The Challenge of Evolution to Religion

The Challenge of Evolution to Religion PDF Author: Johan De Smedt
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108626815
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
This Element focuses on three challenges of evolution to religion: teleology, human origins, and the evolution of religion itself. First, religious worldviews tend to presuppose a teleological understanding of the origins of living things, but scientists mostly understand evolution as non-teleological. Second, religious and scientific accounts of human origins do not align in a straightforward sense. Third, evolutionary explanations of religion, including religious beliefs and practices, may cast doubt on their justification. We show how these tensions arise and offer potential responses for religion. Individual religions can meet these challenges, if some of their metaphysical assumptions are adapted or abandoned.

The Challenge of Evolution to Religion

The Challenge of Evolution to Religion PDF Author: Johan De Smedt
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108626815
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
This Element focuses on three challenges of evolution to religion: teleology, human origins, and the evolution of religion itself. First, religious worldviews tend to presuppose a teleological understanding of the origins of living things, but scientists mostly understand evolution as non-teleological. Second, religious and scientific accounts of human origins do not align in a straightforward sense. Third, evolutionary explanations of religion, including religious beliefs and practices, may cast doubt on their justification. We show how these tensions arise and offer potential responses for religion. Individual religions can meet these challenges, if some of their metaphysical assumptions are adapted or abandoned.

Religion in Human Evolution

Religion in Human Evolution PDF Author: Robert N. Bellah
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674063090
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 777

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Book Description
A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice An ABC Australia Best Book on Religion and Ethics of the Year Distinguished Book Award, Sociology of Religion Section of the American Sociological Association Religion in Human Evolution is a work of extraordinary ambition—a wide-ranging, nuanced probing of our biological past to discover the kinds of lives that human beings have most often imagined were worth living. It offers what is frequently seen as a forbidden theory of the origin of religion that goes deep into evolution, especially but not exclusively cultural evolution. “Of Bellah’s brilliance there can be no doubt. The sheer amount this man knows about religion is otherworldly...Bellah stands in the tradition of such stalwarts of the sociological imagination as Emile Durkheim and Max Weber. Only one word is appropriate to characterize this book’s subject as well as its substance, and that is ‘magisterial.’” —Alan Wolfe, New York Times Book Review “Religion in Human Evolution is a magnum opus founded on careful research and immersed in the ‘reflective judgment’ of one of our best thinkers and writers.” —Richard L. Wood, Commonweal

Evolution, Chance, and God

Evolution, Chance, and God PDF Author: Brendan Sweetman
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1628929863
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 249

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Book Description
Evolution, Chance, and God looks at the relationship between religion and evolution from a philosophical perspective. This relationship is fascinating, complex and often very controversial, involving myriad issues that are difficult to keep separate from each other. Evolution, Chance, and God introduces the reader to the main themes of this debate and to the theory of evolution, while arguing for a particular viewpoint, namely that evolution and religion are compatible, and that, contrary to the views of some influential thinkers, there is no chance operating in the theory of evolution, a conclusion that has great significance for teleology. One of the main aims of this book is not simply to critique one influential contemporary view that evolution and religion are incompatible, but to explore specific ways of how we might understand their compatibility, as well as the implications of evolution for religious belief. This involves an exploration of how and why God might have created by means of evolution, and what the consequences in particular are for the status of human beings in creation, and for issues such as free will, the objectivity of morality, and the problem of evil. By probing how the theory of evolution and religion could be reconciled, Sweetman says that we can address more deeply key foundational questions concerning chance, design, suffering and morality, and God's way of acting in and through creation.

