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Secular Sermons: Essays on Science and Philosophy
Discursive, entertaining and provocative, Secular Sermons contains fourteen essays by celebrated philosopher Professor Alan Musgrave, examining the basic assumptions of science, religion and mathematics. Can we decide what to believe? Why do scientists do experiments and wat can their experiments show? Is evolution a scientific theory? Such apparently simple questions are brilliantly investigated by Musgrave in order to interrogate the worldviews we inhabit – and their consequences. He brings to these questions an expansive historical knowledge, provoking his readers to enter the now-discredited belief-systems of earlier ages in order to compare these with their own.
208 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2009
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May 25, 2021
I was never taught by Professor Musgrave, but very much noticed his enduring impact on the department when I was studying philosophy at Otago. This book contains 15 witty essays from various lectures he has delivered. My favourite essay was ‘Wandering Stars and Falling Stones’ which speculated on why the Copernican revolution took so long. Runner up is a essay called ‘Why invent alternatives to unrefuted theories?’ which argues that we can only know how good our current theories are by comparing them to alternative theories. Popper’s influence on Musgrave’s thought is clear throughout a number of essays.
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