Science and Religion: New Historical Perspectives/Ed. by Thomas Dixon, Geoffrey Cantor and Stephen Pumfrey. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. - 332 p.

The history of the scientific discourse "Science and Religion" is usually counted from the moment of the appearance of Ian Barbour's later famous work "Issues in Science and Religion" (Issues in Science and Religion, 1966). This work and the resulting historiographical tradition sought to debunk the negative image of religion as the main brake on scientific development and consistently criticized "false stereotypes" about the nature of the relationship between religion and science. The authors of most of the works written under the influence of J. Barbour's ideas criticized the idea of a mandatory conflict between science and religion, debunked the "canonical" critical works of Andrew White (1832-1918) and John Draper (1811-1882), and with Sim-

They expressed their sympathy for those points of view that suggested the possibility of peaceful coexistence of scientific and religious worldviews.

The most significant historical apology of the proposed project. Barbour's approach was presented in John Hedley Brooke's Science and Religion: Some Historical Perspectives (1991), 1 which is still used with difficulty today. Barbour, often used by historians as a teaching tool. The collection of articles dedicated to the English scientist is intended, on the one hand, to show the degree of influence of his ideas on the content and nature of modern research, and, on the other, to demonstrate new historical prospects for their development, primarily in the direction set by J. Brooke's methodological principle of the "complex" nature of the relationship between science and religion.

The authors of most of the articles in the collection touch on the "complexity principle" in one way or another, trying either to understand the reasons for its appearance, or to further substantiate it - both theoretically and using historical, usually non-European, material. The editors of the collection set out to overcome the" simplicity " of J. Brook's position and "find a legitimate place for conflict and generalizations in post - Brook historiography" (p. 4). At the same time, the collection is intended to continue the historiographic tradition created by Brook, drawing readers ' attention to the inadequacy of using "generalizations" and the need for a detailed or broader consideration of the relationship between science and culture. religions.

The Introduction, written by Thomas Dixon, one of the editors, provides a preliminary analysis of the main historiographic trends presented in the collection: deconstructing the meta-narrative of "traditional" historiography, politicizing the relationship between science and religion as a way of fighting for power, and turning historians to studying the vision of science and religion by non-European peoples. According to his apt observation, most of the articles in the collection are written from nominalistic positions, and their authors ultimately consider it their ultimate goal to establish, through a deeper understanding of the subject, a harmonious and respectful relationship between religious traditions and science.

1. Russian translation: Brook J. H. Nauka i religiya: istoricheskaya perspektiva [Science and Religion: Historical Perspective]. Moscow: BBI, 2004.

The opening article of Peter Garrison is devoted to the history of the formation and deconstruction of the concepts of "science" and" religion "in the last third of the XX century. P. Garrison conducts a consistent critique of "essentialism" in the history of science and the history of religion, showing that the concepts of "religion" and "science" available to the historian are formed in a certain historical context and they cannot be considered fundamental and self-evident categories of scientific analysis. Drawing on the historiographical tradition dating back to Thomas Kuhn's famous book as arguments for criticizing the concept of "science", P. Garrison draws on the historiographical tradition that begins with the famous work of Wilfred K. Smith2 in his critique of the concept of" religion".

As a conclusion, P. Garrison suggests a number of methodological principles of historical research: historians should understand that the categories they use are artificial in nature and are determined by the specifics of the development of Western civilization; deconstruction leads to a consistent differentiation of concepts and their fragmentation; historical analysis is a unique tool, because it does not cling to theoretical categories, but allows you to focus on the search unique and specific within a particular biography of a scientist or religious figure, thereby demonstrating the "complex" nature of the relationship between science and religion. Unfortunately, for all the wealth of arguments that P. Garrison gives in support of "critical" historiography, he does not offer a positive research program, limiting himself to general recommendations that are suitable for any historian who is engaged in his craft and is used to hearing them from the lips of venerable philosophers of history (even such relatively conservative ones as Richard Evans).

One of the attempts to present a positive reinterpretation of the concepts of "science" and "religion" is made in the article by Jan Golinski about the concept of Bruno Latour, who proves the impossibility of defining religion through the concept of "faith" and shows the emergence of this reduction due to the widespread spread of the scientific worldview. related criticism of the claims of scientific knowledge to the possession of the "last reality", dilutes

2. См. Smith W.C. The Meaning and End of Religion. N. Y: Macmillan, 1962.

the content of the concepts of "science" and" religion " through their definition as two ways of relating to the world - through reference and reference in the first case and through an iconic, performative representation-in the second. Ya. Golinsky easily finds the shortcomings of the approach proposed by B. Latour, but at the same time points out that his conclusions, with their appropriate correction, they can be used fruitfully by historians of science.

