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Transcendence and Transformation: Charles Taylor and the Promise of Inclusive Humanism in a Secular Age

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Transcendence and Transformation: Charles Taylor and the Promise of Inclusive Humanism in a Secular Age University of New Mexico UNM Digital Repository Philosophy ETDs Electronic Theses and Dissertations 6-9-2016 Transcendence and Transformation: Charles Taylor and the Promise of Inclusive Humanism in a Secular Age. Phillip Williamson Schoenberg Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/phil_etds Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Schoenberg, Phillip Williamson. "Transcendence and Transformation: Charles Taylor and the Promise of Inclusive Humanism in a Secular Age.." (2016). https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/phil_etds/8 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Electronic Theses and Dissertations at UNM Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy ETDs by an authorized administrator of UNM Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Phillip Williamson Schoenberg Candidate Philosophy Department This dissertation is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication: Approved by the Dissertation Committee: Iain Thomson, Co-Chairperson Russell B. Goodman, Co-Chairperson Kelly Becker Piotr Gutowski TRANSCENDENCE AND TRANSFORMATION: CHARLES TAYLOR AND THE PROMISE OF INCLUSIVE HUMANISM IN A SECULAR AGE By PHILLIP WILLIAMSON SCHOENBERG B.A., Philosophy, San José State University, 2004 M.A., Philosophy, San José State University, 2006 DISSERTATION Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Philosophy The University of New Mexico Albuquerque, New Mexico May, 2016 Dedication To Amanda Por un beso de la flaca daría lo que fuera por un beso de ella aunque sólo uno fuera. Aunque sólo uno fuera. iii Acknowledgements I have been blessed, as they say, with many friends without whom the present project could never have come to be. I began the study of philosophy in John Himelright's introduction to philosophy class, and I'm happy to lay all the blame on him for the subsequent two decades I spent reading philosophy. John is an inspiring teacher, and a true friend. A related debt goes to Maranina Olcott, who taught me to construe the Greek, and much more besides. These two have enriched my life by introducing me to classical Greek philosophy and culture, and I owe them a debt I cannot repay. During the three years I spent at San José State University I was fortunate to study under Peter Hadreas, Thomas Leddy and Richard Tiezen, who encouraged me to continue my study of philosophy beyond the MA, and supported my application to the University of New Mexico. At UNM Stephen Harris was the only other member of my "cohort" (a martial metaphor especially oddly applied to us), and I have learned much from his friendship, and kindness over the years. At UNM I have also had the pleasure to work alongside, and am grateful for many conversations with Graham Bounds, Daniel Briggs, Andrew Dobbins, Jennifer Gammage, Laura Guerrero, Charles Kalm, Jeremy Martin, Ethan Mills, and Douglas Vanbenthuysen. iv My committee at UNM was supportive of my project from the beginning, and continued to support it to the end, through the many versions of my thesis. I am deeply grateful to Iain Thomson, my true Doktorvater, for his moral and intellectual support, and his example as a teacher, a scholar, and as a human being. Likewise, I am grateful to Russell Goodman, my original advisor. It was Dr. Goodman who originally encouraged my interest in Taylor and introduced me to pragmatism. He also reintroduced me to Ralph Waldo Emerson, for which I am exceedingly glad. Kelly Becker was important for the dissertation in ways I'm sure he may never fully appreciate, but it is a better work because of his presence on my committee. Finally, Piotr Gutowski, the "outside" member of my committee was, in the end, also one of the most engaged, supportive and critical. I am also thankful for his friendship. Besides these four official members of my committee, I would like to thank John Bussanich, a truly maieutic soul, who should have been on my committee. For friendship and encouragement I would also like to thank Gail Baker. Gail read a very early version of this manuscript and it is better for her comments. For our sacred retreat of friendship and virtue, without which I would have given up on this project long ago, I would like to thank my fraternity brothers, especially Esteban Aguilar, Kenneth Davis, Jeff Johnson, and Robert Jones. I am a better person for our acquaintance. v Finally, I would like to thank my students. I have taught every semester for over a decade, and each class has offered me a renewed commitment to philosophy, and confirmed my conviction that the teaching of philosophy changes lives. Among