Atheism 2.0

[DWill]

bradams, could you stick around for the discussion of Haidt's book? I can see you will have something valuable to add.

Glancing at Haidt's web page, it's interesting that he sees the forming of corporate groups, such as political parties and members of a religious faith, as potentially problematic simply because they do form a team, and teams are designed to compete against other teams.

I expected johnson and Dexter to object to at least one statement de Botton made, but maybe they haven't read my summary. He says, "Religions are "the foremost institutions fighting for the the things of the mind." I don't think that's true unless we're using a definition of "the mind" that isn't in standard usage. I'd still say that universities are the institutions that are the great champions of the intellect. Most intellectuals are connected to universities.

[findsharon]

Aren't atheists welcome at Unitarian churches? I understand that ritual and community may be important to some people, but as some have already stated there are other places to find those. Not to be cynical (too late), but I'm getting the impression that this guy is trying to be the televangelist of atheism. Ick.

[Robert Tulip]

I have liked Alain de Botton a lot since reading his first book, How Proust Can Change Your Life, about ten years ago, and then The Consolations of Philosophy, a title he shamelessly filched from Boethius. He writes with a deeply ironic, modest and friendly wisdom, as displayed in the TED talk.

The Proust book is a celebration of simplicity, and the sense of numinous meaning in ordinary things. It gave me a sense that de Botton has a strongly spiritual feeling about connections in everyday life.

The best summary of what de Botton is saying comes in his remarks after his talk ends: "Atheism shouldn't cut itself off from the rich sources of religion." It's about exploiting those resources, for him. They're resources of the "ritualistic, moralizing, and communalistic" sides of religion. We should be "respectful and impious" when frankly stealing from religion. We need to do this bec. "the secular world is full of holes," and there are "areas of life that are not going too well now."

As one who routinely baffles interlocutors here at Booktalk with my idiosyncratic brand of Christian atheism, I find this contention from de Botton very useful as a way to explore the deficiencies in "North Oxford Atheism", by which he means Richard Dawkins.

If I could go back to an essay I wrote in 1983, I was studying Being and Nothingness by Jean Paul Sartre, the famous French existentialist. Sartre has a book called Nausea, in which he describes his feeling of illness at the recognition of the great mystery of being, the knowledge that the universe and material things most definitely do exist. My reaction to this suggestion that nausea is a primary ontological emotion, considered also against Heidegger's theory that Angst is the experience where we encounter being, was that piety before the grandeur and wonder of nature is the best framework for the foundations of philosophy. I got marked down because, as de Botton alludes, piety is generally regarded as irrational and unphilosophical. I just don't think it needs to be that way, because an atheist piety can signify awe and respect for the might of natural reality.

Atheism reacts negatively to terms like piety and worship because of their traditional baggage. But this reaction cuts atheists off from the sense of connection to the whole, the wonder at being part of a complex universe. This wonder is in fact at the root of Christology, with its analysis of how time makes contact with eternity. Again, atheists regard this question as silly, because the concept of eternity is meaningless in their view. I simply think these sort of snap reactions prevent atheists from engaging with the meaning of religion as a 'rebinding' that puts us in contact with deep eternal truths. So I disagreed with de Botton's slighting reference to mysticism at the end of his talk. Like piety, mystery gets a bum rap from science. But the fact is the universe is mysterious, and denying the mystical is a way of denying the presence of mystery.

I was planning to respond to all the interesting things in DWill's post, but this is quite heavy material, so one bite at a time is enough.

Just to add, I remain of the view that Christianity began with an agenda of enlightenment, but was captured by an agenda of control. The original vision was lost after the usurpation, but it is still there beneath the rubble if you look hard. Perhaps this sense of a tantalising hidden vision of cosmic wisdom and love is what de Botton is intimating here as something that can give a dynamism to atheism.

[Dexter]

I see no need to attack the guy, what he's saying is pretty harmless, because I'm not convinced he's saying much.

Like I said, he says sermons are great, but we don't really need to do that, connecting to our physical nature is great, but what exactly follows from that? Do some group exercise or something? Looking at the moon is nice. OK. We should remind ourselves often of important things. OK.

It sounds like, hey I'm a moderate, you religious people are OK, buy my book.

