Download print-quality copy of this image
Dr. John M. Templeton, Jr., Thomas Fowler and Eric Weislogel
Fundación Xavier Zubiri LSI
Fundación Xavier Zubiri
Madrid, Spain
Chairperson: Diego Gracia, Ph.D.
http://www.zubiri.net/
As I mentioned last year, this society, before it even became a grantee of LSI, probably deserved the recognition of a Supplemental Grant Prize. The members of this group pretty much single-handedly began organizing—not only their own institution, which is never a small feat—but their entire country to begin promoting a healthy and rigorous science and religion dialogue. In a short period of time, they organized a mini-network of 8 local societies (now 9) among some of their nation’s top educational institutions, together with some influential intellectual foundations and academic networks. This year, they’ve opened up three major endeavors for promoting the constructive engagement of science and religion. First, they have committed to publishing a regular section on the popular and well-syndicated webmagazine, tendencias21.net, “The Electronic Journal of Science, Technology, Culture, and Society.” This e-journal is among the top 80,000 websites in terms of most visits—and if for some reason that does not impress you, just remember that there are over 85.6 million individual domains on the Internet. That puts it in the top sliver of the top 1%. This society’s “tendencies in religion” section is heavily engaged in the science and religion dialogue, and is well-written, well-edited, and well-designed. I opened it today to find, above the scroll, a picture of Ian Barbour and a story about this very conference. The second initiative of this society has the aim of helping to develop a network of local societies in Central and South America, and connecting it to the Spanish sub-network that is already at work. They have contacted over 100 universities in the region, and are actively developing relationships with 49 institutions. They are planning to incentive participation in the science and religion dialogue by holding a well-publicized essay contest with subsequent publication. Third, this society—along with the other societies in Spain—is working on a joint research project under the umbrella theme of “Human Evolution.” Networking, research, publication, local activities—this society is energetic and creative and very effective.
For further information or other inquires, please contact Metanexus at 212.789.2200 or lsi@metanexus.net.