The ability of writers to imagine what is not the self, to familiarize the strange and mystify the familiar, is the test of their power.

If you play a role, you want to familiarize yourself with that person's world. If I were playing an airline pilot or a doctor, I'd probably want to hang out with a doctor or an airplane pilot for a while, ask some questions. You don't get to hang out the kings. They don't help consult on movies. So your resources are, by necessity, secondary.

People and especially theologians should try to familiarize themselves with scientific ideas. Of course science is technical in many respects but there are some very good books that try to set out some of the conceptual structure of science.

The ability of writers to imagine what is not the self to familiarize the strange and mystify the familiar is the test of their power.