Each world faith tradition has its own distinctive relationship with science, and the science-religion dialogue benefits from a greater awareness of what this relationship is. In this book, members of the International Society for Science and Religion (ISSR) offer international and multi-faith perspectives on how new discoveries in science are met with insights regarding spiritual realities.The essays reflect the conviction that “religion and science each proceed best when they’re pursued in dialogue with each other, and also that our fragmented and divided world would benefit more from a stronger dialogue between science and religion.” In Part One, George F. R. Ellis, John C. Polkinghorne, and Holmes Rolston III, each a Templeton Prize winner, discuss their views on why the science and religion dialogue matters. They are joined in Part Two by distinguished theologians Fraser Watts and Philip Clayton, who place the dialogue in an international context; John Polkinghorne’s inaugural address to the ISSR in 2002 is also included. In Part Three, five members of the ISSR look at the distinctive relationships of their faiths to science: •Carl Feit on Judaism •Munawar Anees on Islam •B.V. Subbarayappa on Hinduism •Trinh Xuan Thuan on Buddhism •Heup Young Kim on Asian Christianity George Ellis, the recently elected second president of ISSR, summarizes the contributions of his colleagues. Ronald Cole-Turner then concludes the book with a discussion of the future of the science and religion dialogue.

Emphasizing its historical, methodological and constructive dimensions, Religion and Science takes the pulse of pertinent current research as the interdisciplinary study of science and religion gains momentum.

Polkinghorne argues that the habits of thought that are natural to the scientist are the same habits of thought that can be followed also in the search for a wider and deeper kind of truth about the world.

This two-volume collection of cutting edge thinking aboutscience and religion shows how scientific and religious practicesof inquiry can be viewed as logically compatible, complementary,and mutually supportive. Features submissions by world-leading scientists andphilosophers Discusses a wide range of hotly debated issues, including BigBang cosmology, evolution, intelligent design, dinosaurs andcreation, general and special theories of relativity, dark energy,the Multiverse Hypothesis, and Super String Theory Includes articles on stem cell research and Bioethics byWilliam Hurlbut, who served on President Bush's BioethicsCommittee

Today we hear renewed calls for a dialogue between science and religion: why has the old question of the relations between science and religion now returned to the public domain and what is at stake in this debate? To answer these questions, historian and sociologist of science Yves Gingras retraces the long history of the troubled relationship between science and religion, from the condemnation of Galileo for heresy in 1633 until his rehabilitation by John Paul II in 1992. He reconstructs the process of the gradual separation of science from theology and religion, showing how God and natural theology became marginalized in the scientific field in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In contrast to the dominant trend among historians of science, Gingras argues that science and religion are social institutions that give rise to incompatible ways of knowing, rooted in different methodologies and forms of knowledge, and that there never was, and cannot be, a genuine dialogue between them. Wide-ranging and authoritative, this new book on one of the fundamental questions of Western thought will be of great interest to students and scholars of the history of science and of religion as well as to general readers who are intrigued by the new and much-publicized conversations about the alleged links between science and religion.

One in the series New Dialogues in Philosophy, edited by Dale Jacquette, Michael Ruse, a leading expert on Charles Darwin, presents a fictional dialogue among characters with sharply contrasting positions regarding the tensions between science and religious belief. Ruse's main characters—an atheist scientist, a skeptical historian and philosopher of science, a relatively liberal female Episcopalian priest, and a Southern Baptist pastor who denies evolution—passionately argue about pressing issues, in a context framed within a television show: 'Science versus God— Who is Winning?' These characters represent the different positions concerning science and religion often held today: evolution versus creation, the implications of Christian beliefs upon technological advances in medicine, and the everlasting debate over free will.

In an effort to address the tension between the basic tenets of the Christian faith and the basic doctrines of current scientific theory, Poe and Davis present a non-threatening way for Christians to examine their presuppositions about their faith and their views on science.

An enlightening discussion that will motivate students to think critically, the book opens with Plantinga's assertion that Christianity is compatible with evolutionary theory because Christians believe that God created the living world, and it is entirely possible that God did so by using a process of evolution.

This book provides an overview of the history of interactions between science and religion, with an emphasis on Christianity. Raymond E. Grizzle examines his own history of self-reflection on science and religion, focusing on what we have learned about the structure, history, and functioning of creation. Both histories are interpreted as histories of discarded images, largely consisting of the replacement of images of creation provided by religion with those provided by the natural sciences. Grizzle assesses the major kinds of creationism that exist today and explores conflicts arising from young Earth creationism and intelligent design. He also provides examples of productive dialogue regarding how science and religion might inform one another. Two major themes that run throughout the book are the importance of underlying beliefs and the reliability of modern science in producing a truthful understanding of the cosmos and the creation process. Science and Religion in Dialogue concludes with some suggested principles for constructive self-reflection and thoughts on how today’s conflict might be replaced with productive discourse involving both science and religion.

"Has science made religion intellectually implausible? Does it rule out the existence of a personal God? In an age of science can we really believe that the universe has a "purpose"? And, finally, doesn't religion hold much of the blame for the present ecological crisis?" "These questions form the nucleus of today's debate between science and religion. This book is a guide for that debate, identifying the questions, isolating the issues and pointing to ways the questions can be resolved." "There are four possible ways, says John F. Haught, that we can view the relationship between religion and science. First, they can stand in complete opposition - the conflict position. Or, we can believe they are so different that conflict is impossible - the contrast position. A third approach holds that while science and religion are distinct, each has important implications for the other. A fourth way views them as different but mutually supportive."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved