Stories in Current Science
      Jack Haas searches the web and finds interesting Faith-Science Stories in the News: recent stories and archives.
      Science News Flash offers free podcasts (mainly by Hugh Ross, Fazale Rana, and Jeff Zweerink, and occasionally others) from Reasons to Believe, with news and commentary about science/religion issues.
      And, of course, there is much more on the web, and you can find it if you search.   { I.O.U. — Eventually I'll search-and-select and then post more links here. }

Stories about Warfare with a Flat Earth, Moving Earth, Old Earth, Evolving Life, and More, plus Science Fiction:

      Intrinsic Conflict between Science and Religion?
      In the late 1800s, two authors — John Draper and Andrew White — popularized a melodramatic “warfare” model of the relationship between science and religion.  They painted a picture of intrinsic conflict between the rationality of science (earnestly searching for truth) opposed by the ignorance of religion (stubbornly trying to block scientific progress), with science fighting valiantly and usually emerging victorious.  Their colorful portrayal of science-versus-religion warfare is dramatic — with clearly defined heroes and villains in mutually antagonistic conflict — and is appealing for many people;  it has exerted a powerful influence on popular views about the interactions between science and religion.  But this oversimplification of complex history is not accurate, and is rejected by modern historians.

      Here are two illustrations of claims for conflict:

      The Myth of Flat-Earth Beliefs
      One question — In the time of Columbus, did educated people believe the earth was flat? — leads to a second question that is more interesting:  When responding to the first question, why do most modern people say YES, when the correct answer is NO?
      To see why, and to learn about a fascinating abuse of history, read an introduction (by Mark Hartwig) and The Myth of the Flat Earth by Jeffrey Burton Russell, a historian who wrote Inventing the Flat Earth: Columbus and Modern Historians (book review plus Amazon's editorial reviews and customer reviews), Did Medieval People Believe in a Flat Earth? by Robert Wilde, and some historical details about How the Myth of the Flat-Earth Dogma Started the Religion-Science War by Matt Rossano.
      Here is a brief summary from my page about the historical myth of "warfare" between science and religion:*  In the time of Columbus, did educated Christians believe the earth was flat?  The correct answer is NO, but most modern people will say YES.  Why?  This wrong idea is due to a fascinating abuse of history that began around 1830 when two writers (a creative novelist inventing a colorful story about Columbus, and an atheist scholar trying to make Christians look foolish) invented a false story about "belief in a flat earth" that, in the 1870s, was popularized by Draper's book.   /   * The main focus of my page, as described below, is "Galileo: Science-and-Religion Conflict?"
      As described in Wikipedia, modern historians and other scholars who have studied this topic — including evolutionist Stephen Jay Gould in his essay "The Late Birth of a Flat Earth" — agree with Russell, but the myth remains widespread and influential.

      Moving Earth — Galileo and the Church
      One of the most famous stories in science involves Galileo and the Church.  Because it is intrinsically interesting, is complex (with many factors to consider), and has become a standard illustration of "science versus religion" that plays a dominant role in our culture, eventually this episode will be examined in detail.  For now, however, here are some interesting pages I found during a quick look at what's on the web:
• Galileo: Science-and-Religion Conflict? by Craig Rusbult (based on quotations from David Lindberg and Stillman Drake) is a brief introduction, setting the Galileo Affair in the context of the popular "warfare" metaphor.
• an excellent video (9:22) by Ted Davis about views of science-religion relationships by historians and popularizers;  he explains how a careful study of history can help us understand the relationships in their actual complexity, and avoid the oversimplistic perspectives that dominate much of the modern conversation.
• an overview by John Polkinghorne.
• a page combining a brief abstract (by the Catholic Educator's Resource Center) and a detailed about The Galileo Affair by George Johnston.
• a journal article (by Thomas Lessl) about the rhetorical strategies that are used to support The Galileo Legend.  Lessl begins his paper with a summary, "Popular legends are strange mixtures with curious effects."  Later, he observes that "science popularizers and educators write selectively, playing up every hint of historical conflict between science and Christianity but omitting to mention the most egregious offenses against scientific freedom committed by secular ideologies."  One example of selective distortion is in the section above, about flat-earth beliefs.
• Truth in Science: Proof, Persuasion, and the Galileo Affair by Owen Gingerich, argues that it would have been difficult for Galileo to persuade the scientists & churchmen of his day, because they did not yet have the post-Galileo framework of Newtonian physics.
 

Age of the Earth
I.O.U. — There will be history about age-of-the-earth science later, maybe in late 2011.
• History and Future of the Relationship Between the Geosciences and Religion: Litigation, Education, Reconciliation? a symposium at the 2003 annual meeting of the Geological Society of America
• The Genesis Flood in Pre-Darwinian American Geology: The Case of Edward Hitchcock by Rod Stiling  (abstract and powerpoint)

Evolution of Life
I.O.U. — There will be history about Darwin (and responses to his ideas) later, maybe in late 2017.

Modern Physics
The Joy of Science and Excitement of Discovery, in a Brief History of Modern Quantum Physics
I.O.U. — And there will be stories about other topics later, maybe in late 2017.

More Stories
Studies in the History of Science and Christianity — a Topics Page from Jack Haas
I.O.U. — And there will be stories about other topics later, maybe in late 2017.

Science Fiction & Christian Faith
I.O.U. — There will be more about science fiction later, maybe in late 2017.
Eventually, we'll explore the "good, bad, and ugly" of sci fi, the benefits and detriments, how it can be edifying or degrading to faith.
Using Science Fiction to Launch Faith Discussions [I'll try to find this] by Laura Harrington  (MS Word)
The Empath [I'll try to find this] (about sacrificial love) in Star Trek has reviews   { But overall, Star Trek (in 5 television series and 11 movies) is not very Christian-friendly. }

 
All links on this page were checked-and-fixed on October 17, 2017.

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