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SPRING 2001 • VOL. 21 No.

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`Secular Humanism THE AFFIRMATIONS OF HUMANISM: LI I A STATEMENT OF PRINCIPLES free inquiry

We are committed to the application of reason and science to the understanding of the universe and to the solving of human problems. We deplore efforts to denigrate human intelligence, to seek to explain the world in supernatural terms, and to look outside nature for salvation. We believe that scientific discovery and technology can contribute to the betterment of human life. We believe in an open and pluralistic society and that democracy is the best guarantee of protecting human rights from authoritarian elites and repressive majorities. We are committed to the principle of the separation of church and state. We cultivate the arts of negotiation and compromise as a means of resolving differences and achieving mutual understanding. We are concerned with securing justice and fairness in society and with eliminating discrimination and intolerance. We believe in supporting the disadvantaged and the handicapped so that they will be able to help themselves. We attempt to transcend divisive parochial loyalties based on race, religion, gender, nationality, creed, class, sexual ori- entation, or ethnicity, and strive to work together for the common good of humanity. We want to protect and enhance the earth, to preserve it for future generations, and to avoid inflicting needless suf- fering on other species. We believe in enjoying life here and now and in developing our creative talents to their fullest. We believe in the cultivation of moral excellence. We respect the right to privacy. Mature adults should be allowed to fulfill their aspirations, to express their sexual pref- erences, to exercise reproductive freedom, to have access to comprehensive and informed health-care, and to die with dignity. We believe in the common moral decencies: altruism, integrity, honesty, truthfulness, responsibility. Humanist ethics is amenable to critical, rational guidance. There are normative standards that we discover together. Moral principles are tested by their consequences. We are deeply concerned with the moral education of our children. We want to nourish reason and compassion. We are engaged by the arts no less than by the sciences. We are citizens of the universe and are excited by discoveries still to be made in the cosmos. We are skeptical of untested claims to knowledge, and we are open to novel ideas and seek new departures in our thinking. We affirm humanism as a realistic alternative to theologies of despair and ideologies of violence and as a source of rich personal significance and genuine satisfaction in the service to others. We believe in optimism rather than pessimism, hope rather than despair, learning in the place of dogma, truth instead of ignorance, joy rather than guilt or sin, tolerance in the place of fear, love instead of hatred, compassion over selfish- ness, beauty instead of ugliness, and reason rather than blind faith or irrationality.

We believe ;n the fnIIect re,lli7:ltinn of the best and noblest th»'ee .lrt' capable of is human beings.

For a parchment copy of this page, suitable for framing, please send $4.95 to FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, New York 14226-0664 EDITORIAL FEATURES

God in the Public Is Philosophy Obsolete? Square: The • Hallelujah Choir 24 Introduction Paul Kunz f Tom Flynn 27 Philosophical OP-ED free inquiry Employment: History and 8 Value in the Wrong SPRING 2001 VOL. 21, NO. 2 Prospects Place Austin Dacey Christ( pher Hitchens ISSN 0272-0701 29 Philosophy in 9 NATO's Poisoned Crisis Arrow Mario Bunge Justin Raimondo 32 Exorcising the Homunculus 10 Standing By, Again David C. Noelle Peter Singer 36 Plato's Method 11 A Problem that Meets Cognitive Dares Not Speak Science Its Name Stephen P. Stich Christina Hoff Sommers 39 Metaphors, Minds, and the Fate of Special Pleading 12 Western Philosophy Galore Interview with George Tibor R. Machan Lakoff and Mark Johnson 13 The Evolution of 42 Humanity in Time Thought and Space James Underdown Victor J. Stenger 44 The Sources and 15 An Open Letter to Dangers of George Bush Postmodern Edward I abash Anti-Science Norman Lelia 17 Silverman's Wager f Jeri) Silverman DEPARTMENTS 18 R.I.P., Naked Public Square 20 Frontlines "luny I:I Vnn 22 Letters 48 Church-State Update REVIEWS Calm (?) Before the Storm 58 The Left Behind Tribulation Novels 67 Who's Who in Hell Tom Flynn Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins Warren Allen Smith Fdmund D. Cohen 49 Great Minds 67 Chocolat Errors of the Elohist Robert M. Price 62 The Myth of a Matriarchal Prehistory Jame., [ Inderdown Cynthia Eller 52 Media Scan Joan Kennedy Taylor Newspapers and Atheism Gary Sloan 63 The Quest for the Historical Muhammad j 53 God on Trial Q.cst tor 4, Ibn Warraq The Irrelevant `God fI storical Muñamma Robert Price Debate' Jeremy Patrick 65 Totally MAD the Learning Company 55 Science and Brian Siano Religion God and Darwin 66 Why I Am Not a Secularist Square Off rrad William E. Connolly Clay Farris Tom Flynn 70 Humanism at Large FI Editorial T Editor-in-Chief Paul Kurtz U Editor Thomas W. Flynn free inquiry Managing Editor Andrea Szalanski Editorial Board Deputy Editor Norm R. Allen, Jr. Robert Alley Columnists Nat Hentoff, Christopher Hitchens, Wendy Kaminer, Mark Crispin Miller, Professor of Humanities Emeritus, Univ. of Richmond, Virginia Katha Pollitt, Justin Raimondo, Peter Singer, Christina Hoff Sommers Hector Avalos Senior Editors Vern L. Bullough, Richard Dawkins, Martin Gardner, James A. Haught, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Iowa State University Gerald A. Larue, Taslima Nasrin Joe E. Barnhart Professor of Philosophy, Associate Editor Wendy McElroy North Texas State University Contributing Editors Jo Ann Boydston, Paul Edwards, Albert Ellis, Roy P. Fairfield, H. James Birx Professor of Anthropology, Charles Faulkner, Antony Flew, Levi Fragell, Adolf Grünbaum, Marvin Kohl, Canisius College George Bishop Thelma Lavine, Joe Nickell, Lee Nisbet, J. J. C. Smart, Svetozar Stojanovic, Professor of Political Science, Thomas Szasz, Richard Taylor University of Cincinnati Rob Boston Editorial Associate Warren Allen Smith Author, Americans United for Separation of Church and State Art Director Lisa A. Hurter Barbara Forrest Associate Professor of Philosophy, Production Paul E. Loynes, Sr. Southeastern Louisiana Univ. Cartoonist Don Addis Stewart Guthrie Professor of Anthropology, Fordham University Contributing Illustrators Gerald Fried William Harwood Webmaster Terese Rozelle Author, Mythology's Last Gods Stuart Jordan Cover Illustration Brad Marshall Senior Staff Scientist, Depicted on the cover: (from left to right) John Dewey, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Baruch Spinoza, Plato, and Friedrich Nietzsche Alfred Kisubi Philosopher, Poet, University of Wisconsin Lena Ksarjian Committee on the History of Culture, Council for Secular Humanism University of Chicago Ronald A. Lindsay Chairman Paul Kurtz Lawyer, Philosopher Board of Directors Vern Bullough, Jan Loeb Eisler, Jonathan Kurtz, Joseph Levee, Timothy J. Madigan (Chairman) University of Rochester Press Kenneth Marsalek, Jean Millholland, Robert Worsfold Michael Martin Professor of Philosophy, Chief Operating Officer Thomas W. Flynn Boston University Coordinator, Alliance of Secular John Novak Professor of Education, Brock University Humanist Societies Erika B. Hedberg Jean Claude Pecker Coordinator, Campus Freethought Astronomer, Educator, Author, Alliance Austin Dacey Professeur Honoraire, Collège de France Anthony Pinn Director, African Americans Associate Professor of Religious Studies, for Humanism Norm R. Allen, Jr. Macalester College Robert M. Price Development Officer James B. Kimberly Professor of Biblical Criticism, Center for Inquiry Institute Director of Libraries 'timothy Binga Theodore Schick, Jr. Professor of Philosophy, Fulfillment Michael Cione, Michelle Keiper Muhlenberg College Victor J. 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FREE INQUIRY (ISSN 0272-0701) is published quarterly by the Council for Secular Humanism, a nonprofit educational corpo- ration, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226. Phone (716) 636-7571. Fax (716) 636-1733. Copyright 02001 by the Council for Secular Humanism. All rights reserved. No part of this periodical may be reproduced without permission of the publisher. COUNCIL Periodicals postage paid at Buffalo, N.Y., and at additional mailing offices. National distribution by International Periodicals FOR Distributors, Solana Beach, California. FREE INQUIRY is available from University Microfilms and is indexed in Philosophers' Index. Printed in the United States. Postmaster: Send address changes to FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226- SECULAR 0664. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the editors or publisher. No one speaks on behalf of the Council for Secular Humanism unless expressly stated. Subscription rates: $31.50 for one year, $53.50 for two years, $72.50 HUMANISM for three years. Foreign orders: add $7.00 per year. God in the Public Square: The Hallelujah Choir

EDITORIAL

PAUL KURTZ

ltimately, the 2000 presidential contest ended not in an election but a coronation. Al Gore carried the national popular vote ■ by over half a million and Washington, D.C.—except for the Supreme Court, which he lost free inquiry by one vote! Naderites claim that the nation is ruled by a Republicrat Party, and that there are no mean- ingful differences between the two major parties. Liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans dispute that, maintaining that there are sharp ideological differences; in turn, many liberals blame Ralph Nader for spoiling Gore's chances for victory. George W. Bush has said that he wishes to work with all factions of the country and that continued heal- ing efforts will need to be exerted if we are to bring this nation together. Bipartisanship in the Congress is being hailed as a worthy step beyond "partisan politics." We hope that this does not transform America into a one-party state—for dissent is the life-blood of a viable democracy. The culture wars are likely to continue. There are real differences in views in America about the relationship between church and state that need to be debated. For secular humanists the most contentious issue concerns the role of religion in the public square. There has been too little dissent about this. Bush has said that, for him, Jesus is the most influential philosopher(!) Bush's first public act after the announcement of his victory was a prayer. He and Vice President-elect Richard Cheney wish to use public funds to support "faith-based charities." Bush believes that the Ten Commandments should be posted in public buildings and that both creation and evolution should be taught in the schools—though he would leave that up to the local school boards to decide. Unfortunately, during the campaign the Democratic Party moved to the right on the God question—in order, it is said, to pre-empt Bush's conservative base. If so, the strategy didn't work, but the damage done to the wall of separation may endure long after Campaign 2000. In any case, the basic principle of separation of church and state was seriously compromised—at least if we take the major candidates at their word.

"The Senators and Representatives ... and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States." (Italics added.)

—Article VI, Constitution of the United States of America

Appended to this editorial are some selected quotations of George W. Bush/Dick Cheney and Al Gore/Joe Lieberman, which they uttered during the heat of the election battle. As one can see, both the Republicans and the Democrats espoused the ideology of the Religious Right. Indeed, the Wall Street Journal observed wryly that, if a Republican candidate professed Lieberman's views, then liberals would have been up in arms. Candidates Bill Bradley and Ralph Nader declined to interpose their private religious beliefs into the political campaign—but both were soundly

Paul Kurtz is editor-in-chief of FREE INQUIRY and professor emeritus of philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo.

defeated. The future of the Democratic ion.

Party is up for grabs. Will it opt to iss Fkow To TALI_ WHEN WE REACH TRUE REL1GIoU5 TOLERANCE rm weaken secularism, as the Republican e h p

Party has long advocated? it

I submit that the United States is a d w te in secular democracy (the best single r piece of evidence for this being our god- Rep less Constitution), and that the private d. religious beliefs of the president are not relevant to his or her performance. The reserve hts Constitution clearly states that "no reli- ig gious Test shall ever be required as All r

Qualification to any Office or public Inc. trust." Although this is legally the case ices

(de jure), in practice (de facto) few if Serv any candidates have dared express dis- dia senting views about religion and God in Me ne

the public square. ibu Tr

Although the Democratic Party has © been a strong advocate of the First Amendment religion clause, regrettably, both Gore and Lieberman supported faith-based charities, a clear violation of the separation principle. Senator Lie- berman said that God needed to be restored to the "naked public square"— Lieberman asserted that the First John E Kennedy, on deciding to run a phrase first popularized by the neo- Amendment religion clause applied to for the presidency, demonstrated the conservative Richard John Neuhaus, freedom of religion, not freedom from proper posture: he was a candidate who and Vice President Gore apparently religion. The candidates tried to outdo happened to be a Roman Catholic, but agreed with these sentiments. each other in God-blessing everyone. (Continued on page 69)

The Campaign 2000 Candidates on Religion

George W. Bush Muslim, ought to be eligible for public dedicated to their children, their churches money to advance their good work." and their communities.".. "When you turn your heart and your life over to Christ, when you accept Christ as Al Gore Joseph Lieberman the savior, it changes your heart." From President Bush's inaugural "The men and women who work in faith- "We are still arguably the most religiously address: "We are guided by a power larg- and values-based organizations are dri- observant people on earth, and share a er than ourselves, who created us equal in ven by their spiritual commitment; to near universal belief in God. But you his image; ... Church and charity, syna- serve their God, they have sustained the wouldn't know it from national public life gogue and mosque, lend our communities drug addicted, the mentally ill, the home- today. The line between church and state their humanity, and they will have an hon- less; they have trained them, educated is an important one and has always been ored place in our plans and laws." them, cared for them, healed them. Most hard for us to draw, but in recent years we "It seems to me 'Thou shalt not kill' is of all, they have done what government have gone far beyond what the Framers pretty universal. I think districts ought to can never do; what it takes is God's help, ever imagined in separating the two. So be allowed to post the Ten Command- sometimes, for all of us to manage; they much so that we have practically banished ments. No matter what a person's religion have loved them." religious values and religious institutions is there's some inherent values in those "The idea of social justice is inextrica- from the public square and constructed a great commandments." bly linked in the Scriptures with ecology. 'discomfort zone' for even discussing our "[Schools should teach] different forms In passage after passage, environmental faith in public settings—ironically making of how the world was formed, [with evolu- degradation and social injustice go hand religion one of the few remaining socially tion taught alongside creation]. I believe in hand. Indeed, the first instance of 'pol- acceptable targets of intolerance." children ought to be exposed to different lution' in the Bible occurs when Cain slays As a people we need to reaffirm our theories about how the world started." Abel and his blood falls on the ground, faith and renew the dedication of our nation rendering it fallow" and ourselves to God and God's purposes." "The center of my life is faith and fam- "We know that the Constitution wisely Dick Cheney ily and I have a passion in my heart to separates church from state, but remem- "Governor Bush and I believe faith-based fight for the families who most need a ber: the Constitution guarantees freedom groups, whether Mormon or Methodist or champion, those who wake up each day of religion, not freedom from religion."

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org u New Directions

We welcome Thomas Flynn as the new editor of FREE INQUIRY, replacing Lewis Vaughn. We thank Lewis for a job well done. We are pleased that Tom Flynn, a veteran secular humanist, has agreed to assume the editorship of FREE INQUIRY in its twenty-first year. We also welcome Dr. Edward Buckner as the new executive director of the Council for Secular Humanism. We are sorry to lose Matt Cherry. Ed Buckner has excellent qualifications as both an educator and administrator. Announcing Our A note about editorial policy: FREE INQUIRY is not a political magazine. New West Coast We recognize that our readers represent a wide range of political views from Right to Left—and that they include Democrats, Republicans, Headquarters Libertarians, Social Democrats, Conservatives, Green Party advocates, and others. We are pleased to announce We wish to emphasize in FREE INQUIRY the issues that bring us together that the Council for Secular are: (1) a commitment to free inquiry, (2) a defense of individual freedom— Humanism, in cooperation of conscience and of choice, (3) a belief that it is possible and desirable to with our sister organization, develop ethics independent of religious grounds, (4) steadfast support of the the Committee for the Scien- principle of separation of church and state, (5) the conviction that democra- tific Investigation of Claims of cy is the best form of government, and (6) that human rights should be pro- the Paranormal (CSICOP), has tected globally. purchased a new headquarters We will continue to bring a wide range of op-ed columnists expressing building, at 4773 Hollywood diverse opinions. We welcome our readers' comments. Paul Kurtz Boulevard in Los Angeles, California. This will replace Nat Hentoff, Wendy Kaminer, Katha Pollitt, and Mark Crispin Miller are on hiatus this the rented space that we have issue. They'll be back in the Summer FI. operated out ` of for the past several years. It will be the West Coast branch of the Center for Inquiry, serving the needs of humanists and skeptics in Southern California. It Richard Dawkins will also be developed as a new national media center. What to Write FI Column more appropriate place for this than Los Angeles—the media capital of the world? We are very excited about what this new center can Richard Dawkins, Charles Simonyi accomplish. It will focus on cre- Professor of the Public Under- ating a response to the spiritu- standing of Science at Oxford al-religious-paranormal view- University and author of numerous point so predominant in the media and seek to provide a best-selling science books, will join FREE INQUIRY'S lineup of secular humanist and scientif- regular columnists starting with the Summer 2001 issue. Dr. ic-rationalist alternative. We Dawkins, for several years a senior editor of FI, will join dis- intend to create a distinctive new center, and we welcome tinguished columnists including Wendy Kaminer, Peter the support of our readers as Singer, and Christopher Hitchens, writing an op-ed col- we embark upon extensive umn on a topic of his choosing in each quarterly issue. renovations.

