COVER CENTERS FOR INQUIRY •• www.centerforinquiry.net/about/centerswww.centerforinquiry.net/about/centers

CFI/Buenos Aires (Argentina) Ormond Beach, Fla. 32175 DOMESTIC Ex. Dir.: Alejandro Borgo Tel.: (386) 671-1921 Buenos Aires, Argentina email: [email protected] CFI/Transnational Founder and Chair: CFI/Cairo (Egypt) CFI Community/ Ex. Dir.: Barry Karr Chairs: Prof. Mona Abousenna Fort Lauderdale PO Box 703, Prof. Mourad Wahba President: Jeanette Madea Amherst, N.Y. 14226 44 Gol Gamal St., Agouza, Giza, Egypt Tel.: (954) 345-1181 Tel: (716) 636-4869 CFI/Germany (Rossdorf) Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Ex. Dir.: Amardeo Sarma CFI Community/Harlem CFI/Austin Kirchgasse 4, 64380 Rossdorf, Germany President: Sibanye Ex. Dir.: Jenni Acosta Rossdorf, Germany Email: [email protected] PO Box 202164, CFI/India (Hyderabad) CFI Community/Long Island Austin, Tex. 78720-2164 Ex. Dir.: Prof. Innaiah Narisetti President: Gerry Dantone Tel: (512) 919-4115 Hyderabad, India PO Box 119 Email: [email protected] CFI/Italy Greenlawn, N.Y. 11740 CFI/Chicago Ex. Dir.: Hugo Estrella Tel.: (516) 640-5491 Email: [email protected] Ex. Dir.: Adam Walker CFI/Kenya (Nairobi) PO Box 7951, Ex. Dir.: George Ongere CFI Community/Miami Chicago, Ill. 60680-7951 President: Argelia Tejada Tel: (312) 226-0420 CFI/London (U.K.) Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Ex. Dir.: Suresh Lalvani Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, CFI Community/Naples (Florida) CFI/Indiana London WC1R 4RL, England Coordinator: Bernie Turner Ex. Dir.: Reba Boyd Wooden 801 Anchor Rode Ave. 350 Canal Walk, Suite A, CFI/Low Countries Suite 206 Indianapolis, Ind. 46202 Ex. Dir.: Floris van den Berg, PhD Naples, Fla. 34103 Tel: (317) 423-0710 Bunnik, The Netherlands Tel.: (239) 261-6652 Email: [email protected] CFI/Nepal (Kathmandu) Email: [email protected] Ex. Dir.: Gopi Upreti CFI/New York City CFI Community/Northeast Ohio Ex. Dir.: Derek C. Araujo Kathmandu, Nepal President: Brent Bowen 80 Broad St., 5th Floor, CFI/New Zealand (Auckland) PO Box 2379 New York, N.Y. 10004 Ex. Dir.: Bill Cooke Akron, Ohio 44309 Tel.: (866) 254-8580 Tel: (212) 504-2945 CFI/Nice (France) Email: [email protected] Ex. Dir.: Dr. Henri Broch Email: [email protected] CFI/Michigan Universite of Nice, Faculte des Sciences CFI Community/Orange County Ex. Dir.: Jeff Seaver Nice, France President: David Richards 4773 Hollywood Blvd. 3777 44th Street SE CFI/Nigeria (Ibadan) Grand Rapids, Mich. 49512 Ex. Dir.: Leo Igwe Hollywood, Calif. 90027 Tel: (616) 698-2342 Oyo State, Nigeria Tel.: (323) 666-9797 Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] CFI/Ontario (Toronto, Canada) CFI/San Francisco Ex. Dir.: Justin Trottier CFI Community/Pittsburgh Ex. Dir.: Michael Adkisson 216 Beverley Street, Toronto, President: Bill Kaszycki PO Box 14880 Ontario, M5T 1Z3, Canada Box 1748 San Francisco, Calif. 94114-0880 Monroeville, Pa. 15146 CFI/Perú (Lima) Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Ex. Dir.: Manuel A. Paz y Miño CFI/Tampa Lima, Peru CFI Community/Tallahassee Ex. Dir.: Nan Owens Presidents: Meredith Stangel CFI/Poland (Warsaw) Email: [email protected] 5201 West Kennedy Blvd., Suite 124, Ex. Dir.: Andrzej Dominiczak Tampa, Fla. 33609 Warsaw, Poland CFI Community/Tucson/ Tel: (813) 849-7571 Southern Arizona Email: [email protected] CFI/Russia (Moscow State University) Coordinator: Paul Taylor Ex. Dir.: Dr. Valerii A. Kuvakin 735 S. Placita Amena CFI/Washington, DC Moscow, Russia Green Valley, Ariz. 85614 (Office of Public Policy) 621 Pennsylvania Ave. SE, CFI/Senegal (Dakar) Tel.: (520) 648-7231 Washington, D.C. 20003 Ex. Dir.: Fadel Niang Email: [email protected] Tel: (202) 546-2330 Dakar-Fann, Senegal Email: [email protected] CFI/Spain (Bilboa) CFI/West Ex. Dir.: Luis Alfonso Gámez Ex. Dir.: James Underdown CFI/Uganda (Kampala) 4773 Hollywood Blvd., Ex. Dir.: Deogratiasi Ssekitooleko Hollywood, Calif. 90027 Tel: (323) 666-9797 Email: [email protected] COMMUNITIES INTERNATIONAL www.centerforinquiry.net/about/ communities CFI/Beijing (China) Ex. Dir.: Ren Fujun CFI Community/ China Research Institute Daytona Beach for Science Population Coordinator: Bob Stevenson Beijing, China PO Box 1824

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 2 Editorial Features 4 From the Editors ISLAMOFASCISM: Restoring Universal FICTION OR THREAT? Human Point/Counterpoint Rights at the United Nations 23 Introduction 6 Editorial 24 Islamofacism Is a August/September 2008 Vol. 28, No. 5 Op-Ed Gross Misnomer ISSN 0272-0701 Laurence W. Britt 14 The Vatican’s 25 Islamofacism Is an Long Game Apt Descriptor Tom Flynn 16 Why Is Polygamy 29 The New Pariahs: Illegal? Atheists in the Wendy Kaminer U.S. Military Michael Dorian 18 Israel at Sixty: 31 Where Can God Act? Jewishness and A Look at Quantum Victor J. Stenger 19 Benedict’s 37 Why Is There a Subversive Universe at All, Journey Rather Shadia B. Drury Than Just Nothing? Part 2 22 The Real Problem in Adolf Grünbaum Embryo Research 42 A Short History Poem of Secularism Graeme Smith By David Park Musella 45 41 To Friedrich August Comes to Kekulé von Remus Cernea 47 Secularism

Departments 11 Leading Questions Fundamentalist Atheists An Interview with Chris Hedges 12 Letters 49 Church-State Update Edd Doerr and Tom Flynn Reviews 50 Living Without 57 A Secular Age Religion By Charles Taylor I Want (Not) to Believe Austin Dacey Katrina Voss 59 The Secular Conscience: 52 The Good Life Why Belief Belongs in Refirement in Our Time Public Life Roy P. Fairfield By Austin Dacey 53 Humanism Tom Flynn and Culture A Humanist in 61 Expelled: God’s Country No Intelligence Allowed Jason Gersh Directed by Nathan Frankowski 56 Humanism at Large Edd Doerr Miracles Ralph Estling FI Editorial Staff Editor in Chief FROM THE EDITORS Paul Kurtz Editor Thomas W. Flynn Associate Editors Norm R. Allen Jr., Nathan Bupp, Austin Dacey, D.J. Grothe, R. Joseph Hoffmann, David Koepsell, John R. Shook Managing Editor Restoring Universal Human Andrea Szalanski Columnists Arthur Caplan, , Shadia B. Drury, Rights at Nat Hentoff, Christopher Hitchens, Wendy Kaminer, Tibor R. Machan, Senior Editors the United Nations Bill Cooke, Richard Dawkins, Martin Gardner, James A. Haught, Jim Herrick, Gerald A. Larue, Ronald A. Lindsay, Taslima Nasrin Contributing Editors Jo Ann Boydston, Roy P. Fairfield, Charles Faulkner, Antony Flew, Levi Fragell, Adolf Grünbaum, Marvin Kohl, Thelma Lavine, Lee Nisbet, J.J.C. Smart, his year marks the sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Svetozar Stojanovic,´ Thomas Szasz Declaration of Human Rights, that monumental and hopeful Ethics Editor document that extends equal dignity to every member of Elliot D. Cohen T the human family and relies on the rule of right as the only final Literary Editor David Park Musella recourse against violence and war. Since its inception, the United Assistant Editors Nations has kept at its heart an organ dedicated to protecting Donna Budniewski, Julia Lavarnway human rights. Art Director In 2006, under mounting criticism that it had become “too selec- Lisa A. Hutter tive and too political”—in the words of then-Secretary General Kofi Production Christopher Fix, Paul E. Loynes Sr. Annan—the U.N. Commission on Human Rights was replaced by the Cartoonist U.N. Human Rights Council. The creation of the U.N. Human Rights Don Addis Council (UNHRC) was met with renewed optimism that the U.N. would Cover Images again rise to the high ideals embodied in the Universal Declaration. (Left to right) Osama Bin Laden, Rush Limbaugh, , and Dick Cheney On Friday, March 28, 2008, a blow was struck at the very heart of the United Nations. Council for Secular Humanism Chair A new U.N. initiative would “stifle the Paul Kurtz Board of Directors speech Thomas Casten, , David Henehan, Dan Kelleher, Lee Nisbet, Jonathan Kurtz, of the world’s citizens when seen as Richard Schroeder, Edward Tabash Emeritus: Jan Loeb Eisler, Joseph Levee necessary in order to protect particular Executive Director Ronald A. Lindsay beliefs and practices from criticism.” Director, Educational Programs (CFI) Austin Dacey Director, Campus and On that day, the Canadian delegation moved a resolution at the Community Programs (CFI) UNHRC to renew the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on Freedom D.J. Grothe of Speech. Traditionally, this office has been charged with monitoring Director, African Americans for Humanism and protecting the freedom of expression, that uniquely important Norm R. Allen Jr. freedom that is a precondition for the protection of all others. Vice President of Planning and Development (CFI) However, according to an amendment advanced by a coalition Sherry Rook of Islamic governments and supported by China, Russia, and Cuba, Vice President Communications (CFI) Nathan Bupp the mandate of the Special Rapporteur would be changed. It would Assistant Communications Director (CFI) now include the responsibility “to report on instances in which the Henry Huber abuse of the right of freedom of expression constitutes an act of Director of Libraries (CFI) racial or religious discrimination.” Timothy Binga The real meaning of this language, put forward in the midst of public Fulfillment (CFI) Jackie Mohr, Darlene Banks controversy surrounding the release of publications and films critical of Staff radical Islam, was unmistakable: the United Nations was now to stifle the Pat Beauchamp, Lauren Becker, Cheryl Catania, speech of the world’s citizens when seen as necessary in order to protect Eric Chinchón, Thomas Donnelly, Roe Giambrone, Debbie Goddard, particular beliefs and practices from criticism. During the debate, some Leah Gordon, Sandra Kujawa, Sandy Lesniak, Corey Neil, Lisa Nolan, Paul Paulin, Anthony Santa Lucia, John Sullivan, Vance Vigrass went so far as to suggest that if member states did not limit freedom Executive Director Emeritus of expression, they could face violence in their streets at the hands of Jean Millholland Islamic extremists.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 4 The amendment would, in the words of the Canadian dele- rights must take it upon themselves to undo this travesty. gation, “turn the mandate on its head. Instead of promoting free­ dom of expression the Special Rapporteur would be policing its herefore, we join with the many civil society organizations exercise.” (This is despite the fact that there already exist at the Tfrom around the world—including many from the Islamic U.N. other bodies, such as the Committee on Elimination of All states—in denouncing this unnecessary, unwise, and immoral Forms of Racial Discrimination, charged with working against action by the United Nations Human Rights Council. Freedom- incitement to racial hatred.) Joining Canada in resisting this rad- loving people know that the noble purpose of the Council is not ical new interpretation of the Special Rapporteur’s role were the to close any one matter off from discussion within society but to open a space for free, public discussion of every matter in “At the center of the human rights sys- all societies. In our judgment, the UNHRC has lost any legitimate claim tem to moral authority on human rights. This authority will not be of the United Nations there now stands regained­ until the United Nations enacts substantial structural reforms­ to the Council that would remove from decision-making a blasphemy taboo.” power any states that demonstrate their hostility to the letter and spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. May this sixtieth anniversary commemoration be the renew- European Union, the United Kingdom (which spoke for the United al of the idea of universal human rights, not its funeral! States and Australia), India, Brazil, Bolivia, Guatemala, and Switzerland. All withdrew their support of the original resolution Paul Kurtz along with more than twenty of the original fifty-three co-sponsor- Austin Dacey ing nations. Staggeringly, the amendment was adopted—with a Norm Allen Jr. vote of twenty-seven in favor and fifteen against with three absten- Hugo Estrella tions—and the resolution passed 32 to 0 with fifteen abstentions. At the center of the human rights system of the United Paul Kurtz is the founder of the Center for Inquiry/Transnational,­ Nations there now stands a blasphemy taboo. More fundamen- the chair of the Council for Secular Humanism, and the edi- tally, the manipulation of the instruments of the Council by a tor in chief of Free Inquiry. Austin Dacey is an associate minority in an attempt to silence critics of a particular belief editor of Free Inquiry and represents CFI at the U.N. He is also the author of the book The Secular Conscience and an system has negated the very idea of human rights norms with associate editor of Free Inquiry. Norm Allen Jr. is the exec- universal application to individual persons. Yet it is persons, utive director of African Americans for Humanism and an not beliefs, which deserve protection. associate editor for Free Inquiry. He and Hugo Estrella are It is now clear that if the ideals of the Universal Declaration the codirectors of international programs for CFI. are to be realized, nations and peoples committed to human

Earn your Master’s Degree in General Education through the University at Buffalo and the Center for Inquiry! • Explore the methods and outlook of science as they intersect with public culture and public policy. This degree is ideal for enhancing careers in science education, public policy, and science journalism—and prepares you for positions that involve communicating about science. • This unique graduate two-year degree is entirely online. Take courses from anywhere in the world, at your own pace! Courses include: Science, Technology, and Human Values; Research Ethics; Critical Thinking; Scientific Writing; Informal Science Education; Science Curricula; History and Philosophy of Science.

For details, visit: http://www.centerforinquiry.net/education/graduate_program/ How to apply: http://www.gse.buffalo.edu/programs/lai/31/ Questions? Contact John Shook, Vice President for Research, at [email protected]

5 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 FREE INQUIRY (ISSN 0272-0701) is published bimonthly by EDITORIAL the Council for Secular Humanism, a nonprofit educational corporation, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. Phone PAUL KURTZ (716) 636-7571. Fax (716) 636-1733. Copyright ©2008 by the Council for Secular Humanism. All rights reserved. No part of this periodical may be reproduced without permission of the publisher. Periodicals postage paid at Buffalo, N.Y., and at additional mailing offices. National distribution by Disticor, www.disticor.com. FREE INQUIRY is indexed in Philosophers’ Index. Printed in the United States. Postmaster: Send address changes to FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors or pub- lisher. No one speaks on behalf of the Council for Secular Humanism unless expressly stated.

TO SUBSCRIBE OR RENEW • CALL TOLL-FREE 800-458-1366 (have credit card handy). • Fax credit-card order to 716-636-1733. • Internet: www.secularhumanism.org. The Ethics of • Mail: FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. • Subscription rates: $35.00 for one year, $58.00 for two years, Secularism $84.00 for three years. Foreign orders add $10 per year for sur- face mail. Foreign orders send U.S. funds drawn on a U.S. bank; Visa, MasterCard, American Express, or Discover are preferred. • Single issues: $5.95 each. Shipping is by surface mail in U.S. he secular humanist is often challenged thusly: “If you do (included). Canadian and foreign orders include $1.56 for not base your ethics on religious foundations, then in what 1–3 issues and $3.00 for 4–6 issues. By air mail, $3.00 for 1–3 issues and $7.20 for 4–6 issues. sense can you be good?” The ethics of secularism has a long history in human culture. In the following, I wish to present CHANGE OF ADDRESS Tfour contemporary aspects of the ethics of secular humanism: liber- • Mail changes to FREE INQUIRY, ATTN: Change of Address, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. ation, enlightened self-interest, altruism, and goodwill. These prin­ • Call Customer Service: 716-636-7571, ext. 302. ciples are grounded in human experience and are thus natural. They • E-mail: [email protected]. are herein delineated in answer to the charge that the “new atheists,” with whom secular humanists are often conflated by public opinion, BACK ISSUES • Back issues through Vol. 23, No. 3 are $6.95 each. Back lack an ethical outlook. On the contrary, one can be a secularist and issues Vol. 23, No. 4 and later are $5.95 each. 20% discount also be a good person. on orders of 10 or more. Call 800-458-1366 to order or to ask for a complete listing of back issues. REPRINTS/PERMISSIONS • To order reprints of articles or to request permission to use any part of FREE INQUIRY, write to FREE INQUIRY, ATTN: Julia Lavarnway, Permis­sions Editor, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. “. . . The ethics of secularism has a long his- WHERE TO BUY FREE INQUIRY tory in human culture. . . . These principles • FREE INQUIRY is available from selected book and magazine sellers nationwide. are grounded ARTICLE SUBMISSIONS • Complete submission guidelines can be found on the Web at in human experience and are thus natural.” www.secularhumanism.org/fi/details.html. • Requests for mailed guidelines and article submissions should be addressed to: Article Submissions, ATTN: Tom Flynn, FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. Liberation LETTERS TO THE EDITOR • Send submissions to Letters Editor, FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box Historically, secularism has been an ethic of liberation for those 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. revolting against repressive institutions of society, such as those • For letters intended for publication, please include name, originating with the Puritans, the Victorians, and the Catholic address (including city and state), and daytime telephone Church. Secularists wished to realize happiness here and now rather number (for verification purposes only). Letters should be 300 words or fewer and pertain to previous FREE INQUIRY than focus on alleged divine rewards in the afterlife. They objected articles. strenuously to the barriers to this pursuit laid down by authoritar- ian-theological dogmas. Intimate relationships outside of marriage, The Council for Secular Humanism cultivates rational inquiry, ethical values, and Paul Kurtz is a professor emeritus of philosophy at the State human development through University of New York at Buffalo, the chair of the Center for Inquiry, and editor in chief of Free Inquiry.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 6 the termination of unhappy or even abusive marriages, birth By contrast, forty-four states now prohibit same-sex mar- control, interracial marriage and miscegenation, homosexu- riage or define marriage as the union of a man and woman; ality—in most countries, these were forbidden by church and twenty-seven have already enacted similar amendments to their state. Similarly, alcohol consumption and activities like state constitutions. Indeed, in California such an amendment is gambling, which can be pleasurable if done in modera- on the November ballot—an estimated 1.2 million names tion, were often condemned as sinful vices. were gathered by petition. If enacted, it would Paradoxically, the upper classes were allowed to overturn the California Court’s decision. enjoy themselves, while the poor were considered de­ bauched if they pursued similar activities. Often, the enforcement of the standards was hypocritical; the elites used them to hold the lower classes in check. More often than not, religious morality became the instrument for maintaining the social order. Libertarian ethics emerged with the rise of democratic liberties. Freedom from repres- sion became the battle cry of generations of liberal secularists and humanists. Thus the right of privacy became a central moral ideal and still is; with this came the demand for toleration of diversity in tastes and life­ styles. This led to the conviction that society should not seek to legislate adult moral behavior so long as it does not harm others. Today, the battle over same-sex marriages illustrates this issue. Although progressives now champion equal rights for homosexuals, gays and lesbians, many authoritarians still remain adamantly opposed. The recent ruling by the California Supreme Court that the denial of marriage to gays, lesbians, and transgendered persons was unconstitutional is a welcome development for secular libertarians. California now joins Massachusetts in this regard. The Council for Secular Humanism filed an amicus curiae brief (drafted by Edward Tabash, chairman of the First Amendment­ Task Force), which pointed out that much oppo- sition to same-sex marriage is based in religion and as such “Historically, secularism has been an is a violation of the First Amendment. The California Supreme ethic Court chose not to use this argument but instead focused on other issues, such as equal protection of the laws. What is at of liberation for those revolting against stake is fairness in the application of tax and inheritance laws, repressive institutions of society. . . .” eligibility for healthcare coverage and retirement benefits, access to loved ones and input into decisions about their care in medical settings, equal considerations of applications for the adoption of children, and other rights enjoyed by heterosexuals but generally denied to same-sex relationships. Then there is Parenthetically, it would be regrettable if the liberation of the fundamental right to marriage itself, which many believe gay people from discrimination were to engender a new and strengthens the commitment between two persons who have bitter phase in the impending elections in the United States. freely chosen to tie their lives together. There are too many other important issues that ought to be at In many countries, same-sex marriage is already recognized— the top of the political and social agenda, not a Kulturkrieg Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Canada, and South Africa. In against moral freedom. other countries and in some U.S. states (Connecticut, Ver­mont, New Jersey), civil unions or domestic partnerships are recognized, Enlightened Self-Interest allow­ing homosexuals many of the same privileges and rights as Implicit in the democratic revolutions of modern times is the heterosexual couples. realization that the pursuit of happiness is an essential secular A key argument used by the California Supreme Court is goal. This is true for all men and women no matter what their that laws prohibiting same-sex marriage are similar to those station in society. Intrinsic to this is the concept of self-interest. that prohibited interracial marriages and miscegenation in the It is not wicked or evil to be concerned with one’s own good. United States sixty years ago. At that time, twenty-nine states This has high priority on the secular ethical agenda. Each had restrictions­ against interracial marriage. The California individual has but one life to live, and in the last analysis every Supreme Court’s decision notes that California was the first state person is responsible for his or her own well-being. Neither (in 1948) to repeal this law. Today, no states in the U.S. prohibit the church nor the state should dictate how a person is allowed to interracial marriage. live. Although each person is dependent on others—on parents

7 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 during the formative years of nurture and growth, on teachers to satisfy the built-in homoeostatic conditions necessary to live during the period of education and development, on society and and function. Beyond that are the sociogenic needs that emerge the economy for income and providing jobs—the project of every in every community—the family, tribe, town, society, or nation person is that he or she is in some sense autonomous and that at large. There are psychogenic needs as well: the capacity to what a person becomes depends on the personal choices that relate to others, to love and be loved, to develop rationality, are made. These decisions concern our attitudes toward others, to exercise creativity and achieve some degree of realization our selection of sexual partners and degree of commitment, our of one’s own unique talents and aspirations. Individuals­ exist career paths—intellectual, emotional, social, political, educa- both in a sociocultural setting and a geographical location. Each tional, medical, and moral choices are made every day. Hence, person is conditioned by vast impersonal forces—yet each has some measure of freedom of choice that is real. I have written so much about this in my books and articles that I hesitate to elaborate further other than to say that a person’s potential goals are multifarious and depend on who he or she is and where he or she lives at a particular time in history. For every person, the first challenge of life is to live, and the second is to live well and achieve some measure of every per- happiness—or as I have described it, a meaningful and enriched son life overflowing with the possibility of creativity, joy, and exu- berance. It is, of course, essential to recognize that our lives are interjoined with other human beings, and so among our noblest values are those we share with others. Secular humanists, whatever the cultural context, have extolled en­lightened self-interest, not solely egoistic or selfish behavior but a life in which persons can relate to each other and enjoy consummatory experiences together. Accordingly, self-interest is central, but en­lightened self-interest emphasizes personal ex­­cellence and the qualities of a life well- lived. Excellence depends on proper nutri- tion and health, self-discipline and self-re- straint, the capacity to love and be loved; some measure of rationality, some aes- thetic appreciation, and some fulfillment of one’s talents. Included­ in a good life is the development of moral relationships with others.

“Secular humanists . . . have extolled Altruism enlightened self-interest, not solely ego- Although secular humanists have heroically defended the rights of individuals to pursue their own interests, altruism, I submit, istic is also intrinsic to the good life—though some radical libertar- or selfish behavior but a life in which ians have denied that anyone is capable of genuine altruistic behavior. I do not think that human motivation is simply based persons can relate to each other and on egoism or selfishness, for there is abundant evidence of enjoy altruism in human conduct. Some libertarians have been accused of being indiscriminate fleshpots (for whom “anything goes”) or consummatory experiences together.” ruth­less Machiavellians to achieve their aims. This need not be the case. Moral libertarians have internalized principles of self-con­trol and have a compassionate regard for the needs of others. Therefore, I see no contradiction in espousing both needs to be self-interested. He or she should not self-interest and altruism as concomitant in a full life well-lived. abdicate his or her right to personal freedom to others. A Such self-interest may be said to be enlightened when we take person’s sense of self is at the center of his or her existential into account­ the interests of others in addition to or instead of world; it identifies a person’s needs and shapes dreams, plans, our own. and projects, values and ideals. Thus, self-interest is the crux Such altruism is justified in two senses: on utilitarian of how a person lives and determines whether he or she merely grounds because of the positive consequences of assisting peo- survives or thrives by realizing the fullness of life. ple who need help, and intrinsically because altruism is praise- There is a whole constellation of needs that a person must worthy for its own sake. “Why should we be concerned with the satisfy if he or she is to flourish. First of course are the basic good of others?” asks the egoist or cynic—to which I respond: biological needs for food, water, shelter, and protection needed we should be concerned with the good of others because that

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 8 helps other persons in need and it bestows upon persons who over and beyond that, I submit that altruism has deep sources perform such altruistic acts a quality of experience and a deep within human nature and is valued for its own sake, considered sense of right. Examples of altruistic behavior in relationships worthwhile for both the giver and receiver. Indeed, there is a are abundant: it occurs between parents and children, teach- good deal of evidence that such moral conduct is a result of ers and pupils, medical professionals and patients, lovers and biological evolution. This would mean that human beings are loved ones, siblings, colleagues, and friends. It is the bond of a poten­tially moral and that whether these tendencies come to friendship that especially illustrates this moral quality, for it fruition depends on the social context in which a person is nour- ties people together and implies recognition that one person is ished and cultivated. There is a moral sense implanted within willing to perform favors and make sacrifices for another and exceed the normal obligations of a relationship. This is based on a sincere sense of caring. The real test of altruism arises when we encounter strang- ers in our midst to whom we voluntarily offer a lending hand, “Although secular humanists have hero- although we are not required to do so. The helping professions minister to those in need every day. This is their job and a ically defended the rights of individuals source of income, of course, and they perform what is expected to pursue of them. But their actions have a moral dimension and are often rooted in empathy. For the average person, altruistic concerns their own interests, altruism, I submit, may awaken a sense that if I can, I should help another, not is also intrinsic to the good life.” simply out of self-interest but because I have a moral sense that I ought to deep within my being, even if I am reluctant to do so because it is inconvenient or demanding. A deed can be an eloquent expression of our highest moral capacities—as the Old Testament recognized when it stated that we should treat aliens humans through the long process of evolution, though sociopaths in our midst with some moral compassion. Kant’s categorical tragically may lack that sense. To be fully human, I submit, is to imperatives to treat other persons as ends in themselves and develop our moral sensibilities. not as means can be generalized, for if the maxim under which oodwill I act were flouted, it would mean a breakdown of all moral G standards. These rational considerations have persuaded innu- Goodwill is a key secular virtue, but it is most effective when it merable persons to behave altruistically. A self-interested per- is based on an affirmative attitude toward living. Individ­ son may calculate that it is to his or her long-range advantage uals who have a positive attitude are more likely to express good­ to help others. But even these reasons may not be sufficient will toward other human beings. for insensitive individuals who may be selfish, lack the milk of For persons of goodwill, life is intrinsically worthwhile— human kindness, and are disinclined to adopt a moral frame indeed, it can be bountifully overflowing with zest and exuber- of mind. Such a person may be motivated by ambition, wealth, ance—and their affirming attitude has an effect on other peo- sexual gratification, glory, or power and be impervious to any ple. By loving life, such people are able to share their sense of sense of responsibility to others, as the tyrants and despots the good life and are considerate of others’ needs and interests. throughout history so blatantly illustrate. When a lack of altru- This affects those they encounter—children and pets, parents ism develops into a criminal mindset that causes actual harm, and grandparents, lovers and partners, brothers and sisters, victims must be protected by laws. Fear is a deterrent used to aunts and uncles and cousins, friends and colleagues, and even maintain law and order. However, we should insist that laws be strangers whom they meet in the world of affairs. A person just and fairly applied. of goodwill usually has confidence in his or her capacities for There is still another powerful motivation for altruistic enjoying the good life and self-respect. He or she is well motivat- moral conduct: passion for empathy, which can be developed ed and expresses­ it with spontaneity and vitality. within children and adolescents; that is, by nourishing within Life presents us all with challenges: a self-reliant person can the young an appreciation for the interests of other human seize the opportunities and realize their promise and deal with beings within their immediate communities and the world defeats with some equanimity. For such people, life is rich with beyond. The justification for altruism is thus a combination meaning and significance—there are always new plans and of rational considerations and emotions. It has, if you will, a projects down the road. rational-passional source: it draws upon both the mind and Reflective thinking and rational behavior­ have vital roles to the heart, reason and emotion, cognition and caring. The best play, but this leaves room for passion and emotion. The intensi- guarantee of morality is to cultivate within human beings con- ty of living is thus enriched by the heart as well as the mind. Life cern for other human beings. This is the task of moral education. can be interesting and exciting despite its disappointments, which Social approval also exerts a powerful influence on motivation: must be balanced with its promises and achievements. there is disapprobation for callous deeds committed and appro- Alas, we are all too often surrounded by naysayers—people bation for those based on beneficence. of bad will, the pallbearers of the world. They spread doom The question is often raised, what is the ultimate source of and gloom, negativity and de­spair. They are pessimists and altruism and moral caring? Self-interest is no doubt a strong nihilists. Such people are profoundly ill at ease. They find little motive for many people: persons may donate to a charity satisfaction in living, and they resent that other people are because of social recognition—their names may be placed on enjoying life. For them, life is a vale of tears. They leave all who a plaque. Or perhaps they will receive a tax deduction. Yet meet them with a bitter taste.

