Abstract

How do scientists and theologians conceive new ways of mapping the world? Can parallels be found between the images they use, or the models they offer when new questions arise? I will explore Albert Einstein’s views on scientific imagination with the goal of contributing – at least within his own perspective – to answering these questions. Drawing on McGrath, I will first briefly describe Einstein’s desire for a unified vision of reality, the links between science and a ‘cosmic religion’, and his overall ideas on transcendence. I will later further develop Einstein’s fundamental features of a cosmovision that grounds his work in physics, and encompasses his philosophical views on human existence and his general way of seeing the world. I will focus on Ideas and Opinions (1982), which will allow me to set the broad picture of his theory of everything and, at the same time, bring up the central aspects of Einstein’s ideas on the scientific imagination. Finally, I will briefly summarise my conclusions concerning Einstein’s views on the nature of scientific imagination as a mental device, especially regarding its twofold role in what I call ‘visual image play’ and conceptualization.