George wrote: “Whether Jesus is trivial or not compared to another Jew, e.g. Einstein, it depends on what are your priorities. If it is physics then certainly he is. If it is about being a source of wisdom (whether or not you believe in his historicity) then certainly Jesus’ teachings were understood and DIRECTLY influenced many, many more people than Einstein’s relativity theories, and the triviality comparison would go the other way around.”

Dear George,

Jesus’ Jewishness is important because it is part of the myth of the Messiah that he must be a descendant of David. If one accepts the myth then the Jewishness of Jesus is relevant.

Einstein’s Jewishness has no bearing on the validity of his work. Either his work can be verified by observation and experiment or it can’t.

However, I prefer Einstein to Jesus as a source of wisdom. According to scripture Jesus claimed that only through him could one enter the kingdom of heaven. That is pure arrogance. It doesn’t what kind of life you have led or how good a person you were only if you believe in a particular bit of mumbojumbo are you accepted. Unfortunately many people prefer authoritarian statements to humility.

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/a/albert_einstein.html points to a number of Einstein quotes. Three of them follow.

Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.

The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.

Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death.

I don’t believe Jesus was the least bit concerned with curiosity or intellectual growth. He was pushing faith. I think there’s too much faith in the world already.

A Newton quote:

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/i/isaac_newton.html

If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.

The above quote is most refreshing compared to the arrogance of Jesus.

Of course there are many more statements made by Jesus, Einstein and Newton. However, from what I have read I prefer the wisdom of Einstein and Newton to that of Jesus.

Dear david f,

When I say 'we' I am only referring to myself and people with my background. I don't think you are a member of that 'we' because I don't think you have the save background as me. We (in this case you and I) can test that hypothesis just by comparing notes but I think I know enough about you to surmise that that would show that we do not belong to the same 'we' (me, you and others like me).

I'm sure there are lots of points we (ie. you and I and probably others like you and I) could use to test whether or not Jesus was the greatest figure in world history vis-a-vis Newton, Darwin and Einstein. I (i.e.. me but excluding others of the egocentric we) think one test is to ask if Jesus stood on the shoulders of others with respect to his achievements. My answer would be no. But I cannot say the same about Newton, Darwin and Einstein.

Interesting question - was Jesus the most influential figure in world history?

I stumble over the problem of Christianity claiming that Jesus was in fact God (God the father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost). If you believe in Christianity, then God has to be the most influential figure not because of setting up Christianity in his supposed incarnation as Jesus, but in creating the universe. The universe influences all of us whether or not we are Christians, so that has to be the more influential act.

If we rule Jesus out of the competition because he is God, then who would be the most influential human? In establishing Christianity, that might be Peter, or Constantine. On a world basis Mohammed might come into contention - he didn't claim to be God/Allah, just his messenger. Over the last 2000 years, we could accept the human founders of Christianity, over the last 1500, maybe Mohammed, if we're talking about influence over the largest number of people, and in the most impactful way. "Influence" after all can be good or bad, and the same "influence" might be good and bad, depending whether you on the giving or receiving side.

Taking another tack, maybe this is a false comparison: between those figures (or gods) who created religions and those who advanced our understanding of the world and our ability to manage it to our advantage. So maybe Einstein, Darwin at al should be compared to the person(s) who invented the wheel, planted the first seed, and built the first irrigation canal. Their influence was huge, across people of all religions. Surprised the engineers on this forum weren't already cheering for them!

Dear Cossomby,

For Christ's sake please don't get the engineers involved. They don't know anything about history, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, archaeology, etc. All they know about is what they were trained to do. That is, making roads, machines, electric motors, etc. If you are going to start asking engineers about the origins of agriculture, urbanisation, culture, civilisation, etc., then you may as well ask a bunch of 10 year old primary school children as well in order to get a balanced view.

Ah, Mr Opinion, I've worked with some lovely engineers. Though they do have a tendency to think water, like light, always travels in straight lines, down pipes.

Dear Shadow Minster,

Thank You for bringing up this topic for
discussion. I also found it exciting to
learn about the black holes. And look to
learning more in the future.

To me science differs from other types
of knowledge in that scientific progress
depends on new ideas expanding or replacing
old ones. Great works of art produced today
do not take the place of masterpieces
of the past. But the theories of modern
scientists have revised many ideas held by
earlier scientists. Repeated observations
and experiments lead scientists to update
existing theories and to propose new ones.

As new discoveries continue to be made
even many recent scientific theories will become
outdated, and will have to be replaced by
better theories that can explain more facts.
It's exciting that scientific knowledge is
always growing and improving.