9 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 No doubt everyone faces adversities. But there are also has integrity, is truthful, keeps promises, and is sincere and attainments. In any case, persons of goodwill endeavor to man- honest. He or she is trustworthy and shows fidelity to friends, ifest constructive attitudes toward one and all. Such persons relatives, colleagues, coworkers, and fellow citizens. are willing to be helpful, and they express amiability, especially Such persons are dependable, reliable, responsible, and are when the occasion arises. They endeavor to be polite and do not prepared to help others. They hold themselves accountable knowingly insult other people and are sensitive to their feelings. for what they have or have not done but avoid vindictiveness. The person of goodwill is of good character, good-hearted, Persons of goodwill bear malice toward none and do not harbor good-humored, agreeable, and honorable. He or she has inter- hatred, envy, jealousy, animosity, or resentment.­ They do not nalized what I have called in my book Forbidden Fruit “the carry grudges and do not blame others for their travails or common moral decencies” and “excellencies.”* misadventures. Such people are well-intentioned and well-meaning, striving They are thus considerate, thoughtful, caring; every effort to be cooperative, beneficent, empathetic, and altruistic. They is made to reduce suffering and pain whenever they can; not are good companions, friendly and fraternal, especially toward only for other human beings but other sentient beings in the colleagues and acquaintances en­countered during various biosphere. Such persons are beneficent, charitable, kind, and appreciative of the needs of the helpless, the weak, the forlorn, the disadvantaged, and the handicapped. People of goodwill are not awed by those who wield power, seek fame, or amass wealth; they do not seek to confer favors “A person of goodwill has a deep appre- only on the high and mighty. A person of goodwill is fair and ciation shows gratitude and appreciation for deeds well done. Although such people may disagree with the beliefs or predi- of the meaningful opportunities for lections of someone else, they will accord them the same rights as is expected of themselves. Thus they are tolerant of diversity finding joy in tastes and lifestyles, however different they may be, provided in living and of excitement and thrill they are not destructive to the freedom and rights of others. Persons of goodwill will not resort to violence to achieve of achieving a full life.” their aims and wherever possible will urge peaceful means to achieve shared goals and values. Ever willing to sit down and break bread with others, to forgive and forget past mistakes and misdeeds, they eschew re­venge and retribution. Wherever pos- sible, they seek to negotiate differences and work out compro- activities. They understand that they should try to be helpful mises in the spirit of fair play and reasonableness, recognizing and agreeable with coworkers. In times of defeat or tragedy, that cooperation­ is a virtue that enables civilizations­ to flourish. they will seek to assist or console other persons who are demor- Secular humanists are impressed by the magnificence of alized or suffer. nature and are in awe of the immensity of the expanding uni­verse— Secularists do not need to look outside the world of human on both the macrolevel of galaxies and on the microlevel of affairs to a transcendental source to bolster this attitude. subatomic particles—and by the teeming biosphere. The evo- Pivotal to goodwill is that such persons endeavor to be reason- lutionary history of the uni­verse as revealed by the sciences is able, rational, and sensible yet also are empathetic, sensitive, the history of human­kind as well, for the hu­man species emerg­ed and supportive. They do not need religious commandments to from the same nat­ural processes that formed galaxies, stars, and tell them not to harm others and to be kind and considerate. planets. Each of us is composed of recycled stardust to which The secular humanist, especially in an open society, recognizes we will eventually return. Of the billions of seeds, sperm, spores, that this life affords manifold opportunities to achieve goals and and eggs that appear and are wasted in the fecundity of repro- discover satisfactions not only for oneself but also for others. duction, so very few are fertilized and survive as an individual Persons of goodwill seek to overcome obstacles, solve problems, form of life. Every living person is unique, equal in dignity and and ameliorate the human condition wherever he or she can; val­ue, possessed of the potentialities of crea­tive living. such persons are not easily demoralized or embittered. Blended­ A person of goodwill has a deep appreciation­ of the meaning- with the resolve to improve life for oneself is the need to respect ful opportunities for finding joy in living and of excitement and others and applaud their achievements. A person of goodwill is thrill of achieving a full life. It is hoped that he or she has discov- gratified if other people they know succeed. If others prosper, ered that life is its own reward. Fortunate is the person­ who has they pros­per. actualized the bountiful satisfactions of a life well-lived. He or she There is a stoic attitude about those situations in life that recog­nizes with some humility that human beings are fallible and are beyond our pow­er to repair, such as an incurable disease, that we should seek to be the best that we can become. crushing defeat, or an accident. One goes on in spite of suf­fering In the light of this, a person of goodwill is able to express a the blows of outrageous fortune. positive, accepting attitude toward oneself and others and has A person of goodwill is a morally decent person capable of developed a reflective intellect and an open heart. For such a attaining some measure of excellence in life. And goodwill is person, life can be beautiful and is to be enjoyed and adored. He among the most eloquent of human excellences. Such a person or she is eager to share this attitude with others so that they too *A new edition with a Prologue, entitled Forbidden Fruit: The can exult in the enrichment of the full life. Such a person realizes Ethics of Secularism, is due out later this year from Prometheus that after all is said and done, and in spite of limitations, life— Books. this life—for ourselves and other sen­tient beings, is a wonder to

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 10 Journalist Chris Hedges spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in LEADINGLEADING QUESTIONSQUESTIONS Central America, the Middle East, Africa, and the Balkans and has reported from more than fifty countries. He is senior fellow at The A Conversation with Chris Hedges Nation Institute in New York City, a lecturer in the Council of the Humanities, and the Anschutz Distinguished Fellow at Princeton University. He has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News, and The New York Times, where he spent fifteen years. He is the author of a number of books, including American Fascists. He recently discussed his new book, I Don’t Believe in Atheists, with D.J. Grothe, associate editor of Free Inquiry.

ree Inquiry: You liken the New Atheists to the fundamentalist religious F extremists you at­tacked in your pre- vious books. Chris Hedges: Correct. I have nothing against . It has an honored place in the Western intellectual tradition. I don’t think any serious student of theology or religion can consider themselves educat- ed without studying Nietzsche, who was a mixture of brilliance and insanity but who understood the moral consequences of the Death of God. Sartre, Camus, and most of the great philosophical and theological reformers in their day were considered athe- ists—as were people like Spinoza and even Martin Luther. So, I actually came to the New Atheists fairly predisposed to accept their position. I was stunned to find that what they had done was replicate the belief sys- tem of Christian fundamentalists in secular garb, including complete corruption and misuse of science. FI: So your problem isn’t with atheism but with what you term fundamentalist Fundamentalist atheism. We all agree that fundamental- ism is a bad thing, but tell me what is “fundamentalist” about a or Christopher Hitchens when they are just Atheists being outspoken about their atheism. and Hitchens. But just because you think does not have to be just a religious phe- Hedges: It is how they define themselves they are wrong doesn’t mean they are fun- nomenon. It is a way of viewing the world. and the worldview that they adopt that, like damentalists. It is a form of self-exultation. It is utopian in that of the radical Christian Right, entails a Hedges: I disagree with a lot of people. I that it believes that human history is linear fundamentalist mind-set. What is that? A disagree with Nietzsche, but I don’t think and that there is such a thing as collective binary worldview of “us versus them.” It is he is a fundamentalist. It’s not just a matter moral progress, which I don’t think either elevating ourselves to a higher moral plane of who I disagree with; it is a matter of the human history or human nature bears out. and relegating others to positions of moral ideological structure that they embrace. In the case of the New Atheists, it embraces inferiority. It is an embrace of catastroph- Let’s take an example from the Arab not science but the cult of science. By that ic, even apocalyptic, violence as a cleans- world’s fundamentalists: they are linguis- I mean that they talk about evolutionary ing agent to remove human impediments tically, culturally, and historically illiterate biology and then use it to make a leap of toward, if not a perfected world, a world and make grand pronouncements about faith to talk about collective moral evolu- made more perfect. Sam Harris, in his book people’s cultures and ways of being that tion. The End of Faith, asks us to consider car- they know nothing about. Before I wrote I FI: You have a problem with the inten- rying out a nuclear first-strike on the Arab Don’t Believe in Atheists, I spent two years sity with which the New Atheists criticize world. That’s not a rational opinion—that’s writing a book on the Christian Right, so Islamism. But there is intensity in many pub- insanity. the fundamentalist mind-set is something I lic debates, and this is hardly the hallmark of FI: Obviously, you disagree with Harris am very familiar with. And fundamentalism a fundamentalist mind-set.

11 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 LETTERS

a system of civil laws that guarantee try. It’s a logical impossibility. Scientific freedom of expression and untrammeled ideas must always be researchable­ and debate with­in the bounds of appropriate amenable to new evidence. This cannot limitations. “Appropriate limitations” sim- be done when one begins one’s system ply means law­fully sanctioned respect for with a metaphysical idea like “creation by the next person’s rights, even though his divine fiat.” or her opinions may differ from yours. Humanist moral beliefs in tolerance Other standards of “due process of law” and free thought require considerably more are deducible­ from this. We must defend self-discipline than the mindless pre­ten­ them in public forums, or we may well sion of religious revelation. But un­for­ lose our humanist behinds. I do not exag- tunately, history is replete with far more gerate. If Christian fanatics in America triumphs of the latter than of the former. will throw bombs into abortion clinics and Hence, we dare not become complacent Muslim fanatics in Europe will murder a and just assume that because “we’re critical Dutch filmmaker, there is no rea- smart” and our opponents are “ignorant” son to sup­pose that future papal fanatics that we are going to win. This is sim­ply will not destroy genetics laboratories the not the sordid record of history. We closer we come to mastering the human simply have to abandon our academic genome. ivory towers and fight in public forums. With the national general elections Otherwise,­ we may lose, and lose big time. very near, religious fundamentalists here John L. Indo in Texas are again organizing to elect as Religion in the Houston, Texas many “creationists” to influential school Public Square boards as possible. Their goal, of course, is to force their idiotic “creation science” I wish Austin Dacey had chosen to focus A dire consequence of humanists’ failure into the school curricula. Thus far, the on a more appealing character than Joseph to “speak up” in public life (“The Sec­ular federal courts have objected to this on Ratzinger, the former head of the Congre­ Conscience” by Austin Dacey, FI, June/ separation of church and state grounds. gation for the Doctrine of the Faith (aka July 2008) is that our opponents have But there is no guarantee that this pro- the Inquisition), in his article. Ratzinger been allowed to portray us as self-serving tection will last forever. All it takes is a is the last person I’d be inclined­ to pay intellectual libertines compulsively bent decree from a judge who understands attention to for the development of moral on “nay-saying” and “attacking” tradi­ ­tional neither the scientific method nor its his- conscience, given the role he played in en­ public values to the point of re­ducing toric mission in civic life. Moreover, these suring that the Roman Catholic hierarchy society to nihilism. The diatribes of Pope days some of the creationists are veering was protected and never called to account­ Benedict XVI are a prime case in point. away from the courts and taking their during the priest sexual-abuse crisis. Even While it is unfortunately true that some nonsense to the scientifically ignorant today, one of those archbishops involved people calling themselves “humanists” have laity. This is really not hard to do since in the “musical chairs” cover-up (movement been guilty of such “educated chauvinism”— science education in America is at an all- the nineteenth-century social Darwinists, of offend­ing priests to different dioceses) time low. They want to elect their people for example—such cases are historically enjoys a high Vatican office. Go figure! to office by force of sheer demagoguery. rather insignificant­ compared to the hor- The claim that “secularism of the West If we do not oppose them publicly, we rors inflicted on the world by organized has loosed Western civilization from its may lose. I’m afraid I must respectfully religion and political authoritarianism. moral moorings” is plain, unadulterated disagree with Professor Richard Dawkins Humanists, indeed, have made their polit- codswallop. The truth, painful as it may on this point. We cannot refuse to debate ical and philosophical mis­takes. But at be to Dacey, is that Western civilization least some of our erroneous views have creationists in public places. If we do, we has been on this trajectory for some been amenable to the criticism and scru- will be perceived as unable to defend our time. A large component of the Zeitgeist tiny of reason and scientific in­quiry. This views. Honestly, it does not take a rocket was engendered as a virulent reaction cannot be said for the welter of papal scientist to explain to the laity in simple to the hypocrisy of organized religions, bulls that have made their way through- terms that religion and science are com- including Ratzinger’s own church! One out Western civilization. pletely separate issues and that one can is reminded­ here of the role of the Vati­ We humanists have to somehow make neither deduce one from the other nor can in assisting the escape of Nazi war it known that we are not without our refute one by means of the other. More­ criminals to South America (cf. Un­holy con­scientious values. Our philosophical over, it is very simple to point out that one Trinity by Loftus and Aarons, 1998). main­stay is what we consider the “value” cannot deduce a testable hypothesis from When Ratzinger and his religious lot of scientific inquiry and the free mar- a creationist tautology. This is like trying get their own morality squared away, it ket of ideas. This, in turn, presupposes to “tri-sect” an angle in Euclidian­ geome- may be time for atheists to take them

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 12 LETTERS

seriously! level of atheism but that seeks to avoid There a Universe at All, Rather than Just Philip A. Stahl the trappings of a cult. I am eighty Nothing?”­ (FI, June/July 2008). When Colorado Springs, Colorado years old and still strug­gling with “athe- one asks “Why?,” it is assumed that some- ism” be­ing an apparent logical fallacy thing or some event will be a candidate Austin Dacey replies: because it asserts a negative position. for an answer, that something is capa- Let me review how I have now arrived at ble of explaining something else. But in Philip Stahl wishes that I had chosen a the label proposed by Law­rence Rifkin, this in­stance, what is supposedly in need more appealing character than Joseph “evolutionary humanism.” of explanation includes whatever it is Ratzinger to appear in my article I was about twelve years old when I that might suffice to explain it; the “Why” “The Secular Conscience.” Of course, was shocked to notice lightning rods atop could only refer to something that exists, I chose Ratzinger not for his appeal our hallowed Lutheran church in Penn­ not anything that does not exist. So noth- but for his influence over public dis- sylvania. I changed to the Baptist church ing, as it were, outside existence—liter- cussions about the moral heritage and down the street, to the heart-wrenching ally nonexistent—could be the answer. future of Eur­ope and the West. By chagrin of my parents. Alas, that church Yet the question itself assumes that there objecting and taking­ Bene­dict XVI to likewise had lightning rods, as well as can be something that is nonexistent that task, Mr. Stahl’s letter actually pro- locked doors and other blatant indica- brings about existence or reality. And that vides an illustration of his influence. tions of a paucity of true faith. is plain nonsense. I was about seventeen years old when Although the question seems to make I decided I understood not one complete­ grammatical sense, the syntax clearly sentence of the liturgy and was being puts the lie to that supposition. Evaluating deceived by those who taught the cate- Tibor R. Machan chism and offered no reasonable expla- R. C. Hoiles Chair in Business Ethics Evolutionary nations in response to my questions. and Free Enterprise Humanism I was probably thirty when I became Chapman University a skeptic. Hey, wow, I’m not alone. Orange, California Dr. Lawrence Rifkin’s thoughtful piece, At age fifty or so, I was sure I was a “Evolutionary Humanism for a New Era,” closet atheist but not sure how to justify (FI, June/July 2008) contains two factu- the negative definition. al errors that, though in no way under- Around age seventy, I became a secu- The Rewards of an mine the logic of his article, are disturb- lar humanist, but the word secular was Atheistic Life ing in an essay that is so closely linked too vague, too general—not unlike athe- ist, which is based on a negative pre­mise. to the scientific worldview. I was interested to read “The Lost segment was completely First, life on Earth did not begin Re­wards of the Spiritual Life” by Julian in accord­ with my beliefs. “hundreds of millions of years ago.” The Baginni (FI, June/July 2008), but I went At age eighty, I am no longer a intended­ reference may have been to the away disappointed. What spiritualism skeptic, no longer secular. I have settled Cambrian explosion, which dates from feeds is emotional rather than intellec- square­ly on evolutionary humanist. about 600 million years ago, but by that tual. It’s like closing the blinds when it’s Finally, a solid label. Both evolution and time life had already been well underway raining—you can pretend it’s sunny, but humanism are beautifully definable, as on Earth for some three billion years. it doesn’t really change anything. well as being the most powerful combi- Second, the available evidence, though The author falls into a mistake com- nation of science and religion. For what indirect, suggests that there are consid- mon among Darwin doubters: “If I don’t it’s worth, I am willing to assume the erably more stars than the “billions” in understand it, it can’t be so.” It’s merely an posture that evolutionary humanism is Dr. Rifkin’s description of our universe. extrapolation of personal bias and doesn’t a religion . . . whenever anyone asks. Most authorities would put the number advance one’s argument. For example, Hey, it’s the values thing! somewhere between one and fifty sextil- just because the author thinks “Why both- Carl Bauer lion—at least ten orders of magnitude great­ er?” doesn’t mean the rest of us agree. Prescott Valley, Arizona er than Dr. Rifkin’s number. My feelings aren’t limited by someone else’s Peter Rogatz, MD, MPH imagin­ation or empathy, and it’s insulting Port Washington, New York to say I can’t be an honest atheist and feel Much Ado About my efforts are worthwhile. Ritualized gratitude is not necessarily Lawrence Rifkin has taken a step for- Nothing a good thing. In religions, it often rein- ward in better identifying those of us forces a subservient role to the teachings who are progressing through stag- The very famous Leibnitzian metaphysi- and leaders of the religion. We’ve all seen es of unbelief in hopes of acquir- cal question of “Why is there something someone rescued from a burning building ing a label that best describes­ a rather than nothing?” fails for another who says “Thank God” instead of thank- common denominator of thinking/ reason other than those considered by ing the firefighter who hauled him or her belief that probably started with some Pro­fessor Adolf Grünbaum­ in “Why Is (Continued on page 62)

13 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 OP-ED

TOM FLYNN

his predecessor, George Coyne, in 2006 for being too dismissive of intelligent The Vatican’s design theory). Just last fall, the Italian observatory hosted two hundred astrono­ mers for a five-day conference on disk galaxies. Mean­while, a new building is under construction at Castel Gandolfo Long Game with residences, offices, labs, a museum, and a library. So the Vatican is serious about astron- ig Bang of Words Follows Vati­ omy. But why spotlight it now? Some obvi- can’s OK to Believe in E.T.,” ous answers suggest themselves. As re­ “Bscreamed the Chicago Tribune headline (May 18, 2008). “Just like there is an abundance of creatures on earth, there could also be other beings, even intelli- “The Vatican has been in gent ones, that were created by God,” said the astronomy business Jesuit priest and astronomer Jose Gabriel Funes, director of the Vatican Observatory,­ since 1578, and consid- adding that “we cannot put boundaries ering to God’s creative freedom.” Why so much media hoopla after a Vatican astrono- the possibility of extra­ mer declared that intelligent life on other terrestrial intelligence worlds is compatible with Roman Catholic (ETI) for years now.” doctrine? City to the papal summer residence Granted, the statement appeared in the at Castel Gandolfo and entrusted it to official Vatican newspaper l’Osservatore­ the Jesuits. It acquired two powerful Romano, suggesting that top church offi- telescopes and in 1981 built a sec- cently as 1990, the idea of “intelligent life cials really wanted to get this message out. ondary research center in America’s on other worlds” involved three un­knowns: And yes, the church has come a long way Arizona desert. By and large, the Vatican (1) whether there were worlds out­side our since 1600 when it burned Giordano Bruno, Observa­tory does genuine astronomy solar system; (2) whether life ever emerged in part for speculating about other worlds. (though Father Funes is now the direc- elsewhere than on Earth; and (3) whether But let’s not overreact. The Vatican has tor be­cause Pope Benedict XVI sacked any of that life is intelligent. Today, the been in the astronomy business since 1578, and considering the possibility of extra- terrestrial intelligence (ETI) for years now. (In 2005, Jesuit brother and Vatican Observa­tory astronomer Guy Consolmagno published a booklet arguing that “nothing in Holy Scrip­ture . . . could confirm or contra- dict the possibility of intelligent life else- where in the universe.”) No, the real story lies between­ the lines. Why has the Vatican attached­ such priority to astronomy, and why is it calling greater attention to it now? What we now know as the Vatican Observatory was founded by Pope Greg­ ory XIII in connection with his reform of the Western calendar. It began system- atic astronomical observations in 1800 and was formally established by Pope Leo XIII in 1891. By 1935, Pope Pius XI had moved the observatory from Vatican

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 14 OP-ED

“other worlds” issue is settled; nearly three soon discover a second, independent tree hugely embarrassing to Western Christ­ hundred planets have been confirmed in of life on the world next door.* Hmm—one- ianity. Here was this vast and utterly unex­ ­ other star systems. As I write, NASA’s and-a-half unknown down, one and a pected landmass, and Scripture said noth­ Phoenix lander is about to drill into Mar­ half to go! ing about it! Rationalists made great sport tian ice seeking biological traces. We may But when analyzing what the Church of that failure; in time, the Mormon proph­ * For simplicity’s sake, I will ignore the of Rome is up to, it’s seldom wise to focus et Joseph Smith undertook to remedy it, genuine possibility that life on Mars might solely on today’s headlines. The Vatican weaving America and its native peoples prove to have a common origin with life here. Primitive life might have emerged but once is one of the rare institutions that can into the Christian salvation narrative. on either world, then “hitchhiked” to the strategize on a horizon of de­cades, even Smith’s handmade faith, now a fast-grow- other on debris ejected from some cosmic centuries. So what might be the Vatican’s ing world religion, grew primarily by drawing­ impact. Of course, the scenario that would pose the greatest challenge to traditional “long game” here? I’m just guessing, but converts from Catholic and Protestant ranks. Christianity would be if Mars life proved I think it has to do with the last time My guess is that the Vatican has clearly to be a “second Genesis,” wholly inde- humanity discovered a New World. learned its painful lesson. Just as Scripture pendent of life on earth. The discovery of the Americas was said nothing about those continents half a

If Christians widen theirA world Savior picture Catholic divinefor E.L. MascallThem (1905– presented All? an ironic future in which to include intelligent aliens, the next 1993) had the opposite view, arguing the Roman Catholic Church endeared questions are unavoidable: Do the ETs that if God had made multiple races of itself to a faintly addle-pated galac- have souls? Do they need salvation? sentient beings, each would need its tic civilization by preaching the very Science-fiction writer James Blish own incarnation and salvific sacrifice. idea Paine scorned: in the theology of (1921–1975) pondered those ques- The English Quaker poet-composer “serial incarnation,” an endlessly shut­ tions in A Case of Conscience, which Syd­ney Carter (1915–2004) even pen­ tling Cosmic Christ met a different won the Hugo Award for best sci- ned “Every Star Shall Sing a Carol,” a ghastly end on world after world, and ence-fiction novel of 1959. In it, a 1961 Christmas hymn that envisioned Jesuit missionary to a lizardlike alien other mangers and even other crosses race suffered a crisis of faith when he on other worlds: “Who can tell what realized that the aliens seemed not other cradle / High above the milky way / Speculation whether to need salvation, never having suf- Still may rock the King of heaven / On the son of God took fered original sin. In 1996, Mary Doria another Christmas day? . . . Who can count Rus­sell published The Sparrow, a how many crosses / Still to come or long on “little green flesh to multiple-award-winning novel about ago / Crucify the King of heaven? / Holy save little green men” another Jesuit priest confronting the is the name I know.” theological implications of first contact So, to borrow a phrase from Tem­ has such a long pedi- with sentient aliens. Believe it or not, ple­ton Prize recipient Paul Davies, gree that even Thomas the movie starring Brad Pitt is expect- does Jesus “take on little green flesh ed in 2010. to save little green men?” The question Paine weighed in. If ETIs have souls and need sal- has been debated longer than you vation, the next question all but might think. Thomas Paine pondered asks itself. In 2003, previous Vatican it in part one of The Age of Reason Observatory director George Coyne (1794)! Apparently speculation about for a fat fee the church would send a wrote: “God chose a very specific way extraterrestrial beings—and how Jesus panel of cardinals to your planet to to redeem human beings. . . . He sent might save them—was then in vogue. tell you which (if any) of its historic his only son, Jesus, to them. . . . Did Paine ridiculed the notion that “the holy men was a true incarnation. God do this for extraterrestrials?” Son of God” might “have nothing Perhaps the last word should Current Vatican Observatory direc- else to do than to travel from world belong­ to Arthur Peacocke (1924– tor Jose Gabriel Funes got his job by not to world, in an endless succession of 2006), scientist, theologian, and Tem­ saying anything Father Coyne said, and, death.” He thought the idea was so pleton Prize recipient: “Does not the in his much-ballyhooed Osservatore ludicrous that whether they knew it mere possibility of extraterrestrial Romano interview, Funes declared or not, people who seriously believed life render nonsensical all the super- that “Jesus incarnated once and for in extraterrestrial­ beings could not lative claims made by the Christian all. The incarnation is a unique and logically also be Christians. church about the significance” of non-repeatable event.” (How does he For whatever it’s worth, my own Jesus? know?) Mid-twentieth century English science-fiction novel Galactic Rap­ture Does it not, indeed?

15 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 OP-ED

world from Europe, it is silent about other (The report even speculated about the teachings will not be threatened if a genu- worlds and the beings who might call them wisdom of concealing ETI finds from the ine ETI turns up, amounts to an exercise home. The discovery that those entities also public.) More recently,­ SETI (Search for in anticipatory damage control. Here’s my exist, unbeknownst to Scripture, could be Extraterrestrial­ Intelligence)­ pioneer Jill best guess: The next time humanity learns devastating for the faith. Tarter, who runs a project scanning the (in ’s phrase) that “the universe Of course, the idea that discovering skies for alien signals, proposed another is much bigger than our proph­ets said,” Vat­ intelligent life Out There might have omi- way that finding ETI could rock human i­­can strategists aim to be among the reli- nous consequences for life Down Here is belief systems. “If we get a message” gious leaders who can give the world a nothing new. It’s a staple of science fiction from a presumably superior alien civili- thumbs-up and say, “Oh yeah, we were on but also a theme that has long in­trigued zation “and it’s secular in nature, I think this all along.” serious thinkers. In 1960, a Brookings that says that they have no organized Institution panel warned that the dis- religion—that they’ve outgrown it.” Tom Flynn is the editor of Free covery of ETI might have a “disruptive Of course, I’m just guessing. But I Inquiry and the editor of The New effect on humanity” and might wrench think the Vatican’s fascination with Encyclopedia of Unbelief (Prometheus­ the profoundly religious more than most. astronomy, and its new insistence that its Books, 2007). He is striving contuma-

WENDY KAMINER

women, I suspect, would have chosen polygamous marriages over death by Why Is Polygamy burning.) Today the Court’s analogy is as anachronistic as a ban on adultery. After all, what’s the difference between an Illegal? adult­erer and a polygamist? And if it’s “. . . polygamy is illegal pponents of gay rights often warn and unprotected by the that legalizing same-sex marriage Constitution because Owould inexorably lead to legalizing polygamy. Maybe it would, and maybe it the Supreme Court should. Denying gay couples the right to doesn’t like it.” marry violates state constitutional guar- antees of equality, as the California and Massachusetts high courts have rightly ruled. (The Supreme Court of California also held that the right to marry is funda- not illegal for a married man to support mental.) Surely Mormons have the same a girlfriend or two and father children rights to equal treatment under law—and out of wedlock with them, how can it be of course, they have a substantial First illegal for him to bind himself to them Amendment­ claim to engage in multiple according to the laws of his church? Why marriages according to the dictates of offence against society.” The Reynolds is a practicing Mormon with two wives a their faith. decision upheld the criminal conviction criminal while Staten Island Congress­ So why is polygamy illegal? Why don’t of a man accused of taking a second wife man Vito Fosella, recently­ embarrassed Mormons have the right to enter into in the belief that he had a religious duty by the discovery of his second family, multiple marriages sanctified by their to practice polygamy, a duty he would is simply a punchline? What’s the moral church, if not the state? There’s a short violate at risk of damnation. The Court and practical difference between a man answer to this question but not a very compared polygamy to murders sancti- who maintains multiple families without good one: polygamy is illegal and unpro- fied by religious belief, such as human the approval of any church and a man tected by the Constitution be­cause the sacrifice or the burning of women on who main­tains multiple­ families with his Supreme Court doesn’t like it. Over one their husbands’ funeral pyres. church’s approval? hundred years ago, the Court held in Even in Victorian America, this com- Nontheists who favor civil unions Reynolds v. U.S. that polygamy was “an parison made little sense. (Most Vic­torian for everyone—taking the state out of

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 16 OP-ED

the busi­ness of approving or disapproving more than cautious concern for them— parent have a religious right to harm re­ligious matrimonial rites—should be but predictably, the national conversa- their children by denying them medical especially supportive of the First Amend­­­ tion generally reflected little sympathy care, subjecting them to sexual molesta­ ment right to engage in polygamous mar­ for the civil liberties of people involved tion, or otherwise abusing them. I’m riages sanctified by any faith. Whether in a religious group far outside the simply pointing out that the state should or not polygamy should be legalized so mainstream. Imagine the reaction had not abuse the power to prosecute people that people in polygamous marriages the state instead invaded a communi- or forcibly remove their children because enjoy equal rights and entitlements (like ty of Chris­tian Scientists and removed authorities don’t approve­ of their “life­ Social Security benefits), it should at least all their children after receiving an style.” Gay men were once routinely be decriminalized. Why should we care anonymous tip that one child had been suspected of being pedophiles, a suspi- about other people’s private religious cer- harmed by the refusal of his or her par- cion that persists today but with consid- emonies? How dare we criminalize them? ents to provide medical care. erably less prevalence and respectability. “Polygamy encourages child abuse,” The Search for Zion case is different, Indeed, opposition to gay marriage still people say, citing instances involving the some reply, because polygamy is illegal. relies on specious arguments about the marriage of older men to underage girls. Exactly. Polygamy’s illegality doesn’t harm it poses to children. Some fools Assuming for the sake of argument that make the state’s actions less abusive— still compare homosexuality to bestiali- this is true, it still doesn’t justify categor- imagine the reaction if the state sum- ty, just as the Supreme Court once com- ical prohibitions on polyg­amy. Alcohol marily removed all the children from a pared poly­gamy to human sacrifice. We consumption may en­courage sexual vio- commune in which parents were sus- progress when we base the extension of lence; it’s often blamed for date rape. pected of smoking dope—but it does rights on reason, not bias or judicial Should we prohibit its use, as members provide authorities with an argument, hyperbole. of the Women’s Chris­tian Temperance however flawed. Union demanded over one hundred years Of course, I’m not suggesting that any Wendy Kaminer is a lawyer and so­ ago? Or should we prosecute alcohol-fu- eled violence whenever we find it? We rightly prohibit violence, not drunkenness, even though some drunks are violent; we should prohibit child abuse, not polygamy, even though some polygamists are abusers. To do otherwise is to court worse abuses than we seek to prevent, as the raid on the Search for Zion compound in Texas this past April demonstrated. On the basis of one anon- ymous phone call (that later appeared to be a hoax), Texas authorities forcibly removed more than 460 children from their parents without evidence of actual abuse in each case. Parents and children were ordered to undergo DNA testing (Who knows how long the state will main- tain the DNA database, or to what uses it will be put?), and the children were summarily consigned to the notorious Texas foster-care system. They were sub- sequently reunited with their parents on order of Texas courts, which rightly held that the state had acted unlawfully, but who knows how much damage was done? It’s hard to explain the relative com- placency or cautiousness that initial- ly greeted this extraordinary abuse of power, except with reference to reli- gious bigotry or squeamishness about polygamy. Members of the Search for Zion sect tried taking their case to the public—some attorneys defended their rights, and the American Civil Liberties Union eventually expressed

