h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

My philosophical hero, John Rawls, wrote a book called 'Political Liberalism' in which he explored the consequences of what he called 'permanent pluralism' (or something like that). Roughly, this is the view that there are now and will always be very different conceptions of the 'good life', very different world views, very different moral and metaphysical outlooks. Given this, how can people agree to live together within a stable state?

Rawls' suggestion is what he calls an 'overlapping consensus' - trying to find points of agreement between otherwise very different views about what the state should look like. He aruged that people should have a sense of themselves as citizen, and as private individual. As private individual, I might believe x and y and z, but as a citizen I accept that I have the right to believe this and argue for it, but not to impose it on others.

Thus, the state stays neutral between these competing conceptions. Rawls argued that people should have a loyalty to this 'overlapping consensus' as something that protects their rights now, and their rights to change their mind about their life in the future. Not a 'mere modus vivendi'.

What troubles me is a tendancy to reject this overlapping consensus. Surprisingly, it's coming not from the religous fundamentalist, but from a new kind of secular fundamentalist. These SFs are not content just to fight and argue against certain metaphysical viewpoints and to try to reduce the religious influence in society (which is reasonable), but to try to silence voices from the political debate (which is not).

This is often accompanied by the setting up of 'straw target' religious views that are attacked and easily destroyed, ignoring or failing to engage with more sophisticated versions. The typical 'straw target' religious person is a fanatic, a controller, a fascist, an evolution denier, completely irrational. There are many like that in all religions - Christianity has its Taliban as well as Islam. But a great many religious people, particularly in the western world, are not like that at all.

I'm a liberal, secular, humanist. I don't want to live in a more religious society, but it's only possible to advance liberal, secular, and humanist aims by understanding the arguments of one's opponents. And understanding them properly, not just attacking straw targets. And in general, I think, people have a duty as citizens and as credible thoughtful people to properly understand the viewpoints of others.

I find it worrying when secular, sensible people start to close themselves off to other ideas, to ridicule other views rather than trying to understand them, to try to silence and attack ad homenim rather than letting the arguments be heard, and then seeking to win the debate properly and fairly. Especially as that's what they accuse their opponents of doing.

Fascinating. I've often grappled with this. Clearly religion doesn't have a monopoly on fanaticism. "Atheist" philosophies have come up with extremist philosophies of their own, although atheism may not quite be the way to describe them. To me, it seems that atheism is a philosophy that says "don't force me to believe that for which there is no objective evidence". A rational philosophy indeed, but it does not necessarily conflict with views that allow for the non-material, the supernatural if you like (at least until people start claiming that the non-material can become physically real). It also shouldn't necessarily necessarily negate the views of others who do believe in that for which there is no objective evidence.

I agree entirely. Generally atheism is a liberal kind of world view - if there's no God to tell us how to live, it seems sensible to be open to a wide variety of ways of living. The kind of atheist liberal you describe seems to me to be saying "there's no objective evidence for God (or for what he's like or wants), therefore leave it out of rational discussion of pratical matters", but leaves open a space for what's outside the world of objective evidence - if I understand you correctly.

What worries me is the 'if you're religious, you're an idiot' kind of argument, which ought to be very obviously false if only because of the number of very obviously clever people who are religious. To me, this kind of view shows a lack of clear thinking, a lack of understanding, and more importantly a lack of respect.

Anyone who has been religious knows that, for the religious person, the evidence for the existence of God is strong, and often overwhelming. However, it's subjective evidence that can't be communicated. And because it can't be communicated, it can't easily be understood. It's true that from an atheist mindset it does make no sense to be religious, but many with this mindset don't seem able or willing to see that the subjective evidence may look one way to them, but very differently to someone else. And it's that failure - or even that refusal - to see that someone else may see the world differently and respect them all the same that's illiberal.

This is the kind of thing I mean:
F135418?thread=3405425&skip=0&show=20

Yes - it was your comment in that thread that enticed me to go over to your PS. It was well put and didn't descend into the personal attacks so common here when discussing these things.

We've been discussing topics such as this in Edward's journal (F2217673): might be worth taking a look. Some very good comments by and large. No major threats of violence so far!

