Essay Competition to Honour John Polkinghorne's 80th Birthday
In 2010 the International Society for Science and Religion will be celebrating the 80th birthday of its founding President, John Polkinghorne.
In association with the Ian Ramsey Centre in Oxford, it is organizing a conference on “God and Physics” as part of this celebration, to be held at St. Anne’s College, Oxford, UK, from 7th to 11th July 2010. (For more details click here.) ISSR will also be publishing a festschrift on Polkinghorne’s work, based in part on invited papers to be given at this conference.
In addition to these two activities, and with funding from the John Templeton Foundation, the Society now offers three substantial prizes to students or younger academics (not yet in a tenured post) for an essay (written in English), of no more than 10,000 words, on an aspect of Polkinghorne’s work:
1st: prize £10,000
2nd: prize £5,000
3rd: prize £2,000
ISSR encourages applicants from a range of disciplines, not merely those already well-integrated into the ‘science and religion’ discourse.
The essay should be concerned with a major theme in John Polkinghorne’s work on the interface between theology and science, focusing on one of the following:
a) divine action
b) chaos theory
c) eschatology
d) natural theology
e) information
f) epistemology
f) any other major theme in Polkinghorne’s work on the science-religion dialogue.
The essay should contain at least one of the following:
a) an exploration of what is unique in the work of Polkinghorne
b) an analysis of the way in which his work relates to that of other scholars
c) an exploration of how his work relates to recent trends in the science-religion dialogue that are not part of his own work (e.g. evolutionary psychology.)
The essay should show a good grasp of the relevant component of John Polkinghorne’s work and also aim to advance the reader’s understanding and appraisal of that work. The winner of the first prize will be given an opportunity to present the winning essay at the conference described above and may - if the essay is of sufficient quality and relevance - be invited to include it in the festchrift.
The competition will be judged by three leading experts in the science and religion field. The essays will be judged on:
- Clarity and lucidity of engagement with Polkinghorne’s work.
- Quality of argument (originality, clarity, etc.)
Each essay and a curriculum vitae of its author must be received by Dr.Christopher Knight, the ISSR Executive Secretary, by 31st March 2010. These may be sent by post to him at:
ISSR Office,
Bene’t House,
St.Edmund’s College,
Cambridge CB3 0BN,
United Kingdom.
or else (preferably) sent as attachments to an email message to him (email: cck26@cam.ac.uk). (An email message to him indicating the intention to enter the competition would be very helpful to the organizers.) |
