Science and religion

Science and religion is the study of how scientific inquiry and religious beliefs, practices, and institutions interact, conflict, and shape one another.

Conflict thesis: The historical claim that science and religion are inherently opposed and have repeatedly clashed. It frames tension as the defining relationship, though historians dispute its accuracy.
Galileo affair: The seventeenth-century Catholic Church proceedings against Galileo Galilei over his support for heliocentrism. It became a defining example of institutional conflict over astronomy and scripture.
Ian Barbour: An American physicist and theologian known for influential twentieth-century work on science and religion. His typology organized the relationship into conflict, independence, dialogue, and integration.
History of science: The study of how scientific knowledge, practices, and institutions have developed over time. Historical scholarship tests sweeping claims about religion’s influence on science.
Evolutionary creation: The view that God creates through evolutionary processes rather than through separate acts of biological creation. It offers a religious interpretation that accepts mainstream evolutionary science.
Non-overlapping magisteria: Stephen Jay Gould’s proposal that science and religion address separate domains of empirical fact and moral meaning. It offers a clear separation of domains as an alternative to conflict.
Scopes trial: The 1925 Tennessee trial of teacher John T. Scopes for teaching human evolution in public school. It dramatized disputes over evolution, education, and biblical interpretation.
Stephen Jay Gould: An American paleontologist and evolutionary biologist who proposed the idea of non-overlapping magisteria. His framework argues that science and religion answer different kinds of questions.
Scientific Revolution: A period of major change in European natural philosophy and astronomy, roughly from the sixteenth to seventeenth centuries. Its religious and political settings complicate stories of science emerging against faith.
Intelligent design: The claim that certain features of life or the universe are best explained by an intelligent cause rather than unguided processes. Its scientific status and religious motivations remain sharply contested.

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