John Templeton Foundation
Encyclopedia
"The John Templeton Foundation is a philanthropic organizationthat funds inter-disciplinary research about human purpose and ultimate reality. It is usually referred to simply as the Templeton Foundation. It was established in 1987 by the late investor and philanthropist Sir John Templeton
; the current president is his son John Templeton, Jr.
The mission of the Foundation is:
According to the Foundation, it gives away about $70 million per year in research grants and programs.
The Foundation restructured its grant making process in January 2010. It is divided into five core funding areas which include:
The Foundation accepts online funding inquiries twice a year. If the initial inquiry is successful, applicants are invited to make a full proposal. Typically, grants are approved in a process that incorporates scientific peer review. The Foundation funds many high-level scientific research projects, usually by means of international competitions to which research teams from large universities apply.
In 2008, the Foundation received the National Humanities Medal
from the National Endowment for the Humanities
.
Examples of projects that have received funding include the Foundational Questions Institute established by physicists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
and University of California, Santa Cruz
. FQXi supports research on questions at the foundations of physics and cosmology, particularly “new frontiers and innovative ideas integral to a deep understanding of reality but unlikely to be supported by conventional funding sources”.
and fundamental nature of life
, human life
, and mind
, especially as they relate to issues of meaning and purpose, the Foundation supports Theistic evolution
. Projects that have received funding from the Foundation cover a variety of fields including the biological sciences, neuroscience
, archaeology
, and palaeontology.
Professor Simon Conway-Morris from the University of Cambridge was awarded a grant in this area for his "Map of Life" project, which seeks to document examples of evolutionary convergence.
Professor Martin Nowak, Director of the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics at Harvard University, was awarded a grant for the “Foundational Questions in Evolutionary Biology” initiative, which seeks to advance fundamental questions in the context of evolutionary biology and to generate new understanding in the origins of biological creativity, the deep logics of biological dynamics and ontology, and the concepts of teleology and ultimate purpose in the context of evolutionary biology.
, creativity
, free will
, generosity
, gratitude
, intellect
, love
, prayer
, and purpose.
Purdue University
in Indiana
, USA received money from the Foundation to establish its Center on Religion and Chinese Society, which studies the impact and role of religion in Chinese societies and among the Chinese diaspora.
Anton Zeilinger
, Professor of Physics at the University of Vienna
, received a grant from Templeton to run a fellowship for young scholars interested in the nature of quantum reality and its philosophical implications.
The World Science Festival
received a grant from the foundation for its Big Ideas Series. It used this to host public discussions of subjects like "Nothing: The Subtle Science of Emptiness," "What It Means to Be Human," and "Parallel Universes".
, creativity
, curiosity
, diligence
, entrepreneurialism, forgiveness
, generosity
, gratitude
, honesty
, humility
, joy
, love
, purpose, reliability
, and thrift
.
Stanford University
is among the recipients of a grant for Wiliam Damon’s research on types of commitments young people hold and how those commitments develop, which was the first phase of the Youth Purpose Project.
More recently the Foundation awarded a grant to the University of Chicago
for its research on an interdisciplinary study of virtue.
In relation to Character Development, the Foundation also supports the Purpose Prize, an initiative of Civic Ventures. The Purpose Prize seeks to inspire men and women with a vision of how to live with purpose in retirement.
to Milton Friedman
, believed that individual freedom was the indispensable foundation of economic, social, and spiritual progress, and that without economic freedom, individual freedom was fragile and vulnerable. To this end, the Foundation supports a range of programs which promote freedom and free enterprise.
In 2007 a grant was awarded to Robert Townsend, from the University of Chicago for “The Enterprise Initiative” a research collaboration with MIT's Poverty Action Lab, Yale's Economic Growth Center, and the University of Chicago's Computation Institute. This initiative seeks to elucidate enterprise-based solutions to poverty by studying the specific factors that lead to success at the individual level.
One example of its work is the grant given to an academic from Princeton University for the study: “Budapest: The Golden Years Early 20th Century Mathematics Education in Budapest and Lessons for Today”.
Previous genetics projects receiving grants from the Foundation include how research on Genetics and the Origin of Organismal Complexity by Günter P. Wagner and Alison Richard from Yale University.
The Foundation has established "Can Genetically Modified Crops Help to Feed the World?" as 2011 Funding Priority.
. A panel of high-profile scholars and public figures are invited to address a question and write a detailed essay in response. To date, the Foundation has posed the following questions:
Contributors have included Bernard-Henri Lévy
, Ayaan Hirsi Ali
, Christopher Hitchens
, Jerome Groopman
, Robert Reich
, He Qinglian
, Stephen Pinker, Francis Collins
, Simon Conway Morris
, Michael Gazzaniga
, Rebecca Goldstein
, and Jonah Lehrer
.
to a ‘living person who has made an exceptional contribution to affirming life's spiritual dimension, whether through insight, discovery, or practical works’.
Jerry Coyne
, quoted above feels the Templeton Prize attempts to make a virtue of faith and believes that scientific enquiry requires doubt and careful enquiry, that faith has not added to human knowledge.
The Templeton Prize was first awarded in 1973. The monetary amount is adjusted to always be slightly higher than the Nobel Prize
though it is less prestigious. In 2010 the prize was $1.5 million.
Since its inception, recipients of the prize have included Mother Teresa
, Taizé Prior Roger Schutz, Evangelist Billy Graham
, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
and Baba Amte
.
The 2010 Templeton Prize winner was Francisco J. Ayala
, an evolutionary geneticist and molecular biologist who has opposed the teaching of creationism in the public schools.
In 2009, the French physicist and science philosopher Bernard d'Espagnat
won the prize.
In 2008, Polish cosmologist and catholic priest Michał Heller was awarded the Templeton Prize. Heller received the prize in recognition of scholarship and research that has, according to the Foundation, pushed at the metaphysical boundaries of science.
In 2007 the Templeton Prize was awarded to Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor
. Taylor is known for his belief that Western secular society does not satisfy the natural human desire for meaning. Commenting on the Templeton Prize award to Taylor, the United Kingdom’s Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks
said, “If there is such a thing as a saint in a secular age, he deserves that title”.
Other recent prize winners include:
Charles H. Townes, Professor in the Graduate School at the University of California, Berkeley, who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1964 for his investigations into the properties of microwaves and his co-invention of the laser, and theoretical cosmologist
George F.R. Ellis of the University of Cape Town, who advocates “balancing the rationality of evidence-based science with the causal effect of forces beyond the explanation of hard science, including issues such as aesthetics, ethics, metaphysics, and meaning".
The $100,000 Epiphany Prizes for ‘inspiring movies and TV’. Winners of the movie prize include: Amazing Grace
, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
, The Passion of the Christ
, Amistad
and the Preacher's Wife
.
The Purpose Prize, sponsored by Civic Ventures with grants from The Atlantic Philanthropies and the John Templeton Foundation. This initiative annually provides five awards of $100,000 and 10 awards of $10,000 to people over 60 who are taking on 'society’s biggest challenges'. Winners have been recognized for a diverse range of activities, including creating a mentor network for refugees to reducing rates of young offender recidivism.
, Max Tegmark
, John D. Barrow
, James Otteson
, Stephen G. Post
, Martin Seligman
, Harold Koenig, Laurence Iannaccone
, Nicholas Colangello, and Alexander Astin
. Organizations that are associated or which have received grants include the American Association for the Advancement of Science
(AAAS), Civic Ventures, Developmental Studies Center
, Junior Achievement
, Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
, Rotary International
and many major research universities, including the California Institute of Technology
, Cambridge University, Harvard University
, MIT, Oxford University, Princeton University
, Yale University
and among others.
Nature magazine lists the top ten grants:
MediaTransparency
lists grant-receiving institutions for 1998 to 2004; the top five are:
The Foundation also has media presence. It runs its own publisher, Templeton Press, and from 2004–2010, it published the periodical “In Character: A Journal of Everyday Virtues”. Each issue had a theme such as "thrift" or "purpose" or "honesty." All of the articles are archived online.
causes.
