Cobb argued that humanity's most urgent task is to preserve the world on which it lives and depends,[7] an idea which his primary influence, Whitehead, described as "world-loyalty".

Because of his broad-minded interest and approach, Cobb has been influential in a wide range of disciplines, including theology, ecology, economics, biology, and social ethics.

[15] Seeing how the same events could be presented in such different ways based on the country in which he was living, Cobb became ever-more counter-cultural and critical of the dominant views in churches, media, universities, and government.

[17] He was chosen for the Japanese language program, which was filled mainly with Jewish and Catholic intellectuals who helped make him aware of the narrow, parochial nature of his Georgia Protestantism.

Within six months of such exposure my faith was shattered ... God, who had been my constant companion and Lord up to that point, simply evaporated, and my prayers bounced back from the ceiling unheard.

[19]Hoping to reconstruct a Christian faith more compatible with scientific and historical knowledge, Cobb entered the University of Chicago Divinity School.

After receiving his PhD degree from the University of Chicago under the supervision of the Divinity School's DeanBernard Loomer in 1952,[21] he spent three years teaching at Young Harris College in north Georgia, while also serving as part-time pastor to a six-church circuit and establishing a seventh congregation in the area.

[26] Although Cobb is most often described as a theologian, the overarching tendency of his thought has been toward the integration of many different areas of knowledge, employing Alfred North Whitehead's transdisciplinary philosophical framework as his guiding insight.

[28] He believed that the university model encourages excessive abstraction because each specialized area of study defines its own frame of reference and then tends to ignore the others, discouraging interdisciplinary dialogue and inhibiting a broad understanding of the world.

In service to this vision, Cobb consistently sought to integrate knowledge from biology, physics, economics, and other disciplines into his theological and philosophical work.

[33] Like its deconstructionist counterpart, constructive postmodernism arose partly in response to dissatisfaction with Cartesian mind–matter dualism, which viewed matter as an inert machine and the human mind as wholly different in nature.

[33][34] While modern science has uncovered voluminous evidence against this idea, Cobb argues that dualistic assumptions continue to persist: On the whole, dualism was accepted by the general culture.

He also proposed that Christianity specifically needed to appropriate knowledge from the biological sciences in order to undercut its anthropocentrism (human-centeredness) and devaluation of the non-human world.

[45] A recent (2013) article has shown that global GPI per capita peaked in 1978, meaning that the social and environmental costs of economic growth have outweighed the benefits since that time.

[54] Cobb and Birch develop the idea of "trusting life" as a religious impulse, rather than attempting to achieve a settled, perfected social structure that does not allow for change and evolution.

[59][60] Cobb was active in formulating his own theories of religious pluralism, partly in response to another Claremont Graduate University professor, John Hick.

[66] In the late 1950s, Cobb and Claremont professor James Robinson decided that the time had come to end this one-sidedness and move to authentic dialogue between American and European theologians.

For one, Cobb stressed the problems inherent in what he calls the "substantialist" worldview—ultimately derived from Classical Greek philosophy—that still dominates Christian theology, as well as most of western thought.

Cobb has not only turned to other religions (most notably Buddhism) in order to supplement Christian ideas and systems,[72] but also to other disciplines, including biology, physics, and economics.

He did not believe that God is omnipotent in the sense of having unilateral control over all events, since Cobb sees reconciling total coercive power with love and goodness to be an impossible task.

To encourage a stronger response, he organized Progressive Christians Uniting with the Episcopal priest George Regas in 1996,[78] chaired its reflection committee, and edited a number of its books.

As the perceived gap between the policies of the American government and Christian teaching grew wider, these books moved beyond simply reformist proposals.

[79] Process philosophy in the tradition of Alfred North Whitehead is often considered a primarily American philosophical movement, but it has spread globally and has been of particular interest to Chinese thinkers.

[81] Through the IPDC, Cobb helped to coordinate the work of twenty-three collaborative centers in China, as well as to organize annual conferences on ecological civilization.

[citation needed] In 1996, Cobb co-founded the Claremont Consultation with George Regas in an effort to organize and mobilize progressive Christian communities.

PCU today describes itself as "a social justice and faith organization dedicated to amplifying hope and actions individuals can take that lead to a more compassionate and just world.

[81] The IPDC works to promote new modes of development in China and the West, drawing from both classical Chinese philosophy and constructive forms of Western thought in order to address practical problems associated with economic growth, social change, and globalization.

[84] In 2014, Cobb was the founding chairperson of the board for Pando Populus, an LA-based non-profit organization that seeks to enact a more ecologically balanced way of life in the LA area.

[85] In 2015, Cobb was a founding board member of the Institute for Ecological Civilization (EcoCiv), a non-profit organization which seeks to enact "a fully sustainable human society in harmony with surrounding ecosystems and communities of life."

[86] In 2019, Cobb led the formation and was a founding board member of the Claremont Institute for Process Studies, a non-profit organization that aims to "promote a process-relational worldview to advance wisdom, harmony, and the common good" by engaging "in local initiatives and cultivates compassionate communities to bring about an ecological civilization."