Science and the Sacred: Alexander, Denis
Denis Alexander is the Director of the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion at St. Edmund’s College, Cambridge, to which he was elected a Fellow in 1998. Alexander writes, lectures, and broadcasts widely in the field of science and religion. He is a member of the International Society for Science and Religion. You can read more about Alexander here.
Blogs by Alexander
Made In the Image of God: The Theological Implications of Genomics, Part 2
January 14, 2012
About a year ago I posted the first article in this series, asking whether recent advances in genomics made any difference to the Judeo-Christian notion of humanity being made in the 'image of God'. That article focused on DNA sequencing data from our closest relatives. This article will focus on the issue of genetic determinism.Comments (4)
A Response to Coyne, MacDonald, Ruse, and Wilkinson, Pt 2
February 5, 2011
The comments so far are really by way of introduction so that we can get going again with the main topic. But a few more general points still need to be highlighted in the context of comparing these two particular models.Comments (39)
A Response to Coyne, MacDonald, Ruse, and Wilkinson, Pt. 1
February 4, 2011
I am pleased to note that my paper speculating on the initiation of human spiritual life, with its suggestions of possible ways to relate theological and scientific truths, has stimulated a good discussion. As is the way with such discussions, the topic has broadened in the process, so here I will simply cherry-pick a few points that seem most pertinent.Comments (9)
Models for Relating Adam and Eve with Contemporary Anthropology, Part 5
January 13, 2011
The Homo divinus model has the advantage that it takes very seriously the Biblical idea that Adam and Eve were historical figures as indicated by those texts already mentioned. It also sees the Fall as an historical event involving the disobedience of Adam and Eve to God’s express commands, bringing death in its wake. The model locates these events within Jewish proto-history.Comments (35)
Beware Evolutionary ‘Just-so’ Stories About Religious Belief
January 8, 2011
As an evolutionary biologist I am fascinated by the emergence of that suite of cognitive abilities that make us so distinctive from other living species. There are, however, risks in making up evolutionary "just-so" stories to explain the origins of complex human beliefs, such as religious ones.Comments (12)
Made In The Image Of God: The Theological Implications Of Human Genomics—Part 1
January 4, 2011
The tenth anniversary of the human genome has been marked by some striking new genetic insights into human evolution and diversity. Do these new discoveries have any significance for the dialogue between science and religion in general, or for our sense of human uniqueness in particular?Comments (33)
Models for Relating Adam and Eve with Contemporary Anthropology, Part 4
January 3, 2011
Like the Retelling Model, this model also represents a protohistorical view in the sense that it lies beyond history as normally understood, but like the Retelling Model looks for events located in history that might correspond to the theological account provided by the Genesis narrative. But in this case the model locates these events within the culture and geography that the Genesis text provides.Comments (39)
Denis Alexander on Restoring a Traditional Creation Theology
December 30, 2010
In this video, Denis Alexander discusses the need to restore a traditional creation theology to the discussion of science and faith. One way to do this, argues Alexander, is to discourage investing evolution with an atheistic narrative, and instead allow it to do the job it is meant to fulfill: to explain the origins of biological diversity.Comments (17)
Models for Relating Adam and Eve with Contemporary Anthropology, Part 3
December 28, 2010
How do we relate the anthropological understanding with the profound theological essay that the early chapters of Genesis provide for us, with their carefully nuanced presentation of ‘Adam’? There are two main models that seek to answer this question, which we will here label as the ‘Retelling Model’ and as the ‘Homo divinus Model’, for reasons that will become clear in a moment.Comments (78)
Models for Relating Adam and Eve with Contemporary Anthropology, Part 2
December 22, 2010
The last common ancestor between us and the chimpanzee lived around 5 – 6 million years ago. Since that time we and the apes have been undergoing our own independent evolutionary pathways. Today we have religion, chimps do not. At some stage humanity began to know the one true God of the scriptures. How and when did that happen?Comments (43)
Models for Relating Adam and Eve with Contemporary Anthropology, Part 1
December 16, 2010
One of our aims at BioLogos is to build a network of leading Evangelicals who can help us tell the magnificent story of what God has done in Creation as revealed by modern science. To that end, we invited 65 leading pastors, scholars, scientists, public intellectuals, and informed laypersons to join us in New York City for three days in November to consider several pressing questions at the interface of science and faith.Comments (47)
What Does it Mean to Have “Common Ancestry”?
November 17, 2010
In this brief video “Conversation” Denis Alexander, director of the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion, explains the definition of common ancestry. Common ancestry does not mean that we are descended from apes, rather, it means that we last shared a common ancestor with them roughly 6 million years ago. While apes have been evolving their way since that time, so too have humans.Comments (174)
Biology and Ideology – From Descartes to Dawkins
September 3, 2010
Ever since modern science emerged in the 16th and 17th centuries it has been used and abused for purposes that lie well beyond science. Biology has been particularly susceptible to ideological manipulation and application, a trend that shows no sign of abating.Comments (76)
Darwin: The Father of Modern Racism?
August 25, 2010
Last week, popular television commentator Glenn Beck referred to Charles Darwin as "the father of modern-day racism." Certainly, Beck's sentiments are nothing new; links between Darwin and racism, as well as to eugenics and other destructive ideologies, are mentioned constantly by opponents to the modern theory of evolution. But are these links valid?Comments (92)
Denis Alexander On the Barriers to Traditional Creation Theology
May 15, 2010
In this video Conversation, Denis Alexander addresses the most prominent barriers to accepting a traditional Creation theology.
Comments (21)
Understanding Genesis and the Fall
January 30, 2010
In this video clip, Denis Alexander, Director of the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion, discusses the description of the Fall found in Genesis. Alexander suggests that the picture we might have of the story owes more to the imaginative expansion of the narrative as found in Milton’s Paradise Lost than what is actually present in the biblical text itself.Comments (3)