Calculating God

Rating:
Summary: God it¿s good but not great
Review: Robert Sawyer is the greatest science fiction writer that Canada has produced and one of the finest in the world. In Calculating God, Sawyer doesn't back down from the serious questions that arise when looking at the existence of God.

Sawyer's setting is the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto where an atheistic paleontologist plays host to space aliens who wish to examine fossil records. Their purpose is to confirm that previous mass extinctions were the work of God using evolution to develop intelligent species. Our human hero is incredulous and disbelieving of course but then the aliens reel off an incredible barrage of evidence to show that the odds of the universe as we know it existing are for all intents and purposes zero without a creator's plan. While the argument and story line progress our paleontologist is stricken with lung cancer.

Calculating God also has a sub-plot that involves bombing an abortion clinic. One would think that this was a regular occurrence in Canada if one didn't know the difference. I suspect that Sawyer wrote this sub-plot to fill out the story, create some action and to make his own rather one-sided philosophical point. Whatever the case, it doesn't fit in Calculating God.

Ultimately, Sawyer does come up with an explanation of God that doesn't fit the Judeo-Christian vision nor that of any other major religion although his God is more activist than that of Spinoza. Sawyer's God suits both his hard science bent and his New Age philosophy.

Calculating God is a very good novel although not a great one. I believe Robert Sawyer is capable of greatness as he demonstrated with The Terminal Experiment for instance. There are a couple of problems with Calculating God such as the bombing sub-plot mentioned above and the first person perspective which is logically inconsistent but it's still well worth reading. Sawyer not quite perfect is better than most writers at their peak. Maybe next time he will give us that brilliant work that is waiting to come out. Maybe he needs some divine inspiration.

Rating:
Summary: A fun first-contact story with interesting ideas
Review: My favorite scene: A huge, spidery-looking alien enters the lobby of the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, approaches the guard, and says in perfect English, "I would like to speak to a paleontologist." The guard, figuring that another movie is being filmed in Toronto, decides to play along and replies, "Vertebrate or invertebrate?" The alien, confused by this question, asks, "Are not all your paleontologists humans and therefore vertebrates?"

This is an entertaining story about our first visit from aliens. It's also an interesting version of the "teleological" argument for the existence of God--the argument that, since the world and the creatures in it show evidence of having been carefully and intelligently designed, there must be a Designer. This story takes that argument to a cosmic scale, as the alien scientists/theologians enlist our help in their project.

(I'm confused, though, about why anyone believes that this argument has religious significance. Maybe our universe does have a designer, but what does that have to do with God? Maybe it's not one designer but a committee. Maybe the designer is not good but evil or at least incompetent--as might well be inferred from all the suffering in the world. The argument doesn't even try to prove that the designer is loving, forgiving, just, gracious, or any of the stuff we really long for from our God.)

But anyway, it's a fun book, whether you're interested in religion or not.

Rating:
Summary: Interesting Novel
Review: "Calculating God" is a very interesting novel. It brings suspence, excitement and curiosity to the viewer. When i found out that the main character Tom Jerico has a deadly disease i felt for him. i like this book especially cause im from Toronto and when he starts describing toronto and the subway station i new it. it was interesting to read it. But i was disapointed in the ending. Also some of his scientific parts were rather boring and complex. So for the simple minded person. It might be hard to read. But overall a great novel!

Rating:
Summary: Different than anything I have read before
Review: Let me start this out by saying that I am an atheist. This book did not change that fact. I am also a molecular biologist. Sawyer manages to explain very complex molecular processes as "regular" people can understand them, and yet he gets it right. There is not the dumbing down that often happens. That I enjoyed quite a lot.

I was intruiged by the title of the book, and decided to try it out. This is any extremely funny, thought-provoking, sad, and uplifting book. Yes, those may seem like contradictions, but I believe that they are all accurate descriptions.

