“Does God exist?” is a question of science and reason, not faith and belief, say Olivier Bonnassies and Michel-Yves Bolloré. The two Frenchmen, coauthors of God, the Science, the Evidence: The Dawn of a Revolution (Palomar Editions, Oct.), are entrepreneurs and mathematicians whose book, they claim, shows proof of the Almighty.
After selling 400,000 copies in Europe since 2021, they are launching it with a 110,000 first printing in English in the U.S. and U.K., featuring four-color illustrations and quotes from 63 Nobel Prize winners. The authors have underwritten the publishing and are planning academic conferences at universities and a documentary series to promote their book. Joseph Montagne, VP and publisher at Abrams, distributor for the book, told PW, “We believe the book’s fresh perspective, showing how science increasingly points toward the existence of a creator God rather than away from it, will resonate with many.”
Why does it matter if God exists?
MYB: If there is no creator God, we are just animals—nothing is important, nothing counts. It's not good to live in illusion. So, if there is no creator God, let's eat, drink, and dance. But if there is a creator God, perhaps there is eternal life afterward. And then, everything is important, and everything counts.
You call today’s relationship between science and religion “the Great Reversal.” Why?
OB: We’re living within a surprising intellectual shift. For four centuries, from Copernicus to Freud, via Galileo, Newton, Laplace, and Darwin, science seemed able to explain more and more of the world without the need for the hypothesis of God. Things have now changed, and the pendulum of science has swung back in the opposite direction. Until recently, believing in God seemed incompatible with science. Now, reason has come full circle. Science is now God’s ally.
What is the science you believe confirms that God exists?
OB: Our work is based in three scientific conclusions: that we live in what we call space-time that inextricably links matter, space, and time together; that all this seems to have a beginning; and that the parameters of the universe are very fine-tuned so that if you change a little, life is impossible. Through science, we rediscover the definition of God that exists in philosophy and religion—an all-powerful being outside of our universe who created everything so humanity and all life could come into being.
In your view, the existence of God does not have to lead to religious faith. Why not?
MYB: Because from the point of view of knowledge, it's very simple to know if a creator God exists. It is the same question as “Do Martians exist?” It's just a question. And we just want to know the answer. Faith and religion ask, “What is the name of God? What does God say? What does He want?” We are not interested by what God can say, who He is, what He wants, what He promised. We are just interested to know if a creator God exists.
Why did you retain ownership of the book as publishers of the U.S. edition?
MYB: We had the freedom to make it alone. The success of the book in Europe gave us the means and experience to do it ourselves in the U.S., where some publishers had offered to print the book in black and white, to have the footnotes at the end of the book, and to set a very high selling price. Additionally, the U.S. market is the most important in the world, not only by size but also because it is the center of the world for the debate between science and faith.
