Stephen Jay Gould was an American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science. He was one of the most influential and widely read authors of popular science of his generation. Gould spent most of his career teaching at Harvard University and working at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. In 1996, Gould was hired as the Vincent Astor Visiting Research Professor of Biology at New York University, after which he divided his time teaching between there and Harvard.
The relationship between religion and science involves discussions that interconnect the study of the natural world, history, philosophy, and theology. Even though the ancient and medieval worlds did not have conceptions resembling the modern understandings of "science" or of "religion", certain elements of modern ideas on the subject recur throughout history. The pair-structured phrases "religion and science" and "science and religion" first emerged in the literature during the 19th century. This coincided with the refining of "science" and of "religion" as distinct concepts in the preceding few centuries—partly due to professionalization of the sciences, the Protestant Reformation, colonization, and globalization. Since then the relationship between science and religion has been characterized in terms of "conflict", "harmony", "complexity", and "mutual independence", among others.
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark is a 1995 book by the astrophysicist Carl Sagan.. In it, Sagan aims to explain the scientific method to laypeople and to encourage people to learn critical and skeptical thinking. He explains methods to help distinguish between ideas that are considered valid science and those that can be considered pseudoscience. Sagan states that when new ideas are offered for consideration, they should be tested by means of skeptical thinking and should stand up to rigorous questioning.
Recurring cultural, political, and theological rejection of evolution by religious groups exists regarding the origins of the Earth, of humanity, and of other life. In accordance with creationism, species were once widely believed to be fixed products of divine creation, but since the mid-19th century, evolution by natural selection has been established by the scientific community as an empirical scientific fact.
Criticism of religion involves criticism of the validity, concept, or ideas of religion. Historical records of criticism of religion go back to at least 5th century BCE in ancient Greece, in Athens specifically, with Diagoras "the Atheist" of Melos. In ancient Rome, an early known example is Lucretius' De rerum natura from the 1st century BCE.
Religious skepticism is a type of skepticism relating to religion. Religious skeptics question religious authority and are not necessarily antireligious/clerical but rather are skeptical of either specific or all religious beliefs and/or practices. Socrates was one of the most prominent and first religious skeptics of whom there are records; he questioned the legitimacy of the beliefs of his time in the existence of the Greek gods. Religious skepticism is not the same as atheism or agnosticism, and some religious skeptics are deists.
Cosmos is a popular science book written by astronomer and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Carl Sagan. It was published in 1980 as a companion piece to the PBS mini-series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage with which it was co-developed and intended to complement. Each of the book's 13 illustrated chapters corresponds to one of the 13 episodes of the television series. Just a few of the ideas explored in Cosmos include the history and mutual development of science and civilization, the nature of the Universe, human and robotic space exploration, the inner workings of the cell and the DNA that controls it, and the dangers and future implications of nuclear war. One of Sagan's main purposes for both the book and the television series was to explain complex scientific ideas in a way that anyone interested in learning can understand. Sagan also believed the television was one of the greatest teaching tools ever invented, so he wished to capitalize on his chance to educate the world. Spurred in part by the popularity of the TV series, Cosmos spent 50 weeks on the Publishers Weekly best-sellers list and 70 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list to become the best-selling science book ever published at the time. In 1981, it received the Hugo Award for Best Non-Fiction Book. The unprecedented success of Cosmos ushered in a dramatic increase in visibility for science-themed literature. The success of the book also served to jumpstart Sagan's literary career. The sequel to Cosmos is Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space (1994).
Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon is a 2006 book by American philosopher and cognitive scientist Daniel Dennett, in which the author argues that religion is in need of scientific analysis so that its nature and future may be better understood. The "spell" that requires "breaking" is not religious belief itself but the belief that it is off-limits to or beyond scientific inquiry.