17 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 OP-ED

CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

tized by his synagogue, all the Christian authorities applauded the dogmatic and Israel at Sixty: tyrannical stand taken by the rabbis they otherwise despised.) Thus, the European­

Jewishness and “Judaism . . . forces its adherents to confront the rich temptations Secularism of the secular view, to which many of them he sixtieth anniversary of the duly succumb.” statehood of Israel is a useful Toccasion to review the relation- ship between Jewishness and secular- Enlightenment came to the Jews as a ism. It’s a noticeable fact that in the double liberation—from oppression­ by atheist and agnostic ranks of many Gentiles and from domination by their countries, Jews are very much in the “own” clerics. It’s not a coincidence that fore. It is so noticeable, indeed, that the fantastic flowering of what is some- I was recently asked by the Spertus times called “Jewish genius”—Marx, Institute in Chicago, a Jewish center Freud, Einstein,­ or fill in your own of higher learning, to give a lecture preferred name in the field of medicine, entitled: “Do Jews Have a Gene for physics, literature, law, politics, enter- Athe­ism?” My (half-serious) answer, with tainment—starts to occur immediately which the bulk of the audience was obvi- after this process begins. And it re­mains which they were so critical. In my book a fact that the greatest achievements ously in sympathy, was “Almost.” Judaism God Is Not Great, I suggest that the Jews of Jews have been in assimilated and teaches itself in direct opposition to are the first people in history to have secular societies. Hellenism and rationalism (its word for become self-emancipated from religion. Of course, the Diaspora was also the heretic being apikoros, or “follower of In almost all countries, including Israel scene of the most terrible tragedy and Epicurus”) and thus forces its adher- itself, they are in their majority and in crime ever to befall the Jews since the ents to confront the rich temptations their character overwhelmingly secular. Babylonian exile. And for many people, of the secular view, to which many of This is a nice irony considering they are Zionism is the answer to that age-old them duly succumb. Judaism does not the people who invented monotheism in dilemma, because Zionism claims that proselytize, it does not dwell very much the first place. only it can put the Jewish future into if at all on the afterlife, and its greatest My late friend Dr. Israel Shahak, a Jewish hands. It is sometimes argued thinker, Maimonides, when speaking of teacher at the Hebrew University in the Messiah wrote that though he will Jerusalem who was a moral hero of the that Zionism­ is itself a secular move- indeed come, “he may tarry.” (At least secular and the human-rights move- ment, and certainly for a long time it was Judaism doesn’t say that the Messiah ments there, once phrased it to me like led by secular individuals and opposed has come already!) this: the centuries of Christian anti-Semi­ by ultra-Orthodox rabbis who main- When I debate with Christian or tism placed the Jewish people under a tained that only the Messiah could bring Muslim or Jewish believers or simply give double oppression. Not only were they the Jews back from exile. However, the a speech advocating the atheist world- penn­ed up in ghettoes and denied access­ supposedly “secular” nature of Zionism view, it is as likely as not that the venue to almost all professions except the deserves a second look. will be a Reform synagogue. Educated hated business of money-lending, but In the first place, why must Jewish Jews are proud of the titanic figures of within the ghetto itself they were sub- autonomy or self-determination be their community, such as Spinoza and jected to the control of fundamentalist sought in Palestine or “The Holy Land”? Einstein, who are heroes for the human Orthodox rabbis. (Remember that when This only makes sense if you believe species and not just for the tribe of Spinoza was condemned and anathema- that there is some truth to the biblical

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 18 OP-ED

award of a certain territory between the including the drawing (not to say the ple, and so forth. towns of Dan and Beersheba—or between re-drawing) of the national borders, that I don’t at all mean to confine the blame for the Nile and the Euphrates, according yeshiva students can be exempt from the current nightmare to one monotheism: to other texts. Israeli archeology has military service, that those who brandish every reader of this magazine knows the proven the whole story of Moses and the vile record of the jihad­ists, muftis, and Exodus false, even while confirming that mullahs in the region, to say nothing of there has always been a Jewish pres- “. . . why must Jewish the crimes of the Christian­ zealots (the ence in Palestine. Einstein and others autonomy or self- worst of whom are, alas, often tolerated were in favor of a state for Jews in the by the Israelis for the most opportunistic area but not in favor of “a Jewish state.” determination be sought of reasons: it turns out that Israel is more A great deal hangs on the distinction. To in Palestine or ‘The Holy than ever dependent on non-Jewish sup- state it simply, a state for Jews would port). But while the bulk of the Jewish protect the areas where they were a Land’? This only makes Diaspora flourishes as never before in majority and would allow them to form sense if you believe that secular conditions, the Israeli Jews are a constitution that declared everyone an the most endangered and insecure part of equal citizen. The likelihood that they there is some truth to the the family and have become embroiled in would pick something like the American a sanguinary quarrel where the lowest Bill of Rights is overwhelming. A Jewish biblical award of a certain and most fanatical elements of all faiths state, by contrast, says that Jews have territory. . . .” are the ones with the whip hand. There more rights than non-Jews, that only might even be a lesson here somewhere. rabbis can perform marriages, that the state must subsidize places of worship, the Torah can be allowed to “settle,” or that God has a hand in everyday politics, rather steal, the land of non-Jewish peo- Christopher Hitchens is a columnist

SHADIA B. DRURY

Luther for saying that burning heretics is against the will of God. Pope Gregory XVI Benedict’s condemned every modern achievement that was wrenched from the tyrannical power of the church—, freedom of worship, , freedom of assembly, freedom of educa- Subversive Journey tion—as so much “heretical vomit.” “Pope Benedict XVI . . . uring his recent visit to the United States, Pope Benedict XVI presented his church as Ddelivered a series of speeches that a reverberated with a strange tone of un­reality. He presented his church as a champion of religious champion of religious freedom and tol- erance as if his American audience, and freedom and tolerance the whole world, were in the grip of the as if his American audi- most dreadful case of historical amne- sia. But the world has not forgotten that ence, and the whole from the moment that the Catholic Church world, were in the grip of became the official religion of Rome, all religious tolerance was outlawed. The the most dreadful case Council of Nicea (325 c.e.) ended the of historical amnesia.” religious freedom granted by the Edict condemned the Edict of Nantes (1598) of Toleration (313). Christian emperors for granting equality of citizenship to prohibited pagan rites and worship. They all regardless of religion. Pope Innocent Only a fool would assume that the prohibited Jews from building syna- X denounced the Peace of Westphalia Catholic Church has undergone a rad- gogues, marrying Christians, and serving (1648) for granting toleration to those ical reformation. There has been only in the imperial forces. Pope Clement VIII of all religions. Pope Leo X condemned one significant change. Thanks to three

19 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 OP-ED

hundred years of secular, liberal revo- In his speech to the bishops of the during the week to promote business lutions, the Catholic Church lacks the United States in Washington, D.C. (April practices or medical procedures con- power to carry out its usual abomina- 16, 2008), Benedict declared that “. . . trary to those beliefs? Is it consistent tions. It lacks the power to act on its con- any tendency to treat religion as a for practicing Catholics to ignore or victions openly and directly in the world. private matter must be resisted. Only exploit the poor and the marginalized, In view of his powerlessness relative to when their faith permeates every aspect to promote sexual behavior contrary his predecessors, Benedict is compelled of their lives do Christians become to Catholic­ moral teaching, or to adopt to pay tribute to the achievements of the positions that contradict the right to life modern world. But anyone who listens of every human being from conception carefully will recognize that his posture to natural death?” of submissiveness and humility­ is only “Nothing retarded the The message to the bishops was a veneer behind which lurk the same clear. If you are a true Christian, if your conceits. It would be naïve to think that development­ of civilized faith is to be more than mere words, it is not enough to live by it yourself. Nor is Benedict’s opinions differ from the toxic nations more than the it enough to encourage your priests and views expressed­ by his predecessors. their parishioners to live by it. Benedict For example, Benedict is fond of claim- irrational demands of the tells them that it is their duty to avail ing that the separation of church and popes who mobilized themselves of the “” state has its roots in Catholic doctrine.* in the public square in order to influence He accomplishes this fantastic feat by the power of the state “current and proposed legislation.” In blurring the distinction between the mod- to launch crusades, burn short, it is their duty to make every effort ern doctrine of the separation of church to ensure that their faith becomes the and state (which guarantees re­ligious heretics, rob Jews of their law of the land. freedom and tolerance) and the Catholic children, and carry out Benedict’s ambition knows no bounds, doctrine of the two swords as espoused but he is not under the illusion that by Pope Gelasius I (492–496). According other savage preoccupa- the voices of his bishops will suffice to to the latter, church and state have two subvert the American Constitution and separate functions: the state must care tions.” transform the American polity. In a for the health and security of the body, democratically organized society, the while the church must minister to the laity is necessary in great numbers. welfare of the soul. But since the soul is This explains the strong stand Benedict superior to the body, spiritual well-be- truly open to the transforming power takes on the need for America to be ing must take precedence over physical of the Gospel.” He urged his bishops to lenient toward illegal immigrants— wellness. So, just as the body must be become politically engaged, telling them most of them are Catholics and so can subordinate to the soul, the state must be it was their duty to make sure that their be instrumental in restoring America to subordinate to the church. This was the Catholicism shapes “cultural attitudes” “the authentic teaching” and rescuing basis of the demand for papal supremacy and becomes the basis of public policy. it from the precipice of secularism and over all civil authorities. Therefore, the Benedict asked his audience rhetor- debauchery. Catholic doctrine of the “separation” of ically: “Is it consistent to profess our It is important to recognize that the church and state does not guarantee beliefs in church on Sunday, and then Vatican’s objection to abortion and birth religious freedom but quite the contrary. The demand for papal supremacy was the harbinger of the fanaticism and intolerance of the Middle Ages. Nothing retarded the development of civilized nations more than the irratio- nal demands­ of the popes who mobilized the power of the state to launch cru- sades, burn heretics, rob Jews of their children, and carry out other savage preoccupations. Thus, it is obscene for Bene­dict to pretend that the Catholic Church is the original architect of the separation of church and state and an advocate of religious freedom and tolerance. *Joseph Ratzinger (aka Benedict XVI) and Marcello Pera, Without Roots: The West, Relativism, Christianity, Islam (New York: Basic Books, 2006), pp. 70, 108, 109.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 20 OP-ED

control is not merely theological; it is a basis for the peace and security of the the Vatican condemned the American political strategy intended to augment human family.” What could he possibly Constitution for its separation of church the power of the church. The same mean? Are these not the unknowable and state, which explains why Amer­ican strategy is at the root of Benedict’s matters about which religions differ? Catholics were once debarred by their staunch opposition to Muslim migration Are these not the sort of questions that government from high office, lest they into Europe and his antipathy toward were, and continue to be, the cause of undermine the Constitution. John F. the inclusion of Turkey in the European religious strife and persecution? How Kennedy was the first Catholic to be Union. Far from eschewing political could these questions and concerns be elected president because he distanced supremacy, the Vatican is relying on the basis of peace? himself from the Catholic Church and biology to advance its agenda. There is only one logical answer. declared without a shadow of a doubt When speaking to the leaders of Since these are matters of visceral dis- that he did not speak for his church and other religions (in Washington, D.C., pute among diverse religions, peace can his church did not speak for him. But on April 17, 2008), Benedict praised only be secured by the domination of Kennedy is not the sort of politician that their ecumenical efforts. He extolled the a single church and its faith. By mod- Benedict admires. In contrast, George shared values that unite them against estly dubbing his visit the “apostolic W. Bush shares the pope’s aversion to the secular forces of depravity and dis- journey,” the Vatican reminds one and the separation of church and state. He is solution. But he worried that the ecu- all that Benedict is supposedly the true therefore the perfect facilitator of menical dialogue might focus too much heir of Jesus Christ and the apostles. Benedict’s subversive project—a fact on the pragmatic search for peace while The Catholic Church has not abandoned that is not lost on the pope. forgetting the search for truth. He urged the conviction that it is the custodian them to consider the questions that of the one and only truth on which the Shadia B. Drury is Canada Research really matter: “What is the origin and salvation of humanity depends. This Chair in Social Justice at the Uni­ destiny of mankind?” or “What awaits is the same conceit that fueled the versity of Regina in Canada. She is us at the end of our earthly existence?” religious barbarism of the Middle Ages the author of Terror and Civil­ization: Pushing the limits of credulity, the pope from which the separation of church Christianity, Politics, and the Western declared that “only by addressing these and state was intended to rescue us. Psyche (Palgrave Macmillan,­ 2004). deeper questions can we build a solid Americans should never forget that Her newest book is Aquinas and Mod­

Plan a visit to America’s only museum this summer or fall. In the heart of New York’s Finger Lakes region, which abounds with freethought-related historic sites. Visit www.freethought-trail.org!

DRESDEN, NEW YORK (off State Route 14 between Geneva and Watkins Glen) For info, e-mail [email protected] or visit www.secularhumanism.org/ingersoll. For directions, phone (315) 536-1074.

21 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 OP-ED

ARTHUR CAPLAN

pre-implantation genetic diagnosis. We continue to see clinics use this technol- The Real Problem in ogy to pick and implant embryos solely for reasons of sex selection. Other clin- ics here and abroad are pushing genetic diagnosis of embryos as a prudent course Embryo Research for any couple interested in avoiding a “Leaving reproductive he news that a team of re­search- technology in private ers in New York (led by Dr. Zev hands has produced an TRosenwaks,­ director of the Center for Reproductive Medicine and Infertility America where people at New York-Presbyterian/Weill­ Cornell Medi­cal Center) had genetically altered a are forbidden from buy- hu­man embryo stirred up quite an ethical ing and selling babies con­tro­versy. Commen­tators have warned that this experiment is the first step but are free to buy toward designer babies and eventual- and sell sperm, eggs, ly the widespread use of genetic engi- neering of children to achieve eugenic and surrogate wombs.” goals. For example, Marcy Darnovsky,­ “Unlike England, Canada, child with diseases and defects such as leaving the field, its funding, and its a risk of breast cancer, cystic fibrosis, or Australia, the United oversight mainly in private hands. deafness, and various forms of dwarf­ States has no public This will not do. The public should ism. While some of those states are cer- not be frightened by talk of monsters tainly diseases, some are nothing more agency, group, or author- and genetically engineered embryos than differences that may or may not be ity to keep a wary when researchers insert a marker gene disadvantageous, de­pend­ing on context. in what is known to be a nonviable We are long overdue for more over- eye on reproductive and hu­man embryo for the sole purpose of sight of reproductive-technology research­ tracking early embryogenesis. That’s all and all forms of embryonic-stem-cell genetic technologies.” the Cornell group did. This experiment research. I hope that the next president had as much to do with making designer and Congress will move to fix this giant associate execu­tive director of the Center babies as putting a tag on a suitcase has lacuna in American research ethics. for Genetics and Society (Oak­land, Cali­ to do with flying to an exotic locale for Leaving reproductive technology in pri- fornia), said that the Cornell scientists vacation. Some modifications of embry­ - vate hands has produced an America were developing techniques that others os are just markers to make their fea- where people are forbidden from buying might use to make genetically modified tures easier to find, and nothing more and selling babies but are free to buy and people, “and they’re doing it without any than that. sell sperm, eggs, and surrogate wombs. kind of public debate.” Are we really heading toward a eu­ Eugenics using genetic engineering is It certainly is true that this experi- genic tomorrow because of what Rosen­ a long, long way off. Making babies with ment should not have been done without waks and his colleagues at Cornell did? an eye toward buying the best sperm or the approval of a governmental regula- Hardly. The experiment is not even egg is much closer. Designing our kids by tory agency that operates in a transpar- especially interesting. It em­ployed a tech­ sorting our embryos is already here. ent, public manner. Whoops, I forgot. nique widely used in animal work, and it Whether any of these is a good or bad Un­like England, Canada, or Australia, the certainly does not even put a toe on the thing is not so obvious; that we need a United States has no public agency, group, path leading to genetically engineering public forum charged with helping to or authority to keep a wary eye on embryos to improve or enhance them. decide these questions is. re­productive and genetic technologies. If critics want to get nervous about The Bush administration has preferred the prospect of eugenics, they would be Arthur Caplan is the Emmauel and to keep the government out of this area, wise to wonder what is going on with Robert Hart Professor of Bioethics

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 22 INTRODUCTION

ant to start an argument among seculars? Launch a discussion, any discussion, about Islam. Is it a religion of peace or inherently violent? Should we respect­ the W folkways of Muslim peoples or apply Western notions of universal human rights that would mandate treatment of females quite unlike that prescribed under law? Must secular liberals approach Islam combatively, or is a less pugilistic stance the wiser choice? If there’s an enemy here at all, is that enemy “Islamism” or “political Islam,” or is it the religion itself? Many seculars find themselves pulled between their ideals of pluralism and tolerance and their convictions that theological absolutism should be militantly opposed. Free Inquiry stands for, well, free inquiry on all of these subjects. Still, there’s no denying that thinkers who advocate a hard line in matters Islamic are conspicuous among our writers and editors. Several have wielded the word Islamofascism, a neologism that briefly entered White House rhetoric and enjoys some acceptance on the political Right. Is this a case of strange bedfellows, of seculars joining some on the Right in a justified common cause, or is this a case of out-and-out sleeping with the enemy? There begins another classic argument among seculars. Does Islamofascism specify the most harmful aspects of militant Islam? Is it intolerant and pejorative? Is it a fiction signifying nothing at all? We are pleased to present two very different perspectives. Neither writer has seen the other’s work. Laurence Britt believes “Islamofascism” is a harmful fiction; his witty short essay “Fascism Anyone?” (Free Inquiry, Spring 2003), listing fourteen warning signs of incipient fascism, is beyond doubt the most-widely reprinted (and most-widely bootlegged) single article in Free Inquiry’s history. It even turned up on a still widely sold unauthorized poster. For Ibn Warraq, “Islamofascism” signifies a threat that richly merits opposition by those committed to Enlightenment­ values. Warraq is a Center for Inquiry Fellow, author of the classic Why I Am Not a Muslim and, most recently, Defending the West: A Critique­ of Edward Said’s Orientalism­ , and the editor of several critical scholarly works on Islam. Let the disputation begin . . .

Tom Flynn is the editor of Free Inquiry.

23 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 POINT / COU NTERPOINT IslamIslamoofascismfascism

Islamofacism Is a Gross Misnomer Laurence W. Britt

n recent years, the biz­arre term Islamofascism has begun mak- Iing the rounds, usually emanat- ing from the strange world of right-wing politics and neocon pundits and their acolytes. After a test run on the fringe, the term broke into the big leagues of political discourse in the fall of 2006, when President George W. Bush and top members of his administration simultaneously adopted its use in a desperate attempt to bolster sup- port for the stumbling war in Iraq and the related “war on terror.” The Bush admin- istration was finding it more and more difficult to define just who or what we were fighting against. To declare a war on a tac- tic is imprecise to the point of meaningless- ness. To replace the Global War on Terror (GWOT), a catchall phrase was needed to “The only thing Islamic terrorists have in common with label the enemy and simplify matters. The phrase had to represent something bad, something that would historic fascists who gained control of modern industri- al (Continued on page 26) nations is that they are both bad. However, that fact conjure up visceral fear and hatred. Certainly fascism, Laurence W. Britt is a retired international does not lead business­person, writer, and commentator. His to the conclusion that they are equivalent. Drug dealers brief article “Fascism Anyone?” (FI, Spring 2003), offering numerous references to historical are fascism, became the most-reprinted single arti- bad too, but that does not mean that they’re also fas- cle published by Free Inquiry.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 24 POINT / COU NTERPOINT IslamIslamoofascismfascism

Islamofacism Is an Apt Descriptor Ibn Warraq

t is curious how certain writers suddenly become semantically persnickety when the Iterm fascism is applied to Islam. I doubt if the same writers would voice similar concerns for the followers of Rush Limbaugh if someone labeled him “fascist.” The fact is, the term fascist is now legiti- mately applicable to a range of movements on the basis that they share a common ethos. Here is how Roger Scruton’s Dictionary of Political Thought (Hill and Wang, 1982) lists the features that fascist movements have in common: • Nationalism • Hostility to democracy, egalitarianism, and the values of the liberal Enlightenment • The cult of the leader and admiration for his special qualities • A respect for collective organization • A love of symbols One could add to the list a cult of violence and a violent anti-Semitism, in the sense of hatred of Jews.

(Continued on page 27) “The neo-Islamic totalitarian movements are essentially fascist movements. They concentrate on mobilizing passion and violence to enlarge the power Ibn Warraq is a senior research fellow at the Center of their charismatic leader and the solidarity for Inquiry. He is the author of Why I Am Not a Muslim and the editor of The Origins of the Koran, of the movement.” —Manfred Halpern The Quest for the Historical Muhammad, and What the Koran Really Says (all from ).

25 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 (Islamofacism Is a Gross Misnomer cont’d. from p. 24) Standing these historical factors on their heads, we are now asked to believe that the above definition and description of a discredited , combined with the bogey- the fascist modus operandi describes the terrorist threat we man status now accorded to the Muslim religion in the minds are now facing. Al Qaeda and its imitators represent no sin- of most Americans, was a perfect match. The problem is that gle national power. Rather, they attract followers from many they don’t match up at all. nations with the common bond of adherence to violent Islamic Islamofascism is a neologism, that is, a new word. Neologism’s religious fundamentalism. During the ascendance of fascism, secondary definition is “a meaningless word or phrase.” Perhaps there was no talk of the threat of “international fascism” per here we are approaching the heart of the matter. First, consider se. It was the individual nations that posed the threat, based on the primary users of this curious term. It stems mostly from the their formidable military and industrial infrastructures. political Right, especially in the United States, and it is constantly Islamic fundamentalism and the terrorist actions its adher- being repeated in the echo chamber of conservative talk-shows ents perpetrate appear to have as an objective the establish- and associated commentators in the print media. Right-wing ment of fundamentalist Islamic states where Western power polemicists such as David Horowitz, Norman Podhoretz, and and influence can be excluded and secularism abolished. Daniel Pipes have been the main promoters of the concept. David There is no indication that they are seeking world economic Horowitz even promoted an “Islamofascism Awareness Week” on or military hegemony, not that such an objective has even the college campuses in the fall of 2007. slightest chance of success. The only thing Islamic terrorists President Bush started using the term in a 2006 press con- have in common with historic fascists who gained control of ference. Within weeks, it became a staple commodity within modern industrial nations is that they are both bad. However, the administration, repeated frequently by administration that fact does not lead to the conclusion that they are equiv- spokespersons including then-Secretary of Defense Donald alent. Drug dealers are bad, too, but that does not mean that Rumsfeld, then-Press Secretary Tony Snow, Condoleeza Rice, they’re also fascists. Vice President Richard Cheney, and a number of Republican ome of the exponents of Islamofascism seem to dwell on “Islamofascism is a neologism, that is, a Sthe points made by Italian writer Umberto Eco in his 1997 book, Five Moral Pieces. In this work, Eco describes the new word. Neologism’s secondary defi- characteristics of individuals who would be susceptible to the lure of fascism. These characteristics include such things nition is as anti-intellectualism, the need for action, intolerance of ‘a meaningless word or phrase.’ Perhaps dissent, rejection of pacifism, identification of enemies, male dominance, the willingness to use violence, and general fanat- here icism about their belief system. The problem is that most of we are approaching the heart of the these characteristics could be assigned to adherents of any authoritarian religion, including many Christian sects—not to matter.” mention that they could also resemble such disparate move- ments as communism, the Mafia, Japanese militarism, and any number of despotic regimes throughout history. members of the Senate and House. Obviously, the campaign Anti-Semitism is also used as “proof” of an Islamic/fascist was well planned and orchestrated. tie-in. But again, a look at the historical facts significantly weakens this argument. Only the Nazi version of fascism was he use of this term represents a curious twisting of histor- violently anti-Semitic, and this was based on a convoluted Tical facts and logic. The word fascism is bandied about by racial theory, not religion. Converting to Christianity could many who have little knowledge of what it actually means or not save Jews from the Holocaust. Islamic anti-Semitism is who simply extract a meaning to fit their purposes. The Ameri­ based on the incursion of infidels (the Israelis) into previously can Heritage Dictionary of the English Language defines Islamic lands. fascism as “a philosophy or system of dictatorial government There have been many articulate rejections of the of the extreme Right typically through the merger of state and Islamofascism concept from across the political spectrum. In corporate leadership usually tied to an ideology of belligerent an October 29, 2007, International Herald Tribune column nationalism.” titled “Fearing Fear Itself,” Paul Krugman wrote, “. . . there How the above definition of fascism can be associated with actually isn’t any such thing as Islamofascism—it’s not an a stateless, religion-based, transnational terrorist movement ideology; it’s a figment of the neocon imagination. The term whose apparent raison d’etre is opposing Western incursion came into vogue only because it was a way for Iraq hawks to into Islamic lands is incomprehensible. Fascism, first and fore- gloss over the awkward transition from pursuing Osama bin most, was a nationalistic movement wherever it came to power Laden who attacked America to Saddam Hussein who didn’t.” and sought the aggrandizement of that nation. These regimes British historian Niall Ferguson, a conservative whose were corporatist in how they functioned and were usually sup- recent book War of the World covered World War II and the ported by the economic elite of the nation. The regimes were fascist experience in depth, declared in 2006, nominally secular, though usually tied to the Christian church in some way. They were ethnocentric, opposed to transnation- . . . what we see at the moment is an attempt to interpret our present predicament in a rather characterized World War al cooperation, and harshly suppressed domestic opponents. II idiom. I mean, “Islamofascism” illustrates the point well, These opponents were often labeled as terrorists. be­cause it is a completely misleading concept. In fact, there is

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 26 virtually no overlap between the ideology of al Qaeda and fas- Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje was another great scholar of cism. It’s just a way of making us feel that we’re the “greatest the field and a longtime professor of Arabic at the University generation” fighting another World War. You’re translating a of Leiden. He, too, recognized that Islamic law aimed at “con- crisis symbolized by 9/11 into a sort of pseudo World War II. So 9/11 becomes Pearl Harbor and then you go after the bad guys trolling the religious, social and political life of mankind in all who are fascists, and if you don’t support us, then you must be its aspects, the life of its followers without qualification, and an appeaser. the life of those who follow tolerated religions to a degree that As Eric Margolis observed in an August 2006 syndicated prevents their activities from hampering Islam in any way.” essay, “There is nothing in any part of the Muslim world that The all-embracing nature of Islamic law can be seen from the resembles the corporate fascist states of western history. The fact that it does not distinguish between ritual, law (in the clan and tribal-based traditional Islamic societies, with its European sense of the word), ethics, and good manners. In fragmented power structures, local loyalties, and consensus principle, this legislation controls the entire life of the believer decision-making, is about as far as possible from western and the Islamic community. industrial state fascism.” Not only is the use of this term disingenuous for the American people as an explanation of what we are fighting “It is above all the strength of the monis- for or against, it also causes unneeded outrage in the Muslim tic impulse and the pronounced politi- world. In a September 11, 2006, article in The Nation, Katha Pollitt wrote that “Islamofascism enrages to no purpose the cal moralism of the Islamic traditionalist dwindling number of Muslims who don’t already hate us. At and fundamentalist movements which the same time it clouds with ideology a range of situations— Lebanon, Palestine, airplane and subway bombings, Afghan­ makes them akin to fascism and the rad- istan, Iraq, Iran—that we need to see clearly and distinctly ical right alike.” and deal with in a focused way. No wonder the people who brought us the disaster in Iraq are so fond of it.” —Said Amir Arjomand One deeply suspects that the foisting of this oxymoron on the public is yet another attempt at crude wartime propaganda and disinformation designed to distract a gullible public to accept Bertrand Russell wrote in The Practice and Theory of a disastrous policy. One further suspects that this outlandish Bolshevism (1920) that “Bolshevism combines the charac- twist of the English language may serve another, more handy teristics of the French Revolution with those of the rise of purpose. Among the harshest critics of the Bush administration, Islam. . . . Marx has taught that Communism is fatally pre- the word fascism is also wafting through the air. But it’s not destined to come about; this produces a state of mind not aimed at the Islamic terrorists. It’s aimed at the Bush admin- unlike that of the early successors of Mahommet. . . . Moham­ istration itself—the perpetrators of warrantless wiretaps, medanism and Bolshevism are practical, social, unspiritual, flaunters of the Geneva Convention, extraordinary rendition, concerned to win the empire of this world.” Guantánamo, torture, secret prisons, the right to perpetrate In his 1949 study Sociologie du Communisme, Jules preemptive attack on other countries, overthrowing uncoopera- Monnerot called Communism the “twentieth-century Islam,” tive governments, and the grabbing of other nation’s resources. noting that it: Now that is a comparison to fascism with some validity. takes the field both as a secular religion and as a universal The disinformation strategy is simple. If the Bush adminis- State; it is therefore more comparable to Islam than to the tration can name the enemy as fascism, then how can anyone Universal Religion which began by opposing the universal State in the Hellenistic and Roman worlds, and which can be said to accuse it of exhibiting the same characteristics? have drawn men’s hearts away from the State to itself. . . . This merging of religion and politics was a major characteristic of the Islamic world in its victorious period. It allowed the head of State to operate beyond his own frontiers in the capacity of (Islamofacism Is an Apt Descriptor cont’d. from p. 25) commander of the faithful (Amir al-muminin). . . . Religions of this kind acknowledge no frontiers. Soviet Russia is merely the Islam fits perfectly within such a characterization, as a geographical center from which communist influence radiates; host of Western scholars have noted since the beginning of it is an “Islam” on the march, and it regards its frontiers at any the twentieth century. Far from being of only recent usage, given moment as purely provisional and temporary. the application of either totalitarian or fascist to Islam goes In The Captive Mind, Czeslaw Milosz devoted a chapter back nearly a hundred years and furthermore—far from being to how people in totalitarian societies develop means to cope a loose term of abuse—has been used precisely. publicly with all the contradictions of real life. One cannot In 1937, Charles Watson, a Christian missionary in Egypt, admit to contradictions openly; officially they do not exist. described Islam as totalitarian because “by a million roots, Hence, people learn to dissimulate their views, emotions, and penetrating every phase of life, all of them with religious sig- thoughts, never revealing their true beliefs publicly. Milosz nificance, it is able to maintain its hold upon the life of Moslem finds a striking analogy of the same phenomenon in Islamic peoples.” G.H. Bousquet, one of the foremost authorities on civilization, where it bears the name kitman or ketman, the Islamic law, distinguished two aspects of Islam that he consid- Persian word for “concealment.” ered totalitarian: Islamic law itself and the Islamic notion of Islam has also been compared more precisely to Nazism or jihad, which has for its ultimate aim the conquest of the entire sometimes fascism, usually synonymously. For example, in an world in order to submit it to one single authority. interview in the late 1930s, the famous Swiss psychiatrist Carl

