This Unit supports scholarship that explores the relationship of religion, theology, technology, and the natural sciences. We support research that attempts to bridge the gap between religious and scientific approaches to reality and encourage the development of constructive proposals that encourage engagement and dialogue with the sciences, along with a critical assessment of the meaning and impact of technologies for the human condition and the natural world.
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Science, Technology, and Religion Unit
Call for Proposals
The Science, Technology, and Religion Unit is soliciting proposals on the following topics:
Science, Human Flourishing, and Human Nature
What role can science play in enhancing or diminishing human flourishing? What ideals of human flourishing are found in the human sciences and how do they overlap or contradict different religious traditions?
Science-Engaged Theology
What is science-engaged theology? How does one make scientific evidence tractable for religious claims? Is empirical data neutral, or is it always entangled with theological and philosophical assumptions? Is science-engaged theology something all religious traditions can undertake or is it restricted to particular traditions?
Religious consequences of technology at home and work
How will simulations (e.g., Meta/Facebook's vision for virtual reality) and other forms of telepresence change our experience of others and ourselves?
Teaching Science and Religion
What are best practices for teaching “science and religion”? What books and topics should be covered? How does one balance questions of theology versus religious studies approaches? What questions, paradigms, books unite (or should unite) the field?
Debates on decolonizing science
Do ‘religion’, ’theology’, and ‘spirituality’ play any role in these debates? Should they? What are the intellectual and institutional conditions within which recent decolonization debates can have a transformative impact on the study of science, technology, and religion?
Sociology of science, technology, and religion (Co-sponsored with Sociology of Religion Unit)
We invite papers on vaccines (and vaccine skepticism), virology, climate science, surveillance, virtual ritual/worship, social/digital media, big data, etc.
Statement of Purpose
Chairs
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Heather Mellquist Lehto, University of Toronto1/1/2022 - 12/31/2027
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Josh Reeves, Samford University1/1/2018 - 12/31/2023
Steering Committee Members
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Peter Jordan, University of Oxford1/1/2020 - 12/31/2025
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Sarah Lane Ritchie, University of Edinburgh1/1/2020 - 12/31/2025
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Donovan Schaefer, University of Pennsylvania1/1/2022 - 12/31/2027
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Yunus Dogan Telliel, Worcester Polytechnic Institute1/1/2017 - 12/31/2022