l]Dildoccr 0(0) TOE The Proceedings of the South Place Ethical Society

Vol. 107 No. 10 £1.50 December 2002

EDITORIAL - JOHN GRAY ON 'SHODDY' HUMANISM

The New Statesman (16-30 Dec) contains an astonishing attack by John Gray, Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics, on what he calls 'liberal humanism', Mow....the unthinking creed of conventional people' (none of whom is named).

Gray says that liberal humanism 'is very obviously a religion - a shoddy derivative of Christian faith notably more irrational than the original article, and in recent times more harmful.' The crimes of Stalin, Mao and Hitler were 'done by atheist regimes in the service of Enlightenment ideals of progress.' In that case, how come the pre-war atheist World Union of Freethinkers was attacked by the fascists, and the Russian Humanist Society, equivalent to those in the West, was not permitted until the 1990s?

'The need for religion appears to be hard-wired in the human animal.' The evidence for this is that 'Atheists are usually just as emotionally engaged as believers.' But if any strongly held belief is to be counted 'religious', irrespective.of content, to term any alleged hard-wiring 'religious' is thoroughly misleading. Further, that an impulse is there does not imply that it ought to be accepted; we are entitled to disregard it.

Gray says, 'Liberal humanism inherits several key Christian beliefs, - above all, the belief that humans are categorically different from animals.' This is a mistake as the notion that only humans have souls is not shared by humanists, for whom the biological relationship between animals and humans is a fundamental datum. Gray is wrong to say that humanists have 'faith' in humanity's inevitable prosperity through science, although we would claim that our technological creativity is now indispensable for our survival as a species.

However, in Gray's recent book, Straw Dogs (Granta), he correctly, in my view, dismisses free will as an illusion. This illusion is crucial to the theology of the three monotheisms, which he knows must therefore be false. He nevertheless complacently looks forward to their revival, gloating that atheism will then be seen as a 'relic'. We can only conclude that these ridiculous arguments bear no relation to Humanism as we know it.

THE LAST RITES FOR RELIGIOUS EDUCATION? Professor John White 3

ARGUMENTS FOR GOD IN THE ABSENCE OF MIRACLES Patrick Lewin 9

ETHICAL SOCIETY EVENTS 24 SOUTH PLACE ETHICAL SOCIETY Conway Hall Humanist Centre 25 Red Lion Square, London WC I R 4RL. Tel: 020 7242 8034 Fax: 020 72428036 Website: www.ethicalsoc.org.uk [email protected]

Officers Chairman of the GC: Terry Mullins. Hon. Representative:Don Liversedge. Vice Chairman: John Rayner. Registrar: Edmund McArthur.

SPES Staff Administrative Secretary to the Society: Marina Ingham Tel: 020 7242 8034 Librarian/Programme Coordinator:Jennifer Jeynes M.Sc. Tel: 020 7242 8037 Hall Manager: Peter Vlachos M.A. For Hall bookings: Tel: 020 7242 8032 Caretakers' Office: Tel: 020 7242 8033 Editor, Ethical Record: Norman I3acrac

New Members Carol Ajegbo, London SW19; Claire Bostock, London N7; Jim Clayson, London SW15; Terry Liddle, London SE9; Philip H. Slade, Kessingland, Lowestoft, Northants.

Obituary: PETER HEALES 1931 - 2002 It is with great regret that we report the sudden death from a heart attack of Peter Heales on 10 December 2002. I-lis funeral took place at North East Surrey Crematorium on 20 December, the officiant being Brian Dougherty. Peter Heales was one of the Ethical Society's Appointed Lecturers and a Holding Trustee for the past 8 years.

Tom Rubens contributed the following note: Since the 1980s. Peter Heales had been one of the most regular speakers at South Place Ethical Society, delivering over 40 lectures in all, mainly on philosophical subjects. He had a special interest in the history of 13ritish philosophy, particularly the period from Hobbes to Hume and the late 19th century but was also highly knowledgeable on Continental thought, especially 20th century existentialism. His vocal delivery was always clear and lucid and he avoided academic jargon. Peter studied philosophy as a mature student at London University in the 1950s (under the tutelage, incidentally, of Sir Alfred Ayer). Though his working life was largely in the field of administration, in recent years he did teach philosophy as an extra-mural lecturer with the University of London. 1 knew Peter from the mid 80s. For me, the many conversations we had together were enormously rewarding: not only because of his knowledge of philosophy but also because of his critical acumen. To me he was a kind of mentor - as I imagine he would have been to any younger friend seeking to formulate a philosophical position. His sudden death at a relatively early age is an immense loss to the Society.

Further notes will appear in a future Ethical Record.Ed]

THE HUMANIST REFERENCE LIBRARY The Library at Conway Hall is open for members and researchers from Tuesday to Friday from 1400 to 1800

Ethical Record, Decemben 2002 THE LAST RITES FOR RELIGIOUS EDUCATION? John White Professor of Philosophy of Education. Institute of Education, University of London

Lecture to the Ethical Society 8 December 2002

Britain is a secular society and becoming increasingly so. In statistical terms, in 1998 only 21% of British people firmly believed in God. Between 1970 and 1990 active adult membership of Trinitarian churches in the UK dropped from 9.3 to 6.6 million. In England, Christian church attendance dropped from 10.2% of the adult population to 7.7% between 1980 and 2000: in the same period in Wales it dropped from 12.5% to 6.6% (HMSO 2000, p.219).

Although there have been smaller-scale increases in religious observance, not least Islam, over the last thirty years, these statistics suggest that Britain is now a country where organised religion plays little or no part in the great majority (80-90%) of people's lives. If the trends mentioned continue into the twenty-first century, organised Christianity is likely to die out in Wales by around 2020; and in England by 2060.

Despite all this, religious education (RE) is still a compulsory part of the curriculum in state schools in England and Wales. Before 1988 indeed, RE was the only compulsory subject. Why this apparent paradox?

Reasons For The 1944 Act The answer lies in the period just before and during the Second World War. In 1944 religious instruction, as well as a daily act of corporate worship, was made compulsory in all state schools, subject to the right of withdrawal if parents desired this. It thus became the only compulsory subject.

Before 1944, there had been no bar to religious instruction in state schools, unlike some other countries. It was in fact still widespread. What made Britain decide to make it compulsory needs to be understood against the political background of the time. The later thirties in Europe saw the increasing influence of totalitarian systems of belief - Nazism, Fascism, Communism. In 1938, the year of Munich, British official thinking was especially affected by the German experience:

Germany had been revivified by an ideal: the Aryan religion had wrought a revolution in conduct; it had had, demonstrably and undeniably, 'a powerful effect on life and character'. Where was the counter-ideal to mobilize the energies and command the dedication of the British people? The Germans had, when they began their revival, nothing but belief: where was the belief behind the British way of life, which was now so sorely threatened? (Loukes, 1965. p22)

The Spens Report on grammar and technical high schools of 1938 suggested that the solution lay in religious education. The theme was taken up by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York in 1941:

There is an ever-deepening conviction that in this present struggle we are fighting to preserve those elements in human civilisation and in our own national tradition which owe their origin to Christian faith. Yet we find on every side profound ignorance of the Christian faith itself. There is evidently an ungent need to strengthen our foundations by securing that effective Christian education should be given in all schools to the children, the future citizens, of our country. (ibid, p.23) Ethical Record, December 2002 3 • By the time the 1944 Education Bill - which was to introduce compulsory religious instruction - was being debated in parliament, a firm association had been made between the Christian religion and the cause of democracy itself.

The war was seen as a clash of ideologies. To some it was a war between Nazi and Christian, but to most it was a war between totalitarianism and democracy. Therefore, people were forced to ask themselves what was the basis of this democratic tradition for which so many men had fought and died. To the majority, Christian ethics seemed to be the basis of British democracy.... 'it was vital that the children of the nation should learn about the Christian faith in order that they, as citizens of the future, might have the necessary moral fibre to uphold the democratic way of life....' (Rosalind Strachan, quoted by Niblett 1966 p 20)

Religious education was made compulsory in 1944 for civic reasons, to help strengthen people's moral commitment and attachment to democracy.