Templeton Jr has always maintained that his own personal religious beliefs do not affect his ability to administer the Foundation in accordance with the wishes of his father. The Templeton Foundation has also gone to great lengths to stress that it is non-political with no bias towards any one faith.
, including gifts to Gertrude Himmelfarb
, Milton Friedman
, Walter E. Williams
, Julian Lincoln Simon
and Mary Lefkowitz
, and referred to John Templeton, Jr., as a "conservative sugar daddy". The Foundation also has a history of supporting the Cato Institute
, a libertarian
think-tank, as well as projects at major research centers and universities that explore themes related to free market economics, such as Hernando de Soto
's Instituto Libertad Y Democracia
and the X Prize Foundation
.
In a 2007 article in The Nation
, Barbara Ehrenreich
drew attention to the Foundation's president Dr. John M. Templeton Jr. funding of the conservative group Freedom's Watch
, and referred to the Foundation as a "right wing venture". Pamela Thompson of the Templeton Foundation, responding to Ehrenreich's allegations, asserted that "the Foundation is, and always has been, run in accordance with the wishes of Sir John Templeton Sr, who laid very strict criteria for its mission and approach", that it is "a non-political entity with no religious bias" and it "is totally independent of any other organisation and therefore neither endorses, nor contributes to political candidates, campaigns, or movements of any kind".
because its grants can cover projects of a scientific and religious nature. The foundation has always strenuously denied supporting the movement.
In 2005, the foundation disputed suggestions that it promotes intelligent design
saying that, while it had supported unrelated projects by individuals who identify with intelligent design, it was one of the ‘principal critics’ of the intelligent design movement
and funded projects that challenged it.
The same year the New York Times reported that the foundation asked intelligent design proponents to submit proposals for actual research and quoted Charles L. Harper Jr., senior vice president at the Templeton Foundation, as saying "They never came in" and that while he was skeptical from the beginning, other foundation officials were initially intrigued and later grew disillusioned. "From the point of view of rigor
and intellectual seriousness, the intelligent design people don't come out very well in our world of scientific review", he said.
In 2007 in the LA Times, the Templeton Foundation, wrote "we do not believe that the science underpinning the intelligent-design movement is sound, we do not support research or programs that deny large areas of well-documented scientific knowledge, and the foundation is a nonpolitical entity and does not engage in or support political movements".
In March 2009, the Discovery Institute
, a supporter of Intelligent Design, accused the Templeton Foundation of blocking its involvement in a Vatican-backed, Templeton-funded conference in Rome on evolution. On the lack of involvement of any speakers supporting Intelligent Design, the conference director Rev. Marc Leclerc said, “We think that it’s not a scientific perspective, nor a theological or philosophical one…This make a dialogue difficult, maybe impossible.” At the conference, Francisco Ayala, an evolutionary biologist, former president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
and long time advisor to the foundation, said ID and Creationism were "blasphemous" to both Christians and scientists.
Sean M. Carroll
, a cosmologist at the California Institute of Technology
, wrote, in describing his self-recusal from a conference he discovered was funded by the Foundation, that "the entire purpose of the Templeton Foundation is to blur the line between straightforward science and explicitly religious activity, making it seem like the two enterprises are part of one big undertaking. It's all about appearances." But he also said, "I appreciate that the Templeton Foundation is actually, in its own way, quite pro-science, and is not nearly as objectionable as the anti-scientific crackpots at the Discovery Institute
." Different scientists report widely differing experiences so it is impossible to evaluate what consistent policy if any the Templeton Foundation has.
John Horgan
, a science journalist and the author of several books, wrote in 2006, an article for The Chronicle of Higher Education
(reprinted in Edge) of his "misgivings about the foundation's agenda of reconciling religion and science". He said that a conference he attended favored scientists who "offered a perspective clearly skewed in favor of religion and Christianity", and says that a Templeton official
John Horgan fears recipients of large grants from the Templeton Foundation sometimes write what the Foundation wants rather than what they believe.
In his book The God Delusion
, Richard Dawkins
(an evolutionary biologist) repeatedly criticizes the Templeton Foundation, referring to the Templeton Prize as "a very large sum of money given...usually to a scientist who is prepared to say something nice about religion." Concerning the conference that he and John Horgan attended, and to John Horgan's resulting article, Dawkins comments, "If I understand Horgan's point, it is that Templeton's money corrupts science."
Peter Woit
, a mathematical physicist at Columbia University
occasionally writes about his misgivings with the foundation on his blog (which is hosted by Columbia University). Woit feels it is unfortunate that Templeton's money is used to influence scientific research towards a convergence between science and religion.
In June 2005, Woit wrote:
In October 2007, he gave this more qualified, but still largely critical, assessment of the Foundation following attendance at a Templeton sponsored seminar:
Nonetheless, Woit's impression is that the Foundation is careful to keep conservative politics out of its activities and he does state that “their encouragement of religion seems to be of a very ecumenical nature".
Professor Paul Davies
, British-born physicist and member of the Foundation's Board of Trustees, gave a defense of the Foundation's role in the scientific community in the Times Higher Education Supplement in March 2005. Responding to concerns about the funding of such research by religious organisations that might have a hidden agenda and in particular the Templeton Foundation, Davies said:
Dr Sunny Bains of Imperial College London
claims that there is
Bains feels the Templeton Foundation “blur the line between science and religion”.
Bains' claims have been disputed by Josh Rosenau of the National Center for Science Education.
In 2010, journalist Nathan Schneider published a lengthy investigative profile of the Templeton Foundation in The Nation, a leading magazine of the left. In it, he aired familiar complaints about the Foundation, but observed that many of its critics and grantees alike fail to appreciate “the breadth of the foundation's activities, much less the quixotic vision of its founder, John Templeton.” Schneider observed:
Schneider wrote that to call the Foundation “conservative” is to misunderstand it:
Though the Foundation, in Schneider’s view, “has associated itself with political and religious forces that cause it to be perceived as threatening the integrity of science and protecting the religious status quo,” these alliances mean the Foundation “is also better positioned than most to foster a conservatism—and a culture generally—that holds the old habits of religions and business responsible to good evidence, while helping scientists better speak to people's deepest concerns.”
Prominent science journalist Chris Mooney, an atheist and author of The Republican War on Science, received a 2010 Templeton-Cambridge Journalism Fellowship, enabling him to join other journalists for a three-week lecture program on science and religion at Cambridge University. In a June 7, 2010, post on his Discover magazine blog, Mooney wrote, “I can honestly say that I have found the lectures and presentations that we’ve heard here to be serious and stimulating. The same goes for the discussions that have followed them.” In 2006, freelance science journalist John Horgan, a 2005 Templeton-Cambridge fellow, wrote in The Chronicle of Higher Education (April 7, 2006) that he had enjoyed his fellowship, but felt guilty that by taking money from the Templeton Foundation, he had contributed to the mingling of science with religion. In a June 10, 2010, post on his blog, Mooney took issue with Horgan’s point, calling the idea that the fellowship was a “Trojan horse” for religion “pretty untenable.” Prominent Templeton critics Richard Dawkins, A.C. Grayling, and Daniel Dennett
declined to answer a Templeton-Cambridge fellow’s interview requests, saying that they did not want to lend credibility to the science and religion journalism program. Mooney rejected this approach, writing, “You can’t both denounce the fellowship for being intellectually tilted and also boycott it, thereby refusing to help lend it more of the balance you claim it needs.” Grayling and Dennett answered this criticism as follows:-
Daniel Dennett
A.C. Grayling
In 2011, the science journal Nature took note of the ongoing controversy among scientists over working with Templeton.
Jerry Coyne
, University of Chicago
evolutionary biologist sees a fundamental impossibility in attempting to reconcile faith with science.
Jerry Coyne, a fierce Templeton critic, told Nature writer Mitchell Waldrop that the Foundation’s purpose is to eliminate the wall between religion and science, and to use science’s prestige to validate religion. But other scientists, including Foundation grantees like University of Chicago psychologist John Cacioppo and Anthony Aguirre, a University of California—Santa Cruz astrophysicist, told Nature that they have never felt pressured by Templeton to spin their research toward religion-friendly conclusions.
