Audiovisual Media
Holmes Rolston, III
Media in general circulation in Colorado State University Library
(and some other libraries, also some online)
2005. Challenges in Environmental Ethics, Streaming video, 55 minutes. Online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/37816
DVD format. 55 minutes. Copy in CSU :Library.
Videoclips, Commentary, Holmes Rolston, III. Shot at Tamasag, CSU facility near Bellvue, Colorado, February 18, 2005.
Cases discussed:
1. Antelope Fence, Red Rim, Wyoming
2. Hunter's Ethic, Colorado
3. Bear Hunting
4. Drowning Whales in Alaska
5. Drowning Bison in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
6. Elephant Calf Euthanized, Botswana
7. Wawona Tree, Yosemite National Park, California
8. Tree Spiking
9. San Clemente Goats, San Clemente Island, California
10. Old Growth Forest, Pacific Northwest, USA
11. Yellowstone Fires, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
12. Home Planet: Earth
Library of Congress Number
GE42.R667 2005
2020. Philosopher gone wild: Rolston bio-photo-media 2020. 43 minutes. Online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/37821
Holmes Rolston's biography: Shenandoah Valley childhood. Education. Years in Southwest Virginia. Grand Canyon River run. Colorado State University, classroom. Interview, University of Georgia. Family and outdoors. Rolston-Rollin debate, 1989. Wild Rockies, including wolves. Travels, Africa, Asia including Nepal, and Antarctica. Science and Religion. Oakland University, Michigan, Gifford Lectures, Edinburgh, 1997-1998. Wilderness. Templeton Prize in Buckingham Palace, 2003. In the woods. Endowed Rolston Chairs, Davidson College, CSU. The Pasqueflower, 2008.
2013. Three Big Bangs: Matter-Energy, Life, Mind. Streaming video. Online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/89539
The Carter-Chalker Lectureship on Faith and Contemporary Issues, The College of Idaho, November 7, 2013.
Scientific natural history discovers "three big bangs," each marking a serendipitous singularity.
(1) At the primordial big bang, matter-energy appears, initially in simpler forms, but with the remarkable capacity to generate heavier elements, without which life would not be possible.
(2) Life explodes on Earth with DNA discovering, storing, and transferring information. Across a singular natural history, life persists in the midst of its perpetual perishing, generating and regenerating billions of species. These increase in biodiversity, with trajectories escalating biocomplexity.
(3) The human genius, a massive singularity, crosses a trans-genetic threshold, generating language and making possible cumulative transmissible cultures, radically novel in kind and in scale. Life becomes ideational; ideas pass from mind to mind. Ideas generate ideals.
The nature of matter-energy, the nature of genes and their genesis, invites those at the center of complex caring intelligence to wonder where they are, who they are, and what they ought to do. Human uniqueness on a wonderland Earth generates intense responsibilities. Is there sacred Logos in, with, and under a cybernetic system with such breakthrough creativity? Also on DVD disks in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress number: B818 .R665 2013
2008. Three Big Bangs: Matter-Energy, Life, Mind. Streaming video. 1 hour, 23 minutes. Online at:
Willard O. Eddy Lecture at Colorado State University, September 18, 2008. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number: B818 .R665 2008
2010. The Future of Environmental Ethics. Online, streaming video, Windows Media, 56 minutes. Lecture at The Institute for Learning and Teaching (TILT), Colorado State University, September 22, 2010. A Managed Earth and the End of Nature? Global Warming: Too Hot to Handle? Human Nature. Pleistocene Appetites? Sustainable Development vs. Sustainable Biosphere. Biodiversity: Good for us/ Good in itself. Earth Ethics. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
GE42 .R658 2010
2008. The Future of Environmental Ethics, Online, streaming video, Windows Media, 1 hour, 26 minutes. University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point, Thomas W. Overholt Lecture. November 20, 2008. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number
GE42 .R658 2008
2013. Rediscovering, Rethinking Green Fire, Online, streaming video, Windows Media, 49 minutes. Lecture at Utah Valley University, April 4, 2013. Aldo Leopold shot a wolf a hundred years ago, the most iconic wolf kill in conservation history. He recalled the "green fire" in her dying eyes, metaphor and symbol, and his "thinking like a mountain," when launching his land ethic, on a moral frontier. Leopold is reconsidered, searching for an Earth ethics for the new millennium, thinking like a planet. 1. The Shooting - Rediscovered and Confirmed. 2. Green Fire - Metaphor and Symbol. 3. Game Management - Predators and Prey. 4. Thinking Like a Mountain - Wolves and Ecosystems. 5. Land Ethic - Respect for Life, Landscape Integrity. 6. Beyond Green Fire - Thinking Like a Planet. Also DVD format, copies in Colorado State University Library, and in Rolston Library in Eddy Library, Philosophy Department, Colorado State University. A newspaper story about Rolston's trip to rediscover the site of the shooting can also be found here. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
GE42 .R355 2013
2009. Sustainable Development vs. Sustainable Biosphere, Online, streaming video, Windows Media, 30 minutes. American Association for the Advancement of Science, Chicago. February 14, 2009. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
QH540.5 .R653 2009
2007. Down to Earth: Persons in Nature. DVD format. Disk 1: 1 hour 15 minutes. Disk 2: 1 hour, 16 minutes.
Classroom lecture by Holmes Rolston, III, in PHIL 345, Environmental Ethics, December 4, 2007.