the many students who have inspired me, Ranime Oueis, Tim Regalado, Ricardo Roybal, Oliver Stephanz and Lisa Sundval especially stand out. I would also like to mention, by way of memorial, my student Wolfgang Scott-Cohen. Finally, I thank my family most of all: Amanda, Robert and "baby girl." One of the most fundamental, and most important experiences of self-transcendence available to us in this world comes with becoming a parent, the sudden realization one only finds one's true self in loving devotion to another. vi TRANSCENDENCE AS TRANSFORMATION: CHARLES TAYLOR AND THE PROMISE OF INCLUSIVE HUMANISM IN A SECULAR AGE By Phillip Williamson Schoenberg B.A., Philosophy, San José State University, 2004 M.A., Philosophy, San José State University, 2006 Ph.D., Philosophy, The University of New Mexico, 2016 ABSTRACT This is a study in the religious philosophy of the Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor. I focus in particular on the role of transcendence in his later writing on religion and secularity with the aim of contributing to a better understanding of his overall vision of the way out of the malaise of modernity, namely, his adumbration of a pluralistic solution, which I call "inclusive humanism" in contrast to both a narrow religious humanism on the one hand, and a narrow "exclusive" secular humanism on the other. Transcendence as transformation is the centerpiece of Taylor's hope for the moral and spiritual health of the late modern West, a civilization that he argues is struggling to maintain its commitment to a number of demanding universal moral standards in the face of dwindling resources for vii articulating continued affirmation or practical commitment. While Taylor believes that the Judeo-Christian tradition contains within itself the potential for renewal, his pluralist vision is open to the possibility of a new, inclusive humanism. The requisite transformation he envisions is modeled after religious conversion, but it is also clear that Taylor is open to non-religious possibilities. viii Table of Contents Chapter One Introduction .................................................................................................. 1 Chapter Summary ...................................................................................................... 7 Chapter Two Challenges to Humanism and Transcendence in a Secular Age ..... 14 Ruth Abbey’s Challenge to Taylor’s Secularity Thesis ....................................... 21 Taylor’s Working Definition of Religion .............................................................. 28 Problems Arising from Taylor's Critique of Modernity in Sources of the Self .. 34 Chapter Three Varieties of Transcendence in a Secular Age .................................... 49 On the Very Idea of Transcendence ...................................................................... 51 The Immanent Frame .............................................................................................. 57 Exclusive Humanism: The Modern Alternative to Religious Transcendence 59 Chapter Four Transcendence as Transformation and the Promise of Inclusive Humanism ................................................................................................................ 77 Chapter Five Two Critics of Taylor on Transcendence ............................................ 102 Martha Nussbaum on Internal Transcendence and Drawing the Line ......... 103 Drawing the Line ................................................................................................... 120 Nussbaum on the Incoherence of Immortality .................................................. 124 The Maximal Demand ........................................................................................... 126 The (In)Adequacy of Exclusive Humanism ....................................................... 134 Thomson on Ontological Inconsistencies and Drawing the Line ................... 141 ix Chapter Six Pragmatism and Inclusive Humanism: Taylor and Dewey .............. 163 Taylor and Dewey: The Potential for a Constructive Engagement ................ 166 Reference List .................................................................................................................... 182 x Chapter One Introduction Let us pose the question once more in principle: Is faith possible without transcendence? Can man be taken possession of by a goal belonging to the inner world, that has the character of faith, because its content appertains to the future and is therefore, so to speak, transcendent to the present and in contrast to the suffering, discordancy and self-contradictory reality of the present?--a goal which, like so many religious faiths, has the tendency to delude us concerning the present, to console, to find a substitute in something non-existent, non-present?--and is nevertheless capable of
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