Social Sciences
Science and Religion
Science and religion have been historically viewed as conflicting belief systems, with science relying on empirical evidence and religion often based on faith. However, contemporary perspectives recognize the potential for dialogue and mutual respect between the two, acknowledging that they can coexist and even complement each other in understanding the complexities of human existence and the natural world.
Written by Perlego with AI-assistance
Related key terms
1 of 5
12 Key excerpts on "Science and Religion"
eBook - ePubNaturalism and Religion
A Contemporary Philosophical Investigation
- Graham Oppy(Author)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
For a historical example, we might point to Blaise Pascal; for a contemporary example, we might point to Francis Collins. Whatever statistical correlations hold between scientists and religiosity, it is clear – both from the historical record and from contemporary observation – that there have been, and are, scientists distributed all the way across the spectrum of religiosity. 4. How is science related to religion? Many discussions of ‘the relationship between Science and Religion’ launch into considerations of ‘models’ for ‘the relationship’ – ‘conflict’, ‘independence’, ‘dialogue’, ‘integration’ – without adequately considering exactly what the proper focus of attention is in those discussions. In particular, many of those discussions proceed from very woolly understandings of ‘religion’ and ‘science’. Recall that, at least roughly, science is a collective enterprise of data-driven description, prediction, and interpretation in which universal expert agreement functions as regulative ideal. At any time, established science is the sum of what is established in any of the sciences: formal, natural, social, and applied. At any time, for a claim to be established in a particular science, that claim must have universal – or near-universal – expert agreement: it must be, for example, a claim that is not controversial among the relevant members of national academies of science and elite research institutions. Among the claims that are established in a particular science, there are claims about the territory, or domain, that belongs to that science: that is, there are established claims that identify a body of not yet established claims that belong to the science in question
eBook - PDFReligion and Truth
Towards an Alternative Paradigm for the Study of Religion
- Donald Wiebe(Author)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- De Gruyter Mouton(Publisher)
The 'science of religion' is thus a label intended primarily to designate that attitude on the part of certain scholars to treat religion, insofar as that is possible, without (theological) bias or prejudice (prae + judicium; a judgment that has been passed before the issue has been subject to test or trial). It suggests then that the founda-tions of the study of religion must be intellectual rather than practical or, as Smart (1973b: 4, 8) puts it, to be concerned with the truth about religion and not the truth of religion.4 The claim that the science of religion is autonomous and independent of the other social sciences is the second broad area of agreement as to the nature of the new sci-ence and has already been discussed at some length above. Some further comments, however, are required here. It is self-evident that any talk of a science of religion involves a distinction of that science from the other social sciences - otherwise one might simply contrast the social scientific studies of religious phenomena (whether from a psychologi-cal, anthropological or sociological perspective), with the theological interpretation of the phenomena. The reasons 52 The study of religion: Preliminary considerations for this distinction and the unwillingness of the students of religion to be content with talking simply of the sciences of religion or the scientific study of religion are, how-ever, not at all clear. Waardenburg (1973a, see also 1973b), in an examination of the methodological debate, traces that unwillingness to the difference perceived by the religion scholar, between the search for understanding and the search for explanation.
eBook - ePubEmerging Voices in Science and Theology
Contributions by Young Women
- Bethany Sollereder, Alister McGrath, Bethany Sollereder, Alister McGrath(Authors)
- 2022(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
12With these features of language in mind, it is suggested that Science and Religion can helpfully be considered as two different languages. Science is a system of communication used to describe, predict, and understand the physical world. Science conveys specific information about nature using arbitrary elements, like theories, measurement units, equations, and methods. Scientists also follow conventional rules to conduct experiments, collaborate with other researchers, publish research articles, speak at conferences, and write grant proposals. In addition, scientific activities are inherently social, connecting researchers, labs, institutions, and the wider society. Religion is another means of communication about beliefs, meanings, values, and orientations in life. It takes the form of theologies, doctrines, and practices to help people make sense of their lives in the world. Religion binds people together, forms communities of believers, and affirms a sense of belonging.When taking the metaphorical view that Science and Religion are languages, Science and Religion are no longer some abstract and obscure entities, they are social discourses in a specific context by a particular linguistic community. As languages, Science and Religion change over time and are influenced by sociocultural factors. Most importantly, Science and Religion, just like other languages, become part of the everyday manner in which people perceive and experience the world.In this chapter, I will argue that Science and Religion can be seen as individual languages, and that they offer distinct but partial visions of reality. First, examining the domain of science, I will show how the language of science is made up of scientific constructs and presuppositions and influences the perception of the natural world. I will also discuss that this metaphorical approach yields some benefits in conceptualising the scientific world-view. Then, moving to the domain of religion, I will demonstrate how the language of religion, consisting of theological constructs and doctrines, generates a coherent view of the world encompassing physical, social, and spiritual realms. Some advantages in employing the metaphorical understanding of religion will also be outlined. Finally, given that the language of science and the language of religion individually have limits of expression that lead to restricted worldviews, the use of both languages may expand the scope of communication and enable an enriched view of reality.