Down to Earth: Persons in Nature, Disk 1, online, streaming video, Windows Media.
Ethics living in place; Earth as home planet; Aristotle and humans as political animals, living in cities; humans as both citizens of cities and residences on landscapes; correcting Socrates (who thought that nature could not teach him anything); living on Western landscapes with "nature in your face": four priorities on the current world agenda (peace and war, population, development, environment); escalating population; escalating consumption (affluenza).
Down to Earth: Persons in Nature, Disk 2, online, streaming video, Windows Media.
Humans as earthling overseers; environmental ethics as respect for life; human biography as storied residence on Earth; test for appreciating a resident environment; three role models for living in nature: Arne Naess, Norwegian philosopher; John Muir; Aldo Leopold, founder of the land ethic. Leopold's experience of thinking like a mountain and seeing "green fire" in a dying wolf's eyes; Earth ethics and overview of the blue planet.
Library of Congress Number
GF21.R6673 2007 Disk 1 Disk 2
1997. Genetic Creativity: Diversity and Complexity in Natural History. DVD format. 1 hour.
Lecture 1 of the Gifford Lectures, University of Edinburgh, series 1997/1998. Lecture given November 10, 1997.
Library of Congress Number
QH426.R6573 1997
Genetic Creativity: Diversity and Complexity in Natural History, Online, streaming video, Windows Media
Lecture series published as: Genes, Genesis and God: Values and their Origins in Natural and Human History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
1997. Genes, Genesis and God. DVD format. 1 hour.
Lecture 10 of the Gifford Lectures, University of Edinburgh, series 1997/1998. Lecture given December 1, 1997.
Library of Congress Number
BJ1311.R652 1997
Genes, Genesis and God, Online, streaming video, Windows Media, 1 hour.
2012. Big Bang: Start Up! Set Up? (Three Big Questions). Lecture by Holmes Rolston, III, with commentary by Roger Culver and Sanford Kern. Recorded February 16, 2012. 1 hour, 10 minutes. Produced by Department of Philosophy, Colorado State University.
Elements essential to life are made in the stars. Some explode; their matter condensed as planets, on one of which life evolves What should we make of this? Dismiss the puzzle? It really isn't surprising that the universe has produced us. But those who want a fuller explanation will find it impressive to discover that what seem to be widely varied facts cannot vary widely if the universe is to generate matter, life, and mind Might the start up big bang might also be a set up for creative genesis. Does the astrophysics and microphysics shape our metaphysics? Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
B818 .R667 2012
2012. Life: Full House! Lonely Planet? (Three Big Questions). Lecture by Holmes Rolston, III, with commentary by Michael Antolin and John McKay. Recorded March 22, 2012. 1 hour, 13 minutes. Produced by the Department of Philosophy, Colorado State University.
Where once there were no species on Earth, there are today five to ten million. Information coded in DNA, a "cybernetic" molecule. makes possible a creative upflow of life struggling through turnover of species and resulting in more diverse and complex forms of life, producing a wonderland of biodiversity. Life is ever "conserved," biologists might say; life is perpetually "redeemed," theologians might say. Is such creative evolutionary natural history probable, improbably, lucky, random, ordered, disordered, inevitable? Is wonderland Earth a lonely planet? What of the human responsibility to respect life? Is life sacred? A gift? Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
B818 .R6675 2012
2012. Human Singularity. Mind. Spirit. (Three Big Questions). Lecture by Holmes Rolston, III, with commentary by Wayne Viney and Bryan Dik. Recorded April 26, 2012. Lecture, 44 minutes. Discusssison, 54 minutes. Produced by the Department of Philosophy, Colorado State University.
Humans on Earth are a singularity beyond animal achievements, considering genetics, neuroscience, moral, psychological, philosophical, and spiritual experience. This gives humans a unique dignity. Science has been discovering deep space, deep time, and pushing deep down into subatomic nature On astronomical scales, we are cosmic dwarfs. But another perspective is possible: If we ask where the "deep" thoughts about this "deep" nature are, they are right here. Such thoughts are scientific, they are also philosophical and religious. We alone can ask big questions. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
B818 .R6676 2012
2014. Why Wilderness? Rolston talk at the 2014 Mansfield Conference, "The Storied Past, The Troubled Future: The Imperative of Wilderness at 50 Years," held at the University of Montana, September 10-12. 46 minutes, with some Q&A.
1. Half a Century of Wilderness. 2. Urban, Rural, Wild - Three-Dimensional Persons. 3. Wilderness is for People!? 4. Wilderness as Social Construct? Mind? 5. Wilderness as Social Construct? Hand? 6. The World that Runs Itself. Montana, the mountain state, can set a national and global example of conserving and celebrating wilderness.
Library of Congress Number:
GE42.R65 2014
2012. Do General Principles Govern All Science? Aired on PBS, variously, 2012. 26 minutes.
On the program Closer to Truth, Robert Lawrence Kuhn interviews:
Geoffrey West, physicist, Santa Fe Institute, on complex adaptive systems
Martin Rees, astrophysics, Cambridge University, on complex systems resulting from simple laws.
Stuart Kauffman, theoretical biologist, Santa Fe Institute and University of Calgary,.on super-critical complex systems, molecular and economic.
Holmes Rolston, III, philosopher, Colorado State University, on three Big Bangs: matter-energy, life, human mind, genesis of cognitive complexity, revealing a Logos in creation. (Rolston interview starts at 15 minutes, 20 seconds.)