After the war, less and less was made of this civic rationale for RE. Over the next decades, however, it developed a civic dimension of a different sort. The idea that RE should encourage adherence to Christianity was replaced by a non-confessional approach, emphasising an understanding of religion. Its exclusively Christian emphasis was replaced by a multi-faith approach. For many years a central aim of RE has been to encourage pupils to understand and respect the beliefs and practices of citizens from , different faith communities, Christian, Moslem, Jewish, Hindu and others. Since 1988 Christianity has been given a special weighting among these.

Morality Was Linked With Religion Although the wartime perception of religion as a basis for democracy has withered, the more general belief that religious education is closely interlinked with morality has been more long-lived.

As of 2001, there is no statutory national programme of study for RE, as there is for the subjects of the National Curriculum introduced in 1988. Instead, there are two Model Syllabuses, drawn up centrally (by the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority in 1994) for the guidance of those framing 'Agreed Syllabuses' at local authority level (SCAA 1994). In addition, there is a centrally published booklet laying down aims and expected attainments, as for the National Curriculum subjects (QCA 2000).

It contains countless examples of links taken to exist between religion and morality. Take the section about 'the Importance of Religious Education'. It comprises nine statements:

'Religious education develops pupils' knowledge and understanding of, and their ability to respond to, Christianity and the other principal religions represented in Great Britain.

By exploring issues within and across faiths, pupils learn to understand and respect different religions, beliefs, values and traditions (including ethical life stances), and their influence on individuals, societies, communities and cultures.

RE encourages pupils to consider questions of meaning and purpose in life.

Pupils learn about religious and ethical teaching, enabling them to make reasoned and informed judgements on religious, moral and social issues.

4 Ethical Record, December, 2002 Pupils develop their sense of identity and belonging, preparing them for life as citizens in a plural society

Through the use of distinctive language, listening and empathy, RE develops pupils' skills of enquiry and response.

RE encourages pupils to reflect on, analyse and evaluate their beliefs, values and practices and communicate their responses.

RE does not seek to urge religious beliefs on pupils nor [sic] compromise the integrity of their own beliefs by promoting one religion over another.

RE is not the same as collective worship, which has its own place within school life.

The first two of these have to do with the aim, mentioned above, of understanding and respecting the plurality of faiths in British society. This is less controversial (but see III [a] below) than 3.4.5 and 7. The most obvious way of interpreting these is that a central aim of RE is to develop pupils' understanding of and ability to make judgements about ethical matters - about meaning and purpose in life, moral and social issues, identity and belonging.

This is reinforced when one looks at the Model Syllabuses, statements of expected achievements. and RE's contribution across the school curriculum. Although most of the material has to do with coming to understand the main features of different religions, general moral objectives are evident in such phrases as

'consider and respond to...questions about the nature of values in human society' (Learning across the curriculum/ spiritual development (C)CA 2000, p13);

'RE includes learning about taking responsibility for oneself and others. The beliefs and values studied are the foundation for personal integrity and choice' (Learning across the curriculum/improving one's own learning and performance (op.cit. p14)).

There are very many examples in the Model Syllabuses of work on specific religions triggering more general moral learning. To give just one, from work on Hinduism at Key Stage3 (age 11-14), children 'should be encouraged to think about', among other things, 'the importance of keeping promises', 'the use of violence', 'qualities they admire in people' (SCAA 1994. Model 2, p43).

RE was made compulsory in 1944 for moral/civic reasons and the legacy continues in two ways: [aj in the notion that RE is morally educative and [b] in its aim of helping children to understand and respect the plurality of faiths. How adequate are .these justifications?

What Does The Moral Life Rest On? [a] RE is no longer to be taught in a confessional way. Its aim is not to induct pupils into Christianity, but to promote understanding of this and other religions. How is the academic study of religions meant to be morally educative? There is, after all, a difference between learning facts about the place of promise-keeping or love of one's neighbour in Hinduism and Christianity, and developing in moral judgement or sensitivity. How is the former meant to bear on the latter?

Where RE is more openly confessional - as it generally was in this country in the past and still is in some schools, making links between religion and morality may seem Ethical Record, December, 2002 5 less problematic. If there are fewer qualms about reinforcing a belief in God in children, cannot one lead them to see that the reason why they should be kind, loyal and forgiving is that these things are in line with how God wants them to behave?

There are well-known problems about this kind of justification. How does one get from premiss to conclusion? It does not follow from the fact that someone wants us to do something that we ought to do it. If a drug dealer in the West Indies wants me to take a kilo of cocaine on my flight to London. I am not morally oblieed to do so. Justificatory appeals to God's will only work if it is assumed that what God wants us to do is morally worthy. But this, as Plato showed in the Euthyphro, makes moral worthiness independent of divine will.

This religious justification rests on the further assumption that God exists. In a confessional system reinforcing this belief in children may have seemed unproblematic. In present-day RE there is no place for it. This means that the subject cannot aspire to be morally educative via this route. The problem is that there does not seem to be any other. Merely knowing facts about moral beliefs in different religions is of little help.

Of course, some children may imbibe the idea that morality is at root religious without being explicitly taught it. Given the pervasiveness of references to moral values in the Model Syllabuses and other RE literature, this would not indeed be surprising.

This pervasiveness may well also leave many children confused about the moral life and what it rests on. As from 2000, two new subjects have been introduced into the National Curriculum: Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE) and Citizenship. Both are heavily weighted towards moral/ethical learning, the former more in the personal domain, the latter in the civic. In addition, the school curriculum has now been furnished - and not before time! - with a set of overarching aims. Very many of these have to do with personal/civic qualities and have a high ethical content. Every subject, not just RE, is expected to contribute to such overall aims as 'valuing ourselves, our families and other relationships, the wider groups to which we belong and the environment in which we live': 'the virtues of truth, justice, honesty, trust and a sense of duty'; 'being responsible and caring citizens'.

RE became compulsory in 1944 for moral/civic reasons, but in the light of these post-2000 developments this rationale no longer applies: there are now so many other parts of the curriculum involved in this work. These new forms of moral/civic education are moreover secular. If RE continues to have its traditional moral remit, there is a danger that pupils who take this seriously will be confused by the conflicting messages reaching them from different parts of the curriculum.

I conclude that the claim that RE is morally educative is ill-founded and cannot be used as a valid justification for its being a compulsory school subject.

Why Restrict Belief Systems To Religious Ones? [b] Moral education is not the only aim of RE. There is also the aim built into the first two of the nine statements - about developing pupils' understanding of and respect for different religions.

There is a lot to be said in favour of this. It is part of a proper civic education that children should learn about different groups in their society and their beliefs. But what 6 Ethical Record, December, 2002 weight does this objective have in relation to other curricular aims? Is the weight strong enough to support RE as a separate curriculum subject, with all the kudos that this brings with it? There are three ways in which current guidance for RE in the Model Syllabuses falls short.

First, there is no good reason for restricting the belief systems of different groups in the society to religious ones. Only some 20% of the population live by these. Among the thousands of items in the two Model Syllabuses, I have found none which acknowledge there are non-religious people who live according to different values and beliefs. Students need to understand and respect all sorts of pictures of how best to live a human life, pictures not necessarily dependent on religion: the pursuit of physical pleasures and comforts, devotion to learning and the pursuit of truth, vegetarianism, feminism, views which highlight sport, artistic pursuits, adventure, social service, polities, intimacy, self-knowledge.

It is not just a matter of understanding and respecting others' views. Pupils should also be encouraged to weigh up their credentials. The second defect of current RE syllabuses is that they provide so little opportunity for assessing the soundness of the views presented. The items arc all within a religious thought-world which is treated uncritically. Even in the one place where fundamental questions are raised about the existence of God in Christian thought, the suggested focus is on 'evidence for God' (my italics). This is elaborated as

'the grounds on which Christians argue for the existence of God - revelation through scripture and personal experience, through observation and reflection on the universe, and through reason' (SCAA 1994, Model 2, p.53).