John Templeton
Sir John Marks Templeton was an American-born British stock investor, businessman and philanthropist.-Biography:...
; the current president is his son John Templeton, Jr.
The mission of the Foundation is:
[to serve] as a philanthropic catalyst for discoveries relating to the Big Questions of human purpose and ultimate reality. We support research on subjects ranging from complexity, evolution, and infinity to creativity, forgiveness, love, and free will. We encourage civil, informed dialogue among scientists, philosophers, and theologians and between such experts and the public at large, for the purposes of definitional clarity and new insights.
Our vision is derived from the late Sir John Templeton's optimism about the possibility of acquiring "new spiritual information" and from his commitment to rigorous scientific research and related scholarship. The Foundation's motto, "How little we know, how eager to learn," exemplifies our support for open-minded inquiry and our hope for advancing human progress through breakthrough discoveries.
According to the Foundation, it gives away about $70 million per year in research grants and programs.
The Foundation restructured its grant making process in January 2010. It is divided into five core funding areas which include:
- Science and the big questions
- Character development
- Freedom and free enterprise
- Exceptional cognitive talent and genius
- Genetics
The Foundation accepts online funding inquiries twice a year. If the initial inquiry is successful, applicants are invited to make a full proposal. Typically, grants are approved in a process that incorporates scientific peer review. The Foundation funds many high-level scientific research projects, usually by means of international competitions to which research teams from large universities apply.
In 2008, the Foundation received the National Humanities Medal
National Humanities Medal
The National Humanities Medal honors individuals or groups whose work has deepened the nation’s understanding of the humanities, broadened citizens’ engagement with the humanities, or helped preserve and expand Americans’ access to important resources in the humanities.The award, given by the...
from the National Endowment for the Humanities
National Endowment for the Humanities
The National Endowment for the Humanities is an independent federal agency of the United States established by the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965 dedicated to supporting research, education, preservation, and public programs in the humanities. The NEH is located at...
.
Science and the big questions
The largest of the Foundation’s funding areas, science and the big questions, covers the following:- mathematical and physical sciences
- life sciences
- human sciences
- philosophy and theology
- science in dialogue.
Mathematical and physical sciences
The Foundation focuses its funding in this area on foundational questions in mathematics or projects that seek a deeper understanding of the nature of reality within the realm of physics, cosmology, astronomy, chemistry or other physical sources.Examples of projects that have received funding include the Foundational Questions Institute established by physicists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
and University of California, Santa Cruz
University of California, Santa Cruz
The University of California, Santa Cruz, also known as UC Santa Cruz or UCSC, is a public, collegiate university; one of ten campuses in the University of California...
. FQXi supports research on questions at the foundations of physics and cosmology, particularly “new frontiers and innovative ideas integral to a deep understanding of reality but unlikely to be supported by conventional funding sources”.
Life sciences
Life Sciences covers projects examining the evolutionEvolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
and fundamental nature of life
Life
Life is a characteristic that distinguishes objects that have signaling and self-sustaining processes from those that do not, either because such functions have ceased , or else because they lack such functions and are classified as inanimate...
, human life
Human life
Human life may refer to*in medicine or statistics, the human lifespan*in sociology, the everyday personal life*in philosophy**the conditio humana**discussion of the meaning of life*in jurisprudence, a value protected by human rights...
, and mind
Mind
The concept of mind is understood in many different ways by many different traditions, ranging from panpsychism and animism to traditional and organized religious views, as well as secular and materialist philosophies. Most agree that minds are constituted by conscious experience and intelligent...
, especially as they relate to issues of meaning and purpose, the Foundation supports Theistic evolution
Theistic evolution
Theistic evolution or evolutionary creation is a concept that asserts that classical religious teachings about God are compatible with the modern scientific understanding about biological evolution...
. Projects that have received funding from the Foundation cover a variety of fields including the biological sciences, neuroscience
Neuroscience
Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system. Traditionally, neuroscience has been seen as a branch of biology. However, it is currently an interdisciplinary science that collaborates with other fields such as chemistry, computer science, engineering, linguistics, mathematics,...
, archaeology
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
, and palaeontology.
Professor Simon Conway-Morris from the University of Cambridge was awarded a grant in this area for his "Map of Life" project, which seeks to document examples of evolutionary convergence.
Professor Martin Nowak, Director of the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics at Harvard University, was awarded a grant for the “Foundational Questions in Evolutionary Biology” initiative, which seeks to advance fundamental questions in the context of evolutionary biology and to generate new understanding in the origins of biological creativity, the deep logics of biological dynamics and ontology, and the concepts of teleology and ultimate purpose in the context of evolutionary biology.
Human sciences
The Foundation provides funding to projects that look to apply disciplines such as anthropology, sociology, political science, and psychology to various moral and spiritual concepts, such as altruismAltruism
Altruism is a concern for the welfare of others. It is a traditional virtue in many cultures, and a core aspect of various religious traditions, though the concept of 'others' toward whom concern should be directed can vary among cultures and religions. Altruism is the opposite of...
, creativity
Creativity
Creativity refers to the phenomenon whereby a person creates something new that has some kind of value. What counts as "new" may be in reference to the individual creator, or to the society or domain within which the novelty occurs...
, free will
Free will
"To make my own decisions whether I am successful or not due to uncontrollable forces" -Troy MorrisonA pragmatic definition of free willFree will is the ability of agents to make choices free from certain kinds of constraints. The existence of free will and its exact nature and definition have long...
, generosity
Generosity
Generosity is the habit of giving freely without expecting anything in return. It can involve offering time, assets or talents to aid someone in need...
, gratitude
Gratitude
Gratitude, thankfulness, gratefulness, or appreciation is a feeling, emotion or attitude in acknowledgment of a benefit that one has received or will receive. The experience of gratitude has historically been a focus of several world religions, and has been considered extensively by moral...
, intellect
Intellect
Intellect is a term used in studies of the human mind, and refers to the ability of the mind to come to correct conclusions about what is true or real, and about how to solve problems...
, love
Love
Love is an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. Love is central to many religions, as in the Christian phrase, "God is love" or Agape in the Canonical gospels...
, prayer
Prayer
Prayer is a form of religious practice that seeks to activate a volitional rapport to a deity through deliberate practice. Prayer may be either individual or communal and take place in public or in private. It may involve the use of words or song. When language is used, prayer may take the form of...
, and purpose.
Purdue University
Purdue University
Purdue University, located in West Lafayette, Indiana, U.S., is the flagship university of the six-campus Purdue University system. Purdue was founded on May 6, 1869, as a land-grant university when the Indiana General Assembly, taking advantage of the Morrill Act, accepted a donation of land and...
in Indiana
Indiana
Indiana is a US state, admitted to the United States as the 19th on December 11, 1816. It is located in the Midwestern United States and Great Lakes Region. With 6,483,802 residents, the state is ranked 15th in population and 16th in population density. Indiana is ranked 38th in land area and is...
, USA received money from the Foundation to establish its Center on Religion and Chinese Society, which studies the impact and role of religion in Chinese societies and among the Chinese diaspora.
Philosophy and theology
The focus of this area is to support projects that attempt to develop new philosophical and theological insights, especially (but not only) in relation to advances in scientific understanding.Anton Zeilinger
Anton Zeilinger
Anton Zeilinger is an Austrian quantum physicist. He is currently professor of physics at the University of Vienna, previously University of Innsbruck. He is also the director of the Vienna branch of the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information IQOQI at the Austrian Academy of Sciences...
, Professor of Physics at the University of Vienna
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna is a public university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world...
, received a grant from Templeton to run a fellowship for young scholars interested in the nature of quantum reality and its philosophical implications.
