Religion and Scientific Naturalism: Overcoming the Conflicts (Suny Series in Constructive Postmodern Thought) (Suny Series, Constructive Postmodern Thought) [Paperback]

David Ray Griffin (Author)

Book Description

Series: Suny Series, Constructive Postmodern Thought | Publication Date: May 31, 2000

Articulates a metaphysical position capable of rendering both science and religious experience simultaneously and mutually intelligible. In this book, David Ray Griffin argues that the perceived conflict between science and religion is based upon a double mistake-the assumption that religion requires supernaturalism and that scientific naturalism requires atheism and materialism.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

David Ray Griffin is Professor of Philosophy of Religion and Theology at the Claremont School of Theology and Claremont Graduate University in California. His many books include The Reenchantment of Science: Postmodern Proposals, Unsnarling the World-Knot: Consciousness, Freedom, and the Mind-Body Problem, and Parapsychology, Philosophy, and Spirituality: A Postmodern Exploration. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 364 pages
• Publisher: State University of New York Press (May 31, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 079144564X
• ISBN-13: 978-0791445648
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,765,284 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A good primer on the topic, March 6, 2007

By 

D. S. Bornus (St. Paul, MN) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Religion and Scientific Naturalism: Overcoming the Conflicts (Suny Series in Constructive Postmodern Thought) (Suny Series, Constructive Postmodern Thought) (Paperback)

The ongoing attempt to reconcile religion with science is understandably challenging as we try to encompass the infinite within our finite human rationality. This book does a good job of framing the discussion.

This book's approach is to classify "religion" and "science" into two categories each.
1. Supernaturalism (religion-sup) holds that God is outside and independent of creation and can affect it from the outside.
2. Non-supernatural religion (religion-ns) holds that God is a part of creation and is not outside of its laws and rules, and must work within them.

3. Scientific-atheistic-materialistic science (naturalism-sam) says that the material universe is all there is, and we can only know what can be perceived via our five senses. This version of naturalism is necessarily atheistic and deterministic (our "minds" are an illusion of our physical brains, and there is no freedom of action, all actions are prescribed by the action/reaction of the matter that composes us.)

4. Non-supernatural science (naturalism-ns) does not insist on only a materialist perspective. Since our consciousness is a self-evident aspect of our existence, we can also know things via non-sensate experience (introspection, etc.)

The author's thesis is that a combination of religion-ns and naturalism-ns can bring fruitful reconciliation of impasses between religion and science. If we accept that God is a part of nature (Griffin's analogy is that God is the "mind" of creation as a human mind is part of the body), and that science includes non-material matters, we can overcome difficulties associated with the religion-sup (why does a good, all-powerful God allow evil?) and naturalism-sam (if the material is all there is, how do we explain our consciousness in a satisfying way?).

This metaphysical viewpoint also provides fresh perspectives to consider such areas as parapsychology (which materialism-sam rules out a priori), and reconciling the creation/evolution debate. Griffin presents an interesting discussion of both subjects. Particularly helpful is his is identification of 14 different iterations of "Darwinian evolution" that have been discussed, showing that when people speak of "evolution" it is important to identify/clarify which of the 14 iterations they have in mind. Griffin thoroughly explores all the nuances of these iterations of Darwinism, invaluably framing this topic for future debates.

Also interesting is his proposal that the materialist perspective of science, and the "ex nihilio" religious view that God was apart/outside of creation, were not settled on from the beginning but are fairly recent developments in past centuries.

While I do not completely concur with Griffin's premises and conclusions (I have no problem with the concept of an all-powerful "supernatural" God who could take six days to create a world that appears physically to have been in existence for billions of years, or who self-defines what is good and evil and who is not subject to our human formulations of logic, rationality, etc.), I found this book very interesting and helpful to clarify the issues, and thus I give it five stars.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very informative, November 23, 2003

By 

D. Collingridge (Utah) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Religion and Scientific Naturalism: Overcoming the Conflicts (Suny Series in Constructive Postmodern Thought) (Suny Series, Constructive Postmodern Thought) (Paperback)

Overall, I really enjoyed this book. I especially like Griffin's coverage of the historical events and philisophical issues surrounding the science-religion debate. I think that he effectively discusses the history of science and the enlightnment within the context of 18th, 19th, and 20th century religiousity (i.e., deism, atheism, etc.). I also like his description of how science influenced religion and vice versa during the previous centuries. These well-constructed discussions are presented in the first few chapters.
Although I don't agree with his synthesis of science and religion (specifically, I don't favor rejecting God's supernaturalism), he does a good job of educating the reader on how important issues such as supernaturalism, determinism, and free will, etc. play a role in the issue of reconciling science and religious beliefs. I sometimes found myself saying, "that is a great insight."

