
It may just be that science is an imaginative, creative, and emotive enterprise, just as it is obviously a rational, mathematical, evidence-based discipline. Which, to John Dickson’s mind – and that of our expert guest – makes perfect sense. After all, the Creator is an artist and logician in one!
Meet our guest

Tom McLeish is a physicist and inaugural Professor of Natural Philosophy in the School of Physics, Engineering and Technology at the University of York. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society, the pre-eminent scientific academy of the UK. His work is renowned for breakthroughs in our understanding of the properties of soft matter – like liquids, foams, and biological materials.
Links
Download a transcript of this episode here
This episode of Undeceptions is sponsored by Zondervan Academic’s new book Biblical Critical Theory: How the Bible’s Unfolding Story Makes Sense of Modern Life and Culture by Christopher Watkin.
Read:
- Get Tom McLeish’s book, The Poetry and Music of Science: Comparing Creativity in Science and Art.
- Check out Tom’s project ‘Ordered Universe’, which investigates the scientific work of medieval polymaths.
- More on Robert Grosseteste (1175-1253), English bishop and scholar.
- More on Karl Popper (1902-1994), British philosopher of natural and social science.
- Read about the recent discovery of Thomas Gainsborough sketches in 2017.
- Take a look at ‘Mr and Mrs Andrews’ by Thomas Gainsborough at The National Gallery.
- Meet our ‘Phone a Friend’ guest, Dr Kirsty Beilharz.
- Read the Book of Job, Chapter 28
Watch/Listen:
- The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
- Both Sides Now, Joni Mitchell
- Undeceptions Episode 74, Medieval Science
- Watch the BBC’s Horizon documentary on ‘Proving Fermat’s Last Theorem’ with Andrew Wiles.
- Pretty Woman (1990)
- Listen to Robert Schumann’s Concert Piece for four horns in F major, played by the Berliner Philharmoniker.
- The Big Bang Theory (2007-2019)

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