Doubtless you have read the synopsis, so you know about the general premise. And as to the person who thought that Tom's illness was "distracting".... I think that it adds a great dimension to the book.

The characterizations were vivid, and I could actually picture Hollus, and the other aliens, to a certain extent. That is really cool to me, considering how different they are from our normal "Spock" representations of "alien" life.

I read this book in a day. Great read, makes you think, highly recommended. Try it if you want to think about the possibilities.

Rating:
Summary: A philosophical SF classic!
Review: It may appear premature to speak of CALCULATING GOD as a "SF classic", but it does have all the ingredients to put it in this lofty category: fine writing, excellent imagination, and a philosophical dialogue between an Alien Being and a moribund human that transcends the well-worn paths of the science fiction genre.

On the whole, the novel can be taken as an optimist's antidote to the black cynicism of James Morrow's equally brilliant ETERNAL FOOTMAN.

Rating:
Summary: is it fiction or could it be reality?
Review: When i first started this book i didn't know what to expect and to tell the truth the aliens saying "take me to your paleontalogist" was a little cheesy, but from there it all went above and beyond what my imagination was expecting.

First off this book is very well written, there is alot of technical stuff about dna, mass extinction, etc. but none of it's gets too bogged down for a comman person like myself to understand. secondly the aliens are very imaginative in their looks, nothing like humans, and sawyer explains why. the interaction between the main characters and the aliens are great. Two more memorable parts are when the main character is showing star trek episodes to the alien, and when the alien comes down for dinner with the main characters family.

The only bad part about this book in my opinion is the ending. Although it satisfied me somewhat, i wanted to know the truth about the aliens and their messages, and it was never completly answered.

But overall this book is not only worthwhile reading, every human being who wonders if god exsists, and definatly EVERY religous human should read this book. This book had such a good descriptioin of this scenario of god that i came away actually thinking that this could be true to a point. This book will change the way you see or think of god.

Rating:
Summary: amazing
Review: it made me cry at multiple points....it was the most powerful science fiction i've ever read.

Rating:
Summary: An excellent examination of faith and science
Review: Most authors choose to separate or contrast religion/faith and science. Sawyer has taken a bold controversial step to merger the two and write about both in the same novel. The story produces an interesting outlook on how the two are connected. Hollus, a spider-like alien (which was a little hard to believe at first) comes to the ROM in Toronto and meets up with Tom Jericho, an archaeologist. Tom studies extensively with Hollus while he battles cancer. This is interesting because often when people are dying they will eventually turn to faith because they get to the point where they feel they have nothing left. This Tom eventually does, but not without the help of his friend and mentor, Hollus and his degrading condition. A very fantastic novel which is justified by the fact that it is a "game of dice", with God as the player.

An excellent read for those who have an open enough mind to merge religion/faith and science into one realm.

Rating:
Summary: Simply Amazing
Review: "Calculating God" has to be one of the best books I've read, science fiction or otherwise. The book is basically about one man's struggle to come to terms with his own death and his beliefs about God. But the story gets MUCH bigger than that. The end of the novel (which is excellent) proves the ultimate existence of God and may even show the birth of another God, to reign over the universe that follows this one, as the current God may be the sole "survivor" from the universe preceding this one. You won't want to miss this book...it suggests an answer to a problem that has plagued the human race for a long time: how science and religion can exist together, in harmony.

Rating:
Summary: Science Fiction Which Promotes Creationism!
Review: Robert Sawyer, some say, is Canada's answer to Michael Crichton. I would agree. Like Crichton, Sawyer tells a fascinating story in a fun-filled manor. Also, like Crichton, Sawyer confuses science with fantasy.

There is one major difference between both writers; Crichton plays with dinosaur DNA and super-mysterious Spheres never trying to claim this fiction is hard-science fiction. He is the perfect science-fantasy writer balancing his art somewhere between George Lucas and Greg Bear.