If I have to pick something I did not like it would have to be his lengthy coverage of Darwinism. He presents a Process Theologian interpretation of Darwinism to support his viewpoint. I found this long discussion tedious, but others may find it interesting.

IMO, this book is a good read.

Dave

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The worldview of reductionistic naturalism falters...but so does panentheism, August 28, 2010

By 

Justin Holcomb (Seattle) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Religion and Scientific Naturalism: Overcoming the Conflicts (Suny Series in Constructive Postmodern Thought) (Suny Series, Constructive Postmodern Thought) (Paperback)

This book is a venture in constructive philosophy concerning the relation of science and religion. The central question he addresses is whether there is anything essential to science that is in conflict with any beliefs essential to religion, especially theistic religion. According to Griffin, to claim that there is no essential conflict requires that religion is not equated with supernaturalism and that science is not equated with a maximal naturalism. Harmony between the two can occur if and only if theism were to give up all remnants of supernaturalism in favor of theistic naturalism, and if science were to give up reductionistic naturalism in favor if a minimal naturalism restricted to the rejection of supernatural worldviews.

Griffin argues that science and religion do not need radically to redefine themselves for the sake of reconciliation. Alfred North Whitehead provides for Griffin the grand philosophical system, with its "wider and more open form of naturalism," that makes room for both. Harmony is to be effected by integrating science and religion into the philosophical worldview of Whitehead. Foundational to this claim is that religion needs to be understood in terms of naturalistic theism or panentheism, rather than supernaturalism. According to Griffin, it is not correct to assume that theistic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, require supernaturalism.

The book is divided into two parts. The first part focuses on science, religion, and naturalism. Griffin traces the development of maximal naturalism (the materialistic version of scientific naturalism) and shows how it leads to conflict with many forms of religion. He also looks at various methods of harmonizing science and religion that challenge his approach and theses- that religion can thrive without supernaturalism and that science rightly presupposes naturalism in the minimal sense. Griffin then begins the exposition of his position of harmonizing science and religion in terms of "minimal naturalism."

Part two shows how Whitehead's naturalism provides the basis for harmonizing religious and scientific beliefs in relation to some issues on which there has been considerable conflict during the last modern period. Issues raised include the mind-body relation, materialism and dualism, the Cartesian view of matter, and the relations between religious beliefs and parapsychology. Griffin then explains the issue at the heart of the conflict- the idea from a theistic view that the world is created out of nothing by a supernatural creator rather than coming about by a naturalistic evolutionary process. He suggests that Whitehead's theistic naturalism provides a resource for developing a position combining the strengths of both views while avoiding their pitfalls.

Though pastors and educated lay readers will find it accessible, the text is intended for an academic, rather than an ecclesiastical, audience. Griffin provides a valuable service in presenting a thoughtful challenge and critique of "scientism," a strong version of naturalism that is equated with sensationism, atheism, materialism, determinism, and reductionism.

However, Griffin's harmonization of science and religion is an accommodation of theism to science and naturalism. While arguing against a strong version of scientific naturalism, Griffin agrees with the contemporary affirmation that theists have the epistemic right to believe what they wish; however, so long as they understand their sacred texts in a general straightforward manner, they ought not to claim or pretend that they hold justified, rational, or true beliefs since they conflict with well-established scientific claims or panentheism. Such a restriction derives from the notion of science and philosophy as the paradigm of plausibility, a hallmark of secularism.

Given the assumptions of Whitehead's philosophy or process theology, Griffin's argument is a consistent and clear harmonization of science and religion. Even for those who do not go agree with "process philosophy" or panentheism, Griffin's work is helpful for thinking about science and religion and struggling with the issue of incommensurablity. Griffin rightly insists that the overriding issue in this discussion is that of worldview. He claims that the worldview of reductionistic naturalism falters, but can panentheism withstand worldview critiques? This is a question for another book.

There is another way to view the relation of theism and science apart from a panentheistic harmonization. The theist can be confident in a discussion on the nature and use of science precisely because the theistic worldview provides the necessary preconditions for the intelligibility of the scientific enterprise. In other words, without the philosophical, theological, and epistemological aspects of the theistic worldview, the scientific discipline is at best arbitrary and at worse undermined. The naturalist account of science, understood in either a maximal or minimal sense, falters under the weight of numerous internal contradictions. Scientific naturalism is able to avoid nihilism and skepticism only by being inconsistent with its own worldview and by relying on "borrowed capital" from the theistic worldview.