Jewish Tradition and the Challenge of Darwinism

Jewish Tradition and the Challenge of Darwinism PDF Author: Geoffrey Cantor
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226093018
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
Darwin’s theory of evolution transformed the life sciences and made profound claims about human origins and the human condition, topics often viewed as the prerogative of religion. As a result, evolution has provoked a wide variety of religious responses, ranging from angry rejection to enthusiastic acceptance. While Christian responses to evolution have been studied extensively, little scholarly attention has been paid to Jewish reactions. Jewish Tradition and the Challenge of Darwinism is the first extended meditation on the Jewish engagement with this crucial and controversial theory. The contributors to Jewish Tradition and the Challenge of Darwinism—from several academic disciplines and two branches of the rabbinate—present case studies showing how Jewish discussions of evolution have been shaped by the intersections of faith, science, philosophy, and ideology in specific historical contexts. Furthermore, they examine how evolutionary theory has been deployed when characterizing Jews as a race, both by Zionists and by anti-Semites. Jewish Tradition and the Challenge of Darwinism addresses historical and contemporary, as well as progressive and Orthodox, responses to evolution in America, Europe, and Israel, ultimately extending the history of Darwinism into new religious domains.

The Reluctant Mr. Darwin: An Intimate Portrait of Charles Darwin and the Making of His Theory of Evolution (Great Discoveries)

The Reluctant Mr. Darwin: An Intimate Portrait of Charles Darwin and the Making of His Theory of Evolution (Great Discoveries) PDF Author: David Quammen
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393076342
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
"Quammen brilliantly and powerfully re-creates the 19th century naturalist's intellectual and spiritual journey."--Los Angeles Times Book Review Twenty-one years passed between Charles Darwin's epiphany that "natural selection" formed the basis of evolution and the scientist's publication of On the Origin of Species. Why did Darwin delay, and what happened during the course of those two decades? The human drama and scientific basis of these years constitute a fascinating, tangled tale that elucidates the character of a cautious naturalist who initiated an intellectual revolution.

Scientific Challenges to Evolutionary Theory

Scientific Challenges to Evolutionary Theory PDF Author: Jay Schabacker
Publisher: Elm Hill
ISBN: 0310103819
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
Scientific Challenges to Evolutionary Theory: How These Challenges Affect Religion addresses all aspects of the giant battle between two major belief systems…those that believe in a ‘naturalistic worldview’ and evolution, and those that believe in a miracle-performing God and the Creation of all things. On a trip to Mount St. Helens, some look at the catastrophic eruption of May 18, 1981 as a significant corroboration of the Creation event. Others, deniers of the possibilities of miracles, hold to the view that God’s creation cannot be taken seriously by the scientific community. At the Mount St. Helens book store, I asked about books for sale that gave a Christian view of the catastrophic eruption. The reply was, “I’m sorry, sir, but we only carry books by scientists.” It was time for the author, Jay Schabacker, to do a little scientific sleuthing. Join Jay Schabacker as you learn of the hundreds, even thousands, of Ph.D. scientists who repudiate the theory of evolution, but hold rather to the truth of the theory of Creation. Significant general information, likely new to most readers gives corroborative evidence from many sources, including: • From all over the ancient world, hundreds of accounts of a global flood • Well documented accounts of the Ark of Noah, indeed, located at the top of Mount Ararat • Ancient ‘Near East’ finds, inscribed on rock, told of the actual details covered in the Holy Bible Numerous scientific papers refute the naturalistic dogma forced on us the government, public schools, universities and media. You’ll find arguments that assert: • The earth’s geological features appear to have been fashioned by rapid catastrophic processes that affected the earth on a global scale. • Life on earth was suddenly created, not over billions of years. • The use of radiometric dating method is often grossly in error. • The fossil record shows that all present living kinds of animals and plants have remained fixed since creation. • Mutations and natural selection are insufficient to have brought about any emergence of living kinds from a simple primordial organism. • The universe has “obvious manifestations of an ordered, structural plan and design.” The universe and the solar system were suddenly created. If evolution is wrong why are our children being only taught it in our public schools? Numerous polls favored biology teachers teaching Darwin’s Theory of evolution, but also the scientific evidence against it. The final section of the book gets further into the “Action Plan” where church pastors and members, scientist groups, etc., could make an important difference if: • We all read about the subject and started the conversation; • We gave our views to the school boards and legislators who are the decision makers; • We initiate needed petitions in support needed legislation; and • We urge church pastors to create their own church schools and concerned families to start home schooling for their children.

