← New Books Network
New Books Network
Michel-Yves Bollore and Olivier Bonnassies, "God, the Science, the Evidence" (Palomar, 2025)
00:43:54
Loading summary
Transcript42 lines
- [00:00]
TJ Watt
I'm NFL linebacker TJ Watt and this is my personal best. YPB by Abercrombie is the activewear I'm always wearing. That's why I reached out to co design their latest drop. I worked with designers to create high performance activewear that holds up to my toughest workouts. Shop YPB by Abercrombie in store, online and in the app because your personal best is greater than any.
- [00:32]
WhatsApp Advertiser
When did making plans get this complicated? It's time to streamline with WhatsApp, the secure messaging app that brings the whole group together. Use polls to settle dinner plans, send event invites and pin messages so no one forgets mom 60th and never miss a meme or milestone. All protected with end to end encryption. It's time for WhatsApp message privately with everyone. Learn more at WhatsApp.com.
- [00:59]
Lowe's Advertiser
Lowe's knows you've got a job to do and we help get it done with the Mylos Pro Rewards program. Eligible members save more with volume discounts on qualifying orders through a quote of $2,000 or more. Join for free today. Lowe's we help you save offer can't be combined with any other discount, contract and or special pricing exclusions. More terms and restrictions apply. Details@lowe's.com Subject to change welcome to the New Books Network.
- [01:33]
Caleb Zakrin
I'm Caleb Zakrin, editor of the New Books Network. Today I'm speaking with Michel Bolleret, co author of the book the Science the Evidence, selling nearly half a million copies in Europe. The science that evidences popularity speaks to a real hunger around the world for a deeper meaning to life. We've become familiar with the atheistic scientist in the mold of Richard Dawkins, claiming that science demonstrates the rationality of belief in God. Many scientists, however, disagree with Dawkins. God the Science, the Evidence considers the current state of science, arguing that it supports the existence of God. Michel, thank you. And I think this will be an extremely fun conversation. So thanks so much for joining me today on the nufix Network.
- [02:15]
Michel Bolleret
Thank you Caleb. I'm very pleased to be with you.
- [02:18]
Caleb Zakrin
I'm excited for this conversation. When I first heard of this book, I thought that it just sounded so fascinating and it's not a surprise that it's sold so well in Europe, obviously was originally published not in English, but in French and since then it's been translated. So I really am curious to see what this reception will be like in the United States. But my guess, it will probably be pretty similar to what the reception has been like in France. But before even jumping into the book, I just wonder if you just tell us a little about yourself and your co author.
- [02:50]
Michel Bolleret
Yes, of course, with pleasure. I'm an Engineer, I am 79 years old. I'm married, I have three children, several grandchildren. I have been working in the industry all my life. But as a scientist, I have always been interested very much by the development and the discoveries of science, especially with cosmology and also because I am a Christian, I have always been very interested with the relationship between science and the existence of God. That's a very interesting topic, especially because it has changed very much very recently. And Michael also, it's a very important, interesting case because he's a mathematician. He has done the best school university in France for mathematics and he was an atheist. So he was an atheist until he was 20 and one day he saw a book about the reason to believe in a creator God and he thought it was stupid and it would be a ridiculous book. And he started to read it just for fun if I may say. And he realized that it was a very serious matter. And then he decided to read more books and more reading and more and more. After 2, 3 years he decided to become a Christian. So it's interesting to see that for a mathematician it's possible to change your mind for rational reason, not faith.
- [04:29]
Caleb Zakrin
Right. And of course there are many scientists that do believe in God. Know, there's obviously this, this very popular mold of a, of a, of a, of the atheistic scientist like a Dawkins. But you know, this is, is not, not everyone, of course, and, and I'm wondering if you could introduce a little bit why you found it so important to write this book. What was it that drove you to write it?
- [04:57]
Michel Bolleret
Just to answer first to your first question, in the United States, the Pew Research center has made some statistic about scholars, scientists, top scientists and 50%, a little more than 50% believe in a creator God or something equivalent. And a little less of 50% believe in materialism. So it's very interesting to see that it is divided half and half when usually people believe that the top scientists are all in the materialism or not believing God. So it's not true. It's in fact it is. Half an hour. So why did we write this book? It's very simple. It's because we have been looking together with Olivier, my co author for this book. We were looking for a book which was first easy to read, I mean for everybody, for ordinary people like you and me, and which would be not only for Science, but considering science, of course, because it's very important, but also the other fields of knowledge like philosophy, morality, history, and some thrilling enigmas. So this book, we have been looking for it, it was not existing. And with my friend Olivier, we decided to write it and we made a big mistake because we thought it would take one year of our time, when in fact it took four years with the help of 20 top scientists. So it has been a very, very long. It has been an extremely long work. But we are happy because, first of all, it's really extremely interesting. It's really wonderful and very exciting. We have met so many interesting people and it is an achievement. We are very happy of that.
- [06:57]
Caleb Zakrin
Yeah. Selling as many copies as you have is a incredible achievement in the book world. And I think it's because you're speaking to something that a lot of people feel are and are naturally intrigued by these sorts of existential philosophical questions. I want to start rather than looking at, know some of the, the evidence that you proffer for the existence of God and start with, you know, why science has been seen often as, as supporting atheism. So I, obviously there, there is, you know, the kind of the twin sciences of geology and of evolutionary biology that those are seen many ways as, as, as chipping away at the. Some of the beliefs in the, that, you know, in that humans were created, that there wasn't, that they didn't evolve, and also that the earth is 6,000 years old. So I was wondering if you just talk a little about some of the evidence that you see in the past that was going against maybe some of the beliefs that were being put forth in the Bible.
- [08:01]
Michel Bolleret
Yes. First of all, I would like to reply to your first question. Yes. The success of the book has been a surprise for everybody, including for us, and we have discovered something we ignored completely is that there is a real hunger in the general public to know more about this question because there is some anxiety because there are many people and sometimes family are divided. And also it's a very important question because it's one of the most important question of our life. If there is no creator God, we are just animals. And if there is a creator God, then we are not animals. We are much more. We have a soul. And in that case there is something at stake which is possibly an eternal life. So I believe really that every one of us, each of us, it would be reasonable to think and to reflect and to work a little bit on this question at least once in a life. Voila. Now to come back to Your second question? Yes, it's very important because if we start at Renaissance, around 1500, at that time in Europe, 100%, almost 100% of the people were believing in God. And then modern science appeared. And we all know there has been three big shock in Europe. The first shock has been about cosmology. We all know this shock with Copernicus, Galileo, Newton, Laplace. And the first thing which appeared to people is that it was possible to explain the universe without God. And you know, if you can, if it is possible to explain universe without God, some people started to cease to think that perhaps the reason of that, the reason for that is that simply God did not exist. So after the cosmological shock came another shock you were mentioning. It's not mainly Buffon who discovered that the planet Earth was not 6,000 years ago, but million of years. Well, he was wrong because it's in fact it is billion of years. But nevertheless the shock was there. And then after, there has been a third shock, very strong, even probably the strongest shock in Europe, in the Christian Europe, it is the evolution, which is Lamarck and Darwin. And people realized two things. First, the ideas they had in mind have been, you know, have been challenged. And the reality was not what they had in mind. So that first shock and the second shock is that people said, well, now we can explain everything without the necessity of a creator God. So then came the philosophers of the 18th century and they all said, if we can explain the universe without God, it is very simple. It's because God does not exist. After