—Paul Kurtz

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001

CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

the right to kill people en masse in order to safeguard "holy places" in Value in the Wrong Kosovo, and some Albanian spokesmen have claimed the right to reply in kind. In modern India, human sacrifices have been offered to the notion that a mosque Place in Ayodya might or might not have been—in a subcontinent not short of econd only to the miraculous heal- houses of worship—built on someone ing (and not necessarily second, at else's "site." We laugh now at the idea Sthat) the concept of the "holy that Russia went to war in the Crimea, place" makes its loud claim in the regis- in the mid-nineteenth century, in order ter of foolish and dangerous ideas. The to help solve a dispute between Chris- folly ought to be doubly self-evident even tian orthodoxies over the use of a key to to the faithful, since, while a benevolent the Holy Sepulchre. But we laugh at our deity might perhaps wish to "intervene" own peril; lands were laid waste before every now and then with a miracle here, this on more negligible questions, and a plague or earthquake there, if only in will be laid waste again. In this sorry record, however, nothing order to keep up morale or show who is the Temple will descend again—obliterat- presents a more ridiculous and degrading boss, the same lofty he or she cannot ing much in its current path—while reli- spectacle than that of the United States of possibly have any interest in the preser- gious anti-Zionists (who are actually the America nervously offering to broker a vation of any man-made structure or most literal and zealous practitioners of deal on holy places in Jerusalem and man-maintained site. Messianic Judaism) maintain that the Hebron and Bethlehem while doing its I suppose this general proposition State of Israel itself is the secular obsta- best to sell arms to all sides. Never before might not hold for polytheists, who say cle to the moment of redemption. has a country that affirms the separation that the waterfall or tree or rock forma- The only thing that all these hysteri- of church and state put itself in such an tion actually is god, for propitiatory pur- cal cults have in common is the belief absurd position. Yet all our newspapers poses. In their case, the object of wor- that this world will be consumed, and and chat-shows and politicians behave as ship is the object of worship, just as it deservedly so, when the moment is ripe. if this was to be expected: a weighty and may be in the case of a totem or image. They also, all of them, profess a great natural responsibility instead of a farce But the monotheists—heaven shower disdain for earthly possessions. Yet they and a disgrace. We are directly subsidiz- them with blessings—are much more pass the intervening time in haggling ing and encouraging people who openly firm. This Earth, they say, is a spiritual over the most trivial and paltry property slum, populated by sinners and dominat- rights, over caves and rocks and dis- say—or whose religious leaders all say, ed by evil. The idea of worshiping idols putable pieces of archeological rubble. and have in the past been willing to or fetishes that are of this Earth or made This is heartening in a way, because it prove—that they would cheerfully take human life in order to save the symbolic by its dwellers is, they say—correctly, as confirms the essential insecurity with honor of a mythical Prophet, or Redeem- it seems to me—a laughable blasphemy. which most irrational beliefs are held. A er, or Messiah. Judaism, Islam, and Christianity all con- man claims to believe that God is every- I don't wish to sound isolationist or tain quite strict and specific edicts on where and is ultimate and all-seeing and indifferent, but there are times when the this point, differing only in degree. all-wise. But take away this same man's Yet when did you last open a newspa- temporal and tribal claim to some frag- faithful deserve to be taken at their own valuation. And when they say that God's per and fail to see a long and tortured ment of land or item of wreckage, and he kingdom is not of this world, they are, report about the Temple Mount, and the will scream that the same god has been even if they keep forgetting it, absolute- need for the secular American taxpayer unpardonably evicted from his only to be arbitrating its destiny? What are we home. Now comes the disheartening bit; ly right. Let us not encourage them to profane any further, lest they endanger talking about here? Different Christian in pursuit of such fatuous and contradic- their immortal souls and our mortal sects claim separate jurisdictions over tory claims, the man is not just willing ones along with them. MI differing times of access to different but also eager to take the lives of others, relics. Muslims affect to believe that and also the lives of their children. Christopher Hitchens is a columnist for Muhammad's horse left a hoofprint in the Such a barbaric mentality is by no Vanity Fair and the Nation and the rock before bounding up to heaven. means confined to Palestine. In modern author most recently of Unacknowledged Religious Zionists cling to the idea that Europe, Serbian leaders have claimed Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere.

free inquiry http://www.secularhuroanism.org o JUSTIN RAIMONDO

of official denials. But these denials ring hollow, as the relatives and loved NATO's Poisoned ones of the poisoned soldiers cry out for justice. They ring especially hollow when even official military publications detailing the handling and use of DU Arrow emphasize the dangers posed to anyone who comes in contact with it. For years, everyone ignored the he consequences of the Kosovo horror stories coming out of Iraqi hos- war continue to rain down on pitals—birth defects that seemed to the heads of U.S. policymak- T mirror the demonic power of the ers—and those charged with carrying Anglo-American assault: babies born out those policies, namely U.S. troops with no heads, no genitals, no faces, in the field. With the Kosovo limbs grown together, webbed feet, Liberation Army's United Nations and stunted limbs. But such atrocities (UN)-backed reign of terror in Kosovo, occurring in the third world are hard- heightened tensions spreading out- ly sufficient to awaken the Western ward to Macedonia, and U.S./North conscience: there is, after all, an American Treaty Organization mass poisoning. embargo against all information com- (NATO) troops increasingly caught in Actually, this story has been perco- ing out of Iraq, in tandem with the eco- the crossfire between warring fac- lating for years. It finally broke through nomic blockade, and so the informa- tions, the delicate Balkan fabric con- to the surface back in March 2000, tion was summarily dismissed as pro- tinually threatens to unravel. Now when the UN task force wrote to paganda by Western news agencies comes the news that, in the effort to Secretary General Kofi Annan and and ignored. But now that these same "liberate" the Balkans and stop warned that the sites of about a hun- allegations are coming out in the alleged ethnic cleansing, the NATO- dred NATO targets were dangerously Western European media—that DU crats have poisoned the entire region. contaminated. The bombardment of Bosnia, Kosovo, Depleted uranium is radioactive has caused and is causing incredible and much of Serbia with depleted-ura- with a half-life of 4.5 billion years, damage to a whole generation of sol- nium (DU) weaponry—also used in twice as dense as lead, and ultra-toxic. diers and millions of noncombatants— Iraq during the Gulf War—has appar- The San Francisco Examiner, which the dangers of DU have been suddenly ently contaminated large swaths of broke the story, informs us that "discovered." land, which are now for all intents and "depleted uranium burns when it hits a Better late than never, but it is purposes practically uninhabitable, at target, contaminating the tank and the instructive to note that no one is raising least by the health standards we are surrounding area." Depleted uranium the same amount of concern for the used to here in the West. is the napalm of America's post-millen- biggest victims of the NATO poison- More than a dozen European veter- nial Vietnam. ers—the people of the former Yugo- ans of the Kosovo war, fighting on the It is almost incredible that the slavia, especially in Serbia proper, NATO side, have died of leukemia, and United States and its allied govern- where the sheer volume of the NATO more are ill. Death appears to be among ments to this day refuse to acknowl- bombardment hit hardest. What will be the health consequences of "victory" for edge the horrendous effects of DU on the health consequences for these inno- the victors. The proud "democracies" their own military personnel, as well as cent civilians—and has anyone told rained their spears on Belgrade in the innocent civilians, and continue to Carla del Ponte, the chief inquisitor of name of humanity, declaring that theirs deny its link to Gulf War Syndrome. As the International Tribunal investigating was a "humanitarian intervention," a the soldiers of Belgium, England, war crimes in the Balkans, about this? felicitous phrase invented by the news France, Spain, Italy, Hungary, etc., fall Perhaps the mass poisoning of an entire anchors at Cable News Network and ill and die from the effects of NATO's people will be enough to divert Her echoed around the world. Who could DU-bombing, the power of the poison Honor away from her exclusive obses- have known that their spears were metaphor becomes even more ap- sion with proving alleged Serbian war dipped in poison? As a metaphor for the pallingly apparent: we have poisoned crimes, although I doubt it. consequences of our recklessly inter- not only our enemies but also our- In signaling what we might expect ventionist policy in the Balkans, one selves, our own sons and daughters, from the incoming president of the could not have found a better one than who are dropping like flies in the face United States, George W. Bush's for-

http://www.secularhumanism.org Ill spring 2001

eign policy advisors have given the al process considerably—from four continues to believe that we ought to impression that they intend to start years to four days. If the new president maintain a military presence for one withdrawing troops, slowly but surely, knows what's good for him, he'll high- more week in the poisoned lands of over the next four years. The news that tail it out of Kosovo and environs but the Balkans. f El Bill Clinton poisoned not only Kosovo fast, or face the righteous anger of the but also large sections of Bosnia with same veterans groups that once sup- Justin Raimondo /s the editorial DU, causing long-term and possibly ported him. director of A ntin'ar.cont, and the fatal consequences for the occupiers as How long must we all pay for Bill author of An Enemy of the State: The well as the occupied, gives "Dubya" Clinton's sins? That is the question Life of Murray N. Rothbard (Prome- every reason to speed up the withdraw- that must be put to anyone who now theus Books, 2000).

Healthcare, Ltd., obtained a supply of a PETER SINGER cheap generic version of Combivir, a drug that is effective in controlling AIDS. Combivir is manufactured in the United States by Glaxo SmithKline. It costs about ten dollars per pill there, a price that is totally out of reach of Standing By, Again almost everyone in Ghana who needs it. (In many sub-Saharan African countries, ten dollars is about the total n 1998, President Bill Clinton visited annual expenditure on health care per Rwanda and made an emotional person.) The generic version of I speech to survivors of the genocide Combivir, manufactured by the Indian there. He told them: 'All over the world company Cipla, Inc., costs about ninety there were people like me sitting in cents per pill. At least some of the offices who did not fully appreciate the Ghanians who are HIV positive can depth and the speed with which you afford that, certainly far more than were being engulfed by this unimagin- could afford ten dollars. But, when able terror." And then he added, "Never Glaxo SmithKline found out that Cipla again must we be shy in the face of the was exporting the generic version of evidence." Today, another terror is Combivir to Ghana, they threatened to engulfing parts of Africa. It has already take Cipla to court. Cipla stopped ship- killed far more people than the Hutus ping the drug to Ghana, although there killed in Rwanda, but it kills more slow- are grounds for believing that the Glaxo ly. There is plenty of time to assess the SmithKline patent does not apply in evidence that it is happening, and to African countries have considered Ghana. take action. That terror is AIDS. other options. The South African gov- Whatever the legal niceties of these Since the onset of the worldwide ernment has floated the idea of com- issues, it is unconscionable for the HIV/AIDS epidemic, more than 42 mil- pulsorily licensing manufacture of the major drug corporations to stop the lion people living in sub-Saharan Africa drugs in South Africa, so that they manufacture or distribution of life-sav- have been infected with the disease. could be produced at a fraction of the ing drugs that would make the differ- About 17 million of these have died, cost now demanded by the pharmaceu- ence between life and death to 25 mil- leaving around 25 million, or almost 10 tical corporations. This procedure is lion people. The drug manufacturers percent of the total adult population, permitted, in the case of a national argue that, even though they have currently HIV positive. In some coun- emergency, under the intellectual prop- already made billions from selling anti- tries, including South Africa, one in five erty agreement of the World Trade AIDS drugs in the developed world, they adults is infected. Organization. If South Africa's AIDS must protect their legal rights so that In the rich nations, being HIV posi- crisis is not a national emergency, it is they can make still larger profits, in tive is no longer a death sentence, difficult to imagine what would be. order to develop the next generation of because there are drugs that effectively Nevertheless, when it became known drugs or vaccines. But the profits to be suppress the infection. But the over- that South Africa was considering com- made by selling these drugs to a popu- whelming majority of HIV positive peo- pulsory licensing, many of the major lation as poor as that of sub-Saharan ple in Africa have no hope of being able pharmaceutical corporations sued to Africa are negligible compared to those to afford these drugs at the prices at stop the South African government to be made in the industrialized which the manufacturers are prepared from taking any action. nations. It is reasonable for the phar- to make them available. In the latest move in this tragic bat- maceutical companies to protect their In this desperate situation, some tle, a drug distributor in Ghana called most lucrative markets, in the rich

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 10 countries, by demanding protection on the part of individuals who can expense, if it will not spend at least as against drugs manufactured in Africa write to the pharmaceutical companies much to save the lives of a far greater from being sold in other markets, but and demand that they stop restricting number of Africans? Is a human life that is a technical problem and there the supply of life-saving drugs to worth more when it is threatened by must be ways of making batches of the nations that cannot afford to pay full bullets or knives than when it is drugs traceable so that they cannot be price for them. So far some corpora- threatened by a virus? f© sold on. tions have made donations of drugs, In the face of the immense catastro- but these piecemeal gestures do not Peter Singer is DeCamp Professor phe that is overwhelming several address the real problem. If we do of Bioethics at the University Center African countries, urgent, generous nothing, are we not repeating what the for Human Values at Princeton action is needed—on the part of the rich nations did—and now express University. He is the author of pharmaceutical corporations, on the regret for having done—when mas- Animal Liberation, Practical Ethics, part of the governments of nations sacre threatened in Rwanda? Why did How Are We to Live?, and Rethinking wealthy enough to be able to help, and NATO intervene in Kosovo, at great Life and Death.

CHRISTINA HOFF SOMMERS

a college degree is increasingly a requirement for entrance to the middle A Problem that Dares class—to say nothing of the personal benefits of an education. Two recent studies, one from the National Urban Not Speak Its Name League (State of Black America) and another from the U.S. Department of Education (Trends in Educational recently heard Patricia Ireland, pres- Equity of Girls and Women) suggest ident of the National Organization that the problem of male underachieve- for Women, say that, when she visits ment starts early and persists through colleges and universities around the every stage of education. Though boys country, she finds female students are excel in a few areas, they are signifi- worried about being sexually harassed cantly behind girls in most of the ways or victims of dating violence. I wondered that count. They get lower grades, they what planet she is living on. Male are materially less proficient in reading malfeasance is not a significant problem and writing, and, most significantly, the for most college women. Meeting men at average boy is less committed to being all is the problem. academically successful than is the girl Our campuses are now 56 percent sitting next to him. female. According to Department of Not everyone is moved by the plight Education projections, that number will of boys. Hard-line feminists are espe- increase to 58 percent by 2010. versity freshman. The Boston Globe cially resistant to the idea that young Admissions officers at schools like describes a typical BU social gathering: men need help. A college education is University of Georgia, New York well-dressed girls dancing the samba less important for boys, says the University, and American University are with girl friends. "I just wish I had a Nation's Katha Pollitt: "A boy can get a already confronting a 61 percent female, dance partner," a wistful Sheila Erimez certificate from Microsoft or Intel and 39 percent male gender disparity. A told the Globe. She is not optimistic. earn a decent living." Which boys does panel discussion entitled "Where Have BU's freshman class of 2000 is 62 per- she have in mind? Only 9 percent of the All the Young Men Gone?" was a major cent female. U.S. work force is employed in high attraction at a recent meeting of the Though one can sympathize with col- technology. The typical low performing, National Association of College Admis- lege girls who are depressed by the lack barely literate, and intellectually disen- sion Counseling. of boys, it is clearly the missing boys we gaged 17-year-old boy is unlikely to be What does this mean for the daily should be worrying about. College atten- among them. life of a college student? "It pains me. dance has never been more important Unfortunately, Ms. Pollitt's dismis- It's very hard to meet guys," says 18- for a young person's life prospects. For sive attitude is common on campus. year-old Amy Horowitz, a Boston Uni- the vast majority of males and females, Harry Dawe, assistant director of

http://www.secularhumanism.org f i spring 2001 OP-ED

admissions at Oberlin College, refers up in college, has its origin in the K-12 •Colleges should tone down the to the phenomenon of the vanishing grades. Here are some known effective "Women are from Venus, men are from male as "the issue that dares not measures that schools might take: Hell" rhetoric that flows from so many speak its name." But when he suggest- •Elementary and high school teach- dean of students' office and women's ed some tentative remedial steps, his ers should find their way back to boy- studies departments. No more specious, colleagues bristled and reminded him friendly pedagogy: more classroom com- male-bashing hate "statistics" that im- that men were "privileged" and even petition, more memorization and fact- ply that the average young man is a "oppressing." Amy Wax, a law profes- based learning, more male heroes, more proto-harasser, batterer, or rapist. sor at the University of Virginia, recess, more tolerance of rough-and- •Finally, colleges with a serious male expresses the tacit view of many girl tumble play. shortage should consider implementing advocates when she says, "Men rule •More experiments with all-male programs that will attract males: frater- everywhere and in everything, so why classrooms. (These appear to be espe- nities, hockey teams, and engineering should we care that boys do worse in cially helpful to disaffected, low-achiev- departments. high school?" Few will accept Wax's ing, pre-adolescent boys.) Such changes may distress hard- harsh argument. Nevertheless, her •"Gender equity" in the schools core gender partisans like Ms. Ireland, logic has been implicitly accepted by should mean equity for girls and boys. Ms. Pollitt, and the colleagues of Mr. an educational establishment that for For example, schools that offer special Dawe at Oberlin. But they would bright- more than a decade has bent over math and science programs for girls en the prospects for millions of backward to help girls but has still not should offer special reading and writing American boys. And millions of girls, acknowledged the need to help the programs for boys. like those attending the dismal dances nation's boys. •College admission committees at Boston University, would be a lot bet- What should be done? First we must should weigh student performance in ter off as well. f© get the word out: it is boys, not girls, who eleventh and twelfth grade far more are on the fragile side of a widening gen- heavily than tenth grade. The average Christina Hoff Sommers is the author der gap; we must focus on them and do 14- or 15-year-old-boy is socially and of The War on Boys and is the W.H. everything we can to encourage them intellectually unformed compared to his Brady Fellow at the American Enter- academically. The problem, which shows female counterpart. prise Institute.

law is left behind—abandoned as even a guiding principle, let alone as actual Special Pleading public policy. Why? First, our educators, many of them special-interest pleaders themselves, no longer believe in the original ideals Galore the Founders put on record. Granted that these Founders and the framers, in particular, made fatal compromises Tibor R. Machan when it came to those ideals, but at least they announced them as an ideal to aim for. These days this ideal is not e ideal of justice in a free society even mentioned, except in Fourth of includes treating everyone as equal July rhetoric and some courtroom dra- Thunder the law But to achieve this, mas on television. the law itself must confine itself to dealing Second, given no guidance from the with matters where such equality can be principle of equality under the law, many assured. This is why government was people sincerely believe that when it deemed by the Founders of this republic to comes to their goals, exceptions must be concern itself with "securing" our made to the rule that government ought "rights." The general welfare referred to that no longer even declares itself to be to lend only one kind of help: protecting in the U. S. Constitution, which is often in favor of equality under the law but, everyone's equal rights to his or her pur- used to justify special treatment for cer- instead, embarks openly on public poli- suit of happiness, which means pursuing tain individuals, was to be achieved by cies that favor some at the expense of one's own goals without infringing on securing these rights for everyone. That, others. When farmers, scientists, educa- the rights of others. Instead, most folks indeed, is the only "general welfare" there tors, artists, workers, business people say, "My goals are special—I am a scien- is: the protection of basic rights for every or other groups reach out by means of tist, educator, musician, farmer, whatev- individual. All other kinds of welfare are lobbying and campaign contributions, er—and my group deserves getting gov- not general but special. thereby obtaining special government ernment support in the way of wealth Today we find ourselves in a country favors, the ideal of equality under the redistribution." Just a few days ago Dr.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org David Baltimore of Pasadena, California, farming, the arts, or what have you. All ment redistribution of resources. home of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory these groups insist that the federal gov- Clearly, there is nothing like the prin- there, opined—in the International ernment must make their cause one of its ciple of equal treatment under the law Herald Tribune and the New York "most immediate priorities." All of our at work in our country now—it is not Times—that the Bush administration pursuits should be national priorities even an acknowledged goal for most had better give ample support to basic now, by virtue of our feeling that what we people. Countless Americans are con- scientific research because, well, we are concerned about is unique. Since vinced that what they do is not only cannot leave such matters to the free that is impossible, we have a war of all more important than what others do, choices of American citizens. Dr. special interests against all others to but requires that others be deprived, at Baltimore asserted that Mr. Bush "can become such national priorities! the point of the gun (which is the final do that by making education and basic These are instances of brazen special instrument of public policy), of scientific research his most immediate pleading, nothing else. The fact is that in resources to support their own activi- priorities and launching a Program for a a bona fide free society, no one gets to ties. This is a sad development and for Competitive America." rob others so as to further one's own America to resume its distinctive place Educators around the country echo goals, regardless of how attached one in human political history, it needs to be this sentiment, as they insist that their may be to these, no matter how impor- turned around, and fast. f f3 craft requires the instrument of taxation, tant one feels one's goals are even to namely, confiscation of the wealth of hidi- others. In a free society, the only public Tibor R. Machan teaches at Chapman viduals so that it may be transferred to benefit to be provided is the protection of University. His most recent book is other individuals. And so do members of everyone's right to such pursuits, not the Initiative—Human Agency and Society other professions, be they business, favoring of these pursuits via govern- (Hoover Institution Press, 2000).