Science in dialogue
The Foundation also funds projects that bring one or more scientific disciplines into a mutually enriching discussion with theology and/or philosophy for an academic audience or the public.The World Science Festival
World Science Festival
The World Science Festival is a science festival held in New York City that is held annually in the summer. The 2008 inaugural festival was held May 28 – June 1 and consisted mainly of panel discussions and on-stage conversations, accompanied by multimedia presentations.The festival was the...
received a grant from the foundation for its Big Ideas Series. It used this to host public discussions of subjects like "Nothing: The Subtle Science of Emptiness," "What It Means to Be Human," and "Parallel Universes".
Character development
The Foundation supports a broad range of programs, publications, and studies focused on the universal truths of character development, from childhood through young adulthood and beyond. The qualities of character emphasized in the Foundation’s charter include aweAwe
Awe is an emotion comparable to wonder but less joyous, and more fearful or respectful. Awe is defined in Robert Plutchik's Wheel of emotions as a combination of surprise and fear...
, creativity
Creativity
Creativity refers to the phenomenon whereby a person creates something new that has some kind of value. What counts as "new" may be in reference to the individual creator, or to the society or domain within which the novelty occurs...
, curiosity
Curiosity
Curiosity is an emotion related to natural inquisitive behavior such as exploration, investigation, and learning, evident by observation in human and many animal species. The term can also be used to denote the behavior itself being caused by the emotion of curiosity...
, diligence
Diligence
Diligence is steadfast application, assiduousness and industry — the virtue of hard work rather than the sin of careless sloth.Diligent behaviour is indicative of a work ethic — a belief that work is good in itself....
, entrepreneurialism, forgiveness
Forgiveness
Forgiveness is typically defined as the process of concluding resentment, indignation or anger as a result of a perceived offense, difference or mistake, or ceasing to demand punishment or restitution. The Oxford English Dictionary defines forgiveness as 'to grant free pardon and to give up all...
, generosity
Generosity
Generosity is the habit of giving freely without expecting anything in return. It can involve offering time, assets or talents to aid someone in need...
, gratitude
Gratitude
Gratitude, thankfulness, gratefulness, or appreciation is a feeling, emotion or attitude in acknowledgment of a benefit that one has received or will receive. The experience of gratitude has historically been a focus of several world religions, and has been considered extensively by moral...
, honesty
Honesty
Honesty refers to a facet of moral character and denotes positive, virtuous attributes such as integrity, truthfulness, and straightforwardness along with the absence of lying, cheating, or theft....
, humility
Humility
Humility is the quality of being modest, and respectful. Humility, in various interpretations, is widely seen as a virtue in many religious and philosophical traditions, being connected with notions of transcendent unity with the universe or the divine, and of egolessness.-Term:The term "humility"...
, joy
Happiness
Happiness is a mental state of well-being characterized by positive emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy. A variety of biological, psychological, religious, and philosophical approaches have striven to define happiness and identify its sources....
, love
Love
Love is an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. Love is central to many religions, as in the Christian phrase, "God is love" or Agape in the Canonical gospels...
, purpose, reliability
Reliability
In general, reliability is the ability of a person or system to perform and maintain its functions in routine circumstances, as well as hostile or unexpected circumstances.Reliability may refer to:...
, and thrift
Thrift
Thrift may refer to:* A savings and loan association in the United States* Restrained or disciplined spending habits* Apache Thrift a remote procedure call framework developed at Facebook for "scalable cross-language services development"....
.
Stanford University
Stanford University
The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...
is among the recipients of a grant for Wiliam Damon’s research on types of commitments young people hold and how those commitments develop, which was the first phase of the Youth Purpose Project.
More recently the Foundation awarded a grant to the University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
for its research on an interdisciplinary study of virtue.
In relation to Character Development, the Foundation also supports the Purpose Prize, an initiative of Civic Ventures. The Purpose Prize seeks to inspire men and women with a vision of how to live with purpose in retirement.
Freedom and free enterprise
Sir John Templeton, a follower of classical liberalism from Adam SmithAdam Smith
Adam Smith was a Scottish social philosopher and a pioneer of political economy. One of the key figures of the Scottish Enlightenment, Smith is the author of The Theory of Moral Sentiments and An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations...
to Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman was an American economist, statistician, academic, and author who taught at the University of Chicago for more than three decades...
, believed that individual freedom was the indispensable foundation of economic, social, and spiritual progress, and that without economic freedom, individual freedom was fragile and vulnerable. To this end, the Foundation supports a range of programs which promote freedom and free enterprise.
In 2007 a grant was awarded to Robert Townsend, from the University of Chicago for “The Enterprise Initiative” a research collaboration with MIT's Poverty Action Lab, Yale's Economic Growth Center, and the University of Chicago's Computation Institute. This initiative seeks to elucidate enterprise-based solutions to poverty by studying the specific factors that lead to success at the individual level.
Exceptional cognitive talent and genius
The Foundation supports young people who demonstrate exceptional talent in mathematics and science. In the U.S., they have supported accelerated learning for students capable of working well beyond their grade level, and a number of important national studies of the issue. Internationally, they have sponsored academic training and competitions for students who show extraordinary potential but whose talents might not otherwise be developed, especially because of their economic circumstances or insufficient educational support.One example of its work is the grant given to an academic from Princeton University for the study: “Budapest: The Golden Years Early 20th Century Mathematics Education in Budapest and Lessons for Today”.
Genetics
The Foundation’s engagement with this funding area is still in its early stages. The Foundation is particularly interested in major advances in genetics might serve to empower individuals, leading to spiritually beneficial social and cultural changes.Previous genetics projects receiving grants from the Foundation include how research on Genetics and the Origin of Organismal Complexity by Günter P. Wagner and Alison Richard from Yale University.
The Foundation has established "Can Genetically Modified Crops Help to Feed the World?" as 2011 Funding Priority.
The big questions
The Foundation runs what it calls Big Questions conversations, a campaign conceived in collaboration with the designer Milton GlaserMilton Glaser
Milton Glaser is a graphic designer, best known for the I Love New York logo, his "Bob Dylan" poster, the "DC bullet" logo used by DC Comics from 1977 to 2005, and the "Brooklyn Brewery" logo. He also founded New York Magazine with Clay Felker in 1968.-Biography:Glaser was born into a Hungarian...
. A panel of high-profile scholars and public figures are invited to address a question and write a detailed essay in response. To date, the Foundation has posed the following questions:
- Does the Universe have a purpose?
- Will money solve Africa’s development problems?
- Does science make belief in God obsolete?
- Does the free market corrode moral character?
- Does evolution explain human nature?
- Does moral action depend on reasoning?
Contributors have included Bernard-Henri Lévy
Bernard-Henri Lévy
Bernard-Henri Lévy is a French public intellectual, philosopher and journalist. Often referred to today, in France, simply as BHL, he was one of the leaders of the "Nouveaux Philosophes" movement in 1976.-Early life:...
, Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Ayaan Hirsi Magan Ali is a Somali-Dutch feminist and atheist activist, writer, politician who strongly opposes circumcision and female genital cutting. She is the daughter of the Somali politician and opposition leader Hirsi Magan Isse and is a founder of the women's rights organisation the AHA...
, Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Eric Hitchens is an Anglo-American author and journalist whose books, essays, and journalistic career span more than four decades. He has been a columnist and literary critic at The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, Slate, World Affairs, The Nation, Free Inquiry, and became a media fellow at the...
, Jerome Groopman
Jerome Groopman
Jerome Groopman has been a staff writer in medicine and biology for The New Yorker since 1998. He is also the Dina and Raphael Recanati Chair of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, Chief of Experimental Medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and author of five books, all written for a...
, Robert Reich
Robert Reich
Robert Bernard Reich is an American political economist, professor, author, and political commentator. He served in the administrations of Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter and was Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton from 1993 to 1997....
, He Qinglian
He Qinglian
He Qinglian is a Chinese author and economist, most prominently known for her critical view of Chinese society and media controls in China.-Biography:...
, Stephen Pinker, Francis Collins
Francis Collins (geneticist)
Francis Sellers Collins , is an American physician-geneticist, noted for his discoveries of disease genes and his leadership of the Human Genome Project . He currently serves as Director of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Prior to being appointed Director, he founded and...