the philosopher came other scientists like Freud and Marx. And they said, not only we can explain the universe without God, not only it doesn't exist, but is toxic, it's a poison. And we must get rid of God and all religion and then man, humanity will be free and wealthy. And after that it was beginning of the 1900 and almost all the scientists and philosophers were all atheists. So this explains the revolution we have seen during the 20th century. From Mexico, France, Italy with Mussolini, Germany with Hitler, Russia with Lenin and Stalin, China with Mao Zedong, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So all these revolutions. So science influenced philosophy, philosophy influenced religion and political ideas. And, and this is how revolution has been started. And what is very interesting is that surprisingly, and everybody was very surprised, many discoveries happen which reverse completely this, it is a reversal. And these discoveries, three, mainly three type of discoveries mainly came and said we cannot anymore explain the universe without a creator God. So the three questions which are challenging materialism today is the first Thing is the absolute beginning of the universe. So the first question is, have our universe had an absolute beginning or not? And everybody understand and agree that if our universe had an absolute beginning, then there is a necessity for a creator God. Everybody agrees on that. So in fact, the materialists today, they don't agree on the absolute beginning. But as you can see, the absolute beginning of the universe is a scientific question. And in the last century, five evidence. I'm not going to discuss this evidence because it would be too long. And those of your listeners who are interested will read the book. Five evidence came, independent evidence, different one from the other came and said, it's not possible that our universe is eternal. Our universe has certainly had an absolute beginning. It has been thermodynamic expansion of the universe, the big bang, the quantum mechanic, which has been showing that there is no infinite in our universe. And finally, mathematics and philosophy, all this have discovered evidence that our universe cannot be eternal. So if the universe is not eternal, if it had an absolute beginning, then we have to come to the conclusion that there is something. Because we all understand, like the philosopher Parmenides have said, 2,500 years ago, he said, it's usually known in Latin, ex nihil, o nil, which in English gives from nothing, nothing can come from nothing, from nothingness, nothing can come out of nothing. So as we are real, we are not nothing. So we are something. We cannot come from nothing. Or the universe is eternal, or if it is not, there is somebody eternal who has made the universe, and that's God. So that's the first thing. It is the discoveries about the beginning of the universe. It's not absolute proof, but it's very strong evidence. The second type of discoveries which have challenged materialism is the fine tuning of the universe. I believe that more or less we all know what is the fine tuning of the universe. And today there is not really a. A good explanation of the fact that our universe is so finely tuned. And the third shock, which happened also in the 20th century, is that if God does not exist, life must come naturally from matter, out of matter. And for a long time, people, everybody thought that it was easy that life would come out of matter, from. From, you know, from a hot pond at the foot of a volcano with some chemical products and perhaps, you know, some electricity and magnetism and whatever. And now we know that life, the smallest cell, is something extraordinarily complicated, more than a huge aircraft. More of like, it's very, very complicated, with plenty of computers and languages, et cetera. So we Realize now that for life to come out of matter is. Now is a huge leap. You know, it's not a small gap to fill. It's a huge leap. And this creates a problem. So this is the three problems of the 20th century. The beginning of the universe, the fine tuning, and how can life search or appear from enough matter?
- [16:38]
Caleb Zakrin
Right. And you know, there are a variety of ways in which someone might think about these examples. For example, like a very popular idea now is, I don't know to the extent to which people who profess this actually believe it as simulation theory, that the Universe is some simulation program like now that might point to some sort of existence of God. What type of God that is, we don't necessarily know. But you know, when you think about just the Big Bang argument, it doesn't necessarily imply any particular type of God. There might be some, some, you know, greater power, but we don't know what type of God that is. So I'm kind of curious a little bit if you could, you know, extrapolate a little bit how you are imagining this, this God, that. That is supported by, by the science that you, that you, that you detail in the book.