Sawyer, however, has written many hard-science fiction books, many, quite fun to read, like his Quintalaglio Trilogy, Starplex, and Illegal Alien. He has sited the great scientists of the past two centuries from Galileo to Sagan, and from Darwin to Gould. But with his book The Terminal Experiment-where he claims scientists find proof for the Soul-Sawyer began to use his fiction more as a weapon of anti-science propaganda rather than entertainment.

This is most certainly true of his latest book-recently published in mass-market form-Calculating God. In this book, Earth is visited by two different alien species, the Forhilors & the Wreeds (could he have meant Creeds?). Both species have come to the conclusion that science has proven the existence of God, and Sawyer's human scientists must deal with the fact that these aliens are not Jerry Falwell, but advanced intelligent life far ahead of humans in technology. Alas, the perfect way for Sawyer to claim that Creationism and God-belief is the intelligent response to our universe.

From the line on page 18 stating, "That we live in a created universe is apparent to anyone with sufficient intelligence and information," to Sawyers' conclusion that the aliens' God really
does exist, is par the course in Calculating God.

The premise backing the alien's creationism? The Anthropic Principal, which states that the universe "seems" to be such that with the slightest change of physics & chemistry, it would not be able to sustain life; therefore, that this universe happened to indeed have life (at least on Earth as readers must remember, we have not found Forhilors or Wreeds quite yet), means that this universe is one amazing lucky chance for us all!

But chance is not what Sawyer has in mind. As much as he tries to prove this however, by stating coincidence after coincidence, he cannot scientifically rule out either the multi-universe idea, or any other scientific explanation, which would show chance is the key factor indeed. The only way Sawyer does back up is pseudo-scientific ideas in his novel is via his alien creations.

Sawyer proposes a universe where all life seems to be so similar that evolution on all planets followed the same cycles producing only minor differences in form. He even concocts the absurd idea that the two alien worlds and Earth went through the exact same kind of mass extinctions, at the exact same time; and, of course, this was caused by God towards His ultimate goal for life in the universe. How convenient that this is so in Sawyers universe!

Sawyer also includes more traditional creationist ideas like how cilia or the human eye could have formed one step at a time and still be functional at each step. He chooses to ignore Richard Dawkins work in this, which clearly explains that Irreducible Complexity is just a bad idea. Sawyer's aliens ask of humans how we could "believe in" evolution's idea of speciation if we have never seen a fish turn into a human. Or, how could we "believe" in the Big Bang if we cannot know what occurred at the origin of the universe "absolutely." But we HAVE shown how speciation occurs and that the Big Bang has occurred, we do not need an expanded life-span to know these scientific theories are true.

In his novel, as in past works, Sawyer talks about two great scientific minds: Carl Sagan and Steven J. Gould. But he chooses, with Gould, to focus on his one work of dubious merit, "Rock of Ages." With Sagan, he attacks his one and only novel Contact, as being pro-God. It is amusing that this reference appears in Calculating God. About three years ago, this writer had an email dialogue with Sawyer on his pseudo-science debacle; Terminal Experiment. In that conversation he brought up Contact and said to me, well, just what he later wrote into Calculating God. "It (Contact) said that the universe had been designed, created to order by a vast sentience...(Sagan)...allowed the possibility of a creator."

He then went on to say, as he did in the conversation with me, that Sagan did not have to believe what he wrote in the novel any more than Lucas had to believe in the Force. But clearly, Sawyer wants to discredit these two atheists by addressing that somewhere beneath their hard exterior lives(ed) men of Faith after all. Besides, Sagan did not mean what Sawyer thinks he meant, and Lucas writes FANTASY, not hard Science Fiction.

In the end, the god of Calculating God is some sort of superior entity who plays with universes to create offspring in it's own image. Sound familiar? Of course, if such a creature existed, as startling as it might be, it would certainly be a challenge for science and NOT for religion. It is time for Sawyer to reconsider himself a fantasy writer, or a science-fantasy writer at most, and stay far, far away from hard science fiction.