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Michael Ruse

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Michael Escott Ruse
Ruse in 2020
Born(1940-06-21)21 June 1940
Birmingham, England
Died1 November 2024(2024-11-01) (aged 84)
EraContemporary philosophy
RegionWestern Philosophy
SchoolAnalytic philosophy
InstitutionsFlorida State University (2000–2024)
University of Guelph (1965–2000)
Doctoral studentsDavid Castle
Main interests
Philosophy of biology
Philosophy of science
Notable ideas
Orthogenesis as the view that evolution has a kind of momentum of its own that carries organisms along certain tracks[1]

Michael Escott Ruse FRSC (21 June 1940 – 1 November 2024) was a British-born Canadian philosopher of science who specialised in the philosophy of biology and worked on the relationship between science and religion, the creation–evolution controversy, and the demarcation problem within science. Ruse began his career teaching at The University of Guelph and spent many years at Florida State University.

Early life and career

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Ruse was born in Birmingham, England, attending Bootham School, York.[2] He took his undergraduate degree at the University of Bristol (1962), his master's degree at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario (1964), and Ph.D. at the University of Bristol (1970).

Ruse taught at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada for 35 years. Since his retirement from Guelph, he had taught at Florida State University and was the Lucyle T. Werkmeister Professor of Philosophy (2000–20??). In 1986, he was elected as a Fellow of both the Royal Society of Canada and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He received honorary doctorates from the University of Bergen, Norway (1990), McMaster University, Ontario, Canada (2003) and the University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada (2007). In September 2014 he was made an Honorary Doctor of Science by University College London.

Ruse was a key witness for the plaintiff in the 1981 test case (McLean v. Arkansas) of the state law permitting the teaching of "creation science" in the Arkansas school system.[3] The federal judge ruled that the state law was unconstitutional.

His 1996 book on the idea of progress in biology (orthogenesis), Monad to Man, had a mixed reception from other philosophers of biology. Peter J. Bowler described it as an important and controversial book on the status of evolutionism.[4] Ron Amundson called Ruse an analytic and empiricist philosopher, but found Ruse's handling of structuralism "less satisfactory" than of the adaptationist, Darwinian traditions.[4] He called Ruse's writing style "bluff, unselfconscious, and opinionated" and finds Ruse sarcastic, "scarcely a neutral observer".[4] Michael Ghiselin criticised Ruse as a "politically correct" "academic bigot", disagreed with Ruse's narrative about phylogenetics, and accused him of "completely ignor[ing] recent work such as by Carl Woese, "neglect[ing] data" that contradict his thesis. Ironically, in Ghiselin's view, Ruse's own epistemological ideal for science relied on the idea of Progress.[5]

Ruse delivered some of the 2001 Gifford Lectures in Natural Theology at the University of Glasgow. His lectures on Evolutionary Naturalism, "A Darwinian Understanding of Epistemology" and "A Darwinian Understanding of Ethics," are collected in The Nature and Limits of Human Understanding (ed. Anthony Sanford, T & T Clark, 2003). Ruse debated regularly with William A. Dembski, a proponent of intelligent design.[6] Ruse takes the position that it is possible to reconcile the Christian faith with evolutionary theory.[7] Ruse founded the journal Biology and Philosophy, of which he was Emeritus Editor,[8] and had published numerous books and articles. He cited the influence of his late colleague Ernan McMullin.[9]

From 2013, Ruse was listed on the Advisory Council of the National Center for Science Education.[10]

In 2014, Ruse was named the Bertrand Russell Society's award winner for his dedication to science and reason.[11]

Ruse sought to reconcile science and religion, a position which brought him into conflict with Richard Dawkins and Pharyngula science blogger PZ Myers.[12][13] Ruse had engaged in heated exchanges with new atheists.[13][14] According to Ruse in 2009, "Richard Dawkins, in his best selling The God Delusion, likens me to Neville Chamberlain, the pusillanimous appeaser of Hitler at Munich. Jerry Coyne reviewed one of my books (Can a Darwinian be a Christian?) using the Orwellian quote that only an intellectual could believe the nonsense I believe in. And non-stop blogger P. Z. Myers has referred to me as a 'clueless gobshite.'" Ruse said new atheists do the side of science a "grave disservice", a "disservice to scholarship", and that "Dawkins in The God Delusion would fail any introductory philosophy or religion course",[13][14] and that The God Delusion makes him "ashamed to be an atheist". Ruse concluded, saying "I am proud to be the focus of the invective of the new atheists. They are a bloody disaster".[13][14]

Personal life and death

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Ruse had two children from his first marriage, and was married to his second wife from 1985, with whom he had three children. Ruse was an atheist. He rejected the New Atheism movement.[13]

Ruse died on 1 November 2024, at the age of 84.[15][16]

