The Catholic Book Club discussion

5) Which of the veiled historical characters comes most alive to you? Least alive?

I like Agatha Christie, though she doesn't really play a central role.
Edith Stein is sort of weak and maybe not accurate (she was teaching in a high school at this time, not sure she ever lectured in Heidelberg).
Who was "Hugh" in the Inklings?
Who is "Drake"? Churchill?

Hugo Dyson.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Dyson

I liked Chesterton, and found him well characterized.

My favorite is Chesty, Chesty, Chesty. Although i am sure that a lot of my heros Will appear in this story.

I have a couple of issues about the philosophical discussion in the last chapter of Part II, between John and Jones.

a) Einstein was famous, very well known to the general public since his General Relativity was confirmed by Arthur Eddington during a solar eclipse in 1919, and even more when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1921. I doubt that Tolkien would have never heard about him in 1930, even though he did not read newspapers every day.

b) Jones's mention of Kurt Gödel in July 4th 1930 is a clear anachronism. At that time, Gödel was unknown. His two famous incompleteness theorems were published in 1931. On the other hand, the Gödel described by Jones in his debate with John has nothing to do with the real Gödel. Jones uses Gödel to support his skeptic, nominalist, anti-realist theories: "Jones was asking if all of this was illusion, just a sensory and intellectual construct..." Although this vision is true to a current epistemological theory, it is the exact opposite of what Gödel defended, as he was a Platonic realist.

c) Gödel never said that "time is a human construct..." Being a realist, he couldn't. I think this is another anachronism, plus a misunderstanding of Gödel's work by the author of the novel. It is true that Gödel developed (much later, in 1949) a solution to Einstein's cosmological equation which would correspond to an universe with time loops. This would make time travel possible in that world. However, this universe would be devoid of matter, which means that time travel would be possible, but there could be no time travelers. In fact, he developed this solution precisely to prove Einstein that his equation could have very strange solutions; in fact, to make him doubt his equation. He was successful.

d) Gödel never considered time an illusion. Einstein did, but not as a consequence of his Relativity Theory. The reason was that Einstein had embraced the B theory about time, a philosophical, not a physical theory. (See this post in my blog for further information: http://populscience.blogspot.com/2016.... And this about Gödel's realism: https://populscience.blogspot.com/201...).

Manuel wrote: "I have a couple of issues about the philosophical discussion in the last chapter of Part II, between John and Jones.

a) Einstein was famous, very well known to the general public since his General..."
Well the only point that i can reply is the point one. The rest i lean to the superior criterion of my friend in scientific question. It is posible that Tolkien was not interested in scientific questions. For example in my case there are a lot of famous people that i am not interested to know.
About the next points i think that are very interesting and this constructive critic can help to T.M. Doran in future novels. One of my reasons because i wanted that the T.M. Doran`s book was chosen was to T.M. Doran and Manuel Alfonseca did Friends and could help and support together. Few persons know about science as Manuel Alfonseca, besides he is a good catholic, and his books are really good and very moral, with human carácter that they take the fairest decisión. He knows a lot the related with the Inklings because is an admirer of C.S. Lewis, indeed their books about Magic Jigsaw are influenced in the Chronicles of Narnia. All books of Manuel Alfonseca are worth to be well known out of Spain, even in Spain are not enough read.
About T.M. Doran this book is an evidence that he is an excellent storyteller. His story are liking the majority of the readers, despite the human mistakes and the Reading of this book are energizing the group. Perhaps we should suggest Reading the sequel Lucifer Ego.

Fonch wrote: "It is posible that Tolkien was not interested in scientific questions."

Fonch, Tolkien could have been uninterested in scientific questions, but it's extremely improbable that he had never heard speak of Einstein, over a decade after Einstein became a world famous name.

Manuel wrote: "Fonch wrote: "It is posible that Tolkien was not interested in scientific questions."

Fonch, Tolkien could have been uninterested in scientific questions, but it's extremely improbable that he had..."
It is true is really improbable, the own G.K. Chesterton in "New Jerusalem" had Heard about Einstein, but although think that you are right it is not imposible, ocasionally it is good to be the Devil Advocate and defending an improbable fact :-), but in my opinión that i say to you in my letter this question we should speak about this in the part of science, but we can not delete this message in case that Doran or other Catholic users want to participate in the discussion. It is for looking for more balance. This part has eight message and the part of the discussion dedicated to the science only one. We can continue the discussion in the part of science.

As an engineer/scientist myself, I have witnessed the misuse of science and the work of prominent scientists to defend a personally held position or to promote a cause. Recall Jones' primary purpose in this encounter.

John wrote: "5) Which of the veiled historical characters comes most alive to you? Least alive?"

Chesterton came most alive for me. I was intrigued by Edith, but didn't realize she was Edith Stein - that's my ignorance, not any fault of the author. I did figure that Drake was meant to be Churchill. I understood that the pubsters were the Inksters, but as I am not familiar with most of them, I didn't particularly identify with an of them.