There is no indication that many people question the existence of God. Neither, thirdly, do the thousands of items in the Model Syllabuses say anything negative about religion or religions. The general tone is positive and approving. There is nothing about the bigotry, persecution, intolerance and inter-faith conflict and wars, which have been so marked a feature of human history and which scar so many countries in our day.

The study of religion should certainly feature in the school curriculum. But not as now. It should be purged of the three blemishes which mar it, as well as of its role in general moral education. But this does not leave RE with a good case for remaining a separate compulsory subject. With PSHE and Citizenship as well as History now part of the National Curriculum, there is plenty of scope for including religious material in the work of other subjects. PSHE has as part of its remit to introduce pupils to a range of views about global aspects of our human life, including religious views. History and Citizenship can together explore the role of religions in human life for good and ill, both in the past and today. The over-detailed study of differences between faiths and their practices which now chokes the RE syllabus and chokes off its recipients is scarcely a priority.

No Good Reason For RE's Protected Status I have looked at the actual rationales officially given for compulsory RE and found them wanting. RE has no place as an independent subject either as a vehicle of moral education or in order to promote an understanding of religions. Does that mean that its legally privileged place in the curriculum as a compulsory subject from 5 to 16 should be abandoned?

A view currently being aired is that the only valid justification for RE depends Ethical Record, December, 2002 7 on a radical change in its content (Hand 2003). Rather than teach children about different religions, it should engage them in the examination of religious claims - about the existence of God, for instance, or whether there is an afterlife. These involve epistemologically distinctive forms of argumentation, to which all pupils should be exposed.

1 agree that these kinds of questions should be discussed - although I don't see them as epistemologically unique, since they bring in scientific considerations as well as religious. But the new reason is not good enough for keeping RE in its current privileged position. A central issue is how much curricular time between 5 and 16 should be devoted to such reflection? At the moment each pupil is supposed to have some 500 periods of RE over these eleven years. Assuming that confessional, moral and multi-faith aims are to be excluded, this seems far too much time for this limited purpose, given also that relevant work on evolution, astronomy and other topics in science will take place elsewhere. The issue, in any case, cannot be resolved without looking at what priority discussion of these religious/scientific questions should have in comparison with other activities which might compete for the same curricular space.

I see no justification, therefore, for compulsory RE from 5 to 16. Is there a better case for keeping it as a compulsory subject in a slimmed-down way, perhaps only for older children who have more of the scientific and other understanding necessary to pursue the questions? One difficulty here is that questions about the creation of the universe, life after death, etc bring in scientific as well as religious perspectives - and ethical ones, too, insofar as these are entangled with religious notions. So there is no good reason for keeping the title 'religious education' for work of this kind. The title itself generates a bias towards a certain point of view.

Another solution would be to abandon RE as a separate entity altogether. Since 2000 the National Curriculum ineludes Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE). Much of this new subject is about self-understanding. The questions we have been discussing fit well under this umbrella. There is no good reason for keeping them hived off in a discrete part of the curriculum.

My overall conclusion is that no good reason is available for keeping RE as a separate school subject. It is time for its protected status under the 1944 Act to be removed.

Note I have learnt much from discussions on the subject matter of this talk with my colleague at the Institute of Education, Michael Hand.

References Hand M. (2003) 'Is compulsory Religious Education justified?' In White, J. (ed) Rethinking the School Curriculum (provisional title) London: Routledge/Falmer. HMSO (2000) Social Trends 30. London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office. Loukes H. (1965) New Ground in Christian Education. London: SCM Press. Niblett R. (1966) 'The Religious Education clauses in the 1944 Act' in Wedderspoon, A.G. (ed) Religious Education 1944-1984. London: Allen and Unwin. Plato: Euthyphro. QCA (2000) Religious Education: non-statutory guidance on RE. London: Qualifications and Curriculum Authority. SCAA (1994) Model Syllabuses I, 2 London: SCAA.

Ethical Record, Decembet; 2002 ARGUMENTS FOR GOD IN THE ABSENCE OF MIRACLES DEATH, EVIL, LOVE, LOSS, AND HOPE Part II Confessions of a panentheistic unitarian Christian Patrick Lewin The Society fbr Process Thought Lecture to the Ethical Society, 20 October 2002

'I met in the street a very poor young man who was in love. His hat was old, his coat was threadbare there were holes at his elbows: the water passed through his shoes and the stars through his soul.'

'I am in the night. There is a being who has gone away and carried the heavens with her.'

'Is there a God, Lasher?' I do not know. Rowan. I have formed an opinion and it is yes. but it fills me with rage.' ' Why?' ' Because I am in pain. and, if there is a God, he made this pain.' ' But he makes love, too, if he exists.' ' Yes, Love. Love is the source of my pain.''

Life is a journey. a voyage in uncharted waters, a pilgrimage, a quest, an adventure, a predicament. a feast or famine, a hand at cards we didn't ask to play; to Horace Walpole 'a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those that feel', to Edna St Vincent Millay not 'one damn thing after another' it is one damn thing over and over', and to each of us a miracle, since the odds against our being born were astronomical.' 'Let us endeavour so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.'

'Give me but one firm spot on which to stand, and I will move the earth.'" Where is the Archimedean base from which to comprehend a moving world? 'Know thyself' was the first of the three maxims inscribed on the Temple of Apollo at Delphi,' and though some awareness of our own ignorance combined with a pack-animal mentality has often meant enslavement to a Pope, a paper Pope, some fanatic or Messiah promising a kingdom here or hereafter." that still commends itself as the best place to start. 'Faith in its newer sense.' said Dewey in Living Philosophies, 'signifies that experience itself is the sole ultimate authority.' Both/and suggests we do well to take heed of and perhaps become part of the creative centre of our culture, to enrol in the university of travel, and to journey widely in the mind. Bertrand Russell claimed that 'Every man, wherever he goes. is encompassed by a cloud of comforting convictions, which move with him like flies on a summer day." As in a serious chess game many times more moves are made in each head than are played on the board, so there are others of us who find ourselves accompanied everywhere by countless memories, voices of friends and others we've met, or of those long gone speaking through books, music that outlasts the centuries, snatches of popular song, many an idea challenged by another.

'The unexamined life is not worth living' and there's plenty of time. Why on earth should anyone want to kill time? i am never less alone than when alone,' said Scipio Africanus.'" Pascal said reading Montaigne's Essays had gained him thirty years of study and reflection. Given my time over, I wouldn't read two-thirds of the books, because there were better." or watch nine-tenths of the television, but like Newton we can all stand on giants' shoulders. In the natural rhythm of our days there are times of society and of solitude, but the most precious resource for life, enjoyment,

Ethical Record, December 2002 9 understanding and safety is our brain.'2 Helen in1he typing-pool, with a face to launch at least a flotilla, who realized one day she was sitting on a gold mine. was scarcely more wasteful of inner potential than the rest of us, who regard prodigies as freaks. We shudder at the thought of John Stuart Mill's father teaching him Greek at three, and point out that he later suffered a breakdown. We forget, or we never read, what the victim had to say in his Autobiography: 'What I could do, could assuredly be done by any boy or girl of average capacity and healthy physical constitution: and if I have accomplished anything. I owe it, among other fortunate circumstances, to the fact that through the early training bestowed on me by my father. I started. I may fairly say. with an advantage of a quarter of a century over my contemporaries.' Norbert Weiner graduated at fourteen, and after further study at Harvard and Cornell, received his Ph.D. from Harvard at eighteen. Russell's Autobiography includes a letter from Norbert's father before he came on to Cambridge, explaining that this was 'not as the result of premature development or of unusual precocity, but chiefly as the result of careful home training, free from useless waste'. We feed and water our plants and livestock; some of us occasionally exercise our bodies; through sheer ignorance of what our brains need, we wind up with a clapped-out Ford instead of the Rolls-Royce we might have had. Joy Adamson told me lions were better than humans, because humans fell in the Garden of Eden, lions didn't; but notice what the writers of Genesis considered our sin: eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in other words becoming wise through gaining experience and thinking for ourselves, something hardly likely to commend itself to the elders or the priesthood. As the serpent said: 11/Jour eyes will be opened, and you will be like God.' Judging by results, for all that fruit conferred, it must have been a banana. Were we to be transported to the future, or to a civilised planet, we would be the ones pitied, as stunted freaks.