the era that bore Christianity. It took almost 1,500 years and mov- The Evolution of able type for Western civilization to make books available to large numbers of people who could then learn (if they could read) about things beyond their Thought immediate environs. After taking fifteen centuries (from the time of Christ, if he existed) to go from pulling carts to James Underdown pulling nicer carts, we needed another two centuries to start laying the foundations for modern science and technol- All great truths begin as ogy. During this Enlightenment, we blasphemies. began studying the physical world and the skies just for the sake of under- —George Bernard Shaw standing them. Science soared at a time when religion staked out territory and It's not what we don't know built fences. When science and technol- that hurts, it's what we know ogy made the Industrial Revolution pos- that ain't so. lar humanists. There are angels on tele- sible, and a middle class came to life, —Will Rogers vision, devils in the movies, and "In God education, books, and the means to We Trust" disfiguring our money. When think independently finally began arriv- f the millions of nonreligious peo- are we, as a species, going to graduate ing on the doorstep of the masses—for ple out there, many seem to be past all this? the first time in history. Remember, 0experiencing a fairly high level of Let's take a step back and see if the widespread, free, public education has frustration about the recent rate of the evolution of thought really is plodding been with humanity for less than two evolution of thought. (By "evolution of along slowly, or if it just feels that way. hundred years. thought," I mean the long, slow transi- Two thousand years ago, humanity's Think about that. The majority of tion from the belief in myths and magic knowledge of the universe was very lim- humans have really only had access to to the use of science and reason.) We ited. We humans generally didn't ven- the tools—never mind the incli- witness political candidates engage in ture very far from home; we didn't nation—to question ancient myths and prissy contests to see who can get to understand where weather, disease, or medieval thinking for two hundred church (or synagogue) first, and hear earthquakes came from; and a great measly years. (Many still don't.) That public figures routinely assume that many of us were clearly divided between represents .0013 of human history religious citizens are somehow more the very rich (and educated for the time) (based on 150,000 years of modern moral than atheists, agnostics, or secu- and the very poor or enslaved. This is humans.) Without access to knowledge

® http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001

through books and education, humans Adam and Eve as a discussion about would be unheard of, or kept quiet. Now could hardly be expected to question the goblins or witches—also once common the large religions lose countless adher- beliefs of their ancestors. Even today, beliefs. Before Darwin a century and a ents because people just don't buy the the notion of ancient beliefs, traditional half ago, few scientists had any idea old party lines. That, too, is progress. medicines, and age-old teachings con- about how life evolved on this planet. People live the science every day. We notes a deeper understanding of life and How could the average person be may not understand why our cars start, the world. expected to be able to refute Genesis? our computers hum, or our cell phones The modern world knows exponen- Today, no competent biologist, zoologist, ring, but these things work, and we tially more than in Jesus' day, or Dar- geologist, etc., denies evolution. That is know science and reason brought them win's for that matter. Two hundred progress, fast progress. to us. Science lifts us into space, cures years ago, how many people had the Today, religions are coopting (at diseases, and broadcasts a world of knowledge or education to challenge the least the language of) science to support knowledge into our homes. Science pre- creation story in Genesis? What church religion. The Institute for Creation dicts the weather, powers our furnaces, would have ever felt compelled to com- Science and the Shroud of Turin and helps us live longer than our par- pose a reasoned response to such a chal- Institute are both examples of religion ents. When their lives are in jeopardy, lenge? How many calls were there on attempting to deal with an increasingly holy men (and women) go to the hospi- churches at the turn of this century to educated mass of people. The Catholic tal—not to a mosque, church, or syna- cite scientific or rational arguments to Church apologized to the long-dead gogue—if they want to live on. Science support beliefs in Noah's Ark, the part- Galileo for his heliocentric ideas, and is easing at least some of the fears reli- ing of the Red Sea, or the Shroud of admits there is something to this evolu- gion sought to address from the begin- Turin? For centuries, you believed what tion thing. Religion is for the first time in ning. That trend continues. the church taught or you were shunned history feeling the need to use science I know only too well how slow this (excommunicated? executed?). It was and reason to support its ideas. process feels, but in the context of his- dangerous to challenge dogma. It still is The face of religious belief is chang- tory, it appears that the good ship in many places. Churches engaged in no ing as well. Many religious people don't Religion's leaks are becoming more serious debate with nonbelievers believe in hell (or the devil) anymore. unmanageable, while science and rea- because they felt no need to. The tradi- Catholics no longer believe in Limbo or son sail methodically, unflaggingly, into tion of openly challenging religion and abstaining from eating meat on Fridays, the unknown to demystify it. Patience, superstition is very modern. and (many) make their own choices (e.g. sailors, patience. f © Ah, but today there is debate. about abortion, birth control, and pre- Despite the creationists in our midst, marital sex) about right and wrong inde- Jantes Underdown is the director of most modern people would as soon pendently of church dogma. the Center for Inquiry West in Los entertain a serious discussion about Fifty years ago this individuality V I i~geles. sew £vertse4spns reeEcngs! Humanist Holiday Cards Please send me boxes of Humanist Holiday Cards at $15.95/box. TOTAL: $

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free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org m An Open Letter to George W. Bush Church-State Future Is in Your Hands

Edward Tabash

assumed an awesome responsibility that requires you to take as much care in protecting those of us who may hold philosophical views divergent from your own, as you will exercise in looking after the interests of those who share your religious beliefs. Though I am a white, heterosexual, profession- On December 28, 2000, Edward al male with a Jewish Tabash sent an open letter to then- background—my father is President-elect George W. Bush. an ordained Orthodox rabbi and Tabash is a civil liberties attorney, my mother was an Auschwitz chair of the Council for Secular survivor—I am a member of the Humanism's First Amendment Task most unjustly despised minor- Force, a national board member of ity in America today. I am an Americans United for Separation of atheist. My atheism does not Church and State, and chair of the stem from a desire to be con- Center for Inquiry West. This article trary to everything most of my is adapted from Tabash's significant- brother and sister Americans ly longer letter.—Ens. believe in. It does not stem from a desire to be different from most Dear Mr. President-Elect: other Americans. It does not stem Ever since your victory was secured, you from a desire to shock society or have insisted that you will be the presi- to tear down cherished values. dent of all of us, whether or not we share Like most atheists, I simply your views on a host of issues. In your could not overcome the logical, hands, particularly in your future scientific, and philosophical dif- appointments of Supreme Court Jus- ficulties encountered when con- tices, rests the future of the freedoms fronting the concepts of a God that have become synonymous with the and the supernatural. last half of the twentieth century and the Atheists have come to beginning of the twenty-first. the conclusion that Throughout the just-concluded cam- there are no supernat- paign you expressed deep religious con- ural agencies in our victions. You have every right to derive universe. We see the personal sustenance from these beliefs. universe as a natural However, as our new leader, you have place, with no powers

® http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 within it that can violate the laws of dictated or promoted by government church-state separation, then there will nature. An atheist is just a person who in any way. Contrary to popular con- be a five-to-four majority in favor of finds all supernatural claims unconvinc- ception, the separation of church and government sponsorship of, and ing and has the honesty and courage to state is a perfect philosophical fit for favoritism toward, religion. admit it. conservatives. You said throughout the campaign Let me now say that atheists like me On this logic, the Religious Right is that Justices Antonin Scalia and have no interest in achieving a society an alien presence within the Repub- Clarence Thomas best embody the in which we have greater rights than lican Party. A party, dedicated to maxi- types of Justices you would like to nom- religious believers. We are not interest- mizing individual liberty through limit- inate. May I suggest that, in keeping ed in destroying the rights of others to ed government, faces a grave internal with the Republican Party's goals of practice their religion or to speak pub- maximum freedom for all people in a licly in attempting to promote their context of limited government, Justices faith. All we want is a society in which David Souter and Sandra Day our rights remain equal with those of The O'Connor far better fulfill your stated religious people. only ideals. Newsweek reported that, on It has become fashionable, not just election night, when it seemed you among Religious Right Republicans, way to continue might be losing, Justice O'Connor was but even among prominent main- to ensure equality overheard to exclaim that she would stream Democrats like Senator not want to retire from her seat on the Lieberman, to assert that people who for all people in Court unless you were the president to profess belief in a biblical God have a our country, replace her. And yet, on church-state higher morality than those of us who separation, she is consistently at odds don't. I argue that this is untrue. While believers and with her two colleagues, Justices we atheists would always preserve the nonbelievers Scalia and Thomas. She is, in fact, the rights of Bible-believers to practice originator of one of the most forceful their faith, we also claim full equality alike, is to and elegant expressions of church- with traditional religious believers in state separation. She has consistently the realm of moral virtue. Further, preserve the said that government bodies may not though the Bible is a source of comfort separation of send a "message to nonadherents that for millions of people in our nation, they are outsiders, not full members of some of its teachings are morally church and state, the political community, and an accom- defective, even unacceptable by mod- especially the ideal panying message to adherents that ern standards, and cannot serve as the they are insiders, favored members of ultimate source of moral virtue. of strict neutrality the political community" (Lynch v. Mr. President-Elect, I raise all of in matters of Donnelly, 465 U.S. 668, 688 [1984]) these points not to strike down your reli- and that no branch of government can gious faith or the faith of anyone else, religious "treat people differently based on the but to argue that the viewpoints of athe- belief. God or gods they worship, or do not ists should be respected as fully as the worship" (Board of Education of perspectives of religious people. Kiryas Joel v Grumet, 512 U.S. 687, The only way to continue to ensure 714 [1994]). equality for all people in our country, contradiction if it allows itself to be Though a dyed-in-the-wool Repub- believers and nonbelievers alike, is to dominated by a force committed to har- lican, Justice O'Connor has played a preserve the separation of church and nessing the power of the state to major role in preventing the Religious state, especially the ideal of strict neu- restrict our freedoms based on the Right from turning our nation into a trality in matters of religious belief. teachings of any religious belief system. theocracy. I urge you to view her as a Government bodies must never dis- The only way to ensure the contin- better prototype for future Supreme play bias in favor of belief over nonbe- ued survival of the separation of church Court Justices. Of course, if I could ful- lief, and must never get involved in the and state is by making sure that only fill my deepest wishes, I would be ecsta- business of promoting religious belief. those committed to this ideal are nomi- tic to see you actively seek out prospec- As a conservative, you hold that gov- nated to the United States Supreme tive Supreme Court nominees like ernment should be limited, that, in Court. No one, Mr. President-Elect, now Justice Souter. However, being a realist, wide areas of human endeavor, indi- has more power to determine the if I could argue to you the propriety of viduals should make decisions for course and destiny of our highest Court adjusting your criteria for the Court to themselves without government intru- than you. Six Justices on the Court now favor jurists like Justice O'Connor, I sion. Those of us who believe in this favor the principle that no branch of would be deeply relieved. concept want matters of religious government may favor belief over non- belief to remain in the private market- belief. If even two of that current major- Respectfully submitted, place of personal choice and not to be ity are replaced by opponents of Eddie Tabash f©

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org Ea Silverman's Wager Herb Silverman

laise Pascal (1623-1662) and Herb Silverman (1942—????) Bhave had two common interests: mathematics, which led to our mutual profession, and theology, which led to Preserve the our respective wagers. Though a Christian, Pascal was also a doubter. In future of Number 233 of his Pensées he says, "If there is a God, He is infinitely incom- humanism. prehensible, since, having neither parts nor limits, He has no affinity to Provide for us. We are then incapable of knowing either what He is or if He is." Pascal Free Inquiry in later went on to say, "Reason can decide nothing here." He then conclud- your will. ed, in his now famous wager, that belief would—intelligent, honest, rational peo- in God was the only rational choice to ple who require some evidence before make: "If God does not exist, one will holding a belief. Pascal would undoubt- lose nothing by believing in him; while edly agree with me that our most promis- Please remember FREE INQUIRY if he does exist, one will lose everything ing students ask provocative questions (the Council for Secular Human- by not believing." until convinced by rational arguments, ism) when planning your estate. Before stating my own wager, let me while our dullest students mindlessly Your bequest will help to main- make a couple of comments about accept what they think we want them to tain the vitality and financial Pascal's. His first conditional statement believe. Wouldn't a supreme teacher con- security of humanism in a society could just as well refer to the Tooth cur? My kind of Supreme Being would often hostile toward it. Depend- Fairy or the pot of gold at the end of the favor eternal discourse with a Carl ing on your circumstances, a Sagan over a Pat Robertson. rainbow. Were we to devote our entire charitable bequest to FREE life to such fruitless searches, we would Such a superior intellect would pre- INQUIRY may have little impact be left with an unproductive and wasted sumably be bored by and want little con- life—certainly a loss. tact with humans who so confidently on the net size of your estate or The second conditional statement is draw unwarranted conclusions about may even result in a greater even more problematic. Pascal assumes his unprovable existence. This brilliant amount being available to your the only existing god would be his designer would be as appalled as I am by beneficiaries. Christian version—one who rewards those who profess and glorify blind faith. We would be happy to work believers with eternal bliss and punish- With that kind of deity in mind, I mod- with you and your attorney in es nonbelievers with eternal damnation. estly make my own wager. It is almost a the development of a will or Moreover, it would be a god who either plagiarism. I change none of Pascal's could not distinguish genuine from words, except that his last not now estate plan that meets your feigned belief or who would simply appears earlier in the wager. But what a wishes. reward hypocrites for pretending a faith difference a not makes! that they lack. I hereby propose "Silverman's I agree with Pascal that no god is com- Wager": If God does not exist, one will For more information, prehensible to us. But suppose, for the lose nothing by not believing in him; contact: Development Director, while if he does exist, one will lose sake of argument, I posit the existence of Free Inquiry, P.O. Box 664, a creator who actually cares about everything by believing. f171 Amherst, NY 14226-0664. human beings and elects to spend an eternity with a chosen few What selection criteria would such a Supreme Being Herb Silverman is professor of math- All inquiries are held in the adopt? I expect this divine scientist ematics at Charleston College and strictest confidence. would prefer having a "personal relation- founding chair of the Coalition for the ship" with the same kind of folks I Community of Reason.

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001

a generation, judges defended the naked public square—I'd maintain— R.I.P., Naked Public because it was the right thing to do. During that same period, most politicians complained about it only in ways that wouldn't matter, perhaps because Square they saw, however grudgingly, that the naked public square was the best way to prepare America for a demographic Tom Flynn revolution in which our nation would extend its welcome to every religion on Earth. n unprecedented torrent of com- During the 1990s, support for the pulsory "civic Christianity" is naked public square declined sharply. about to sweep America, soaking A Charitable choice, stadium prayer, Jew and Muslim, Hindu and secular courtroom Commandments, piety on the humanist alike in the figurative blood of campaign trail—as the twentieth centu- the lamb. Under George W. Bush, ry waned, the only thing rising faster America is on the threshold of a new than religion in public life was the and frightening experiment—a whole- Nasdaq. Secular humanists objected sale retuning of the church-state model off-limits to religion. Some found that that's driven Supreme Court jurispru- idea abhorrent. Neoconservative dence (and much executive branch Richard John Neuhaus put the phrase activity) since the late 1940s. Everson v "the naked public square" (and himself) Board of Education (1947) established on the map with his disapproving 1984 what would become the reigning inter- book of the same name. Joseph Lieber- 66 pretation of church-state separation: man dismissed it as a "discomfort first, that government must neither pro- zone." Other observers see its logic. A No matter mote any particular sect nor promote naked public square provides a useful religion over irreligion generally; and, buffer zone where Americans of all how Election second, that existing government prac- faiths—and of none—can come togeth- 2000 turned tices that violated this principle could be er, transact the public's business, and dismantled by the courts. get to know each other as citizens out, the naked With another trio of cases, Engel v rather than sectarians. As a bonus, the public square Vitale (1962) and Abingdon School state's machinery enjoys protection District v Schempp and Murray v from the strife of sects. had a date with Curlett (both 1963), the U.S. Supreme Make no mistake, the naked public Court put these ideals into action, square was never popular. A national the tailor. declaring public school-sponsored school-prayer referendum held on any prayer unconstitutional. Many ob- day between 1963 and the present servers sensed where such jurispru- would have spewed the "Our Father" dence must lead—toward a "naked pub- back into American classrooms by the lic square" in which public schools and greatest mandate since Johnson sand- the affairs of state would be explicitly bagged Goldwater. Still, for more than 99 when Lieberman said freedom of religion shouldn't mean freedom from religion. But Lieberman was not the first "Neither a state nor the Federal Government Democrat to use that rhetoric. Bill Clinton employed it repeatedly between can set up a church. Neither can pass laws 1993 and mid-1995, when his Education which aid one religion, aid all religions, or pre- Department issued guidelines on religion in public schools whose effect was fer one religion over another." to open schools to drastically heightened (and of course, mostly majority —Justice Hugo L. Black, Christian) student religious expression. No matter how Election 2000 turned Everson v Board of Education, 1947. out, the naked public square had a date with the tailor. Still, Bush seems unlikely to waste time taking the next and

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org D

OP-ED

most radical step: appointing federal judges and Supreme Court Justices who There is only one philosophy journal that will be willing to discard Everson v Board of Education. From this case critically examines religious claims. Its name is comes the all-important principle that government must not promote religion against irreligion. Everson is the tent pole from which are draped all the pro- iHIjQ tections against discrimination unbelievers depend on. If it's abandoned, discrimination against the nonreligious It gathers some of the best minds in the world to provide rigorous critiques of religious ideas and won't be sporadic and hard to fight, as it doctrines and to examine issues in humanistic and naturalistic ethics. Prominent philosophers offer penetrating assessments of arguments for and against the existence of God, traditional church is today. It'll be legal. If that happens, dogma, naturalistic vs. theistic explanations, atheism, naturalism, and humanistic values. will open government preference for Philo is the official journal of the Society of Humanist Philosophers and is published by the Christianity over other faiths, and for Council for Secular Humanism. Two issues per year, 80+ pages per issue. Protestant evangelical Christianity over Subscribe now. Fill out the form below and mail to Philo, Council for Secular Humanism, other Christian sects, be far behind? Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. Or call 1-800-458-1366. (Please have your credit card And this is where the greater dan- ready.) Or FAX your credit card order to 716-636-1733. ger lies. Abandoning the naked public ❑ One Year (for individuals in the U.S. and Canada) $35 square would be narrow-minded ❑ under the best of circumstances. To do One Year (for institutions and overseas, postage paid) $60 it now, when record numbers of children from devout but non— 0 Two Years (for individuals in the U.S. and Canada) $56 Judeo-Christian families are entering U Two Years (for institutions and overseas, postage paid) $96 our public schools, seems little short of reckless. How will Muslim parents U Three Years (for individuals in the U.S. and Canada) $78 react when their third-graders are ❑ Three Years (For institutions and overseas, postage paid) $135 compelled to pray to Jesus? How Spring 01 will Hindu seventh-graders respond when they're taught that monotheism is the character- P ~ MAKE ateRY istic that distinguishes civi- EA/2E, L.OR-D, ol~~ lized people from barbarians? What happens when Sikh tax- IMPRh~ED -THAT IM 6o payers are unfairly audited by EV&R t Internal Revenue Service tP IOU R E T AND DEVart workers who display crosses at YOUR their work stations? HUMg1,f SERVANT As a secular humanist, I hate to say this—but the big issue is no longer whether atheists will keep their civil liberties. If civic Christianity is imposed on all Americans, including devout non—Judeo-Christians, with all the intolerant energy that current trends suggest, the result may be out-and-out religious violence in our l'.., i1t€N TRou WAYE6t, schools and on our 6nR - ro íH iuol T, A 1) streets. I hope I'm wrong OH 1Ha) NA 1• about that. If not, remem- SHOT ber where you heard it Wog/PRAY TO1HY FATHER.. first. f ©

