Ursula W. Goodenough (b. March 16, 1943) is a Professor of Biology at Washington University in St. Louis and author of the best selling book Sacred Depths of Nature. This highly regarded book has resulted in her teaching the paradigm of Religious Naturalism and the Epic of Evolution around the world and also her participation in television productions on PBS and The History Channel, as well as NPR radio broadcasting.. In December of 2009, Goodenough began participating in a National Public Radio blog Cosmos And Culture.
Dr. Goodenough earned her M.A. in zoology from Columbia University and in 1969 she completed her Ph.D. at Harvard University. Goodenough was an assistant and associate professor of biology at Harvard from 1971-1978 before moving to Washington University where she wrote three editions of a widely adopted textbook, Genetics. Goodenough joined the Institute on Religion in an Age of Science (IRAS) in 1989 and served continuously on its council and as its president for four years. She also served as president and is a member of The American Society for Cell Biology. She has presented papers and seminars on science and religion to numerous audiences, co-chaired three IRAS conferences on Star Island, and serves on the editorial board of Journal of Religion and Science.
Goodenough believes that the critical success factor for women balancing the demands of raising children and developing a career is knowing that you can do both. She says that realizing that a child's development are influenced by many people in their lives other than their mother has helped her achieve both her personal and professional goals. She is the mother of five children: Jason, Mathea, Jessica, Thomas, and James.
Science & Spirit describes her as a warm, brilliant and embracing woman, [whose] contradictions make up a harmonious whole — sort of like nature itself, and describes her book as a poetic and accessible bestseller.
Goodenough taught a junior/senior level cell biology course at Washington University for many years. Recently she has helped to begin a new 200-level course that is cross-listed under biology, physics and earth and planetary sciences-- The Epic of Evolution. The course is team-taught by Goodenough and fellow Washington University professors Clifford Will, Ph.D., professor of physics and Michael E. Wysession, Ph.D., associate professor of earth and planetary sciences. Bernard brings his expertise in physics, Goodenough her insight into cell and molecular biology and Wysession his knowledge of geophysics to the course. The idea is for students to contemplate the wide arch of evolution from The Big Bang and the subsequent expansion of the universe to the origins and progression of life on Earth. The course is predicated upon presenting the science of evolution along with challenging students to interpret the ways evolution has impacted other parts of life. Much of the inspiration of the course is drawn from Goodenough's work linking science with religion and philosophy through numerous publications and organizations of national symposia.
Use of the term ‘religious naturalism’ was initiated after Edward O. Wilson used it in his 1978 book On Human Nature. Loyal Rue, who was also familiar with the term from Brightman's book begin using it the 1990’s. Subsequent conversations between Rue and Goodenough [both of whom were active in IRAS (The Institute on Religion in an Age of Science)] led to Goodenough's use of it in her book The Sacred Depths of Nature and by Rue in Religion is not about God and other writings. Since 1994 numerous authors have used the phrase or expressed similar thinking. Examples are: Chet Raymo, Stuart Kauffman and Karl Peters.
An Epic of Evolution Journal was published from 1998 till 2000 with articles by noted authors — Brian Swimme, Thomas Berry, Jennifer Morgan, Connie Barlow, and Goodenough. She makes frequent use of the term and uses it to extrapolate from the concept of evolution to a guiding belief for mankind. She writes in Sacred Depths — "Emerging Religious Beliefs: When the responses elicited by the Epic of Evolution are gathered together several religious principles emerge that I can believe, serve as a framework for a global Ethos". She continues — "Theologian Philip Hefner offers us a weaving metaphor. The tapestry maker first strings the warp, long strong fibers anchoring firmly to the loom, and then interweaves the welt, the pattern, the color, the art. The epic of evolution is our warp, destined to endure, commanding our universal gratitude, and reverence and commitment."
Concerning the Epic of Evolution, she writes “the epic is a fantastic myth that happens to be true of the material Universe” .”We do have something of a story here, a true story, that we can work with religiously should we elect to do so."“The Epic of Evolution is such a story, beautifully suited to anchor our search for planetary consensus, telling us of our nature, our place, our context. Moreover, responses to this story — what we are calling religious naturalism — can yield deep and abiding spiritual experiences. And then, after that, we need other stories as well, human-centered stories, a mythos that embodies our ideals and our passions.”
