Comments on: The “option” of unbelief http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/2008/12/19/the-option-of-unbelief/ Secularism, religion, and the public sphere Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:45:49 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Martin Struik http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/2008/12/19/the-option-of-unbelief/comment-page-1/#comment-7347 Martin Struik Thu, 17 Dec 2009 16:41:37 +0000 http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/?p=1008#comment-7347 It is claimed that unbelief "continues to persist in many of [pre-modernity's] 'illusions'." Right; so here is an acknowledgment that pre-modern belief is, in a sense, illusory. The illusion of unbelief, for its part, rests in the idea that it cannot account for morality and meaning. This is remarkable because Dawkins, Dennett, Pinker and other naturalists provide us with extensive explanations of these matters, in terms of modern day evolutionary theory and/or cognitive science. Also, the presupposition that all thought (including unbelief) is fundamentally historically conditioned has it´s limits. It seems there have been nonbelievers and skeptics throughout almost all of human history and civilization. Usually individualists with a healthy level of common sense, if you ask me. Naturalism is not as closed-minded as I think it is implied. However, confronted with extraordinary claims of various sorts that contradict our current understanding of nature, it insists on strong epistemological standards to back them up. The progress that science makes is fine, and the fact that most phenomena of the current 'Wiederzauberung' (e.g. synchronicity; though I'm not sure in what sense De Vries means it here) have not yet proven able to meet these standards needn't worry us. Taylor himself has beautiful passages where he articulates the "moral source" of naturalism: <blockquote>“We touch here on one of the deep sources of the moral attraction of immanence; something we can feel even with Lucretius. There is a strong attraction to the idea that we are in an order of "nature", in which we are part of this greater whole, arise from it, and don't escape or transcend it. even though we rise above everything else in it. One side of this attraction is the sense of belonging, being part of our native land; we are at one with this nature. We feel this most palpably on summer days, as we sit in a garden, hearing the birds singing and the bees humming. We belong to the earth. ... Another facet of this same belonging is our sense of wonder that something like ourselves arose out of lower nature." (p. 547)</blockquote> Point well taken; there's no 'spiritual poverty' in naturalism. Taylor sometimes claims that naturalism has problems with self-articulation; that is, it lacks its own 'ontology'. On the contrary, Pinker (1998) and Dennis Dutton (2009) give us some fine examples of how to account for our aesthetic and intellectual joys. It is claimed that unbelief “continues to persist in many of [pre-modernity's] ‘illusions’.”

Right; so here is an acknowledgment that pre-modern belief is, in a sense, illusory. The illusion of unbelief, for its part, rests in the idea that it cannot account for morality and meaning. This is remarkable because Dawkins, Dennett, Pinker and other naturalists provide us with extensive explanations of these matters, in terms of modern day evolutionary theory and/or cognitive science.

Also, the presupposition that all thought (including unbelief) is fundamentally historically conditioned has it´s limits. It seems there have been nonbelievers and skeptics throughout almost all of human history and civilization. Usually individualists with a healthy level of common sense, if you ask me.

Naturalism is not as closed-minded as I think it is implied. However, confronted with extraordinary claims of various sorts that contradict our current understanding of nature, it insists on strong epistemological standards to back them up. The progress that science makes is fine, and the fact that most phenomena of the current ‘Wiederzauberung’ (e.g. synchronicity; though I’m not sure in what sense De Vries means it here) have not yet proven able to meet these standards needn’t worry us.

Taylor himself has beautiful passages where he articulates the “moral source” of naturalism:

“We touch here on one of the deep sources of the moral attraction of immanence; something we can feel even with Lucretius. There is a strong attraction to the idea that we are in an order of “nature”, in which we are part of this greater whole, arise from it, and don’t escape or transcend it. even though we rise above everything else in it. One side of this attraction is the sense of belonging, being part of our native land; we are at one with this nature. We feel this most palpably on summer days, as we sit in a garden, hearing the birds singing and the bees humming. We belong to the earth. … Another facet of this same belonging is our sense of wonder that something like ourselves arose out of lower nature.” (p. 547)

Point well taken; there’s no ’spiritual poverty’ in naturalism. Taylor sometimes claims that naturalism has problems with self-articulation; that is, it lacks its own ‘ontology’. On the contrary, Pinker (1998) and Dennis Dutton (2009) give us some fine examples of how to account for our aesthetic and intellectual joys.

