Does religion belong in the laboratory? What relationship exists between science and Christian faith? Are the two mutually exclusive? Arguing that Christianity has much to contribute to the scientific and ethical debates facing today's world, gifted scientists and committed Christians Alexander and White ask the hard questions as they examine some of the greatest scientific and ethical challenges of the age. Topics include: the new genetics, reproductive technologies, cloning, the significance of evolution, the environment and climate change, and sustainable consumption. - from publisher information.
Science challenges faith to seek fuller understanding, and faith challenges science to be socially and ethically responsible. This book begins with faith in God the Creator of the world, and then expands our understanding of creation in light of Big Bang cosmology and new discoveries in physics. Examining the expanding frontier of genetic research, Ted Peters draws out implications for theological understandings of human nature and human freedom. Issues discussed include: methodology in science and theology; eschatology in cosmology and theology; freedom and responsibility in evolution and theology; and genetic determinism, genetic engineering, and cloning in relation to freedom, the comodification of human life, and equitable distribution of the fruits of genetic technology. The dialogue model of relationship between science and religion, proposed in this book, provides a common ground for the disparate voices among theologians, scientists, and world religions. This common ground has the potential to breathe new life into current debates about the world in which we live, move, and have our being.
Every day, headlines emphasise the impact that technology has on the manipulation of life. We all want to live longer, healthier, happier lives. To live at all costs and maintain life at all costs has become a popular aim. This book examines those costs; it probes the consequences of putting one's faith in science. It explores the belief that with science comes certainty. The use and misuse of implants, transplants, cloning, genetic manipulation, health care resources, birth and death control are debated in terms of the complex scientific, economic and ethical issues involved.
Faith and Health examines controversial issues in medical ethics such as embryo stem cell research, the face transplant, cyborgs and the human and physician assisted suicide. Those struggling with such confusing and controversial subjects will appreciate the insights from ethics, theology, and law the author brings together. Here is guidance for personal or social responses to questions in medicine that affect us all.
The past decade has witnessed a renaissance in scientific approaches to the study of morality. Once understood to be the domain of moral psychology, the newer approach to morality is largely interdisciplinary, driven in no small part by developments in behavioural economics and evolutionary biology, as well as advances in neuroscientific imaging capabilities, among other fields. To date, scientists studying moral cognition and behaviour have paid little attention to virtue theory, while virtue theorists have yet to acknowledge the new research results emerging from the new science of morality. Theology and the Science of Moral Action explores a new approach to ethical thinking that promotes dialogue and integration between recent research in the scientific study of moral cognition and behaviour—including neuroscience, moral psychology, and behavioural economics—and virtue theoretic approaches to ethics in both philosophy and theology. More particularly, the book evaluates the concept of moral exemplarity and its significance in philosophical and theological ethics as well as for ongoing research programs in the cognitive sciences.
Grand Winner of the 2014 Nautilus Book Awards Thoughtful observers agree that the planetary crisis we now face-climate change; species extinction; the destruction of entire ecosystems; the urgent need for a more just economic-political order-is pushing human civilization to a radical turning point: change or perish. But precisely how to change remains an open question. In Earth-honoring Faith, Larry Rasmussen answers that question with a dramatically new way of thinking about human society, ethics, and the ongoing health of our planet. Rejecting the modern assumption that morality applies to human society alone, Rasmussen insists that we must derive a spiritual and ecological ethic that accounts for the well-being of all creation, as well as the primal elements upon which it depends: earth, air, fire, water, and sunlight. He argues that good science, necessary as it is, will not be enough to inspire fundamental change. We must draw on religious resources as well to make the difficult transition from an industrial-technological age obsessed with consumption to an ecological age that restores wise stewardship of all life. Earth-honoring Faith advocates an alliance of spirituality and ecology, in which the material requirements for planetary life are reconciled with deep traditions of spirituality across religions, traditions that include mysticism, sacramentalism, prophetic practices, asceticism, and the cultivation of wisdom. It is these shared spiritual practices that can produce a chorus of world faiths to counter the consumerism, utilitarianism, alienation, oppression, and folly that have pushed us to the brink. Written with passionate commitment and deep insight, Earth-honoring Faith reminds us that we must live in the present with the knowledge that the eyes of future generations will look back at us.
"A devastating attack upon the dominance of atheism in science today." Giovanni Fazio, Senior Physicist, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics The debate over the ultimate source of truth in our world often pits science against faith. In fact, some high-profile scientists today would have us abandon God entirely as a source of truth about the universe. In this book, two professional astronomers push back against this notion, arguing that the science of today is not in a position to pronounce on the existence of God—rather, our notion of truth must include both the physical and spiritual domains. Incorporating excerpts from a letter written in 1615 by famed astronomer Galileo Galilei, the authors explore the relationship between science and faith, critiquing atheistic and secular understandings of science while reminding believers that science is an important source of truth about the physical world that God created.