The paradigm of religious naturalism began evolving in the late 1940’s but did not attract attention until the 1990’s when Goodenough and others such as Loyal Rue and Jerome A. Stone began writing about it. Goodenough has supplied major postulates to this evolving concept, such as — Nature is Sacred; Credo of Continuation: Covenant with Mystery; Global Ethos; and Shared Worldview. She has also contributed to the development of The Epic of Evolution and Emergence that are part of the basic doctrine.
Goodenough on religious naturalism - “I profess my Faith. For me, the existence of all this complexity and awareness and intent and beauty, and my ability to apprehend it, serves as the ultimate meaning and the ultimate value. The continuation of life reaches around, grabs its own tail, and forms a sacred circle that requires no further justification, no Creator, no super-ordinate meaning of meaning, no purpose other than that the continuation continue until the sun collapses or the final meteor collides. I confess a credo of continuation. And in so doing, I confess as well a credo of human continuation”. ,
Goodenough presented The Humpty Dumpty Project: Putting Evolution and Religion Together Again atVirginia Wesleyan College in 2009 at the Center for the Study of Religious Freedom.
In 2002, Ursula Goodenough was a member of a five-scientist panel invited by the Mind and Life Institute as part of an ongoing series of seminars on Western science for His Holiness Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama and his inner circle of monk-scholars. Previous seminars explored particle physics and neuroscience. This was the Dalai Lama’s first foray into cellular biology. Goodenough found him a quick study:"He’s very interested in science and really wants to understand this stuff. We’d been told that he knew about DNA and proteins, but when I started it became clear that he had very little background. Of course, one is left to wonder how many of the world’s leaders understand DNA protein.” Goodenough was joined by scientists Stuart Kauffman, Per Luigi Luisi, Steven Chu and Eric Lander on her next trip to India. Goodenough was invited back to Dharamsala, India to lecture again in 2005.
Goodenough and colleagues are studying the molecular basis and evolution of life-cycle transitions in the flagellated green alga, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. They have cloned genes in the mating-type (mt) locus and genes regulated by mt that control the transition between vegetative growth and gametic differentiation and zygote development. These include genes responsible for mate recognition, uniparental inheritance of chloroplast DNA, and gametic differentiation, allowing them to study their function and their evolution during speciation.
Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Sciencesmoreless
Dr. Ursula Goodenough was elected a Fellow in 2009 in to Section 2 — Cellular and Development Biology, Microbiology and Immunology (including Genetics)
Founded in 1780, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences has elected as members the finest minds and most influential leaders from each generation, including George Washington and Benjamin Franklin in the eighteenth century, Daniel Webster and Ralph Waldo Emerson in the nineteenth, and Albert Einstein and Winston Churchill in the twentieth. Members are leaders in the academic disciplines, the arts, business, and public affairs. Current membership is about 4,000 American Fellows and 600 Foreign Honorary Members which includes more than 250 Nobel laureates and more than 60 Pulitzer Prize winners.
Lee, J-H., S. Waffenschmidt, L. Small, and U.W. Goodenough. 2007. Between-species analysis of short-repeat modules in cell wall and sex-related hydroxyproline-righ glycoproteins of Chlamydomonas. Plant Physiol. 144: 1813-1826.
Lin, H., and U.W. Goodenough. 2007. Gametogenesis in the Chlamydomonas reinhardtii minus mating type is controlled by two genes, MID and MTD1. Genetics 176: 913-925.
Ferris, P.J., S. Waffenschmidt, J.G. Umen, H. Lin, J-H Lee, K. Ishida, T. Kubo, J. Lau, and U.W. Goodenough. 2005. Plus and minus sexual agglutinins from Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. Plant Cell 17: 597-615.
Umen, J.G., and U. W. Goodenough. 2001. Chloroplast DNA methylation and inheritance in Chlamydomonas. Genes & Development 15: 2585-2597.
Umen, J.G., and U.W. Goodenough. 2001. Control of cell division by a retinoblastoma protein homolog in Chlamydomonas. Genes & Development 15: 1652-1661.
Ferris, P.J., and U.W. Goodenough. 1994. The mating-type locus of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii contains highly rearranged DNA sequences. Cell 76, 1135-1145.
Ambrust, E.V., P.J. Ferris, and U.W. Goodenough. 1993. A mating type-linked gene cluster expressed in Chlamydomonas participates in the uniparental inheritance of the chloroplast genome. Cell 74:801-811.
