Book Review: Religion and Science as Forms of Life: Anthropological Insights Into Reason and Unreason by Carles Salazar and Joan Bestard.

• Jurisdiction: Derecho Internacional
• Author: Quest, Linda
• Date: 01 September 2016

Salazar, Carles, and Joan Bestard, eds. Religion and Science as Forms of Life: Anthropological Insights Into Reason and Unreason. New York: Berghahn Books, 2015. vi + 231 pages. Hardcover, $90.00.

In the book's Introduction, co-editor Salazar--a Professor of social and cultural anthropology--hypothesized that the study of the relationship between religion and science is about to enter a new phase in contemporary 'knowledge societies.' To test this, the book assembled eleven, international specialists: anthropologists, sociologists, philosophers, religious scholars, theoretical workers, and field workers. Their task was to dissolve intra and interdisciplinary boundaries and analyze the relationships, consistencies and contradictions, between religion and science as forms of life. Co-editor Bestard--a professor of social anthropology--appeared to be familiar with the contributors' work from previous collaborations.

McCauley's chapter "Maturationally Natural Cognition Impedes Professional Science and Facilitates Popular Religion," Blume's contribution "Scientific Versus Religious 'Knowledge' in Evolutionary...