Living with Darwin

Living with Darwin PDF Author: Philip Kitcher
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780199724994
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
Charles Darwin has been at the center of white-hot public debate for more than a century. In Living With Darwin, Philip Kitcher stokes the flames swirling around Darwin's theory, sifting through the scientific evidence for evolution, Creation Science, and Intelligent Design, and revealing why evolution has been the object of such vehement attack. Kitcher first provides valuable perspective on the present controversy, describing the many puzzles that blocked evolution's acceptance in the early years, and explaining how scientific research eventually found the answers to these conundrums. Interestingly, Kitcher shows that many of these early questions have been resurrected in recent years by proponents of Intelligent Design. In fact, Darwin himself considered the issue of intelligent design, and amassed a mountain of evidence that effectively refuted the idea. Kitcher argues that the problem with Intelligent Design isn't that it's "not science," as many critics say, but that it's "dead science," raising questions long resolved by scientists. But Kitcher points out that it is also important to recognize the cost of Darwin's success--the price of "life with Darwin." Darwinism has a profound effect on our understanding of our place in the universe, on our religious beliefs and aspirations. It is in truth the focal point of a larger clash between religious faith and modern science. Unless we can resolve this larger issue, the war over evolution will go on.

Challenges to Moral and Religious Belief

Challenges to Moral and Religious Belief PDF Author: Michael Bergmann
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199669775
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
Fourteen original essays by philosophers, theologians, and social scientists explore the challenges to moral and religious belief posed by disagreement and evolution. The collection represents both sceptical and non-skeptical positions about morality and religion, cultivates new insights, and moves the discussion forward in illuminating ways.

Religion and the Challenges of Science

Religion and the Challenges of Science PDF Author: William Sweet
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351150383
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 387

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Book Description
Does science pose a challenge to religion and religious belief? This question has been a matter of long-standing debate - and it continues to concern not only scholars in philosophy, theology, and the sciences, but also those involved in public educational policy. This volume provides background to the current 'science and religion' debate, yet focuses as well on themes where recent discussion of the relation between science and religion has been particularly concentrated. The first theme deals with the history of the interrelation of science and religion. The second and third themes deal with the implications of recent work in cosmology, biology and so-called intelligent design for religion and religious belief. The fourth theme is concerned with 'conceptual issues' underlying, or implied, in the current debates, such as: Are scientific naturalism and religion compatible? Are science and religion bodies of knowledge or practices or both? Do religion and science offer conflicting truth claims? By illuminating contemporary discussion in the science-religion debate and by outlining the options available in describing the relation between the two, this volume will be of interest to scholars and to members of the educated public alike.

Deeper Than Darwin

Deeper Than Darwin PDF Author: John Haught
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 0786729880
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 170

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Book Description
In his acclaimed book God After Darwin, John Haught argued that religious belief is wholly compatible with evolutionary biology. Now, in Deeper Than Darwin, he advances his argument further by saying that religious belief is even more revealing about life than Darwinism. Haught looks hard at the question of how, after Darwin, religions may plausibly claim to be bearers of truth and not just of meaning and adaptive consolation. While he assumes the fundamental correctness of evolutionary biology, he firmly rejects the non-scientific belief that evolutionary biology amounts to an adequate explanation of living phenomena. Even though Darwinism is illuminating, Haught argues, it by no means tells us everything we need to know about life, even in principle. To find the deepest, though certainly not the clearest, understandings of life and the universe, we may still profitably consult the religions of the world. Deeper Than Darwin takes up where God After Darwin left off, arguing that Darwin's vision is important and essentially correct but that we can still dig deeper in our understanding of what is going on in the life-story.