David Deutsch, physicist, Oxford University, on good explanations in general systems theory.
Among the conclusions: As we get closer to truth, everything seems more interconnected. God is consistent with these general principles, but not required for them. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
Q175.32.C65 K84 2012
2012. Why Science and Religion Think Differently. Aired on PBS, variously, 2012. 27 minutes.
On the program Closer to Truth, Robert Lawrence Kuhn interviews four theologians at Helsingør, Denmark, and an atheist in London.
Niels Henrik Gregersen, theologian, University of Copenhagen. Science is more analytical, religion is more synthetic, comprehensive. The two are not at war,. but religion cuts a wider path through all of human experience.
Holmes Rolston, III, philosopher, theologian, Colorado State University (Rolston interview starts at 6 minutes, 30 seconds). Science is good at empirical questions, but does not touch the deeper value questions. After four hundred years of science, the deeper value questions are as sharp and as painful as ever.
Christopher Southgate, theologian, University of Exeter. Science focuses on limited questions, but most aspects of life go beyond to questions of personal experience and transcendent truth, the answers to which are far more difficult.
Celia Deane-Drummond, theologian, Notre Dame University. The study of nature in science can point to God, but religion confronts ethical questions. The goal of the religious search is a transcendent God, who cannot be subject to the scientific analysis appropriate for the physical world.
Anthony A. C. Grayling, philosopher, atheist, New College of the Humanities, London. Science has demands for rationality and is powerfully self-correcting. Religion has faith and suppresses doubt.
Conclusions: Science cannot judge values and meaning, but it does not follow that the diverse religions can. The truth or falsity of religion must stand or fall on its own merits. Each should be assessed in its own light. The ultimate question is whether any transcendent reality exists beyond the reach of science. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
BL240.2 .K84 2012
2012-2014. What Kind of a World Did God Create? Online interview on Closer to Truth, Robert Lawrence Kuhn interviews Richard Swinburne, philosopher, Oxford University, John Hick, theologian, Claremont Graduate University, Holmes Rolston, Sarah Coakley, theologian, Cambridge University, Brian Leftow, philosopher, Oxford University, Alister McGrath, theologian, Oxford University, asking what kind of a world did God create.
2012. Cybernetic and Cruciform Nature. An event of interviews and lectures, honoring the seven living persons who have both given the Gifford Lectures and been awarded the Templeton Prize, held June 1, 2012, at the British Academy, London.. Interview 22 minutes, Lecture 22 minutes, total 44 minutes. Group photo.
Natural and cultural history on Earth is a cybernetic process, a creative generate-and-test process, resulting in our planetary wonderland of biodiversity. With the emergence of humans, endowed with unique cognitive faculties, including language and the transmission of ideas from mind to mind, this creative genesis occurs in novel and even more spectacular ways. Humans are the only species that reflects on where we are, who we are, and what we ought to do.
Cybernetics generates caring, increasingly in sentient life. This cybernetic process is also cruciform. Life is suffering through to something higher. Life has its logos, its logic, its history; life has its pathos. Life is in prolific and pathetic. The fertility is close-coupled with the struggle. Biologists find life perpetually "regenerated"; theologians find life perpetually "redeemed." Both in the divine Logos once incarnate in Palestine and in the life incarnate on Earth for millennia before that: "Light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it." Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
Q175.32.E85 R665 2012
2012. Concerns Concerning Biosciences, Human Nature, and Governing Science. Seminar, Governing Science: Technological Progress, Ethical Norms, and Democracy, held at Princeton University, Department of Politics, April 13-14, 2012. Rolston lecture, 45 minutes, April 13, 2012.
The biological sciences have developed dramatically in the last half century, raising concerns about their implications for human nature and behavior. While such research can and ought shape policy, policy equally should critique such research. Science, as much as any other human institution, needs its humanist critics--ethicists, philosophers, theologians, policymakers. Analysis of a half-dozen claims coming from biological sciences, to demonstrate that half-truths, if taken for the whole, can be both misleading and dangerous. Fortunately scientists are also good at being their own critics.
1. Selfish Genes. 2. Genetic destiny. 3. Pleistocene appetites. 4. Monkey's Mind. 5. Neuroscience: Bottom up? Top Down? . 6. Enlightening/escalating Self-interest. 7. Ideology: Reasoned Governing Behavior. Also on DVD disk in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
QH332 .R6675 2012
2009. "Holmes and Jane Rolston: Memories and Recollections." Holmes Rolston III (1932- ) and his wife, Jane Irving Wilson Rolston (1931- ) interviewed in their home, Fort Collins, Colorado, October 2009, by David Rolston. a relative. 2 DVD disks. In Rolston CSU Library archives, but not in general circulation. Also in Rolston Digital Library archives. Also online.
