Dr Andrew Davison

Dr Davison has been the Starbridge Senior Lecturer in Theology and Natural Sciences since 2014. Before he moved into theology he was a scientist, and he holds undergraduate degrees and doctorates in both natural science and theology. Before his current appointment, Andrew taught Christian doctrine at Oxford and Cambridge. He is a fellow of Corpus Christi College, where is he also Dean of Chapel, having been ordained in 2003.

From 2015-21 held the position of Canon Philospher at St Albans Cathedral, the first such position in the Church of England. Since 2021, he has been Canon Emeritus. He has been a fellow of Corpus Christi College since 2014, and Dean of Chapel since 2019. He is news editor for the journal Theology and Science, and editor of the Cambridge University Press series Cambridge Elements in Christianity and Science. He is a regular contributor to Church Times and the Times Literary Supplement.

Education

BA in Chemistry with Biochemistry and Biophysics (Oxford, 1996; MA in 1999)

DPhil in Biochemistry (Oxford, 2000)

BA in Theology and Religious Studies (Cambridge, 2002; MA in 2009)

PhD in Theology (Cambridge, 2013)

Research Interests

Dr Davison works at the intersection of theology, science and philosophy. His recent work has addressed astrobiology, inter-species cooperation (or mutualism) in biology, and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis. He is also know for his work on Thomism and Christian Platonism.

In the 2016-17 academic year, he was a fellow at the Center of Theological Inquiry in Princeton, New Jersey, on a NASA-sponsored programme to consider the implications for human society and self-understanding of life elsewhere in the universe. His monograph on the significance of 'exobiology' for the main aspects of the Christian faith will be published in 2021.

His monograph Participation in God: A Study in Christian Doctrine and Metaphysics (Cambridge University Press, 2019) explores the idea of participation – sharing in, or sharing from – as a structuring principle in Christian thought.

Dr Davison is open to supervising doctoral research in Christian theology as it bears upon the natural sciences, or other areas of interest.

Key Publications

Journal Articles

‘Machine Learning and Theological Traditions of Analogy’. Modern Theology 37, no. 2 (April 2021): 254–74.

‘All Creatures That on Earth Do Make a Dwelling: Ecological Niche Construction and the Ubiquity of Creaturely Making’. Philosophy, Theology and the Sciences 7, no. 2 (2020): 181–204.

‘Christian Doctrine and Biological Mutualism: Some Explorations in Systematic and Philosophical Theology’, Theology and Science, 17.3. June 2020.

‘Biological Mutualism: A Scientific Survey’, Theology and Science, 17.3. June 2020.

'Christian Systematic Theology and Life Elsewhere in the Universe: A Study in Suitability'. Theology and Science, 16.4. https://doi.org/10.1080/14746700.2018.1525224.

‘"He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change", but "who knows how?": Evolution and Divine Exemplarity.' Nova et Vetera, 16.4. 2018.

‘"Not to escape the world but to join it": responding to climate change with imagination not fantasy'. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, 375. 2017. (20160365) https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2016.0365.

Edited Editions of Journals

Philosophy, Theology and the Sciences 7. 2 (2020) - on theology, philosophy and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis

Theology and Science, 17.3 (2020) - on theology and biological mutualism

Chapters

‘Science and Christian Platonism’, with Jacob Holsinger Sherman, in Christian Platonism: A History, edited by Alexander Hampton and John P. Kenney. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020.

'Scientific Cosmology as Creation ex Nihilo Considered "from the Inside"'. In Creatio ex nihilo: Origins and Contemporary Significance, edited by Markus Bockmuehl and Gary Anderson. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2017.