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: “The discussions reinforced…
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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 Amanda Beardsley and Jude Likori The most frequently used words in feedback given by our ECR workshop participants In July of this year, the INSBS Network hosted a week-long workshop for Early Career Researchers. The Workshop was split into two groups to accommodate a broad range of time zones. Two members of the groups give us their reflections on the workshop below; Amanda (West Cohort) and Jude (East Cohort).
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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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By Kimberley Rios This article was originally published on the Heterodox Blog and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution, Non-Commercial, No-Derivatives 4.0 International License. Just a few weeks ago, a blog post appeared in my social media news feed titled “Why your Christian friends and family members are so easily fooled by conspiracy theories.” The post caught my…
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By James C. Ungureanu In his Autobiography, Charles Darwin (1809-1882) gave three specific reasons for his growing religious doubts. He became morally revolted by the God of the Old Testament, whom he characterised as a “revengeful tyrant.” Moreover, the discovery of the “fixed laws of nature” made belief in miracles seem “incredible” to him. Finally, he concluded that recent historical-critical scholarship—or biblical criticism—demonstrated that the Gospels were completely…
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Congratulations to our Network member, Bastiaan Rutjens (University of Amsterdam) on his recent success in securing a European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant to set up a lab focussed on the psychology of science skepticism. We caught up with Bastiaan recently and he explained that “The rejection of science that we see across various segments of society represents an important challenge. While recent research has…
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By Juan Manuel Rodriguez-Caso UNAM Central Library, south wall, seen from the esplanade of the rectory. Source: José Miguel García Fernández, Wikimedia Commons (CC Attribution Share Alike 4.0 International license) When problems related to the teaching of evolution in the classroom, and the conflicts arising from various forms of creationism – particularly scientific creationism and “intelligent design” – are discussed, the country which may…
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By Parandis Tajbakhsh A lithograph of the hoax's "ruby amphitheater", as printed in The Sun. Source: Wikimedia Commons (Public Domain). In 2018, the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) began its two-year mission searching for extrasolar planets, orbiting around 200,000 stars located within 300 light-years of the Earth. TESS followed in the footsteps of NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope, launched in 2009to find Earth-sized or smaller planets around…
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By Kostas Tampakis Science and Religion, as a field of study, is flourishing. This is an easy assessment to make, if one considers the number of conferences, articles, books and dedicated journals that operate within the broad boundaries of the field. A subtler sign of the field’s growth is to be found in the disciplines that Science and Religion scholars have brought into the field in recent years. As last…
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By Sarah A. Qidwai Historiography, or how historians write history, is often a tricky topic to pin down. Methods are often developed over time, or sometimes they seemingly appear out of nowhere. To that end, the field of the history of science and religion in the academic context has its own historiographical past. Understanding and engaging with scholars in the field is often difficult without this historiographical context.
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