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Contents: Introduction The Interface of religion and science Ways of seeing Relevance Change and commitment 1. From the Greeks to the Medieval World Pre-socratic theories Plato Aristotle Shaping the Medieval World Religion and the Rise of Science 2. The Rise of Science Evidence and sense experience The Scientific method Copernicus and Galileo Francis Bacon Newton Practical Science Mathematics and Statistics Certainty and authority The end of religion? 3. The Origin of the Universe The dimensions of the universe The Big Bang Theory Creationist Views Creatio ex nihilo God: 'Being Itself' or external agent? The Anthropic Principle 4. Evolution and Design Purpose and direction Providence Geology Darwin and Natural Selection DNA The Design Argument Intelligent Design Social Darwinism 5. Freedom and Determinism An Historical Perspective Leibniz - God's chosen world Kant - determined but free A romantic challenge? Haeckel and Monod - a naturalistic view A quantum view Playing dice? 6. Miracles Historical Background Hume on evidence and miracles Reasonably miraculous? Redefining the miraculous Miracles and the arguments for the existence of God 7. Scientific explanations of Religion Anthropological explanations Sociological explanations Psychological explanations Biological explanations 8. Modern Physics and the Nature of Reality Relativity Quantum mechanics Mystical and religious perspectives 9. What is a human being? Human origins A human machine? Minds, brains and artificial intelligence Surviving death? 10. Technology and Ethics Experiments Technology without limits? Why benefits? Instant information Intellectual property
Suggestions for further reading...
Well up on the Amazon ratings for Religion and Science comes God: the failed hypothesis by victor J Stenger. This is one of the most irritating books I've read for a long time. A good scientist with a little subtlety when it comes to religion and philosophy. His thesis - that science has now advanced to a point at which it can show that God does not exist - is really no more than a 'god-no-longer-has-a-gap-to-fill' argument. On the cover, Richard Dawkins says that he 'learned an enormous amount' from this book, which is even sadder! Come to think of it, however, with it's faulty logic and glib arguments, this might just be a good book to give brighter students, who may enjoy finding examples of careless logic. For those who, having admired his earlier work, are tempted to take Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion as a seriously argued work of philosophy or science, should read The Dawkins Delusion by Alister McGrath. This book, by a fellow Professor at Oxford who started his career as an atheist rather than a theologian and as a scientist, as a usefully negative function of showing just how far Dawkins has given up any pretence at serious argument in favour of re-cycling outdated atheist polemic. Although I was fearing an equally polemical theist tract, that was not the case. I found the book helpful, and a useful counterbalance to Dawkins. Controversial (from a religious standpoint) but readable, Richard Dawkins books (especially perhaps The Blind Watchmaker, Climbing Mount Improbable and Unweaving the Rainbow) are always good value. His opposition to conventional religious views is a great stimulus to serious thought. For more advanced study, Religion and Science by Ian G Barbour (SCM, 1998) gives solid and serious coverage of the issues.
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A comment from the author...
"So much has happened in the religion and science debate over the last ten years. Sadly, the most widely publicised is the on-going battle between the fundamentalist extremes, with those who defend a naive and literalist interpretation of Genesis, waged against some scientists (including Dawkins, who really should know better) who refuse to take a measured or scientific view of religion, who who tend to move in the direction of scientism - the 19th century view that science offers the only way to describe reality. Hopefully, this book will restore the rightful position of the middle ground, recognising that religion is an interesting phenomenon for science to examine, but also exploring and celebrating the proper (and inspiring!) place of scientific knowledge in a balanced and humane view of the world." Mel Thompson
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