Content by 2013-2015 Sinai and Synapses Fellows (Page 4)
A Conversation with a Mormon Biotechnician
A Mormon biotechnician asks, “Does the physical body explain everything about who we are?”
Genetic Knowledge Explains. It Doesn’t Predict.
What can we really predict about human behavior in light of increasing knowledge from genetics?
How Our Choices Change Our DNA
With new discoveries in epigenetics — how our environment affects our DNA — how much control do we have over our own choices?
Knowledge is Power… Especially When We Feel Powerless
We are gaining more and more knowledge about the intricacies of genetic information. But if knowledge is power, how should we use this power? How much does it help us and how much might it harm us?
Animals Evolve. People Evolve. Can Groups Evolve?
If evolution only involves discrete entities replicating themselves with high fidelity, then group-level selection probably doesn’t happen. But not everybody agrees that this is the litmus test for evolution.
Our Genes, Our Selves
As genetic technology continues to advance, what happens when we try to create or eliminate certain characteristics for our children? What are the potential unintended consequences with fiddling with our DNA? Should humans be “playing God”? Lisa Ortuno, a Sinai and Synapses Fellow, explores those questions through a series of interviews, asking several experts, “Are we more than our genes?”
Anthropology, Not Demagoguery, Is the Way to Understand ISIS
Instead of writing off the enemy as evil animals who are motivated by greed or mental illness, an anthropologist actually tries to understand where ISIS is coming from, so as to better interpret their motives.
Is Religion Evolutionarily Adaptive?
Connor Wood argues that religion’s evolutionary adaptiveness (or lack thereof) shouldn’t have the slightest bearing on the epistemic credibility of religious beliefs, or the ultimate goodness of religion.
To Overcome Evil, We Need to Rethink Shame
Rev. Dr. Gawain de Leeuw, an Episcopal priest in White Plains, suggests that perhaps evil is rooted in our need to cover up that which threatens to make us discardable and invisible.
Uncovering the Torah of Technology – An ELI Talk by Rabbi Michael Mellen
There are items in our world that are both spiritual and technological at the same time, just waiting for us to discover both.
Quality of Life or Quantity of Life?
As medical technologies continue to grow, we are able to save many more people than in the past. But the ethical challenges will only increase.
Reaching for the Heavens: Technologies of Science and Religion
Astrophysicist and Christian John ZuHone realizes that in both his scientific life and his religious life, he must rely on something “in between” to get to what he’s really after.