Science and Religion: What are we Actually Disagreeing About?

The relationship between science and religion has long been a subject of much contention. Even though the popular idea that the two have historically been at war has been well exposed as a simplistic myth, there remains the normative question of what their actual relationship is. What are people who believe science and religion in conflict think they are in conflict about? Answering this is surprisingly hard work because attempts to essentialise ‘science’, let alone ‘religion’, quickly run into trouble. Ultimately, neither can be pinned down to one single meaning or definition. In this talk, which draws on extensive research with over a hundred leading thinkers in the UK, I will explore what the fundamental question of what ‘science’ and ‘religion’ actually are, before building on that to answer the familiar question of how they relate to one another.