I know, I'm a cynical bastard, I need some rituals and stuff.

[geo]

I haven't watched De Botton's video yet, but I'd still like to make a couple of off-the-cuff comments.

One, religion has an awful lot of baggage with it. A lot of folks do have the tendency of throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and maybe to some extent it's warranted. Then again, it's clear that many other people find personal meaning in religion. As DWill says, some of us find great comfort and meaning in the rituals and the sense of community.

I'm not sure what De Botton is proposing, but maybe he's just waxing nostalgic at a way of life that we're losing. Secularism has emerged out of industrialism and capitalism. So to say we have secularized badly is probably true, but it probably doesn't have much to do with religious beliefs or lack thereof. It's all about economic factors and the movement away from an agricultural-based economy. Perhaps religion made more sense when the majority of us were involved in the production of food and lived in small towns and villages. Ironically, at the same time that we lost our sense of community, we have improved living conditions on our planet (at least in first world countries). Like it or not, we're moving into an increasingly homogenous and globalized economy where religion seems increasingly quaint and irrelevant. I'm not saying it's better, but that is the direction we're going.

[Dexter]

By the way, Sam Harris said he is writing a book called Waking Up: A Scientist Looks at Spirituality, which I am very interested to read.

[findsharon]

The Sam Harris book sounds interesting. I can't keep up with all of these great suggestions for books, articles, etc. You guys are going to keep me busy.

[geo]

By the way, Sam Harris said he is writing a book called Waking Up: A Scientist Looks at Spirituality, which I am very interested to read.

"Spirituality" is one of those nebulous words that can mean just about anything. I've always argued that you don't have to believe in the supernatural or be religious to be a spiritual person. It will be interesting to see what old Sam comes up with. I would read that book.

[DWill]

Aren't atheists welcome at Unitarian churches? I understand that ritual and community may be important to some people, but as some have already stated there are other places to find those. Not to be cynical (too late), but I'm getting the impression that this guy is trying to be the televangelist of atheism. Ick.

I think one thing we'd need to accept about de Botton is that atheism can, maybe should, act as an interest group. For many atheists here, atheism is no more than a statement of what we lack. It's not that definitional and doesn't mean that we coalesce into a group for any particular purpose. De Botton sees these matters as something beyond the level of individual choice. Sure, we can all join whatever group we want to feel as though we're connected to people, but de Botton says--and here I tend to agree with him--that society as a whole will be missing something unless there is a substitute for the "power" aspects of religion that de Botton details in his talk. De Botton offered no suggestions in his talk about how we would go about doing this. I think it's ironic that the atheists who are interested in being an interest group, such as those who mount campaigns around Christmas time, are the loud, impolite ones that de Botton doesn't like!

I thought of the Christian college near me. It's one specifically geared to homeschooled Christian students whose level of achievement might get them into Ivy League colleges. Instead they apply to Patrick Henry, just 50 miles from DC. The purpose of the college is to train soldiers for Christ, and it's no joke. These kids learn about how to affect legislation and be skilled in lobbying. They're highly competent. That's just an example of the forces that religion can muster, in this case for a cause I don't like. But what can atheists do in response?

[DWill]

I see no need to attack the guy, what he's saying is pretty harmless, because I'm not convinced he's saying much.

Like I said, he says sermons are great, but we don't really need to do that, connecting to our physical nature is great, but what exactly follows from that? Do some group exercise or something? Looking at the moon is nice. OK. We should remind ourselves often of important things. OK.

It sounds like, hey I'm a moderate, you religious people are OK, buy my book.

I know, I'm a cynical bastard, I need some rituals and stuff.

Would you consider Cynical Bastard as your user name? Seriously, though, I just have such a strong feeling that a lot of this stuff simply comes down to the personalities we have. If we could do some kind of checklist of what we like and dislike, maybe something on the order of the Myers-Briggs (although I hate it), without mentioning religion/spirituality specifically, could we predict who would tend to favor the "spiritual" side? Such as: do you like to read poetry?; do you tend to get sentimental about things?; do you feel "moved" very often? Positive responses might describe those who tend to endorse some things about religion; negative responses might describe those who are more exclusively rationalistic or intellectual.