eBook - PDFScience and Religion
Some Historical Perspectives
- John Hedley Brooke(Author)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Cambridge University Press(Publisher)
There were Henry Drummonds in every generation who did make 23 Science and Religion connections between their theology and their science. If we begin with too cavalier an attitude toward them, we may miss a certain richness in our intellectual heritage and one that had a profound bearing on how the word science was understood, by both practitioners and their public. Consider, for example, three contrasts commonly drawn by scholars when comparing our modern scien- tific age with earlier times when magic prevailed. Sci- ence, it is said, operates within a world-view that regards natural phenomena as the product of impersonal forces. By contrast, religious and magical systems involve per- sonalized gods, spirits, or demons. Whereas the scientific enterprise is legitimated by agreed testing procedures, the theological enterprise has been characterized by dogma- tism. Whereas religions have required worship, ceremony, and sacrifice, these are forms of activity alien to Western science. On such grounds Science and Religion are commonly differentiated. Closer inspection of the history of science, however, suggests a more complex picture. Science may be concerned with impersonal forces, religion with per- sonalized gods; but the very word force carried religious meanings, even for Isaac Newton (1642–1727) who, in describing the operation of a gravitational force in math- ematical terms, also ascribed it to an omnipotent God. By his critic Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716), he was accused of making the action of gravity a perpetual miracle. The contrast between self-criticism in science and an uncritical spirit in religion cannot be made absolute. Sci- entific theories have often been cherished when in the eyes of their critics they ought to have perished. Recalling 24 Interaction between Science and Religion a symposium held at St. Louis in 1961, the distinguished organic chemist Herbert C.
eBook - PDF- John H. Evans(Author)
- 2018(Publication Date)
- University of California Press(Publisher)
44 3 Te Academic Analysts of the Relationship Between Religion and Science In addition to scientists and theologians in the academic debate, there are a number of other academics who are analysts or observers of the relationship between Science and Religion who, I will show, are also teaching the public the systemic knowledge perspective. In this chapter I will focus on the two most active groups, the historians and the sociologists. Historians show, for example, that Victorian era scientists ofen thought they were investigating the details of God’s creation, and thus there was harmony in religious and scientifc knowledge. Sociologists assume that the spread of scientifc knowledge is a cause of the loss of religious belief. As in the previous chapter, I will also ofer an explanation of why these felds see the relationship in this way. I will particularly focus upon explaining this view within the feld of sociology, given that it ofen focuses on the general public, and I am claiming that the public does not use systemic knowledge to understand Science and Religion. HISTORIANS OF RELIGION AND SCIENCE In recent decades, historians have been on a quest to debunk the claim of the inevita-ble confict between religion and science over knowledge about the world. Tey want to replace the universal knowledge confict narrative with descriptions of the lim-ited times and places such confict has occurred, and emphasize the other times and places where there was no confict over knowledge. 1 While debunking the simplistic view of universal confict, the historians nonetheless inadvertently reinforce the idea that the relationship, and any confict, is by defnition about systemic knowledge. It is difcult to generalize about the complexity that historians see in the rela-tionship between religion and science. Metaphorically, imagine two stages facing Academic Analysts of the Relationship 45 each other.
eBook - PDFReligion as a philosophical matter
Concerns about truth, name, and habitation
- Lars Albinus(Author)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- De Gruyter Open Poland(Publisher)
3 Philosophy of Religion as a Social Phenomenon Philosophy of religion is a social phenomenon just as religion is a social phenomenon and thus the two are found on the same plane of existence. This is trivial, of course, and it doesn’t prevent us from investigating religion (nor philosophy for that matter), just as we are used to investigate the transactions of value in Economy and institu-tions of law and power in Political Science. The fact that we are part of the reality we behold doesn’t preclude us from perceiving things and sometimes seeing things that internally committed participants don’t see themselves. What the basic condition of our position calls for, more than anything else, is a balanced interaction between understanding and explanation.70 Nevertheless, the Study of Religion differs from other fields of investigation such as Economy, Political Science, Studies of Literature and Art, primarily because of the ontology invested in it. We can engage in social, and various interpretative, sciences without being involved in questions about ontology, that is, the range and nature of existing entities. Yet, religion is about how we humans basically conceive of the world, and therefore incommensurable ideas of existence are at stake in what is generally regarded as an unbridgeable gab between religion and science.71 To speak of religion as an aesthetic or a psychological phenomenon, or even as an anthropological phenomenon, misses the real engagement underlying all inter-actions with religion, namely the question of truth, not about religion, but of reli-gion. In other words, what is at stake, are questions about ultimate existence and the determination of our existence as human beings (regarded as questions from our point of view, that is).
