Trustee, Science and Religion Lead
Pranab Das is Professor (retired) of Physics at Elon University and Executive Director of the Institute for Technology, Science and Culture (InTerSeCt). He was educated at Reed College and the University of Texas at Austin, where he obtained his PhD in the Dynamics of Small Asymmetric Self-Connected Hopfield Neural Networks.
Prof. Das is the recipient of a number of awards and grants in such areas as science and religion, active matter, and diverse intelligences. He served as P.I. on the major international program “Global Perspectives on Science and Spirituality”, and its follow-up the GPSS Major Awards Program overseeing the identification, support and development of scholars and programs in science and spirituality in Eastern/Central Europe and Asia. He served as Executive Editor for the International Society for Science and Religion’s “ISSR Library project” curating and distributing a canonical collection of over 200 volumes in science and religion to 150 institutions of higher learning worldwide. He has been an active participant in the philosophy of science surrounding active matter and was co-PI on “Emergence of Cytoplastic Dynamics using Active Matter”.
Most recently, he was responsible for the design and content of a $50 million grants program run by the Templeton World Charity Foundation. The “Diverse Intelligences Initiative” for which he was the Principal Advisor from 2017 to 2022, has funded almost 100 research programs and projects across a wide variety of scientific disciplines. He is currently the Principal Investigator on “New Opportunities in Diverse Intelligences”, serves on the leadership team of the annual Diverse Intelligences Summit, and consults with various private foundations and boards.