The article by Margaret Osler3 is largely descriptive, demonstrating the relationship between the process of forming the concept of "scientific revolution" and the historians ' view of the relationship between science and religion as a conflict relationship. The history of the classical paradigm, presented in the works of E. Mach, A. Coire, G. Butterfield, J. Sarton, and R. Westfall, ends in the article with its triumphant deconstruction by representatives of the new paradigm - R. Koch. Porter, A. Cunningham, S. Shapin, B. Dobbs, and others. Although M. Osler rightly notes that the emergence of a new trend in the historiography of science took place in the 1970s, the time of the formation and active dissemination of postmodern philosophy, and emphasizes that the" new historiography "significantly enriched the historians' vision of the process of science development, yet, it seems, it is not entirely fair to the classical paradigm, which, in its interpretation, it is somewhat de-monized for its "essentialism" - a reproach that will be repeated again and again by representatives of the constructivist camp in the history of science.

One of the authors of the collection, Noah Efron, rightly notes that the main lesson given by J. Brook to the historiography of science and religion is not a methodological lesson, but a moral one. It is no coincidence that N. Efron frames his article with a biographical story about himself in his youth, when he first read the work of J. Brook, sitting on the carpet in the library, which completely changed his vision of the subject of history. Historians, of course, can destroy existing stereotypes, relativize the categories used, build explanatory schemes, but they should never forget that the main subject of their research is the phenomenon of "man", which, given its complexity, cannot be considered from any one and "only correct" theoretical position. Ultimately, according to N. Efron, the main

3. See the translation of the article in this issue of the journal.

The lesson given by J. Brook required attention, respect, and, most importantly, sympathy for the subject.

Understanding this fact led Ronald Nambers to come to the following conclusion: despite the truth of the principle about the complex nature of the relationship between science and religion, J. Brook did not give clear recommendations on how a historian who studies in this area and adheres to this principle should act. R. Nambers 'interpretation of the principle of "complexity", in fact, boils down to the need to follow the principle of" intellectual honesty", formulated by M. Weber in the report" Science as a vocation and profession " (Wissenschaft als Beruf, 1917).

As an alternative to, on the one hand, the unclear "complexity" and, on the other hand, the clear but erroneous "grand narrative", R. Nambers suggests a kind of "middle way" - to use "middle" generalizations, although they do not pretend to cover the entire material, but provide a certain space for discussion and, in particular, to use the "middle" generalizations. ultimately, they are the most convincing ones for the attentive reader. As such, he identifies five basic trends: naturalization - the process of removing references to God or religious faith outside the limits of scientific research; privatization - the process of turning faith into a private matter of a scientist; secularization - the process of a scientist's transition from faith in specific dogmas to faith in "amorphous spirituality"; globalization - the process of spreading religious ideas beyond the boundaries of scientific research. radicalization - the process of scientists and religious figures defending their point of view as the only true one. According to R. Nambers, these five trends allow us to specify what exactly is the "complexity" of the relationship between science and religion. However, in fact, these mid-scale generalizations, in addition to their clearly sociological bias, do not fundamentally differ from the" concrete " typology of relationships proposed by J. Barbour.

Frank Turner, in an interesting article, draws the reader's attention to the fact that the" conflict thesis", whose statement historians of science and religion already habitually associate with the works of E. White and J. R. R. Tolkien. It was an integral part of the intellectual thought and culture of the first half of the nineteenth century. The conflicting vision of the relationship between science and religion was a consequence of the reaction of not only scientific (materialist) circles

the ideas of natural theology, but also religious (fundamentalist) circles that called for a literal reading of the biblical text. According to F. The contrast between science and religion was historical in nature, and in his article, using the example of several significant works of the period under consideration, he successfully demonstrates the logic of its maturation in the early Victorian era.

One of the most striking historiographic trends of recent times is an attempt to show the complex nature of the relationship between "Islam" and science, destroying the "classical" negative narrative that has developed, primarily due to the significant impact of the works of Ernest Renan. Conducting a careful analysis of the historiography of science, first of all the idea of the role of Islam in the history of science, Harun Kuchuk comes to the conclusion that the interpretation of Islam as a "pure Semitic religion" is important in the process of forming a conflicting vision of the relationship between religion and science. In the philological and historical studies of the Victorian era, the creativity of Semites and Aryans was contrasted. In this case, scientists were talking about two different sources of European culture: the first gave Europe religion (monotheism) and authoritarianism, the second, through the Greeks, science and democracy. The positive view of Islam that developed among historians who noted the influence of Arab philosophy on Western science was supplemented by a negative view of it as a pure carrier of a "Semitic" worldview, not clouded by the influence of Indo-Aryan civilization, rejecting democratic values and supporting authoritarian regimes.

