Aliens and C.S. Lewis (”Religion and Rocketry”), with Jordan Duncan

2023-06-13

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As a kind of epilogue to Out of the Silent Planet, Chris talks with Jordan Duncan from Lesser-Known Lewis about C.S. Lewis' 1958 essay, "Religion and Rocketry," also published as "Will We Lose God in Outer Space?" You can find it collected in The World's Last Night and Other Essays. This is a wide-ranging conversation (we get a lot of mileage out of a comparatively short essay), and we cover everything from the question of aliens, to government conspiracies, to apologetics, to Richard Dawkins, El...

As a kind of epilogue to Out of the Silent Planet, Chris talks with Jordan Duncan from Lesser-Known Lewis about C.S. Lewis' 1958 essay, "Religion and Rocketry," also published as "Will We Lose God in Outer Space?" You can find it collected in The World's Last Night and Other Essays.

This is a wide-ranging conversation (we get a lot of mileage out of a comparatively short essay), and we cover everything from the question of aliens, to government conspiracies, to apologetics, to Richard Dawkins, Elon Musk, James Cameron (and of course, Sir Fred B. Hoyle), to Lewis' idea of animals and humans "becoming" something higher and what that has to do with rational souls, to (oddly enough) the Monkey King from The Journey to the West, as well as The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, and The Story of Your Life (Arrival).

Come for the self-indulgent semi-conspiratorial ramblings, and stay for Chris actually disagreeing with C.S. Lewis about something, as well as for the following hypothetical questions, as posed by Lewis and by us:

If aliens existed would this invalidate the Christian faith?
If aliens existed would this actually prove the existence of God?
If aliens existed, should Western democracies opt out of the new space race that would result?
Should we avoid colonizing other planets (for instance, Mars), even if they are uninhabited?
Is adventure bad (the result of the Fall) or is it how God designed us? And isn't making contact with aliens another adventure?
Speaking of good intentions potentially having disastrous consequences: Is C.S. Lewis indirectly responsible for James Cameron's Avatar?

If you like this podcast, please rate it on iTunes. Please also consider dropping us a line at Inklingsvarietyhour@gmail.com. We'd love to hear from you.

Also, I highly recommend Jordan's podcast, Lesser-Known Lewis. This will be the first of a few collaborations.

Next time, I'll be talking with Sørina Higgins about her book of short stories, Shall These Bones Breathe?

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