Ian Barbour, Who Found a Balance Between Faith and Science, Dies at 90

[cbayer]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/13/us/ian-barbour-academic-who-resisted-conflicts-of-faith-and-science-dies-at-90.html

By WILLIAM YARDLEY
JAN. 12, 2014


Ian Barbour, right, who had physics and divinity degrees, with Sir John Templeton after winning the Templeton Prize in 1999. Marty Lederhandler/Associated Press

Ian Barbour first studied science, then religion, but instead of concluding that the two are in eternal conflict, he helped create an academic realm where they share common ground.

Dr. Barbour, who was 90 when he died on Dec. 24 in Minneapolis, earned a doctorate in physics at the University of Chicago and then a divinity degree from Yale, and he never abandoned his passion for scientific exploration or his place in the pew. He embraced the complexities of evolution and the Big Bang theory, of genetics and neuroscience. He also embraced Christianity. He was a devoted parishioner at First United Church of Christ in Northfield, Minn.

In 1999, when he won the Templeton Prize, a prestigious award given annually to “a living person who has made exceptional contributions to affirming life’s spiritual dimension,” he said it was missing the point to focus on the supremacy of one over the other, to read either religious texts or scientific findings as comprehensive in their capacity to explain existence.

“If we take the Bible seriously but not literally,” he said in his acceptance address, “we can accept the central biblical message without accepting the prescientific cosmology in which it was expressed, such as the three-layer universe with heaven above and hell below, or the seven days of the creation story.”

more at link

[trotsky]

1. Worth noting is that the "balance" he found...

was realizing that when they do conflict, religion must yield to science.

[Brettongarcia]

2. Even as he admits that something is missing in his Religion; an accurate cosmology etc.

So that Religion as he embraced it, is not quite enough to fully live by; it misses some key things.

He's right about one thing: it needs Science to help it out.

[struggle4progress]

4. "... he said it was missing the point to focus on the supremacy of one over the other ..."

So mebbe, despite your claim, he didn't conclude religion must yield to science

[trotsky]

6. Read the very next paragraph.

"Mebbe" he's saying that, but he clearly means otherwise. He's discarding biblical information that does not comply with scientific knowledge, thus demonstrating that when in conflict, go with science.

[madrchsod]

3. civilizations were built on both science and religion

i really do not see the conflict

[cbayer]

5. I agree with you.

While there can be areas of conflict, evolution being the prime example, I think they are in different spheres and even complementary at times.