Selected works

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  • The Darwinian revolution (1979) ISBN 0-226-73164-2
  • Is science sexist? and other problems in the biomedical sciences (1981) ISBN 90-277-1250-6
  • Darwinism defended, a guide to the evolution controversies (1982) ISBN 0-201-06273-9
  • Sociobiology, sense or nonsense? (1st ed. 1979, 2nd ed. 1985) ISBN 90-277-1798-2
  • Taking Darwin seriously: a naturalistic approach to philosophy (1986) ISBN 0-631-13542-1
  • Homosexuality: A Philosophical Inquiry (1988) ISBN 0-631-17553-9
  • The Philosophy of biology today (1988) ISBN 0-88706-911-8
  • The Darwinian paradigm: essays on its history, philosophy and religious implications (1989) ISBN 0-415-08951-4
  • Evolution: The First Four Billion Years. (edited with Michael Travis) (2009) ISBN 978-0-674-03175-3
  • Evolutionary naturalism: selected essays (1995) ISBN 0-415-08997-2
  • Monad to man: the concept of progress in evolutionary biology (1996) ISBN 0-674-58220-9
  • But is it science? the philosophical question in the creation/evolution controversy (1996) (ed.) ISBN 0-87975-439-7
  • Mystery of mysteries: is evolution a social construction? (1999) ISBN 0-674-00543-0
  • Biology and the foundation of ethics (1999) ISBN 0-521-55923-5
  • Can a Darwinian be a Christian? the relationship between science and religion (2001) ISBN 0-521-63716-3
  • The evolution wars: a guide to the debates (2003) ISBN 1-57607-185-5
  • Darwin and Design: Does evolution have a purpose? (2003) ISBN 0-674-01631-9
  • Darwinian Heresies (edited with Abigail Lustig and Robert J. Richards) (2004) ISBN 0521815169
  • The Evolution-Creation Struggle (2005) ISBN 0-674-01687-4
  • Darwinism and its Discontents (2006) ISBN 0-521-82947-X
  • Cambridge Companion to the Origin of Species (edited with Robert J. Richards) (2008) ISBN 978-0-521-87079-5
  • Philosophy after Darwin (2009) ISBN 0-691-13553-3
  • Defining Darwin: Essays on the History and Philosophy of Evolutionary Biology (2009) ISBN 1-59102-725-X
  • Science and Spirituality: Making room for faith in the age of science (2010) ISBN 0-521-75594-8
  • The Philosophy of Human Evolution (2012) ISBN 0-521-11793-3
  • The Gaia Hypothesis: Science on a Pagan Planet (2013) ISBN 978-0226731704
  • Atheism: What Everyone Needs to Know (2015) ISBN 0-199-33458-7
  • Darwinism as Religion: What Literature Tells Us about Evolution (2016) Oxford University Press
  • On Purpose (2018) Princeton University Press
  • Why We Hate: Understanding the Roots of Human Conflict (2022) Oxford University Press ISBN 0-197-62128-7
  • Understanding the Christianity–Evolution Relationship (Understanding Life) (2023) Cambridge University Press ASIN B0C5Y2KHRP

References

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  1. ^ Ruse 1996, p. 261.
  2. ^ Bootham School Register. York, England: Bootham Old Scholars Association. 2011.
  3. ^ "Testimony of Dr. Michael Ruse". AntiEvolution.org. 1981. Archived from the original on 18 October 2002. Retrieved 14 September 2010.
  4. ^ a b c Amundson, Ron (September 1998). "Reviewed Work: Monad to Man: The Concept of Progress in Evolutionary Biology by Michael Ruse". The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science. 49 (3): 515–521. doi:10.1093/bjps/49.3.515. JSTOR 688089.
  5. ^ Ghiselin, Michael T. (1997). "Monad to Man: The Concept of Progress in Evolutionary Biology. Michael Ruse". The Quarterly Review of Biology. 72 (4): 452. doi:10.1086/419959.
  6. ^ Stewart, R.B. (2007). Intelligent Design: William A. Dembski & Michael Ruse in Dialogue. New York: Fortress Press.
  7. ^ Ruse, Michael (2000). Can a Darwinian be a Christian?. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  8. ^ "Editorial Board". Biology and Philosophy. Springer Netherlands. ISSN 0169-3867.
  9. ^ Ruse, Michael (2012). "Science and Values: My debt to Ernan McMullin". Zygon. 47 (4): 666–685. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9744.2012.01287.x.
  10. ^ "Advisory Council". ncse.com. National Center for Science Education. Archived from the original on 10 August 2013. Retrieved 30 October 2018.
  11. ^ Philosophy professor honored by Bertrand Russell Society for dedication to science and reason; Florida State University Arts and Sciences; 20 May 2014
  12. ^ Ruse, Michael (2 June 2010). "A Scientific Defense of the Templeton Foundation". Huffington Post. Retrieved 14 November 2014.
  13. ^ a b c d e Ruse, Michael (August 2009). "Why I Think the New Atheists are a Bloody Disaster". Beliefnet. The BioLogos Foundation as a columnist of Beliefnet. Retrieved 19 August 2015. … the new atheists do the side of science a grave disservice … these people do a disservice to scholarship … Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion would fail any introductory philosophy or religion course. Proudly he criticizes that whereof he knows nothing … the poor quality of the argumentation in Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens, and all of the others in that group … the new atheists are doing terrible political damage to the cause of Creationism fighting. Americans are religious people … They want to be science-friendly, although it is certainly true that many have been seduced by the Creationists. We evolutionists have got to speak to these people. We have got to show them that Darwinism is their friend not their enemy. We have got to get them onside when it comes to science in the classroom. And criticizing good men like Francis Collins, accusing them of fanaticism, is just not going to do the job. Nor is criticizing everyone, like me, who wants to build a bridge to believers – not accepting the beliefs, but willing to respect someone who does have them … The God Delusion makes me ashamed to be an atheist … They are a bloody disaster …
  14. ^ a b c Dougherty, T; Gage, LP (2015). "4/ New Atheist Approaches to Religion, pp. 51-62". In Oppy, Graham (ed.). The Routledge Handbook of Contemporary Philosophy of Religion. Routledge. pp. 52–53. ISBN 9781844658312. Michael Ruse (2009) claimed that Dawkins in The God Delusion would fail 'any philosophy or religion course'; and for this reason Ruse says The God Delusion made him 'ashamed to be an atheist'
  15. ^ "In Memoriam: Michael Ruse (1940–2024)". Leiter Reports. Retrieved 2 November 2024.
  16. ^ "Michael Ruse Obituary (2024)". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 4 November 2024 – via Legacy.com.

Sources

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