The parents I chose, or the hand fate dealt me, blessed me with a mother who gave me a sense that nothing I ever did would cause her to stop loving me, though she'd hand me over to the police if I wouldn't turn myself in.'" And a father who on returning from the war allowed me to argue endlessly about anything, and never condescended, condemned or crowed. Though I never admitted it. I lost every single argument, not because I was necessarily any stupider or less logical, but because he knew and had experienced so much more. We are pattern-making animals; by the next day, I had added his knowledge to mine and found the pattern had redrawn itself." It was a valuable lesson, that what we find plausible merely indicates the limits of our knowledge or a group prejudice; that there's no shame in being wrong: the shame is in not respecting truth enough to be willing to grow. Someone said education should be a series of enchantments, each raising us to a higher level of awareness, understanding, and kinship with all living things. If this world is Keats's vale of soul-making and life itself is an education's , so it should be, but in the process. less romantically, my experience has been Bernard Shaw's, 'a succession of eye-openers each involving the repudiation of some previously held belief.' The first thing I said to each new class was: 'Do not believe a word I say merely because I say it.' Some of them are now saying it to their young.

And Io! Creation widened in man's view' There's a picture, an engraving I think. of a gowned philosopher-scientist in his study: there are books, a globe, telescope, measuring instruments; he is gazing into a full-length mirror. The caption reads: His one unsolved problem.'" He has fared better when looking through the telescope. As has she. In 1967 Jocelyn Bell at Cambridge, examining the trace of a radio-telescope, was the first to spot a 'bit of scruff'. It turned out to be a pulsed signal from a rapidly- spinning neutron star, originally called a pulsar." Cosmology is of major importance.

ID Etlacal Record, December. 2002 It explores the origin and development of the cosmic theatre, in a tiny area of one small stage of which our drama has so far been playing. How we have seen ourselves placed on that stage has done much to determine the nature of our society. Thinking ourselves centre-stage, and Deity looking down giving orders through a hierarchy of kings and/or priests, led to a static society of whom obedience was demanded. Today Arthur C. Clarke says we are never going to know much about the cosmos so long as we're still crawling around in the playpen of the solar system. When Peter Cook in Beyond the Fringe declared. 'I am very interested in the Universe — I am specializing in the universe and all that surrounds it,' the audience duly laughed, but it's not as absurd as it sounds. More than one theory based on our current understanding of physics suggests a possibly infinite process of universes coming into being. No light can escape from a black hole but it may be in black holes that, unobserved, other universes explode into existence, like bubbles out of the side of other bubbles, our universe having dramatically inflated out of an older one, in what is now being called the multiverse. One of several possibilities put forward by Andrei Linde at Stanford, rooted in physical theory and not just plucked out of the air, is that our universe may exist on the inside of a single magnetic monopole produced by cosmic inflation. And that monopole might be inside another universe which is inside another monopole, and so on indefinitely? Martin Rees, the Astronomer Royal, is among those who think our universe may not be the only one, and that sonic of the basic questions may be settled within a decade. But he doesn't confuse physics with metaphysics. 'Physicists may someday discover a unified theory that governs all of physical reality, but they will never be able to tell us what breathes fire into their equations and what actualizes them in a real cosmos:2'

How 'a hot, amorphous fireball' evolved over ten to fifteen billion years into our complex cosmos, and how atoms assembled on Earth and perhaps elsewhere into 'living beings intricate enough to ponder their own origins', are questions, Rees thinks, it may well be an unending quest to answer That's enough to keep us agnostic, but we are not without clues. Nobel laureate Steven Weinberg and Mario Livio, head of the science division working with the Hubble Space Telescope, both devote chapters to the part beauty plays in looking for truth at the level of fundamental physics. Its hallmarks are symmetry, simplicity, and the Copernican principle. This last can be summarized as 'We are nothing special.'" A fortunate baby finds its parents and seemingly everything else revolving around it; it is natural that in the babyhood of our species we should too, and in reality we are barely at the cave mouth in terms of being civilized. Plato, Aristotle, and the other classical authors are still read today because the two to two and a half thousand years that separate us are next to nothing, and because they asked, and attempted intelligently to answer, many of the deep childlike questions we ask ourselves in our more reflective moments. In reaching for some semblance of objectivity, we rightly seek to see everything sub specie aeternitatis, from the viewpoint of eternity, and in that light, if we say that almost all our philosophy and particularly our theology is parochial, we are being polite. It is infantile. That should be enough to keep us agnostic. 'It may be as presumptuous of us to evaluate the universe as for a hydrogen ion in the blood stream of a man to evaluate the latter:1' Besides, those who think they know it all can be mildly irritating to those of us who do."

Even so, what has been revealed recently by cosmology, a science so dependent on improved instruments, where, as Rees says, 'observation is king', is breathtaking, and humbling. Our solar system is thought to have been in existence for some 4.6 billion years, molecular biologists estimate mankind diverged from its closest relative about five million years ago, homo erectus dates to less than two million, the Cro- Magnons (those of us that aren't Neanderthals) to around 40,000 years. If one day Ethical Record, December, 2002 11 represents the age of the solar system, one second is over 53,240 years!' Our entire species has arrived on the last stroke of midnight of that one day. We are barely out of the womb. The science-based pace of change is increasing. If we don't wipe ourselves out, or something else in nature doesn't, those who conic after us should have a couple of billion years or so to grow up. before Earth starts to become uncomfortably warm as our dying sun slowly becomes a red giant. Think what they will know then and what technology should be available to them to take the necessary action. Our own children and grandchildren can look forward to knowing vastly more than we do. As it is. one evening's download from the Internet can bring them intellectual wealth to leave Solomon gasping. Whether they use it (Inert ideas' are pernicious) is another matter, as is what they choose to download. Pascal famously observed, 'The eternal silence of these infinite spaces terrifies me,' but were he to return and learn what has been known since 1917, when some of Vesto Slipher's observations of red shifts were published. the first firm evidence our universe was expanding and our galaxy not the only one, he might share the wonder so memorably expressed by Kant!" and be freed from the narrow cage of his particular Jansenist convictions. Narrowness comforted that tortured genius. 'Servitude to our God will set you free from bondage to the world, and to the Satan that has temporarily usurped divine authority over it is a comforting belief in a superstitious age. It is the rigidity of the conviction that imprisons, not the being religious, which can be as broad or as narrow as any other philosophy or way of life!'

There are still many who say that as yet we have no hard evidence there are other universes besides our own, and that for them, despite the Copernican principle, the apparent 'fine-tuning' of our universe is further evidence to be put beside all the rest in favour of there being an almighty, omniscient God. I recall exactly where I was standing, in a bookshop in Nairobi, when I read the chapter from which this comes:

'Atoms and molecules can exist only because action is quantized: but this very important feature of the universe, which is essential for the existence of the great variety of matter, introduces an ineluctable indeterminacy (the famous Heisenberg principle that prevents precise knowledge of future events, even if the solutions of all the equations that govern all events are known. The reason for this is that solutions of differential equations can predict the future only if the present is precisely known; but quantum indeterminacy, which is an essential part of nature, prevents this. Now this indeterminacy is not only a restriction on man's ability to make precise measurements; it is a restriction built into the laws of nature themselves, so that there can be no infinite intelligence that can know all things and predict all future events.'"

If Lloyd Motz, then professor of astronomy at Columbia, is correct, that is as much a roadblock in the way of believing in an omniscient God as the one erected by critical study in the way of believing that any particular historical figure can be shown to have lived a blameless life and therefore be uniquely the Son of God.

Dennis Nineham, a major British New Testament scholar, formerly on the Archbishops' Commission on Doctrine in the Church of England and one-time regius professor of divinity at Cambridge, drew attention to the historical roadblock, and on another occasion observed: the Christ of 2,000 years ago is already problematic. What will be the case with the Christ of 2,000 million years ago? That is a question theologians should not ignore, for we are quite credibly informed that the human race may yet have two billion years to go. When the Lord then conies will he find "the faith- on the earth? Do we really expect hint to?'"