- [17:31]
Michel Bolleret
Yes. In fact, it's not so easy to keep the interpretations that you are proposing because what we know from the big bong is that since Einstein, we know that is that space, matter and time are completely linked together, which means at the beginning of the universe, it's not only the beginning of matter, it's not only the beginning of time, but it's also the beginning of space. So before, if we can say if the world exists, there was no time, no matter, no space, no space at all. So what is the reason which has been able, what is the philosophical reason which could have been able to create simultaneously space, time and matter? No, it's a very powerful cause. So everybody, everyone can give a name to this cause, but usually the philosophers admit that this cause has a general name, which is God. It doesn't mean that we want to know what is the name of God or who he is or where. But just take the impine message. The definition of God, according to the philosopher, just is a cause is the cause of everything. That's all. And we don't want to know more about that. At least our book doesn't care about to know more. We just want to know, in fact, is materialism, is it still, is it still valid belief? Is it still a rational belief? And in fact what appears today is that materialism, which is a belief, you know, like any other One, materialism today is turning to be a little bit an irrational belief. And that's a lot already. Now if we are of course the answers of materialist and many people is say, well, we are in a universe, but there are billion of other universe. And this is how to explain that our universe is so good. In fact, we are in the good one, but there are plenty of other universes which are not so good. Well, it's, you know, everything of course, is theoretically possible, but it's not very likely.
- [19:53]
Caleb Zakrin
Yes. Yeah. One of the scientists that you deal with at length in the book, whose ideas and whose research I think feed in quite a bit to some of the arguments you make as Albert Einstein, who had a very interesting relationship with religious belief. And I was wondering if you just explained, give a little bit of some background on how Albert Einstein's scientific ideas inspired his own faith in God.
- [20:19]
Michel Bolleret
Yes, that's very important because Einstein is considered and he deserves it is considered as the most important scientist of the 20th century. And very probably he is. So what Einstein believes in is important for everybody. So we have made a chapter just for Einstein. So just to make it very short, Einstein had no religion, he had no relation with God, but he was what we call a deist. He believed that there was a cause, that there was a very powerful spirit, a powerful spirit who did everything. So this is exactly the good definition for Albert Einstein. He said something like, you will find it in the book. Something like, everyone who is interested in science and knows science understand that everything has been made by some spirit much more clever than all of us. So he was believing in something, but he refused all his life to have a religion or to adhere to a faith.
- [21:35]
Indeed Advertiser
This episode is brought to you by Indeed. When your computer breaks, you don't wait for it to magically start working again. You fix the problem. So why wait to hire the people your company desperately needs? Use Indeed's sponsored jobs to hire top talent fast. And even better, you only pay for results. There's no need to wait. Speed up your hiring with a $75 sponsored job credit@ Indeed.com podcast. Terms and conditions apply.
- [22:05]
Mint Mobile Advertiser
Mint is still $15 a month for premium wireless. And if you haven't made the switch yet, here are 15 reasons why you should. One, it's $15 a month. Two, seriously, it's $15 a month. Three, no big contracts. Four, I use it. Five, my mom uses it.
- [22:21]
Lowe's Advertiser
Are you.
- [22:21]
Mint Mobile Advertiser
Are you playing me off? That's what's happening, right? Okay, give it a try@mintmobile.com Switch upfront.
- [22:28]
Michel Bolleret
Payment of $45 for three month plan.
- [22:29]
WhatsApp Advertiser
$15 per month equivalent required New customer.
- [22:31]
Michel Bolleret
Offer first three months only, then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com bundle and safe. With Expedia you were made to follow your favorite band and from the front.
- [22:40]
Lowe's Advertiser
Row we were made to quietly save.
- [22:43]
Michel Bolleret
You more Expedia made to travel savings vary and subject to availability.
- [22:47]
Lowe's Advertiser
Flight inclusive packages are atoll protected.
- [22:50]
Caleb Zakrin
There's other, other scientists too that you also look at and I was wondering if, you know, without asking you to run through every single scientist that you look at or every mathematician like Godel, just other views from scientists that you have found particularly interesting and compelling.
