Jane Shaw reviews Magisteria for The Financial Times. 22/03/2023

The death of the female mathematician–philosopher Hypatia at the hands of Christians in 415. Galileo’s 1633 recantation. Thomas Huxley debating Darwin’s ideas with “Soapy Sam”, Bishop of Oxford, in 1860.

Nicholas Spencer opens Magisteria with these famous examples of science in conflict with religion — only to turn around and knock the cases down, “straw men” all of them.

That story, of a constant clash between science and religion, is largely a product of the late 19th century. Historians have long refuted that account of conflict, and Spencer, who works at the religion and society think–tank Theos, has drawn on a rich field of scholarship to produce a highly readable history of the entangled relationship between science and religion in the west.

Read the full article here.

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