The God Delusion is a 2006 book by British evolutionary biologist and ethologist Richard Dawkins. In The God Delusion, Dawkins contends that a supernatural creator, God, almost certainly does not exist, and that belief in a personal god qualifies as a delusion, which he defines as a persistent false belief held in the face of strong contradictory evidence. He is sympathetic to Robert Pirsig's statement in Lila (1991) that "when one person suffers from a delusion it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called religion." In the book, Dawkins explores the relationship between religion and morality, providing examples that discuss the possibility of morality existing independently of religion and suggesting alternative explanations for the origins of both religion and morality.
The Hedgehog, the Fox, and the Magister's Pox (2003) is Stephen Jay Gould's posthumous volume exploring the historically complex relationship between the sciences and the humanities in a scholarly discourse.
The Dawkins Delusion? Atheist Fundamentalism and the Denial of the Divine is a book by the theologian Alister McGrath and the psychologist Joanna Collicutt McGrath. It is written from a Christian perspective as a response to arguments put forth in The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. The work was published in the United Kingdom in February 2007 by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge and in the United States in July 2007.
God: The Failed Hypothesis is a 2007 non-fiction book by scientist Victor J. Stenger who argues that there is no evidence for the existence of a deity and that God's existence, while not impossible, is improbable.
Calculating God is a 2000 science fiction novel by Canadian writer Robert J. Sawyer. It takes place in the present day and describes the arrival on Earth of sentient aliens. The bulk of the novel covers the many discussions and arguments on this topic, as well as about the nature of belief, religion, and science. Several planetary civilizations illustrate the logical conclusion of the Fermi paradox.
The efficacy of prayer has been studied since at least 1872, generally through experiments to determine whether prayer or intercessory prayer has a measurable effect on the health of the person for whom prayer is offered. A study in 2006 indicates that intercessory prayer in cardiac bypass patients had no discernible effects.
Non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA) is the view, advocated by paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould, that science and religion each represent different areas of inquiry, fact vs. values, so there is a difference between the "nets" over which they have "a legitimate magisterium, or domain of teaching authority", and the two domains do not overlap. He suggests, with examples, that "NOMA enjoys strong and fully explicit support, even from the primary cultural stereotypes of hard-line traditionalism" and that it is "a sound position of general consensus, established by long struggle among people of goodwill in both magisteria." Some have criticized the idea or suggested limitations to it, and there continues to be disagreement over where the boundaries between the two magisteria should be.
The term New Atheism describes the positions of some atheist academics, writers, scientists, and philosophers of the 20th and 21st centuries. New Atheism advocates the view that superstition, religion, and irrationalism should not be tolerated. Instead, they advocate the antitheist view that the various forms of theism should be criticised, countered, examined, and challenged by rational argument, especially when they exert strong influence on the broader society, such as in government, education, and politics. Critics have characterised New Atheism as "secular fundamentalism" or "fundamentalist atheism". Major figures of New Atheism include Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett, collectively referred to as the "Four Horsemen" of the movement.
The Trotter Prize is awarded at Texas A&M University and is part of an endowed lecture series. It is awarded "for pioneering contributions to the understanding of the role of information, complexity and inference in illuminating the mechanisms and wonder of nature" and includes The Trotter Lecture which "seeks to reveal connections between science and religion, often viewed in academia as non-overlapping, if not rival, worldviews.
Donald Ross Prothero is an American geologist, paleontologist, and author who specializes in mammalian paleontology and magnetostratigraphy, a technique to date rock layers of the Cenozoic era and its use to date the climate changes which occurred 30–40 million years ago. He is the author or editor of more than 30 books and over 300 scientific papers, including at least 5 geology textbooks.
God in the Age of Science? A Critique of Religious Reason is a 2012 book by the Dutch philosopher Herman Philipse, written in English and published in the United Kingdom. Philipse found his Atheist Manifesto (1995) to be too hastily and superficially written, and decided to set up a more complete work to systematically refute all the arguments for the existence of God and adherence to any form of theism.