, Simon Conway Morris
Simon Conway Morris
Simon Conway Morris FRS is an English paleontologist made known by his detailed and careful study of the Burgess Shale fossils, an exploit celebrated in Wonderful Life by Stephen Jay Gould...
, Michael Gazzaniga
Michael Gazzaniga
Michael S. Gazzaniga is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he heads the new SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind. He is one of the leading researchers in cognitive neuroscience, the study of the neural basis of mind...
, Rebecca Goldstein
Rebecca Goldstein
Rebecca Goldstein is an American novelist and professor of philosophy. She has written five novels, a number of short stories and essays, and biographical studies of mathematician Kurt Gödel and philosopher Baruch Spinoza....
, and Jonah Lehrer
Jonah Lehrer
Jonah Lehrer is an American journalist who writes on the topics of psychology, neuroscience, and the relationship between science and the humanities...
.
Prizes and awards
The Foundation is involved both in the awarding of prizes for specific achievements in different categories, and the funding of research in science and theology.The Templeton Prize
In addition to its central activity funding scientific studies, the Foundation awards the annual $1.5 million Templeton PrizeTempleton Prize
The Templeton Prize is an annual award presented by the Templeton Foundation. Established in 1972, it is awarded to a living person who, in the estimation of the judges, "has made an exceptional contribution to affirming life's spiritual dimension, whether through insight, discovery, or practical...
to a ‘living person who has made an exceptional contribution to affirming life's spiritual dimension, whether through insight, discovery, or practical works’.
The Templeton Prize, which once went to people like Mother TeresaMother TeresaMother Teresa , born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu , was a Roman Catholic nun of Albanian ethnicity and Indian citizenship, who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India, in 1950...
and the Reverend Billy Graham, now goes to scientists who are either religious themselves or say nice things about religion.
Jerry Coyne
Jerry Coyne
-Online articles:* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* ", The New Republic * -Online articles:* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* ", The New Republic (Review of Michael Behe's The Edge of Evolution)* -Online articles:* , The New Republic* , The...
, quoted above feels the Templeton Prize attempts to make a virtue of faith and believes that scientific enquiry requires doubt and careful enquiry, that faith has not added to human knowledge.
The Templeton Prize was first awarded in 1973. The monetary amount is adjusted to always be slightly higher than the Nobel Prize
Nobel Prize
The Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
though it is less prestigious. In 2010 the prize was $1.5 million.
Since its inception, recipients of the prize have included Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa , born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu , was a Roman Catholic nun of Albanian ethnicity and Indian citizenship, who founded the Missionaries of Charity in Calcutta, India, in 1950...
, Taizé Prior Roger Schutz, Evangelist Billy Graham
Billy Graham
William Franklin "Billy" Graham, Jr. is an American evangelical Christian evangelist. As of April 25, 2010, when he met with Barack Obama, Graham has spent personal time with twelve United States Presidents dating back to Harry S. Truman, and is number seven on Gallup's list of admired people for...
, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was aRussian and Soviet novelist, dramatist, and historian. Through his often-suppressed writings, he helped to raise global awareness of the Gulag, the Soviet Union's forced labor camp system – particularly in The Gulag Archipelago and One Day in the Life of...
and Baba Amte
Baba Amte
Murlidhar Devidas Amte, popularly known as Baba Amte was an Indian social worker and social activist known particularly for his work for the rehabilitation and empowerment of poor people suffering from leprosy....
.
The 2010 Templeton Prize winner was Francisco J. Ayala
Francisco J. Ayala
Francisco José Ayala Pereda is a Spanish-American biologist and philosopher at the University of California, Irvine. He is a former Dominican priest, ordained in 1960, but left the priesthood that same year. After graduating from the University of Salamanca, he moved to the US in 1961 to study for...
, an evolutionary geneticist and molecular biologist who has opposed the teaching of creationism in the public schools.
In 2009, the French physicist and science philosopher Bernard d'Espagnat
Bernard d'Espagnat
Bernard d'Espagnat is a French theoretical physicist, philosopher of science, and author, best known for his work on the nature of reality....
won the prize.
In 2008, Polish cosmologist and catholic priest Michał Heller was awarded the Templeton Prize. Heller received the prize in recognition of scholarship and research that has, according to the Foundation, pushed at the metaphysical boundaries of science.
In 2007 the Templeton Prize was awarded to Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor
Charles Taylor (philosopher)
Charles Margrave Taylor, is a Canadian philosopher from Montreal, Quebec best known for his contributions in political philosophy, the philosophy of social science, and in the history of philosophy. His contributions to these fields have earned him both the prestigious Kyoto Prize and the...
. Taylor is known for his belief that Western secular society does not satisfy the natural human desire for meaning. Commenting on the Templeton Prize award to Taylor, the United Kingdom’s Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks
Jonathan Sacks
Jonathan Henry Sacks, Baron Sacks, Kt is the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth. His Hebrew name is Yaakov Zvi...
said, “If there is such a thing as a saint in a secular age, he deserves that title”.
Other recent prize winners include:
Charles H. Townes, Professor in the Graduate School at the University of California, Berkeley, who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1964 for his investigations into the properties of microwaves and his co-invention of the laser, and theoretical cosmologist
George F.R. Ellis of the University of Cape Town, who advocates “balancing the rationality of evidence-based science with the causal effect of forces beyond the explanation of hard science, including issues such as aesthetics, ethics, metaphysics, and meaning".
Other prizes
In addition to the Templeton Prize, the Templeton Foundation also provides grants for several independently administered awards. These include:The $100,000 Epiphany Prizes for ‘inspiring movies and TV’. Winners of the movie prize include: Amazing Grace
Amazing Grace
"Amazing Grace" is a Christian hymn with words written by the English poet and clergyman John Newton , published in 1779. With a message that forgiveness and redemption are possible regardless of the sins people commit and that the soul can be delivered from despair through the mercy of God,...
, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is a 2005 epic fantasy adventure film directed by Andrew Adamson and based on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the first published and second chronological novel in C. S. Lewis's children's epic fantasy series, The Chronicles of...
, The Passion of the Christ
The Passion of the Christ
The Passion of the Christ is a 2004 American drama film directed by Mel Gibson and starring Jim Caviezel as Jesus. It depicts the Passion of Jesus largely according to the New Testament Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John...
, Amistad
Amistad
"Amistad" is a Spanish noun meaning "friendship". It may refer to:Ships* Amistad/Amitie, an 18th century schooner that transported Acadians from France to Louisiana....
and the Preacher's Wife
The Preacher's Wife
The Preacher's Wife is a 1996 romantic-family-dramedy-christmas film directed by Penny Marshall, and starring Denzel Washington, Whitney Houston, and Loretta Devine. It is a remake of the 1947 film The Bishop's Wife....
.
The Purpose Prize, sponsored by Civic Ventures with grants from The Atlantic Philanthropies and the John Templeton Foundation. This initiative annually provides five awards of $100,000 and 10 awards of $10,000 to people over 60 who are taking on 'society’s biggest challenges'. Winners have been recognized for a diverse range of activities, including creating a mentor network for refugees to reducing rates of young offender recidivism.
Other recipients of funding
Individuals associated with Templeton-funded initiatives or who have received support from the Templeton Foundation include Paul DaviesPaul Davies
Paul Charles William Davies, AM is an English physicist, writer and broadcaster, currently a professor at Arizona State University as well as the Director of BEYOND: Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science...
, Max Tegmark
Max Tegmark
Max Tegmark is a Swedish-American cosmologist. Tegmark is a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and belongs to the scientific directorate of the Foundational Questions Institute.-Early life:...
, John D. Barrow
John D. Barrow
-External links:****** The Forum-Publications available on the Internet:************...
, James Otteson
James Otteson
James R. Otteson is an American philosopher. Formerly the chairman of the department of philosophy at the University of Alabama, he has also taught at Georgetown University...
, Stephen G. Post
Stephen G. Post
Stephen G. Post PhD, is the best selling author of The Hidden Gifts of Helping: How the Power of Giving, Compassion, and Hope Can Get Us Through Hard Times , as listed on the nonfiction best seller list with the Wall Street Journal....
