Human Identity at the Intersection of Science, Technology and Religion

Christopher C. Knight, Nancey Murphy

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN:
  9781317120032
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Humans are unique in their ability to reflect on themselves. Recently a number of scholars have pointed out that human self-conceptions have a history. Ideas of human nature in the West have always been shaped by the interplay of philosophy, theology, science, and technology. The fast pace of developments in the latter two spheres (neuroscience, genetics, artificial intelligence, biomedical engineering) call for fresh reflections on what it means, now, to be human, and for theological and ethical judgments on how we might shape our own destiny in the future. The leading scholars in this book offer fresh contributions to the lively quest for an account of ourselves that does justice to current developments in theology, science, technology, and philosophy.

Ashgate Science and Religion Series

Series Editors:

Roger Trigg, University of Warwick, UK and Senior Research Fellow, Ian Ramsey Centre, University of OxfordUK

J. Wentzel van Huyssteen, Princeton Theological Seminary, USA

Science and religion have often been thought to be at loggerheads but much contemporary work in this flourishing interdisciplinary field suggests this is far from the case. The Ashgate Science and Religion Series presents exciting new work to advance interdisciplinary study, research and debate across key themes in science and religion, exploring the philosophical relations between the physical and social sciences on the one hand and religious belief on the other. Contemporary issues in philosophy and theology are debated, as are prevailing cultural assumptions arising from the ‘post-modernist’ distaste for many forms of reasoning. The series enables leading international authors from a range of different disciplinary perspectives to apply the insights of the various sciences, theology and philosophy and look at the relations between the different disciplines and the rational connections that can be made between them. These accessible, stimulating new contributions to key topics across science and religion will appeal particularly to individual academics and researchers, graduates, postgraduates and upper-undergraduate students.

Other titles in the series:

Science and Religious Anthropology

A Spiritually Evocative Naturalist Interpretation of Human Life

Wesley J. Wildman

978-0-7546-6592-2 (hbk)

978-0-7546-9670-4 (ebk)

Mind, Brain and the Elusive Soul

Human Systems of Cognitive Science and Religion

Mark Graves

978-0-7546-6226-6 (hbk)

978-0-7546-9352-9 (ebk)

God’s Action in Nature’s World

Essays in Honour of Robert John Russell

Edited by Ted Peters and Nathan Hallanger

978-0-7546-5556-5 (hbk)

978-0-7546-8360-5 (ebk)

Human Identity at the Intersection of Science, Technology and Religion

Edited by

Nancey Murphy

Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, USA

and

Christopher C. Knight

St Edmund’s College, Cambridge, UK

First published 2010 by Ashgate Publishing

Published 2016 by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017, USA

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

Copyright © Nancey Murphy and Christopher C. Knight and the contributors 2010

Nancey Murphy and Christopher C. Knight have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the editors of this work.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Notice:

Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Human Identity at the Intersection of Science, Technology and Religion. – (Ashgate Science and Religion Series)

1. Human beings. 2. Religion and science. 3. Theological anthropology – Christianity.

I. Series II. Murphy, Nancey C. III. Knight, Christopher C., 1952–

202.2-dc22

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Human Identity at the Intersection of Science, Technology, and Religion / [edited by] Nancey Murphy and Christopher C. Knight.

p. cm. -- (Ashgate Science and Religion Series)

Includes index.

1. Human beings. 2. Religion and science. 3. Theological anthropology – Christianity. I. Murphy, Nancey C. II. Knight, Christopher C., 1952– BL256.H865 2010

202’.2–dc22

2010014656

ISBN 9781409410508 (hbk)

ISBN 9781315587431 (ebk)

DOI: 10.4324/9781315587431

Contents

• List of Contributors
• Preface
• Introduction Nancey Murphy
• PART I: THE LIMITS OF RELIGION, THE LIMITS OF SCIENCE
  • 1 Homo Religiosus: A Theological Proposal for a Scientific and Pluralistic Age Christopher C. Knight
  • 2 Religious Symbolism: Engaging the Limits of Human Identification F. LeRon Shults
  • 3 Fundamentalism in Science, Theology, and the Academy George F. R. Ellis
• PART II: THE EMERGENCE OF THE DISTINCTIVELY HUMAN
  • 4 Reductionism and Emergence: A Critical Perspective Nancey Murphy
  • 5 Nonreductive Human Uniqueness: Immaterial, Biological, or Psychosocial? Warren S. Brown
  • 6 Human and Artificial Intelligence: A Theological Response Noreen Herzfeld
  • 7 The Emergence of Morality James W. Haag
• PART III: THE FUTURE OF HUMAN IDENTITY
  • 8 What Does It Mean to Be Human? Genetics and Human Identity Martinez Hewlett
  • 9 Distributed Identity: Human Beings as Walking, Thinking Ecologies in the Microbial World Wesley J. Wildman
  • 10 Without a Horse: On Being Human in an Age of Biotechnology Noah Efron
  • 11 From Human to Posthuman: Theology and Technology Brent Waters
  • 12 Can We Enhance the Imago Dei? Ted Peters
• Index

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Frontmatter 1
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Contributors
• Preface
• Introduction—Nancey Murphy
• PART I: THE LIMITS OF RELIGION, THE LIMITS OF SCIENCE
• PART II: THE EMERGENCE OF THE DISTINCTIVELY HUMAN
• PART III: THE FUTURE OF HUMAN IDENTITY
• Index