Salman Hamid, in an article devoted to the analysis of the spread and degree of influence of the ideas of evolutionism in the Islamic world, demonstrates the diversity of existing approaches to this issue and once again recalls the need to use the principle of "complexity" as a methodological setting that guides the historian in the process of his work. According to S. Hamid, the current conflict between evolutionism and Islam dates back to the writings of a number of Muslim philosophers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Now it has proved popular as part of the rhetoric directed against the spread of secularism and the way of life that modern Islamic radicals associate with Western culture.

The editors of the collection paid special attention to non-European-

I also try to improve the perception of the problems of the relationship between science and religion. Sujit Shivashundaram points out the specific vision of this problem in the XIX century on the part of both Christian missionaries and representatives of Hindu, Buddhist and Islamic religious traditions. Many missionaries considered scientific knowledge, especially in the field of medicine, as a means to promote religious conversion of indigenous people to Christianity, as it showed the strength and significance of European Christian civilization. The controversy between Christians and those of other religious traditions in South and Southeast Asia shows that Christian missionaries usually opposed scientific knowledge to the religious beliefs of indigenous peoples and sought to demonstrate their own superiority, as, for example, in the case of the apologetic work of indologist John Muir, which provoked a response from educated pundits.

The articles, combined in the section "Evolution and Creationism", analyze various aspects of the relationship between these two areas of thought and try to free themselves from the existing stereotypes. Bronislaw Zierzynski, conducting a comparative analysis of European and American creationism, in particular the reaction to the ideas of evolution, comes to the conclusion that the polemic of evolutionists and creationists should be considered not so much as a struggle between science and religion, but as a struggle of different ideas about man, that is, placing it in the context of philosophical anthropology. Such a perspective, in his opinion, helps to overcome the opposition between evolutionists and creationists and allows us to find in both groups both people who are prone to dogmatic reductionism and people who are capable of open discussion of the "riddle of man".

Adam Shapiro in his article calls for rethinking the meaning of the famous "monkey trial" as a vivid example of the confrontation between science and religion. Placing this event in a broad cultural context and, in particular, analyzing the specifics of the development of educational policy at that time, he points out that the "conflict" interpretation was deliberately used by the "defense" party as a means to attract the attention of the general public.

In the section" Publication Policy", Jonathan Topham argues that research of particular value to historians of science is the study of-

research projects carried out within the interdisciplinary field "history of books". By placing a particular work in the focus of their attention and having an idea of the books that lay on the author's desktop, the historian gets the opportunity to gain a broad perspective that allows them to correct their vision of the relationship between science and religion in history and culture. In the final article of the collection, Jeffrey Cantor substantiates the thesis of conflict, drawing on Leon Festinger's psychological theory of cognitive dissonance for its apology. According to J. R. R. Tolkien, Cantor, conflict and dialogue, opposed by J. Brook, are two poles of the same process, caused by the reaction of reason to the need to combine two opposing worldviews, ideals, methodologies and beliefs. Moreover, J. Kantor, sympathetically quoting Karl Popper, notes the positive role of radical statements that provoke conflicts, since any new knowledge is born through the denial of old knowledge. Ultimately, the author tries to show that it would be too naive to consider active proponents of the conflict thesis (however, as well as proponents of the possibility of harmonious relations between religion and science) as stubborn "dogmatists" who are not capable of accepting the "obvious" complexity of the relationship between science and religion. Rather, it should be said that both parties are generated by a traumatic process of cognitive dissonance and, instead of critically understanding reality, are engaged in dogmatically promoting a certain theoretical statement, intellectual scheme, and religious dogma.

In general, the collection reflects the recent trends in the development of the scientific discourse "Science and Religion". Despite the open declaration of the methodological position, which presupposes the constant extrication of the historian from the snares of his own text and the desire for a clear awareness of his own methodological prerequisites and values, the authors largely remain dependent on the historiographic discourse that took shape in the 70s of the XX century. In fact, the main goal of the historian remains nothing more than the deconstruction of the grand narrative, due to which an increasingly refined "complexity" of the vision of historical reality is achieved (either by expanding it or by clarifying theoretical concepts), but clarity, simplicity and accessibility are lost.

At the same time, without marking a revolution in historiography, the collection under consideration will certainly remain for some time one of the necessary manuals that can acquaint the attentive reader with the current state of analysis of the relationship between science and religion in the historical perspective.

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