Disk 1. View online. View CSU Library Digital Archives
Holmes' childhood, Rockbridge Baths, Virginia
Jane's childhood, Richmond, Virginia
Holmes youth, Charlotte, NC
Davidson College and Union Theological Seminary
Holmes Graduate study, University of Edinburgh
Pastor, Walnut Grove and High Point Presbyterian Churches, Bristol, Virginia
Graduate study, Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh
Disk 2 View online. View CSU Library Digital Archives
Rolston, Professor of Philosophy, Colorado State University
University Distinguished Professor
Rolston's books and publications
Gifford Lectures, University of Edinburgh, 1997-1998
Templeton Prize, 2003
Intellectual Biography, Saving Creation, 2009
2011. StoryCorps Interview. Rolston interviewed by Douglas Yeager. Audio, 43 minutes. Listen.
Youth in the Shendandoah Valley of Virginia. The father of environmental ethics exploring new directions interpreting values in nature. Life has a logic, a capacity for creative genesis, and that opens up possibilities for religious interpretation. Early publications, rejected, later reprinted many times. Personal agenda, loving nature, turns out to be a global environmental crisis. Recollections of being awarded the Templeton Prize. and of giving the Gifford Lectures, Edinburgh. The importance of information, beyond matter and energy, in biology, coded in DNA, yet limits to genetic explanations
1992. Living with Nature. 1 hour.
Interview in Athens, Georgia, April 6, 1992.
Living with Nature, Online, streaming video, Windows Media.
1. Values in Nature
2. Following Nature
3. Nature and Culture
4. Aesthetics in Nature
5. Concept of the Sublime
6. Wilderness
7. Increasing Environmental Concern
8. Government and Business
9. Sustainability
10. Residence on Landscapes
11. Forests
12. Regulation
Also available on DVD in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
GE42.R6677 1992
2009. Does Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature Need to be Science-Based? Online, streaming video, Windows Media. Interview,
University of Helsinki, March 25, 2009. 20 minutes. Also available on DVD in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
GE42 .R653 2009
1989. Rollin-Rolston Debate on Environmental Ethics. Online, streaming video, 51 minutes. Windows Media, via Colorado State University.
51 minutes.
Bernard E. Rollin and Holmes Rolston, III, both in the CSU Department of Philosophy, debate environmental ethics. Rollin defends an animal welfare ethic and Rolston defends an ecocentric ethic. Moderated by David Crocker, CSU Department of Philosophy. Recorded by CSU Instructional Services on November 29, 1989. Also available on DVD in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
GE42 .R655 1989
1990. Dominion over Nature. DVD. 1 hour 6 minutes.
1. The Conquerors. Discussion of advertisement: "The Conquerors." Discussion of Pioneer plaque greeting others in space. Human conquest of space, spaceship Earth, dominion over Earth.
2. Models of Dominion: (1) Subjugation Earth Tyrant. (2) Commander Earth Pilot. (3) Domestication Earth Gardener. (4) Steward Earth Trustee. (5) Paternal Earth Father. (6) Prophets, Priests, Kings. (7) Redemption - Earth Redeemer.
3. Exploit, Maximize, Optimize
4. Multiple values versus Multiple Use
5. Managed/Endangered Planet. God-man-nature hierarchy, Time Magazine: Endangered Earth. Scientific American: Managing Planet Earth.
6. The meek inherit the Earth. Beatitude: "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." Using Earth justly and charitably.
Library of Congress Number
GE42.R6673 1990
1991. Incompleteness in Evolutionary History. DVD format. 47 minutes.
Evolution as a random walk? Evolution of biodiversity and biocomplexity. Evolutionary development generating more out of less. Life as negentropy. Information discovered and stored in DNA.
Origin of life. Origin of humans. Selection of the advanced. Evolutionary history as a genetically-based information search. Earth as a prolific, pro-life system, a creativity complementary to religious accounts of creation.
Based on Chapter 3 of Holmes Rolston, III, Science and Religion: A Critical Survey. New York: Random House, 1987, and various reprints.
Library of Congress Number
B818.R66 1991
1993. Order and Disorder in Nature, Science, and Religion. DVD format. 1 hour, 10 minutes.
Plenary Lecture at Fourth Annual Science, Technology, and Religious Ideas Conference, Institute of Liberal Studies, Kentucky State University, April 12, 1993
1. Order in Physics
2. Disorder in Physics
3. Disorder in Biology
4. Order in Biology
5. Order and Disorder in Science
6. Order and Disorder in Religion
Questions and Answers.
Lecture published as: "Order and Disorder in Nature, Science, and Religion." Pages 1-14 in George W. Shields and Mark Shale, eds., Science, Technology and Religious Ideas. Proceedings of the Institute for Liberal Studies, vol. 4. Frankfort, KY: Institute for Liberal Studies, Kentucky State University, 1993.
Library of Congress Number
Q175.R544 1993
1998. "Let there be light": Science, Theology, and Aesthetic Experience of Nature, Carl Howie Lectures, Howie Center for Science, Art, and Theology, Union Theological Seminary, Richmond, Virginia. Three lectures:
Lecture 1. Planet Gone Wild. October 9, 1998. 39 minutes.
"The Earth produces of itself." Mark 4.28
1. Planetary Aesthetics: Earth from Space
2. The Wild Planet: Biological Beauty
3. Wildlands and Wonder
4. The Planet with Promise
Lecture 2. Animals: Beasts Present in Flesh and Blood. October 9. 1998. 52 minutes.
"The young lions roar for their prey, seeking their food from God." Psalm 104.21
1. Born Wild and Free
2. Beauty in Motion
3. Predators and Prey
4. Humans: Aesthetic Animals
Lecture 3. Life: Perpetually Perishing, Perpetually Regenerated. October 10, 1998. 1 hour, 6 minutes
"...green pastures ... through the valley of the shadow of death" Psalm 23
1. The Struggle for Survival
2. The Evolution of Pain
3. Regeneration and Redemption
4. A Cruciform Creation
Library of Congress Number
BH301.N3
R657 1998
pt. 1 pt. 2 pt. 3
1999. Genes, Genesis and God. DVD format. 1 hour.
Keynote address at Philadelphia Center for Religion and Science, April 19, 1999.
