SCIENCE, PHILOSOPHY, RELIGION

The result of these cumulative efforts to investigate the cell—to investigate life at the molecular level—is a loud, clear, piercing cry of design The result is so unambiguous and so significant that it must 

But no bottles have been uncorked, no hands slapped. Instead, a curious, embarrassed silence surrounds the stark complexity of the cell. When the subject comes up in public, feet start to shuffle, and breathing gets a bit labored. In private people are a bit more relaxed many explicitly admit the obvious but then stare at the ground, shake their heads, and let it go at that. 

Why does the scientific community not greedily embrace its startling discovery Why is the observation of design handled with intellectual gloves The dilemma is that while one side of the elephant is labeled intelligent design, the other side might be labeled God. 

Science is a noble pursuit that can engender fierce loyalty. The purpose of science is to explain the physical world—a very serious enterprise. However, other academic disciplines (principally philosophy and theology) also are in the business of explaining parts of the world. Although most of the time these disciplines stay out of each other s way, sometimes they conflict. When that happens some dedicated people put their discipline ahead of the goal it is supposed to serve. 

Some future day may yet arrive when all reasonable chemical experiments run to discover a probable origin for life have failed unequivocally. Further, new geological evidence may indicate a sudden appearance of life on the earth. Finally, we may have explored the universe and found no trace of life, or process leading to life, elsewhere. In such a case, some scientists might choose to turn to religion for an answer. Others, however, myself included, would attempt to sort out the surviving less probable scientific explanations in the hope of selecting one that was still more likely than the remainder.1 

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Clulee, Nicholas H. John Dee s natural philosophy between science and religion. London, New York Routledge, 1988. xiv, 347 p. ISBN 0-415-00625-2... 

Fisher, Bruce S. An impossible dream - an attempt to reunite philosophy, religion and science.. 4 vols in 2 (254, 258p)... 

Kroll, Richard, Richard Ashcraft and Perez Zagorin, eds.Philosophy, science and religion in England 1640-1700. Cambridge Cambridge Univ. P., 1992. 

The modern Alchemist is, according to Levi s extended definition, literally a Symbolist. Moreover, the ever symbolizing Alchemist is simultaneously employed in the service of Art, Science, Philosophy, and Religion. As Levi grandly put it. 

Clulee, N. H. John Dee s Natural Philosophy Between Science and Religion. London Routledge, 1988. 

The series began in 1995, and now represents a wide variety of topics in history, philosophy, religion, science, and the humanities. Over the next few years it will grow to a library of around 200 volumes - a Very Short Introduction to everything from ancient Egypt and Indian philosophy to conceptual art and cosmology. 

A brief scrutiny of the history of art, politics, philosophy, religion, and science itself shows that all these activities have from time to time been much influenced by those whose perceptions ranged from the unusual to the bizarre (p. 305). 

It is not clear to anyone, least of all the practitioners, how science and technology in their headlong course do or should influence ethics and law, education and government, art and social philosophy, religion and life of the affections. Yet science is an all-pervasive energy, for it is at once a mode of thought, a source of strong emotion, and a faith as fanatical as any in history. 

Examining the key concepts of modem science, he comes to the conclusion that the cessation of any creative function of the human mind (art, philosophy, religion) would retard the development of scieiK. He claims that in the historical perspective, we do not know pure science without philosophy. Philosophy penetrates science and will never be replaced by science (Vernadsky, 1988). 

Vernadsky shows an essential difference between science, philosophy and religion. 

Yolton,John W. ed. Philosophy, Religion, and Science in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. Rochester, N.Y University of Rochester Press, 1990. 

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