds a unique vantage point on topics fundamental to our existence: time, space, matter, and human consciousness. Lightman is professor of the practice of the humanities at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the author of numerous novels and books on science and philosophy, and the creator and subject of the 2023 PBS documentary series "Searching: Our Quest for Meaning in the Age of Science."
Over the course of their conversation, they discuss where our sense of awe comes from, the role of spirituality in a materialist world, whether or not human consciousness will ever be understood on a physical basis, the interplay of faith and reason in modern scientific practice, and more.
In this episode, we discuss:
- 3:58 How Lightman found himself at the intersection of physics and creative writing
- 5:46 The ways in which physics is the most "philosophical" science
- 9:13 The definitions of "materialists" and "vitalists"
- 11:56 How Lightman conceptualizes his position as a "Spiritual Materialist"
- 16:07 Contending with materialism despite awe-inspiring, transcendental experiences
- 22:30 Whether or not Lightman considers himself a "reductionist"
- 25:28 Where our sense of awe and appreciation of beauty comes from
- 32:17 The role of faith in scientific pursuits
- 34:20 Finding meaning in a materialist world
The following is a partial transcript (note errors are possible):
Johnson: So this podcast is going to be a little bit different from some of our other episodes in a few respects. One is that Alan, as he has asked us to call him, is not directly involved with the healthcare profession in any obvious way. But at the same time, I feel like his, I don't know, philosophical or ethical or metaphysical bent is about as similar to that of mine and Henry's as anyone, perhaps, that we've spoken with.
And so I'm particularly excited to talk to him because I think that he has a very direct and accessible way of approaching the very kinds of questions that matter the most to us and has done this in a very public way that I think has been enlightening and important. And I'm really excited to see what kind of fruit our conversation is going to produce. So thank you so much for being here with us.
Lightman: Thank you. Tyler, you said that I haven't had any direct connection with the healthcare profession, and that's mostly true. I have a brother who is an ophthalmologist, and I wrote a whole novel that took place largely within the healthcare system. It's called The Diagnosis. And there was a lot of medical material in that book, so sort of tangentially. Of course, all of us are connected to the healthcare system in some way or another because we all need medical help now and then.
Johnson: Of course, and Henry will be joining your brother in the field in however many years when he finishes his training. So that'll be good. Well, maybe we can actually start out. Can you tell us what do you do? What's your job? Just explain it for those of us who are not physicists, which I'm pretty sure is pretty much all of our listeners, maybe we have a few physicists out there for some random reason, but what exactly do you do?
Lightman: Well, I have several jobs. One of them is as an astrophysicist, and physics, there's a pretty clear dividing line between experimentalists and theorists. And I am a theorist, which means that I work with mathematics and equations and computers. And I try to make predictions about astronomical phenomena like stars orbiting a black hole. And how would we be able to tell from their orbits that there's a black hole at the center? That kind of thing. But I also teach at MIT for the last 25 years or 30 years. I've put most of my time into writing, so I'm probably more of a writer than a physicist now.
Bair: So can you tell us how the two strands of your career, how did those come into play? Like, did one come first, then the other? Or has it always been, as far as you can remember, the two have been alive in you?
Lightman: Well, that's a great question. The two have been alive in me forever. When I was 8 or 9, 10 years old, I had an interest in both science and the arts. I built rockets. I built remote control devices. I had a chemistry set. I was curious about how things worked, but I was also a reader and I wrote poetry and short stories. And so from a very young age, I was interested in both the sciences and the arts.
Johnson: And how did you get to be a physicist specifically?
Lightman: Well, of all the sciences, physics attracts me the most because it's the most philosophical and I have a philosophical bent. I think at the frontiers of physics, we're very close to philosophy and theology. Those areas interest me a great deal. Physics is also the most fundamental of all the sciences. Of course we need chemistry and biology and the other sciences. They're vitally important. But if you're interested in understanding the universe at the most fundamental level, the level of elementary particles and fundamental forces of nature, physics is your area.
For the full transcript, visit The Doctor's Art.
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