Tom Flynn is editor Of FREE INQUIRY and former coordinator of the First Amendment Task Force.

rn http://www.secularhumanism.org s ring 2001 FRONT Lines

EMBATTLED Great Britain Overrun By HOSPITAL Atheists, LEAVES Laments Archbishop CATHOLIC CONSORTIUM of Canterbury For the second time in history, community opposition has forced a public hospital to reverse a merger with hospi- Britain has become a society of tals controlled by the Roman Catholic Church. atheists, the Archbishop of Canterbury said recently in On December 31, 2000, Bayfront Hospital of St. Petersburg, Florida, exited a sermon at St. German's Baycare Health System, a network of Tampa Bay hospitals that included eight Cathedral on the Isle of Man. public and Catholic facilities. (The Bayfront controversy was the cover story in Claiming that a "tacit atheism the Winter 2000/01 FREE INQUIRY.) prevails," Dr. George Carey Bayfront, historically St. Petersburg's indigent-care health provider, merged called for spiritual reinvigora- into BayCare Health System in 1997 in order to benefit from centralized pur- tion and increased evangelism chasing and administration. At that time Bayfront officials assured St. within the Anglican commun- Petersburg's City Council that services offered at Bayfront, including elective ity. At the same time, the abortion, would not change. In 1999 local media revealed that Bayfront no longer Archbishop has warned of offered abortions. Indeed, it was conforming to the health-care directives of the imminent moral decline due to National Conference of Catholic Bishops, in one case refusing a therapeutic the godlessness of the popula- abortion to a woman whose fetus was nonviable, forcing her to carry her doomed tion. According to a recent pregnancy to term. study by the International Community outrage led the city to sue in 2000 to force Bayfront's withdrawal Social Survey Program, less from the consortium. The city charged that Bayfront's cooperation with Catholic than 24 percent of the British directives violated the hospital's lease and involved the city in an unconstitution- strongly believe that God exists al breach of the separation of church and state. The suit involved legal gray and less than 12 percent believe in hell (See "What areas; prior to the merger Bayfront was actually operated by a private nonprofit Americans Really Believe," organization, though the city owned the land and most of the buildings in the hos- FREE INQUIRY, Summer 1999). pital complex. After attempted settlements fell through, BayCare Health Systems Perhaps the Archbishop was voted to expel Bayfront. Advocates of abortion rights and church-state separa- more alarmed by the dearth of tion hailed the outcome. Anglican believers specifically. Opponents say the economic pressures that made merger imperative for Of the 60 million British, less Bayfront in 1997 continue, and question whether the hospital can remain viable than one million now regularly on its own. Some have urged Bayfront to buy back its lease and buildings from attend Anglican services on the city so it can legally rejoin a religious health-care system. Members of the Sunday. Meanwhile, the Islamic coalition that focused public attention on the Bayfront situation are now trying religious minority has grown to to prevent other public health-care facilities in the region from merging with 3 percent. Catholic-controlled consortiums.

—Tom Flynn

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 20

Indy Church Seizure Standoff Ends SIDE LINES

The nation's first seizure of a church a U.S. Supreme Court Appeal (which the YOU MAY NOW KISS THE NUCLEO- building for nonpayment of taxes court subsequently declined to hear), TIDE—In an effort to prevent legal occurred peacefully. Indianapolis U.S. marshals were authorized to seize same-sex marriages, the state of Texas the property in November. The church issues marriage licenses only to couples Baptist Temple stopped withholding pay- in which one partner is genetically male roll taxes in 1984, claiming that God's members began occupying the building and the other is genetically female. church is exempt from any government twenty-four hours a day, sometimes Therefore the Bexar County Clerk had no regulation. (Though exempt from most joined by prominent Christian Right or choice last fall but to grant a license to militia spokespeople. In February, eighty- two women, Jessica Wicks and Robin taxes, churches are still liable for taxes Manhart. Robin, a transsexual who con- on wages paid to employees.) With back five federal marshalls moved in. Church siders herself female, was born male. taxes and fees near $6 million, in fall members offered some passive resistance, but the marshals kept their guns APPLICATIONS NOW BEING ACCEPTED— 2000 a federal judge ordered the church Pope John Paul II is considering naming seized. Even though the church had filed holstered and violence was avoided. Saint Isidore of Seville the patron saint of Internet users and computer programmers. Isidore lived in the seventh century and is AMERICANS VAGUE ON CHURCH AND credited with writing the first encyclopedia. The Vatican established its Web site, STATE, HOSTILE TO NONBELIEVERS powered by three computers named Raphael, Michael, and Gabriel, in 1996. According to a nationwide telephone leaders posed a threat to the American "LAST SUPPER" LEADS TO INDIGES- survey, Americans hold foggy notions system. Atheists, agnostics, and the TION—Chicago artist Dick Detzer is ruf- about church-state separation, gen- nonreligious made up 13 percent of the fling feathers in his hometown with his erally favor raising religion's profile sample, more than half the number of interpretation of the "Last Supper," which he has renamed "The Last Pancake in public life, and hold negative evangelical Christians (24 percent). Breakfast." Mrs. Butterworth subs for views of the nonreligious. The non- Still, 85 percent of the total sample— Jesus in the new work, and is joined at profit Public Agenda polled 1,507 U.S. almost nine in ten of respondents the table by Toucan Sam, Cap'n Crunch, adults in late 2000 (margin of error: who identified themselves as reli- and other commercial breakfast favorites. gious—agreed that deep religious The work is another in the artist's series ±3%). Seventy-nine percent of respon- "Corporate Sacrilege," which has shown dents favored organized religious beliefs would make one a better parent, Jesus on a Wheaties box, the Pillsbury observance in schools (though two- an attitude many secular humanists Doughboy on a crucifix, and Mickey and thirds of them favored only a moment of would equate with bigotry. The news is Minnie Mouse in the Garden of Eden. silence). A mere 19 percent opposed not all bad: 58 percent of the total sam- Things aren't much better for those in the northeast who are sensitive to such observances. Respondents were ple said belief in God is unnecessary for artists depicting religious figures in conflicted on religion in politics: 74 per- good values. A chilling sidelight: among unconventional ways. And, they have cent criticized expressions of piety by evangelical respondents, a strapping the Brooklyn Museum of Art to thank. political candidates, but only 31 percent 84 percent say Satan is behind oppo- The museum is featuring the work "Yo Mama's Last Supper," which substitutes f © thought political activity by religious nents of religion in public life. a naked woman for Christ. "You can never have a closed mind about these things, but we prefer that people cook with it." What High Schoolers Think —A Procter and Gamble spokesperson, reacting to word that, before his swearing-in as a Missouri senator Fifty-seven percent of high-achieving high schoolers believe that public years ago, attorney general-designate schools should be allowed to lead students in prayer. Forty percent do John Ashcroft was anointed with not. So says a 2000 survey conducted by Who's Who Among American P&G's Crisco oil. High School Students on education, drugs, social, and sexual issues. OUT WITH THE OLD, AND THE NEW, Under the category of "social concerns," students were asked about T00. Deeming them insulting to Islam, what offended them. Sex in the media was the focus, and 74 percent the Taliban has ordered the destruction of all statues in Afghanistan. If carried said they were put off by depictions of homosexual relationships on out, among the figures that will be television and in the movies. In response to another question on preju- destroyed is world's tallest statue of a dice, 38 percent said they were prejudiced against homosexuals. standing Buddha, dating from the fifth However, the majority believed that homosexuals should not be dis- century. Modern culture did not escape the Taliban's watchful eye, as recently it criminated against, in the military, in education, and as leaders of youth jailed twenty-eight barbers for providing groups and in the clergy. haircuts like the one Leonardo DiCaprio Nearly 3,000 students participated in the survey. They were mostly wore in Titanic. It was charged that the female, White, Christian, and attended public schools. style allowed hair to block men's eyes when they prayed.

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001

Nat Hentoff's attack on the courts (and intent of the speaker, and whether or When Rights Collide on the ACLU) for violating the First not the words were uttered within the Amendment in protecting the need of hearing of the person who later With great respect, it nevertheless employees not to be insulted in the claimed to be offended.) seems to me that Nat Hentoff has over- workplace appears to be another of his And the ACLU was founded to pro- reacted and exaggerated in his article familiar uses of the "slippery slope" tect free speech! "The ACLU Abandons the First Amend- argument. He is ready to see any ment" (FI, Winter, 2000/01). I have been attempt to limit even ugly and injurious a card-carrying member of the language by an employer as an "aston- American Civil Liberties Union for ishing contempt for free speech." Jews and about a quarter of a century, and I don't We can appreciate Hentoff as a war- believe that they ever have or ever will rior for human freedom (some might Ethnocentrism "abandon" the First Amendment. like him even more if Without having read Paul Kurtz writes in his review of Jew he respected women's the case in question, it DANIEL C. DENNETT • vs. Jew (FI, Winter 2000/01) "The Jews right to choose), but it still seems to me from have suffered persecution for three mil- would be nice if we could reading the said article lennia—due in large part to their cling- see how his argument that the Court ordered ing to the faith of their fathers...." The differs from the Nation- what was necessary to Vatkan statement is illogical and offensive. It Its al Rifle Association's protect the employees blames the victim for the acts of the "If they take away our from future ethnic dis- predator, reminiscent of the common assault weapons, next crimination. As a lawyer claim of the rapist, "She asked for it." it'll be our deer rifles I know that there are The Jews are not responsible for the Gáa ScAnce Pro. and bird guns." many reasonable excep- rtrafic actions of Stalin or Hitler or for the ¡ERRY~REI R The workplace, much tions to the constitution- Facing Art Aron. n doctrines of the Catholic Church over al right of free speech, as with marriage and the centuries. All peoples, Jews includ- the military, is a setting which has never been ed, have a right to maintain their cul- with inherently disparate absolute. tural identity, even if Dr. Kurtz disap- power relations. A work- John Guinn Ramsay proves of it. er may need a job very badly. Do employ- Colorado Springs, Colorado Donald Shernoff ers need a right to abuse their workers? White Plains, New York In this case, Hentoff doesn't make I was a card-carrying ACLU member for clear whether the objectionable list of proscribed insults is definitive or open- several years, touting it because it sup- Paul Kurtz told us a bad Jewish joke in ended (this would make some differ- ported everyone's constitutional his review No, I'm not referring to his ence, since ambiguity could be a factor) rights—and because of a belief that if absurdly simplistic remark that, "Jews but either way civilized people recog- we are mindful of the small picture, and have suffered persecution for three nize that it isn't only bone-breaking look after individual rights on a case-by- millennia due in large part to their sticks and stones that hurt. Psychic case basis, the big picture will take care clinging to the faith of their fathers." wounds may go deeper and may never of itself. Through such cases as the I'm referring to his claim that, "Rabbi heal at all. Nazis vs. Skokie, Ill., in which the ACLU Sherwin Wine's Secular Humanist John M. Chrisman supported the Nazis' constitutional Judaism of Birmingham, Michigan, is a Stonington, Illinois right of freedom of assembly, I had far wiser guideline to follow for those deduced that the ACLU had to be, in Jews who wish to celebrate the an- principle, opposed to political correct- Nat Hentoff responds: cient contributions of Judaism along ness. The Aguilar vs. Avis Rent A Car with secular humanist values." His System proved me wrong. In the Aguilar case, the ACLU sup- naive recommendations for ancestor As adults, we need to accept the fact ported a ruling that the trial judge be worship is very amusing coming from that having to listen to things you don't instructed to compile a list of "dis- an atheist. want to hear from time to time is a small criminatory" offensive words that Jewish apologists like Rabbi Wine price to pay for freedom of expression. could never be uttered in the work- and others have tried to reinvent Richard E. Wackrow place. (The list was to be used regard- Judaism as a non-kosher culture club. Polebridge, Montana less of the context of the words, the They would have me believe I can be a

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org "Jewish" atheist. This has as much sub- emerged in the U.SA. For those who by fuzzy-headed, bleeding-heart educa- stance as the hole in my Sara Lee bagel. do not choose to abandon their tors bent on encouraging students to be These romantics claim that the great Jewish cultural identity, I think autonomous human beings (oh, hor- intellectual and cultural contributions Sherwin Wine's approach, "Secular ror!). "my brethren" have made are reason Humanist Judaism," is the best avail- Of course, children should be taught enough to cling to Jewish identity. able and I commend him for his to respect others and shown the impor- However, these contributions belong to efforts. My own long-range ideal is a tance of civil behavior. Sommers, howev- all humanity. They are no more accessi- secular society and an assimilation er, seems to long for a return to a con- ble to me than they are my Christian model; and this I would apply to all formist learning environment where friends. I have no rational reason to religious and ethnic sects. student self-expression is tightly con- take special pride in them. trolled, patriotism is mandatory, and the Without god, who needs Jewish iden- Ten Commandments hang on the class- tity at all when we can claim member- room wall. ship in the human family? Jewish identi- In Defense of Sommers believes the democratiza- ty is superfluous to a true secular tion of the school house has spawned humanist. I belong to humanity. I do not Dr. Laura killer kids who "blow themselves up and wish to be a "secular Jew" any more destroy those around them." I, however, than I wish to be a "secular Christian." I I am sorry to see FREE INQUIRY added to look at today's students and see large do not wish to make apologies for the list of organs that have published numbers of them standing up for the Judaism in order to preserve a sepa- against the phenom known as "Dr. environment, free speech, tolerance, ratist and elitist identity. Laura" ("Don't Listen to Dr. Laura," FI, and racial harmony. The religious war of Jews vs. Jew is Winter 2000/01). Most of her critics, I A very small number of children com- a war of attrition. Why should we reform think, have spent scant time listening mit terrible acts of violence. We need to the Jewish religion and Jewish identity to her. find out why and how to prevent it. We when we had best abandon them alto- Though I am personally a vehement can bully children into following narrow gether? After all, we are already doing secular humanist and atheist, I neverthe- standards of right and wrong. But the so in great numbers. less find the bulk of her positions to be more humane way of raising civilized Norm Cohen eminently sensible, moral, and refresh- children is to show them that we as Birmingham, Michigan ing. Certainly, I disagree with her emphat- adults value kindness and generosity, ically on theistic issues, but those involve and by giving them the freedom to be Paul Kurtz replies: but a small bit of her discussion. themselves. Time and again I hear compassion, Todd Paeper Re Donald Shernoff's letter: I was kindness, and empathy coming through Waterloo, Iowa referring to religious doctrines that in her voice and words. And while she separate the true believers from the uses pejorative language somewhat lib- rest of society. I think that Chassidic erally, in most cases it's an effective I agree with Sommers that the educa- Jews who cling to their strange cus- means of getting her point across. What tion of children should include toms—archaic clothing, prayer is a man who willingly abandons his instruction in basic rules of ethics shawls, sidebeards, etc.—tend to children if not a "bum," after all? and citizenship. Perhaps the greatest invite criticism, ostracism, and Perhaps others of us should likewise be obstacle to this is our problem with worse. I would apply the same criti- less pussyfooting when it comes to rec- differentiating between religion and cism of Muslim women who wear ognizing irresponsible/immoral conduct valid, reason-based ethics. Since the veils and long tunics in Western as exactly that. Constitution prohibits teaching of reli- countries, or the Amish. Does Dr. Laura give bad advice? gion in public schools, this must The concept of "the Chosen People," Almost inevitably, she exhorts people to extend to the teaching of ethics if one the belief that members of their tribe of grow up, take responsibility, be more, is unable to separate the two. We must believers along will be saved, is a myth achieve in life, and so on. All of these, learn the difference between ethics that is totally without any empirical certainly, are admonitions we human- and religion. Valid ethics have a solid foundation, as is the superiority atti- ists can strongly agree with. rational basis; religion has an irra- tude of devout Muslims or fundamen- Glade Ross tional dogmatic basis. talist Baptists. It is divisive. San Juan Capistrano, California Teachers should have some knowl- Of course, I believe in freedom to edge of the subjects they teach and, like practice any creed that a person or most everyone else, they do not know group wishes, but that does not mean Save the Children which rules of ethics are valid—and that these practices should be why. Students would be more receptive immune to criticism. Christina Hoff Sommers ("The Right to to the rules of ethics if teachers had the Regarding Norm Cohen's com- Be Civilized," FI, Winter 2000/01) ability to explain why they are valid and ments: we need to recognize the fact believes that, for the last thirty years, that Orthodox Judaism has re- school children have been spoiled rotten (Continued on page 68)

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 Philosophers have been keen to tackle both questions, and secular humanists have always loved pondering what they have to say. If anything the philosophers say too much, leaving us to sift through an embarrassing wealth of contradictory "answers" in search of an account of human nature that just might be—pardon a loaded term—true. Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Leibniz, Hume, Kant, Berkeley, and a surfeit of mod- erns have proposed such accounts, yet each of their proposals suffers from a certain arbitrary despera- tion. Just as anyone can throw off propositions about God, anyone can put forward a model of human nature. One model may appeal to intuition more strongly than another; one may outdo its rivals in helping frame further inquiries with real-world implications. But the limits of human knowledge have always made it impossible to decide which description, if any, best captures that elusive thing we call the human condition. We are lost in a forest of theories—how to organize the trees? One useful metaphor for the purpose is C. P. Snow's notion of the rift between science and the humanities. When we peer through this lens certain broad patterns emerge. In 1877, mathematician William Kingdon Clifford published his relentlessly scientific account of knowledge and credence, "The Ethics of Belief." From Clifford's manifesto, hardcore skeptics draw their motto, "It is wrong, always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence." In 1890, psychologist William James responded on behalf of the humanities with "The Will to Believe," an apology for belief on insufficient evidence that went on to spread much of the intellectual quicksand in which today's postmodernists Tom Flynn have erected their rickety castles' For his part—and despite his lifelong fondness for James—the American pragmatist philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce once confessed his ambi- or centuries Western culture has depended on philoso- tion to "rescue the good ship Philosophy for the service of phy for the most penetrating inquiries into what it Science from the lawless rovers of the sea of literature."' F means to be human. What are consciousness, cognition, More recently, E. O. Wilson outraged thinkers in the human- decision making, and memory? To pose this question is to ask, ities by suggesting in Consilienee: The Unity of Knowledge in a very fundamental way, What is human nature? One's (1998) that the sciences and the humanities may be close to answer to that query is bound to shape the way one approach- reunification—but only on science's terms. Whether this reuni- es the bedrock question: How ought we to live?2 fication is imminent or desirable remains subject to debate. But Tom Flynn is the editor of FREE INQUIRY. there's no question why the notion of patching up C. P. Snow's