eBook - PDFAfter Science and Religion
Fresh Perspectives from Philosophy and Theology
- Peter Harrison, John Milbank(Authors)
- 2022(Publication Date)
- Cambridge University Press(Publisher)
On the category ‘natural philosophy’, see, e.g., Andrew Cunningham, ‘Getting the Game Right: Some Plain Words on the Identity and Invention of Science’, Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science, (), –; Margaret J. Osler, ‘Mixing Metaphors: Science and Religion or Natural Philosophy and Theology in Early Modern Europe’, History of Science, (), – (); William A. Wallace, ‘Traditional Natural Philosophy’, in Charles Schmitt and Quentin Skinner (eds.), The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ), –; Peter Harrison, ‘Physico-Theology and the Mixed Sciences: The Role of Theology in Early Modern Natural Philosophy’, in Peter Anstey and John Schuster (eds.), The Science of Nature in the Seventeenth Century (Dordrecht: Springer, ), –. Science and Religion as Historical Traditions Arguably, it was their broader vision, both philosophical and religious, that led to the remarkable theoretical breakthroughs that characterised the period. But to return to the main point, the history of the development of scientific disciplines can be illuminative of the processes that render religious and philosophical questions no longer askable. To be clear, the claim is not that all scientists are necessarily so constrained in their thinking. The participation of scientists in this book project is clear evidence to the contrary. But it remains true that qua scientists, on the current understanding of the disciplines, certain broad conceptions and avenues of investigation seem to be off-limits. If there is anything to this line of investigation, the relations between Science and Religion, and indeed among the sciences themselves, may turn on differences in disciplinary formation. Such differences can be masked by the fact that science–religion discussion takes place, by proxy, at the level of competing truth claims or differing epistemological commitments.
eBook - PDF- Nicholas Rescher(Author)
- 2013(Publication Date)
- De Gruyter(Publisher)
Chapter 3 RELIGION AND SCIENCE 1. ANSWERING OBJECTIONS Any discussion aimed at reconciling religion with science opens the door to an array of possible objections. But these are not so deci-sive as to preclude plausible replies. It is instructive to examine this landscape of controversy somewhat more closely. “ Is a scientist’s dedication to knowledge not paramount to a de-gree where he could only accept a religion whose creedal commit-ments he would conscientiously consider as truths ?” This is doubtless so. But even a conscientious scientist would do well to distinguish be-tween literal and figurative truths, factual and normative truths, in-formative and orientational truths. After all, the question of what we as individuals should do with our lives and make of the various op-portunities at our disposal is not a scientific issue. Once we decide this sort of thing science can undoubtedly help us to get there. But what our destination should be is a matter not for science but rather for our commitment to goals and values. And this sort of thing is simply outside the province of science which tells us what the world is like but not what we should do with our lives. There will, of course, be overlapping issues where both religion and science will enter interactively. Religion calls on us to honor hu-man life by according special treatment to the dead. By science will be needed to decide the question of whether Smith is in fact now dead so that these special procedures should be instituted. And so, while re-ligion and science are distinct enterprises they certainly can and should interact with one another. A further objection may well arise at this point: “ Granted, Science and Religion have different roles to play and different questions to ad-dress.