The genesis of life on Earth is keyed to genes, located in organisms in evolutionary ecosystems. Molecular genetics is integrated into developing natural history, with spectacular levels of achievement and power, resulting in the myriad values of nature and culture. But there is remarkable scientific and philosophical debate about order and disorder, randomness and probability, the inevitable and the contingent, actualities and possibilities, as these result in increasing diversity and complexity over the evolutionary epic.
The DNA in organisms is vital sets of information molecules, dramatically perpetuated and elaborated across species lines, stimulated by Earth's dynamic environments. This biological information originating over time displays a cumulative creativity that, although described by science, is nowhere an implication of biological theory.
Such genesis invites an account of God as the Ground of Information.
Library of Congress Number
BJ1311.R652 1999
2004. The Science and Religion Dialogue: Why It Matters. 1 hour, 30 minutes. Rolston lecture only, CSU digital archives.
Public event sponsored by the International Society for Science and Religion, Sheraton Boston Hotel, August 19, 2004. Three Templeton Prize Laureates in an exchange across the common borders of science and theology.
(1) George F. R. Ellis, 2004 Templeton laureate, theoretical cosmologist
(2) Holmes Rolston, III, philosopher, Colorado State University.
(3) John C. Polkinghorne, Mathematical Physicist, Cambridge University, and Anglican priest.
Moderated by Owen Gingerich, Astronomy, Harvard University. Question and answer session at the end.
Also available on DVD in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number
BL241.E55 2004
Archived online, Rolston lecture only
Promised Land and Planet with Promise. 22 minutes. Chapel talk given by Holmes Rolston III at Eastern Mennonite University, Harrisonburg, Virginia, October 23, 2013. Anciently Palestine was a promised land. Landscapes east and west, north and south, on six continents have proved homelands that peoples can come to cherish and on which they can flourish. My forebears in the Shenandoah Valley, coming from Scotland, loved gospel and landscape, sometimes wondering which love took priority. When this wonderland Earth is seen as divine gift, grace, that vision makes more alarming that Earth is also a planet in peril. "A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever." That ancient certainty needs now to become an urgent future hope. Today and for the centuries hence, the call is to see Earth as a planet with promise. Also available as audio CD in CSU Library, general circulation.
Library of Congress Number:
BT695.5 .R667 2013
Messaging Morality: Ethics across the Cosmos. Rolston lecture at a SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) workshop, February 14, 2015, Mountain View, California. 52 minutes. When we consider active SETI, or METI, transmitting messages that might be received by extraterrestrial intelligence, what might we say about human morality? Messages will more likely be understood if kept short and basic. Seek peace! Be fair! Tell the truth! Keep promises! Taking a longer view, considering transit millennia, we should transmit truths that are both profound and permanently true.
2006. Challenges in Environmental Ethics. DVD format. 1 hour.
Richard J. Burke Lecture, Oakland University, Rochester, MI. March 14, 2006.
Library of Congress Number.
GE42.R667 2006
2006. Genes, Genesis, and God. DVD format. 1 hour.
Richard J. Burke Lecture, Oakland University, Rochester, MI. March 13, 2006.
The scientific and philosophical debate about order and disorder, randomness and probability, actualities and possibilities, as they result in increasing diversity and complexity over the evolutionary epic.
Library of Congress Number
BJ1311.R652 2006
2006. Generating Life: Six Looming Questions in Evolutionary Biology. DVD format. 1 hour.
University of Montana, Missoula, MT. July 28, 2006. Sponsored by the Center for Ethics, University of Montana, Missoula, MT.
Boxed with panel discussion, Science, Religion, and the Environment, held on July 27, 2006.
Library of Congress Number
GE42.R6675 2006 disk 1-2
2006. Generating Life on Earth: Six Looming Questions. DVD format. 1 hour.
Lecture at The Ohio State University, November 2, 2006.
1. Creating information.
2. Inevitable vs. contingent creativity.
3. Possibilities: Omnipresent vs. emerging.
4. Co-option generating novel possibilities.
5. Anthropic biology?
6. Human uniqueness: Intelligent spirit.
Library of Congress Number.
GE42.R66752 2006
A version of this lecture is published as:
"Generating Life on Earth: Five Looming Questions." Pages 195-223 in F. LeRon Schults, ed. The Evolution of Rationality. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2006.
An abbreviated earlier version (which appeared in print later) is:
"Originating Life: Six Big Questions." With questions and commentary. Pages 13-21
in Connie Bertka, Nancy Roth, and Matthew Shindell, eds., Workshop Report: Philosophical, Ethical, and Theological Implications of Astrobiology. Washington, DC: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 2007.
Rolston Publications in Science and Religion
Books
Columbia University Press, 2011
ISBN 978-0-231-15639-4
Science and Religion: A Critical Survey
Republished by Templeton Foundation Press, 2006
ISBN 1-59947-099-3 (10 digit number)
ISBN 978-1-59947-099-3 (13 digit number, starting 2007)
First published, text edition, Random House, 1987
ISBN 0-394-36327-2
Hardcover, Temple University Press, 1987
ISBN 0-87722-437-4
Text edition, McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1989
ISBN 0-07-554211-0
Republished 1997:
Harcourt Brace College Publishers
ISBN 0-15-505797-9
"Human Uniqueness," new introduction 2006 edition. Download/print in PDF format.