Walter Lippmann coined the phrase 'the acids of modernity.'" 'Science,' says 12 Ethical Record, Decembet; 2002 Don Cupitt, is now vast in scope and very powerful. how can you keep it out?' 'Suppose you are a tribesman and you see a medical team arrive in your area and cure the blind in hundreds, at a few dollars a time. You are bound to be impressed — and your gods are bound to shiver in their shrines.' ; The great power and beauty of scientific knowledge lies in the fact that it is built on a firm foundation of doubt, and ' ; (ideally, at least) ' : the old' ; rejoice to see the young ' ; prove them wrong."' The power of positive thinking, also described as the power of mind over matter, is demonstrated daily, but there is no good reason to suppose that by divine fiat there are miraculous disruptions of the ordinary workings of nature: it is a foundational belief of modern science, also testified to every day, that there are not. If there were, modern science as we know it would have been impossible, and legions of the sick would not have been cured."

Atheism and Agnosticism I heard that fine actress Dame Sybil Thorndike on 'Talk of the Devil' quoting to this effect: 'The highest truth is only a half-truth. Think of any truth as a tent in which to spend a summer night but do not settle down in it or it will become your tomb. If you descry a doubt, weep not, for it will lead you to a further truth.'" Appropriately, since at the end of Part I (November 2002) I quoted Whitehead as saying it was trying to treat half-truths as whole truths that played the devil. And I added that, 'If atheism stopped at saying there are no miracles, I would be an atheist. But it says more.' It denies there is anything beside the realm of the contingent, and, since I don't know that. I am an agnostic.

As a sceptic, I doubt even my doubts.' Many atheists also seem remarkably sure what God is like, or would be if he hadn't omitted to exist. The standard reply is: 'Please describe this God you don't believe in, because I'm fairly sure I don't believe in him either.' (Always a 'Him'.)" 'The progress of religion is defined by the denunciation of gods. The keynote of idolatry is contentment with the prevalent gods." To make use of a well-known if controversial concept, I hope we are in a process of paradigm' shift from belief in a miracle-working God above to belief in a much richer, in some respects godlike, World or Universe or Multiverse than traditional atheists and traditional theists are as yet willing to acknowledge. If those in authority in the world religions accept the need for an updating of doctrine (and only a minority appear to), they still have a problem: how to hold on to members who will not or cannot change, while not losing those who find having to translate old words in their heads every time they attend public worship increasingly borders on intellectual dishonesty.

Meanwhile, 'To the symmetrical natures religion is indeed a crown of glory; nevertheless, so far as this world is concerned, they can grow and prosper without it. But to the unsymmetrical natures religion is a necessary condition of successful work even in this world."" It would be cruel to attempt to kick away crutches from those who still desperately need them, though we recognize that rabbit's-foot religion leaves those who cling to it vulnerable to an unnecessarily painful encounter with reality. Better the uncomfortable truth than the comforting untruth. Traditional atheists still fighting old battles risk becoming mirror images of those they condemn; nay-saying can become a denial of the positive spirit that welcomes new truth and inspires others to the unending quest. Those wholly set in their ways are like one of the two monks. Out dispensing charity, they had come across a young woman hesitant to cross a fast-flowing stream. One had carried her across. Back in the monastery at nightfall, he was chided by the other for doing so. 'But I put her down hours ago,' he replied; it is you, Brother, that have been carrying her around all day.'

Ethical Record, December, 2002 13 For theists it is doubly hard to remain open-minded, to hold belief provisionally as in theory scientists do. In most religions belief in the Ultimate is focussed very personally in some divine-human figure. Commitment has become lifelong companionship with 'a Friend who sticketh closer than a brother'. It is hard to say, 'I think I have a divine Friend who never fails me.' Though not as difficult as admitting to being filled by the Holy Ghost. If there are no miracles, there are no divine-human figures and, while the various 'Scriptures' may still have much to say to us, as does all great literature, none can any longer be treated as sacred, as unquestioned revelation.' Atheists and agnostics whose commitment is to be fair will not of course confuse the many images of Christ with the prophet from Galilee. There will always be a tension between the world as it is and the world as it ought to be, and Jesus stood in the desert tradition of the great Hebrew prophets harking back to Moses, some with their own souls swept clean by the awesomeness of the Judean wilderness that has to be experienced to be understood, who saw the corruption of life in the cities and pronounced the judgement of Yahweh on the worshippers of Mammon.' Even before his time the denunciations themselves had become corrupted, turning nationalistic.' New Testament scholarship cannot determine with any certainty Jesus' own motives but his dreams included the divine Son of man coming from the skies to restore the reign of God over the earth that had manifestly been usurped by Satan. However he saw himself, he clearly played a seminal role in what scholars describe as 'the Christ Event'. It says something for humankind's perception of justice that in the predominant Western religious tradition, greater than any king, a carpenter' turned preacher became the peg on which down the ages we have hung our ideal figure: stern for Presbyterians, caring for Quakers, for H. G. Wells 'like some terrible moral huntsman digging mankind out of the snug burrows in which they had lived hitherto,' Che Guevara for the radical young.

It is said that no tribe has ever been discovered that is without religion. That we die puts up everywhere a question mark against life. Wilfred Owen, whom many hold to be the greatest of the First World War poets, and who was himself killed in action one week before the armistice, called one of his poems 'Futility'. Is everything that is said in places of worship and at the grave side sheer wishful thinking? When the lamp shatters, the light goes out, not off to somewhere else. Or was Plato right in being convinced that value implies purpose, so that everything of value must be preserved in God? 'As to death,' wrote Voltaire, beg that we may reason a little. It is very certain that we do not feel it at all, it is not a painful moment, it resembles sleep like two drops of water, all that gives us pain is the idea that we shall not awaken. What is horrible is the apparatus of death, it is the barbarism of extreme unction, the cruelty of warning us that it is all over.' And again: 'To believe in absolutely no god'; would be a frightful moral mistake, a mistake incompatible with wise government.' Voltaire was a deist." Nature endows all life with a powerful instinct to survive, supremely indifferent to individual consequences, equipping predator and prey alike through natural selection of random mutations to become more skilled in the chase. One creature's life is another creature's breakfast yet there is still enjoyment. Below our level of self-consciousness it does not appear to induce mass neurosis.

'There are so many different reasons,' writes a contemporary, 'why we cannot know what the nature of total reality is that I have no difficulty in explaining it as a fact. The difficulty is in living with it.' : All my life I have been brimming over with an almost uncontainably powerful desire to live.' ; it is not only with my personal survival that I am concerned: I have also a greedy, sharp-edged curiosity about how things are, a clamant need to understand ' ; and about this there is something impersonal and objective. I believe I would still have it if I were indestructible.'" 14 Ethical Record, Decembet; 2002 So contradictory and often improbable are many of the beliefs about what happens after death that it is hard not to think that a great deal of such belief is irrational, but that in itself is insufficient to discredit it. Reason can only go so far. The primary wonder and mystery is that anything exists at all; of the second wonder Einstein said: 'The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility ' ; The fact that it is comprehensible is a miracle.'" Philosophy and science are born of wonder; 'The man who cannot wonder, who does not habitually wonder (and worship); wrote Carlyle in Sartor Resartus, ; is but a pair of spectacles, behind which there is no Eye.' Love is filled with wonder, '0 wonderful, wonderful, and most wonderful wonderful! and yet again wonderful, and after that, out of all whoopingr, and love withers if the wonder dies. 'Familiarity' is miscalled: it is the refocussing on self that closes the eye, if it ever saw the true wonder of the other in the first place. Picking up on what Socrates said or Plato wrote," the greatest Platonist philosopher of modern times declared: 'Philosophy begins in wonder. And, at the end, when philosophic thought has done its best, the wonder remains.'" With that wonder there are also love and joy, fierce desire, pity, and hope. Biological evolution was first posited by a Greek but did not take root; evolution has been called a child of the Enlightenment. Jean Baptiste de Lamarck's Philosophic zoological(' was published in 1809, the same year Darwin was born, who was to establisd beyond serious doubt the mechanism that explains our biological origin" from primaeval slime through our recent forebear, a hairy quadrumanous primate of the great anthropoid group, making us just another denizen of nature's zoo. The 19th was Darwin's century and in 1809 also were born Edward FitzGerald and Alfred. Lord Tennyson, whose two long poems were principally concerned with death, with living in the shadow of it, wondering what meaning it might have, though reaching very different conclusions about what to do about it.

'All philosophy is a meditation upon dying and death.'" What then has philosophy to say? I have Iwo images in my head as I start to write this. One is of an aunt when I was small searching for her glasses: she would never find them by looking for they were on the top of her head. The other a bov with his head held down in a bucket of water by an African chief. His offence? None. He had asked the chief how to find God and was learning that we only find Him when we want Him enough. I still don't believe that is an African story: it has missionary written all over it. But it does point up that this is a serious existential question. Only those seriously committed to following life-changing truth can expect to find it. The Bible takes it for granted that God exists: 'The fool hath said in his heart there is no God.' (The Bible being a library, there are traces of older beliefs, polytheistic and henotheistic, and what brought the prophet Amos to monotheism was ethical insight: virtues and vices are independent of political frontiers. He would have denied cultural determinants.)

The big three 'arguments' are still the cosmological, teleological, and ontological. That the last strikes most people when they hear it as patently nonsense has not deterred some very bright philosophers from espousing it. As originally formulated by Anselm. God is 'that than which nothing greater can be conceived: Think of a Being combining all perfections. If it only existed in our mind, we could think of a greater. one combining all perfections outside our mind, in reality. Kant demolished this in five words: *Existence is not a predicate.' Even though a thousand pounds in our bank account is worth a thousand pounds more in real life than the same sum in our head. Gaunilo, a monk, had already debunked it when it was put forward, positing a perfect island (what he said is worth reading for its humour) so Anselm had come up with what is claimed to be a stronger formulation: God is that which cannot be conceived not to exist. If we can so much as conceive of his existence, he must exist. If we are only thinking of a Being in our head, we are not thinking of God! My own Ethical Record, December, 2002 15 view is that AnseIm would have done better to use the idea as a meditation: Were the eyes of our spirit to be open, we would see how much more wonderful God must be/Thou art than anything which in our earth-bound state we can possibly conceive.

The teleological or design argument has been holed below below the waterline by Darwin. Indeed, as the late Stephen J Gould used to say, how bad some of the designs in nature are is evidence of evolution. Take the panda's thumb. An engineer would completely redesign it, but evolution had to start with the bears paw as it was. Little by little it adapted to enable the panda to behave in an unbearable way. It is far from perfect but it does the job. Recently, as we have noted, the apparent 'fine-tuning' of our universe, without which there would be no possibility of life, has been advanced as evidence of design, but the possibility of its being only one of many has caused that argument to lose much of its cogency.

The cosmological argument is far the most important, but having read fairly widely in the literature I can't help feeling most philosophers and theologians have rather missed the point by pressing the argument too far." There are several versions of it but its strongest version is in essence very simple and straightforward.

If there had ever been absolutely nothing, no universe, no space, no time, no space-time. no matter, energy or mind, no creative or generative principle, no womb of infinite possibilities, no laws of physics or anything else, no God, no being of any kind, nothing at all, what would there be now?

Answer: Nothing. Of course. Surprising how many with a smattering of cosmology claim the universe brought itself into existence, citing, for instance, the Hartle-Hawking 'no boundary condition' theory as set out in Hawking's A Brief Histmy of Time and elsewhere. 'The boundary condition of the universe is that it has no boundary', just as when we reach the north pole we can keep on going right round the globe again. 'So long as the universe had a beginning, we could suppose it had a creator. But if the universe is completely self-contained, having no boundary or edge, it would have neither beginning nor end: it would simply be. What place, then, for a creator?' But all such theories presuppose some laws of physics."

John Leslie's Universes, 1989, is outstanding as an introduction to modern cosmology and its philosophical implications, but loses me in the two arguments he sets such store by. One he thinks is buttressed by Einstein. 'Why, indeed, would a good world ever include changes? Why create situations and have Time's tooth gnaw away at them? Well, I find it useful to model Time as not gnawing at realities. take my inspiration from Einstein's statement that it is "natural to think of a four-dimensional existence, instead of, as hitherto, the evolution of a three-dimensional existence-. That is, I accept what is known as the B-theory of Time, now very popular with philosophers. Past events are no more absent from existence than Africa is absent from existence just because you find yourself in Canada. Past-ness, present-ness, and fiiturity are as relative as here-ness and over-there-ness.'

Of what comfort, I ask, can it be to those who have wept for the loss of loved ones to believe they are still living in past time? It is bad enough if they have emigrated and show no sign of returning. But we can email people on other continents and speak to them on the telephone. Socrates doesn't have a computer and his telephone number is ex-directory. The other is the Neoplatonic view of God as 'the workl:c creative ethical requiredness. Or, which comes to the same thing, he is the creatively effective ethical requirement that there he a good universe or universes. Or, again, he is the 16 Ethical Record, December; 2002 Principle that the ethical need for a universe or universes is itself responsible for the actual existence of that universe or those universes. However, it might instead be that God was a divine person creating everything else. Such a person might owe his existence and creative power to the fact that this was ethically required, a position suggested by the philosopher A. C. Ewing. It is no insult to a divine person to suggest that he exists for that kind of reason. If anything, what would be uncomplimentary would be to call his existence utterly reasonless.' Make of that what you will.

To return to our first step: If there had ever been nothing, there would still be nothing. (How not to use time tenses when talking of a theoretical situation without time, defeats me.) Second step: But there is something, a great many somethings, so there has always been something.

The third simple step in this argument is to distinguish between what the schoolmen called 'contingent being' and 'necessary being'. It seems as if everything we encounter in this universe is contingent. That is to say, it happens to exist but it didn't have to exist. It couldn't create itself, it was brought into being by something already here, and one day, in the near or far future, it will probably cease to exist.

'Necessary being' is theoretical. It is put forward as an alternative to contingent being because, if everything is contingent, then we have an apparently insuperable problem: how did the first contingent something or somethings come to exist if they were the first? They couldn't make themselves. Many philosophers past and present have agreed there has to be necessary being because contingent being cannot create itself.

A minority in the past (I have no idea how present-day philosophers would divide on this) have argued that, while isolated contingent beings can't produce themselves, an infinite series of contingent beings doesn't need explaining. Plato, Aristotle, and most philosophers in the past have thought that it does. I agree.

What it does not do is prove the existence of God. That is going too far. Let us set out the possibilities.

I. The existence of an eternal God, who has probably been eternally creating. The existence of more than one God, one or more of them eternally creating. But far enough apart not to bump into one another and drop a universe or two. The existence of a Whatever, which is at least creative, even ifunconsciously. The existence of two or more Whatevers, preferably immobile if they're not conscious of what they're doing. This universe or multiverse having something, in it or about it or both, which is not contingent. More than one of these combinations of contingency and necessity.

My own hunch is that No 5 is correct and all that is needed is some dusting down and refurbishment of a very ancient belief, in classical Greece and in ancient India: the One and the many.

The One is necessary, eternal. The many are contingent, in time.I3ut in the ancient belief the One was simply another name for God, and wasperfect, unchangeable, since perfection was thought of as static; only whatwas imperfect needing to change.

Ethical Record, December, 2002 17 This idea of perfection is not even 'all very well' for statues: beautiful art gives us an impression of life. And this old idea of perfection goes against all our experience of life. So let us speculate and suggest that the One exists eternally, but its entire life is exclusively in time, in the many And furthermore, that nothing that happens to the many in time is lost, being preserved for ever in the One and making a difference to the One, being its own experience and history in time.