27 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 Jung was asked if he had any views on what was likely to be ligence tracking down former Nazis. In 1948, he joined the the next step in religious development. He replied, referring State Department, where he worked on Middle East affairs, to the rise of Nazism in Germany, “We do not know whether and in 1958 he came to Princeton, where he did the same. In Hitler is going to found a new Islam. He is already on the way; 1963, Princeton published his Politics of Social Change in he is like Muhammad. The emotion in Germany is Islamic; the Middle East and North Africa, an academic treatment of warlike and Islamic. They are all drunk with wild god. That Islamism, which Halpern labeled “neo-Islamic totalitarianism”: can be the historic future.” The neo-Islamic totalitarian movements are essentially fas- Also writing in the 1930s, Karl Barth reflected on the threat cist movements. They concentrate on mobilizing passion and of Hitler and his similarities to Muhammad: violence to enlarge the power of their charismatic leader and the solidarity of the movement. They view material progress Participation in this life, according to it the only worthy and primarily as a means for accumulating strength for political blessed life, is what National Socialism, as a political exper- expansion, and entirely deny individual and social freedom. iment, promises to those who will of their own accord share They champion the values and emotions of a heroic past, but in this experiment. And now it becomes understandable why, repress all free critical analysis of either past roots or pres- at the point where it meets with resistance, it can only crush ent problems. . . . Like fascism, neo-Islamic totalitarianism and kill—with the might and right which belongs to Divinity! represents the institutionalization of struggle, tension, and Islam of old as we know proceeded in this way. It is impossible violence. to understand National Socialism unless we see it in fact as a new Islam [emphasis in original], its myth as a new Allah, and A comparison of Islamism with fascism was also put for- Hitler as this new Allah’s Prophet. ward by Maxime Rodinson, eminent French scholar of Islam and by common consent one of three greatest scholars of Islam of the twentieth century. A French Jew born in 1915, Rodinson also learned about fascism from direct experience: his parents “. . . during the 1930s, many Islamists perished in Auschwitz. In a 1978 Le Monde article censur- ing Michel Foucault’s uncritical endorsement of the Iranian themselves realized their faith’s affinity Revolution, Rodinson admitted that trends in Islamic move- to Nazism and made overtures to Hitler, ments such as the Muslim Brotherhood were “hard to ascer- tain. . . . But the dominant trend is a certain type of archaic among them al-Husseini, the fascism (type de fascisme archaïque). By this I mean a wish Grand Mufti of Jerusalem.” to establish an authoritarian and totalitarian state whose political police would brutally enforce the moral and social order. It would at the same time impose conformity to religious tradition as interpreted in the most conservative light.” In 1984, Said Amir Arjomand, an Iranian-American sociol- Albert Speer, Hitler’s minister of armaments and war pro- ogist at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, also duction, wrote a memoir of his World War II experiences pointed to “some striking sociological similarities between the while serving a twenty-year prison sentence imposed by the contemporary Islamic movements and the European fascism Nuremberg Tribunal. Speer’s narrative includes this discus- and the American radical right. . . . It is above all the strength sion, which captures Hitler’s racist views of Arabs on the one of the monistic impulse and the pronounced political moralism hand and his effusive praise for Islam on the other: of the Islamic traditionalist and fundamentalist movements which makes them akin to fascism and the radical right alike.” Hitler had been much impressed by a scrap of history he had learned from a delegation of distinguished Arabs. When the After this parade of quotations, some readers will object Mohammedans attempted to penetrate beyond France into to my reliance on Western scholars, some firmly in the camp Central Europe during the eighth century, his visitors had told that bears the much-feared label “Orientalist.” Of course, the him, they had been driven back at the Battle of Tours. Had the influence of charlatans like Edward Said—and the pernicious Arabs won this battle, the world would be Mohammedan today. academic climate of relativism and multiculturalism that he For theirs was a religion that believed in spreading the faith by the sword and subjugating all nations to that faith. did so much to engender—has made cross-cultural judgments Such a creed was perfectly suited to the Germanic tem- well-nigh impossible. (For more on this, see my Defending the perament. [Emphasis added.] Hitler said that the conquering West: A Critique of Edward Said’s Orientalism, Prome­theus Arabs, because of their racial inferiority, would in the long run 2007.) have been unable to contend with the harsher climate and con- ditions of the country. They could not have kept down the more To dismiss out of hand any criticism of Islam simply vigorous natives, so that ultimately not Arabs but Islamized because it comes from a Westerner is to fall foul, of course, Germans could have stood at the head of this Mohammedan of the genetic fallacy and further betrays a sort of racism. We Empire. [Emphasis added.] Hitler usually concluded this his- who pride ourselves on being rationalists should look at the torical speculation by remarking, “You see, it’s been our misfor- arguments and ask if such-and-such thesis is true, valid, or tune to have the wrong religion. Why didn’t we have the religion of the Japanese, who regard sacrifice for the Fatherland as the justified by the evidence and not ask first who developed it or highest good? The Mohammedan religion too would have been put it forward. Furthermore, it should be noted that far from much more compatible to us than Christianity. Why did it have being a term used by “racists,” Islamofascism has also been to be Christianity with its meekness and flabbiness?” applied to Islam by ex-Muslims and by those of a democratic Manfred Halpern was a politics professor at Princeton for temperament in Islamic countries. Finally, during the 1930s, nearly forty years. Born in Germany in 1924, Halpern and his many Islamists themselves realized their faith’s affinity to parents fled the Nazis in 1937 for America. He fought against Nazism and made overtures to Hitler, among them al-Hussei- the Nazis in World War II, then worked in U.S. counterintel- ni, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 28 The New Pariahs: Atheists in the U.S. Military Michael Dorian

n 2007, United States Army Specialist Jeremy Hall decided to hold a meeting of atheists and agnostics at his base camp in Tikrit, Iraq. Hall, a military police Isoldier in Iraq at the time, was about to have his life changed in ways he could never have imagined. Three other people showed up for Hall’s meeting, one of them Army Major Freddy Welborn. Hall says Welborn declared himself “a freethinker” as his entrée into the group. But fifteen minutes into the meeting, Hall realized something was very wrong. Major Welborn was no kindred nonbeliever. According to Hall, Welborn began chastising him for his athe- ism and threatening him with disciplinary action. According to his MySpace page and his e-mails, Welborn is a self-described “warrior of Christ” and an openly zealous Christian who attended the meeting apparently in order to confront the unseemly godless among his ranks. Declining an interview for this article, Welborn replied by e-mail that “the truth is more important than anything and I truly believe that God wants me to tell it. I’m following His will and don’t think the time is now [to tell my side of the story].” After the meeting, Hall allegedly received death threats, was physically harassed, and was virtually ostracized by his fellow American soldiers. After three months, he was sent to a base in Kansas, because otherwise it seemed he would end up as another casualty of war. One of the most alarming threats to Hall’s personal safety occurred while Hall was on leave in Qatar during the summer of 2007. “Six or eight big guys [American soldiers] started following me around, calling me an ‘atheist ass pirate,’ say- Specialist Jeremy Hall tried to start a ing ‘we’re going to beat your ass.’ They wanted to hurt me,” meeting of atheist and agnostic soldiers. reports Hall. He also feared being “fragged”—having a frag- mentation grenade tossed into his tent while sleeping, a tactic Three months later he was sent home suspected in instances of not-so-friendly fire. “I couldn’t sleep. because he wasn’t safe in Iraq. I didn’t want to go out like that,” states the laconic Hall. Hall and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation—a watchdog organization headed by retired Air Force attorney Mikey Weinstein—filed a lawsuit in the Kansas federal court- house, naming as defendants not only Major Welborn but lawsuit claims that Hall was denied a promotion due to his also United States Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. The atheism because he might be “unable to put aside his personal case charges that Hall’s rights of free speech and assembly convictions and pray with his troops,” and he would have trou- were violated and that he was subjected to an impermissible ble bonding with them if promoted to a leadership position. religious test, another constitutional breach. Additionally, the Michael Dorian is a writer and documentary filmmaker. He Hall’s plight, although more arduous than most, is not alto- blogs for the New York City Atheists at www.nyc-atheists gether unusual. “The only religion I’ve seen overtly supported .org/blog. is the Christian religion,” claims Master Sergeant Kathleen Johnson, who has been in the U.S. Army for twenty-three

29 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 years. She founded the Military Association of Atheists & have received more than 5,500 complaints from retired and Freethinkers (MAAF). “But as more and more people refuse current U.S. soldiers fed up with the blatantly religious tenor to pretend to be something they’re not, there are going to be of the armed services. more and more incidents. A good example is Jeremy Hall; he When asked why he thinks atheists are so reviled in the military, Adkins credits “a lot of left-over Cold-War sentiment that atheism equals Communism.” Adkins ultimately resigned his commission as a matter of principle, saying, “I don’t want “Commanders recognize that spiritually to be part of the military of a nation that’s moving toward being a theocracy and thinks it’s in a holy war with Islam.” fit Hall corroborates this sentiment among the troops. “When soldiers are better fighters, and can some soldiers go to Iraq, a Muslim country, they think they’re doing God’s work. I’ve heard that said. People have actually bring a expressed the view that this war is justified because we’re going to spread God’s love.” This declared notion, perhaps spirit of determination to the mission better than anything else, elucidates the inherent dangers of that is be­lieving one enjoys a proprietary relationship with a deity. Hall contends that “if you’re not a Christian, you’re second courageous and heroic.” rate, you’re not in the club.” Does he think that he still gets unfair treatment? “Yes, I get unfair treatment,” says Hall, but — Maj. Eric Albertson, a Catholic due to the pending lawsuit, “I can’t discuss it at the moment.” chaplain On being stationed at Fort Riley, Kansas, Hall quietly admits, “I feel tolerated. I’m not seen as a soldier. I’m just that guy who did that thing.” After three-and-a-half years in the Army, Specialist Hall will not be re-enlisting. His pending federal lawsuit against stood up for his rights.” Defense Secretary Gates and Major Welborn will keep him as Another soldier who has endured difficulties for his nonbe- lief is Wayne Adkins, a decorated National Guard officer who served in Iraq. He says that he “began noticing a trend: mostly chaplains but also senior officers making comments in the news media disparaging atheists in the military.” Adkins was “Jeremy Hall believes that ‘if you’re not finally prompted to take action by remarks that Lt. General H. Steven Blum delivered before a meeting of the National a Christian, you’re second rate, you’re Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 2006. not in Blum declared that “agnostics, atheists, and bigots” are not as well suited to life on the frontlines because “something the club. . . . Yes, I get unfair treatment,’ that they lived their whole life [sic] believing gets thrown says Hall, but due to the pending law- out the door” when they are faced with mortality. Then-First Lieutenant Adkins filed a formal complaint with the National suit, Guard Bureau’s Equal Opportunity Office against Blum, a ‘I can’t discuss it at the moment.’” three-star general. Adkins says that the complaint was essentially ignored, presumably in the hope that as months passed the whole inci- dent would just be forgotten. “They sat on it,” claims Adkins, a thoughtful former pastoral theology student. “Every time I close to the military as he now cares to be. called to follow up, they acted like they were hearing about Altering the attitudes of soldiers who want to hurt Hall it for the first time. Ultimately, I was told they weren’t going or who see him as an unwanted outsider is a problem with to do anything about it.” Adkins asserts that a disregard for much deeper roots in society than even the hugely powerful atheists, and even discrimination against them, is a systemic U.S. armed forces can transcend. The more practical issue is problem in the military. whether the military will make substantive modifications to its According to an article in The Catholic Herald, Chaplain apparent disdain for the nonbelievers among its ranks. and Major Eric Albertson, a Catholic priest in the military Change within this system won’t come easily or quickly. archdiocese, says: “Commanders recognize that spiritually fit Segregation in the military ended officially in 1954 with the soldiers are better fighters, and can bring a spirit of determi- abolition of the final all-African-American unit. Both women nation to the mission that is courageous and heroic.” and homosexuals have had a notoriously hard time within the “Religious indoctrination is part of military culture, specif- armed forces as well. Now it looks like it’s the heathens’ turn ically Christian religious indoctrination, at least in my experi- to confront a system that is likely incapable of implementing a ence,” attests Master Sergeant Johnson. policy in this instance of “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” With the likes of Hall, Weinstein, Johnson, and Adkins come the first real rumblings of change to the old order. Weinstein’s Military Religious Freedom Foundation claims to

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 30 Where Can God Act? A Look at Quantum Theology

Victor J. Stenger

carry on by itself. Whatever purpose God had in creating the universe, that purpose is built-in and The Clockwork Universe inevitable, since every event is already predetermined. Indeed, n 1687, Isaac Newton published The Mathematical only if God were imperfect would he need to intervene to change Principles of Natural Philosophy, now referred to simply Ias Principia, which many scholars say is the greatest work of science ever produced. Newtonian mechanics pro- “By including chance in the develop- vided the means for predicting the motion of every body in the universe with what appears to be unlimited precision. All ment of life well before the twentieth you need to know is the mass of the body, its initial position century, when chance became a major and momentum, and the net force acting on it, and the laws of motion allow you to calculate the position and velocity of the player in physics and body at any time. cosmology, evolution blew a big hole in Newton insisted that he was demonstrating the work of divine providence in nature. However, his discoveries conflict- the clockwork universe and relegated ed profoundly with traditional Christian teaching. If the motion of every body in the universe is fully determined by Newton’s the Enlightenment deist God to history.” laws of motion and force, then there is nothing for God to do beyond the creation—no reason to step in to perform miracles or answer . Even before Newton, philosophers had the course of events. begun to view the universe as a vast machine. With Newton, This period in Western history, when science and rational that picture seemed to be confirmed. We all live in a clockwork thinking began to challenge superstition and appeals to reli- universe with everything predetermined. gious authority, is called the Age of the Enlightenment. The As a consequence, a new concept of God arose, a new theol- central tenet of the Enlightenment was Newtonian determin- ogy called “deism,” in which a perfect, all-knowing, all-powerful ism. Many of America’s Founding Fathers—including Thomas God created the universe and its laws, then left it alone to Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, and Thomas Victor J. Stenger’s New York Times best-seller, God: The Paine—were deists. Some European thinkers saw no need Failed Hypothesis—How Science Shows that God Does Not even for a deist God, and for the first time in the history of Exist, is now out in paperback with a foreword by Christendom, atheism became a respectable alternative. Christopher Hitchens and a new postscript by the author. The main objection to the clockwork universe is its impli- Stenger is an adjunct professor of philosophy at the Uni­ cation that humans do not possess free will. This means that versity of Colorado and professor emeritus of physics and we are not responsible for our actions and possess no power astronomy at the University of Hawaii. of choice. Not only does this contradict the central religious

31 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 doctrines of sin and atonement, it poses real problems for flowers, peer through telescopes into the heavens, and bear secular society. If a person is not responsible for his acts, what witness to God’s creative artifacts in nature. The argument basis is there for punishing or rewarding those acts? Besides, from design remains the most common scientific argument most people have the innate conviction that they possess the theists give for their beliefs, despite the fact that evolution by freedom to act self-consciously no matter what scientists or natural selection is now solidly confirmed as the mechanism by philosophers may say. which complex living organisms develop from simpler forms. Of course, most fundamentalist Christians refuse to accept In Emile, ou l’education, Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s fic- evolution because it conflicts with the Bible. These dedicated tional Vicar of Savoyard chastises philosophers to recognize faithful represent a strong political force in the United States, that something may be true even if they cannot understand but they have so far failed in their efforts to remake science it. Such is the case, the vicar says, for the free-acting immate- so that Christian principles take precedence over established rial mind, which is a fact immediately perceived in his “inner scientific methodology. light.” Rousseau led the way out of Enlightenment deism and atheism by teaching a theology in which everything natural is The Premise Keepers The antiscientists do not concern me in this essay. I am far more interested in and respectful of those theologians who “The argument from design remains the accept the results of science and do not dispute the power of most common scientific argument the- its meticulous procedures but make an honest attempt to rec- oncile it with God. In an earlier essay, which mainly focused on ists give for their beliefs, despite the fact evolution theology, I referred to them as the “premise keepers.” that evolution They include, among others, the particle physicist and Anglican priest John Polkinghorne, the biochemist and Anglican priest by natural selection is now solidly con- Arthur Peacocke, the biologist Kenneth Miller, the physicist and firmed theologian Ian Barbour, the cosmologist and Quaker George Ellis, the physicist and theologian Willem Drees, and theolo- as the mechanism by which complex gians John Haught and Nancey Murphy. Since many of the living organisms develop from simpler proposals I will discuss have appeared in the writings of several of these thinkers, I will generally not single out the views of indi- forms.” viduals but rather seek out their common thread. The problem of locating God’s action has been the subject of a multiyear collaborative project between the Vatican good and evil is humanity’s doing (although the notion of the Observatory and the Center for Theology and the Natural “noble savage” was not Rousseau’s doing). Sciences, located in Berkeley. Five volumes of proceedings edited by Center director (and premise keeper) Robert John Natural Theology Russell have been produced. A whole issue of Zygon, the The Enlightenment did not bring about the demise of Journal of Religion and Science was recently devoted to the Christianity. Rather, Christianity began to adapt to its own question. A number of books of varying scholarly quality have brand of deism, using the metaphor of mechanism and the also been published. wonders of science to extol the glory and power of God while The premise keepers, who are almost all Christians, recog- assuming the existence of a parallel world of mind or spirit nize that the deist God, even in the dual model of matter and that was not constrained by Newton’s laws. Furthermore, mind, is not the Christian God. So they seek ways for a God to nature itself ostensibly offered proof of God’s existence. act that is both consistent with Christian tradition and does William Paley eloquently articulated this view in his 1802 not violate natural laws. These acts might be in response to book Natural Theology, in which he introduced the famous earnest prayers or the need to fix some sequence of events watchmaker analogy for God. Paley tells of walking on the that has gone off course just because of the large amount of heath and finding a stone and a watch. While the stone is random, unpremeditated chance that evidently exists in our easily viewed as an object formed by natural forces, the same universe. is not true of the watch, which is clearly an artifact. Paley Note that the premise keepers do not allow for miracles then compares the watch with biological structures such as if these violate laws of nature. As Polkinghorne put it, if God the human eye and argues that the eye cannot possibly be the worked against the laws of nature it would be God acting product of any purely natural process. It calls out for a design- against God, the presumed author of those laws. So it is not er, and that designer, of course, is God. simply a matter of saying “God is God, he can do anything he Charles Darwin, who was assigned the same rooms at wants to do.” Whatever actions the premise keepers propose Cambridge that Paley occupied a generation earlier, was very for God to take in the current world beyond his actions at cre- impressed by Paley’s argument. But ultimately he was uncon- ation should be consistent with the laws of nature—at least as vinced and in 1859 published On the Origin of Species, laying we perceive them on the human scale. This is not a restriction out the evidence that living organisms evolve by a process of on God; it is a restriction on the possible theories of God that random mutations and natural selection (a process that Alfred theologians can consider while being consistent with science Russel Wallace had independently also discovered). and avoiding the need for God to act against his own creation. Even today, Christians are told by their preachers to look at What may appear as a miracle is just an unusual event, not a the beauty and complexity of the world about them, smell the violation of natural law.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 32 Another restriction on theologians is that their God the- ory must allow for human free will, which is fundamental to Christian belief. This means that God’s actions can, in princi- ple, be thwarted by human actions. Somehow theologians have to arrange it so that God’s actions are beyond the reach of the “Since there is no compelling evidence human capability to undo. As with the clockwork universe, theologians must grope for that God acts anywhere, the simplest a place for God to act in the course of evolution. Since we still conclusion is that he does not exist. do not understand how life originally came about on Earth, any- one is free to propose that God initiated the process. However, However, theologians would soon lose even if God did create life, he could not simply then turn it over their jobs if there were no God to natural selection the way the deist God turned over physics to Newtonian determinism. Consider the matter of the devel- theories to speculate about.” opment of the human race. Evolution tells us that we are the result of an enormous number of random mutations that have occurred since life began on Earth four billion years ago. If, as Christianity and other religions teach, God created the universe with a special place and plan for humanity, then he would have teaching and widespread human belief that we are special and had to intervine countless times along the way—every time central to God’s plan for the universe. there was a mutation on the path to Homo sapiens—to make Nevertheless, evolution by natural selection did theologians sure that we evolved. Such actions may be indistinguishable a great favor. By including chance in the development of life from evolution but would constitute a form of intelligent design well before the twentieth century, when chance became a inconsistent with the more parsimonious evolutionary principle major player in physics and cosmology, evolution blew a big that random mutations are sufficient to provide the genetic hole in the clockwork universe and relegated the Enlighten­ changes needed for natural selection to operate. ment deist God to history. Living organisms are not predeter- Several premise keepers have proposed that God did not mined after all. They are a consequence of random chance and care whether humans evolved or not. For his own reasons, he natural selection. set things up the way he did, with many paths to some final end that need not include humanity. That’s possible, but such Uncertainty a God must then be reconciled with the traditional Christian The Newtonian clockwork universe has never been a problem

33 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 for the vast majority of believers to whom the name Newton is being God, he can do that. But so long as God limited himself more likely to bring up an association with a tasty fig cookie to placing the electron at a precise location within a volume than laws of motion. Nevertheless, prior to the twentieth the size of Earth in six seconds, humans would not be able century, theologians still had to grapple with the problem of to detect it, just as poking his finger into evolution would be finding a place for God to act within the framework of the indistinguishable from randomness. All this appears possible— clockwork universe. Natural theology just swept this under God could be behaving in this way—and the only argument the rug. Since there is no compelling evidence that God acts against it is once again parsimony. Every gram of matter contains a trillion trillion electrons, protons, and neutrons. This means that a deity would have to somehow maintain control over countless events taking place at the submicroscopic level over extended periods of time. The “Several theologians have proposed prospect of God micromanaging all these particles throughout the universe has not appealed to many theologians. The prem- chaos as the means for amplifying God’s ise keepers are looking for ways for God to act on the everyday action from the quantum level to the scale of human experience, where that action is meaningful to humanity. If God is to use quantum mechanics to act in the macroscopic level.” universe, those actions must be amplified by some mechanism, and, furthermore, they must involve large-scale phenomena that are otherwise not predetermined.

Butterflies and Chaos anywhere, the simplest conclusion is that he does not exist. Some premise keepers have proposed that the amplification However, theologians would soon lose their jobs if there were mechanism might be found in the so-called butterfly effect, dis- no God theories to speculate about. And here is where modern covered in 1960 by meteorologist Edward Lorenz. Running a quantum mechanics provides a playing field for speculation. model of the atmosphere on one of the primitive computers of Perhaps the most important innovation in quantum the day, Lorenz found that the model was very sensitive to tiny mechanics is the uncertainty principle, introduced in 1927 changes in the input data, such as when he entered a number by Werner Heisenberg, which says that the momentum and that had been rounded off in printing from the actual number position of a body cannot be simultaneously measured with inside the computer. It was as if a butterfly flapping its wings unlimited precision. (Except at speeds near the speed of light, could change the weather days ahead. momentum can usually be approximated as the product of the Since then, this phenomenon, dubbed “chaos,” has been mass and velocity of a body.) studied extensively with experiments and computer simula- We saw above that Newton’s laws of motion provide a tions. We have seen that Newtonian mechanics allows the pre- means for predicting the motion of a body when we know diction of the motion of a body with unlimited accuracy, at least the initial position and velocity of the body and forces acting for large-scale phenomena. It can do this as well for a system on it. This was the basis of the clockwork universe in which of two bodies. But when you move to three bodies, it becomes everything that happens is predetermined. The uncertainty impossible because of the mathematical complexity required to principle seems to rescue us from determinism. For example, describe all possibilities and the apparent impossibility of an there is no way for a physicist to predict with any reasonable exact solution. Approximation techniques, such as perturba- accuracy the motion of a free electron initially confined within tion theory, enable physicists to make useful calculations for a volume the size of an atom. The uncertainty in the electron’s systems of a few bodies that interact with one another weakly, velocity by virtue of its position being so well known is one for example, the planets and other bodies in the solar system. million meters per second with random direction! Six seconds But even this fails when the bodies strongly interact. later, the electron can be anywhere within a volume the size Of course, it is hopeless to calculate the detailed motion of Earth. By contrast, the uncertainty in the velocity of a body of the trillion trillion molecules in a gram of familiar matter. of mass equal to one gram confined to a cubic centimeter is Instead, physicists use statistical techniques to calculate the 5x10-30 meters per second, and the motion of such a particle average behavior of such systems. With the highly developed can be predicted with great accuracy. theory of statistical mechanics, many of the gross properties Of course, the fact that a physicist cannot predict something of the gases, liquids, and solids of normal and laboratory expe- does not necessarily mean it is not predetermined. But let us rience can be computed, but these systems must be in thermal assume this is an ontological, not just an epistemological, fact equilibrium (constant temperature throughout) or not too far so that we are not back to the Enlightenment deistic God. from it. This stratagem fails for many multibody systems that Does this open up a place for God to act, poking his finger are far from equilibrium, for example, Earth’s atmosphere in so that the electron goes where he wants rather than, as with its turbulence and strong interactions with land and sea. implied by quantum mechanics, almost any place at random? Computer simulations have shown that the butterfly effect Many premise keepers have suggested so. In the case of the and other unexpected phenomena are associated with sys- electron confined to a tiny region of space, God could direct tems that have three basic characteristics: the motion of that electron to where he wants it within the 1. Nonlinearity. A linear system is one whose output response limits of the uncertainty principle. But note that to do so, he to a stimulus is proportional to the stimulus. For nonlinear would in fact be violating the uncertainty principle, just as he systems this is not the case. violated evolution in the example discussed above. Of course, 2. Energy dissipation. The system must have a means of

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 34 losing energy, such as friction. drive to Las Vegas, changing the chemical composition of the 3. External driving force. An outside force must act on the atmosphere just enough to thwart God’s plan. system. In short, it does not seem that quantum mechanics, even A simple example of a system that meets these characteris- with chaotic amplification, provides a place for God to act that tics is the damped, driven pendulum. A pendulum will respond­ avoids violating laws of nature or human free will. linearly to a slight push, but its response becomes nonlinear as the push gets harder. Add damping, and the pendulum A God Who Plays Dice behaves chaotically. We have seen that the Enlightenment’s deistic God who created Chaotic systems appear to behave unpredictably. At least the universe with everything predetermined is not viable if we there is no known mathematical technique that enables one to go from the initial conditions to the final results. However, for a system on the everyday human scale, individual bodies such as air molecules inside the system obey Newtonian mechanics. The apparent unpredictability of a chaotic system is the result “…while Christian apologists can find of our own limited knowledge of the initial conditions. When we ways to fit the chaos deity into their do computer simulations on chaotic systems, we can predict the outcome even if we can’t calculate it by traditional mathemati- always-flexible cal means. All we need to do is run the simulation once and see interpretations of scripture and religious where the system ends up. Then, as long as we run it again from the same initial point (taking care to avoid rounding errors), we doctrines, this God is not one to pray will end up at the same final point. For these reasons, we refer to and is hardly worth anyone’s time to to the chaos associated with nonlinear systems as “determinis- tic chaos.” Indeed, quantum systems, which are not determin- worship.” istic in most interpretations, are linear and so do not exhibit this variety of chaos. Attempts to develop a nonlinear version of quantum mechanics have so far failed. In fact, linearity lies behind many quantum effects, such as “entanglement.” The primary characteristic of chaotic systems is their accept the view of most physicists and philosophers that quan- sensitivity to initial conditions. The uncertainty principle of tum mechanics implies only a statistical determinism. This is quantum mechanics could in principle result in a large-scale, certainly the way quantum mechanics is currently applied. The otherwise deterministic, chaotic system such as a pendulum same equations of motion that appear in classical Newtonian or an unpredictable atmosphere because of our inability to set mechanics can be used to predict the average motion of an the initial conditions accurately. ensemble of particles but not that of individual particles. This is Several theologians have proposed chaos as the means for not to say that the motions of particles are random. Somehow amplifying God’s action from the quantum level to the macro- their motions are constrained to yield the calculated average. scopic level. Working within the uncertainty principle so that Indeed, the exact statistical distribution giving the range of he breaks no laws of physics, God would have to change the deviations from average motion can also be calculated. initial conditions of a chaotic system to affect the outcome. Now, it remains possible that the motions of particles are This means that God, knowing how to do Newtonian predetermined, and we simply have not yet discovered the mechanics better than we do and presumably having the best underlying principles. This was the suggestion made in the computer in heaven at his disposal, can thus obtain his desired 1950s by David Bohm—that there are “hidden variables” gov- outcome. He simply chooses the initial conditions that lead erning the behavior of individual particles. The pursuit of these deterministically to the desired result. hidden variables has led to some interesting developments that Christian schoolmaster Timothy Sansbury has pointed to have been given mystical interpretations, which I covered in three problems with this scenario for God’s action. First, a my 1995 book, The Unconscious Quantum. For our present significant time delay is involved in the kinds of chaotic ampli- purposes, let me just note that no evidence for hidden variables fication systems we might consider; for example, it might take has been uncovered, and the world of quantum mechanics con- several days for the butterfly effect to change the weather. tinues to appear indeterministic. And, if Bohm turns out to be Second, it is not clear that dramatic changes can be effect- correct and everything is predetermined after all, we are back ed, such as bringing rain in response to farmers’ prayers. It to the very non-Christian “God” of Enlightenment deism. certainly would not move fast enough to change the course We are rapidly narrowing the list of possible gods consis- of a tornado heading straight for your house or end a storm tent with science. We can with some confidence eliminate the endangering a ship at sea. Enlightenment’s deist God. A personal God who acts within Third, during the time that a chaotic system is working quantum uncertainty, possibly amplified by chaos, to change its way from initial conditions to final outcome, something the outcome of events in the natural world remains possible might happen to change that course. This may not be a but- but unnecessary. This would seem to leave open only the pos- terfly flapping its wings, but since we are assuming God gave sibility of the God to which Einstein strongly objected, the God humans free will, some human might take an action that God who “plays dice.” did not anticipate when he made his adjustment to the initial As mentioned, several premise keepers have proposed such conditions. For example, that human might decide at the last a god. This is a different kind of deist God who creates the uni- moment to get into his carbon monoxide-emitting SUV and