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org We live in a remarkable era in which experimental results are beginning to elucidate philosophical questions. —Abner Shimony, professor emeritus of philosophy and physics, Boston University' rift is in the air: it's driven by revolutionary developments in cognitive science. "[F]or the first time physiology is asserting itself as an effective body of knowledge, as distinct from a scrap- heap."5 When Alfred North Whitehead said that in 1925, he was far ahead of his time. Today those words all but ring prophetic. Contemporary inquiries into the physiology, chemistry, and behavior of the brain are opening unexpected windows into John Dewey what philosopher Paul M. Churchland called "the engine of reason, the seat of the soul."' With these new tools we are For philosophy, this is actually a positive development. probing the deep relationships between our modes of thought There will be challenges aplenty in working out the implications and the fact that they are housed in biological apparatus and teasing apart the meanings of the new insights into human shaped by a specific evolutionary history. And just perhaps, nature that seem likely to emerge from the experimental we're close to developing genuine answers to age-old ques- domain. But as to the question "What is man?," a question so tions about the nature of sensation, thought, and volition. After ancient that it almost defies recasting in nonsexist terms, its millennia of speculation, it may be that cognitive science is answer may soon be forthcoming ... from the sciences. The poised to settle core debates over human nature that were for- implications of that are enormously exciting. And as secular merly the philosophers' exclusive preserve. humanists, where else can we be but in the middle of it all? f © A similar process is underway in physics, where theory and experiment are beginning to map territories once consigned to the metaphysicians. What is causality? Does determinism rule? Notes What is the ultimate nature of matter and energy? Final answers 1. Abner Shimony, "The Reality of the Quantum World," Scientific to these questions are at last conceivable, anticipated not from American 258, 1 (January 1988): 46. 2. Devotees of G. E. Mooré s idea of the naturalistic fallacy, who insist the fevered brows of solitary scholars but from the intersubjective that normative statements are immune to the influence of brute fact, will arena of science. We must be prepared to receive the answers we disagree with this implication. I humbly return the favor. do not want to hear. And sometimes, as in the clash between 3. For a discussion see Timothy J. Madigan, ed., The Ethics of Belief • and Other Essays (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus, 1999); also Walter determinism and free will, the verdict may be that the philoso- Kaufmann's classic discussion of the Clifford-James controversy in phers were asking the question wrongly from the beginning. Religion from Tolstoy to Camus (1961), revised edition (New Brunswick, In the long run, prophecy always fails. Whitehead followed his N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1993). 4. Charles Hartshorne, Paul Weiss, and Arthur Burks, eds., Collected prescient observation quoted above with a declaration that "[l]f Papers of Charles Sanders Peirce (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University science is not to degenerate into a medley of ad hoc hypothesis, Press, 1931-58), vol. 5, Q 449 (1869). 5. Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (New York: it must become philosophical and must enter upon a thorough Macmillan, 1925; New York: Mentor Books, 1948), pp. 17-18. criticism of its own foundations."' The reality has turned out 6 Paul M. Churchland, The Engine of Reason, the Seat of the Soul: A rather opposite. It may be that science will compel philosophy to Philosophical Journey into the Brain (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1995). 7. Whitehead, p. 18. criticize its foundations, and perhaps even to cede large tracts of the intellectual territory it has long held as its own.

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PHILOSOPHICAL EMPLOYMENT: HISTORY AND PROSPECTS

that merely reflect our rules governing the meanings of terms, Austin Dacey and therefore say nothing about the extra-linguistic world. Within the then-dominant school of logical empiricism or logical positivism, synthetic claims were placed under the exclusive purview of the sciences. It was thought that, by lim- iting philosophy to the analysis and clarification of the logical structure of language, we could purge it of barren meta- uring the first half of the twentieth century, most physics—such as unverifiable speculation about the nature of philosophers in the English-speaking world causation or the freedom of the will—and thereby boost the maintained a delicate division of labor between discipline's productivity. Philosophy's job was not to tell us themselves and their colleagues in the science departments. what things are like, but to tell us what we mean by things. Central to the division was a distinction between so-called con- By mid-century, however, this job description began to tingent, or "synthetic" claims, and necessary, or "analytic" undergo substantial modification. In 1951, W. V. Quine's "Two claims. Contingent claims were understood as assertions about Dogmas of Empiricism" shook English-speaking philosophy to reality that in principle are subject to revision in the face of new its core by discrediting the strict analytic-synthetic distinction, evidence, such as "Tom is a bachelor." Analytic claims were puncturing a barrier between factual and conceptual inquiry. understood as assertions—like `All bachelors are unmarried"— During the next twenty years, as logical empiricism retreated under theoretical attack from various additional directions, Austin Dacey is the managi1,rf editor of Philo and coordi- some philosophers began to feel more comfortable with think- nator of the Campus Freet/m' .111 ieee. ing and writing in a metaphysical mode. The tradition of

Sidney Hook Jean-Paul Sartre Simone de Beauvoir Sir Isaiah Berlin

® http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 American philosophical naturalism was subsequently revived thought are acquired in sensorimotor experiences early in the in a number of popular forms, including the idea that an accept- organism's development. For example, the metaphor "categories able philosophical theory must in some way be consonant, or are containers" (as in, `Are tomatoes in the fruit category?") even continuous, with the best theories of the natural sciences. originates in the fact, familiar from lived experience, that objects Meanwhile some thinkers acknowledged the decline of posi- with similar properties also tend to go together in space. Lakoff tivism but in practice continued in a positivist vein to treat phi- and Johnson contend that, as primary pieces of our conceptual losophy purely as "conceptual analysis." Indeed, distinguished palette, "categories are containers" and other metaphors exert a philosopher of science Mario Bunge sees the contemporary pervasive, and sometimes misleading, influence when we engage scene as one of fragmentation and disarray. in philosophical reflection. If philosophy is to come to grips with But during the last few decades, as philosophers were busy the embodiment of mind, it must recognize its own dependence trying to discern their proper place in a post-positivist, natural- on such basic metaphors. This in turn reveals the inadequacy of ist intellectual economy, a development was taking place that classical notions of the self, agency, rationality, morality, knowl- would threaten to answer that question for them. With the the- edge, and truth, and motivates a radical transformation of the oretical and experimental collapse of psychological behavior- aspirations and techniques of philosophy. ism, the examination of processes like perception, memory, and On behalf of philosophers' job security, there are a couple of consciousness had again become scientifically respectable. ways that one might respond to these challenges. One might Advances in digital computing and artificial intelligence had argue that they are premised on a misunderstanding of the given researchers powerful new tools with which to devise and brain sciences. Cognitive science could not replace philosophy test models of the human mind. Cognitive psychologists, lin- because, as it has already been pointed out, philosophy is a guists, anthropologists, and philosophers joined in an interdis- part of cognitive science. Philosophers such as Daniel ciplinary effort that became known as cognitive science. Dennett, Pat and Paul Churchland, and Jerry Fodor have made Increasingly, neurobiology began to play a leading role in this major contributions. However, as cognitive science comes partnership as researchers turned from an exclusive focus on more and more to mean cognitive neuroscience, the future of the mind as a computer program to the exploration of how this the armchair contributor is cast in doubt. program is actually implemented in the brain's "wetware." Alternatively, perhaps the idea that science could replace Among the discoveries now emerging from the maturing philosophy is based on a misunderstanding of philosophy. brain sciences are results that challenge philosophical tradi- Traditionally, philosophy has defined itself by essential refer- tion and raise the possibility that certain time-honored prob- ence to a particular subject matter: the nature of knowledge, lems can be more fruitfully addressed with cognitive scientific the will, justice, and so on. But today philosophers are just as methods rather than classical philosophical methods. While likely to define their art as a particular way of asking questions philosophy goes on wondering how to put the questions, the about the fundamental concepts employed by other fields of cognitive sciences have started to answer them. abstract discourse, such as physics, psychology, or law. Some outstanding examples of such results can be found in Whereas the biologist might ask, "Has genetics scientifically the work of cognitive scientists David Noelle and Stephen Stich, solved the puzzle of life?" the philosopher asks, "What counts linguist George Lakoff, and philosopher Mark Johnson, who as a scientific answer?" And how could there be a scientific have all contributed to this issue of FREE INQUIRY. Dr. Noelle answer to that question? explains recent research that has begun to unravel the neuro- Or suppose we conceive of philosophical questions, as John biology of "controlled behaviors," such as making choices and Searle does, as just those questions for which there is no gen- executing plans of action. The emerging model of "executive erally agreed upon procedure for arriving at an answer. So, for control" belies both the traditional notion of the will as an example, the investigation of semantics was exported from autonomous rational faculty and the dualism between reason philosophy to linguistics as a consensus formed regarding the and emotion that has characterized philosophical discussions of methods of inquiry that would make it a systematic research practical rationality and moral psychology for centuries. program. If this way of conceiving of philosophy is correct, DE. Stich has been conducting a series of psychological exper- then one might argue that expansions in scientific exploration iments designed to assess the validity of that staple of philosophy actually increase the scope for philosophy rather than dimin- methodology he calls "Plato's Method": the assessment of theo- ishing it. They result in more fresh frontiers of knowledge, ries by applying them to hypothetical examples and consulting which tend to be characterized by the very procedural uncer- the "intuitions" that average language-users have in response. tainty that makes an issue uniquely philosophical. Plato's Method, Stich suggests, does not survive an encounter In these possible scenarios, philosophy would not be with the facts. But without it, what's a philosopher to do? phased out. Nevertheless, it would be transferred from being a In a massive 1999 book, Philosophy in the Flesh, Drs. Lakoff producer of knowledge to a provider of services for other pro- and Johnson go even further in challenging the tradition. They ducers, taking its main direction and sustenance from physics, synthesize converging lines of evidence for the operation of com- biology, psychology, and sociology. This is just as it should be, plex metaphors at every level of human thought, from uncon- according to Bunge. He argues that precisely this kind of reori- scious information processing to abstract reasoning. They claim entation is needed to prevent the discipline from falling into that this feature of the mind is a consequence of its "embodi- irrelevance or dogmatic slumber while on the clock. Is philos- ment": the fact that the mind is a part of a concrete individual ophy ready for a pink slip and two weeks' severance pay? organism, generated by a history of bodily interactions with its Perhaps not quite yet. But if these thinkers are correct, then it environment. On this view, the basic metaphorical ingredients of certainly should be put on notice. f©

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org ECI

IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

PHILOSOPHY IN Not dead, but treading water CRISIS

philosophy, obscure writing is sometimes just a cloak to pass Mario Bunge off platitude or nonsense for depth. This is how Heidegger won his reputation as a deep thinker: by writing such sentences as "Time is the ripening of temporality" Had he not been a German professor and the star pupil of another professor famous for his hermetism—namely Husserl—Heidegger might have been taken for a madman or an impostor. here seems to be consensus that philosophy is • Obsession with language. No doubt, philosophers must currently at a low ebb. Some even claim that it be careful with words. But they share this responsibility with is dead. This idea is not new: it was stated by all other intellectuals, whether they be journalists or mathe- Comte and repeated by Nietzsche, later on by Wittgenstein, and maticians, lawyers or demographers. Only poets can afford to T write about lucky winds or drunken ships. Besides, it is one nowadays by Richard Rorty and others. Moreover, there is a whole Death of Philosophy industry. Ironically, some professors thing to write correctly and another to turn language into the make a living from burying, exhuming, and reburying philoso- central theme of philosophy—without, however, paying any phy: their activity is more necrophilic than philosophical. attention to the experts, namely linguists. Philosophy is far from being dead but, in my opinion, it is • Idealism. Although idealism is one of the dominant aca- stagnant. In fact, few if any radically new and correct philo- demic philosophies, it is just as exhausted as Marxism: it has sophical ideas, let alone systems, are being proposed. Gone are produced no new ideas in recent times. Objective idealism, the days of exciting new and grand philosophical ideas that from Plato to Leibniz, and from Bolzano to Frege, is only viable spilled over into other disciplines or even the public—for better in the philosophy of mathematics—and even so on condition or for worse. Today most philosophers teach, analyze, comment that live mathematicians and active mathematical communion, or embellish other scholars' ideas. Others play frivolous if ties are overlooked. All the other disciplines, whether scientif- ingenious academic games. Few philosophers think on a large ic or technological, are tacitly materialist since they deal with scale: most are schoolmen without a school. However, if the phi- concrete objects. True, the hermeneutic thesis that social facts losophy looks barren, the genuine philosopher will attempt to are "texts or like texts" has been well received in the shanty- cultivate it instead of just lamenting its decay. towns that surround the social sciences. But it is barren because it neither describes nor explains any social facts and, SOME CAUSES OF THE CRISIS a fortiori, it cannot guide social policy making. I submit that current philosophy suffers from, among others, As for subjective idealism, from Berkeley to Kant, and from the following ailments. Mach to Goodman, in ignoring material things and processes, • Excessive pro fessionalization. In the old times philoso- such as natural resources and work, it does not help to under- phy was a calling. it only attracted amateurs enamored of gen- stand what happens around us. To understand or alter reality, eral problems and bold if often vague or even wacky ideas. whether natural, social, or mixed, we must start by assuming From Kant on, philosophy has become one more profession. (Science has suffered the same process since the end of World War II.) Technical competence, and the attendant caution, "There are roughly 9,000 philosophy Ph.D.'s in the often replace passion. The profession has thus been filled with country. More than 5,000 of them teach at four-year functionaries that are neither advancing philosophy nor trans- colleges, according to the American Philosophical mitting an enthusiasm they lack, and without which no great Association, but few Americans would be able to enterprise can be undertaken. recognize the name, much less the work, of a single • Mistaking obscurity for profundity. Deep thought is one." hard to understand, but it can be grasped with some effort. In —Peter Edidin, New York Times, Mario Bunge is a professor in the Foundation and January 28, 2001 Philosophy of Science Unit at McGill University and a Laureate of the International Academy of Humanism.

http://www.secularhumanism.org fi S e rin _ 2001 that it is concrete rather than a subjective experience. none of the fathers of philosophy held a philosophy chair, or • Exaggerated attention to mini problems and fashion- even a doctorate in philosophy. able academic games. Why kill time thinking of a handful of artificial mini-problems when knowledge and action pose so FROM NEURON TO MIND many authentic and urgent problems? For example, why do Until the mid-twentieth century there was little communica- not moral philosophers devote more attention to the problems tion between neuroscientists and psychologists. Typically, the affecting billions of people—such as those of poverty and former were interested only in the various subsystems of the unemployment—than to those that touch only a few, such as nervous system, whereas most psychologists studied only those of abortion and euthanasia? Just because religionists overt behavior, or learning, or conscious processes. Hardly are more upset by the latter than by the former? anyone was interested in the mechanisms whereby neural sys- • Insubstantial formalism and formless insubstantial- tems control behavior, much less in the nonmotor and nonsen- ity. William James famously classed philosophers into tough- sorial activities of the central nervous system of the higher minded and tender-minded. Regrettably, nowadays the tough- vertebrates (mammals and birds). Consequently, behavior minded, if skillful in the handling of formal tools, seldom tack- appeared largely mysterious, and mind nonexistent or at least le bulky problems. They usually work under the delusion that beyond the reach of the scientific method. In particular, no logic suffices to reveal the secrets of the universe—something self-respecting scientist tackled the problem of the nature of that actually only science can do. By contrast, some of the ten- self-consciousness, let alone its location in the brain. der-minded brave tough problems but without making use of The gap is now slowly closing. Neuroscientists are becom- formal tools. The result of combining hard methods with bland ing increasingly interested in behavior, memory, perception, problems is triviality. That of combining soft methods with ideation, consciousness, and emotion, while some psycholo- tough problems is disappointment. And handling bland prob- gists and ethologists are happily ignoring the paralyzing lems with soft methods, in the manner of the linguistic injunction "Do not neurologize!" Better yet, they are starting (Wittgensteinian) philosophers, only elicits yawns. to guess on that which controls behavior and does the menta- • Fragmentarism and aphorism. We have paid dearly for tion, while biological psychiatrists are treating mental disor- the failure of the "grand" philosophical systems, such as those ders with increasing success. of Aristotle, Aquinas, Leibniz, Wolff, Kant, Hegel, or Lotze. The A consequence of the success of the brain-centered price has been diffidence for any attempts to build philosophi- approach to the study of mind and behavior is that the old the- cal systems, and the concomitant preference for the brief ological and idealist view that detaches mind from matter is in essay or even the aphorism. Nowadays the expression esprit decline. It survives only in functionalist (nonbiological) cogni- de système is used in a pejorative sense. But this diffidence is tive psychology, in the philosophy of mind attached to it, and in as unreasonable as it would be to mistrust physics or engi- such verbal vestiges as "X is the neural correlate (or basis, or neering because sometimes they fail. What is wrong is not to substrate) of mental function Y," and "X is the neural system systematize (organize) ideas, but to cling dogmatically to this that mediates (or subserves) mental function Y." What is real- or that product of such effort. It is wrong because all things ly meant by these subterfuges is simply "Neural system X per- and all ideas come in systems. forms mental function Y." We ought to systematize ideas because stray ideas are The fusion of neuroscience with psychology is thus finally unintelligible; because we need logical consistency; because taking place: Cognitive neuroscience, as psychobiology is now deductive power is desirable; and because the world is not a often called, is a going concern. pile of unrelated facts but a system of interrelated things and Neuroscientists know that the nervous system is only one processes. of the subsystems of the whole animal—albeit the most com- • Detachment from the intellectual engines of modern plex and interesting of all; and psychologists are realizing that civilization. These engines are science, technology, and ide- real animals are not black boxes. The great wall between body ology. Detachment from them expedites wild and anachronis- and mind is being bored from within (subjective experience) tic speculation. Most contemporary philosophers have neither and from without (the brain). The same wall is also being their feet on the ground nor their eyes fixed on the stars. scaled on both sides: from perception to concept formation, So much for a diagnosis of the ailments of contemporary and from single neuron to whole brain. As the drilling and the philosophy. Every one of them ought to suffice sending the scaling proceed, it is being realized that the wall is not in dear old lady to the emergency wing. The adequate treatment nature, but in theology and the idealistic philosophy that con- of the patient is obvious: A transfusion of new and tough prob- tinued the theological tradition. They invented the myths of lems whose solution would advance knowledge; intensive the immaterial, immortal, and inscrutable soul, and of the rad- exercises in conceptual rigor resulting in the elimination of ical discontinuity between man and the other primates. pseudophilosophical toxics; selected morsels of mathematics, Yet, the fusion or merger strategy has so far been sketched science, and technology; training in the detection and inacti- only in vague terms. Moreover, there is some confusion as to vation of ideological minefields; and renewal of contacts with the credentials required to be regarded as a card-carrying the best philosophical tradition. Unless the patient follows this cognitive neuroscientist. For example, scientists who investi- treatment, or a similar one, it will die of hunger and boredom. gate the visual system, or the effects of stress on self-percep- If this were to happen, its place would be taken by amateur tion and behavior, do not usually regard themselves as cogni- philosophers, which would not be tragic because the best tive neuroscientists. Such imprecision and confusion origi- among them would eventually discipline themselves. After all, nates not only in historical accident and turf division, but also

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 30 IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

in philosophical sloppiness. Witnesses of the second factor are truth of the thesis that science and philosophy overlap partial- the expressions "mind/brain" (why not "walk/legs"?); "the ly rather than being disjoint. brain causes the mind" (do the lungs cause respiration?); Finally, the same synthesis of psychology and neuroscience "intentionality" instead of "reference"; and "computation," falsifies the claim that, since science does not know about when all that is meant is signal propagation (e.g., along an souls, which are the concern of religion, there is no basic con- axon) and transduction (e.g., across a synapse). flict between the two "non-overlapping magisteria."' Indeed, Some conceptual precision should be introduced if we want science does know something about the soul, namely, that it to find out how best to integrate the various approaches, meth- does not exist any more than the phlogiston, the aether, life ods, and findings of the many sciences, from biophysics to force, penis envy, collective memory, or the manifest destiny of sociology, concerned with the problem of accounting for behav- a certain nation. It also knows that the soul is an invention ior and mentation. that began as a naive explanation of certain daily life events— such as dreams and unexplained phenomena—and ended up CONCLUSION by becoming the nucleus of a whole family of ideologies used Evidently, whoever wants to make original contributions to for social control. knowledge must specialize. But specialisation need not, nay Moreover, it is easy to see that science and religion are must not, exclude the elaboration or use of a comprehensive mutually exclusive rather than compatible. Indeed, science (philosophical) scheme of things allowing one to locate one's takes it for granted that the world is material and lawful problems, choose the right approach to tackle them, and make rather than spiritual and miraculous. This assumption under- use of any relevant scraps of knowledge found in adjoining fields, lies the very endeavor to explore and control the world, at to the point of integrating erstwhile disparate research fields. least in part, with the help of mundane technological proce- Such integration of formerly disjoint research fields, par- dures rather than through religious practices. By the same ticularly neurobiology and psychology, has shown its worth in token, every success of the scientific and technological bridging the gap between neuron and mind, as well as in treat- endeavors weakens the hold of religion and its secular arm, ing some serious mental disorders. namely philosophical idealism. tElEl The integration of the various sciences of mind and behav- Adapted with permission from Philosophy in Crisis: The Need for ior is being effected despite the resistance put up by the old Reconstruction by Mario Bunge (Prometheus Books, 2001). theological and idealist dogma of psychoneural dualism, as well as by radical reductionism. And the synthesis in question Note is witness to the intellectual vigor, fertility, and practical use- 1. S.J. Gould, "Non-Overlapping Magisteria," Skeptical Inquirer 23, fulness of both materialism and systemism, as well as to the 4(1999): 55-61.

