Darwinism as Religion: What Literature Tells Us about Evolution
- ISBN-10
- 0190241047
- ISBN-13
- 9780190241049
- Category
- Science
- Pages
- 288
- Language
- English
- Published
- 2016-09-20
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press
- Author
- Michael Ruse
Description
The Darwinian Revolution--the change in thinking sparked by Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, which argued that all organisms including humans are the end product of a long, slow, natural process of evolution rather than the miraculous creation of an all-powerful God--is one of the truly momentous cultural events in Western Civilization. Darwinism as Religion is an innovative and exciting approach to this revolution through creative writing, showing how the theory of evolution as expressed by Darwin has, from the first, functioned as a secular religion. Drawing on a deep understanding of both the science and the history, Michael Ruse surveys the naturalistic thinking about the origins of organisms, including the origins of humankind, as portrayed in novels and in poetry, taking the story from its beginnings in the Age of Enlightenment in the 18th century right up to the present. He shows that, contrary to the opinion of many historians of the era, there was indeed a revolution in thought and that the English naturalist Charles Darwin was at the heart of it. However, contrary also to what many think, this revolution was not primarily scientific as such, but more religious or metaphysical, as people were taken from the secure world of the Christian faith into a darker, more hostile world of evolutionism. In a fashion unusual for the history of ideas, Ruse turns to the novelists and poets of the period for inspiration and information. His book covers a wide range of creative writers - from novelists like Voltaire and poets like Erasmus Darwin in the eighteenth century, through the nineteenth century with novelists including Elizabeth Gaskell, George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Henry James and H. G. Wells and poets including Robert Browning, Alfred Tennyson, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson and Gerard Manley Hopkins, and on to the twentieth century with novelists including Edith Wharton, D. H. Lawrence, John Steinbeck, William Golding, Graham Greene, Ian McEwan and Marilynne Robinson, and poets including Robert Frost, Edna St Vincent Millay and Philip Appleman. Covering such topics as God, origins, humans, race and class, morality, sexuality, and sin and redemption, and written in an engaging manner and spiced with wry humor, Darwinism as Religion gives us an entirely fresh, engaging and provocative view of one of the cultural highpoints of Western thought.
Get the book
Other editions
-
- 2016-10-13
- 312 pages
- Paperback
- Oxford University Press
-
- 2016-09-15
- 288 pages
- Ebook
- Oxford University Press
Similar books
-
Can a Darwinian be a Christian?: The Relationship Between Science and Religion
By Michael RuseLondon : John Murray . 1871. The Descent of Man . London : John Murray . 1872. ... London : J. Johnson . Darwin , F. ed . 1887. ... Human chauvinism : review of Full House by Stephen Jay Gould . Evolution 51 ( 3 ) : 1015-20 . 1997b .
-
Asian Religious Responses to Darwinism: Evolutionary Theories in Middle Eastern, South Asian, and East Asian Cultural Contexts
By C. Mackenzie BrownThis volume brings together diverse Asian religious perspectives to address critical issues in the encounter between tradition and modern western evolutionary thought.
-
Darwin's Religious Odyssey
By William E. PhippsDraws on newly available material to consider Darwin's personal religious beliefs, profiling him as a man from a specific time in history struggling to harmonize his spiritual worldviews with his scientific findings. Original.
-
Darwin's Gift to Science and Religion
By Francisco J. AyalaAn acclaimed evolutionary biologist with a background in theology, Francisco Ayala offers clear explanations of the science, reviews the history that led us to ratify Darwin's theories, and ultimately provides a clear path for a confused ...
-
Deeper Than Darwin: The Prospect For Religion In The Age Of Evolution
By John HaughtDeeper Than Darwin takes up where God After Darwin left off, arguing that Darwin's vision is important and essentially correct but that we can still dig deeper in our understanding of what is going on in the life-story.
-
Darwin, Dharma, and the Divine: Evolutionary Theory and Religion in Modern Japan
By G. Clinton GodartDarwin, Dharma, and the Divine is the first book in English on the history of evolutionary theory in Japan.
-
Science and Scientism in Nineteenth-century Europe
By Richard OlsonThe 19th century produced scientific and cultural revolutions that forever transformed modern European life. Richard Olson provides an integrated account of the history of science and its impact on intellectual and social trends of the day.
-
The Emergence and Evolution of Religion: By Means of Natural Selection
By Jonathan H. Turner, Alexandra Maryanski, Anders Klostergaard Petersen2005; Rosenbaum, Maldonado-Chapparo, and Stoinski 2016; Lukas et al. 2005; Watts and Mitani 2002; Goodall 1986, 1990; Nishida 1990; Stumpf et al. 2009; Boesch and BoeschAchermann 2000). In Table 3.1, Maryanki's cladistic analysis of ...
-
The Reluctant Mr. Darwin: An Intimate Portrait of Charles Darwin and the Making of His Theory of Evolution (Great Discoveries)
By David Quammen"Quammen brilliantly and powerfully re-creates the 19th century naturalist's intellectual and spiritual journey.
-
The Cambridge Companion to Science and Religion
By Peter HarrisonThis book explores the historical relations between science and religion and discusses contemporary issues with perspectives from cosmology, evolutionary biology and bioethics.