]]> By: Lucas Perkins http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/2008/12/19/the-option-of-unbelief/comment-page-1/#comment-5316 Lucas Perkins Sat, 20 Dec 2008 17:47:31 +0000 http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/?p=1008#comment-5316 I find that one of the more interesting—and from many perspectives disconcerting—consequences of this “open space” of the age of the immanent frame, is that although we increasingly have a viable “option” between belief and unbelief, it seems like we rarely have a sufficient sense of how much “belief” continues to reside in our “unbelief.” This means that most modern atheists and materialists, whether of a Spinozist variety or otherwise, imagine their own atheism as possessing a heroic, sui generis character. You can certainly see this in someone like the rather Whig-ish Richard Dawkins: thank goodness Galileo et al threw off the yoke and enabled us to live without the illusions of pre-modernity, and woe to those, not just religious folks but also Harry Potter fanatics (in Dawkins’ most recent gesture), who would persist in those illusions. The atheist (the unbeliever in Taylor’s terminology) refuses to be duped and stands on the shoulders of the non-duped in prior ages. But what recent thought on the post-secular or whatever you want to call it has convincingly shown is that modern unbelief in the West not only grows semi-organically out of deep religious traditions, but also continues to persist in many of its “illusions,” illusions that might well be constitutive of human experience as such. Phenomenology certainly has a great deal to say here: living in a “world” full of “objects” imbued with some sort of “meaning” is already a departure from a radical materialism that is forced to insist on the sheer indifference of matter. When an atheist believes, for example, in a better future or in the goodness of people, how much of their atheism can they be said to retain? Indeed, the question of what could constitute a true “unbelief” is interesting for precisely this reason, for such an unbelief would have to jettison nearly every form and basis of hope and “belief” previously known to us. But I have my doubts that anyone can achieve this without being reduced to a sort of naked life, that is, mere survival. Thus, I take de Vries’ last paragraph to argue that if post-modernity--if we accept it as a Jamesian “open space”--means anything, it is that period in which a new array of “re-enchantments” become possible. De Vries’ references to mediatization, synchronicity, miracles, and the like seem to suggest this. If secular modernity produces alienation in the form of distantiation and de-coupling from “participation” in “being” (whatever that might mean) via Taylor’s buffering of the self, then de Vries could well be right that Taylor hasn’t thought dialectically enough in thinking about the consequences of post-secularity, if we can yet speak of such a phase. What lies on the other side of modernity in this respect? What forms of “Wiederzauberung” become available to us and what are the dangers? If we listen to our atheists, we can only be blind to these possibilities, because the atheist gratefully accepts the “Jamesian open space” wihtout understanding its roots or its consequences. And this would mean a failure to fully engage the forms of belief that are in the process of becoming possible. I find that one of the more interesting—and from many perspectives disconcerting—consequences of this “open space” of the age of the immanent frame, is that although we increasingly have a viable “option” between belief and unbelief, it seems like we rarely have a sufficient sense of how much “belief” continues to reside in our “unbelief.” This means that most modern atheists and materialists, whether of a Spinozist variety or otherwise, imagine their own atheism as possessing a heroic, sui generis character. You can certainly see this in someone like the rather Whig-ish Richard Dawkins: thank goodness Galileo et al threw off the yoke and enabled us to live without the illusions of pre-modernity, and woe to those, not just religious folks but also Harry Potter fanatics (in Dawkins’ most recent gesture), who would persist in those illusions. The atheist (the unbeliever in Taylor’s terminology) refuses to be duped and stands on the shoulders of the non-duped in prior ages. But what recent thought on the post-secular or whatever you want to call it has convincingly shown is that modern unbelief in the West not only grows semi-organically out of deep religious traditions, but also continues to persist in many of its “illusions,” illusions that might well be constitutive of human experience as such. Phenomenology certainly has a great deal to say here: living in a “world” full of “objects” imbued with some sort of “meaning” is already a departure from a radical materialism that is forced to insist on the sheer indifference of matter. When an atheist believes, for example, in a better future or in the goodness of people, how much of their atheism can they be said to retain? Indeed, the question of what could constitute a true “unbelief” is interesting for precisely this reason, for such an unbelief would have to jettison nearly every form and basis of hope and “belief” previously known to us. But I have my doubts that anyone can achieve this without being reduced to a sort of naked life, that is, mere survival.

Thus, I take de Vries’ last paragraph to argue that if post-modernity–if we accept it as a Jamesian “open space”–means anything, it is that period in which a new array of “re-enchantments” become possible. De Vries’ references to mediatization, synchronicity, miracles, and the like seem to suggest this. If secular modernity produces alienation in the form of distantiation and de-coupling from “participation” in “being” (whatever that might mean) via Taylor’s buffering of the self, then de Vries could well be right that Taylor hasn’t thought dialectically enough in thinking about the consequences of post-secularity, if we can yet speak of such a phase. What lies on the other side of modernity in this respect? What forms of “Wiederzauberung” become available to us and what are the dangers? If we listen to our atheists, we can only be blind to these possibilities, because the atheist gratefully accepts the “Jamesian open space” wihtout understanding its roots or its consequences. And this would mean a failure to fully engage the forms of belief that are in the process of becoming possible.

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