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EN http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

EXORCISING THE There's no one behind the curtain HOMUNCULUS

Unfortunately, asserting that such a will is the source of our David C. Noelle actions does little to advance our understanding; it merely introduces a regress concerning the locus of decision making. We started with the question of how the individual makes a choice, and we are left with the question of how the will makes a choice. The will takes on the character of a homunculus—a little man who resides in the mind and acts as the "cen- mong the issues probed by philosophers, tral executive" of the cognitive enterprise. The homunculus perhaps none strikes closer to home than seems to be the ruler of the mind, the maker of choices, and inquiries into the origins of human action. the kernel of identity, but it is truly a useless hypothetical con- How do our thoughtful decisions arise, and how are they trans- struct that explains nothing about the origin of our actions. If lated into overt words and deeds? Many of our actions appear we are to understand our own controlled behavior, the to be produced automatically, without deliberation. We need homuncular will must be exorcised from the mind. not focus on the precise control of every muscle as we execute That exorcism is currently under way, using the tools of a practiced golf swing, and we rarely find ourselves weighing modern experimental psychology and cognitive neuroscience, each individual word choice when we utter a request for a but it is not yet complete. While a detailed and substantiated condiment during dinner. In the midst of such automatic account of the mechanisms of controlled behavior is still forth- behaviors, decisions seem to be made for us, enacted by coming, mounting evidence suggests that what has been tradi- reflexes and learned habits. There are some actions, however, tionally called "the will" is neither largely independent of other for which we claim authorship. We carefully weigh the options mental systems nor functionally localized and atomic in the before selecting a particular golf club from our bag, or we pur- brain. Instead, current speculations see "executive control"— posely edit an amusing tale that might offend those with whom the array of processes that, for many cognitive scientists, we dine. These controlled behaviors feel more effortful to replaces traditional notions of "the will"—as emerging from produce, and we sense that they stem from our conscious the concerted interaction of disparate neural circuits. thoughts. WILLFUL NEURONS The mental faculty responsible for the selection of our controlled actions has traditionally been dubbed "the will." From While it is easy to introspect and speculate about the varied the cogitava of Aquinas to the noumenally free will of Kant, sources of our thoughts, actually reverse engineering the philosophers have posited this central faculty as the helm of brain to determine its primary working parts is an incredibly the body and the mind. The will is said to be where desires and difficult task. The brain has about a hundred billion neurons, goals are translated into action and where ingrained habits each connected to about a thousand other cells; simply pro- are suppressed in favor of reasoned plans. It has been herald- ducing any sort of a wiring diagram is a monumental project. ed as the seat of moral thought. Even more difficult is finding ways to watch the brain in By some accounts, the mind is modular, with the will fairly action. Still, scientists have produced a number of techniques, isolated from other mental faculties. The sources of emotion, both behavioral and neuroscientific, for collecting clues con- world knowledge, memory, learning, and imagination are at cerning the architecture of the mind, and these have been used the will's disposal, but are not part of it. Indeed it is thought to discern the structure of executive control. the will can function, if perhaps clumsily, without these other Experiments have shown that controlled behaviors tend to faculties. The will is also often seen as essentially atomic—a be slower than their more automatic counterparts, especially fundamental aspect of the self that cannot be decomposed into when one is trying to inhibit an automatic response. The clas- other psychological processes. sic example of this is the Stroop task, in which you are asked to name the color of the ink of a printed word.' You will tend to David Noelle is a postdoctoral research associate at the be slower to name the ink color if the the printed word is the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition, a joint project of name of a color (e.g., "green"). The idea is that executive con- Carnegie Mellon University and the University of trol processes have difficulty overcoming your predisposition Pittsburgh. simply to read the word that appears before your eyes.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org Control is dynamic, allowing you to switch from one behav- INTERDEPENDENT MECHANISMS ior to another rapidly and flexibly. But this comes at a cost. You will tend to be slow at a newly engaged task until you "get into One might be tempted to see the frontal cortex as the home of the groove" by performing it a bit. Also, the dynamic nature of the traditional will, but reality seems to be less simple than executive control makes control easy to lose: distractions can that. It is far from clear that frontal systems are capable of cause us to slip into automatic patterns of behavior. Control executive control on their own. In addition, the frontal cortex processes seem to require active maintenance of behavior- appears to be essential for certain psychological processes guiding information.' Such a "working memory" system unrelated to executive control. appears to be central to executive control, providing the The frontal cortex appears to be important for reasoning and means to keep in mind what needs to be done. Working mem- problem solving, but other areas seem critical for these higher ory is also critical to the reasoning and planning processes functions, as well. Knowledge about the world, mediated in part required to consciously select actions—maintaining interme- by circuits in the temporal lobes, is important for problem solv- diate conclusions and goals while the mental gears grind. ing. Visual and spatial reasoning rely on systems in the occipi- In the brain, the frontal lobes appear to be critical for exec- tal and parietal lobes of the brain. Still, the frontal cortex seems utive control. In addition to housing higher motor areas, the to play a central role in such activities. Evidence for this frontal cortex appears to play a central role in working mem- includes the observation that prefrontal activity is consistently ory, maintenance of goals, selective attention, and strategy prompted by a wide range of standardized I.Q. test tasks.' generation. Patients with frontal lobe damage exhibit a wide Traditional conceptions of the will assume that reason and range of behavioral deficits. They have difficulty with fine the will are tightly bonded, but posit a greater isolation movements and complex chains of motions. They show prob- between the will and the emotional faculties. Emotion, after lems in flexible problem-solving, attention, and memory. all, seems to drive many of the kinds of automatic responses Frontal lesions can produce a tendency to persist with a pat- that executive control must overcome. There is now reason to tern of behavior after it has ceased to be appropriate, a lack of believe, however, that emotional systems are critical for effec- appreciation for the risks involved in certain actions, and tive, reasoned decision-making. This evidence primarily impaired learning. Frontal patients have difficulty inhibiting stems from patients with ventromedial frontal lobe damage. automatic responses (e.g., they show excessive Stroop inter- These patients score well on standard I.Q. tests, but show ference), they have trouble maintaining mental focus over a marked deficits in practical reasoning skills They can delay, and they spontaneously produce fewer actions, in gen- become stuck on even simple problems, endlessly exploring eral. In short, the frontal cortex seems to be important for the options without ever coming to a conclusion. They behave selecting actions appropriately, producing flexible action as if they are insensitive to risks, even though they can intel- sequences, keeping relevant information in mind, and over- ligently discuss such risks. Their reasoning seems to be coming habitual behaviors' decoupled from their actions. Importantly, these patients also There is evidence to suggest that frontal systems develop show a pronounced absence of physiological responses to slowly as we mature and deteriorate with old age. Behavioral emotional situations (e.g., sweating or increased heart rate). experiments certainly support this lifetime pattern of perfor- These cases have caused some neuroscientists to suggest mance on executive control tasks. Children and seniors show that healthy emotional responding plays a critical role in increased difficulty inhibiting automatic responses and flexi- guiding reasoning processes and in connecting deliberation bly switching between tasks.' to action.' Emotional systems allow conclusions to be reached

The Brain Dorsal Medial Temporal Areas (mostly hidden)

ACC: Posterior Anterior Cingulate Cortex

BG: Basal Ganglia Dorsolateral PFC

PFC: Anterior Frontopolar PFC Prefrontal Cortex Ventromedial PFC Ventral

http://www.secularhumanism.org in spring 2001 in a timely manner, and they give conviction to our thoughts. sistently follows a ringing bell, these neurons will initially fire Thus, counter to traditional accounts, emotion appears to be when food is presented, but will, over time, stop firing for the critical for executive control. The armchair philosopher might food and start firing for the bell. Computer scientists have pro- argue that, since we can conceive of a rational decision- duced model neural circuits that are capable of learning to pre- maker free of emotion, the will must be conceptually indepen- dict reward in this way and, critically, these models can use dent of emotional systems. The brain does not seem to be con- such predictions to learn to select appropriate actions for com- vinced by this argument, however. plex tasks.12 (A world-class backgammon playing program sold Psychological processes not primarily identified with exec- by IBM learned its strategy using a neural network model of this utive control also seem critically dependent on the frontal cor- kind.13) Through its connections with the frontal cortex, the tex. For example, various kinds of learning and memory seem basal ganglia may also learn to identify the properties of work- to require frontal support. While memory for recent autobio- ing memory contents that are predictive of reward and may, graphical events is often associated with the medial temporal thus, signal frontal systems to actively maintain exactly those lobe, both brain imaging studies and work with patients have control signals that are needed for success.18 suggested that the frontal cortex actively contributes to stor- It is interesting to note that the basal ganglia are also age and retrieval of such memories.' Frontal working memory thought to be involved in the basic initiation of actions and in systems also appear to be important for explicit forms of the coordination of action sequences. Parkinson's disease learning, such as learning from direct instruction.' selectively affects this limbic structure, and patients stricken with this ailment have trouble starting motions and switching COMPONENTS OF WILL between well-learned motor sequences. Thus, it is likely that In order to banish the homunculus, we must find a way to the basal ganglia are involved in both automatic and con- reduce executive control functions to a collection of more sim- trolled aspects of the motor system. ple psychological mechanisms. While efforts to decompose the Another brain area of importance for executive control is the circuits of controlled behavior are just beginning, some early anterior cingulate cortex. Nestled in the deep fold that separates findings and speculations are the brain's hemispheres, the cin- both fascinating and promising. Healthy emotional responding gulate appears most active in situ- Some regions of the frontal ations in which there is substan- cortex contain an abundance of plays a critical role tial conflict between competing cells that are richly interconnect- options—situations where the ed. Computer modeling has in guiding reasoning brain is having a hard time set- shown that such a configuration tling on one action or another. of connectivity often results in the processes and in connecting Scalp electric field measurements active maintenance of patterns of have detected a signal from rough- neural firing over time.' In other deliberation to action. ly this area that appears when a words, these recurrent connec- behavioral error is made. This tions may form the basis of a working memory system. Neural error-related negativity appears even when subjects are not recordings in nonhuman primates have found such sustained told they have made an error but, instead, realize it themselves.'° activity in frontal cells, with the activity coding for the proper- It is not clear if this cingulate activity is the result of reward pre- ties of recent events that are important for guiding behavior.'° diction information sent there from the basal ganglia or if it is an For example, a monkey might be trained to note where a small independent measure of task difficulty.20 In either case, such per- dot flashes on a screen, only shifting its gaze to that location formance-monitoring information would be useful for selecting after a bell sounds. While waiting for the bell, some of these both actions and working-memory contents. Some theories see frontal cells actively encode the location of the previously pre- the anterior cingulate as the locus of action-selection processes, sented dot, holding the location in mind until it is time to act. modulated by frontal systems. Other theories see the frontal cor- Neurons in the frontal cortex send connections to areas tex as more central. In either case, the anterior cingulate cortex throughout the brain. Thus, the "control signals" held in a and the frontal areas work together to suppress automatic frontal working memory system are in a good position to modu- responses in favor of explicitly selected actions. late processing in a fairly global way: focusing attention in per- What emerges is a general story in which the frontal cortex ceptual systems, priming responses in motor systems, and sends actively maintained control signals to much of the rest inhibiting inappropriate automatic processes. Some mechanism of the brain. The nature of these signals is selected primarily is needed, however, to determine the kind of control information by circuits in the limbic system, based on predictions of that should be actively maintained. While there is some evi- reward. The control signals maintained in working memory, dence to suggest that certain areas of the frontal cortex play a along with conflict-related processing in the anterior cingu- role in the adjustment and manipulation of working memory late, give rise to the selection of appropriate actions for the contents, another candidate for this role lies deep in the brain. current situation. Hiding far beneath the folds of the cerebral cortex, the basal Cognitive neuroscientists have begun breaking down exec- ganglia receive extensive projections from the frontal cortex utive control into its functional parts. Much of this research is and, through the thalamus, send extensive connections back. still speculative, and detailed accounts of such processes as Certain cells in this limbic area can learn to identify events and strategy generation and complex action planning have yet to actions that are predictive of reward." For example, if food con- receive much attention. There is still much work to be done.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

THE POWER OF THE BRAIN COMPELS YOU The traditional view of the will as a kind of little man in your head needs to be replaced by a detailed account of how neur- NOT EVEN MATH al tissue gives rise to controlled behavior. Preliminary attempts to understand the mechanisms of executive control IS IMMUNE have found that they do not form an isolated psychological faculty, but are heavily dependent on other psychological process- Kevin Christopher es, including emotional response. Initial attempts to dissect the mental executive have identified critical roles for a frontal In Where Mathematics Come From (Basic working memory system and a limbic reward-prediction sys- Books, 2000), George Lakoff and Raphael tem. The scientific exorcism of the homunculus continues, hoping to produce a clear view of how mere flesh can give rise Nuñez apply theories of metaphorical concep- to our most deliberate and considered actions. f © tualization and the cognitive unconscious in an attempt to demonstrate that mathematical con- structs such as arithmetic, algebra, logic, set

Notes theory, and infinity are based on metaphors 1. J. Ridley Stroop, "Studies of Interference in Serial Verbal derived from embodied human experience in Reactions," Journal of Experimental Psychology 28(1935): 643-62. the physical world. Nuñez is a research associ- 2. Jonathan D. Cohen, Todd S. Braver, and Randall C. O'Reilly, "A Computational Approach to Prefrontal Cortex, Cognitive Control, and ate at the University of California, Berkeley. Schizophrenia: Recent Developments and Current Challenges," Lakoff and Nuñez argue against what they Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 351 (1996): 1515-27. call the "romance of mathematics": the idea 3. Angela C. Roberts, Trevor W. Robbins, and Larry Weiskrantz, eds., that mathematics is abstract, disembodied, The Prefrontal Cortex: Executive and Cognitive Functions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998); and Mark Wheeler, Donald T. Stuss, and Endel independent of those who conceive of it, and Tulving, "Frontal Lobes and Memory Impairment," Journal of the that it provides structure to the physical International Neuropsychological Society 1(1995): 525-36. 4. Norman A. Krasnegor, G. Reid Lyon, and Patricia S. Goldman- world as the language of nature. Rakic, eds., Development of the Prefrontal Cortex: Evolution, The authors begin by discussing areas of Neurobiology, and Behavior (Baltimore: Brookes Publishing, 1997). the brain where mathematical abilities are 5. John Duncan, Rudiger J. Seitz, Jonathan Kolodny, Daniel Bor, Hans Herzog, Ayesha Ahmed, Fiona N. Newell, and Hazel Emslie, "A located, in addition to the inborn ability of Neural Basis for General Intelligence," Science 289, 5478 (2000): infants and some animals to recognize very 457-60. 6. Antonio R. Damasio, Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the small numbers and perform rudimentary Human Brain (New York: G. P. Putnam, 1994). addition and subtraction. They then lay out 7. Lars Nyberg, Endel Tulving, Reza Habib, Lars-Goran Nilsson, Shitij Kapur, Sylvain Houle, Roberto E.L. Cabeza, and Anthony Randal the theory of metaphorical conceptualization McIntosh, "Functional Brain Maps of Retrieval Mode and Recovery of and the cognitive unconscious and attempt to Episodic Information," NeuroReport 7(1995): 249-52. 8. David C. Noelle, "A Connectionist Model of Instructed Learning," show how algebra, set theory, and symbolic Ph.D. thesis, University of California at San Diego, Department of logic are cognitively grounded in largely Computer Science and Engineering, Department of Cognitive Science, 1997. unconscious concepts like the container 9. Daniel J. Amit, Modeling Brain Function: The World of Attractor metaphor and other embodied "image Neural Networks (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1989). 10. Earl K. Miller and Jonathan D. Cohen, "An Integrative Theory of schema"-conceptual primitives postulated Prefrontal Cortex Function," Annual Review of Neuroscience, in press. as the basis of concepts like boundedness, ori- 11. Wolfram Schultz, Paul Apicella, and Tomas Ljungberg, "Responses of Monkey Dopamine Neurons to Reward and Conditioned entation, and other spatial relations that Stimuli During Successive Steps of Learning a Delayed Response Task," allow us to conceive of concepts like sets, Journal of Neuroscience 13(1993): 900-13. 12. P. Read Montague, Peter Dayan, and Terrence J. Sejnowski, "A graphs numbers, lines, and angles. They also Framework for Mesencephatic Dopamine Systems based on Predictive claim that symbolic logic is simply built out of Hebbian Learning," Journal of Neuroscience 16(1996): 1936-47. 13. Gerald Tesauro, "Temporal Difference Learning and TD- "metaphors" from arithmetical operations. Gammon," Communications of the ACM 38(3) (1995). The authors conclude that the concepts of 18. Todd S. Braver and Jonathan D. Cohen, "On the Control of mathematics are based on what matters to Control: The Role of Dopamine in Regulating Prefrontal Function and Working Memory," in S. Mansell and J. Driver, eds., Attention and humans in their everyday functioning, and Performance XVII (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2000). that through conceptual metaphors "[t]he 19. William J. Gehring, B. Goss, Michael G. H. Coles, David E. Meyer, and Emanuel Donchin, "A Neural System for Error Detection and various branches of mathematics mathema- Compensation," Psychological Science 4(1993): 385-90. tize our human concerns" (emphasis added). 20. Matthew Botvinick, Leigh Nystrom, Kate Fissell, Cameron S. Carter, and Jonathan D. Cohen, "Conflict Monitoring Versus Selection-for- Action in Anterior Cingulate Cortex,' Nature 402(1999): 179-81; and Clay Kevin Christopher is public relations director Holroyd, Jesse Reichler, and Michael G.H. Coles, "Is the Error-Related Negativity Generated by a Dopaminergic Error Signal for Reinforcement for the Committee for the Scientific Investiga- Learning? Hypothesis and Model," in Cognitive Neuroscience Society tion of Claims of the Paranormal. Annual Meeting Program, p. 45, Washington, D.C., 1999.

spring 2001 ® http://www.secularhumanism.org ®

IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

PLATO'S METHOD MEETS New discoveries challenge the philosophers of antiquity COGNITIVE SCIENCE

not a correct definition of justice. Stephen P. Stich Quite correct, Socrates.'