, Martin Seligman
Martin Seligman
Martin E. P. "Marty" Seligman is an American psychologist, educator, and author of self-help books. His theory of "learned helplessness" is widely respected among scientific psychologists....
, Harold Koenig, Laurence Iannaccone
Laurence Iannaccone
Laurence R. Iannaccone is a Professor of Economics at Chapman University, Orange County, California. Before moving to Chapman in 2009 he was a Koch Professor of Economics at George Mason University...
, Nicholas Colangello, and Alexander Astin
Alexander Astin
Dr. Alexander W. Astin is the Allan M. Carter Professor Emeritus of Higher Education and Organizational Change, at the University of California, Los Angeles....
. Organizations that are associated or which have received grants include the American Association for the Advancement of Science
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science is an international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsibility, and supporting scientific education and science outreach for the...
(AAAS), Civic Ventures, Developmental Studies Center
Developmental Studies Center
' is a nonprofit organization headquartered in Oakland, California that was founded in 1980 by current president Eric Schaps. DSC develops and disseminates literacy and community-building programs for use in elementary schools, and literacy, mathematics, and science enrichment programs for use in...
, Junior Achievement
Junior Achievement
Junior Achievement or JA or JA Worldwide is a non-profit youth organization that was founded in 1919 by Horace A. Moses, Theodore Vail, and senator Winthrop M. Crane. JA focuses on educating kids in K-12 about the free enterprise system...
, Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics is an independent, resident-based research institute devoted to foundational issues in theoretical physics located in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Perimeter Institute was founded in 1999 by Mike Lazaridis...
, Rotary International
Rotary International
Rotary International is an organization of service clubs known as Rotary Clubs located all over the world. The stated purpose of the organization is to bring together business and professional leaders to provide humanitarian service, encourage high ethical standards in all vocations, and help...
and many major research universities, including the California Institute of Technology
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Pasadena, California, United States. Caltech has six academic divisions with strong emphases on science and engineering...
, Cambridge University, Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
, MIT, Oxford University, Princeton University
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
, Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
and among others.
Nature magazine lists the top ten grants:
- Foundational Questions in Evolutionary Biology ($10,500,00)
- Foundational Questions in Physics and Cosmology ($8,812,078)
- The SEVEN Fund: Enterprise Based Solutions to Poverty ($8,742,911)
- Establishing an Institute for Research on Unlimited Love ($8,210,000)
- The Purpose Prize for Social Innovators Over the Age of 60 ($8,148,322)
- Templeton–Cambridge Journalism Fellowships and Seminars in Science and Religion ($6,187,971)
- Accelerating Progress at the Interface of Positive Psychology and Neuroscience ($5,816,793)
- AAAS Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion ($5,351,707)
- Promoting a Culture of Generosity, Part I: Feature Film ($5,000,000)
- Promoting a Culture of Generosity, Part II: The Philanthropy Channel ($5,000,000)
MediaTransparency
MediaTransparency
MediaTransparency was a left leaning political project begun in 1999 which monitors the financial ties of conservative think tanks to conservative foundations in the United States. Its database tracks over 50,000 grants awarded since 1985, which total more than $3.2 billion USD. It was run by...
lists grant-receiving institutions for 1998 to 2004; the top five are:
- Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences ($23 million)
- National Institute for Healthcare Research ($8 million)
- Philadelphia Center for Religion & Science ($4 million)
- Metanexus Institute on Religion and Science ($4 million)
- Science and Spirit Resources, Inc. ($4 million).
The Foundation also has media presence. It runs its own publisher, Templeton Press, and from 2004–2010, it published the periodical “In Character: A Journal of Everyday Virtues”. Each issue had a theme such as "thrift" or "purpose" or "honesty." All of the articles are archived online.
Leadership
On February 7, 2011, the John Templeton Foundation announced its new executive leadership team, which includes Barnaby Marsh, executive vice president, strategic initiatives; Michael Murray, executive vice president, programs; Dawn Bryant, executive counsel; and Douglas W. Scott, executive vice president, chief administrative officer. The current President of the Templeton Foundation is John M. Templeton, Jr., the son of Sir John Templeton. Templeton, Jr. is an evangelical Christian and is an independently wealthy person who is active in philanthropy outside of the mandate of the Templeton Foundation itself. This includes support for various groups that raise funds for conservativeAmerican conservatism
Conservatism in the United States has played an important role in American politics since the 1950s. Historian Gregory Schneider identifies several constants in American conservatism: respect for tradition, support of republicanism, preservation of "the rule of law and the Christian religion", and...
causes.
Templeton Jr has always maintained that his own personal religious beliefs do not affect his ability to administer the Foundation in accordance with the wishes of his father. The Templeton Foundation has also gone to great lengths to stress that it is non-political with no bias towards any one faith.
Controversies
Broadly, controversial aspects of the Templeton Foundation fall into three categories.- The Foundation is seen by some as having a conservative bias.
- The Foundation receives criticism from some members in the scientific community who are concerned with its linking of scientific and religious questions.
- The Foundation stands accused of using its financial clout to encourage researchers and reporters to produce material favourable to its position linking religion to science etc.
Accusations of conservative orientation
Like all 501(c)(3) organizations, the Templeton Foundation is prohibited from engaging directly in political activity. However, a number of journalists have highlighted connections with conservative causes. A 1997 article in Slate Magazine said the Templeton Foundation had given a significant amount of financial support to groups, causes and individuals considered conservativeAmerican conservatism
Conservatism in the United States has played an important role in American politics since the 1950s. Historian Gregory Schneider identifies several constants in American conservatism: respect for tradition, support of republicanism, preservation of "the rule of law and the Christian religion", and...
, including gifts to Gertrude Himmelfarb
Gertrude Himmelfarb
Gertrude Himmelfarb , also known as Bea Kristol, is an American historian. She has written extensively on intellectual history, with a focus on Britain and the Victorian era, as well as on contemporary society and culture....
, Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman was an American economist, statistician, academic, and author who taught at the University of Chicago for more than three decades...
, Walter E. Williams
Walter E. Williams
Walter E. Williams, is an American economist, commentator, and academic. He is the John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University, as well as a syndicated columnist and author known for his libertarian views.- Early life and education :Williams family during childhood...
, Julian Lincoln Simon
Julian Lincoln Simon
Julian Lincoln Simon was a professor of business administration at the University of Maryland and a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute at the time of his death, after previously serving as a longtime business professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.Simon wrote many books and...
and Mary Lefkowitz
Mary Lefkowitz
Mary R. Lefkowitz is an American classical scholar and Professor Emerita of Classical Studies at Wellesley College. She is best known to non-Classicists for her anti-Afrocentrism book, Not Out of Africa . She is the widow of Sir Hugh Lloyd-Jones.-Biography:Lefkowitz earned her B.A...
, and referred to John Templeton, Jr., as a "conservative sugar daddy". The Foundation also has a history of supporting the Cato Institute
Cato Institute
The Cato Institute is a libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Edward H. Crane, who remains president and CEO, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of the conglomerate Koch Industries, Inc., the largest privately held...
, a libertarian
Libertarianism
Libertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
think-tank, as well as projects at major research centers and universities that explore themes related to free market economics, such as Hernando de Soto
Hernando de Soto (economist)
Hernando de Soto is a Peruvian economist known for his work on the informal economy and on the importance of business and property rights. He is the president of the Institute for Liberty and Democracy , located in Lima, Peru.-Childhood and education:Hernando de Soto was born in 1941 in Arequipa,...
's Instituto Libertad Y Democracia
Institute for Liberty and Democracy
The Institute for Liberty and Democracy is a Lima-based think tank devoted to the promotion of property rights in developing countries...
and the X Prize Foundation
X Prize Foundation
The X PRIZE Foundation is a non-profit organization that designs and manages public competitions intended to encourage technological development that could benefit mankind....
.