Chapter 1. Methods in Scientific and Religious Inquiry. Download/print in PDF format.
Chapter 7. Nature, History, and God. Download/print in PDF format.
"Scientific and Religious Logic" from Chapter 1 (pp. 22-31) reprinted in Michael Peterson, William Hasker, Bruce Reichenbach, and David Basinger, eds., Philosophy of Religion: Selected Readings. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.
Cambridge University Press, 1999. .
Gifford Lectures, University of Edinburgh, 1997-1998
Selected Publications in Science and Religion
"Care on Earth: Generating Informed Concern," in Paul Davies and Niels Henrik Gregersen, eds., Information and the Nature of Reality: From Physics to Metaphysics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pages. 204-245. Download/print in PDF format.
"Creative Genesis: Escalating Naturalism and Beyond," Philosophy, Theology ad the Sciences (PTSc) 1(2014):9-23. This is the inaugural issue of this journal, a European-based hournal of religion and science, in which Rolston was asked to write the lead paper. Download/print in PDF format.
"The Science and Religion Dialogue - Why it Matters," in Fraser Watts and Kevin Dutton, eds., Why the Science and Religion Dialogue Matters: Voices from the International Society for Science and Religion (Philadelphia: Templeton Foundation Press, 2006), pages 33-37. Address at Boston: International Society for Science and Religion, 2004. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Does Nature Need To Be Redeemed?" Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 29(1994):205-229. Article awarded John Templeton Foundation award for best scholarly papers in religion, 1994. Also in Horizons in Biblical Theology 14(no. 2, 1993):143-172. Download/print in PDF format.
Reprinted in Charles Taliaferro and Paul J. Griffiths, eds., Philosophy of Religion: An Anthology (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003), pages 530-543.
"Science and Christianity," in Donald W. Musser and Joseph L. Price, eds., New and Enlarged Handbook of Christian Theology (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2003), pages 450-454. Download/print in PDF format. Earlier article in: The New Handbook of Christian Theology (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1992), pages 430-432.
"Genes, Brains, Minds: The Human Complex," in Kelly Bulkeley, ed., Soul, Psyche, Brain: New Directions in the Study of Religion and Brain-Mind Science (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), pages 10-35. Download/print in PDF format.
"Religion in an Age of Science; Metaphysics in an Age of History," commissioned longer critical review of Ian Barbour, Religion in an Age of Science: The Gifford Lectures, vol. 1 (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1990) in Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 27(1992):65-87.
"Science, Religion, and the Future." Pages 61-82 in W. Mark Richardson and Wesley J. Wildman, eds., Religion and Science: History, Method, Dialogue (London: Routledge, 1996). Download/print in PDF format.
"In the Zone of Complexity: Science and the Sacred," Parabola 30 (no. 1, 2005):46-53. Thirtieth anniversary issue. Download/print in PDF format.
"The Good Samaritan and his Genes." Pages 238-252 in Philip Clayton and Jeffrey Schloss, eds., Evolution and Ethics: Human Morality in Biological and Religious Perspective (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2004). Download/Print in PDF format.
"Sociobiology and Evolutionary Psychology: An Overview." Pages 8473-8477 (vol. 12) in Lindsay Jones, editor-in-chief, The Encyclopedia of Religion, Second Edition (Farmington Hills, MI: Macmillan Reference USA, Thomson/Gale, 2005). Download/Print in PDF format.
"Scientific Inquiry" (Secular Scientific Spirituality). Pages 387-413 in Peter H. Van Ness, ed., Spirituality and the Secular Quest (New York: Crossroad Publishing Co., 1996). Volume 22 of World Spirituality: An Encyclopedic History of the Religious Quest. Download/print in PDF format.
"Evolutionary History and Divine Presence," Theology Today (Princeton) 55(1998):415-434. Download/print in PFD format.
"Disvalues in Nature." The Monist 75(1992):250-278. Reprinted in Andrew Brennan, ed., The Ethics of the Environment (Aldershot, Hampshire, UK: Dartmouth Publishing Co., 1995), pages 87-115. Download/print in PDF format.
"Naturalizing and Systematizing Evil." Pages 67-86 in Willem B. Drees, ed., Is Nature Ever Evil? Religion, Science and Value (London: Routledge, 2003). Download/print in PDF format.
"Kenosis and Nature." Pages 43-65 in John Polkinghorne, ed., The Work of Love: Creation as Kenosis. (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., and London: SPCK). Download/print in PDF format.
"Order and Disorder in Nature, Science, and Religion." Pages 1-14 in George W. Shields and Mark Shale, eds., Science, Technology and Religious Ideas: Proceedings of the Institute for Liberal Studies, vol. 4 (Frankfort, KY: Institute for Liberal Studies, Kentucky State University, 1993). Keynote address at Institute for Liberal Studies, Conference on Science, Technology, and Religious Ideas, Kentucky State University, April 2-3, 1993. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Can Science Dispense with Religion?" Pages 315-326 in Mehdi Golshani, ed., Can Science Dispense with Religion?, 3rd ed. (Tehran, Iran: Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies (IHCS), 2004).
"Inevitable Humans: Simon Conway Morris's Evolutionary Paleontology," Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 40 (2005):221-229. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Science." Pages 1494-1497 (Volume 2) in Bron R. Taylor, editor-in-chief, The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature. London and New York: Thoemmes Continuum Publishers, 2005.
