Philip Clayton

: Ingraham Professor of Theology, Claremont School of Theology, and Professor of Religion and Philosophy, Claremont Graduate University

Featured Presentation: “Emergent Phenomena in the Natural World: What Do They Suggest about Religion?”
11:00am, Monday, October 26, 2009
West Hall, Room 135

Philip Clayton (Ph.D., Yale University) is a philosopher, theologian and public intellectual specializing in the entire range of issues—ethical, political, and theoretical—that arise at the intersection between science and religion. Over the last several decades he has published and lectured extensively on all branches of this debate, including the history of modern philosophy, philosophy of science, comparative religions, and constructive theology. Addressing the cultural battle over the relationship between science and religion, Clayton argues that rejecting the scientism of Dawkins, et. al., does not open the door to fundamentalism. Rather, a variety of complex and interesting positions are being obscured by this fight. By drawing on the resources of the sciences, philosophy, theology, and comparative religious thought, Clayton shows how the compatibility of science with religious belief may be integrated across a variety of fields, including emergence theory, evolution and religion, evolutionary psychology, neuroscience and consciousness.

View Philip Clayton’s website.

Recent Publications:

In Quest of Freedom: The Emergence of Spirit in the Natural World (Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 2009).

Co–editor (with Zachary Simpson) of: Adventures in the Spirit: God, World, Divine Action (Fortress Press, 2008).

Co–editor (with Jim Schaal) of: Practicing Science, Living Faith: Interviews with Twelve Leading Scientists (Columbia University Press, 2007).

Editor of: The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Science (Oxford University Press, 2006).

Co–editor (with Paul Davies) of: The Re-Emergence of Emergence: The Emergentist Hypothesis from Science to Religion (Oxford University Press, 2006).

Mind and Emergence: From Quantum to Consciousness (Oxford University Press, 2004).

This lecture is co–sponsored by the Beyond Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science and the School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies.