In hmolscience, James Francis Salmon (c.1934-) is an American physical chemist, mechanical engineer, and reverend noted for a number of publications surrounding the work of Pierre Teilhard, admixtured with the works of Ilya Prigogine, Alfred Whitehead, Harold Morowitz, among others, in a general effort to supplant reductionism with Christian-infused emergence, so to meld religion into science, via ontic opening argument. [1]
Teilhard
In 1981, having been inspired by the writings of French thinker Pierre Teilhard, Salmon founded the annual Cosmos and Creation Conference at Loyola University, directing the conference until his retirement in 2010, with the overt focus on promoting a Christian interpretation of theology of creation in an evolutionary world or evolving universe as a whole. (Ѻ)
In 2009, Salmon, in his “Emergence in Evolution”, citing Teilhard on human molecules, and Robert Laughlin on emergence, stated the following ideology: [3]
“It eliminates the dualism that plagued science and philosophy since Descartes' general metaphysical ... irreversible chemical phenomena could very will make it a ‘perennial’ philosophical discourse for ... No other substance but this could produce the human molecule.”
The article lists the key words: emergence, matter, chemical self-organization, thermodynamics, process metaphysics, Whitehead, and Teilhard, which are but cherry picked toolism playthings of the ontic opening theorist.
Education
Salmon completed his BS in mechanical engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology, his MA in philosophy at Boston College, and his PhD in physical chemistry in 1961 with a dissertation on “Some properties of tetramethyl-disiloxydialuminum and interaction of boron phosphide diiodide with ammonia and ethylamine” at the University of Pennsylvania. Salmon studied theology at Woodstock College, thereafter becoming an ordained priest. [2] Since at least 2002 to 2014, Salmon has been a professor of chemistry and theology at Loyola University, Maryland. (Ѻ) (Ѻ)
References
1. (a) Salmon, James F. (1987). Teilhard and Prigogine. Publisher.
(b) Salmon, James F. (2009). “Emergence in Evolution” (abs), Foundations of Chemistry, 11(1):21-32.
(c) Salmon, James F. (2005). “Teilhard’s Law of Complexity-Consciousness” (abs), Revista Portuguesa de Filosofia, T. 61, Fasc. 1, Espaço - Tempo - Evolução: Albert Einstein e Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (Jan-Mar):185-202.
2. James F. Salmon (about) – NowYouKnowMedia.com.
3. Salmon, James F. (2009). “Emergence in Evolution” (abs), Foundations of Chemistry, 11(1):21-32.
External links
● Salmon, James F. – WorldCat Identities.