"Aesthetics of Nature and the Sacred." Pages 18-21 (Volume 1) in Bron R. Taylor, editor-in-chief, The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature. London and New York: Thoemmes Continuum Publishers, 2005.
"Planetary Spiritual (In)formation." Pages 330-336 in Charles L. Harper, Jr., ed., Spiritual Information. Philadelphia: Templeton Foundation Press, 2006. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Environmental Ethics and Religion/Science." Pages 908-928 in Philip Clayton and Zachary Simpson, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Science (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006). Download/Print in PDF format.
"Science and Religion in the Face of the Environmental Crisis." Pages 376-397 in Roger S. Gottlieb, ed., The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Ecology. (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006). Download/Print in PDF format.
"Environmental Ethics: Some Challenges for Christians." In Harlan Beckley, ed., The Annual: Society of Christian Ethics (Washington: Georgetown University Press, 1993), pages 163-186. Reprinted in Church and Society, July/August 1996, pages 37-50. Reprinted in The Egg: An Eco-Justice Quarterly (Environmental Justice Working Group of the National Council of Churches) vol. 13, no. 3 (summer 1993):6-10, 18. Keynote address at the Society of Christian Ethics, Annual National Conference, Savannah, GA, January 8-10, 1993. Download/print in PDF format.
"Dominion," entry in Berkshire Encyclopedia of Sustainability, Volume 1, The Spirit of Sustainability, ed. Willis Jenkins (Great Barrington, Mass: Berkshire Publishing Group, 2010), pp.110-111. Download/print in PDF format.
"Science, Religion, and Ecology," entry in Berkshire Encyclopedia of Sustainability, Volume 1, The Spirit of Sustainability, ed. Willis Jenkins. Great Barrington, Mass: Berkshire Publishing Group, 2010), pp. 353-356. Download/print in PDF format.
"The Bible and Ecology," Interpretation: Journal of Bible and Theology 50(1996):16-26. Download/print in PDF format. Also translated into Japanese.
Translated into Chinese in Huan-Jing Luun-Li-Shei Ru-Men (Introduction to Environmental Ethics), ed. Tsu-Mei Chen (Taipei: Taiwan Ecological Stewardship Association, 2007), pages 208-213. ISBN 978-986-84047-0-0. Download/print in PDF format.
"Preaching on the Environment," JP Journal for Preachers 23 (no. 4, 2000):25-32. Download/print in PDF format.
Translated into Chinese, "Huan-Ching Chiang-Chang," in Huan-Jing Luun-Li-Shei Ru-Men (Introduction to Environmental Ethics), ed. Tsu-Mei Chen (Taipei: Taiwan Ecological Stewardship Association, 2007), pages 246-261. ISBN 978-986-84047-0-0. Download/print in PDF format.
"Wildlife and Wildlands: A Christian Perspective." Pages 122-143 in Dieter T. Hessel, ed., After Nature's Revolt: Eco-Justice and Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress Press 1992. Download/print in PDF format.
Reprinted in part as "Christians, Wildlife, Wildlands," in Earth Letter, January 2001, pp. 4-6. (Earth Ministry, 1305 NE 47th St., Seattle, WA 98105).
Translated into Chinese in Dieter T. Hessel, ed., Shengtai gongyi: Dui dadi fanpuide xinyang fanxing (Taiwan: Diqiuri Chubanshe, 1997), pp. 233-265. Translated by Text Committee of the Taiwan Ecological Theology Center. ISBN 0-8006-2532-3. Download/print in PDF format.
"Biodiversity and Spirit," Science and Spirit 11(no. 4, November/December 2000):34. Epilogue, one-page essay in a theme issue on Science, Religion, and the Stewardship of Earth. Download/print in PDF format.
"Creation: God and Endangered Species." In Ke Chung Kim and Robert D. Weaver, eds., Biodiversity and Landscape (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pages 47-60. Also published in Lawrence S. Hamilton, ed., Ethics, Religion and Biodiversity (Cambridge, England: The White Horse Press, 1993), pages 40-64. Download/Print in PDF format.
Electronically reprinted on website, Ecospherics International, Inc., Lanark, Ontario, Canada. http://www.ecospherics.net. Ted Mosquin, editor.
"Caring for Nature: From Fact to Value, from Respect to Reverence," Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 39(no. 2, 2004):277-302. Invited Templeton Lecture, American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, November 23, 2003. Download/Print in PDF format. Lecture at St. Edmunds College, Cambridge, March 9, 2005. Online with lecture and discussion (broadband connection).
Translated into Chinese, "Kan-Kuo Tsu-Jan: Tsung Shih-Shih tao Chia-Chih, Tsung Tsun-Ching tao Tsun-Tsung," in Huan-Jing Luun-Li-SheiRu-Men (Introduction to Environmental Ethics), ed. Tsu-Mei Chen (Taipei: Taiwan Ecological Stewardship Association, 2007), pages 214-244. ISBN 978-986-84047-0-0. Download/Print in PDF format.
Abridged and revised in: "Caring for Nature: From Respect to Reverence," Discerning a Moral Environmental Ethic, The Maryville Symposium: Conversations on Faith and the Liberal Arts (Maryville College, Maryville, Tennessee), volume 2, 2008, pages 5-25.
