A Chat w/ NASA-funded Italian Jesuit Andrea Vicini

Mar 17, 2017 1327

BY: Suzan Mazur

Andrea Vicini was one of two dozen religious scholars who between 2015 and 2017 shared nearly $3M awarded jointly by NASA and the John Templeton Foundation (administered by the Center of Theological Inquiry, Princeton) to investigate how the religious community would respond to the discovery of life in outer space. As I’ve already reported, informants at NASA tell me we will not find life anywhere else in the solar system. So why blow 5% of the NASA Astrobiology Institute budget on such a project?

I spoke recently by phone with Andrea Vicini at Boston College about this matter. Our interview follows. Andrea Vicini is a Jesuit priest, pediatrician, and currently a professor at Boston College where he is Chair of the Ecclesiastical Faculty. His MD is from the University of Bologna and his PhD (theological ethics) from Boston College. He also has an STL (in Sacred Theology) from Boston College and an STM (Sacred Theology) from the Pontifical Faculty of Theology of Southern Italy, Naples. Vicini was a 2015-2016 NASA/Templeton/CTI investigator.

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SOURCE: http://www.huffingtonpost.com

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