Science-religion debate focus of CLU talks

(THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. – Jan. 29, 2013) A theologian at the forefront of the international science-religion debate will discuss intelligent design and the New Atheism in a pair of free lectures at California Lutheran University on Tuesday, Feb. 19.

Philip Clayton will explore “Between ‘Intelligent Design’ and the New Atheism: Science and Religion at the Crossroads” during the 26th Harold Stoner Clark Lectures in Samuelson Chapel. He will present “Beyond the Religion Wars: From Reduction to Reenchantment” at 11:10 a.m. and “The New Sciences of Emergent Complexity: Evolving Religion in an Evolving World” at 4 p.m.

Clayton will discuss what he sees as unbridled hostility that has emerged between science and religion over the past decade and the benefits of moving beyond the religion wars to a world worth preserving. In the afternoon lecture, he will address the question of whether science reduces all reality to physics and suggest ways of thinking about God that lead onward from this crossroads of science and religion.

Clayton is dean of Claremont School of Theology, where he also holds the Ingraham Chair, and provost of Claremont Lincoln University, an interreligious consortium of schools. He received a doctorate in philosophy and religious studies from Yale University and has held visiting appointments at Harvard University, the University of Cambridge and the University of Munich.

Over the course of 25 years of teaching and research, Clayton’s interests migrated from philosophy through the science-religion debate to constructive theology. He has held a variety of leadership positions in the international debate on the science-religion relationship, including principal investigator of the Science and the Spiritual Quest program, and has been an outspoken advocate for multicultural and multi-religious approaches to the field.

He has written or edited more than a dozen books in the field and spoken on the topic in almost every continent. His latest books, “The Predicament of Belief,” which he wrote with Steven Knapp, and “Religion and Science: The Basics,” were published in 2011.

The late Harold Stoner Clark endowed the free lecture series, requesting that presentations address his dual interests of science and philosophy. CLU’s Department of Philosophy sponsors the talks.

The chapel is located south of Olsen Road near the corner of Campus Drive in Thousand Oaks. Additional parking is available in the lot at the corner of Olsen Road and Mountclef Boulevard.

For information, call the Philosophy Department at 805-493-3232.