35 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 verse and its laws and leaves it alone to run itself according to those laws, but allows for an extra ingredient of chance that he does not control. Rather, his purposes are served regardless of We invite you to become an the particular path the universe and life take among the count- less possible paths available to them. This, of course, leaves ample room for human free will and a great amount of possible ASSOCIATE MEMBER creativity, given the way simple systems are able to evolve into As an ASSOCIATE MEMBER of the Council for Secular Humanism, more complex forms naturally and without outside help. you will receive four issues a year of the Secular Humanist Bulletin. Now, while Christian apologists can find ways to fit the The entertaining and provocative Bulletin keeps you up-to-date chaos deity into their always-flexible interpretations of scrip- on humanist news, issues, and activities and provides a forum for ture and religious doctrines, this God is not one to pray to and members to share ideas and plans. is hardly worth anyone’s time to worship. Other benefits you will receive as an ASSOCIATE MEMBER include: Furthermore, modern physics and cosmology make even the chaos deity, and indeed any creator, unlikely. This follows A 10% DISCOUNT ON: from the following observations: • registration fees for conferences 1. No laws of physics were violated when the universe came and seminars into existence. • registration fees for Center for 2. Several detailed theoretical papers have been published Inquiry Institute courses by reputable scientists in reputable journals that provide • audiotapes and videotapes various scenarios by which our universe could have arisen • a select range of humanist and spontaneously from nothing but the quantum characteristics freethought books of a vacuum, in a way consistent with all existing knowledge. • secular humanist T-shirts and 3. Something is more natural than nothing. A state of noth- other merchandise ing will tend to undergo a phase transformation to a state of something. The universe appears to be an evolving state of “frozen nothing.”  I wish to support the work of the Council for Secular Humanism by 4. The laws of physics are those that would be expected to becoming an ASSOCIATE MEMBER! exist if the universe arose from nothing. By “nothing” I refer to l Annual individual $20 a state of complete disorder—no matter, no energy, no struc- Two-year individual $36 ture and, most significantly, no information. l 5. The structure of the universe could have evolved from sim- l Three-year individual $49 pler systems, mostly by chance. l Annual family membership $34 6. The universe at its beginning was in a state of total disorder l Two-year family membership $54 and zero information. Order and information evolved later. l Three-year family membership $78 Thus the universe retains no memory of a creator—or of that l Lifetime Associate Membership creator’s intentions. (Lifetime members also receive Free Inquiry for life) $1,000 In short, a creator who plays dice may have existed. But that universe is evolving by itself without any divine purpose or plan provided by that creator. Charge my l AmEx l Discover l MC l Visa l Check or money order enclosed Further Reading Clayton, Philip. Mind and Emergence: From Quantum to #______Consciousness. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. Haught, John F. God After Darwin. Boulder, Col.: Westview Press, Exp.______Sig.______2000. Miller, Kenneth R. Finding Darwin’s God: A Scientist’s Search for Name______a Common Ground Between God and Evolution. New York: Harper Collins, 1999. Daytime Phone # ______O’Murchu, Diarmuid. Quantum Theology: Spiritual Implications of the New Physics. New York: Crossroad Publishing Company, 1997. Addre Peters, Ted, and Nathan Hallanger, eds. God’s Action in Nature’s World: Essays in Honour of Robert John Russell. Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2006. Polkinghorne, John. “The Metaphysics of Divine Action,” in Chaos and Complexity: Scientific Perspectives on Divine Action, edited by R.J. Russell, N. Murphy, and A. Peacocke. Vatican City: Vatican Observatory, 1995. ———. Belief in God in the Age of Science. New Haven and London: Please make checks payable to Council for Secular Humanism and return to: Council Associate Memberships, P.O. Box 664, Yale University Press, 1998. Amherst, NY 14226-0664. Or call toll-free 800-458-1366. Fax charges to: (716) 636-1733. ———. Quantum Physics and Theology: An Unexpected Kinship. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2007. Sansbury, Timothy. “The False Promise of Quantum Mechanics,” Zygon 42, no. 1 (March 2007). Stenger, Victor J. The Unconscious Quantum: Metaphysics in Modern Physics and Cosmology. Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1995.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 36 Part 2 Adolf Grünbaum

The Failure of Swinburne’s Simplicity However, in a lecture that I delivered in March 2006 at All Recipe for Verisimilitudinous Theories Souls College in Oxford when Swinburne was in the audience, and also at the Royal Institute of Philosophy in London, I demonstrated at least two results that fundamentally subvert Swinburne’s thesis, as he, in effect, conceded in the ensuing public discussion. To state my results, let me speak of a theo- ry B that is more likely to be true than a theory A as “having n his books Simplicity as Evidence of Truth (1997) greater verisimilitude” than A. Then two of my damaging con- and Epistemic Justification (2001), Richard Swin­ tentions against Swinburne can be stated as follows: burne argued strenuously that simplicity provides This essay is based on the Presidential Address that Adolf Grün­ probabilistic evidence of truth by being a tie-breaker among I baum delivered in early August 2007 at the thirteenth quadrennial conflicting theories as follows: greater simplicity is a crite- International Congress of Logic, Method­ology, and Philosophy of rion for “choosing among [competing] scientific theories of Science (DLMPS) of the International­ Union of History and Philosophy equal scope [or content] fitting equally well with background of Science (IUHPS), held at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. It is evidence and yielding the same data. . . .” This choice of the dedicated to Dr. Grünbaum’s late beloved colleague Wesley C. Salmon. simpler of two theories purportedly yields the theory that is Dr. Grünbaum extends his thanks to Thomas Cunningham and Balazs Gyenis for their helpful expository comments. more likely to be true precisely by virtue of being simpler.

http://www.secularhumanism.org 37 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 1. His comparative simplicity ratings, which are to yield a some demonstration of the requisite content-equality of these verdict of greater verisimilitude, avowedly pertain to rival two rival hypotheses. hypotheses of equal content or scope. Yet Swinburne, like Indeed, even if such content-equality were to be demonstrat- Karl Popper before him, has left the implementation of this ed, the supposed greater a priori simplicity of the God hypothe- crucial content-parity requirement glaringly unfulfilled. sis would not confer any greater verisimilitude upon it: as I have argued elsewhere, a priori simplicity and a priori probability are not at all ontologically legislative, and thus Swinburne can- “Just for argument’s sake, posit with not milk any theological capital out of the purported a priori simplicity and a priori probability of the Deity, even if true! Yet Swinburne that in the class of all exis- his theism is explanatorily omnivorous, avowing very dubiously tential hypotheses, the theistic one is that theism explains “everything we observe.” Moreover, there are further difficulties: theory B might be the simplest and therefore simpler than simpler than theory A in one respect while being more compli- its atheistic competitor. . . . [T]his sup- cated in another. But inter-theory comparisons of simplicity for assessing relative verisimilitude call for criteria of greater posed greater simplicity does not show overall simplicity. Yet, previously I have used the comparison theism to be inductively more likely to of Einstein’s general theory of relativity with Newton’s theory of gravitation to impugn the feasibility of ratings of compar- be true than atheism, [because] a priori ative overall simplicity for rival theories. However, differing verdicts from just such ratings are indispensable to both simplicity and a priori Swinburne’s prescription for the greater verisimilitude of one probability are not at all ontologically of these theories and to philosopher J. J. C. Smart’s aspiration of simplicity as an avenue to truth, an aspiration set forth in legislative.” my Part 1 (FI, June/July 2008, p. 35). Indeed, if Einstein’s theory of gravitation were held to be more complex overall than Newton’s in virtue of the nonlinear- 2. In The Existence of God, Swinburne wrote: “. . . if there is ity of its partial differential field equations, then its presumed to exist something, it seems impossible to conceive of anything greater verisimilitude is the death knell of both Swinburne’s simpler (and therefore a priori more probable) than the exis- prescription and Smart’s aspiration. tence of God.” Furthermore, he told us that “. . . the [explana- It has been said that scientists think they know when tory] choice is between the universe as [explanatory] stopping one theory is simpler than another overall as a matter of its point [i.e., as existing qua brute fact] and God as [explanato- greater beauty and elegance. But beauty is in the eye of the ry] stopping point [i.e., existing as a matter of brute fact].” beholder, and, as Einstein aptly remarked, elegance had best Thus, the God hypothesis is supposedly the conceptually be left to tailors. and ontologically simpler option. And the avowed cardinal thesis of Swinburne’s 2004 book, The Existence of God, is “an The Demise of Leibniz’s 1714 Justification argument for God being the cause [ex nihilo] of the existence for the Primoridal Existential of the universe.” Question (PEQ) Just for argument’s sake, posit with Swinburne that in the Now, let us come to grips with the specific, 1714 context in class of all existential hypotheses, the theistic one is the sim- which Leibniz formulated his PEQ and tried to justify it at once plest and therefore simpler than its atheistic competitor. It is then a patent corollary of the conclusion of the argument I pre- sented in my 2008 paper, “Is Simplicity Evidence of Truth?,” that this supposed greater simplicity does not show theism Glossary to be inductively more likely to be true than atheism, absent Adolf Grünbaum is the most recent past president In Part 1 of this essay, Dr. Grünbaum introduced three (2006/2007) of the International Union for History and philosophical abbreviations that recur in Part 2: Philosophy of Science, a past president of the American Philosophical Association (1982/1983), and a past presi- PEQ: the Primordial Existential Question posed by dent of the Philosophy of Science Association (U.S.A.) for Leibniz in 1714, sharpened slightly by Grünbaum for the two consecutive two-year terms (1965/1967, 1968/1970). In purposes of this essay: “Why is there a universe at all, 1960, he joined the faculty of the University of Pittsburgh, rather than just nothing?” where he is the Andrew Mellon Professor of Philosophy SoN: the principle that spontaneously, the world should of Science, Primary Research Professor of History and feature nothing contingent at all, and indeed there would Philosophy of Science, Research Professor of Psychiatry, be nothing contingent in the absence of an overriding and Chairman of the Center for Philosophy of Science. external cause (or reason), because the Null World (see Oxford University Press in New York City will publish below) is the “most natural” of all. two volumes of his collected papers under the overall title Philosophy of Science in Action. Professor Grünbaum is a Null World: A world (or universe) in which no contingent Contributing Editor for Free Inquiry and a Laureate of the thing exists; nothingness. International Academy of Humanism.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 38 by relying carefully on both of the following two premises: (1) determine why it is thus and not otherwise.” Hence, the history His well-known Principle of Sufficient Reason, to which I shall of modern quantum physics teaches that PSR, which Leibniz refer by the acronym PSR, and (2) his a priori argument from avowedly saw as metaphysical, cannot be warranted a priori simplicity for the presupposition SoN, which is inherent in his and indeed is untenable on ultimately empirical grounds. PEQ, an argument I articulated in Part 1 (pp. 34–35). Thus, to discover that the universe does not accommodate Thus, Leibniz declared: “the great principle [of sufficient rea- rigid prescriptions for deterministic explanatory understand- son, PSR] . . . holds that nothing takes place without sufficient ing is not tantamount to scientific failure; instead, it is to reason, that is . . . a reason sufficient to determine why it is thus discover positive reasons for identifying certain coveted expla- and not otherwise. This principle having been laid down, the first nations as phantom. question we are entitled to ask will be: Why is there something rather than nothing? For ‘nothing’ [i.e., the Null World] is sim- pler and easier than ‘something.’ Further supposing that things “It has been said that scientists think must exist, it must be possible to give a reason why they must exist just as they do and not otherwise” [italics in original]. they These very ambitious avowals by Leibniz invite my clarify- know when one theory is simpler than ing comments: 1. Right after enunciating his PSR, he poses PEQ, “Why is another overall as a matter of its greater there something rather than nothing?,” as “the first question beauty and we are entitled to ask.” However, immediately after raising that question, he relies on the supposed simplicity of the Null elegance. But beauty is in the eye of the World to justify the presupposition SoN of PEQ, claiming, in beholder, and, as Einstein aptly effect, that the Null World would be spontaneously realized ontologically in the absence of an overriding external cause. remarked, As we recall, he puts it concisely: “For ‘nothing’ [i.e., the Null elegance had best be left to tailors.” World] is simpler and easier than ‘something.’” And clearly, there is either something or nothing. 2. Evidently, Leibniz is not content to rely on his PSR alone to As we saw, Leibniz had generated PEQ by conjoining his ask the truncated question “Why is there something contin- untenable PSR with SoN. Yet since his a priori defense of SoN gent?” without the accompanying contrasting clause “rather via simplicity has also failed, it remains to inquire whether his than nothing.” Instead, he uses SoN as presupposed in this avowed ontological spontaneity of the Null World might possi- contrasting clause to assert a dual thesis: (a) the existence of bly be warranted empirically. My answer will be emphatically something contingent is not to be expected at all, and (b) its negative for the following reason: it turns out, as an induction actual existence therefore cries out for explanation! As will be from various episodes in the history of science, that SoN is recalled, just this dual thesis was philosopher Derek Parfit’s altogether ill-founded empirically, as we are about to see. implicit rationale for embracing Leibniz’s PEQ. To examine the empirical status of SoN, it will be useful Thus, the soundness of Leibniz’s justification of his PEQ to reformulate it in Richard Swinburne’s aforecited words evidently turns on the cogency of his PSR as well as of his a as follows: “Surely the most natural state of affairs is simply priori argument from simplicity for SoN. But we have already nothing: no universe, no God, nothing.” But since our empirical discounted his a priori argument for SoN in Part 1 (p. 35). evidence comes, of course, from our own universe U, consider Thus, we can now concentrate on appraising his PSR. the corollary of SoN that pertains to U. This corollary asserts Consider the grounds in twentieth-century quantum theory that it is natural or spontaneous for U not to exist rather than for the demise within our universe of the universal causation to exist. Contrary to any a priori dictum on what is the “natu- familiar from Newton’s physics as codified by Laplace’s ral” ontological behavior of U, the verdict on that behavior will “determinism.” This empirically well-founded quantum theory now be seen to depend crucially on empirical evidence, and features merely probabilistic, rather than universal, causal indeed to provide no support for SoN. laws governing such phenomena as the spontaneous radio- Two specific cosmological examples spell out this empirical active disintegration of atomic nuclei, yielding emissions of moral, leaving aside some pertinent technicalities that I do not alpha or beta particles and/or gamma rays. have space to develop here. Yet the point of my examples will In this domain of phenomena, there are physically possible be clear. particular events that could but do not actually occur at 1. The first example is furnished by the natural evolution given times under specified initial conditions. Yet it is imper- of one of the Big Bang models of the universe countenanced missibly legislative to insist, via Leibniz’s PSR, that merely by general relativistic cosmology, the dust-filled, so-called because these unrealized events are thus physically possible, Friedmann universe described by R. M. Wald. This universe there must be an explanation entailing their specific nonoc- has the following features relevant to my concerns: currence and, similarly, a deductive explanation of probabilis- A. It is a spatially closed, three-dimensional spherical tically governed actually occurring events. universe (a “3-sphere”), which expands from a pointlike Big This admonition against PSR was not heeded by Swinburne,­ Bang to a maximum finite size and then contracts into a who avowed entitlement to universal-explainability, declaring pointlike crunch. in The Existence of God: “We expect all things to have expla- B. That universe exists altogether for only a finite span of nations.” In just this vein, we recall, Leibniz had demanded time, such that no instants of time existed prior to its finite for every event an explanatory “reason [cause] sufficient to duration or exist afterward.

39 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 C. As a matter of natural law, its total rest-mass is con- What then is the empirical cosmological verdict on the served for the entire time period of its existence. Thus, during corollary of SoN that asserts that “It is natural for our uni- that entire time, there is no need for a supernatural agency verse not to exist, rather than to exist”? Apparently, there is to generate that mass out of nothing and/or to prevent it from no empirical evidence for this corollary from cosmology, let lapsing into nothingness, contrary to both SoN and to Thomas alone for SoN itself. Its proponents surely have not even tried Aquinas and René Descartes. to offer any such evidence for SoN, believing mistakenly, as we Evidently, the “natural” dynamical evolution of the Friedmann saw, that it can be vouchsafed a priori à la Leibniz. Big Bang universe as a whole is specified by Einstein’s empirically supported cosmology. Thus, the “natural” or PEQ as a Failed Springboard for Creationist spontaneous ontological behavior of Big Bang worlds is not Theism: The Collapse of Leibniz’s and vouchsafed a priori. Swinburne’s Theistic Cosmological Arguments

Probably any one of us who was reared in the Occident has wondered at some time: “Where did everything come from?” As we know, typically this question is not a demand for a state- “. . . can God not be an ‘existing entity’ ment of the earlier physical history of our existing universe. and yet be ‘an answer’ to . . . Instead, the question is driven by the largely unconscious assumption of SoN and is thus simply another version of the question why there is something Leibniz’s query PEQ. Yet as I have argued painstakingly, PEQ rather than nothing?” rests on the ill-founded premise SoN, as well as on Leibniz’s very questionable PSR. Therefore, PEQ is an ill-conceived nonstarter that poses a pseudo-issue and does not warrant the quest for any sort of first cause as an answer! But, as we know, both Leibniz and Swinburne raised PEQ as an imperative question, and thence they concluded 2. The same epistemic moral concerning the empirical status misguidedly that the answer to it mandates divine creation. of cosmological naturalness is spelled out by the illuminating Indeed, in the May 26, 2007, issue of the German magazine case of the now largely defunct Bondi and Gold so-called Der Spiegel, journalist Alexander Smoltczyk tells us inco- steady-state cosmology of 1948. herently: “For most believers, God is neither a person nor Assuming the mutual recession of the galaxies discovered a principle, nor yet an existing entity, but rather an answer by Hubble, the average density of matter ought to decrease to the question why there is something rather than nothing” with time. But in their 1948 theory, Bondi and Gold boldly [my English translation]. Thus, PEQ is invoked to generate postulated that, nevertheless, in a spatially and temporally incoherent theological capital in the culture at large: how, one infinite universe, as a matter of natural law there is large- needs to ask, can God not be an “existing entity” and yet be scale, temporal constancy of the matter-density. Note that this “an answer” to PEQ? Such is the desperation to give God a conservation or constancy is not of matter but of the density job to do. of matter over time. However, PEQ evidently cannot serve as a viable spring- The conjunction of this constancy of the density with board for creationist theism, because it is a pseudo-issue Hubble’s mutual recession of the galaxies from one another based on quicksand! By the same token, Leibniz’s and then entails the following quite counterintuitive consequence: Swinburne’s cosmological arguments for divine creation are throughout space-time, and without any matter-generating fundamentally unsuccessful. agency, new matter (in the form of hydrogen) literally pops Hence, I say to you: whatever philosophical problems you into existence, completely naturally, in violation of matter-en- may have, it is my plea here that answering Leibniz’s PEQ ergy conservation. should not engage your curiosity, because his question is just Hence, the Bondi and Gold world features the accretion or a will-o’-the wisp. formation of new matter as its natural, normal, spontaneous behavior, yet terrestrially at a very slow rate. And although Coda on Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris this accretive formation is indeed out of nothing, its complete vis-à-vis PEQ spontaneity clearly precludes its being “created” by an exter- nal agency. Apparently, if the steady-state world were actual, Despite all the telling arguments for atheism offered by both it would discredit the doctrine of the medieval Latin epigram Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion and Sam Harris in The “Ex nihilo, nihil fit,” which means “from nothing, you cannot End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation, they both get anything,” or more familiarly, “you cannot get blood out of caved in altogether unwarrantedly by countenancing PEQ, a stone.” But Bondi and Gold could. very misguidedly, as a searching question that rightly calls for The steady-state theory owes its demise to the failure of an explanatory answer. its predictions and retrodictions to pass observational muster Thus Dawkins wrote: “Time and again, my theologian in its competition with the Big Bang cosmology. This episode friends returned to the point that there had to be a reason again teaches us that empirically based scientific theories are why there is something rather than nothing. There must have our sole epistemic avenue to the “natural” behavior of the uni- been a first cause of everything, and we might as well give it verse at large, though of course only fallibly so. the name God.”

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 40 Alas, entirely unaware that PEQ is an abortive nonstarter Clarendon Press/Oxford University Press, 1991. posing a pseudo-issue, Dawkins replied unavailingly by actual- ———. Is There a God? Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, ly allowing a “first cause, the great unknown which is respon- 1996. ———. Simplicity as Evidence of Truth. Milwaukee, Wisconsin: sible for something existing rather than nothing” but objecting Marquette University Press, 1997. most feebly that this notion of a first cause as “a being capable ———. Epistemic Justification. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2001. of designing the universe and of talking to a million people ———. The Existence of God. 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2004. simultaneously, is a total abdication of the responsibility to Wald, R. M. General Relativity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984. find an explanation.” However, this purported explanatory responsibility is a mere phantom, an ill-conceived contrivance of the ill-fated PEQ, as I showed in great detail in my 2004 “The Poverty of Theistic Cosmology.” Relatedly, Sam Harris embraces PEQ to his detriment, declaring in Letter to a Christian Nation with very mis- placed intellectual humility: “Any intellectually honest person will admit that he does not know why the universe exists. Scientists, of course, readily admit their ignorance on this point” [italics in original]. But it is a direct corollary of my argument above that there is no ignorance at issue here of the kind that is in need of being admitted! To boot, Harris writes: “The truth is that no one knows how or why the universe came into being. It is not clear that we can even speak coherently about the creation of the universe, given that such an event can be conceived only with reference to time, and here we are talking about the birth of space- time itself.” At this point Harris offers a footnote pointing out that the physicist Stephen Hawking “pictures space-time as a four-dimensional, closed manifold without beginning or end. . . .” But, in the very next sentence, Harris misguidedly capitulates to PEQ by making the aforecited ill-fated categor- ical declaration: “Any intellectually honest person will admit that he does not know why the universe exists.” Clearly, Harris applies this unqualified admission of igno- rance to every instant at which the universe exists, even if it has existed forever. And evidently, he thinks that even Hawking’s model of a universe whose time is unbounded though finite (like a circle) cannot purchase absolution from this challenge by To Friedrich August Kekulé von PEQ, although that model undercuts the particular question of “how or why the universe came into being” at a moment in the Stradonitz (1829–1896), Who Posited the finite past. A fortiori, Harris again implicitly capitulates to PEQ Ring Structure of the Benzene Molecule in the case of other models of the universe, featuring other time-structures. Interested readers may consult my anticre- David Park Musella ationist account of the Big Bang universe in the essay “Theological You had a vision Misinterpretations of Current Physical Cosmology.” of a serpent swallowing its own tail. Further Reading You, a German Bondi, H. Cosmology (2nd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University working in Belgium Press, 1960. in imperialist Europe of the nineteenth Dawkins, R. The God Delusion. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006. Grünbaum, A. “Can a Theory Answer More Questions than One of century, Its Rivals?” The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science you had a vision 27(1)1976. ———. “Theological Misinterpretations of Current Physical Cos­ of a serpent swallowing its own tail, mology.” Philo 1(1), 1998. and all you got from it ———. “The Poverty of Theistic Cosmology.” The British Journal for was a lousy benzene ring. the Philosophy of Science 55(4), 2004. David Park Musella is the literary editor of Free Inquiry and a ———. “Is Simplicity Evidence of Truth?” American Philosophical poet whose work has appeared­ in Deliberately Faulty Balcony: Quarterly 45(2), 2008. Not Unfit to Name (2002) and the anthology­ Trees of Surprise Harris, S. Letter to a Christian Nation. New York: A. A. Knopf, 2006. Leibniz, G. W. “Principles of Nature and of Grace Founded on (2007). He hosted a monthly literary-reading series, the Center Reason” Trans. G. H. R. Parkinson and M. Morris. In Leibniz: for Inquiry/Just Buffalo Literary Café, from October 2004 until Philosophical Writings, edited by G. H. R. Parkinson. London: August 2007, when he relocated to Lex­ington,­ Kentucky. His J. M. Dent & Sons, 1973. first published poem appeared­ in 1976 in FOOM (Friends of Ol’ Smoltczyk, A. Der Kreuzzug der Gottlosen (The Crusade of the Marvel); it was a limerick about the Incred­ible HulkTM. Godless). Der Spiegel 56–69, May 26, 2007. Swinburne, R. The Existence of God. Rev. ed. Oxford/New York:

41 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 A Short History of Secularism Graeme Smith

he West is often described as a secular society. tianity was taken over by science. This diminished the impor- But what does this mean? Does it mean that tance of doctrinal questions; however, it did not remove the need the Christian church is in its final, terminal or power of Christian ethics. Christian ethics have continued to Tdecline? Have we reached the endgame of Christianity? Have shape Western society in the form of a dominant liberalism. myth and superstition been replaced by scientific method and • The Victorian period was a time of exceptional church mem- secular reason? bership and evangelism, one that has not been rivaled. Or is the picture more complex than this? After all, in many When taken together, these ideas show how we can think Western societies, large majorities state that they believe in of Christianity as transformed and also explain why we tend to God and when asked call themselves “Christian.” For example, speak of this transformation in terms of church decline. It is the in the United Kingdom, often regarded as one of the more sec- discussion of these four ideas that will form the bulk of this article. ular nations in Western Europe, 72 percent of the population described themselves as Christian in the 2001 national census. The Fluidity of Christian Identity In some regions of northern England, this reached an amazing Christianity has always been capable of great change in its 80 percent. Similar numbers of people will also state that they identity. The latest illustration of this capacity for change is the believe in God. There are, of course, divergent interpretations of shift from a concern with church attendance and right doctrine these figures. Some will say that they signify residual beliefs that to a preoccupation with ethical questions. The idea of the per- will decline in the same way that church attendance has already manent fluidity of Christian identity is contested. Those who declined. It is difficult for religious beliefs to exist for any length believe the West is becoming evermore secular argue that a per- of time outside of the context of the institutional church. manently changing Christianity is not possible. For them, the Advocates of the secularization hypothesis argue that the Christianity that is declining is a Christianity with a fixed iden- forces of modernization are too powerful for this type of min- tity that must be capable of definition so that it can be shown to imalist Christianity, and that ultimately, long-term religious be rejected. There must be key beliefs and activities associated decline is to be expected. Others argue that what the figures with Christian identity or else we reach a situation in which show is a persistence of belief that is independent of churches, the identity itself is a meaningless concept. To explore this an example of “believing without belonging.” For them, the question, we need to look at the early expansion of Christianity. figures for belief in God and Christian identity are to be taken The discussion of Christianity’s changing identity is a mis- very seriously. siological question. As Christianity has spread and developed, In this article, I argue that it would be a mistake to equate it has changed. New contexts and new historical eras have led secularism with the end of Christianity. Instead, we should to new forms of Christianity. The Dutch missionary historian view secularism as the latest expression of a transformed Anton Wessels has examined this process at work in his anal- Christianity. What form does this new Christianity take? ysis of the early spread of Christianity. Wessels employed two Secularism is ethical Christianity shorn of its concern with aspects of H. Richard Niebuhr’s typology described in the latter’s doctrinal questions. It is a commitment to be and do good Christ and Culture. The first type is Christ as the abolisher of without the questions about the nature of right and true belief. culture. This is perhaps the common idea of what mission is. In To argue this point of view I advance four key ideas. They are: this type, Christianity sweeps away the indigenous religion of • Christianity has always had a fluid identity that has changed the local population and replaces it with its own beliefs. Wessels when it comes into contact with new cultures and societies. gives the example of the missionary Boniface, who in 724 c.e. • The Middle Ages were not the high point of church allegiance cut down an old oak tree dedicated to the Teutonic god Donar. to be contrasted with our own period of decline. In fact, there Boniface remained unharmed after this blasphemy, thereby are important similarities between the Middle Ages and our proving the superior power of the Christian God and leading own times. many people in the German lands to choose baptism. • At the Enlightenment, the technological function of Chris­ However, Christ as the abolisher of culture is not Wessels’s main concern. He is more interested in the idea of Christ as the Graeme Smith is senior lecturer in practical theology transformer of culture. In this model, Christianity adopts local at Chichester University. He is executive editor of the forms of indigenous religious belief but transforms these so international journal Political Theology and has published that they become Christian. One example of this is the stories widely in the field of religion and politics. His most recent and beliefs that surround the Celtic goddess Brigit. The stories book is A Short History of Secularism (IB Tauris, 2008). about her had a powerful hold on the local population. It was