eBook - PDF- Sudha Menon, University of Kerala, India(Authors)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- Society Publishing(Publisher)
The readers are informed about social science and told about the importance it holds in the society and its development. 1.1. INTRODUCTION An individual’s relationship with his/her socio-cultural environment is studied within the realm of social sciences. Since the eighteenth century, social sciences have been studied at the higher education/university education level as a formal field of study and twentieth century onwards they became a part of the curriculum at the school level across the globe including countries like India. In all schools across India, social science also known as social studies is taught as a main subject. This chapter shall cover the main aspects of social science like the conception and evolution of social science, its current status, how it stood through the ages, its components, the integration and interdisciplinary aspects of social sciences. Argumentations, theoretical discussions, experiences, examples as close to reality as possible, various practice and activities that have been planned around stimulated projects have been used to illustrate the various premises and aspects of social sciences. Inter human relationships and the human society is the main fields of study in social sciences. Humans and their lives as social animals comprise the study of social science. Diverse aspects of the society like the value patterns followed the traditions and cultural mores, ethics and religious beliefs, various social institutions and customs, the political and economic behavior are at the center of the social behavior of humans. The curriculum at the schools as well as the higher/ university education include social sciences as an important part. Various subjects of social science like anthropology, political science, history and economics are taught as optional/independent subjects to learners at the high school/ higher education/university level.
- Sudha Menon(Author)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- Society Publishing(Publisher)
Definition of a Social Science 1 CONTENTS 1.1. Social Science And The Scientific Method ........................................... 2 1.2. Social Science as a Study of Human Beings ........................................ 7 1.3. The Study of Social Relationships ...................................................... 13 1.4. Social Science as a Study of Societies ............................................... 18 1.5. Differences Between Social Sciences And The Humanities ................ 24 Chapter 1 Summary ................................................................................. 28 Chapter Introduction to the Social Sciences: The Study of Human Relationships 2 The initial chapter in this book will try to explore the range of definitions of social sciences, primarily based on their characteristics and differences from other differences. In the first section of this chapter will examine the methodologies that are associated with social science. The second section will highlight how socials sciences help to illuminate our understanding of human beings. In the third section, we consider the relational aspects of social sciences. The fourth section elevates these relations into societal patterns that are of interest to social scientists. The chapter will close by explaining the distinction between traditional social sciences and the humanities, while at the same time acknowledging the links that exist between the two broader fields of study. 1.1. SOCIAL SCIENCE AND THE SCIENTIFIC METH-OD One of the key distinguishing features of social science is the scientific method (Benton and Craib, 2010; Herek, 2018; Trist et al., 2016). Over time, many social scientists have regarded this method as the key to understanding what distinguishes them from other “arts” (Bohman and Nouwen, 1991; Lynd, 2015).
eBook - PDFReligion after Science
The Cultural Consequences of Religious Immaturity
- J. L. Schellenberg(Author)
- 2019(Publication Date)
- Cambridge University Press(Publisher)
It is hard for any of them to hold so rich and fluid a phenomenon as religion or science or both together. We might note, for example, that at our present stage, as envisaged by the immaturity view, religion could still be of some help to science, by supporting its results in the public domain, or even by advocating the use of scientific results to solve urgent human problems. (Chapter 10 has some related discussion.) So the notions of ‘compart- mentalization’ and of ‘independence’ should be taken somewhat loosely. Whatever you call it, it’s clear that at the present stage, and indeed at any future stage, there could be perfect harmony between religion and science, much as there can be perfect harmony between the seven-year- old boy and his elder brother. As the title I’ve given to this present section suggests, the developmental approach that brings this relationship into view is certainly positive – and it is also new.
eBook - PDF- Melville Y. Stewart(Author)
- 2009(Publication Date)
- Wiley-Blackwell(Publisher)
Because science is compatible with multiple religious belief systems, scientists of differ-ent religions can work together and reach consensus on scientific issues. If a scientist – or any individual – wants to choose between competing religions, science can only provide partial guidance. An individual in pursuit of religious truth will have to seek other sources of knowledge such as historical sources, personal experience, and the experiences of other trusted teachers and friends. Because I am a Christian, I have paid particular attention to how scientific knowledge interacts with the religious beliefs of myself and my fellow Christians. I have found that science can occasionally correct a mistaken belief about the natural world. But primarily, science has added new layers of knowledge about the world without contradicting knowl-edge that I had gained from other sources. In my own experience as a scientist and as a Christian, scientific knowledge has not replaced, but rather enhanced, knowledge I have gained from my religion, history, culture, and personal experience. Notes 1 Isaac Newton, Principia Mathematica (1687). 2 Pierre Laplace, Treatise on Celestial Mechanics (1799–1825). 3 For example: P. W. Atkins, “The limitless power of science” in John Cornwell (ed.) Nature’s Imagination – The Frontiers of Scientific Vision, (Oxford University Press, 1995). There is another philosophical view called “deism” which asserts that God initially created the material universe and the laws of nature, but now simply lets it go on its way without interacting with it.
Index pages curate the most relevant extracts from our library of academic textbooks. They’ve been created using an in-house natural language model (NLM), each adding context and meaning to key research topics.
