Creative Nonfiction - Fall 2017

CREATIVE NONFICTION 11

by the elderly preacher John Ames, and

the essays “Proofs” and “Humanism,”

from her 2015 collection, The Givenness

of Things. Her responses, which offer only

a glimpse of the warm and penetrating

brilliance of her thinking and writing,

highlight a perspective that we wish

were more broadly available in efforts to

explore the interactions and intersections

of science and religion. If, she suggests,

one views science as a skeptical, question-

ing mode of inquiry “whose terms and

methods can overturn the assumptions of

inquirers,” then it can be neither a threat

nor an alternative to religion. After all,

there are no possible scientific tests for

the reality of soul, self, or God. She holds

science to a strong standard of integrity

while insisting that the concepts of science

“are beautiful in their own right.” This

rigorous and generous way of under-

standing things points the way toward a

harmony that is both intellectually and

emotionally satisfying.

—Lee Gutkind and Dan Sarewitz

LEE GUTKIND is the founding editor of Creative Nonfiction,

and DAN SAREWITZ is the editor of Issues in Science and

Technology. They are both professors in the School for the

Future of Innovation in Society at Arizona State University.