By Marcio Antonio Campos Pope Francis addressing an audience at the Galeão Air Force Base, Brazil 2013. Tania Rego/ABr, CC BY 3.0 BR, via Wikimedia Commons Are seminarians who know what popes have said on evolution more likely to make peace with Darwin? When Pope Francis said in 2014 that God was not “a magician, complete with an all powerful magic wand”,…
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In the final episode of Season 1 of the Science & Belief in Society Podcast, we’re re-joined by Dr Tom Aechtner, Senior Lecturer in Religion and Science in the School Historical and Philosophical Inquiry at the University of Queensland. Tom talks us through the persuasive and rhetorical tactics used by both pro- and anti-evolutionist media and explains what science communicators can learn from their anti-evolutionary counterparts. Alongside his work on…
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Dr Lois Lee is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Kent, and is the Principal Investigator on the Understanding Unbelief programme. You can read her Researcher Profile here. In this episode, we talk with Lois about the relationship between science and non-religion and the perceived affinity between the two. Through her ground-breaking research on non-religion and unbelief, Lois discusses…
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***This blog post originally appeared on the University of Birmingham website, 10 February 2021, and is reproduced here with the kind permission of the University of Birmingham.*** 11 February was the United Nations International Day of Women and Girls in Science. To mark the occasion network members Carissa Sharp and Stephen Jones explore…
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Photo by Scott Graham on Unsplash The Pew Research Center is a fact tank which focuses on issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. For example, they study U.S. politics and policy; journalism and media; internet, science and technology; religion and public life; global attitudes and trends and U.S. social and demographic trends. To carry out such research, the team at Pew Research conduct public opinion polling, demographic…
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Renny Thomas is Assistant Professor (Sociology and Social Anthropology), Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Bhopal, India. Before joining IISER, he taught at the Department of Sociology, Jesus and Mary College, University of Delhi, New Delhi (2015-2021). Renny received his PhD in Sociology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi and was the 2017-2018 Charles Wallace Fellowship in Social Anthropology at Queen’s University, Belfast, UK. You…
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Recently, we caught up with Dr Tom Aechtner, Senior Lecturer in Religion and Science at the University of Queensland, to record an episode for the Science & Belief in Society podcast series. That episode, on Tom’s work around persuasion tactics in science and religion mass media communication, will be launched in Summer 2021. Tom has also been researching vaccination scepticism and anti-vaccination movements and media. Given…
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By James Riley “Buddhist temple detail Singapore #dailyshoot” by Leshaines123 is licensed with CC BY 2.0. To view a copy of this license, visit. Pew Research Center recently released a new report exploring the intersections of science and religion, based on new data from interviews with Hindus, Muslims, and Buddhists in Malaysia and Singapore. The report’s authors said:…
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By Alper Bilgili A cartoon, widely circulated on social media, depicts clergy of various religions in despair, begging a scientist to find a cure for COVID-19. In another, clergy are staring at a picture of a nurse who asks for silence with a “SHHH” sign. Those who share these cartoons seem certain that the ensuing pandemic once again proves the superiority of natural sciences over other forms of knowledge.
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Александр Холл Сегодня, в пятницу, 12 февраля 2016 года, исполняется 207 лет со дня рождения Чарльза Дарвина. Проводимые во всём мире мероприятия называются «День Дарвина», они затронут 6 континентов от Тель-Авива до Токио и будут посвящены работе английского натуралиста, изучению его наследия и обсуждению современного состояния дел в области эволюционной…
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By Alexander Hall Today, Friday February 12th 2016, is the 207th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth. Celebrated around the world as ‘Darwin Day’, events across 6 continents from Tel-Aviv to Tokyo will commemorate the English naturalist’s work, explore his legacy, and discuss the current state of affairs in the field of Evolutionary Biology and beyond. Whilst the majority…
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Par Alexander Hall Aujourd’hui, vendredi 12 février 2016 marque le 207e anniversaire de la naissance de Charles Darwin. Célébrés dans le monde entier sous le nom de « Darwin Day » (Journée Darwin), des événements sur 6 continents, de Tel-Aviv à Tokyo, commémoreront le travail du naturaliste anglais, exploreront son héritage et discuteront de la situation…
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بقلم ألكسندر هول اليوم، الجمعة 12 فبراير 2016، هو الذكرى 207 لميلاد تشارلز داروين (Charles Darwin)، والذي يحتفل به في جميع أنحاء العالم باسم “يوم داروين” (Darwin Day). وسوف تحتفل الفعاليات عبر 6 قارات من تل أبيب إلى طوكيو بإحياء عمل عالِم الطبيعة الإنجليزي واستكشاف إرثه ومناقشة الوضع الحالي في مجال علم الأحياء التطوري (Evolutionary Biology) وما ورائه.
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By Hans Henrik Hjermitslev Charles Robert Darwin, as an ape, holds a mirror up to another ape. Colour lithograph by [F.]. Source: Wellcome Collection. Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) During July and August 2015 the Danish public witnessed a heated controversy on science and religion in the popular media. The reason for this was that two historians of religion, Michael Rothstein and Jens-André Herbener, accused the newly appointed Minister…
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By Stephen H. Jones ‘What has become clear to me in recent years is that the old dream of progress, which used to be assumed, is being replaced in popular culture by visions of disaster, ecological catastrophe in particular’. So said Robert Bellah, one of the twentieth century’s most accomplished scholars of religion, in 2008. His words have seemed apt following the coverage of Pope…
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