What does atheism have to say if it accepts that the realm of the contingent is eternal but insists there is nothing beside the contingent that enables it to be eternal? That it's a mystery. That it just is. Possibly, but that is to stop arguing, to stop questing for explanation. That surely, in reality, is agnosticism. Why not call it so?

What this modest version of the cosmological argument does is suggest we bewilling to recognize the strong possibility, to put it no higher, that thereis more to existence than sheer contingency, that there's an element of the necessary, whatever that element and its qualities be. That is why I personally am an agnostic, though, since it is impossible, and would be wrong were it possible, just to sit on the fence and opt out, I join with dedicated atheists everywhere in working for a better world, admiring them for doing so in the conviction that in time all 'The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces. The solemn temples, the great globe itself ' ; shall dissolve land] Leave not a rack behind.' I and others like me work for what we think will in some sense exist in all its loveliness forever. Music played by those living along the time line will fade upon the ear, but sound forever in eternity. To love and to bc loved is to know eternity here.

There are other arguments, particularly Peirce's 'Neglected Argument', evidently unknown to J. L. Mackie, whose genuine attempt to be fair is distinctly circumscribed in scope, his The Miracle of Theism: Arguments for and against the Existence of God, 1982, One major philosopher's stance must, however, be touched on here. When I was a boy people still referred to 'the silent deep'. Then word leaked out that the Americans had lowered special microphones into the water to listen for enemy submarines and discovered the fish were all shouting with their mouths full of water." It was a reminder that if we don't use the right methods when asking questions we can't expect to obtain sensible answers, and that is a fairly standard criticism of those analytic philosophers who don't find any of the'. traditidnal ;arguments for God' convincing. Neither did Kant, but it didn't turn him into an unbeliever. Flume having woken him from his 'dogmatic slumbers',' he laboured to produce first his Critique of Pure Reason", agreeing we cannot prove the existence of God, but on the grounds that our minds are not equipped to do so, and then his Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics's', Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Moral?', and in 1788 Critique of Practical Reason, arguing that for practical (moral) considerations we are justified in continuing to believe in God, freedom and immortality. But in a long passage in the earlier Critique he made perhaps his most effective appeal: 'While all the ambitious attempts of reason to penetrate beyond the limits of experience end in disappointment, there is still enough to satisfy us [practically]. No one, it is true, will be able to boast that he knows there is a God and a future life: for, if he knows this, he is just the the man whom I have long wished to find.' ; No, my conviction is not logical, hut moral certainty; and since it rests on subjective grounds (of the moral sentiment). I must not even say: It is morally certain that there is a God, etc., but: / am morally certain, that is, my belief in God and in another world is so interwoven with my moral nature that I am under as little apprehension of having the former torn from me as of losing the latter.'"

There is still the problem of evil. Rather, two problems, the other being the 18 Ethical Record, Decembel; 2002 problem of goodness, of the insistent conviction most of us have that we must resist the downward pull of our dark side. These two sides will be battling it out within us till we draw our last breath, which explains why there is such a dark side to every religion, and within politics, society. commerce, the art world, academia, and all things human. For a short while, for personal reasons, I lost faith in humans, and became an atheist. Then I saw humanity at its best and faith returned. Not knowing, but hoping, a Jew about to die once spoke what I believe again.

'Older people have an opinion about everything and are sure of themselves and their actions. It's twice as hard for us young people to hold on to our opinions at a time when ideals are being shattered and destroyed, when the worst side of human nature predominates, when everyone has come to doubt truth, justice and God.' ; It's difficult in times like these: ideals, dreams and cherished hopes rise within us, only to be crushed by grim reality. It's a wonder I haven't abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart. It's utterly impossible for me to build my life on a foundation of chaos, suffering and death. I see the world being slowly transformed into a wilderness, I hear the approaching thunder that, one day, will destroy us too. I feel the suffering of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that everything will change for the better, that this cruelty too will end, that peace and tranquillity will return once more. In the meantime. I must hold on to my ideals. Perhaps the day will come when [-II be able to realize them! Yours, Anne M. Frank'" Twenty days later, acting on a tip-off. the SS and Dutch security police arrested the eight hiding in the Secret Annexe. Only her father survived. Anne herself dying of typhus in Bergen-Belsen. her body thrown into a mass grave. Yet her words live on and will outlast Hitler's.

NOTES I. Victor Hugo, 'Saint Denis' (5.4), Les Miserables, tr. Charles E. Wilbour, 1862.

Ibid.

Anne Rice, The Mtching Hour 1990. cited in John D. Barrow, Impossibility, 1998.

In addition to the odds against the fundamental constants of our universe permitting life anywhere (see John Leslie. Universes, 1989), or its taking root on our planet, or reaching the level of complexity that allows us to become a thinking reed (see S. J. Gould, Wonderfid Life, 1989), there's the happenstance of our parents meeting and their not going to the cinema instead that night, before, as Aldous Huxley explained: 'A million million spermatozoa, All of them alive: Out of their cataclysm but one poor Noah Dare hope to survive. And among that billion minus one Might have chanced to be Shakespeare, another Newton. a new Donne—But the One was Me.' 'Fifth Philosopher's Song', 1920.

S. Mark Twain, The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson, 6 (epigraph), 1894.

Archimedes of Syracuse.

Thies, Solon, Chilon and Phemono6, have all been named as having said it first. Menander wrote: 'The saying "Know thyself' is silly.

Wisest in our generation was Isaiah Berlin, using Archilochus's aphorism about the fox and the hedgehog in support of his contention that 'most men ... crave a bold, Ethical Record, December, 2002 19 universal, once-and-for-all panacea. ... [for which] more human beings have, in our time, sacrificed themselves and others than, perhaps, for any other cause in human history.' The Crooked Timber of Humanity, 237, 1991.

'Dreams and Facts'„S'ceptical Essays, 1928.

Cicero, De Officiis, 3.1.1.

I 1 . In February 1960 Richard Feynman. in a lecture to the American Physical Society, described how all the world's written knowledge could be stored inside the head of a pin.

'The only Fence against the World is a thorough Knowledge of it.' Locke, Some Thoughts Concerning Education, 1693. William James knew in 1890 that 'The brain grows to the exact modes in which it has been exercised.' 'With half an hour's reading in bed every night as a steady practice,' says Osier, 'the busiest man can get a fair education before the plasma sets in the periganglionic spaces of his grey cortex: Out: Freud and Jung. In: neuroscience, etc. T. Norretranders, The User Illusion, 1998; Rita Carter, Mapping the Mind, 1998, and Consciousness, 2002; Joseph LeDoux, The Emotional Brain, 1998; Antonio Damasio, The Feeling of What Happens, 1999; Journal of Consciousness Studies; www.academic press.com

Her love is the foundation of any belief I have that life has more meaning than we choose to give it.

If the range of possible alternatives stretched from A to Z. those who knew only A to C might find 13 the most plausible choice, and those Y who knew only X to Z. So much for 'the specious doctrine of the golden mean', Joseph Wood Krutch's phrase in Living Philosophies: intimate credos, 1930, 1931.

Mark Twain said, 'Soap and education are not as sudden as a massacre, but they are more deadly in the long run:A Curious Dream, 1872. 'Education is a lifelong process interrupted by schooling' and 'I never let thy schooling interfere with my education' have both been attributed to him.

Everybody's Political What's What? 19, 1944.

From Joseph Blanco White's 'Mysterious Night', to Coleridge the greatest sonnet in the English language. Adam. told that night will fall, fears the loss of so much beauty, only to find that 'Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame, Hesperus with the host of heaven came. And lo! Creation widened in man's view. Who could have thought such darkness lay concealed Within thy beams, 0 Sun? or who could find, Whilst flow'r and leaf and insect stood revealed, That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind! Why do we then shun Death with anxious strife? If Light can thus deceive, wherefore not Life?'

No lone, brilliant, immortal physicist with unlimited funds could ever unravel the physical scheme of things, for the inbuilt bias of a single mind needs counteracting. So intersubjective testing is an essential feature of scientific method. 'Know thyself takes on an ironic ring, and 'Judge not that ye be not judged' an ominous one, when it dawns on us we're too blind.

