This book is a welcome addition to scholarship on India for multiple reasons. Renny Thomas conducted ethnographic work—a tool more commonly employed to gain data on underprivileged groups—and applies it to Indian scientists, a highly privileged group. The book’s major argument is that while Indian scientists are a diverse group, Brāhmaṇical religious norms have been adapted as normative values at major scientific laboratories and institutes. Based on fieldwork conducted in 2012 at a scientific research institute in Bangalore, this project is not about the content of science. Instead, this book is about “the religious life of scientists” (5). Thomas presents this book as “a case study of universal science” with “local inflections in India” (14).

In the Introduction, Thomas cites Bruno Latour on the problem that Western anthropologists never really interrogated their own scientists. European scientists were assumed to have transcended religiosity. At the same time, people, even scientists working in laboratory settings, in other parts of the world were considered religious in a way that European anthropologists did not apply evenly to scientists in their own communities.

Thomas makes clear from the outset that there is no way to fully understand the interplay of science and religion in India without taking stock of the role that caste plays: “It is significant to note that the dominant scientific community (here it is Brahmins) defines it and normalizes their culture as the institutional culture. Any study of science and religion in India is inadequate if it does not take into account the persistence of caste in the everyday life of scientists and scientific institutions, and the connection between caste and the dominant religion in shaping scientific life” (3).

Chapter One goes into detail on Jawaharlal Nehru’s influence on early institution building. This was a time period in which the precise definition of “science” was debated and eventually defined in a way that largely excluded the more traditional Āyurveda and Ūnānī medical systems.

Chapter Two begins with a very helpful clarification of what Thomas means by invoking the terms “religion” and “science.” Beyond the overview of the many ways in which scholars have challenged the Eurocentric (and Christian-centric) valence of religion, Thomas notes that the emphasis on science as a means of effecting progress “had a deeper influence on many postcolonial societies; where the focus was primarily on scientific modernity, and science and technology were seen as the solution for all the existing problems; including the ones related to religion” (47). Looking at autobiographies by such as Raja Ramanna and C. N. R. Rao, Thomas demonstrates the extent to which these scientists highly valued their religious traditions and did not see those traditions as being in conflict with their scientific work.

Chapters Three and Four form a valuable combination in which readers learn to appreciate the diversity of both belief and non-belief among the scientists Thomas studies. A key point on the latter group is that non-belief is by no means monolithic and that—while some atheist scientists draw inspiration from European figures such as Charles Darwin—they also engage with older ancient Indian traditions of non-belief and materialism, including Sāṃkhya philosophy as well as the Lokāyata and Cārvāka schools (122–23). These examples refute the idea that atheism itself is a Western import.

Chapter Five analyzes the many ways in which Brahmin religious and cultural norms dominate in scientific institutions. These norms include knowledge of Sanskrit and the Vedas, but also classical Indian music and dance. The ability to appreciate all of these is “considered to be a status symbol. This shared culture of Brahmin scientists helped them to distinguish themselves from other scientists” (147). The key takeaway from this chapter is that many of the Brahmin scientists that Thomas interviewed claim that caste status plays no role in their labs, while at the same time there are Brahmin caste-specific values that reinscribe the types of hierarchies found outside of the lab.

The book’s Conclusion recaps the overall argument, as well as invites more scholars, especially anthropologists and sociologists, to study religion and science in India, specifically through studying attitudes among the general public. This is an important goal because despite the growth of anthropological work on South Asia in the last few decades, the field as a whole continues to be dominated by more traditional textual studies. Through conducting this deep ethnography of Indian laboratories—and the scientists who run them—Thomas broadens our field of study. No one in our field should be surprised that religion in South Asia has a very different set of histories and practices than in other regions, especially Western Europe. What Thomas has done in this study is demonstrate the ways in which science also functions very differently.