Macmurray, The Giffords, Science & Religion
Reading back over the Quantum entries, my passion for dear old John Macmurray, and interest in The Gifford Lectures, became blindingly obvious.
The prestigious Gifford Lecture series, held annually at the ancient Scottish universities since 1888, have carried the words of great thinkers on the broad topic of natural religion. Some of the speakers have, through other strands of synchronous enquiry, already been referenced in this blog (eg. Heisenberg, Bohr, Macmurray).
“Although the will expressed the hope that the presentations would spread sound views “among the whole population of Scotland” the stature of the presenters and the quality of the addresses and books that came from them have reached far beyond Scotland.
“The prestige of the Gifford series derives in part from the world-renowned lecturers and from the diversity of intellectual disciplines they represent. As would be expected in a series on natural religion, numerous lecturers have been theologians and ethicists, such as Jurgen Moltmann and Reinhold Niebuhr, and philosophers, including, Etienne Gilson and Henri Bergson.
“What might not be expected in the series are historians (Arnold Toynbee, Herbert Butterfield), scientists (Werner Karl Heisenberg, Niels Bohr), writers (Iris Murdoch, Hannah Arendt), and even one British Prime Minister (Arthur Balfour). Former speakers such as Karl Barth and Carl Sagan bring very different perspectives on the nature of nature and the meaning and value of natural theology.
“In recent years the Gifford lectures at Edinburgh have been delivered by Mohammed Arkoun, Professor Emeritus of Islamic Thought at the Sorbonne (”Inaugurating a Critique of Islamic Reason”) and Michael Ignatieff, Director of the Carr Center of Human Rights Policy at Harvard University (”The Lesser Evil: Political Ethics in a Time of Terror”).
“These names represent but a small sample of the disciplines, topics and people to be found in the Gifford series.”
There is a new book out called:
The Measure of God: Our Century-Long Struggle to Reconcile Science &
Religion
As one reviewer says…
“…a stimulating volume that would be a welcome gift to anyone interested in the development of modern thought.”
“Although his coverage is necessarily selective, Witham includes an impressive range of material for a single volume: lecture summaries, biographical sketches of selected presenters, observations of Scottish history and local color, and a wealth of background information on intellectual movements that have shaped the lectures over the decades.
Witham follows disciplines and ideologies rather than strict chronology, allowing the story to flow more naturally. The text is deeply researched and factually rich, even dense at times. But fans of the Gifford Lectures will appreciate Witham’s thoroughness, as well as his interest in the personalities of the presenters beyond the lectures themselves. For all their intellectual accomplishment, these thinkers were also
human beings whose “efforts to conceive, produce, and finally deliver the lectures reveal a remarkable drama of mortal hopes, fears, victories, defeats, vanities and frailties.”
Always good to get the human element!