I suppose that another of the things causing conflict between many secularists and religious people (not all, mind you) is the level of anthropocentrism involved in many religious world-views, when the objective reality suggests that the universe wasn't built just for us. It involves a degree of humility that has taken generations to accept.

The other thing that strikes me is that many many secularists (and I include myself in this a good bit of the time) accept an awful lot of scientific knowledge on faith. We are happy to let the experts do the thinking, and so long as its established as fact, we accept it uncritically. Which is fine most of the time, but there are probably degrees of acceptance from an unproven hypothesis to an un-reviewed journal, to a peer-reviewed journal right up to a scientific "law" that has never really been undermined for the last 3000 years. So, in essence, many of us are not that different *psychologically* to people with fervent religious beliefs.

I hope you don't mind that I have added you to my friends list - I'm very interested in what you have to say about things.

Chaps,

I came across this journal entry and your reflections broadly match mine, even though I take a theist position overall.

What gets to me often is a conversation, with clearly intelligent folks, who nevertheless appear to be unwilling to tolerate a different opinion on say the Belief-In-God proposition. As if there is something slightly mad about the idea being considered in a positive manner.

Here is a link / review on Dawkins latest book, it maps to the point that I think Otto was making about straw men argument. It indicates to me either a lack of intellectual honesty or simple ignorance to set up an argument of the 'other side' by picking the weakest argument and/or ignoring stronger ones.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n20/eagl01_.html

I am of an opinion that we all have in our worldviews reason and faith-based positions, perhaps deeply embedded. I believe they to some extent they exist as a symbiotic pair. We need a certain degree of faith to stick to our guns of reason when we face post-modern arguments. And we need a certain degree of reason in our faith to ensure it does not claim truth in the teeth of falsehood. If we can do that we can be atheist/theist and nevertheless steer away from fundamentalism and intolerance.

The enemy of reason is not faith, rather it is the hate of reason - i.e., misology.

When we find an argument that claims to be one of reason, when in fact it is purposed to 'outlaw' anothers contrary point of view, eg., by adjusting definitions to suit the subsequent development of a tautological position being made by the 'other side'. We need to be on alert that something unreasonable is going on.

Thanks for the link - that's a really interesting article, and captures rather nicely some of the points I was trying to make - particularly about the 'straw target' method of argument. Whether this is from ignorance or intellectual dishonesty I'm not sure - I'd probably say it's a combination of arrogance and lack of empathy/imagination.

Having said that, I quite like Dawkins, though I haven't read any of his books in full. Or, better, I'm glad he exists as a counterweight to the influence of religion in our society - someone with a high enough profile to be newsworthy, a kind of Archbishop of Atheism.

Yes a kind of Devils (devil> Advocate to stub Theist's toes from walking over reason. He is just a case book example of Kuhn's Incommensurability, see A1049915

Here is a limerick on that !

Statistics, like lamp-posts when tight,
Might be used for support, not for light.
Kuhn called such utility
"Incommensurability".
That's a bias that's hidden from sight.

Thought I would check this out seeing as you pointed it out.

Good stuff .

Perhaps some serious chilling in the threads in question is needed.

I think seeing the attack dogs of atheism in action was quite the most unedifying spectecle I've seen on this site for some time.

What's wrong with the people who were protesting against the equality legislation, in my view, is that they are ignorant, intolerent of others who are very different from them, and that they want to impose their world view on others and oppose equality.

But some people seem to think that what's wrong is not the intolerence and ignorance of others, but only the choice of target that the intolerence is aimed at.

I also fail to understand how this kind of hectoring is supposed to help. Isn't it better to try to persuade people?

Fundamentalism:
* convinced that your view is absolutely correct
* dismissing other people with different or contrary views as idiots
* using straw men and ad hominems wherever possible to ridicule the views of others who disagree
* having a go at moderates people as fence sitters, feeding the hands of the enemy by tolerating them
* so passionately convinced that violence wouldn't necessarily be out of the question in the right context

Now, this says nothing about whether a particular fundamentalist view really is correct (and I have to admit I have a major problem with the anthropocentric nature of religious fundamentalism, not to mention the oddness and illogicality of many of the tenets of their belief), but I see big parallels in how these views are expressed.