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 42 not easy for these to be swept away by the emerging Christian been exposed to a concerted evangelistic effort by a friar? churches. Consequently, she was adopted and transformed But there is an assumption that after these fragile beginnings by Christianity, becoming instead the Christian saint Bridget. during the medieval period, Christianity came to dominate Wessels says that this happened to such a degree that it is the lives of ordinary people: church attendance was universal difficult for historians to distinguish the true identity of the his- and Christian practice commonplace. In the popular account torical Brigit, especially whether she was Celtic or Christian. of the emergence of secularism, this represents the heyday In one sense, stories and beliefs associated with local saints of Christian belief and practice. There is an assumption are not of central concern to the church. There is scope for that until the Reformation—really until the Enlightenment— some ambiguity about such figures because this does not affect Christian belief and practice was almost entirely universal. core Christian doctrines. However, it becomes more serious­ However, such a picture is far from easy to prove. when fundamental Christian festivals are involved. Wessels Much, although not all, of what is written about medieval points out that there is a discrepancy between the English churchgoing suggests it was far from what might be expected word for Easter and the Greek word pascha. Unlike, for today. Although we do not have comparable statistics from the example, the French or Swedish term, the English term bears period, we do have historical reports of some of the extremes no relation to the Greek word. Wessels argues that this is of behavior. For example, there are reports of parishioners because of the connection between English celebrations of being drunk in church, fighting—even shooting off guns, gos- Easter and the rites and beliefs associated with the Saxon goddess Eastre or Ostara, the goddess of eggs and spring. Wessels quotes from the writings of the Venerable Bede, who “The Archbishop of Rouen reported reports that April was called “Eoster-month.” Ostara was after his diocesan visitation of 1248 that regarded as the goddess of the resurrection of nature after the long death of winter. Eggs were eaten at her festival, he had clergy who were committing and this was preserved by Christians, who transformed the adultery and fathering symbolism of the egg to represent the resurrection of Christ. It may well be that this tradition reaches back to the practice illegitimate children, drinking to excess, of burying eggs in the fields to ensure a successful crop in and, in what might have seemed like a the summer. What happened again was that these customs were so securely embedded in indigenous populations that mild relief, they could not be removed and so were adopted but made Christian. being pugnacious and quarrelsome.” Wessels describes this process of adoption and trans- formation as one of “ongoing inculturation.” It is a two-way siping, trading goods and bartering, and conducting both licit process. Not only were local indigenous religions transformed and illicit romances. The poor and the young were especially by Christ­ianity, but Christianity was itself transformed as it prone to either missing church altogether, in some cases accommo­dated the local religion. This was not just a matter of thereby being accused of bringing down God’s wrath in the turning traditional stories about local goddesses into beliefs form of famine or plague, or of turning up drunk and rowdy. about Christian saints; it affected central Christian festivals The clergy were often not much better. The Archbishop of like Easter. Beliefs and rituals about fertility were incorpo- Rouen reported after his diocesan visitation of 1248 that he rated into Christianity’s main celebration of its fundamental had clergy who were committing adultery and fathering ille- doctrine, that of Christ’s resurrection. Nor was this process gitimate children, drinking to excess, and, in what might have a limited or one-off phenomenon. Wessels identifies the pat- seemed like a mild relief, being pugnacious and quarrelsome. tern of ongoing inculturation in all the historical movements Another archbishop reported that on a visit to a cathedral he of early Christianity, from its Jewish origins into the Roman found the canons rushed far too quickly through the psalms. Empire, and then throughout the Empire to the West and Clergy also chattered and gossiped through the divine office, North of Europe. Christianity has always changed radically as talking to and even across each other. They were frequently it spread and encountered new religions. Furthermore, what found to be ignorant of the basics of the Christian faith, not happened in the earliest days of Christianity has continued knowing the Lord’s or the Ten Commandments­ or into our own times. As we seek to identify and analyze Chris­ understanding the Latin they mumbled at the high altar far tian belief and practice, we need to be aware that Christianity from the sight and hearing of the people. With clergy like is constantly changing. In fact, we are better thinking and this, it is no surprise that the laity were equally irreligious talking about a range of different Christianities, both in local and ignorant. What is clear is that churches were more like expression and historical manifestation. It is this Christianity, community centers or shopping malls than places of worship. or Christianities, that is undergoing radical transformation in Congregations did not sit quietly or reverently in pews, they Western society. did not expect to participate in the worship ceremony, and they would not have attained anything like the Christian liter- The Medieval Church acy even the most infrequent of parishioners have today. The initial spread of Christianity was a haphazard affair. At The exception to this picture of medieval churchgoing comes the beginning of the Middle Ages, church life was affected from some revisionist historical writing about the pre-Reformation by local circumstances. Had a church been built in the local church. The leading exponent is Eamon Duffy. Duffy argues area and within range for a Sunday visit? Was the parish that the picture of a corrupt and irreligious medieval church is priest faithful and caring toward his flock? Had the area predominantly post-Reformation propaganda put forward by

43 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 the Protestant Reformers. He believes that there was far more thinkers of the age, for example Locke or Kant, who laid the piety and devotion among pre-Reformation Christians than is foundations of liberal ideology, were Christians informed by their commonly supposed. He cites examples of Christian piety such faith. Larry Siedentop has argued that the fundamental propo- as that displayed by Margery Kempe. Her devotional practice, sition of liberalism—that the individual has worth as individual while perhaps extreme, illustrates how levels of Christian belief and not as a member of a tribe or clan—is a Christian idea. Its and behavior were far higher than is usually imagined. Duffy ongoing expression in human rights is evidence of the continuing also lists examples of religious processions, funeral rites, cere- importance of this Christian belief. Interestingly, when philoso- monies, and practices—such as beating the parish bounds (that phers like John Gray in his book Straw Dogs seek to write a phi- is, the whole congregation walking the boundaries of the parish) losophy that rejects this Christian heritage, what they produce is on Corpus Christi—that he maintains had widespread popular described as nihilist. That is, for Western liberals, the absence of support. Duffy does make the picture more complex than we Christianity is not an alternative ethics; it is the removal of ethics. might first suppose. However, much of his evidence comes from This, of course, is not to deny the atheism of Hume or the anti- the late medieval period just prior to the Reformation. This does clericalism of . But it is to recognize that their rejection of not take into account earlier, less holy practices. Nor does his Christianity has been less influential for Western society than the evidence lead one to suppose that the medieval church was in individualism that finds its home in Christian belief. fact devout. It might have been more holy than the worst carica- tures, but this does not signify a golden era of Christianity. The The Fanatical Victorians idea that the Middle Ages were a time of great Christian belief In 1851, Thomas Mann conducted a national census of reli- and practice (compared to our own time, which is viewed as gious worship. Based on his data, we can estimate that he secular and irreligious) is not borne out by historical accounts. found that about 40 to 50 percent of the population attended Rather, it is probably safer to say that levels of religious activity church. Compared with the United Kingdom today, this is a mirror our own. There are examples of corruption and sacrilege, remarkably high figure. However, Mann saw it as a disaster. as well as devotion. But any account of secularism that supposes He said it revealed the extent of British godlessness, especial- a Christian fall from the grace of the Middle Ages is flawed. ly in the cities and among the poor. The findings were used to spur on more vigorous evangelistic efforts. The Enlightenment Mann’s survey fit the ethos of the age. It was a period of intense A second element of the popular account of secularism’s rise and evangelism. Callum Brown believes there has been no comparable triumph in the West is the supposition that beginning with the time. Systematically, doors were knocked on, and people street Enlightenment, science and reason have swept away Christian by street and neighborhood by neighborhood were encouraged belief and practice. It is argued that at the Enlighten­ment human- to read the Bible, absorb improving stories, and attend the local ity first began to shed the shackles of Christian myth, prejudice, church. Millions of pamphlets and tracts were printed and distrib- and superstition. There are two parts to this account: one is sub- uted. Shops open on a Sunday were picketed, Bibles were handed stantially accurate and the other needs further attention. What we out, and the “fallen” rescued. It was a vast effort. And it worked. can say is that science replaced Christianity as the technology of Large numbers of people did go to church as a result of this evan- humanity. But science was not able to remove the dominance of gelistic campaign—more than have done so before or since. And Christian ethics in Western liberal society; in fact, as a result of this is why the church thinks of itself as in decline. Compared the Enlightenment, Christianity’s hold on ethics tightened. with the Victorians, the church is in decline—but then so would The Enlightenment was a time of scientific discovery and be any other church at any other point in history. The Victorians innovation. Newton was the towering genius of the period. were exceptional, a blip that cannot be imitated and that should His scientific methodology of mathematics, observation, and not be a point of comparison. It is, after all, no coincidence that experiment was imitated in all fields. Voltaire stated that “we the contemporary idea of secularism emerged in organizational are all his disciples now,” while Hume hoped to become the form during the nineteenth century. It was an attempt to resist the “Newton of the moral sciences.” On the coattails of science unprecedented dominance of the church. came technology. It was a time of new discoveries. In the one hundred years from 1660 to 1760, about sixty new patents were he picture I have been trying to paint is of Western society issued each decade. In the thirty years from 1760 to 1790, 325 Tconforming to the usual patterns of Christian belief and new patents were issued. Innovation was everywhere—even, behavior. We are experiencing the transformation of Chris­ Samuel Johnson claimed, at the gallows in Tyburn. The major tianity, but this is to be expected given the fluid nature of areas of advance were in medicine. Prior to the Enlightenment,­ Christian identity. The support for the institutional church is of local and family cures had combined with prayers to the saints a similar type and nature to that of the medieval period. And and holy water as the main medicinal resource for people. Holy Christian ethics are the dominant values and principles that shrines would go through phases when they seemed particular- underpin Western society. That we tend to think of this in terms ly effective, before they declined and a new saint or shrine came of church decline and secularism, especially in Western Europe, to the forefront. This did not end overnight. Nor were quacks lies in the fact that we follow the Victorians. But this is not the and fraudsters immediately abolished by the Enlightenment. whole picture. Secular society is one in which Christianity is still However, famous physicians like Hermann Boerhaave laid the prevalent. It is a transformed Christianity, ethical but not doctri- foundations for the scientific, empirical medical science we nal. If this Christianity were removed, we really would experi- know today. ence religious change as never before—but it has not happened What is interesting, however, is that although Christianity’s yet. technological function was undermined by the rise of a scientific mentality, its ethical function was reinforced. The great ethical

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 44 Secular Humanism Comes to Romania Remus Cernea

he first speeches on secular humanism ever delivered in Romania were given in on May 5 and 7, 2008, by Paul Kurtz and Norm TAllen from the Center for Inquiry/Transnational and Stephen Law from CFI/London. The lectures’ importance is high: Romania is today a great battlefield, and at stake is the strug- gle to defend freedom of thought, conscience, and religion and the separation between church and state. Paul Kurtz discussed the principles of secular humanism and what he referred to as “planetary ethics,” which is based on humanist ethics, scientific knowledge, and reason. Kurtz noted that “[As secular humanists] we believe in individual freedom and autonomy without church or state dictating to individu- als. . . . We emphasize intelligence, critical thinking, and the use of reason in order to make one’s choices. . . . The best guarantee against tyranny is educated citizens. . . . A person needs some confidence in himself or herself. . . . You do not have to believe in God to be a moral person.” Noble and reasonable as they may seem, such humanist principles are far from being accepted on a broad scale by contemporary . Left to right: Remus Cernea, executive director, Solidarity for Freedom of Conscience; Norm Allen, CFI/Transnational; Stephen Law, CFI/London; Norm Allen lectured twice on the rights of gays, lesbians, Paul Kurtz, CFI/Transnational; Beth Ciesielski, CFI/Transnational Fundatia­ bisexuals, and transgender/transsexual persons, as well as pentru Constiinta Critica (CCC); and Liviu Andreescu, Solidarity for Free­dom of on homophobia. This topic is especially controversial, as the Conscience. Romanian Family Code was recently modified to forbid same- ties are very closely connected with the Romanian Orthodox sex marriages. Parliament justified this decision by referring Church (ROC). A December 2007 poll by the Soros Foundation to the Bible. determined that only 18 percent of the Romanian population Law’s first speech concerned the existence of God. By expressed confidence in Parliament, compared with 84 per- standing the “problem of evil” on its head in designing a “prob- cent who expressed confidence in the churches. The churches lem of good” argument, Law showed that the chances that an are considered by law to be “institutions of public interest” all-powerful and completely benevolent God could exist are and are lavishly supported with public money and properties. slim. His second speech concerned religious schools and reli- This is especially true of the ROC. gious education—in his 2006 book, The War for Children’s After the Romanian anticommunist revolution in 1989, an Minds, Law argued in favor of Liberal education (with a capi- ideological vacuum emerged that was soon replaced not by the tal L), rejecting authoritarian schooling. values of a truly open society but rather by populism, religious Let me give some background that will help explain why excess, and nationalism. More than three thousand Orthodox these talks were so significant. Romania is a new member of churches began construction with strong support from the NATO and the European Union, but it is far from a completely public treasury; more than two thousand were completed. In functional democracy. It has the highest level of corruption addition, more than one thousand “neo-Protestant” (Baptist, and poverty in the EU. The median income is only 350 euros etc.) churches were built after 1989, most without state sup- per month. According to the 2002 national census, fewer than port. In many cities, public parks, monuments, and green 0.2 percent of Romanians are nonbelievers; 87 percent of the areas have been destroyed and replaced by Orthodox church- population is Orthodox, and almost 13 percent belongs to es. At the same time, Romania has far too few kindergartens other Christian denominations. There is a very small number and modern schools, and its research sector suffers terribly of Jews and Muslims. While Romania is a secular state on from lack of funds. paper, it is quite the opposite in practice. The political par- The patriarchy of the ROC launched a project to erect a giant “Cathedral for National Redemption” in one of the most Remus Cernea is executive director of Solidarity for beautiful parks in Bucharest. This project enjoyed strong sup- Freedom of Conscience (www.humanism.ro), an associate port from state authorities: it is perhaps the only instance in member of the International­ Humanist and Ethical Union. the contemporary world when a national parliament passed

45 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 a law to support the building of a cathedral. Four years ago, manner in which religion is taught in Romanian public schools. Solidarity for Freedom of Conscience, a Romanian secular Emil Moise, a philosophy professor and the president of our humanist nongovernmental organization (NGO) that I repre- NGO, succeeded in November 2006 in obtaining a decision from sent, launched a successful campaign to stop the ROC from a state agency, the National Council for Combating Discrimina­ destroying the park and the mausoleum located there. The lat- tion, directing that religious icons be removed from public ter is an important piece of architecture even though it served schools. Unfortunately, the Ministry of Education refused to as a tomb for communist leaders from the sixties. Eventually, carry it out. Another lawsuit is pending on this issue. church and political leaders changed the desired location During the twelve years of public schooling, confessional of the cathedral, but we have continued to resist the idea of religious classes exclusively familiarize students with the building this cathedral anywhere with state support and have literal biblical worldview, including teaching that God created brought a new lawsuit. the world in seven days, woman was created out of one of Religion as practiced by more than a few Romanian ortho- Adam’s ribs, vegetation was created on the third day and the dox priests—and citizens!—seems analogous with a Dark sun on the fourth, and so on. Religion textbooks present the Ages, mystical outlook. For instance, there are still many theory of evolution as an error of modern science. According to one recent study commissioned by the government, only 14 percent of Romanian seventh- to twelfth-graders regard evo- lution as a correct theory. The situation has worsened since “While Romania is a secular state December 2006, when the Ministry of Education completely removed evolution from biology curricula; previously it had on paper, it is quite the opposite been studied in the eleventh or twelfth grade. The Ministry also removed from the former philosophy curriculum a chap- in practice.” ter titled “God,” which offered young men and women the opportunity to study religiously inspired philosophical views (such as those of Pascal or Thomas Aquinas) as well as critical perspectives on religion, including those of Voltaire, Epicurus, reports of exorcism rituals in Orthodox churches. People Nietzsche, and Camus. We have started an international with mental disabilities or other “problems” are believed to campaign to return the theory of evolution and philosophical be possessed by the devil, and because of this are abused or approaches toward religion to high-school curricula. even tortured in various rites. Unfortunately, sometimes the The 2006 law on religious freedom restricts freedom of victims die. Such a shocking case took place in 2005 in the speech and criticism of religion, for example stating in Article Orthodox Monastery of Tanacu, when a priest conducted an 13 (2) that “Any form, means, act or action of religious defama- exorcism that led to the death of a nun who had been crucified tion and enmity, as well as any public offence against religious because he believed that she was possessed by devils. He was symbols, shall be prohibited in Romania.” We will soon launch sentenced to jail for seven years. yet another lawsuit against this law. People who support church-state separation would agree We recently initiated a lawsuit against the Romanian that public schools should be neutral in matters of religion, but national radio station, which begins its programs every morn- in Romania they are not. In practice, most are essentially reli- ing with the “Pater Noster” (the Lord’s Prayer). gious schools and experience profound interference from the After more than three centuries of challenges to dogma ROC. In more than 90 percent of Romanian public schools, the and critical debate, Western churches have accepted the prin- school year begins with religious prayers and rituals. Religion ciples of a secular state. But in Eastern Europe, especially classes, of course, usually start with prayer, and icons hang on in Romania, the situation is very different. We have never classroom walls in more than 90 percent of Romanian public had a real debate on secularism; even now this debate is just schools. The children are officially registered to attend reli- beginning. The ROC is still far from a stance of tolerance and gious classes, and they will be pulled out only if their parents respectful dialogue. For instance, its official pronouncements demand it in writing; only about 8 percent of children know remain pugnacious toward secularists, who are described that this right even exists. More than 95 percent of the children as “frustrated people,” “enemy forces against The Orthodox attend religious classes. Most religion textbooks promote intol- Church,” and “promoters of occult goals.” erance toward other religions and denominations, and also This is only a brief introduction to some of the main issues toward atheists. Orthodox textbooks teach an ethics largely regarding secularism in Romania. As you can imagine, these based on fear—for instance, first-grade textbooks include illus- first speeches by CFI representatives were an intellectual trated lessons suggesting that God will punish you physically “breath of fresh air” for many who attended. The secular (perhaps you’ll be hit by a car) if you are not a good, religious humanist approach is almost completely absent from Roman­ child and you are doing “bad things.” ian public discourse. In 2006, our NGO prepared a report on religion in Romanian The lectures on secular humanism were organized by the public schools with the support of the Institute for Humanist Romanian branch of CFI/Transnational, Fundatia pentru Studies. We continued this analysis in 2007 as part of another Constiinta Critica (CCC), recently founded in Bucha­rest. The project supported by the Dutch Embassy in Bucharest and organizers of these events included Beth Ciesielski, Ancuta initiated by the Pro Europe League, a closely allied NGO. Our Becherescu, Liviu Andreescu, Cristi Lascu, Liviu Dragomirescu, conclusions generated extensive debate in the media concern- and Gabriel Andreescu. ing the abuse of and discrimination against children, the pres- ence of religious symbols in classrooms, and the confessional

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 46 Secularism Perverted Religion and Vote-bank Politics in India Stephen R. Welch

or those on the left of India’s political spectrum, churches, and mosques, and often “raids” these (usually those “secularism” is a rhetorical icon, righteously wield­ of the more well-endowed Hindu temples) for public spending. ed much as “social justice” or “workers’ rights” • The government can enforce caste-based enrollment quotas Fis elsewhere. But for those on the political Right, including­ a and dictate fee structures and curricula in Hindu denomina- great many among India’s majority Hindu community, it is tional schools. Muslim and Christian schools are spared this nothing more than a euphemism for reverse discrimination. To government interference even though many of them receive these Indians, secularism is a dirty word. state-subsidized grants. This situation may seem drearily familiar to Westerners, Though the Hindu majority enjoys a number of benefits in this and indeed, the temptation to fit Indian “church vs. state” pol- system, the most egregious privileges are extended to the Muslim itics within a European or American template is compelling. and Christian communities. Unremarkably, these communities jeal- But the comparison is superficial. In Europe, secularism is ously guard their privileges as religious “rights,” while Hindu conser- challenged by the antisecular doctrines of a growing Muslim vatives attack them as entitlements gifted by the state at the expense minority; in America, the Christian Right squawks that secu- of the majority. But the discourse that swirls around this controversy larism is “hostile” to faith. Neither of these dynamics applies is revealing. Both sides in the debate confuse secularism with “state to India. On the contrary, secularism in India suffers a crisis protection of religious dogma.” This is seen when the government of credibility precisely because it isn’t—nor has it ever truly indulges both sides of the political spectrum with the censorship of been—secular. speech or art that offends the religious feelings of any of their respec- In the West, secularism is an approach to governance tive constituencies. It is also revealed in the labels with which each characterized by separation of the state from religious beliefs side paints itself and tars the other. For example, the communists and institutions. When genuinely secular, the state is assidu- and the Congress Party, who deem themselves secularists, oppose ously neutral toward religion; it awards religious institutions any threat to Islamic personal law as “antisecular,” while Hindu no privileges or subsidies, and relegates religious beliefs to nationalists are regarded as “communalist” because they endorse the private sphere, where they are protected as individual a uniform civil code that would abrogate faith-based personal law. freedoms. In India, however, secularism is regarded as a In India, secularism thus has come to mean its opposite—it is pseu- form of state policy whereby all religions are entitled to equal do-secular. treatment in the public sphere. In terms of governance, the Pseudo-secularism is both a product and cause of the divisive Indian state is therefore expected to promote the interests and intractable “vote-bank” politics in India, where faith-based of religious communities and, where religious minorities are privileges are cynically doled out to entire sections of the popu- in­volved, to proactively engage in positive discrimination on lation who vote en masse along predictable religious lines. On their behalf—that is, faith-based affirmative action. the left of the political spectrum are the Muslim and Christian The Indian state thus juggles a multitude of faith-based minorities, the communists, and much of the intelligentsia who endeavors and pro-religion policies. These may range from dominate the country’s academia and English media. On the symbolic acts, such as the open participation of government right is the grassroots Hindutva movement, including right-wing officials in religious rituals (for example, at the inauguration intellectuals, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and a coterie of public buildings), to more strident pro-religion entitlements of other Hindu revivalist groups. The voice of any truly secular promulgated through legislation and constitutional writ. For moderate in India is rarely heard, drowned out in the din of vote- example: bank politics. • There is no uniform civil code in India; Muslim citizens The problem has its roots in the colonial era. To avoid chaf- are subject to an Islamic personal law as defined by sharia, ing religious sentiments, the British made it their policy to avoid including polygamy and the triple talaaq method of divorce. imposing a uniform code of civil law governing culturally sensitive • The government subsidizes discounted airfares for its Muslim matters such as marriage, inheritance, and divorce. After Indian citizens traveling to Saudi Arabia for the hajj pilgrimage. independence, the nascent government, anxious to hold together • A serial dramatization of the Hindu epic Ramayana has the new country’s disparate communities, continued this practice. been broadcast for years on state-owned television channels. Objectionable religious customs and practices were deferred to • The Indian constitution allows Sikhs to carry the symbolic their respective communities. While Hindu reformers managed kirpan dagger. to largely secularize Hindu personal law by outlawing polygamy, • The constitution specifically protects religious proselytization. encouraging the adoption of girls, and placing daughters on the • The government owns the endowments of religious temples, same footing as sons in terms of inheritance, the Muslims never accepted corresponding reforms for their community. Out of con- Stephen Welch is a fiction writer living in New York City. cern to reassure Muslims who chose to remain in India (rather than His article “Sins of the Missionaries” appeared in the February/ withdraw to Pakistan), the framers of India’s constitution—includ- March 2004 issue of Free Inquiry. ing Nehru, the original champion of Indian secularism—opted

47 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 to acquiesce and permit India’s Muslim citizens to be subject to to propagate that Marxists are anti-religious.” It seems that Islamic personal law. So, when article 44 of the 1949 Constitution some faiths remain more “opiate” than others, however. In the was written, it promised that the state would “endeavor” to provide states of Kerala and West Bengal, CPI-M–dominated boards India a uniform civil code . . . at some future date. of education have instructed that “Muslim rule should never Given the horrific communal violence and population displace­ attract any criticism” in school textbooks—Hinduism, mean- ment that occurred as a result of the partition of India and Mus­ while, is portrayed as a tool of an oppressive “Brahminist” lim Pakistan only two years earlier, this constitutional lacuna ruling class. was defended as necessary, even rational. But other compromis- The most damaging consequence of pseudo-secularism, es were made at the behest of far less fractious religious minori- though, is not merely the hypocrisy of vote-bank politics. The ties. In outlining citizens’ fundamental rights, the draft consti- perversion of the very meaning of the word secularism has tution originally guaranteed that all persons were entitled to fostered a corrosive cynicism in India’s public discourse. A freedom of conscience and the right to freely “profess and prac- depressingly typical example was the treatment by the press tice religion.” After heavy lobbying by Christian representatives of the Godhra massacres. After a group of Hindu pilgrims were and their allies, the relevant article was then amended to read, murdered by a Muslim mob near the town of Godhra in 2002, “profess, practice, and propagate religion” (emphasis added). Hindu vigilantes killed thousands of Muslims in reprisals. Though no other modern constitution had made such a sweeping Predictably, India’s “secularist” English media responded by concession, the right to proselytize—an entitlement distinctly downplaying the Godhra massacre as an “incident,” while it sought by Christians, whose dogmas include a divine mandate rightly condemned the massacre of Muslims as an atrocity. to convert others to Christianity—was now enshrined in India’s As Jagdish Bhagwati warns, “[a]ll atrocities, even those constitution. involving a single life, must be denounced; playing favourites With these precedents established, appeasement of reli- in one’s moral outrage is morally deplorable and, besides, can gious dogma in the name of “secularism” has continued only encourage further atrocities.” Enthralled to vote-bank apace, polarizing Indian politics intractably along a Hindu politics, pseudo-secularism panders to this kind of moral majority versus Muslim-Christian axis. Aligned with the latter favoritism. It does not deserve the name “secular.” are the communists: sacrificing fealty to Marx for political expediency, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Further Reading has creatively amended its dogmas in order to extend its Shourie, Arun. Eminent Historians: Their Technology, Their Line, appeal among the Muslim and Christian vote-banks. In 2005, Their Fraud. New Delhi: HarperCollins India, 1999. an official of the CPI-M went so far as to declare that Marx’s Bhagwati, Jagdish. “Secularism in India: Why Is It Imperiled?” In Sumit Ganguly, ed. Six Decades of Independence. Journal of indictment of religion as the opiate of the masses has been Democracy 18, No. 2, April 2007. Johns Hopkins University Press. “quoted out of context by the enemies of the party in order Edamaruku, Sanal. “India: ‘Marxists Are No More Opposed to “Science, Public Policy, and the Planetary Community”

April 9–12, 2009 Hyatt Regency Bethesda One Bethesda Metro Center (7400 Wisconsin Ave.) Bethesda, Maryland (just outside Washington, D.C.) Telephone: (301) 657-1234 Fax: (301) 657-6453

CONFERENCE RATES (from April 8–14, 2009) • Single: $149.00 • Double: $149.00 • Triple: $174.00 • Quad: $199.00 SPEAKERS INCLUDE: Christopher Hitchens, columnist for Vanity Fair and Free Inquiry, author of God Is Not Great, and editor of The Portable Atheist Roger Bonnet, PhD, Executive Director, International Space Science Institute in Bern, Switzerland Barbara Forrest, PhD, Professor of Philosophy, Southeastern Louisiana University Lawrence Krauss, PhD, prominent theoretical physicist, acclaimed teacher, lecturer, and author , PhD, Distinguished Professor, University of California, Irvine John Mather, PhD, Nobel Laureate, Senior Astrophysicist and Goddard Fellow, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Michael Ruse, PhD, Director of History and Philosophy of Science Program, Florida State University Drew Shindell, PhD, ozone specialist and climatologist, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies The Congress is being held with the support of the Center for Inquiry/Washington, D.C. and the Office of Public Policy. For more information visit www.centerforinquiry.net/events/worldcongress09

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 48 HEADINGCHURCH-STATE SUBHEAD UPDATE

Sacrificing Women’s Lives Edd Doerr According to the World Health Organiza­ ­ tion (New York Times, May 16), a woman in a developing country dies of compli- cations from an unsafe and likely illegal Jindal, mentioned as a possible run- Sanctified Genocide? abortion every eight minutes. That adds ning mate for John McCain, is a twen- In 2006, California politicians voted to up to nearly thirty thousand per year. ty-four-carat theocon. He opposes repro- place a statue of Ronald Reagan in the And who knows how many orphans are ductive choice and stem-cell research U.S. Capitol’s National Statuary Hall. As left behind—or how many of the women while strongly favoring school vouchers each state is allowed only two statues, were victims of rape, a common occur- and the teaching of in public it was decided to remove the statue of rence in the nasty civil conflicts raging schools. Thomas Starr King (1824–1864) to make in a number of these countries? A top Jindal legislative goal for this room. King, a heroic San Fran­cisco Uni­ In May, Pope Benedict XVI marked year is a school-voucher plan for New tarian minister/orator, led the struggle the fortieth anniversary of Humanae Orleans, still a long way from recovery to keep California in the Union during Vitae, the encyclical letter that con- from Hurricane Katrina—thanks large­ the Civil War. Mountains, streets, and demned all forms of “artificial” birth ly to Bush administration and state schools in the state are named after control. “What was true yesterday,” government incompetence and indiffer- him, and his statue stands prominently he pontificated, “remains true today. ence. Jindal favors vouchers despite the in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. The truth expressed in Humanae Vitae fact that a 2004 poll by the Baton Rouge So whose statue will remain in the doesn’t change.” Advocate found vouchers are opposed Hall? That of Junípero Serra (1713–1784), What His Arrogance neglected to the Franciscan missionary who died men­tion was that the overwhelming sixty-four years before California­ became ma­jority of the members of the Vatican part of the United States, having found- “. . . it is not too late for com­mission that studied the issue prior ed the chain of missions from San Diego to Humane Vitae’s composition strong­ to San Francisco. Serra was no ordi- California politicians to ly recommended that the Catholic Church nary clergyman. He was a top agent of avoid further embarrass- move away from its rigid position—a Span­ish colonialism and imperialism, view now shared by the vast majori- and as such was responsible for the ment by leaving Thomas ty of Cath­olics around the world who abuse, exploitation, forced conversion, prefer to follow their own consciences. en­slave­ment, and genocide of California Starr King’s statue in the Yet un­elected church officials have had Indians. Capitol building and enough polit­ical clout to impede United Serra has been “beatified” by the Nations actions on family planning and Roman­ Catholic Church and is a can- removing the one of to influence U.S. govern­mental policy didate for sainthood. His canonization Junípero Serra. . . .” under recent Republi­can administrations, would be an insult to indigenous peoples as with the Reagan, Bush I, and Bush II everywhere. Embarrassed, many Californ­ia gag rules on international family plan- Cath­olics would like to see this process ning aid. brought to a halt. Meanwhile, it is not too Remember also, as I pointed out in statewide by 60 percent to 34 percent, late for Cali­fornia politicians to avoid fur- a recent column, that a third of a cen- very close to the average opposition to ther embarrassment by leaving Thomas tury has gone by since President Ford vouchers or their variants by millions of Starr King’s statue in the Capitol building ap­proved the National Security Study voters in twenty-six statewide referen- and removing the one of Junípero Serra, Memorandum 200 report that recom- da from coast to coast over the last forty a constant reminder of the damage done mended universal access to comprehen- years. The Advocate found opposition to the Golden State’s original inhabitants. sive sex education and contraceptive to vouchers in every region in the state. information and supplies but which was Jindal Jangle In heavily Catholic New Orleans itself, mysteriously “classified” and buried vouchers were opposed 56 percent to 41 Louisiana Republican governor Bobby until nearly the eve of the 1994 U.N. percent. African Americans opposed them Edd Doerr, president of Americans Cairo population conference. In that 63 percent to 33 percent, while whites for Religious Liberty (arlinc.org) and wasted third of a century, we have seen opposed them 59 percent to 35 percent. former president of the American world population balloon by 50 percent, Jindal and Louisiana theocons appar- Humanist Association, is the author an in­crease that has added immeasur- ently care as little for public opinion as of over 3,500 published books, sec- ably to the misery of at least a third of the they do for their state constitution, which tions of books, articles, columns, book world’s people, especially as augmented has one of the country’s strongest prohibi- and film reviews, translations, let- by rising commodity prices, resource tions against tax aid to faith-based schools. ters, short stories, and poems. He has exhaustion, environmental degradation, Laissez les bon temps rouler, as they made over 2,000 speeches and radio and glo­bal climate change. say in Cajun country. and television appearances. How many of the cyclone, earth- quake, tsunami, and civil conflict deaths

