Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Why Study Atheism Among Scientists?

Chapter 2: "Tried and Found Wanting": How Atheist Scientists Explain Religious Transitions

Chapter 3: "I Am Not Like Richard": Modernist Atheist Scientists

Chapter 4: Ties That Bind: Culturally Religious Atheists

Chapter 5: Spiritual Atheist Scientists

Chapter 6: What Atheist Scientists Think about Science

Chapter 7: How Atheist Scientists Approach Meaning and Morality

Chapter 8: From Rhetoric to Reality: Why Religious Believers Should Give Atheist Scientists a Chance

Appendix A: Studying Atheist Scientists

References
Index

About the Author

Elaine Howard Ecklund is the Herbert S. Autrey Chair in Social Sciences, Professor of Sociology, and director of the Religion and Public Life Program at Rice University. She is the author of over 100 research articles and six books, including Science vs. Religion: What Scientists Really Think and (with Christopher P. Scheitle) Religion vs. Science: What Religious People Really Think.

David R. Johnson is Associate Professor of Educational Policy Studies at Georgia State University. He is the author of A Fractured Profession: Commercialism and Conflict in Academic Science and co-author (with Elaine Howard Ecklund) of Secularity and Science: What Scientists Around the World Really Think About Religion.

Reviews

This book is a warm, empirically well founded and welcome argument to thoroughly revise the rhetorical and outdated paradigm of the new atheists about the relationship between faith and science.
*R. Peels, Theologia Reformata*

The book is well worth reading by anyone interested in what real people think about science and religion. Moreover, it readily deserves a place in required reading lists of, for example, undergraduate science and-religion courses.
*Mike Brownnutt, Associate Director of the Faith and Science Collaborative Research Forum at the University of Hong Kong, Science and Christian Belief*

The authors discuss atheist scientists' views on religion, morality, and the limits of scientific questioning and conclude that scientists who are atheists and scientists who are believers may have much more in common than the new atheist dialectic on the issue would lead one to believe. A good resource for those interested in the intersection of science and religion. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.
*A. Jaeger, CHOICE*

The book's premise is that "New Atheist" science—loud, brash, and openly antagonistic and disdainful of religion misunderstands the realities of atheist scientists. The book masterfully demonstrates that this is indeed the case: most atheist scientists are not hostile to religion, and some even embrace it in myriad forms.
*Shiri Noy, Sociology of Religion*

The research is meticulous and appendices provide important details, but the book itself is accessible to general audiences, and would be appropriate for an undergraduate audience in classes on religion, science, and/or morality, in addition to graduate classes on these topics.
*Sociology of Religion*

Ecklund and Johnson reorient our thinking about atheist scientists. New Atheist scientists have framed the relationship between science and religion, the image of the atheist scientist. This book shows that atheist scientists are less hostile and more conciliatory towards religion. Ecklund and Johnson's work will increase dialogue between religious communities and atheist scientists, leading to greater diversity in the scientific workforce. In our polarizing times, their book is a must-read.
*Nichole R. Phillips, Emory University*

Drawing on extensive survey research and interviews with scientists, this book is a valuable corrective to the New Atheist literature inspired by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Daniel Dennett. I was especially impressed with the authors' attention to how the gulf between religion and science might be bridged to encourage more religiously-inclined students to consider careers in science and more scientists to be amenable to that possibility.
*Robert Wuthnow, Princeton University*

This book shows us the importance of looking at the relationship between science and religion from the ground up, by considering what non-believing scientists actually think. Their attitudes turn out to be quite varied, but through analysis and classification Ecklund and Johnson illuminate the striking hues of a picture too often presented in black and white.
*David Voas, University College London*

Science is strengthened when people from diverse perspectives and backgrounds can participate fully in the quest for understanding the natural world. The careful research of this book brings to light the reality that most scientists who identify as atheist are not hostile to religion or religious believers, which is good news since many persons from groups currently underrepresented in science also identify religious faith as an important part of their lives. The authors encourage relationships and bridges between scientists and people of faith, which we would be wise to build.
*Jennifer Wiseman, American Association for the Advancement of Science*

The intention of the book - based on a differentiated, partly faith-friendly self-understanding of scientists, to plausibilize the dialogue of science with religious communities in order to increase social unity - remains foreign to European readers. However, the perspective and intention of this book [...] offer a very informative insight into the Anglo-American social structure and its challenges.
*Theologische Revue 119*

Ecklund and Johnson have a put together a fine work of scholarship showing that, if a scientist identifies as an atheist or a skeptic of Christianity or other religions, they rarely resemble the antitheism of Richard Dawkins, Lawrence Krauss, and their followers.
*Glenn B. Siniscalchi, Horizons: The Journal of the College Theology Society*