Draper, John W.: History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science V1. 29-Aug-2011
 

John William Draper (May 5, 1811 – January 4, 1882) was an American (English-born) scientist, philosopher, physician, chemist, historian, and photographer.

In the early 1870s, Draper was invited to write a History of the Conflict between Religion and Science (1874), a book replying to contemporary papal edicts such as the doctrine of infallibility, and mostly criticising the anti-intellectualism of Roman Catholicism, yet he assessed that Islam and Protestantism had little conflict with science. Draper’s preface summarises the conflict thesis: The history of Science is not a mere record of isolated discoveries; it is a narrative of the conflict of two contending powers, the expansive force of the human intellect on one side, and the compression arising from traditionary faith and human interests on the other.