In a 2007 article in The Nation
The Nation
The Nation is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. The periodical, devoted to politics and culture, is self-described as "the flagship of the left." Founded on July 6, 1865, It is published by The Nation Company, L.P., at 33 Irving Place, New York City.The Nation...
, Barbara Ehrenreich
Barbara Ehrenreich
-Early life:Ehrenreich was born Barbara Alexander to Isabelle Oxley and Ben Howes Alexander in Butte, Montana, which she describes as then being "a bustling, brawling, blue collar mining town."...
drew attention to the Foundation's president Dr. John M. Templeton Jr. funding of the conservative group Freedom's Watch
Freedom's Watch
Freedom's Watch was a Washington D.C. based 501 lobbying organization. Freedom's Watch was supportive of the Bush administration's positions in the War on Terror and of Republican Congressional candidates. The group was run and supported, in part, by several former officials of the Bush...
, and referred to the Foundation as a "right wing venture". Pamela Thompson of the Templeton Foundation, responding to Ehrenreich's allegations, asserted that "the Foundation is, and always has been, run in accordance with the wishes of Sir John Templeton Sr, who laid very strict criteria for its mission and approach", that it is "a non-political entity with no religious bias" and it "is totally independent of any other organisation and therefore neither endorses, nor contributes to political candidates, campaigns, or movements of any kind".
Intelligent design
There have been questions over whether the foundation supports Intelligent DesignIntelligent design
Intelligent design is the proposition that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for...
because its grants can cover projects of a scientific and religious nature. The foundation has always strenuously denied supporting the movement.
In 2005, the foundation disputed suggestions that it promotes intelligent design
Intelligent design
Intelligent design is the proposition that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for...
saying that, while it had supported unrelated projects by individuals who identify with intelligent design, it was one of the ‘principal critics’ of the intelligent design movement
Intelligent design movement
The intelligent design movement is a neo-creationist religious campaign for broad social, academic and political change to promote and support the idea of "intelligent design," which asserts that "certain features of the universe and of living things are...
and funded projects that challenged it.
The same year the New York Times reported that the foundation asked intelligent design proponents to submit proposals for actual research and quoted Charles L. Harper Jr., senior vice president at the Templeton Foundation, as saying "They never came in" and that while he was skeptical from the beginning, other foundation officials were initially intrigued and later grew disillusioned. "From the point of view of rigor
Rigour
Rigour or rigor has a number of meanings in relation to intellectual life and discourse. These are separate from public and political applications with their suggestion of laws enforced to the letter, or political absolutism...
and intellectual seriousness, the intelligent design people don't come out very well in our world of scientific review", he said.
In 2007 in the LA Times, the Templeton Foundation, wrote "we do not believe that the science underpinning the intelligent-design movement is sound, we do not support research or programs that deny large areas of well-documented scientific knowledge, and the foundation is a nonpolitical entity and does not engage in or support political movements".
In March 2009, the Discovery Institute
Discovery Institute
The Discovery Institute is a non-profit public policy think tank based in Seattle, Washington, best known for its advocacy of intelligent design...
, a supporter of Intelligent Design, accused the Templeton Foundation of blocking its involvement in a Vatican-backed, Templeton-funded conference in Rome on evolution. On the lack of involvement of any speakers supporting Intelligent Design, the conference director Rev. Marc Leclerc said, “We think that it’s not a scientific perspective, nor a theological or philosophical one…This make a dialogue difficult, maybe impossible.” At the conference, Francisco Ayala, an evolutionary biologist, former president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science is an international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsibility, and supporting scientific education and science outreach for the...
and long time advisor to the foundation, said ID and Creationism were "blasphemous" to both Christians and scientists.
Debate within the scientific community
The Foundation's views on the connections between religious and scientific inquiry and their ability to provide significant grants for scientific research has led to quite polarising debate within the scientific community.Sean M. Carroll
Sean M. Carroll
Sean Michael Carroll is a senior research associate in the Department of Physics at the California Institute of Technology. He is a theoretical cosmologist specializing in dark energy and general relativity...
, a cosmologist at the California Institute of Technology
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Pasadena, California, United States. Caltech has six academic divisions with strong emphases on science and engineering...
, wrote, in describing his self-recusal from a conference he discovered was funded by the Foundation, that "the entire purpose of the Templeton Foundation is to blur the line between straightforward science and explicitly religious activity, making it seem like the two enterprises are part of one big undertaking. It's all about appearances." But he also said, "I appreciate that the Templeton Foundation is actually, in its own way, quite pro-science, and is not nearly as objectionable as the anti-scientific crackpots at the Discovery Institute
Discovery Institute
The Discovery Institute is a non-profit public policy think tank based in Seattle, Washington, best known for its advocacy of intelligent design...
." Different scientists report widely differing experiences so it is impossible to evaluate what consistent policy if any the Templeton Foundation has.
John Horgan
John Horgan (American journalist)
John Horgan is an American science journalist best known for his 1996 book The End of Science. He has written for many publications, including Scientific American, The New York Times, Time, Newsweek, and IEEE Spectrum...
, a science journalist and the author of several books, wrote in 2006, an article for The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education is a newspaper and website that presents news, information, and jobs for college and university faculty, staff members and administrators....
(reprinted in Edge) of his "misgivings about the foundation's agenda of reconciling religion and science". He said that a conference he attended favored scientists who "offered a perspective clearly skewed in favor of religion and Christianity", and says that a Templeton official
(…) told us that the meeting cost more than $1-million, and in return the foundation wanted us to publish articles touching on science and religion".
John Horgan fears recipients of large grants from the Templeton Foundation sometimes write what the Foundation wants rather than what they believe.
Several areligious scientists told me privately that they did not want to challenge the beliefs of religious speakers for fear of offending them and the Templeton hosts.
In his book The God Delusion
The God Delusion
The God Delusion is a 2006 bestselling non-fiction book by British biologist Richard Dawkins, professorial fellow of New College, Oxford, and inaugural holder of the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford.In The God Delusion, Dawkins contends that...
, Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
Clinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL , known as Richard Dawkins, is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author...
(an evolutionary biologist) repeatedly criticizes the Templeton Foundation, referring to the Templeton Prize as "a very large sum of money given...usually to a scientist who is prepared to say something nice about religion." Concerning the conference that he and John Horgan attended, and to John Horgan's resulting article, Dawkins comments, "If I understand Horgan's point, it is that Templeton's money corrupts science."
Peter Woit
Peter Woit
Peter Woit is a Departmental Computer Administrator and Senior Lecturer in Discipline at Columbia University, known for his criticisms of string theory in his book Not Even Wrong, and his blog of the same name.-Career:...
, a mathematical physicist at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
occasionally writes about his misgivings with the foundation on his blog (which is hosted by Columbia University). Woit feels it is unfortunate that Templeton's money is used to influence scientific research towards a convergence between science and religion.
In June 2005, Woit wrote:
Look not at what the Templeton people say (which is relatively innocuous), but at what they do. They explicitly refuse to support serious science, and instead fund an incredible array of attempts to inject religion into scientific practice. ... Instead they are heavily funding the one part of the field that most people consider dangerous pseudo-science and a serious threat to the whole concept of what it means to do science.
In October 2007, he gave this more qualified, but still largely critical, assessment of the Foundation following attendance at a Templeton sponsored seminar:
The symposium I attended had not a trace of involvement of religion in it, and it seems that Templeton is careful to keep this out of some of the things that it funds as pure science…They appear to have a serious commitment to the idea of funding things in physics that can be considered “foundational”. People working in some such areas often are considered out of the physics mainstream and so find it hard to get their research funded. For them, Templeton is in many ways a uniquely promising funding source”.
"However, they unambiguously are devoted to trying to bring science and religion together, and that’s my main problem with them. ... I remain concerned though about the significance for physics of this large new source of funding, out of scale with other such private sources, and with an agenda that seems to me to have a dangerous component to it."
Nonetheless, Woit's impression is that the Foundation is careful to keep conservative politics out of its activities and he does state that “their encouragement of religion seems to be of a very ecumenical nature".
