Michael Burdett

Academic Summary

DPhil, Theology, Regents Park College, University of Oxford, 2013
MPhil, Theology (Modern Doctrine), Regents Park College, University of Oxford, 2009
BS, Civil Engineering (Structural and Hydrology), California State University, Fullerton, 2007
BA, Math/Physics, Azusa Pacific University, 2007
BA, Theology, Azusa Pacific University, 2004

Dr Michael Burdett is Assistant Professor of Christian Theology at the University of Nottingham and a Member of the Faculty of Theology and Religion, University of Oxford. Before becoming an academic, Michael worked in the aerospace and robotics industries for several years working with a firm that had contracts with NASA and JPL. He holds degrees in engineering, physics, and theology and has been given academic and professional awards in each field. His academic interests lie at the intersection of science and technology, theology and philosophy. He has published and presented internationally on continental philosophy, transhumanism, the technological society and Christian theology. He has lead several grants including “Co-creating Ourselves?: Deification and Creaturehood in an Age of Biotechnological Enhancement” (JTF), “Bridging the Two Cultures of Science and Humanities” (TRT and Blankemeyer) and “Christian Flourishing in a Technological World” (Issachar).

Research Interests

Christian doctrine (creation, eschatology and theological anthropology)
Theological ethics (political theology and bioethics)
Science and technology studies (philosophy of science and philosophy of technology)
Philosophy of religion (phenomenology and atheism/secularism)
Evolutionary theory
Aesthetics and the imagination

Affiliations

Scholarship and Christianity in Oxford, Wycliffe Hall (Oxford)
Member of the Faculty of Theology and Religion (Oxford)
Fellow of the International Society for Science and Religion
Series Editor for Routledge Science and Religion Series

Publications

Monographs and edited volumes

Eschatology and the Technological Future. Routledge, 2015.
Technology and the Rise of Transhumanism: Beyond Genetic Engineering. Grove, 2014.
Finding Ourselves After Darwin: Conversations about the Image of God, Original Sin, and the Problem of Evil, assoc. ed., Baker Academic, 2018.

Articles

“Incarnation, Posthumanism and Performative Anthropology: The Body of Technology and the Body of Christ” Christian Bioethics, Forthcoming 2019
“Human Dignity in a Biotechnological Age: the Image of God, Human Enhancement and Technological Transformation” in Human Dignity and the History of Western Humanism, ed. Loughlin, Bloomsbury, Forthcoming 2019
“Creaturehood and Deification as Anchors for an Ethics of Gene Editing” In Human Flourishing in an Age of Gene Editing, eds. Parens and Johnston, Oxford University Press, 2018
“Technology and Information” In The Blackwell Companion to Political Theology, 2^nd ed., eds. Scott and Cavanaugh, Blackwell, 2018.
“A Moral Theology of Technological Failure” In Theologies of Failure, ed. Sirvent, Palgrave Macmillan, 2018.
“Past, Present and Future: Thoughts on Science and Religion from the Next Generation” In Forty Years of Science and Religion: Looking Back and Looking Forward, eds. Hickman and Spurway, Cambridge Scholars, 2016.
“The Extended Evolutionary Synthesis: New Conversations and Theological Questions at the Frontiers of Modern Science” God and Nature, Winter 2016.
“The Image of God and Human Uniqueness: Challenges from the Biological and Information Sciences” The Expository Times 127, no. 1 (2015): 3-10.
“The Religion of Technology: Transhumanism and the Myth of Progress” In Religion and Transhumanism: The Unknown Future of Human Enhancement, eds. Mercer and Trothen, Praeger, 2014.
“Atheism 3.0: From New Atheism to Secular Transhumanism” The Marginalia Review of Books, Oct 2013
“Teilhard de Chardin: From Nature to Supernature” In Darwinism and Natural Theology: Evolving Perspectives, ed. Robinson, Cambridge Scholars, 2012.
“Contextualising a Christian Perspective on Transcendence and Human Enhancement: Francis Bacon, N.F. Fedorov and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin” In Transhumanism and Transcendence: Christian Hope in an Age of Technological Enhancement, ed. Cole-Turner, Georgetown, 2011. “Assessing the Field of Science and Religion: Advice From the Next Generation” Zygon 52, no. 3 (2017): 747-763.
“A Theological Cartography of Cultural Evolution” with CM Hays, Theology and Science, 15, no. 4 (2017): 473-489.
“Danny Boyle’s Frankenstein: An Experiment in Self-Imaging” Transpositions: Journal of Theology, Imagination and the Arts, Winter 2016.