Sacred Science?

This book investigates whether the symbols of academia can take on a quality of sacrality, whether the rule of experts can be said to have the character of a 'priesthood of knowledge', whether religion has a place in scientific contexts, and other questions.

Science and religion are often viewed as dichotomies. But although our contemporary society is often perceived as a rationalization process, we still need broad, metaphysical beliefs outside of what can be proven empirically. Rituals and symbols remain at the core of modern life. Do our concepts of science and religion require revitalization? Can science itself be considered a religion, a belief, or an ideology? Science's authority and prestige allows for little in the way of alternate approaches not founded in empirical science. It is not unusual to believe that technology and science will solve the world's fundamental problems. Has truth been colonized by science? Have scientific disciplines become so specialized and "operationally closed" that they have constructed barriers to other disciplines as well as the general public? The writers of this book set out to investigate whether the symbols of academia may in some cases take on a quality of sacrality, whether the rule of experts can be said to have the character of a "priesthood of knowledge", whether religion has a place in scientific contexts, and a selection of other questions concerning science and its relations to religious belief.

Preface.- .- 1. Scientific worldviews, religious minds.- Science as religion?.- Science and religious worldviews intertwined.- Sacred science?.- 2. Science and religion?.- Common to all sciences: informed and self-critical argumentation.- The need for critical studies of the sciences.- A need for improvement.- Science: part of the problem, part of the solution.- Plurality of religions: a need for clarifying definitions and convincing justifications.- In the new age: a close relationship between monotheism and science.- The inherent need for a critique of religion.- Modernization of consciousness.- 3. What is epistocracy?.- The historical dimension.- The organizational dimension.- The constitutional dimension.- The process dimension.- The substance dimension.- The actor dimension.- The cognitive dimension.- The normative dimension.- Why not epistocracy?.- 4. Doubt has been eliminated.- Elimination of doubt and the ethos of science.- The unscientific belief in science.- Livssyn – life philosophies.- First or second modernity.- 5. The religious belief in rationality, science and democracy.- Moral imaginaries.- The ideals of religious freedom and the Enlightenment.- The liberal dogma.- Who shall guard whom?.- 6. Psychology as science or psychology as religion.- From Protestantism to therapy.- The turning away from religion.- Psychology as religion.- Psychology as religion reconsidered.- Going back to the roots.- Conclusion.- 7: Science without God.- Introduction: science vs. religion.- Scientific fundamentalism.- Can science explain religion?.- Can science replace religion?.- Science with God, and science without God.- Conclusion: we can do without religion.- 8. Science and religion, natural and unnatural.- A new “cognitive” contrast.- Conceptual oversimplification and historical forgetfulness.- Cognitive commonalities.- A dubious distinction.- Cognitively unnatural science?.- 9. Immortality.- Variations of socio-technical immortality.- Engineeredimmortality.- Concluding: changing coordinates of transcendence.- 10. What should be the role of religion in science education and bioethics?.- The role of religion in science education.- The importance of creationism for science education.- The response of science education to creationism.- The role of religion in bioethics.- What then is the specific place for religion?.- Conclusions.- Current commentary: The arc of civil liberation.- “Obama”.- Tahrir Square.- Occupy Wall Street.- Contributors.