This collection of articles originated from papers presented at the Human Distinctiveness: Wisdom’s Deep Evolution conference at the Notre Dame London Global Gateway in July 2017. The conference was the culmination of the transdisciplinary Evolution of Wisdom research project supported by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation and led by Celia Deane-Drummond and Agustín Fuentes at the University of Notre Dame. Transdisciplinary work of this kind requires humility, curiosity, and a certain measure of risk, and we were fortunate to be able to work with a dedicated and adventurous team of scholars, including Marcus Baynes-Rock, Dylan Belton, Angela Carpenter, Stewart Clem, Julia Feder, Craig Iffland, Chelsea King, Marc Kissel, and Adam M. Willows.
Funding for the conference was made possible by grants from the John Templeton Foundation and from the Notre Dame Institute for Scholarship in the Liberal Arts, College of Arts and Letters. We have many people to thank for the organization of this event, including Becky Artinian-Kaiser, Katie Rutledge, and Elizabeth Kuhn, and for the staff at the Notre Dame London Gateway for creating such a hospitable environment for the conference. Key speakers at the conference included Fiona Coward (Bournemouth University), Jennifer French (University College London), Niels Gregersen (University of Copenhagen), Tim Ingold (University of Aberdeen), Maureen Junker-Kenny (Trinity College Dublin), Jeremy Kendal (Durham University), Karen Kilby (Durham University), J. Wentzel van Huyssteen (Princeton Theological Seminary and University of Stellenbosch), and Aku Visala (University of Helsinki), as well as members of the project team.
This is the first ebook project of the Center for Theology, Science, and Human Flourishing, and we gratefully acknowledge Laura Donnelly who cheerfully guided the process, worked on the technical aspects of formatting and website integration, and performed many of the unseen tasks necessary for bringing a volume like this to production. Our many thanks also to Catherine Osbourne for her careful attention to detail in editing the final draft.