- [23:04]
Michel Bolleret
Well, of course it's extremely interesting to listen to some, the most important scientists, what they can say about that. So you know, many, many scientists have been very surprised by all what happened during this 20th century. And we have written a chapter with only the opinion of the scientists. We have made a special chapter with hundred citations of 100 very important scientists. And just to give just the surprise for many of them, especially when they have discovered first the thermodynamics at the very beginning of the 20th century, even at the end of the 19th century, also the surprise with the expansion of universe, the surprise with the Big bang, then with a of course with the fine tuning of the universe, and finally with life. It's very interesting. For example, we are giving a citation of an atheist. I like it very much. It's George Wald. George Wald is a Nobel Prize of medicine or biology. And in the 1970s, so not long ago he just declared, and this is one of the citation citations of the book, he declared we know now that there is for the origin of life there is only two possibilities. The first possibility is the generation from inert matter, natural generation from inert matter to life, or the creation by God. And he says there is no other possibility. And that's true, there is no other possibility. And then he had we know now that the spontaneous generation of life from matter is not possible. But I don't want to believe in God because philosophically I don't want to believe in God. So I prefer to believe in something I know impossible, which is a spontaneous apparition of life from matter. But it's very interesting because you see that in fact the question of the creation, the question of the existence of a creator God is also a passionate question. And some people, they don't want to whatever are the evidence, whatever are the evidence, they don't want to hear about A creator God. Because they believe probably that it will limit their freedom. They believe it will. They will. You know, many people don't. People want to have no God, no master. So even if you are a top scientist, many people don't want to have God. So they will say, I don't believe whatever are the evidence. But many others have changed their mind and many scientists have changed their mind and have become believers in God after studying science. So it's very interesting and we have a special chapter on that. It's very, very interesting.
- [26:27]
Caleb Zakrin
Yeah, it's interesting to see the opinions and the thoughts of different scientists also studying very different things and how they come to their own sense of whether or not God exists or how life comes about. I find this question, a really fascinating question about how, how life comes from. From, you know, how immaterial things can then end up leading to, to something that has life in it. And I was wondering if you could talk about this particular, this conundrum and how people think about it.
- [27:09]
Michel Bolleret
About, you mean from life. From matter.
- [27:11]
Caleb Zakrin
From. Yeah, life from matter. So, you know, the, the, the development of the first single celled organism.
- [27:18]
Michel Bolleret
I think it's one of the most convincing chapter of the book and all the evidence we have, it is a leap from matter to life. The huge leap from matter to life. You see, the idea of Darwin in 1870, 150 years ago, was that life appeared naturally in a hot, small pound of hot water somewhere at the foot of a volcano and with some electricity and lightnings and heating and chemicals. And then a cell appeared. And everybody thought exactly the same. And everybody agreed. And for 100 years, almost everybody agreed. And in the 1950s, which is not long ago, in the 1950s, there were laboratories in United States, many laboratories, making experiments, trying to see if they could obtain something from a primordial soup, from a, you know, from primitive soup, from. So they were working on that. And the most well known one was Miller in the 1950s. So he has been working a lot and he has been obtaining very little. But he was not alone. There was many other laboratories, probably six laboratories or seven huge laboratories were spending time and money trying to see if from a primordial soup they could obtain something and for example, also obtain life cell. But at the same time, at the end of the 50s, DNA, RNA and Ribosome were discovered. And then people understood that in a cell there were computers, there were a language, there were a lot of software. Extraordinarily complicated. And people realized that all these experiments were vague and very interestingly, all These laboratories have closed. And this is in some ways a proof, you know, why did they close their doors or these libraries? They have stopped all these experiments. They have stopped because they have understood that it was impossible to hope that from a hot pond somewhere on Earth, even adding chemical products or adding anything, one cell would appear any day. So nobody believes now anymore that life has appeared in a pound of hot water somewhere on Earth. So in some ways, the fact that all these laboratories, they gave up this research is a way to prove. They admit themselves, they admit themselves that life cannot search from matter that way. So now there are some other theories, but which are much more complicated. And most of them believe that if life appeared somewhere, it appeared probably in space or on other planets for chemical reason. But everybody realized that it's a very, very complicated thing, because you see in a cell, the density of information is 1 billion times more complex and rich than in the more complex computers today. So you imagine what is a cell, the simplest cell, is something extraordinarily complicated.
