Institute Announces Grants for Research With Theological Implications
Templeton Foundation Funds Physics Research With Theological Implications
The Foundational Questions Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has announced grants totaling $2.2 million as part of an international effort that will fund physics research with theological implications, the Boston Globe reports.
The initial round of grants from the institute will support the work of physicists at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and other leading scientific institutions who are interested in examining questions such as whether the fundamental laws of nature are specially designed to allow life and whether there are truths about the universe that physics is inherently incapable of proving. Although start-up funds for the institute were provided by the John Templeton Foundation in the form of a $6.2 million grant, the institute makes its funding decisions independently of the foundation and is run by two well-respected researchers.
Still, while some scientists welcomed the institute as a way to fund research at the center of modern physics, critics voiced concern that its work would be used to blur the line between science and religion. "I think that bringing science and religion together is not a good thing," said Sean Carroll, a theoretical physicist at the University of Chicago. "It's not that different from the Vietnam War, when people wondered whether to take money from the Defense Department for their research, even if their research had no conceivable military application."
For a complete list of recipients and their projects, see: http://www.fqxi.org/awardees.html.
Cook, Gareth.
“Initiative Will Join Physics, Theology.”
Boston Globe
7/31/06.
Primary Subject: Religion
Location(s): Cambridge, Massachusetts
009324
| 
print
e-mail