49 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 LIVING WITHOUT RELIGION

said for being transported, as it were, to an un­likely and not-so-deep world. There I Want (Not) is something to be said for making suspension of disbelief difficult. There is something to be said for the kind of crisp humor real life never quite affords to Believe and the predictable way the bad guy is always swiftly dispatched in the end. These may be all the more important Katrina Voss in times of war, as wartime audienc- es—whatever their political leanings or levels of sophistication—seem to be otwithstanding the online music “too close to home” and “too immediate” proving. In fact, I suspect there may be video “Iraq: The Musical,” we may aspects may be the explanation, and I something to be said for similarly absurd N be a very long way from “Iraq suspect that in another decade (provided elements in religion, and again, especial­ On Ice.” A very long way, considering we are out of Iraq by then) such films ly in times of war. Indeed, perhaps there that even theatrical endeavors like movies may be as successful among cinephiles is a connection between avoid­ing war with the theme “Iraq: You Were Right as their non-Iraq War-themed but equal- movies and renewing the creationism When You Said It Was a Bad Idea” do ly grown-up counterparts. campaign. In this sense, the nonreli- not seem to be working. An “I told you Then again, timing may be only an gious may be taking a step toward the so” war movie should, in theory, have added aggravation. Iron Man, despite religious—if only in taste. At the risk appealed to the antiwar majority and Iraq War references, made a killing at of companioning myself too closely with earned fortunes at the box office. What the box office, but Iron Man is much the faithful, I’ll admit I get it. I get the could be better than getting one’s choir more about a roguish superhero with appeal of silly, (literally) incredible, and preached to via superb acting, chilling great biceps than about the Iraq War. larger-than-life stories. I just prefer Bond, cinematography, and exquisite,­ matter- James Bond, to Christ, Jesus Christ. of-fact violence, not to mention­ poignant “After all, the same There are inescapable problems with themes of the inevitability of human Iraq War films even for the generally ur­ suffering in war? sophisticated audience bane moviegoer—first, their harsh believ- Iraq War-themed movies have been that drooled over No ability and second, their deeper meaning— consistently solid, inarguably well-made, and these may be the same problems avoid­ and quite often exceptionally well-review­ Country for Old Men ed by biblical literalism. That is, too real- ed, even critically acclaimed. So the explan­ while wholly ignoring In istic can be too distressing. And provided ation for their near-universal public shun­ that the metaphorical is within one’s intel- ning must lie at some deeper level. After the Valley of Elah could lectual grasp, too deep can be too distres­ sing in the same way. all, the same sophisticated audience that hardly complain that drooled over No Country for Old Men while Ironically, literalism makes folklore less wholly ignoring In the Valley of Elah could recent war movies are real. In that sense, literalism is not about hardly complain that recent war movies literal history at all but rather about sub- are too dark. (The former grossed over too dark.” stituting the unbelievable for the believ- $74 million in theaters, while the latter, able, just as escapist cinema substitutes the ridiculous for the poignant. Perhaps also starring Tommy Lee Jones, earned Most moviegoers are not terribly sophis- that is precisely what people want, espe- a paltry $7 million.) Nor does it seem ticated, despite the occasional sophisti- cially in volatile times: a pseudo-history to be an aversion to war violence per se. cated blockbuster. I am allowed to say that is so absurd, so impossible, and so (Sav­ing Private Ryan topped $216 mil- this without sounding elitist because lion, while Iraq War-themed Rendition I include myself among the audience inane as to be completely without any claimed just over $9 million and Stop- with puerile preferences. Admittedly, recognizable­ connection to one’s own Loss just over $10 million.) Indeed, even for me as for many others, however realistic and often painful experience. the most cultured moviegoers seem less profound and vanguard a film, however Perhaps it is the only way to make likely to see an Iraq War movie than moving its antihero and “unhappily ever religion (or for some, movies) palatable. to clean urinals with their tongues. The after” ending, it simply cannot compete How much easier it is to keep religion in a compact lockbox of cartoonish unre- Katrina Voss works as a bilingual with—say—gratuitous sex, clever com- ality, and further, to confine it to one broadcast metrologist and holds the edy, spot-on one-liners, and superfluous day of the week so as to break up the AMS Seal. She is collaborating with special effects. (To be fair, even recent monot-ony of “real” life. After all, during her husband, a Pennsylvania State “serious” war movies include at least one scene where someone blows some- the rest of the week, it is usually best to University physical anthropologist, thing up, but I doubt a sheer fondness pay homage­ to more quotidian concerns, on a book about evolution, genetic for pyrotechnics is behind it.) such as gravity and germ theory, not to ancestry, and society. Certainly, there is something to be mention war.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 50 Same star, different box office: though both starred Tommy Lee Jones, No Country for Old Men (left) grossed more than $74 million in theaters. The antiwar In the Valley of Elah (right) grossed just $7 million. Of course, very bad things happen ries that are obviously preposterous, the truly comforting gems of meaning. when religious folk do, in their heart shouldn’t it be easier still to embrace Besides,­ for those who have a tendency of hearts, believe the ridiculous tripe them as strictly symbolic? Indeed, reli- to erase metaphor altogether, thence that makes up their traditions’ folklore. gious literature seems to beg for sym- goes the baby with the bathwater. One of those very bad things is often bolic interpretation while even the most In the meantime, at least as long as war. If literalism begets war and then thoughtful, profound war movie can only be applied secondarily to human experi- ence in the broader sense. Ap­parently, many religious people cannot distin- “. . . escapist cinema “I get the appeal of silly, guish even the simplest of metaphors­ in substitutes the ridiculous (literally) incredible, and their own holy texts, however freighted with tired parabolic plagiarism. But per- for the poignant. larger-than-life stories. I haps this is not so unwise a position. Perhaps there are stings of truth one Perhaps just prefer Bond, James has good reason to blunt with the balm that is precisely what Bond, of fantasy. Here again, literalism steps in as a comforting agent, defiling deeper people want, especially to Christ, Jesus Christ.” (but often painful) metaphors. Consider in volatile times. . . .” the stories of that great weapon of mass destruction, the god of Abraham: a spite- ful, jealous bully whose temper tantrums war encourages literalism as a form of often result in genocide and infanticide. escapism, what a tricky state of affairs These may be easier to take as, well, Iraq War movies continue to fail, the we have indeed. And yet, I have often fairy tales, than as literal in their pro- sadder-but-wiser might have to grant the suspected that even many religious lit- gression of events. The alternative is happier-but-stupider a few points. A dop­ eralists (at least in the Christian West) to see the metaphor for a fierce, fickle pelganger version of The X-Files’ Mulder do not, in their heart of hearts, truly natural world in which we all have to might have found himself less entangled believe. If they did, there would be many live—and die. To destroy all metaphor in his own pathos next to the slogan, “I more reports of backyard burnings of is to make it easier to go about the tedi- want not to believe.” Indeed, I for one will rams to create an aroma pleasing to um of one’s life without those insulting, continue to settle for the thankfully un­ the Lord, not to mention stonings of burdensome reminders of the transitory believable entertainment of fourteen-year- nonvirgins. Likewise, again aligning nature of existence that religious tradi- old-boys—trite flapdoodle, shorn of ele- myself with the faithful if only in taste, tions do, at that deep level, afford. ments too real or too profound. I say, I do not believe in the likelihood of a That is not to say that the only import- let guns be seductively extracted from a Nikita-esque heroine dodging bullets ant depths to be plunged in religion and Bond girl’s garter, not from an eighteen- and drop-kicking a villain while keeping art are dark ones. What about those year-old soldier’s tattered holster. The her lipstick intact, and I rather like it mes­sages of self-transcendence, ecsta- religious say, let the divine remain a that way. Keep it absurd, and keep it sy, love, and joy found in some spiritual truculent, bearded, male disciplinarian, at an unbelievable, dismissible arm’s traditions (if not, to some extent, in all)? not a faceless and indifferent natural length. Ignor­ance is certainly not bliss, Their discovery, however, obliges a rare force. as Richard Dawkins pointed out in an sobriety and will. It is no great surprise I admit that the comparison is gro­ earlier edition of Free Inquiry (Summer that there are not many Sam Harrises tesquely imperfect. After all, biblical bad 2001), but neither is morose realism. in the world. It requires an extraor- guys (such as God) are not readily and Then there is the issue of religious dinary dedication to pick through the justly dispatched, and one has to blur allegory. If it is easier to swallow sto- excremental heap of mythology to find one’s senses intentionally not to intuit

51 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 THE GOOD LIFE

find out!” So with a vengeance I began counting, eliminating routine business Refirement in notes. The first year I wrote 2,069 letters. The exercise intrigued me, especially when I began using e-mail and noted how and why the number increased­ with Our Time this new medium. In 1994, my first year using e-mail, I had two totals: 2,016 reg- ular letters and 537 e-mails. Eight years Roy P. Fairfield later, the totals were almost equal at “I aspired to be a writ- wo years before I was eligible to ing the Maine coast and condo living er, and I knew that to retire in 1980, I awoke one morn- in Florida, five monographs, and two Ting and said to my wife Maryllyn, lengthy collections of essays on a vari- be one I’d have to go “Why should I retire when I’m already ety of topics. Two of these essays con- tired enough? I’m all fired up do a lot cerned graduate education in America, beyond the half-dozen more of the things I’ve been doing. Why one concerned my first twenty years books and the essays not re-fire?” Then and there the concept with my immediate family, and another of “refirement” was born. During those one was about the evolution of an area I’d edited or written two years, I planned many activities, where we built a cottage for retire- and during my academic and “refirement” became my mantra. refirement. Several years later, a distant associate, Meanwhile, I exercised my human- career.” James V. Gambone, heard of my new istic outrage by writing innumerable word and asked my permission to use letters to the editors of the Portland 1,202 regular letters and 1,224 e-mails. it in a book he was writing: Refirement Press and Miami Herald. During the All told, during nineteen years of dealing for Baby-Boomers, now available­ from first year of the twenty-first century, objectively with my own subjectivity and Refirement, Inc., in Minneapolis. I put together a book, Get Inspired: ethical issues, the total count from 1989 Releas­ing Your Creative Self at Any to 2007 amounted to 46,184—that is, Age, which was published by Prometheus 2,431 letters per year and still counting. Books. In short, I aspired to be a writer, “Why should I retire This was, among other things, a way to and I knew that to be one I’d have to get a handle on my own physical and when I’m already tired go beyond the half-dozen books and the intellectual state; was I “holding my many essays I’d edited or written during enough? I’m all fired up own” or “slowing down”? my academic career and as associate Did I cheat? No. Doing the counting . . . Why not re-fire?” editor of The Humanist. and recording as objectively as possi- As a young man, I went to college ble, I can honestly say that I’ve never after working three full years in indus- written a single letter solely to increase Meanwhile, I was determined to be try—enough time to save (with a new the count nor counted mundane letters a role model of refirement. So, after wife’s assistance) the money needed to such as disputes over a bill. Letter “hang­ing up my spikes,” as the cliché earn a bachelor’s degree and gain entry writing has probably improved my com- has it, I continued to serve as part-time into graduate school. My industrial job munication with generations of former faculty on three masters and doctoral involved writing letters about contracts students. In short, I’ve attempted to use programs. At the local level, I initiated and proposals for projects. I had always an activity I enjoy to increase the qual- seminars in historical methodology at enjoyed writing letters, beginning with ity of life for my family and myself, as Dyer Library in my hometown of Saco, a sixteen-page letter to a high-school well as for my letter recipients, during Maine, and with a co-volunteer, Sallie class­mate, and this activity has always an era when e-mail and cell phones tend Huot, ex­panded an oral history project been very important to me. I also contin- to make personal letter-writing a lost and helped improve the archives, which ued to write personal letters to former art. Maryllyn has been supportive of the extend back to the seventeenth century. classmates and associates. time I expend on my refirement activ- I also wrote a second local history of the This continued during my academic ity, even as she has read voraciously, town, which I self-published. In a single years and also into refirement. By the attended National Embroiderers Guild decade, I wrote two volumes of poetry, mid-1980s, I had written so many letters seminars, and spent untold numbers of a volume of fables, three novels featur- that one of my doctoral grads jokingly hours with her needlework art projects. accused me of being “an enemy of the Roy P. Fairfield, a contributing edi- Also, I think it’s fair to conclude that forests” because of my paper consump- tor of Free Inquiry, is a historian, just as interacting with former students tion. He asked how many letters I wrote educator, and writer. during forty years of teaching was a in a year. I replied, “I don’t know, but I’ll humanistic process, so toward a similar

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 52 HUMANISM AND CULTURE

why. As scholars, it is not our job to pass judgment on the pieces we study A Humanist in but rather to explain how they came about and how they functioned in soci- ety. To some extent, I agree with this assessment. Mixing the roles of critic God’s Country and analyst risks corrupting the integ- rity of scholarship. Still, to take this position unthinkingly denies the possi- Jason Gersh bility (indeed, the likelihood) that many choose to study religious music because of their admiration for religion—that for am a musicologist who specializes concern sacred music. I am thus left with them, the propagation of religious texts in sacred music. I am also an athe- an ethical dilemma: how can I be a good is itself a desideratum. After all, sacred Iist. For years, I treated these two scholar of interesting and important music of many periods and localities aspects of my life separately: I could music while remaining true to my secu- remains part of a living tradition. To ig-­ appreciate sacred music as a musicol- lar humanist convictions? nore the ethical implications of furthering ogist and dispute the existence of God To some, this might appear to be such a tradition would be irresponsible, as an atheist. There seemed no need to a false dilemma: good music is good to say the least. mix the two. But I have come to realize music, regardless of who wrote it and that there is something dishonest about such compartmentalization. After all, the very act of my studying sacred works brings to the forefront texts and rituals I find at best misguided, at worst morally repugnant. In investigating these works, there is a risk of being mistaken as an advocate for them and the religious ideas

Here is my ethical dilemma—how can I be a good scholar of sacred music while remain- ing true to my secular humanist convictions?

they represent. Even if I made crys- tal-clear my distrust of religion and my mixed feelings toward the songs I study, I still bear a degree of responsibility for spread­ing the memes of religious texts and ideas. Yet, as a scholar, I also carry the responsibility of seeking answers to important questions, and many of those Jason Gersh completed a PhD in musicology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and works as an administrator at Drexel University in Philadelphia. His research inter- ests include the rhetoric of Renais­ sance sacred music, the application of evolutionary theory to musicology, and the philosophy of musical analysis.

53 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 But what options are available to the would suggest a few possible answers: manship and revulsion toward their obscen- responsible secular humanist scholar? 1. Craftsmanship: as mentioned, count­ ities. While cherry-picking allows us to A hypothetical fanatic might seek to less musicians (and for that matter, non- identify what we like and dislike, it does eliminate all sacred works from study musicians) have held sacred texts wor- nothing to resolve that conflict. Given and performance, declaring their prop- thy of superb settings by virtue of their that this tension has no obvious remedy, agation so noisome as to be avoided at religious significance. Thus, the standard perhaps a first step in dealing with it all costs. But would such an act be jus- of craftsmanship in setting these texts would be to acknowledge its existence tifiable? I think not. The cost of whole- is often relatively high. As an analyst and discuss it more frequently in public sale rejection of sacred music would be and dabbler in composition, I take great forums. That does not seem too great a tremendous—a loss of some of the most pleasure in identifying and examining demand to make—after all, scholars have beautifully constructed compositions in songs of great intricacy, re­gardless of their spent the last few decades challenging the world. I, for one, would find such provenance. racial, ethnic, sexual, and economic preju- a loss exceedingly hard to bear. But 2. Comparison: because religious rit- dices in music and scholarship. Religious perhaps more important, I do not believe uals tend to use the same texts and prejudice is just one more to add to the list. such a loss is one that needs to be borne. ideas over long periods, sacred music What I ask for is the same degree of Commingled with the obsequious devo- provides a rich field for comparisons sensitivity and openness about religion tionals, masochistic self-recriminations, between various settings, allowing the in music that exists for all the topics and castigations of enemies are deeply possibility of tracing the evolution of musicologists study every day. This is moving and uplifting texts. Furthermore, compositional styles. a goal with which even my theistic col- even a particularly nasty religious text 3. Awe and reverence: although I find leagues might concur; open debate is in (and there are many) may receive an that the awe and reverence of sacred the best interests of everyone who cares exquisitely crafted musical setting. The music is misdirected toward an entity about the continuing impact of religion fine craftsmanship of many sacred texts that most likely does not exist and is upon music and musical scholarship. should not come as a surprise: they weakened by various other forms of One might even argue that in all fairness, have inspired generations of composers, nonsense, I, nonetheless, must confess we nonbelievers should give theists the performers, and listeners—and still do that I empathize with the sentiment. The opportunity to defend their faith and its today. invocation of awe addresses a powerful relation to their work as best they can. If neither wholesale acceptance nor emotional need, one that sacred music What I do not want, however, is a divi- wholesale rejection is a viable solution, often fulfills quite well. The expression sion of the field of musicology according what alternatives remain? One possi- of reverence is likewise one with which to one’s religious beliefs or lack thereof. bility would be for secular humanist I strongly empathize; as a scholar, I find Unfortunately, there are already some scholars to insert continual disclaimers of it a useful stance to adopt in my studies indications that such a division may be their nonreligious stance. Although this and my life more broadly. in the making: a recently constituted “For­ ap­proach has the virtue of openness and 4. Specialization in academia is a neces- um on Music and Christian Scholar­ ship”­­ honesty, it nonetheless­ has costs that, in sity, not necessarily a virtue. For those (www.fmcs.us/) is one such example. I my opinion, outweigh the benefits. The engaged in scholarship as a living, spe- worry that the proliferation of such groups presence of constant disclaimers would cialization in a relatively narrow field is will segregate scholars by ideology more distract from the music under investi- a necessary evil. For those who study than is already the case and ultimately gation and risk diminishing the status literature and the arts, there is a further hinder progress in research by causing of works that are eminently worthy of (perhaps unspoken) expectation that us to adopt radically different analytical study. While the religious context of a our studies will invariably form a strong and critical languages. I am eager to sacred song ought to be carefully exam- part of our identities—indeed, that our laud the virtues of secular humanism ined, it is by no means the only aspect of work is the result of an unconditional but not at the expense of driving wedges this work needing explication; it might love for the subject. I would argue, be­tween colleagues. I hope that my reli- not even be the most interesting. Although however, that it is absurd to think that gious colleagues would be prepared to it is vital to prevent religious partisan- scholars do not cherry-pick just as extend the same courtesy. ship from clouding our judgment of everyone else does. In fact, scholars, In the end, I hope to raise our con- sacred music, it is equally important to with their ostensibly refined critical fac- sciousness about the ethical quandaries prevent our secular humanist values from ulties, ought to be more adept at cher- faced by those of us who try to maintain overwhelming our analytical faculties ry-picking than the average layperson. a delicate balance between our secular and allowing us to sink into philistinism. humanist values and our scholarly Given all the ethical and aesthet- he demands upon a secular human- duties. Although I wrote this essay from ic problems associated with studying Tist scholar of sacred music are not the perspective of a musicologist, the sacred music, one might reasonably easy to reconcile: we are faced with ethical quandaries faced by those in my wonder what attracted me to it in the pieces that, on the one hand, call for field are shared not only by colleagues first place and why I have continued to study because of their intricacies and in other humanistic disciplines but also study it after identifying these difficul- prominence in music history but on the by those who simply enjoy listening to ties. Although I do not claim any deep other force us to suppress our distaste and performing sacred music. I hope to psychological insight into the appeal of for their promotion of varying degrees mobilize those who share my thoughts sacred music (nor would I wish to make of nonsense. In analyzing these works, but have yet to add their voices to the any claims for its effects upon others), I we experience both delight in their crafts­ litany. Sacred music is not just God’s

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 54 “Knowledge is an unending adventure at the edge of uncertainty.” – Jacob Bronowski, scientific polymath For a more rational tomorrow … please support the new phase of the Center for Inquiry New Future Fund

Across our world, forward-thinking men and women have recognized the scientific paradigm as their surest guide for sound thinking and living. For them, knowledge is the greatest adventure. Today, the Center for Inquiry movement strives to keep the adventure of knowledge accessible to all. To defend science, reason, freedom of inqui- ry, and human values in an ever-changing world, we must adopt new methods … new approaches. To realize tomorrow’s ambitious goals, we must expand our organization. Toni van Pelt, Paul Kurtz, Ron Lindsay and (seated) Lawrence The New Future Fund is an audacious, multiyear $26.265 million campaign to fund Krauss, David Helfland, and Nobel Laureate Paul Boyer introduced the Declaration in Defense of Science and program needs, capital expansion, and endowment for the Council for Secular Secularism at the inaugural press conference of the Center for Inquiry/Office of Public Policy in Washington, D.C. In this new phase, the focus turns to Outreach and Education: publishing, media relations, personal outreach and more The Naturalism Research Project: library expansion, research fellowships, and other initiatives to spur exploration of the naturalist tradition

Influencing Public Policy through our new Center in the nation’s capital Local leaders, campus activists, and students from around the world came together at CFI’s Summer Session. Enhancing the Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER)

Transnational Development: reaching beyond borders through the United Nations and direct activism around the globe

Because our work is so vitally important, please make your most generous gift today to support program expansion. By pledging a larger gift over a three- or four-year period, you may find a significant contribution more affordable. Our development staff stands ready to answer questions you may have about asset transfers, planned giving arrange- This CFI-sponsored humanist conference in Nigeria attracted activists from across Africa. ments, and the like. All gifts are fully tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.

For more information or to make a gift, return the tear-out card facing this ad or contact: Center for Inquiry | Department of Development P.O. Box 741, Amherst NY 14226-0741 1-800-818-7071 | [email protected]

The new Naturalism Research Project will more than double our library facilities and create a collegial setting for scholarly dialogue and research. HUMANISM AT LARGE

I wonder if the Dawkinses, the Den­ netts, the Wolperts, and the rest of that Miracles wild pack, the pack I run with, have real- ly thought things through, have really come to grips with the realization that it Ralph Estling is we who are the miracle-mongers, the wonder-makers, while the god-creators are the mundane, quintessential killjoys— unimaginative, disbelieving dismissers t is, I think, time we dealt with mir- All human societies and virtually all of natural miracle—finding in existence acles. Once we posit an all-powerful hu­man beings have believed and still nothing to write home about, nothing to I Being, then miracles follow natural- believe in them. It is the simplest of expla- be amazed over, nothing but the plod- ly; they’re only to be expected. Indeed, nations possible, a bacterium of mental ding gods going about their regular rou- their absence would trouble us. It would accomplishment. The Universe, life, con- tine, their nine-to-five job of keeping the be unnatural, and therefore something sciousness were made by (fill in your Universe and all the rest of it ticking, of a miracle, if miracles did not occur, favorite creator-god). End of problem. un­til one day they decide “Ah, to hell one after the other or perhaps several Miracles come into the equation only with it.” strung together in a chain, as the Being when we rule out gods and insist that But miracle of miracles, all is miracle. wished. Once you put gods into the all of existence is a natural occurrence. Once you throw out the gods, once you equation, where is the miraculous, the Natural occurrence! “What rot!” we realize they’re not there—never were, never surprise, the wondrous? cry out. What utter insane rubbish! Who will be—you’re left with the awesome mir­ It is only when we dispense with gods but a madman could believe in anything acle of Reality. Reality. No wonder the that the truly miraculous can emerge. so unbelievable! The Universe bursting into existence out Atheism, the credo that all things hap- godly can’t swallow a miracle as big as of nonexistence, without cause or rea- pen for reasons that have nothing to this and so give up trying, returning con- son: this is a miracle (one I don’t happen do with gods, is the most difficult, most tently to their cud-chewing, to something to credit, despite the cosmologists assur- challenging, most illogical position one they can swallow and regurgitate and ing me it really happened that way). Life can take. I am a devout atheist, and I swallow again: the little gods of their con- developing from nonlife and then evolv- find that atheism makes next-to-impossible tented bovine imagination. ing through what we call “natural selec- demands. The rule that there are no real tion” (there is nothing “natural” about it— rules, that Chance and Neces­sity gov- it’s incredible) to greater and greater com­ ern everything, that there is nothing but plexity until it finally becomes capable of mere Probability underlying all things, all contemplating what has happened, and occurrences, and that this Probability is will go on happening, even though the (almost) totally reliable, based as it is on primordial bacteria continue on their statistics, actuarial tables—how on earth merry way, perfectly adapted to all sorts can I believe in such a miracle? of living conditions after nearly four bil- Yet I do, fervently. There is trouble lion years. What, I ask you, is the need brewing here. You know it’s coming. for incredible complexity when simplic- You feel the presence of a Calvinist god. ity can manage so well? What is the The god-be­lievers, the yea-sayers blanch requirement­ that drives things on until in horror at so crazy a be­lief, a be­lief “natural selection” invents consciousness, in the utterly godless­ miraculous (also intelligence, art, science, “reality TV”? known as Sci­ence); or perhaps they just To­tally, awesomely miraculous. laugh or shake their heads and call us A jerry-built god, descending gingerly poor dement­ ed­­­ atheists­ a bunch of raving to our stage in a rickety bucket suspend- loonies who should con­­sult a psychiatrist ed by juddery crane and creaking pulley, who would carefully, patient­ly, per­haps is a joke in rather poor taste. Therefore,­ even sympathetically explain our logical it is a transcendentally simple thing to failings to us, our inability to see that no believe in its existence. It demands­ no miracles are in­volved, that all is un­mir­ mental strain, no intellectual striving, aculous, the day-to-day work of the gods no imagination worth mentioning. There whose will, or caprice, determines all is nothing easier to believe in than gods. existence,­ past, present, and future; and that it is our manifest, evident, obvious The late Ralph Estling (1930–2007) was duty to honor the gods for their omni­ a prolific writer, with many articles potence and our slavery, and, most espe- published in the British magazine New cially, most dramatically, for the lack of Scientist and the . miracles that is their handiwork.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 56 HEADINGREVIEWS SUBHEAD

losophy, theology, literature, art, and music. One Damned Thing After Another It is a nar­rative of the disenchantment of the world, a “Great Disembedding”­ of the individual from the society, and finally the Austin Dacey rise of an “exclusive humanism” that plac- es human flourishing within an “immanent frame” rath­er than attaching it to some A Secular Age, by Charles Taylor (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University transcendent ends: “many people are happy Press, 2007, ISBN 978-0674026766) 896 pp. Cloth $39.95. living for goals which are purely immanent; they live in a way that takes no account of the transcendent” (p. 143). Along the way, Taylor resists what he considers more conventional tellings of the story, which he calls “subtraction narratives.” Subtraction narratives would have us believe that secularization pro- t is Easter Sunday, I am sitting a café much of an accomplishment. And yet ceeded sim­ply by peeling away religion, in New York City, and the air is full of this unremarkable experience would superstition, and authority, revealing the I the sound of people not heralding­ the have been inconceivable, even unintel- “natural” state of the human condition risen Christ. Around me, a room full of ligible to my European ancestors of five that re­mains beneath.­ Against this, he patrons joins me in not joining together. hundred years ago. They lived in a world shows that “West­ern modernity, includ- It is not that this is an atheist gathering. in which Easter was not just another­ day, ing its secularity, is the fruit of new inven- For all I know, some of my neighbors, in which time was structured by sacred tions, newly constructed self-understand- men and women of various extractions— meanings outside of their control. Their ings and related­ practices, and can’t be European, Asian, African, Central Ameri­ place was a place of ordained hierarchi- explained­ in terms of perennial features can—may be believers. But that is up cal orderings that bound them together of human life” (p. 22). Chief among these to them. Here, each is absorbed in a with priests, lords, kings, and heavenly new inventions is a newly lived experi- separate observance: a novel, a fashion principalities. Their surroundings were ence of the self, what Taylor calls the magazine, a diary, a spreadsheet, a pri- populated by protective and malevolent “buffered self.” vate conversation. forces that dwelt within­ and hallowed The buffered self is in turn the result No meaning of the day is crowned for everyday objects and ex­pressed themselves of several intersecting cultural develop- all of us to see. Today is a number on a in signs and wonders for all to see. ments. One was the disenchantment of calendar, a box to be filled in on a day How did we get from their world to nature, the end of a world permeated planner. No host and blood are passed this one? What happened between the by spirits, demons, moral meanings, and around; we sip concoctions of our choice year 1500 and the year 2000 to make in­tentionality. Disenchantment owes much from a menu. No sacred liturgy trans- Easter, and all belief, optional? to late medieval reform movements within ports us to Easters past; our prayer books Answering this question is the the Church that took aim at superstition, are iPod playlists, our musical reveries self-declared task of A Secular Age, the miracle-mongering, and pagan practices­ secret. We do not sit in pews. We are latest work by Canadian philosopher with­in religious and communal life. Mean­ not organized by station. The space we and intellectual historian Charles Taylor. while, there was growing emphasis (from share is open, hollowed, welcoming all Ours is a secular age, Taylor maintains, both inside and outside of Christian art by saying nothing to everyone. The non- in three senses. First, public spaces have and theology) on the autonomy of na­ture, congregation is a spontaneous ordering been largely emptied of God and reli- defined by self-sufficient laws bestowed­ by of ind-viduals, like a crowd, a city. The gion. Sec­ond, religious observance has a provident creator. Ultimately, after the messages we receive—“20% discount”; declined.­ Third, belief in God has become triumph of the mechanistic, quantitative “Rest­rooms are for patrons only”—do just one option among others. It is no science of Galileo, we were prepared to not emanate from some inscrutable agen- longer a default or axiomatic. This third cies or powers beyond the day, beyond “trade in a universe of ordered signs, in sense of secularity is Taylor’s preoccu- the city. They are the messages we send which everything has a meaning, for pation: “Our question is how we moved to each other, by which we coordinate a silent but beneficent machine” (p. 98). from a condition in 1500 in which it was our lives for mu­tual benefit. Also during the late medieval period and Spending an idle afternoon at a café hard not to believe in God, to our pres- Renaissance, a series of social reforms—to on an Easter Sunday does not feel like ent situation just after 2000, where this encourage civility and “manners,” to reform has become quite easy for many.” the poor, to tamp down unruly “enthusi- Austin Dacey is an associate editor for Taylor limits the scope of his inquiry asms”—gave rise to a “disciplinary soci- Free Inquiry and a representative­ to the to the West, the North Atlantic societies ety” (in Foucault’s language). Meanwhile, United Nations for the Center for Inquiry. of Latin Christian heritage. In a sweeping “national government, city governments, He is the author of the book A Secular nar­rative, Taylor delivers a history of the church authorities, or some combina- Con­science (Prometheus Books, 2007). modern mind rendered in sociology, phi- tion of them, often came down hard