- [31:09]
Caleb Zakrin
Yeah, it's an incredible mystery. And obviously, even a single cell is. Is unbelievably complex in terms of its contents. You talk also about not just how scientists in terms of their discoveries, because obviously scientists are humans who are living in the world and are faced with moral questions every single day. And I was wondering if you talk a little bit about some of the ways that you talk about morality and what you. How you approach this as an argument for the existence of God.
- [31:49]
Michel Bolleret
Yes, it's a very strong argument, which is completely different because it is not a scientific argument. But if there is no creator God, if God does not exist, we are animals. We are animals resulting from chance and necessity. So, in fact, there is no difference between you and me and a mosquito. It's something the same. We are just particles arranged. There is an arrangement of particles. We are smarter than mosquitoes, we are larger than mosquito. But by nature, we are similar to a mosquito. So in that case, we have to accept, if we want to be logical, if we want to be coherent, we have to accept that good and evil do not exist at all. And it's something very, very few people are ready to admit, that good and evil does not exist. For example, if God doesn't exist, good and evil does not exist. And for example, in United States, the Congress could decide, in any country, the Congress, Parliament could decide to kill, I don't know what to every. All the Jews, for example, and it would be legal and good. They could decide to kill the children or the old people or to do anything, there is no limit. It was in the book of Dostoevsky, a very well known book at that time, the hero says, wow, but if God does not exist, then everything is permitted. And it's exactly true. If God does not exist, everything is permitted. So can we accept that? Don't we feel inside ourselves that there is a limit that we are not ready to go beyond? Are we ready to kill people really for money? Are we ready to kill people? If I offer you $100 million to kill a family, and where you are sure that nobody will know and nobody, you will be free and you can enjoy your money all your life, will you do it? Can you do it? And there is something in you, there is something in me, and I call it my soul. There is something in us which says, no, no, there is a limit, we can't do it. So a materialist believes that we are animals, there is no good and evil. And he has to admit if he wants to equ. Something which is extremely hard, extremely painful to accept, is that there is no good and no evil and everything is permitted.
- [34:38]
Caleb Zakrin
I'm wondering for you what you find to be the most compelling argument that materialists offer.
- [34:49]
Michel Bolleret
The most compelling agreement for the most.
- [34:53]
Caleb Zakrin
Compelling argument that materialists, you know, when you find yourself, I'm sure that you know, in the course of writing this book and discussing it, you found yourself getting pushback from various people. So what do you find to be the most compelling argument that you really have to. Had to sit and think about how to. How to counter?
- [35:08]
Michel Bolleret
Yes, the most frequent and compelling arguments is always the same. It is if a God who is good has done really the world. How is it possible to explain all what we can see in our world, which is disease, death and all the terrible things we can see? So this is the most difficult and the most frequent question of people. How is it possible that a good God would have done a world like ours? And there are reasons for that, but it's something different we don't have time to discuss. But it is the most important, the most sensitive, the most understandable argument of people. And there is another argument which is the one I gave you just before. It is the argument of the other who says, well, I don't know, but I don't want to have God in my life because I want to be free. Well, they are wrong because in fact, people are not more free because they don't believe in God. Sometime even it's just right, the opposite. But this is what people say, no, master, no God No God, no master. I don't want to obey anything. So I don't want God, even if he exists. I don't want to have anyone in my land. So I would say that the two most frequent reason people give to say I don't want. I don't believe in God or I don't want God in my life.
