Science and religion, 1450-1900

Galileo. Newton. Darwin. These giants are remembered for their great contributions to science. Often forgotten, however, is the profound influence that Christianity had on their lives and work. This study explores the many ways in which religion -- its ideas, attitudes, practices, and institutions -- interacted with science from the beginnings of the Scientific Revolution to the end of the nineteenth century. Both scientists and persons of faith sometimes characterize the relationship between science and religion as confrontational. Historian Richard G. Olson finds instead that the interactions between science and religion in Western Christendom have been complex, often mutually supportive, even transformative. This book explores those interactions by focusing on a sequence of major religious and intellectual movements -- from Christian Humanist efforts to turn science from a primarily contemplative exercise to an activity aimed at improving the
quality of human life, to the widely varied Christian responses to Darwinian ideas in both Europe and North America during the second half of the nineteenth century.
Table of Contents: * Acknowledgments * List of Illustrations * Series Foreword * Galileo and the Church: Or, How Do Science and Religion Interact? * Religion and the Transition to "Modern" Science: Christian Demands For Useful Knowledge * Science and the Catholicism in the Scientific Revolution, 1550-1770 * Science and Religion in England: 1590-1740 * Newton´s Religion, Newtonian Religions, and Eighteenth Century Reactions * Scientific Understandings of Religion and Religious Understandings of Science, 1700-1859 * Back to the Beginnings--Of the Earth, of Life, and of Humankind--1680-1859 * What To Do About Darwin? * Primary Sources * Annotated Bibliography * Time-Line * Index