Presenters

George F. R. Ellis

George Francis Rayner Ellis specializes in general relativity theory, an area first broadly investigated by Einstein. A professor of applied mathematics at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, he is considered among the world’s leading relativistic cosmologists; his most recent investigations question whether there was ever a start to the universe and if there is in fact only one universe or many. He is as widely respected for his anti-apartheid, Quaker activism as for his significant contributions to cosmology. In 2004 he was awarded the prestigious Templeton Prize for Progress toward Research or Discoveries about Spiritual Realities, for “his important contributions to the dialogue at the boundary of theology and science.”

Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1939, Ellis earned a B.S. in physics with distinction from the University of Cape Town in 1960 and a B.Com. with distinction as well. He completed his Ph.D. in applied mathematics and theoretical physics at Cambridge University ( St. John’s College) in 1964, after which he served successively as research fellow, assistant lecturer, and university lecturer at Cambridge for the next 10 years. In 1974 he returned to Cape Town, where he is now Distinguished Professor of Complex Systems. He also maintains an appointment as G.C. McVittie Visiting Professor of Astronomy, Queen Mary College, London University.

A year before returning to South Africa, Ellis had collaborated with physicist Stephen Hawking to write The Large Scale Structure of Space Time (Cambridge, 1973), which quickly became a standard reference and is still in print and selling steadily today. Several books have followed, including Flat and Curved Space Times ( Oxford, 1988) and Is the Universe Open or Closed? The Density of Matter in the Universe ( Cambridge, 1997). Ellis has also distinguished himself by moving to bring the forces of science and religion together for the general benefit of both fields, a focus that led to his Templeton Prize. He served as the J.K. Russell Fellow of Science and Religion at the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences at Cal–Berkeley in 1994. In 1996 he co-wrote On the Moral Nature of the Universe: Cosmology, Theology, and Ethics (Fortress, 1996).