"Caring for Nature: What Science and Economics Can't Teach Us but Religion Can," Environmental Values 15(2006):307-313. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Celestial Aesthetics: Over Our Heads and/or in Our Heads," Theology and Science 9(2011):273-285. Address at the 7th International Conference on Environmental Aesthetics, University of Joensuu, at the Valamo Monastery, Heinävesi, Finland, March 2009. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Environment" (Theism and Environment). Pages 541-552 in Charles Taliaferro, Victoria S. Harrison, and Stewart Goetz, eds., The Routledge Companion to Theism (London: Routledge, 2013). Download/Print in PDF format.
"Generating Life on Earth: Five Looming Questions." Pages 197-225 in F. LeRon Shultz, ed., The Evolution of Rationality. (Grand Rapids: MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2006). Download/Print in PDF format.
"Science and Technology in Light of Religion." Pages 33-38 in Heidi A. Campbell and Heather Looy, eds., A Science and Religion Primer. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009). Download/Print in PDF Format.
"Creation and Resurrection." JP Journal for Preachers 32(no. 3, 2009):25-32. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Preaching on the Wonder of Creation." JP Journal for Preachers 34(no. 4, 2011):39-46. Download/Print in PDF format.
"The Bond between Nature, Faith." Times Union, Albany, New York. Saturday, April 4, 2009, p. B3. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Saving Creation: Faith Shaping Environmental Policy." Harvard Law and Policy Review 4(2010):121-148. Download/Print in PDF Format.
"Suffering through to Something Higher." Pages 248-258 in James W. Haag, Gregory R. Peterson, and Michael L. Spezio, eds., The Routledge Companion to Religion and Science (London: Routledge, 2012).
Review of Alister McGrath, The Open Secret: A New Vision for Natural Theology (Oxford: Blackwell, 2008). In Conversations in Religion and Theology 7(no. 2, 2009):194-200, and McGrath response, "On Secrets, Lilies, and Daisies," pp. 200-206. Download/Print Rolston review in PDF format.
Review of Martin A. Nowak, SuperCooperators: Altruism, Evolution, and Why We Need Each Other to Succeed. New York: Free Press, 2011). Download/Print Rolston review in PDF format.
"Science Education and Moral Education." Zygon 23(1988):347-355. Download/Print in PDF format.
"Community: Ecological and Ecumenical." The Iliff Review 30(1973):3-14. (Iliff Theological Seminary, Denver). Download/Print in PDF format.
"The Challenge of the New Millennium. Holmes Rolston III Asks Whether Reasoned Behavior [Governing Science] Is Possible in the Midst of Self-Seeking Ideologies and Ancient Appetites," TPM The Philosophers' Magazine (London: Royal Institute of Philosophy), Issue 59, 4th Quarter 2012, pp. 30-37. Download/print in PDF format.
"Unlimited Love and its Limits." Pages 261-264 in Stephen G. Post, compiler, Is Ultimate Reality Unlimited Love? (West Consohocken, PA: Templeton Press, 2014). Download/print in PDF format.
"Consciousness, Environmental Ethics and Science-Religion Dialogue." Rolston interviewed by T. D. Singh and J. N. Srivastava, on the occasion of his winning the Templeton Prize (2003). In Savijñānam (Journal of the Bhaktivedanta Institute), theme issue: Scientific Exploration for a Spiritual Paradigm, vol. 8 (2013)1-18 (Calcutta, India). Download/print in PDF format.
"Messaging Morality: Ethics across the Cosmos." Rolston lecture at a SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) workshop, February 14, 2015, Mountain View, California. 52 minutes. When we consider active SETI, or METI, transmitting messages that might be received by extraterrestrial intelligence, what might we say about human morality? Messages will more likely be understood if kept short and basic. Seek peace! Be fair! Tell the truth! Keep promises! Taking a longer view, considering transit millennia, we should transmit truths that are both profound and permanently true. Online at: http://hdl.handle.net/10217/89538 .
Research Conference
The following papers appear in an issue of the Center for Theology and Natural Sciences Bulletin, vol. 11, no. 2, the proceedings of a research conference devoted to Rolston's work at the Center for Theology and Natural Sciences, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, CA, February 8-16, 1991. Download/print in PDF format.
"Respect for Life: Christians, Creation, and Environmental Ethics," pp. 1-8.
"Genes, Genesis, and God in Natural and Human History," pp. 9-23.
Proceedings papers, commentaries in analysis of Rolston's published work and conference papers:
(the five commentaries following):
Robert T. Schimke, "Reflections from a Molecular Biologist," pp. 24-26.
Walter R. Hearn, "Science, Selves, and Stories," pp. 26-31.
Carol J. Tabler, "Value Vocabulary in Biology and Theology," pp. 32-33.
Ted Peters, "Beyond the Genes: Epigenesis and God, pp. 34-35.
Margaret R. McLean, "A Moral World `Red in Tooth and Claw'," pp. 36-38.
Anthology
Biology, Ethics, and the Origins of Life. Boston: Jones and Bartlett, 1995. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Co., purchased rights, 1997). Edited anthology from Conference on Biology, Ethics, and the Origins of Life, held at Colorado State University, September 1991. Contributors: Thomas R. Cech, Lynn Margulis and Dorion Sagan, Niles Eldredge, Michael Ruse, Francisco J. Ayala, Langdon Gilkey, Charles Birch.
Other
"Responsible Man in Reformed Theology" Scottish Journal of Theology 23(1970):129-156. Download/Print in PDF format.