The central idea of Plato's method, clearly on display here, is to test normative claims against people's spontaneous judgments about real and hypothetical cases. Contemporary philosophers often call these spontaneous judgments "intuitions." If the normative claim and people's intuitions agree, ormative questions — particularly questions the claim is vindicated. But if, as in Socrates' dialogue with about what we should believe and how we Cephalus, a normative principle conflicts with people's intu- should behave—have always been high on itions, then something has to give. Sometimes we may hold on the agenda for philosophers. Over the centuries there has to the normative claim and ignore a recalcitrant intuition. But been no shortage of proposed answers. But this abundance of if a normative principle conflicts with lots of intuitions or, as in answers raises yet another fundamental philosophical ques- the example from The Republic, if it conflicts with an intuition tion: How should we evaluate the proposed answers; how that we would be very reluctant to give up, then Plato's method can we determine whether an answer to a normative ques- requires that we reject the principle and try to come up with tion is a good one? The best known and most widely used another one. method for evaluating answers to normative questions can Though philosophers have been using this method for over be traced all the way back to Plato. Recently, however, cogni- two millennia, it is far from clear why we should trust it. Why tive scientists interested in cross-cultural differences have should we expect a normative principle sanctioned by this reported findings that pose a serious challenge to this vener- method to be a good one? Indeed, why do principles that cohere able philosophical method. Indeed, in light of these new find- with our intuitions have any special status at all? Plato, of ings some philosophers—I am one of them—have come to course, had an answer to this question. It was part of his famous think that after 2,400 years it may be time for philosophy to theory of anamnesis or recollection. Though scholars would stop relying on Plato's method. In the pages that follow I'll give a much more nuanced account, the basic idea is that before sketch the path that led me to this conclusion. we were born our souls had an opportunity to gain knowledge of ORIGINS the Forms that determine the true nature of knowledge, justice, piety—and everything else. When the soul enters the body the To introduce the method, let's begin with an example of its use whole business is so traumatic that the soul forgets what it knew by one of its most brilliant practitioners, Plato himself. Here is about the Forms. Fortunately, the knowledge is not totally lost. It a famous passage from The Republic, in which Socrates still guides our judgments about cases like the one that Socrates recounts using the method in a conversation about the nature poses for Cephalus, and by using Plato's method with diligence of justice. we can succeed in recovering explicit knowledge of the Forms. It's an ingenious story, though even in Plato's time few peo- Well said, Cephalus, I replied: but as concerning justice, what is it?—to speak the truth and to pay your debts—no more than ple accepted it, and it would be hard to find a contemporary this? And even to this are there not exceptions? Suppose a philosopher who takes any of the stuff about the soul's prior friend when in his right mind has deposited arms with me and encounter with the forms at all seriously. But useable methods he asks for them when he is not in his right mind, ought Ito give are not exactly thick on the ground in philosophy, so while them back to him? No one would say that I ought or that I should be right in doing so, any more than they would say that Plato's account of why his method works has been roundly I ought always to speak the truth to one who is in his condition. rejected, the method itself most definitely has not. Consider, You are quite right, he replied. for example, the following enormously influential passage in But then, I said, speaking the truth and paying your debts is which Nelson Goodman, one of the great analytic philosophers of the last half of the twentieth century, offers a wonderfully Stephen P Stich is Board of Governors Professor of lucid account of the method that he and others in the analytic Philosophy and Cognitive Science at Rutgers University. tradition have long been using.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org D How do we justify a deduction? Plainly by showing that it con- beliefs very differently from the way we do. Suppose further that forms to the general rules of deductive inference.... these exotic folks also have very different intuitions about rea- Analogously, the basic task in justifying an inductive inference is to show that it conforms to the general rules of induction. soning, and that when the method of reflective equilibrium is Yet, of course, the rules themselves must eventually be jus- used with their intuitions it turns out that their way of reason- tified. The validity of a deduction depends not upon conformity ing is justified, though, when the method is used with our intu- to any purely arbitrary rules we itions, it turns out that our very may contrive, but upon conformity to valid rules.... But how is different way of reasoning is justi- the validity of rules to be deter- "There is a growing body fied. Surely, I argued, something mined? ... Principles of deduc- has gone very wrong here, since it tive inference are justified by of evidence indicating large seems that the method of reflec- their conformity with accepted tive equilibrium can justify deductive practice. Their validity any depends upon accordance with and systematic differences way of going about the business of the particular deductive infer- reasoning, no matter how bizarre, ences that we actually make and between East Asians and so long as the folks who use the sanction. If a rule yields inaccept- method have the intuitions to able inferences, we drop it as Westerners on ... cognitive invalid. Justification of general match. We could, of course, avoid rules thus derives from judg- processes including attention, the problem by insisting that in ments rejecting or accepting par- employing the method we must ticular deductive inferences. memory, and perception." use our intuitions, not theirs. But This looks flagrantly circular. it is (to put it mildly) less than I have said that deductive inferences are justified by their con- obvious how this move could be formity to valid general rules, and that general rules are justi- defended. Since we don't believe that our intuitions have been fied by their conformity to valid inferences. But this circle is a shaped by a prenatal glimpse at the Forms, why should we priv- virtuous one. The point is that rules and particular inferences ilege our intuitions over those of some other group? alike are justified by being brought into agreement with each other. A rule is amended if it yields an inference we are Though I thought this was a rather clever objection to the unwilling to accept; an inference is rejected if it violates a method of reflective equilibrium, others were unconvinced. rule we are unwilling to amend. The process of justification And they had an interesting argument: We rely on our intu- is the delicate one of making mutual adjustments between rules itions in philosophy for much the same reason that we rely on and accepted inferences; and in the agreement achieved lies our intuitions in mathematics. They are the only game in the only justification needed for either.- town—the only real intuitions that anyone has. Why should In A Theory of Justice, one of the most influential philosophi- we worry about what might be justified by the intuitions of cal books of the last fifty years, John Rawls advocates much imaginary Martians, they asked, when there are no such the same method for justifying principles in the moral domain. Martians? That's a good question, and one to which, until Rawls also introduced a new name for the method; he called it recently, I had no good answer. "the method of reflective equilibrium." But what about our concern over the justification of the NEW FINDINGS method? What do contemporary philosophers have to offer to About three years ago, however, I happened to run across my replace Plato's myth about the prenatal adventures of the old friend, the psychologist Richard Nisbett, and he began to soul? Goodman, it seems, thinks that passing the reflective tell me about some enormously exciting experiments that he equilibrium test is (as philosophers sometimes say) constitu- has been doing. For decades, scholars have been claiming that tive of justification or validity for normative principles. people in East Asian cultures have very different "mentalities" Passing the reflective equilibrium test is what it is for a prin- from people in Western cultures. Scholars claim that the ciple to be justified. There is no need to tell tales about dimly Chinese and others influenced by Chinese culture perceive remembered encounters with the Forms. In the agreement and think about the world around them in very different ways between principles and intuitions, Goodman maintains, lies from people in Western cultures. Further, these differences are the only justification that is needed for either. reflected in the way they describe and explain events and in I first encountered Goodman's account of the reflective the beliefs and theories they accept. Nisbett and his colleagues equilibrium method when, as an undergraduate at the had begun to explore whether these claims about differences University of Pennsylvania in the early 1960s, I had the great in mentalities could be experimentally verified, and—to my good fortune to take 'a class with him. It all seemed over- amazement and to the amazement of most cognitive scientists whelmingly plausible to me at that time and for many years as well—they discovered that many of them could. There is a after. During those years, I had some very good company, since growing body of evidence indicating large and systematic dif- the method was ubiquitous in post—World War II Anglo- ferences between East Asians and Westerners on a long list of American philosophy. cognitive processes including attention, memory and percep- But then, about fifteen years ago, I began to have some tion. The two groups also differ in the way they go about doubts. In my initial attempts to articulate those doubts I did describing, predicting, and explaining events, in the way they what philosophers so often do—I described a hypothetical case: categorize objects, and in the way they revise beliefs in the suppose we were to encounter cognitive agents (Martians, per- face of new arguments and evidence.' This work suddenly haps, or members of an exotic tribe) who reason and form made it very plausible that the first part of my hypothetical

Ea http://www.secularhumanism.org m spring 2001

case is more than just a philosophical fantasy. There really are Encouraged by these findings, we embarked on a much more people whose reasoning and belief forming strategies are very ambitious project designed to test a variety of philosophical different from ours. Indeed, there are over a billion of them! "intuition probes" on a variety of different groups. So far we've But what about the second part of my thought experiment, the found a total of six intuition probes—all modeled on hypotheti- part that focused on intuitions? Nisbett hadn't looked for cross- cal cases that have been widely discussed by epistemologists— cultural differences in intuitions, on which different groups have but, when I mentioned the possibil- significantly different intuitions. ity to him, he thought it was worth "In light of these new findings In some cases the differences are a try. So, in collaboration with between people with different cul- Shaun Nichols and Jonathan some philosophers ... tural backgrounds, while in other Weinberg, I decided to run a few cases they are between people of experiments designed to explore think that after 2,400 years different socio-economic status whether, in addition to the differ- it may be time ... to stop (SES). High SES Americans and ences that Nisbett found between low SES Americans have different Asian and Western processes of relying on Plato's method." epistemic intuitions! Moreover, in acquiring knowledge, there might many cases these differences are also be differences between Asian quite dramatic. So why haven't and Western intuitions about what knowledge is. philosophers noticed them? Well, since years of education is a One of the oldest and most durable doctrines in epistemology major factor in determining SES, all philosophy professors are is an account of knowledge first proposed by Plato in a dialogue high SES, and the overwhelming majority of us are White and of called the Theaetetus. To count as an instance of knowledge, on Western European ancestry. this view, a belief must be true, and the believer must have some justification for believing it. Neither lucky guesses nor false WHAT'S NEXT? beliefs count as knowledge. This account was the received view What conclusions should we draw from these studies? Perhaps from Plato's time until 1963, when Edmund Gettier published a the first thing to say is that the research in its early days. All six number of hypothetical cases in which people had justified true of the intuition probes in which we've found significant group beliefs, though what made the beliefs true was not causally relat- differences ask subjects to say whether the case counts as ed to what made the beliefs justified. Here is an example of the knowledge or mere belief. It would be fascinating to know sort of case that Gettier proposed. whether there are also cultural and SES differences when subjects are asked to judge what a person should believe or Bob has a friend, Jill, who has driven a Buick for many years. whether a belief is justified, and we are currently collecting Bob therefore thinks that Jill drives an American car. He is not data using those intuition probes. Further down the road, we'd aware, however, that her Buick has recently been stolen, and he is also not aware that Jill has replaced it with a Pontiac, which like to look at moral intuitions to see if they exhibit the same is a different kind of American car. Does Bob really know that cultural diversity that we're finding in epistemic intuitions' If Jill drives an American car, or does he only believe it? we continue to find the sorts of systematic cultural differences in philosophical intuitions that our first studies have uncovered, Cases like this have had a vast impact on philosophers. Just the conclusion I'd be inclined to draw is that Plato's method about every epistemologist has the strong intuition that Bob should be rejected as a strategy for answering normative does not really have knowledge in "Gettier cases," and those questions, since it will yield wildly different results depending intuitions have led the overwhelming majority of philosophers on whose intuitions we use. Another option would be to go rela- to conclude that the traditional justified true belief account tivistic and conclude that the epistemic and moral norms of knowledge is mistaken or incomplete. appropriate for the rich are different from those appropriate for But Nichols, Weinberg, and I had a hunch. Gettier cases are the poor, and that the norms appropriate for White people are typically very similar to unproblematic cases in which the fact different from those appropriate for people of color. But even if that makes the belief true is causally involved in the justification one is inclined to relativism in matters normative—and I am— of the belief. And Nisbett's group has shown that East Asians are this strikes me as relativism gone mad. Surely a much more rea- more inclined than Westerners to make judgments on the basis sonable conclusion is that philosophy's 2,400-year-long infatua- of similarity. Westerners, on the other hand, are more disposed tion with Plato's method has been a terrible mistake.' f n to focus on causation in describing the world and classifying things. So, we speculated, perhaps East Asians might be somewhat less inclined than Westerners to withhold the attribution of Notes 1. The Dialogues of Plato, translated by B. Jowett (New York: Random knowledge in Gettier cases. The results of an experiment House) I, 131, p. 595. designed to test this speculation were nothing short of startling. 2. Fact, Fiction and Forecast (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1965) pp. As expected a substantial majority of Western subjects (74%) 66-67. 3. R. Nisbett, K. Peng, I. Choi, and A. Norenzayan, "Culture and claim that Bob only believes that Jill drives an American car, but Systems of Thought: Holistic vs. Analytic Cognition." To appear in a majority of East Asian subjects (57%) claim that Bob really Psychological Review, 2001. knows! With South Asian subjects, the difference is even more 4. There is already some very impressive evidence indicating that people in different SES groups have different moral intuitions. See J. Haidt, S. remarkable. Sixty-one percent of our Indian, Pakistani, and Koller, and M. Dias. "Affect, Culture and Morality," Journal of Personality & Bangladeshi subjects report that Bob really knows. The Social Psychology, 65, 4(1993): 613-28. 5. I'd like to thank Shaun Nichols for his helpful feedback on an ear- "Gettier intuitions," that led to the rejection of the Platonic lier draft of this article. account of knowledge are, it appears, very culturally local.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

METAPHORS, MINDS, AND THE A conversation with George Lakoff and Mark Johnson FATE OF WESTERN PHILOSOPHY

tive to denote a clearly conceptual, propositional, and entirely Interview conducted conscious kind of processing and reflection. But we believe it is highly cognitive, because it plays a central role in the ordering of by Austin Dacey our conceptual systems. It's part of the structure of how we think about things and how we reason. So we would insist that the cognitive unconscious lays good claim to the term cognitive. George Lakoff, professor of linguistics at the University of FI: You also claim, on the basis of recent findings in cogni- California at Berkeley, and Mark Johnson, professor of tive science, that abstract thought such as theoretical reasoning is largely metaphorical. Could you explain this conclusion philosophy at the University of Oregon, first advanced their theory that human cognition is largely metaphorical and describe in general the evidence that is pointing us in Metaphors We Live By (1983). In 1999, they published towards it? Philosophy in the Flesh, we go through a list of Philosophy in the Flesh, in which they claim their theory is Liion : In being borne out by cognitive neuroscience. the evidence from various fields in linguistics, cognitive psy- -EDS. chology, developmental psychology, and so on. Here are some examples. If you look at the common metaphors for time, for example, you'll notice that you have expressions like "the time will come," "the time has long since gone," "the time for action has arrived," and so on. You have spatial words like come and go and arrive—and then you see them being FilREE INQUIRY: In your new book, used in a very systematic way to talk about time. Philosophy in the Flesh, you claim We then find that words from the domain of space that recent findings in cognitive are mapped onto the domain of time in a system- science are "inconsistent with central parts of atic way. It isn't just a matter of words; inference Western philosophy," and that an "empirically patterns from the domain of space are being responsible philosophy would require our mapped over to the domain of time. And they're culture to abandon some of its deepest philo- PH SOWN mapped in the same way as the mapping that accounts for the words' meanings. Now go and sophical assumptions." I'd like to begin by talk- THE FLESH ing about these cognitive-science findings. One look at novel expressions—poetic metaphors and 004E EM8000(0 MIND OND ITS claim is that much of our thought belongs to ONEUENOE NO MEETHN TNOOOXi song lyrics and so on—you find that these new the unconscious, or what you call the "cognitive 6EIHE mNQf HB YERNrcONXSN. expressions people create invoke the same kind unconscious." What is the cognitive uncon- of metaphors for time, and work by extensions of scious, and how did we find out about it? exactly the same mapping. That gives you a third domain of evi- GEORGE LAxoFF: We found out about it in a number of ways. dence for the existence of this same mapping process. For one, priming experiments—where words or pictures of Now examine the history of languages, and study how which you're not conscious are flashed in front of subjects so words change their meaning over time. Over and over you'll quickly that they don't know they've seen them, but nonetheless see words for space coming to mean words for time. It's the have a systematic effect on how their minds process things. same mapping yet again, now governing the principles of his- MARK JOHNSON: The cognitive unconscious isn't "uncon- torical change. If you then look at gesture evidence, as David scious" in the Freudian sense of repressed experience. We're McNeil at the University of Chicago has, you'll find almost-uni- talking about these massive sets of operations and processes versal metaphorical gestures that are carried out in space to that go into making us have an experience of the world. We express concepts of time. These are spontaneous: they're not cannot be aware of the online processing that generates them. fixed gestures, they're things you make up as you talk about FI: Then in what sense can we call them cognitive? time. And if you examine the constraints that limit possible JOHNSON: Many philosophers wouldn't think of the cognitive acceptable gestures when you're talking about time, they unconscious as a cognitive structure, because they want cogni- reflect exactly the same metaphorical mapping that constrains