Ethical Record, Decembec 2002 Heinz PageIs, Perfect Symmetry. 1985. No book captures better the wonder and excitement of cosmology.

To quote John Gribbin, 'Introduction: Where do we come from?', Companion to the Cosmos, 1996.

'Exploring Our Universe and Others' in Scientific American special edn, the once and future cosmos, Vol. 12, No 2, [1012002]; see also his Before the Beginning, 1998, and Our Cosmic Habitat, 2001.

'we do not occupy a privileged place in the universe.... In general, scientisk absolutely detest theories that require special circumstances, contrived modelling, or fine-tuning.' Mario Livio, The Accelerating Universe, 2000.

Sewall Wright, 'Biology and the Philosophy of Science', in William L. Reese and Eugene Freeman, eds, Process and Divinity 1964.

To amend Sheetz's Rumination, in John Peers, comp., 1,001 Logical Laws, p. 119, 1979.

Stretch out an arm to represent the age of our planet, with a nail file in the other hand lightly brush the extended fingernails, and we've shaved away the species that calls itself homo sapiens sapiens.

'Two things fill the mind with ever-increasing wonder and awe, the more often and the more intently we reflect on them: the starry heavens above and the moral law within', Critique of Practical Reason, Conclusion, 1788.

All in the Mind: A Farewell to God, 1998, by that good and doughty liberal warrior, Ludovic Kennedy, was reviewed by the Catholic philosopher, Roger Scruton. 'It is true that much sin has been committed in the name of Christ. As Kennedy tells us, the Spanish Inquisition murdered 10,000 innocent people over a period of 30 years. But with what do we compare this fact? With the crimes of the Muslims? With those of the Hindus? Or with those of the atheists? (The Soviet Communist Party, in its heyday, managed 10.000 murders a week.). The Times, 7.1.1999. Stalin and Mao may top the infamous list in deaths caused, yet Napoleon remains for the French their greatest hero. If Genghis Khan had had atomic weapons?

Lloyd Motz, The Universe: Its beginning and end, 1975.

'The Use of the Bible in Modern Theology', in Explorations in Modern Theology I, 1977.

A Preface to Morals, 217, 1929.

The Sea of Faith, 8-9, 1984. The book based on his BBC television series. Cupitt, an ordained Anglican, now describes himself as a 'non-realist': traditional objects of belief should now be treated as symbols.

'Science': from scire. 'know'. Thank God the power of prayer doesn't also keep us in permanent darkness.

ITV: interviewed by Kenneth Robinson, 25 January 1969. Ethical Record, December, 2002 21 The supposed refutation of a stronger form of agnosticism, that if it is impossible for anyone to know [that there is or is not anything beside the realm of the contingent], then it is impossible to know that it's impossible to know, is witty but fallacious. Extreme scepticism is self-refuting, since if it is impossible to be sure of anything at all then it is also impossible to be sure of that. Someone from the floor raised the argument that from within the realm of the contingent one can't make valid claims about how it comes to exist. True, but this undermines atheism and theism. Asked by Copleston in their 1948 broadcast debate, 'Perhaps you would tell me if your position is that of agnosticism or of atheism. I mean, would you say that the non-existence of God can be proved?' Russell replied, 'No, I should not say that: my position is agnostic.' He also replied 'Agnostic' when asked his religion on entering prison in 1916. After enquiring how it was spelt, the warder 'remarked with a sigh: "Well, there are many religions, but I suppose they all worship the same God.- This remark kept me cheerful for about a week.' Autobiography.

One contemporary feminist postchristian theologian believes in an enveloping menibrane of divine tenderness that gives miraculous answers to prayer. As Harry Potter's friend would say, 'That's scary!' Whilst substituting one gendered metaphor for another, deploring patriarchalism and downgrading a male Christ. in her theistic doctrine and practice she remains basically an unreformed traditionalist.

A. N. Whitehead, Adventures of Ideas, 2.1, 1933.

New Fontana, 1999, edited by Alan Bullock. The philosophy entries contributed by Anthony Quinton are a miracle of intelligent compression.

Lord Acton, cited by W. H. Auden in Foreword to his translation of Dag Hammarskjold, Markings, 1964.

The Reformation substituted a paper Pope for the Pope in Rome, and the very fact people had to think what it meant as they read, and not take a priest's word for it, paved the way for the Enlightenment.

In AD 6, when Jesus was a child, Varus, Roman pro-consul of Syria, had destroyed Sepphoris in Galilee just north of Nazareth and crucified two thousand followers of a deluded prophet; in 132 AD the revolt under Simon ben Koziba, nicknamed Bar Kochba, 'Son of a Star', led to the expulsion of the Jews from their homeland until our own day, Jerusalem being renamed Colonia Aelia Capitolina.

Or stonemason: 'tekton' in Greek means a worker in wood, metal or stone.

Seeming to incarnate a Joy from beyond their hard and cruel world, 'In the white blaze of this kingdom of his there was to be no property, no privilege, no pride and precedence; no motive indeed and no reward but love. For to take him seriously was to enter upon a strange and alarming life, to abandon habits, to control instincts and impulses, to essay an incredible happiness ... 'A Short History of the World, 1922.

Cocteau told Voltaire's biographer that his life was the greatest 'major poem' ever written. Cyril Connolly's Sunday Times' review of Theodore Besterman, Voltaire, 1969.

Bryan Magee, Confessions of a Philosopher, 461, 1997.

22 Ethical Record, December, 2002 'Physics and Reality', Franklin Institute Journal, March 1936.

'Wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder.' Plato, Thetetetus.

A. N. Whitehead, 'Nature Alive', Modes of Thought, 1938. In 'Understanding' ANW says Ramanujan, the great Indian mathematician who died young, took great delight in the insights that came to him through numbers: 'It was said of him that each of the first hundred integers was his personal friend.'

Before biology come physics and chemistry. Animate and inanimate alike, we are literally stardust.

True enough in a sense, whoever said it. It could be Socrates.

1 would feel more confident but for something Einstein said in his speech honouring Leo Bacck in 1953: 'Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge in the cield of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.' Rabbi Baeck , leader of the German Jews, spent 1942-45 in a concentration camp.

In the Royal Institute of Philosophy's journal, Philosophy, Quentin Smith propounds and defends his theory, evidently enjoying the belief others think he's deranged.The issues are in Vols 72-74, 1997-9, the last paper. No. 290, 10/99, entitled 'The Reason the Universe Exists is that it Caused Itself to Exist.'

Asdic, radar, and sonar were acronyms for what was then supposed to be very hush- hush.

Kant had read Flume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, the simplified 1748 version of the youthful 1739 masterpiece, A Treatise Of Human Nature, which 'fell dead-born from the press'.

55.'A Supreme Being is, therefore, for the speculative'reason, a mere.ideal, though a faultless one, ... but the objective reality of which can neither be proved nor disproved by pure reason.' 1781.

'Criticism is related to ordinary school-metaphysics exactly as chetnistry to alchemy, or as astronomy to the divinations of astrology ... There will always be metaphysics in the world, and what is more in everyone, especially in every thinking man.' 1783. A response to Flume's 'Commit it ... to the flames.'

'Whence have we the conception of God as the supreme good? Simply from the idea of moral perfection, which reason frames a priori and connects inseparably with the notion of a free will.' 1785.

' 58. As the moral precept is at the same time my maxim, reason commanding that it should be so, I shall inevitably believe in the existence of God and in a future life, and I feel certain that nothing can shake this belief, because all moral principles would be overthrown at the same time, and I cannot surrender them without becoming hateful in my own eyes.'

59. The Diary of a Young Girl, The Definite Edition, 1995, 1997.

The views expressed in this Journal are not necessarily those of the Society.

Ethical Record, December; 2002 23 PROGRAMME OF EVENTS AT THE ETHICAL SOCIETY The Library, Conway Hall. 25 Red Lion Square, Holborn, WC I R 4RL. Tel: 020 7242 8037/8034 Registered Charity No. 251396 Website: www.ethicalsoc.org.uk email: [email protected] No charge unless stated

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