- [36:43]
Caleb Zakrin
Right? And obviously that, you know, it's called, I think the Odyssey has been around for a very long time, these sorts of arguments around, you know, if there's bad in the world, then how could God exist? And if God does exist, then God is not all powerful or some other force like the Antichrist or whomever. That is also, you know, challenging. So it's, it's a very interesting argument. And obviously these are these sorts of arguments that you, that you go through in the, in many ways have been, have been around for thousands of years. People have been debating these issues. But I think what's very interesting about the book or what's very, what's very novel about it is the way in which you thread in the views and thoughts and opinions of different scientists and of ways in which contemporary scientific research, you know, might support the existence of God. And, and I'm wondering, you know, for you as, as this book, you know, has recently been translated into English and as you're, you're preparing for the rollout, you know, what you think about just the current state of, you know, religious belief. If it's, if it's something that, you know, that you feel, you know, though there's been quite a, you know, quite a lot of, I think they call them none in America. They call them nuns and o. Any, you know, people that don't have any religion, though there has been a resurgence. And how you think about that just in terms of the, you know, the kind of the gyrations of history.
- [38:11]
Michel Bolleret
Yes, the number of believers is, is declining and has been declining all in all countries, especially in Europe, much more in Europe than in the United States, but in all countries, including also in United States. And the reason for that are, I think, well known. First, we have all this impact of science for four centuries. And all these discoveries we have been talking of and the new discoveries which are in favor of, of the existence of God are not well known today. They are not known at all. And it will take time because nothing is immediate. So it will take probably, I don't know, perhaps 20 years, 40 years, 50 years, one century to make it known. So the scientific discoveries from Renaissance to 1900, but also the Scientific progress, which has made that in the past time. People, when they were sick or they were afraid to die, or they were very poor, they were praying to God to solve their problem. Now, with a much longer life with hospital, with medicine, people feel. It's not sure it's true, but they feel that they don't need God in their life. You know, now they don't need God because they have the hospital, they have the doctor, they have the state welfare. They have many, many things. And they have quite enough money. There is no more problems. For nobody is dying, you know, is dying for food. It doesn't exist anymore. So probably all this, the increase of the duration of life. And the increase of also of wealth of people. Has made that people. That God was not so necessary. So it's probably, in my opinion, one of the very important reason for that. So we shall see. We don't know the future. And it's interesting that at least in one field, which is a field of science, science is leaving a great reversal. And our book is there because we would like people to know that this reversal exists. The book is easy to read. People, ordinary people. The book is made, has been written for ordinary people like you and me. So people can read that they can be convinced. The questions addressed by this book are simple. They are not complicated. Question, question. The beginning of the universe is not a complicated question. So we are very happy to be able to, if I may say, translate. Because we have not made ourselves any discoveries, of course, we are just writers. So we present this. So we are happy that this book has success. We have been ourselves surprised with the success of the book. Now we understand why. As I told you, there is a thirst, there is an anger to know more about God. Because people realize, perhaps they are wealthy people, live long, but they are touching with their fingers emptiness. They are touching with their fingers the fact that their life is empty. And their life is worth nothing and is going nowhere. Pleasure is not pleasure. Food and all this is not holidays. Is not a goal. Is not a goal making us happy. So people are feeling that they are somewhere which is not happy. And they are just wondering if perhaps all this way is wrong. And there is another way and another reality. And is there another reality? Is a creator God exists? Is there a life possible, eternal life after our life? That would be wonderful. Would it be possible that after our life we could be with the people we loved in the past? Our parents, all the people who have died? Is it possible that we could meet together one day? That's a hope. And this hope, which is of course a hope of faith, is supported today by science. And this is what we would like people to know. This is what we have written this book.
- [43:06]
Caleb Zakrin
I think a lot of readers will find a lot of the arguments that you make very interesting. And and I'm very curious to see what the reception is like in the United States and, you know, among people in the scientific community, among people non scientists, you know, just general readers. But I think that it's a it's a book that, you know, no matter what a person, if they're a believer or a non believer, I think that they will find it very interesting. So, Michel, it was really wonderful to have you on the New Books Network and I really enjoyed our conversation.
- [43:34]
Michel Bolleret
Thank you very much. Also thank you very much. It was very interesting very much.
- [43:38]
Caleb Zakrin
It was great speaking with you.