57 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 REVIEWS

on certain elements of popular culture: sion. He admits that “important general often surface only in his rhetorical framing charivaris, carnival[s], feasts of ‘misrule,’ questions are at stake in this reading (Taylor chooses to describe humanism as dancing in church.” The emerging ethos of contemporary spiritual experience,” “exclusive” rath­er than “self-sufficient” and of self-mastery and civilized behavior but he will attempt no general theory of talks of a “Great Disem­bedding” instead of was most pronounced in the Calvinists,­ “what hu­mans seek in religion.” On the a “Great Liber­ating”), in the hues of his who give a special spiritual significance contrary, “it would perhaps be better at prose, or in the mood that hangs over the to the well-ordered, instrumentally ratio- the outset to come clean, and say that I book. That mood is, in a word, ennui. nal, and economically pro­ductive life. Soci­ doubt very much whether any such gen- Almost every action of ours has a point; ety would become an arrangement for eral theory can even be established. . . . we’re trying to get to work, or to mu­tual benefit, or­dained by God but The phenom­ena are much too varied and find a place to buy a bottle of milk built into the auton­omous structure of baffling for that; and even if they were after hours. But we can stop and ask human nature. more tractable,­ we would have to stand why we’re doing­ these things, and that points us beyond to the significance of The self in these conditions is buf­ at the end of history to be able to draw these significances. . . . The issue may fered in that it is “not open and porous such conclusions” (p. 679). And this comes arise for us in a crisis, where we feel and vulnerable to a world of spirits and at page 679! Most readers will feel that that what has been orienting­ our life powers” (p. 27). It stands apart from by that point they should well be at the up to now lacks real value, weight. . . . the world and engages in “disengaged” end of history. But the sense of emptiness, or non-res- onance, may arise in a quite different in­strumental rea­soning over a freestand- On one key topic Taylor writes, “I don’t way. It can come in the feeling that the ing and morally inert nature. The buffered­ want to pursue this point to an utterly con­ quotidian is emptied of deeper reso- identity, “capable­ of disciplined control­ and vincing conclusion. More pertinently, I nance, is dry, flat; the things which benevolence, gen­erated its own sense of don’t think I can” (p. 608). In a thirty-page surround us are dead, ugly, empty; and the way we organize them, shape dignity and power, its own inner satis- academic paper, these kinds of cave- them, ar­range them, in order to live has factions, and these could tilt in favor of ats serve to demonstrate that an author’s­ no mean­ing, beauty, depth, sense. There exclusive humanism” (p. 262). Exclusive mast­ery of some complex material has can be a kind of “nausée” before this humanism would mean “accept­ ­ing no final nuance and depth that surpasses the space meaningless world. [p. 308] goals be­yond human flourish­ing, nor any constraints of the article. In a tome like The cost of the secular age is this allegiance to anything else beyond this A Secular Age, they only prompt one to ma­laise of modernity, the malaise of flourishing” (p. 18). Once this is possible, won­der (in exasperation) exactly why im­man­ence. We moderns are “restless at nontheism becomes a live option. the author could not get around to it in the bar­riers of the human sphere” (p. A Secular Age provides a number of nearly nine hundred pages. It does not 726). We have “deeply felt need” for some- happy occasions for secularists to savor help matters that the book contains a thing more, something beyond our ordinary the victory of secularity. It should re­lieve great deal of repetition. The manuscript flour­ishing (p. 715). We are haunted by some anxiety about the much-reported originated in the Gifford lectures given the thought that the suffering all around “desecularization” of the globe. Bucking by Taylor at Edinburgh in the spring of us is irredeemably pointless. If Taylor the present academic trend of trash- 1999, and apparently the chapters never were in our café, he’d be the one gazing ing the secularization thesis, Taylor fully outgrew the lecture series format. dejectedly while his tea gets cold, think- echoes Alan Wolfe and other perceptive Critics also point out that Taylor’s his- sociologists of religion in documenting torical theses are highly derivative of ing, Is this all there is? how secularity—in the sense of optional Max Weber’s work on disenchantment Is humanism missing something? What belief—is near-inevitable when ortho- and Protestant work ethic (see Charles are we to make of these feelings of empti­ doxy confronts­ modernity. Larmore,­ “How Much Can We Stand? ness, the specter of irredeemable suffer- Studious secularists should consult Re­view of A Secu­lar Age, by Charles ing? Can we continue to find sense in our A Secular Age, if only as a sourcebook Tay­lor,” The New Republic, April 9, moral strivings for a better world? What of material with which to enrich their own 2008: 39–44). are we to do with these longings for a understanding of their tradition. Especial­ All of this is forgivable in a project of transcendent good? For those of us who ly insightful are the chapters on deism such ambition. What is more problematic are moved by such questions at all, I see and sections on neo-Stoicism and the is what lies hidden behind the glut of three possible strategies. Ro­mantics. Taylor’s narrative is also a historical detail and the protestations • Fast. We acknowledge the hunger for useful corrective to the crude popular about theoretical modesty: A Secular the transcendent and resolve not to give history of secularism in which science Age is a polemic. Exceptionally drawn in to it until it can be satiated in some and reason appear de novo in the six- out and mild though they may be, serious good beyond life, perhaps The Good. We teenth century to save humanity from arguments are at work in it. If successful, accept no substitutes. religious superstition and barbarism (in they would vindicate a number of highly • Diet. We acknowledge that the hun­ his version, Catholicism takes its fair share, controversial philosophical claims about ger for the transcendent is real, but and then a little more, of the credit). the nature of morality and the good life. be­cause we also realize that it cannot With discursive footnotes, the book Unfortun­ately, Taylor’s controversial be satisfied in any way we can live with, is 896 pages. And yet the discussion philosophical views are neither clearly we learn to live with the hunger. We is re­markably, sometimes maddeningly, identified as such nor justified through sometimes get pangs, but we see them incon­clusive—even by Taylor’s admis- rigorous argumentation. In­stead, they for what they are.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 58 REVIEWS

• Feast. We recognize the hunger for the lose all of its sense. transport of music or dance, delight in transcendent, and while we see that it can- There is another kind of naturalistic beauty, wonderment at nature, laugh- not be met by some good outside of life, we transcendence that can approach the ter, orgasm. It is no trouble for most of find that it can be nourished by other goods, infinite. This is the transcendence that us to get in at least three transcendent by forms of transcendence within life. happens when through reason we touch experiences a day, especially on the Taylor takes the Fast approach. Of truth, what Aristotle called “rational con­ weekend. course, any faster needs to explain why templation” and Spinoza named amor Despite the many shortcomings (and his favored good is the only kind that intellectualis­ Dei. Taylor denigrates this long-goings) of A Secular Age, Charles can successfully stave off transcendent kind of reason as “disengaged,” but isn’t Taylor has done secularists a great ser- hung­er. Although he devotes zero space it properly called “transcendent?” In fact, vice. He reminds us that we must and can to analyzing the concept of transcendence once we see how transcendence­ can be take seriously the human yearning for in A Sec­ular Age, Taylor character­izes it as immanent and human, far from suffer- self-transcendence. He reminds us that “the full-hearted love of some good beyond­ ing from its lack, we find that our cups the unsabbath­ Sunday afternoon is an life” (p. 639) or “some goals beyond human are running over with it: the overcom- achievement not won merely by subtract- flourish­­ing” (p. 20). Why think that these ing of self for a loved one, the ecstatic ing or “privatizing” once-public beliefs. goals must be found in traditional reli- gion, let alone in a relationship to the God of Abraham, as Tay­lor hopes? Why assume­ that having God around will relieve ennui? Given all that we know about human Real Problem, Excessive Solution? beings, why not instead expect that if there were a heaven, someone would be sitting there this Sunday afternoon think- Tom Flynn ing, Well then, is this all there is? So long as we remain persons in the next world, The Secular Conscience: Why Belief Belongs in Public Life, by Austin such questions may be inescapable.­ And inasmuch as we do not remain persons, Dacey (Amherst, N.Y. Prometheus Books, 2008, ISBN 978-1-59102-604- we literally have nothing to look forward 4) 240 pp. Cloth $24.95. to. I’ve decided that if there are any goods worth wanting in the next world, they will turn out to be goods that we already have in this one—goods like love, knowledge, and beauty. Can the fasting approach­ conceive of some other-worldly values so different from this-worldly val- ues that they promise a nourishment of a ooks by past and present Center Dacey believes mid-twentieth-century different order? for Inquiry staff members threat- American liberalism erred in promot- What should further weaken the will B en to form a literary subgenre. Chris ing the idea that religion was a pri- of the faster is the fact that there are Mooney’s 2005 The Republican War on vate matter, inappropriate for the public plenty of naturalistic explanations for the Science and ’s recent best- square. For decades, that strategy nudged transcendent urge. To the extent that we seller The Age of American Unreason are well-meaning people who understood find sources of this urge in inescap­able among the better-known.* For audacity little about secularism to deflect reli- features of the human condition, we stop of concept, Austin Dacey’s The Secular gious language from public discourse. In seeing them as the stamp of a real super­ Con­science may lead the pack. Dacey—a time, that discourse came to seem closed natural realm and become inclined­ to diet Free Inquiry Associate Editor, the Center not only to religious argumentation but rather than fast. for Inquiry’s­ United Nations representa- to any rhetoric of personal conviction. At one point, Taylor falls back on a tive and architect of 2007’s Secular Islam Secularism­ soon rang false for many who conventional apologetical warhorse, the Summit, proposes to redefine the rules had never understood its real purpose. “If idea that immanent goods fail to satisfy regarding the expression of strong belief, they want to resist the social agenda of because they fall short of the infinite: religious and otherwise, in public life. theological conservatism,” Dacey writes, “all joy strives for eternity, because it “secular lib­erals will have to do better loses some of its sense if it doesn’t last” *Chris Mooney interned at the Center for than asking the devout to please refrain In­quiry while concluding his undergraduate (p. 721). Not in this lifetime. When our from speaking their minds” (p. 70). enjoyment of a good is cut short, we may work at Yale and later worked in the Center’s public relations department before moving on Urging that the “point of the open, sec­ wish it could go on, but the wishing is a to progressive punditry. Susan Jacoby is pro- ular society is not to privatize or bracket sign that it was worth pursuing after all. gram director at the Center for Inquiry/New questions of conscience, but to pur­sue them The recognition that we lost some of its Tom Flynn is the editor of Free Inquiry. in conservation with others” (p. 242), value is evidence that the value did not Dacey proposes a third do­main of dis-

59 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 REVIEWS

course midway between the domain of the secularists! Much abortion-rights secular Americans unconditionally cede government and that of truly private caprice. advocacy began in the humanist move- the public square to the discourse of “Conscience is not public, in the sense of ment of the 1960s, and it was rich in mor­ faith, what happens to the American civil or governmental. But conscience is al discourse. Humanist and atheist publi­ experiment in religious egalitarianism? not private. It is open” (p. 112). In a few cations kept publishing such material I am less eager than Dacey to run that spots, Dacey frankly labels this “domain (recently, Eileen McDonagh’s “Abortion­ test; I fear it might end in the sort of mul- between” the open, a name that deserves Rights after South Dakota” [FI, June/ tireligious society history usually offers to stick. In the “open,” people of faith July 2006] offered a provocative defense us, where the majority creed rules and are welcome to speak, but their views of abortion built on the moral concept of minority life stances (including unbelief) are as subject to objective analysis and maternal consent to pregnancy). It was exist at its sufferance. criticism as any others. Believers must not secularist activists but rather strat- Despite that misgiving, I think Dacey accept­ that no contention can avoid scru- egists at the national women’s-rights tiny because it is religious; “[s]ecular and abortion-rights organizations who liberals must be prepared to talk religion opted to downplay debates over wheth- er fetuses have souls in favor of an appeal to “choice,” hoping that middle- “. . . Austin Dacey has of-the-road religious­ believers would find it less threatening. This strategy identified a genuine “We need better ways to had just the unintended consequences ideological confusion Dacey criticizes (and I criticized also, at participate alongside the time; see my “Pro-Choice, a Wrong that leads too many sec- believers in ethical dis- Turn for Abortion Rights?” [FI, Winter ulars 1991/92]; see also William Saletan’s 2003 course. But is abandon- Bearing Right: How Conservatives Won to isolate themselves ing the idea of religion the Abortion­ War). As secularists qua from moral discourse.” secularists did not create this particular as a private matter truly problem, they may have little prospect of the only way to achieve solving it. Additionally, I can’t shake the sus- this worthy end?” picion that if Dacey’s “open” were fully implemented,­ church-state separation has identified a real problem. The secu- as we’ve known it might go under the lar West faces important challenges, not bus. Dacey presumes that a stout wall of the least of which is the confrontation separation would survive (“judges and with political Islam. There is a genuine while insisting on certain non-negotiable elected officials . . . are bound to uphold risk that secularism may become too political values: freedom of conscience the non-religious nature of state institu- anemic, too hobbled by relativism to and secular government” (p. 106). tions” [p. 109]), but he does not explain pre­vail. Dacey condemns the “misguided Dacey is onto something here. Secu­ how this would be achieved or suggest multi­culturalism that keeps Western lib- lars do sometimes feel inhibited from how to negotiate situations where a erals from criticizing the oppression of joining public conversations about believer’s­ right to speak conflicts with wo­men, religious minorities, and apos- values out of a misguided sense that government’s obligation to avoid the tates in Islamic societies for fear of being statements of personal conviction don’t appear­ance of endorsing religion in its accus­ed of ‘Islamophobia’”­ (p. 158). Hear, belong. We need better ways to par- management of public venues. The free- hear! ticipate alongside believers in ethical wheeling discourse Dacey champions may In The Secular Conscience, Austin discourse. But is abandoning the idea of rankle when it erupts in courthouses, gov- Dacey has identified a genuine ideologi- religion as a private matter truly the only ernment offices, or public schools. cal confusion that leads too many secu- way to achieve this worthy end? And is History shows us few societies where lars to isolate themselves from moral “bracketing” by secularists always the individuals of widely divergent religious discourse. In this reviewer’s opinion, largest problem? backgrounds lived together as equals. Dacey’s proposed solution would ac­ One of Dacey’s cautionary examples America’s effort to achieve that ideal complish too much. Yes, we need a third is the abortion debate, in which genuine is a social experiment with little prece- zone, open for the rhetoric of con- moral dialogue over such things as fetal dent. Since the mid-twentieth century, science, between the governmental and personhood or maternal autonomy has one of the things that has made it work private domains. But that government been largely cashiered in favor of a bland is a policy of stripping public venues of domain must stay secular! The open rhetoric of “choice” that inadvertently religious symbolism, creating de facto domain must coexist with, not replace, leaves anti-abortion conservatives with “religion-free” buffer zones where all the “naked public square” that has on a monopoly on truly moral discourse. I can interact as citizens, not sectari- balance served minority-life-stance couldn’t agree more, but who committed ans, tacitly agreeing to disregard for Americans fairly well. How do we this particular act of bracketing? It wasn’t an interval their differences in belief. If finesse that? That’s a question for

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 60 REVIEWS

news column that the film is a “frighten- Repelled by Expelled ingly immoral narrative,” a “toxic mishmash of persecution fantasies, disconnected and inappropriate references to fallen com- Edd Doerr munist regimes and their leaders and a very repugnant form of Holocaust denial

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, directed by Nathan Frankowski, starring Ben Stein, Distributed by Premise Media Corporation. 2008. 105 minutes. “Whatever you do, t was precisely one o’clock on Sun­ ing over with hostility toward science don’t waste money to day, April 27, when I slid into my seat and scientists and is designed not only see this film; it will only Iin the darkened AMC Rio Cinema to at­tack evolution but also to blame multiplex­ in Gaithersburg, Maryland,­­ to Charles Darwin for Nazism, Stalinism, encourage this sort of watch what is unquestionably one of the and the Holocaust.­ worst films to have ever disgraced the sil­ver Loaded with snippets from old Holly­ nonsense.” screen. The theater was almost empty. wood movies (Frankenstein, Planet of the Apes, etc.) for comic effect and—for propaganda value that would make Leni “Expelled . . . is a crude, Riefenstahl wince—snatches of film of from the monotone big mouth Ben Stein.” Hitler, Stalin, Nazi and Soviet troops, What is a nice Jewish boy like Stein doing hack-propaganda flick and Nazi death camps, the film gives the playing the Holocaust-denial card? boiling over with hostili- term heavy-handed a new set of mean- Expelled has been criticized by sev- ings. Repeated­ ad nauseam are assort- eral of Stein’s interviewees, including ty toward ed bits of film featuring the Berlin Wall, Richard Dawkins and National Center science and scientists intended to reinforce Stein’s grotesque for Science Education executive direc- claim that “intelligent design [creation- tor and anthropologist Eugenie Scott. and is designed not only ism] is being suppressed in a systematic They say they were misled into partic- to attack evolution but and ruthless fashion” by a conspiracy of ipating in the film by being asked to scientists and atheists. be interviewed for a film supposedly also to blame Charles Stein tries to show that intelli- dealing with the “intersection between gent-design creationism has a modicum science and religion.” Darwin for Nazism, of scientific respectability, but he falls While fundamentalist media gave Stalinism, and the laugh­ably short for anyone familiar with Expelled positive reviews, mainstream the controversy. and scientific media generally panned it. Holocaust.” In its review of the film, the Waco Promotion of the film is managed by Times-Herald (published in the city Motive Marketing, the same outfit that closest to President Bush’s Crawford, promoted Mel Gibson’s sadistic The Pas­ Texas, ranch, which is used mainly as sion of the Christ and The Chronicles­ of Only five other people had thrown away a prop for photo ops) wrote “That’s the Narnia, based on the C.S. Lewis novels. good money to see Expelled: No Intelli­ real issue of ‘Expelled’—atheist scien- If an antidote to this toxic brew is need­ gence Allowed. tists versus God—even though it whol- ed, I would recommend three very point- Expelled stars and is narrated by sad- ly undercuts statements by intelligent ed books: Science, Education, and Cre­ faced actor and clown Ben Stein, whose design researchers early in the film that ationism (National Academy of Sciences, c.v. includes a stint as a speechwrit- ID has nothing to do with religion.” The 2008); Not in Our Classrooms:­ Why er for President Richard Nixon. It is review described its “failure to cover Intelligent Design is Wrong for Our a crude, hack-propaganda flick boil- how Christian evolutionists reconcile Schools by Eugenie C. Scott and Glenn Edd Doerr, president of Americans for faith and science” as “perhaps the film’s Branch (Beacon Press, 2006); and a Religious Liberty (arlinc.org) and for­ most glaring and telling omission” and de­tailed account of the Pennsylvania mer president of the American Human­ added that the film “quickly dismissed intelligent-design federal court case, ist Association, is the author of over [such proponents of theistic evolution] Monkey Girl: Evolu­tion, Education, 3,500 published books, sections of books, by a chain of quotes that brand them as Religion, and the Battle for America’s articles, columns, book and film reviews, liberal Christians duped by militant athe­ Soul by Edward Humes (HarperCollins, translations, letters, short stories, and ists in their efforts to get religion out of 2007). poems. He has made over 2,000 speech- the classroom.” Whatever you do, don’t waste money es and radio and television appear- University of Pennsylvania bioethi- to see this film; it will only encourage this ances. cist Arthur Caplan wrote in his MSNBC sort of nonsense. But if you must, let me

61 http://www.secularhumanism.org Aug./Sept. 2008 (Letters cont’d. from p. 13) panies collude to take over the Ameri­can nate couples have been given this misin- health system some twenty-five to thirty formation, obviously by physicians like to safety. An atheist tends to thank those years ago under the guise of “managed John Frantz, and to their dismay (not who are actually responsible for some care.” Unfor­tunately, at its inception to mention to the undue physical and positive effect, and we can also rit­ualize. my colleagues in the medical profession emotional stress on the mother), ended On Thanksgiving Day, I have made it a gave way without a whimper; now the up having two babies in less than a year. habit to thank people who have made in­sur­ance industry has a stranglehold on If Dr. Frantz wants to promote and write my life better in the prior year. I thank the system by paying baksheesh to our about population control, he’d better get specific people for specific deeds, which elected representatives. his facts straight before­ touting a partic- I think makes for a worthwhile ritual. There is now a movement developing ular method. Breastfeeding is definitely Any well-run organization that works to undo the tragic situation in which the not one of them! for the perceived common good imbues American public finds itself. Many unco- Sue Hall, RN, MSN its members with “transcendence.” The ordinated groups are striving to achieve Maternity Nursing Instructor (Ret.) Marines are a very intense community, single-payer universal care. There are Grants Pass, Oregon all working toward specific ends higher also foxes in the henhouse: witness the than themselves. The sacrifice, effort, American Association of Retired Persons’ and severe consequences of their patri- efforts to provide “universal care” as one otic work give them every bit as tran- can discern in their television commer- Erratum scendent an experience as any church cials. Pure hypocrisy! AARP is the largest or temple. Greenpeace, where people work seller of health insurance­ in the nation. An error occurred on the chart that to­gether to save the planet, can be very It opposes the concepts prevalent in other transcendent. These are not mere clubs; in­dustrialized nations. they are ways of life. We must unite in a single cause and try The author states that social groups to achieve care akin to that provided in the are quasi-religious, but I think religions majority of European nations, Canada, and WRITE TO FI are sometimes quasi-social. They play Australia. I, as a member, would suggest a at providing social support, but only in united effort to push the program institut- the context of their narrow interpreta- ed twenty years ago by Physicians for a tion of the world. Rather than support, National Health Plan and its fifteen thou- they often provide a restraint on actions sand members (see http://www.pnhp.org). and even the growth of their members. Dr. Phillips boldly speaks the truth; Consider the religious groups who went however, he provides no solution. It will to Southeast Asia after the 2004 tsuna- be an uphill fight, but we can, I hope, mi and refused to give aid to anyone who prevail if we work together. Already would not worship with them. That is we have a start with the bill (H.R. 676) authoritarianism masquerading as a social introduced into the House of Repre­ group. Religions tend to convince people that theirs is the only community one sentatives. Let us join in the effort to get should have, in extreme cases cutting it to the floor of the House after we are people off from other groups and sever- extra careful in electing the Congress ing connections with nonmembers. this autumn, making sure that the spe- The false comfort provided by religions cific candidates are not beholden to the is not a benefit; it’s a limitation. Just be­cause insurance lobbies. Send submissions to the author doesn’t see the honest comfort Dr. Stephen R. Keister Norm R. Allen Jr., in pursuing the true nature of the universe Erie, Pennsylvania Letters Editor, rather than being spoon-fed mythology FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 664, doesn’t mean I don’t. I feel liberated Amherst, NY 14226-0664. by being an atheist, not hollow. I am free Fax: (716) 636-1733. from the bonds of religion and revel Contraception E-mail: in the reality of the world unhindered [email protected]. by self-reinforcing “Truth” imposed by Confusion In letters intended for religions. publication, please include Richard Lewis name, ad­dress, city and Renton, Washington Breastfeeding does not prevent pregnancy! The fact that he is a doctor and should state, zip code, and daytime know better makes John Frantz’s unfor- phone number Get Involved! tunate statement that “lactation inhibits (for verification purposes ovulation, reducing the likelihood that a only). Letters should be As a retired physician, I could not agree new mother will immediately conceive 300 words or less and pertain more with Peter Phillips (“Healthcare for again” in his article “Major Nuances in to previous All Is a Human Right,” FI, June/July 2008). Population­ Control” (FI, June/July 2008) FREE INQUIRY articles. I stood by and watched the insurance com­ even more so. Thou­sands of unfortu-

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 62 Rebecca Goldstein, philosopher and author (USA) Peter Singer, DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at the Adolf Grünbaum, Andrew Mellon Professor of University Center for Human Values, Princeton Philosophy­ of Science, University of Pittsburgh (USA) University (USA) Jürgen Habermas, professor of philosophy, Jens C. Skou, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry (Denmark) INTERNATIONAL ACADEMY OF HUMANISM University of Frankfurt (Germany) ACADÉMIE INTERNATIONALE D’HUMANISME Margherita Hack, astronomer, astrophysicist (Italy) J.J.C. Smart, professor emeritus of philosophy, The Academy is composed of nontheists who are: (1) Herbert Hauptman, Nobel Laureate; professor of devoted to the principle of free inquiry in all fields biophysical science, State University of New Australian National University (Australia) of human endeavor; (2) committed to the scientific York at Buffalo (USA) Wole Soyinka, Nobel Laureate, playwright (Nigeria) outlook and the use of reason and the scientific Alberto Hidalgo Tuñón, professor of philosophy, method in acquiring knowledge about nature; and (3) Universidad de Oviedo (Spain) Barbara Stanosz, professor of philosophy, Instytut upholders of humanist ethical values and principles. Christopher Hitchens, author, lecturer (USA) Wydawniczy “Ksiazka i Prasa” (Poland) Donald Johanson, Institute of Human Origins HUMANIST LAUREATES (discoverer of “Lucy”) (USA) Jack Steinberger, Nobel Laureate in Physics (USA) Pieter Admiraal, medical doctor (Netherlands) Sergeí Kapitza, chair, Moscow Institute of Physics Shulamit Aloni, former education minister (Israel) and Technology; vice president, Academy of Svetozar Stojanovic,´ director, Institute for Philosophy Ruben Ardila, psychologist, National University of Sciences (Russia) Colombia (Colombia) and Social Theory, University of Belgrade George Klein, cancer researcher, Karolinska Margaret Atwood, author (Canada) Institute, Stockholm (Sweden) (Yugoslavia) Kurt Baier, professor of philosophy, University of György Konrád, novelist; sociologist; cofounder, Pittsburgh (USA) Thomas S. Szasz, professor of psychiatry, State Uni­ Hungarian Humanist Association (Hungary) Etienne-Emile Baulieu, Lasker Award for Clinical Sir Harold W. Kroto, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry (UK) versity of New York Medical School, Syracuse (USA) Medicine winner (France) Ioanna Kuçuradi, secretary general, Fédération­ Baruj Bonacerraf, Nobel Prize Laureate in Sir Keith Thomas, historian, president, Corpus Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie­ Physiology or Medicine (USA) (Turkey) Christi College, Oxford University (UK) Elena Bonner, author, human rights activist (Russia) Paul Kurtz, professor emeritus of philosophy, State Jacques Bouveresse, professor of philosophy, Rob Tielman, professor of sociology, Universiteit Collège de France (France) University of New York at Buffalo (USA) Paul D. Boyer, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry (USA) Valerii A. Kuvakin, philosopher, founding director, voor Humanistiek, Utrecht; former copresident, Center for Inquiry/Moscow (Russia) Mario Bunge, Frothingham Professor of International­ Humanist and Ethical Union Foundations and Philosophy of Science, McGill Gerald A. Larue, professor emeritus of archeology University (Canada) and biblical studies, University of Southern (Netherlands) Jean-Pierre Changeux, Collège de France, Institut California at Los Angeles (USA) Lionel Tiger, professor of anthropology, Rutgers– Pasteur, Académie des Sciences (France) Thelma Lavine, Clarence J. Robinson professor of Patricia Smith Churchland, professor of philosophy, philosophy, George Mason University (USA) the State University of New Jersey (USA) University of California at San Diego; adjunct Richard Leakey, author, paleo-anthropologist professor, Salk Institute for Biological Studies (Kenya) Neil deGrasse Tyson, scientist, Hayden Planetarium Jean-Marie Lehn, Nobel Laureate in Chemistry (USA/Canada) (USA) Bernard Crick, professor of politics, Birkbeck (France) College, University of London (UK) Elizabeth Loftus, professor, University of California/ Mario Vargas Llosa, author (Perú) Irvine (USA) Richard Dawkins, Charles Simonyi Professor Simone Veil, former Minister of Social Affairs, of Public Understanding of Science, Oxford José Leite Lopes, director, Centro Brasileiro de University (UK) Pesquisas Fisicas (Brazil) Health, and Urban Affairs (France) José M.R. Delgado, professor and chair, Adam Michnik, historian, political writer, cofounder Gore Vidal, author, social commentator (USA) Department of Neuropsychology, University of of KOR (Workers’ Defense Committee) (Poland) Madrid (Spain) Jonathan Miller, OBE, theater and film director, physi- Mourad Wahba, professor of philosophy, University Daniel C. Dennett, director of the Center for cian (UK) Cognitive Studies, Tufts University (USA) Taslima Nasrin, author, physician, social critic of Ain Shams, Cairo; president of the Afro-Asian Jean Dommanget, Belgian Royal Observatory (Bangladesh) Philosophical Association (Egypt) (Belgium) Conor Cruise O’Brien, author, diplomat, University Ann Druyan, author, lecturer, producer (USA) of Dublin (Ireland) James Watson, Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Elaine Pagels, Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Umberto Eco, novelist, semiotician, University of Medicine (USA) Bologna (Italy) Religion, Princeton University (USA) Luc Ferry, professor of philosophy, Sorbonne Jean-Claude Pecker, professor emeritus of astro- Steven Weinberg, Nobel Prize winner; professor of University and University of Caen (France) physics, Collège de France, Académie des physics, University of Texas at Austin (USA) Antony Flew, professor emeritus of philosophy, Sciences (France) Reading University (UK) Steven Pinker, professor of brain and cognitive Harvey Weinstein, cofounder of Miramax (USA) Yves Galifret, professor emeritus of neurophysiol- science, MIT (USA) ogy, Université Pierre and Marie Curie; general Dennis Razis, medical oncologist, “Hygeia” Diagnos­ George A. Wells, professor of German, Birkbeck secretary of l’Union Rationaliste (France) tic & Therapeutic Center of Athens S.A. (Greece) College, University of London (UK) Johan Galtung, professor of sociology, University Marcel Roche, permanent delegate to UNESCO of Oslo (Norway) from Venezuela (Venezuela) Edward O. Wilson, Pellegrino University Professor, Nobel Laureate; professor of Salman Rushdie, author, Massachusetts Institute Murray Gell-Mann, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard physics, California Institute of Technology (USA) of Technology (USA) Vitaly Ginzburg, Moscow State University (Russia) Fernando Savater, philosophy educator (Spain) University (USA)