Professor Paul Davies
Paul Davies
Paul Charles William Davies, AM is an English physicist, writer and broadcaster, currently a professor at Arizona State University as well as the Director of BEYOND: Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science...
, British-born physicist and member of the Foundation's Board of Trustees, gave a defense of the Foundation's role in the scientific community in the Times Higher Education Supplement in March 2005. Responding to concerns about the funding of such research by religious organisations that might have a hidden agenda and in particular the Templeton Foundation, Davies said:
If the foundation were indeed a religious organisation with its own specific doctrine, [the] objections would have substance. In fact, it is nothing of the sort. The benefactor, Sir John Templeton, bemoans the way that religious leaders often claim to have all the answers. Imagine, he says, consulting a doctor about an ailment, only to find him reaching for a volume of Hippocrates. Yet priests rely on ancient scriptures to deliver spiritual guidance. Sir John wants to address the big questions of existence with humility and open-mindedness, adopting the model of scientific research in place of religious dogma. "How little we know!" is his favourite aphorism. It is a radical message, as far from religious fundamentalism as it is possible to get.
...recurring research themes supported by the foundation are the search for extra-solar planets, the properties of liquid water, the evolution of primate behaviour, emergent properties of complex systems, the foundations of quantum mechanics and the biological and social bases for forgiveness in areas of human conflict. In none of these projects is anything like a preferred religious position encouraged or an obligation imposed to support any religious group.
Britain is a post-religious society. Yet ordinary men and women still yearn for some sort of deeper meaning to their lives. Can science point the way? Science has traditionally been regarded as dehumanising and alienating, trivialising the significance of humans and celebrating the pointlessness of existence. But many scientists, atheists included, see it differently. They experience what Einstein called "a cosmic religious feeling" when reflecting on the majesty of the cosmos and the extraordinary elegance and ingenuity of its mathematical laws.
Science cannot and should not be a substitute for religion. But I see nothing sinister or unprofessional about scientists working with open-minded theologians to explore how science might be a source of inspiration rather than demoralisation.
Dr Sunny Bains of Imperial College London
Imperial College London
Imperial College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom, specialising in science, engineering, business and medicine...
claims that there is
(…) evidence of cronyism (especially in the awarding in those million-dollar-plus Templeton prizes), a misleading attempt to move away from using religious language (without changing the religious agenda), the funding of right-wing anti-science groups, and more.
Bains feels the Templeton Foundation “blur the line between science and religion”.
Bains' claims have been disputed by Josh Rosenau of the National Center for Science Education.
In 2010, journalist Nathan Schneider published a lengthy investigative profile of the Templeton Foundation in The Nation, a leading magazine of the left. In it, he aired familiar complaints about the Foundation, but observed that many of its critics and grantees alike fail to appreciate “the breadth of the foundation's activities, much less the quixotic vision of its founder, John Templeton.” Schneider observed:
At worst, Templeton could be called heterodox and naïve; at best, his was a mind more open than most, reflective of the most inventive and combinatorial strains of American religious thought, eager to radically reinterpret ancient wisdom and bring it up to speed with some version from the present.
Schneider wrote that to call the Foundation “conservative” is to misunderstand it:
The founder's relationship to the notion was especially paradoxical; in The Humble Approach, Templeton writes, "Rarely does a conservative become a hero of history." Although Templeton could be nostalgic, harking back to time-tested values and homespun sayings, he wanted above all to move the world forward, not hold it back.
Though the Foundation, in Schneider’s view, “has associated itself with political and religious forces that cause it to be perceived as threatening the integrity of science and protecting the religious status quo,” these alliances mean the Foundation “is also better positioned than most to foster a conservatism—and a culture generally—that holds the old habits of religions and business responsible to good evidence, while helping scientists better speak to people's deepest concerns.”
Prominent science journalist Chris Mooney, an atheist and author of The Republican War on Science, received a 2010 Templeton-Cambridge Journalism Fellowship, enabling him to join other journalists for a three-week lecture program on science and religion at Cambridge University. In a June 7, 2010, post on his Discover magazine blog, Mooney wrote, “I can honestly say that I have found the lectures and presentations that we’ve heard here to be serious and stimulating. The same goes for the discussions that have followed them.” In 2006, freelance science journalist John Horgan, a 2005 Templeton-Cambridge fellow, wrote in The Chronicle of Higher Education (April 7, 2006) that he had enjoyed his fellowship, but felt guilty that by taking money from the Templeton Foundation, he had contributed to the mingling of science with religion. In a June 10, 2010, post on his blog, Mooney took issue with Horgan’s point, calling the idea that the fellowship was a “Trojan horse” for religion “pretty untenable.” Prominent Templeton critics Richard Dawkins, A.C. Grayling, and Daniel Dennett
Daniel Dennett
Daniel Clement Dennett is an American philosopher, writer and cognitive scientist whose research centers on the philosophy of mind, philosophy of science and philosophy of biology, particularly as those fields relate to evolutionary biology and cognitive science. He is currently the Co-director of...
declined to answer a Templeton-Cambridge fellow’s interview requests, saying that they did not want to lend credibility to the science and religion journalism program. Mooney rejected this approach, writing, “You can’t both denounce the fellowship for being intellectually tilted and also boycott it, thereby refusing to help lend it more of the balance you claim it needs.” Grayling and Dennett answered this criticism as follows:-
(…) I disapprove of the Templeton Foundation’s attempt to tie theologians to the coat tails of scientists and philosophers who actually do have expertise on this topic. (that materialism is in Dennett’s opinion not an obstacle to an ethical life)
Many years ago I made the mistake of participating, with some very good scientists, in a conference that pitted us against astrologers and other new age fakes. I learned to my dismay that even though we thoroughly dismantled the opposition, many in the audience ended up, paradoxically, with an increased esteem for astrologers! As one person explained to me “I figured that if you scientists were willing to work this hard to refute it, there must be something to it!” Isn’t it obvious to you that the Templeton Foundation is eager to create the very same response in its readers? Do you really feel comfortable being complicit with that project? (Dennett)
Daniel Dennett
Daniel Dennett
Daniel Clement Dennett is an American philosopher, writer and cognitive scientist whose research centers on the philosophy of mind, philosophy of science and philosophy of biology, particularly as those fields relate to evolutionary biology and cognitive science. He is currently the Co-director of...
I cannot agree with the Templeton Foundation's project of trying to make religion respectable by conflating it with science; this is like mixing astrology with astronomy or voodoo with medical research, and I disapprove of Templeton's use of its great wealth to bribe compliance with this project. Templeton is to all intents and purposes a propaganda organisation for religious outlooks; it should honestly say so and equally honestly devote its money to prop up the antique superstitions it favours, and not pretend that questions of religion are of the same kind and on the same level as those of science – by which means it persistently seeks to muddy the waters and keep religion credible in lay eyes. It is for this reason I don't take part in Templeton-associated matters. (Grayling)
A.C. Grayling
In 2011, the science journal Nature took note of the ongoing controversy among scientists over working with Templeton.
Jerry Coyne
Jerry Coyne
-Online articles:* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* ", The New Republic * -Online articles:* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* , The New Republic* ", The New Republic (Review of Michael Behe's The Edge of Evolution)* -Online articles:* , The New Republic* , The...
, University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
evolutionary biologist sees a fundamental impossibility in attempting to reconcile faith with science.
Religion is based on dogma and belief, whereas science is based on doubt and questioning,” says Coyne, echoing an argument made by many others. “In religion, faith is a virtue. In science, faith is a vice.” The purpose of the Templeton Foundation is to break down that wall, he says — to reconcile the irreconcilable and give religion scholarly legitimacy. . .
Jerry Coyne, a fierce Templeton critic, told Nature writer Mitchell Waldrop that the Foundation’s purpose is to eliminate the wall between religion and science, and to use science’s prestige to validate religion. But other scientists, including Foundation grantees like University of Chicago psychologist John Cacioppo and Anthony Aguirre, a University of California—Santa Cruz astrophysicist, told Nature that they have never felt pressured by Templeton to spin their research toward religion-friendly conclusions.