El http://www.secularhumanism.org ® s ring 2001

gestures you'd use to express spatial relationships. And there the world, independent of mind. Yet there's always been an are many such independent sources of evidence, all of which assumption that human concepts are reflections of rational give support for the same metaphorical mappings. These structures in the world. That's been part of Anglo-American metaphors preserve inferential structure from domain to philosophy from the beginning, and it just cannot work for this domain. So it's clear that they're intimately involved in rea- vast metaphorical system that we now recognize. This applies soning, and that they constitute the major mechanism by to most of the reasoning we do about time and metaphors for which we take the inferential mechanisms of sensori-motor time, about events and causes. It applies also to our basic concepts and apply them to abstract concepts. understandings of morality, the mind, the self, being—the most Convergent evidence like this it is very robust. And we have very basic concepts philosophy has always been about. Anglo- this enormously robust evidence concerning not just American philosophy had always assumed that these basic metaphors for time, but for hundreds of familiar cognitive concepts could be characterized in literal terms, and that metaphors. The evidence becomes overwhelming. turned out to be massively false. JOHNSON: We found a number FI: Some philosophers would of people who had done analyses say that's a non sequitur. They of some of our most important might concede that we can only concepts—concepts like mind, perceive and think about reality knowledge, thought, basic politi- "Philosophy as an in ways that depend on our par- cal concepts, moral concepts, the ticular cognitive and conceptual conceptions of the self. All of institution has, in the systems, but they'd deny that these abstract concepts seem to this means we can know no real- be defined by multiple meta- Western tradition, ity independent of our concepts, phors. What we're claiming is in virtue of which our thoughts that you get a new view of philos- adopted certain and perceptions are true or ophy if you understand that a assumptions that we false. How do you respond? philosophy is sort of a putting LAKOFF: Our theory allows together and orchestrating of think are just scientifically you to talk about the truth and vast systems of metaphors, and falsity of philosophical ideas that these metaphors have entail- false. And that has made are metaphorical, or everyday ments. They lead you to reason in ideas that are metaphorical. And certain ways. So if you have a philosophy far less useful that goes beyond the role of the computational model of mind, external world in structuring there are a bunch of metaphors than it should be." those ideas. Consider metaphor- that are working together. This ical truths like saying—to take a isn't just an obvious truth about simple case—"He wasted an how the mind works. It's predi- hour of my time this morning." cated on some basic metaphors That statement is based on the we have about the nature of mind and mental processes—how metaphor of time as a resource. So are statements like "He language works, what a concept is. budgets his time well," and so on. Well, time is not really a And so in order to understand a philosophy, what its logical moneylike resource in itself. There's nothing in the world entailments are and how they affect the way we reason within about time that makes it a resource or moneylike; it's our it—what its basic assumptions are—you've got to understand understanding that creates that correspondence. And yet, the grounding metaphors that define those basic concepts and when we set up a culture in which we pay people by the hour the patterns of reasoning. We are really making a sweeping and force them to live in terms of a "time is like money" claim about philosophy: that if you're going to understand a metaphor, then that metaphor structures our understanding. particular philosophical viewpoint or system, one of the best Then we can talk about sentences like "He wasted an hour of ways to go about that is to do an analysis of its grounding my time" being true or false. Yet that does not mean that it's metaphors. Further, understanding the limitations of some of by virtue of the nature of time in itself that a sentence like that those metaphors can in some cases provide a basis for criti- can be true or false. It can be true or false only in virtue of the cizing certain philosophical views. metaphor. FI: How do the prevalence of metaphor and the idea of the JOHNSON: We are not idealists. We're not claiming that real- cognitive unconscious challenge traditional philosophical ity is a construct, built up from ideas or concepts. We're not theory? claiming that there's a kind of infinitely malleable "something" LAKOFF: In Anglo-American philosophy, you have the corre- that gets structured by these concepts. Rather, we're more in spondence theory of truth, and a theory of meaning based on line with a view like Maurice Merleau-Ponty's, or John that. It assumes a literal correspondence between words and Dewey's, or Alfred North Whitehead's. We're in line with work the world, or between symbols and structures in the world. in the contemporary cognitive sciences that looks at organism- Most metaphorical thought is just not like that; if you look at environment interactions and tries to explain how this mean- metaphors, clearly they can't fit into this literal relationship ingful world that we can make sense of, and act within, and between words and the world. Metaphors aren't out there in make inferences about, comes together. What we're trying to

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 40 IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

avoid is a picture in which there's just the world as it is out gle with them, and, ultimately, you have to act. Persons who there, and then there's our processing mechanism over here. are morally sensitive need to be aware of what their moral We're saying that the basic unit of experience is this assumptions are, what other people's moral assumptions are, process—this ongoing set of interactions—and out of that what the entailments are. There's no substitute here for that arise all of our concepts and our patterns of reasoning. kind of moral sensitivity and perceptiveness and openness. We were never claiming that all truth is metaphoric. We see FI: And you think that this kind of give and take is mirrored many traditionally literal concepts remaining valid. But the at the broader level, in the give and take between philosophy key point is that ours is an embodied theory of truth. It says and the sciences of the mind. that all human understanding is tied to, and grows out of, our LAKOFF: It's very important when you're studying the sci- embodiment. And that embodiment will sometimes involve ence of the mind that you understand your metaphors there, these metaphorical extensions. too. We have to question, as cognitive scientists, the concepts FI: At this point, we can imagine critics saying, "Okay, so we use in our science. And we have to understand which philosophical theories are deeply metaphorical. All thought is. metaphors we're using, and why we're using them. In saying But if we can distinguish good from bad metaphors in these that, we're placing a criterion on science that had never previ- ways that you have been discussing, then, once we do that, we ously even been thought of as a criterion to place on science. can go back to debating the merits of our philosophical theo- FI: Maybe in closing, you could both comment on how you ries." Some critics would say that what you then wind up with think this ongoing dialogue between cognitive science and phi- is essentially no different from the enterprise of traditional losophy will unfold in the future. philosophy. JOHNSON: One has to realize that the dominant philosophi- LAKOFF: Yes and no. What you've just said is not true of cal schools in America and England are still principally work- most philosophy. What we've observed is that science uses ing in an analytic mode. If you go to philosophy conferences, metaphors. In good science, you have metaphors and a math- these assumptions we've been criticizing are still very much at ematics that goes with the metaphors, and, preferably, cases work—determining who does what, what grants are funded, where the metaphors have entailments that are observable— and how people think of education, that sort of thing. But we're and observable in massive numbers—so you can check them encouraged by what we see as a much more genuine, open, out. That's very different from having those metaphors be the honest dialogue emerging between philosophy and the cogni- basis of a philosophy. Philosophical theories are very different tive sciences. I'm thinking of people like Paul and Patricia from scientific theories in this respect. Anglo-American phi- Churchland, Antonio Damasio, Gerald Edelman, and others. I losophy is a good example of this. There is no scientific evi- think we see people who are opening up and are literate and dence for the correspondence theory of truth. There's no sci- can do some of the detailed empirical work in the sciences entific evidence for the idea that meaning is based on truth. that's necessary—and who are beginning to understand the There is no observable evidence based on this. These are pure- philosophical implications. So I'm encouraged. ly metaphorical theories. LAKOFF: I agree with that. And I think it's important to dis- JOHNSON: "Philosophical" discussion and criticism are tinguish philosophy as an enterprise from philosophy as an going to go on, but we're saying they need to be empirically institution. We have no opposition whatever as to philosophy responsible. They need to make use of converging evidence as an enterprise, quite the opposite. We see philosophy as one acquired using multiple methods, from different sciences, and of the most important enterprises anyone can engage in. utilizing all sorts of modes of inquiry. In moral theory, for Philosophy as an institution is a different matter. Philosophy example, you can understand how the concepts are struc- as an institution has, in the Western tradition, adopted certain tured, where they come from, and why we have the kind of assumptions that we think are just scientifically false. And moral concepts we do by using some of these tools and tech- that has made philosophy far less useful than it should be. niques that we've talked about. But there's also a critical com- Philosophy as an enterprise needs to fit what we know ponent. Any moral theory that is predicated on the classical about the nature of the mind in order to be scientifically theory of categorization, as some are, is going to be inade- respectable and cognitively responsible. If philosophy can quate to that extent. So if you have a moral theory that says use the kinds of tools that are coming out of cognitive science that there are moral principles or rules that are applied by and metaphor theory, that will make philosophy better, and having cases brought under the literal concepts that make up better for the world. It will make philosophy understand the rules in a sort of one-to-one way—well, that's not an ade- itself better. The idea of "knowing thyself" is central to all of quate understanding of morality. philosophy. Contemporary Anglo-American philosophy does- FI: What happens when philosophical discourse about n't know itself. It's quite striking to us to look at how much it rationality or morality—which embodies not only descrip- deviates from that idea. As scientists, we take a deeply philo- tions, but also expressions of our values or norms—butts up sophical perspective. We use the tools that emerge from the against some empirical evidence that's inconsistent with it? sciences to question our own work. Then we say, "What can How do we decide which has to give? you do with these tools to have a philosophy that's better LAKOFF: If you have a philosophical account that is incon- informed, and that makes the world better?" Philosophy is sistent with the way the mind works, then the philosophical there to make the world better. And it should be using the account should give. best tools available. JOHNSON: We're not taking away the responsibility of indi- FI: Well, if time is a resource, then I feel that mine has been viduals to reflect on these things, to think deeply, and to strug well spent. Thank you. f©

m http://www.secularhumanism.org If spring 2001 IS PHILOSOPHY OBSOLETE?

HUMANITY IN Scientific data can provide perspective TIME AND SPACE

While not trained directly on bodies and brains, modern Victor J. Stenger telescopes continue to confirm the apparent insignificant status of humans in the totality of existence. Current cosmological theories based on telescopic observations indicate that Since Galileo first turned his telescope on the heavens, scien- even the billions and billions of stars and galaxies of Carl tific instruments have steadily expanded our view of the uni- Sagan's Cosmos are but a tiny speck of dust in a far greater verse. Now we can peer far beyond the puny range of unaided universe that extends beyond our visible horizon. And, human sensory apparatus. What we see when we look through although more speculative, the vast universe in which we live these instruments bears little resemblance to the pictures pre- may be but one of countless many. Surely planet Earth and its viously drawn from everyday experience. Clearly, purely inter- inhabitants can have little to do with the ultimate nature of nal thought processes, whether based on revelation or reason reality. Any purpose we might find for our existence will have and supplemented solely by unaided sensory observation, pro- to be self-generated, a task that I see as neither impossible nor vide a woefully inadequate mechanism for learning about the fruitless. nature of the universe. It seems highly unlikely that we can Data from modern physics likewise cannot be ignored if we hope to understand ourselves without paying close attention wish to understand the human condition. Particle accelerators to the messages brought to us by the instruments of science. have revealed that the universe, though enormous in size, is at Direct information about bodies and brains are provided by the same time remarkably simple in its basic structure. Matter devices such as microscopes and MRI scanners. The latter is ultimately composed of a few basic particles called "quarks" have been especially important in indicating, to the consterna- and "leptons." Material forces result when these particles tion of many, that human thought may be the product of rather exchange other particles called "bosons." While this is well-established natural processes that signal no new physics. undoubtedly not the final story, we have every reason to antic- Indeed, despite some recent attempts to find a special role for ipate that future advances in knowledge will bring even fur- quantum mechanics in understanding consciousness, the data ther simplification. indicate that the brain operates almost exclusively in the The so-called laws of physics themselves, such as the great domain of pre-twentieth-century Newtonian mechanics. At conservation principles of energy, momentum, and angular least, nothing we know at this time requires us to assume oth- momentum that form the foundation of physics, can be under- erwise. stood as expressions of the symmetry and simplicity of nature. Quantum mechanics, of course, plays a role in the chem- Complex structures emerge as a consequence of the uncaused, istry of living organisms. However, the principles involved are accidental breaking of the underlying symmetries. Thus com- the same as those for the chemistry of a rock. So, the first plexity arises naturally out of simplicity. The new creationist thing we learn about ourselves from modern scientific instru- movement that goes by the title "intelligent design" claims that ments is that we are made of the same basic stuff as rocks and this is provably impossible. Such claims are provably false. that life and mind require no special ingredients, material or In discussions of the human condition, many assumptions immaterial. All they need is some carbon and other atoms with are made about the universe that are generally not even rec- sufficient complexity to grow nonlinear structures and enough ognized as assumptions but taken as self-evident fact. Once time for these structures to evolve into forms with sufficient again, these are the consequence of the tunnel vision of unaid- complexity to exhibit the qualities we label as living and sen- ed human perspective. One such assumption, having profound tient. Computer simulations indicate that this type of behavior consequences, is that time is some kind of river that "flows" will develop naturally in sufficiently complex, nonlinear sys- from past to future, carrying us along with its strong, nondi- tems regardless of platform. verging current. Almost a century ago, Einstein showed that the traditional view of absolute time was wrong and that dif- Victor J. Stenger is emeritus professor of physics and ferent observers will measure different time intervals between astronomy at the University of Hawaii and visiting fellow events. Thus it is impossible to objectively define a moment in Philosophy at the University of Colorado. His latest book "now" that is valid throughout the universe. Timeless Reality: Symmetry, Simplicity, and Multiple Universes has just been published (Prometheus Books, 2000). (Continued on page 69)

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The Sources and Dangers Do THESE INTELLECTUAL POPGUNS MATTER? of Postmodern Anti-Science Norman Levitt

This has led to the formation of an academic subculture that snarls at science. The schwerpunkt of the assault on science is the epistemologically radical version of "science studies," which has dominated the sociology of science for a he apparent newness of that peculiar kink in decade or so. Here, "high" postmodernism—the thick brew of our intellectual life called "postmodernism" is Gallic neologisms beloved of literary theorists—is somewhat an illusion. Postmodernism crystallizes atti- muted. The slogans associated with "social constructivism" tudes that have been a component of European and American and the so-called strong program in the sociology of science intellectual life for the better part of this century. These are more prominent. Nonetheless, the same anxieties, fears, themes themselves have a long prior history as old as "Modern resentments, and moralistic yearnings that undergird Europe." They reflect anxieties that have grown in parallel postmodernism proper also shape radical science studies; with scientific rationalism. Postmodernism takes up these they are alternate heads of the same cultural hydra. ideas with a notable carelessness and indifference to the logic I shall focus first on the specific historical sources of post- and consistency----the rationality—that ought to be required modern anti-science before addressing the practical problems even of critics of rationality. But its very incoherence reflects created by the postmodern assault on scientific authority. My the history of a spectacularly brutal century wherein which view of the matter is relatively temperate. The weaknesses of pretty much every form of idealistic politics has come to grief. postmodernist dogmas are glaring when these puerile insights Postmodernism is a formula for amnesia about its own are offered as a basis for supposed reforms in science. sources, an anodyne against the pain of deep reflection on the Nonetheless, the "postmodern stance" on science policy can't be ineradicability of injustice. The famous "irony" with which ignored simply because it is intellectually negligible. A corps of postmodernism addresses every issue is the thinnest of dis- professional "interveners" in science policy has arisen, inspired guises and the most transparent of affectations. The much- in part by postmodernist gurus. They are likely to play a role in flaunted postmodern relativism concerning moral judgments many unfolding controversies, and they may have some initial is a pretext for its opposite—didacticism and moral self-certi- success. It will be necessary, unfortunately, for professional sci- tude. Moreover, the supposed sophistication of postmodernist entists and their allies to get involved in these tiresome squab- philosophy screens a reluctance to tackle the complex, refrac- bles in order to minimize the damage. tory, and truly tangled web of political and ethical problems haunting the world. HISTORY Postmodernists are unhappy with science mostly because The themes trumpeted by postmodernists are of very ancient science undoes both the mythology and the moralism of the lineage. One of the most prominent is the supposedly privileged postmodern stance. The myth is that the Western world is standing of the outsider—the Other—as a touchstone by which especially mired in delusion. Since the success of science is the follies, cruelties, and blind spots of Western culture may be the emblem of Western triumphalism, the devout postmod- exposed. This is a singularly Western notion, salient in Western ernist must find a way to label it delusory. Since science is social thought since the Renaissance. The idea that the defects uniquely connected to Europe, the moral errors of imperialism of one's own society can be clearly illuminated by viewing them and capitalism must be detected in scientific knowledge. Since through an outlander's eyes has not been embraced by any the generality of the scientific picture lays bare the unreliabil- other society of which I am aware. But the "Noble Savage" con- ity of local "ways of knowing," the very ideal of "universalism" cept is recurrent in Western thought. Postmodernism has enthu- in knowledge must be disparaged. Since the feminist wing of siastically taken up this idea, little noting the irony of its dis- postmodernism makes a fetish of detecting misogyny every- tinctly Western provenance. In our time, the Other is not so where, the methods of science must be reconstructed by a fem- much a stranger as a victim of the ineluctable West, one who has inist epistemology. borne the relentless scrutiny of science in addition to his other Norman Levitt is a professor of mathematics at Rutgers tribulations. In using the Other as a pivotal figure in their own University. He is the author of Prometheus Bedeviled: crusade against science, the postmodernists are not only tap- Science and the Contradictions of Contemporary Culture and ping into an old tradition of Western self-critique, but extracting Higher Superstition (with P.R. Gross). symbolic retribution as well.

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 0 Postmodernism is also infused with another historically ories to the narrow path that fact allows. Frankfurt thinkers deep-seated theme, the "spiritual" reaction against scientific like Theodore Adorno and Herbert Marcuse were disdainful of thought. Modern science is relentlessly "Copernican" in its philosophical and methodological doctrines linked to sci- insistence that the human desire to find human meaning in the ence—empiricism and, more narrowly, the positivism of Mach structure of the universe cannot be allowed to shape or veto and the Vienna Circle. Empiricism is deeply inimical to the scientific findings. Good scientists, though quite aware that free-ranging, impressionistic "critique" favored by the perfect objectivity is impossible, still see the necessity of striv- Frankfurt theorists, as positivism is to central Marxist cate- ing toward that rather inhuman goal. This grates harshly upon gories like "the dialectic of history" and "class consciousness." "poetic sensibility," the tendency to exalt moral intuition, The Frankfurt school bequeathed many of its attitudes, in par- human sympathy, and deeply felt spiritual certainty as the ticular, its anti-empiricism, to its postmodernist descendants, proper masters of the cognitive realm. The "poets," so to whence "positivism" is a leading postmodernist cuss-word. If speak, have long been estranged from the "scientists." This postmodernists had to satisfy even the most minimal empirical counter-reaction against science ranges far wider than poets standards before pontificating, they would have precious little and has entered our culture permanently. It is certainly fused opportunity to say anything. Hostility toward the natural sci- into the postmodernist mindset. After all, the intellectual ences is an automatic corollary of postmodernism's way of "homeland" of postmodernism is literary studies, a field in doing intellectual business. Postmodernists quail at the notion which Shelley's claim that "poets are the unacknowledged leg- that empirical sufficiency ought to be the very touchstone of islators of the world" has given way to the assertion that liter- theoretical legitimacy. ary theorists ought to be the acknowledged lawgivers. It is therefore a paradox that in science studies depart- The idea that science is relentlessly corrosive of tradition- ments it is claimed that the radical constructivist critique of al belief systems pervades our culture, troubling hundreds of scientific epistemology is justified by close empirical study of millions. It may seem perverse to insist that this strand of what scientists actually do. How can a school of thought that thought and feeling, which is closely tied to straightforward emphatically rejects the mere empiricism of scientists put religious traditionalism, should have had a role in nurturing such trust in its own empiricist methodology? But the conun- postmodernism. Postmodernism is supposed to be the res- drum is illusory. Most of the vaunted "case studies" through olutely "anti-foundationalist" enemy of religious orthodoxy. which constructivist sociologists try to demystify scientific Presumably, postmodernist skepticism should be even quicker authority turn out to be very thin stuff indeed. This is a realm to disdain religious "truth" as a mere social construction than where very doubtful studies are acclaimed instant "classics" to denounce science in such terms. Nonetheless, postmod- without much of careful scrutiny. Science would indeed ernist circles sneer far more fiercely and consistently at sci- deserve the scorn of its critics if scientists were content with ence than at religion. Underneath the carapace of postmodern the evidentiary standards prevailing in "science studies." knowingness, one can discern a heart broken by the passing These case studies, it turns out, are little more than pretexts away of all gods and angels. But we should not be so surprised for the science-studies faithful to believe what they've already by this. The actual people who embrace postmodernism are decided they want to believe. creatures of the same society that produces millions of pious Politics is crucial to understanding postmodernism. The believers. They are beset by the same metaphysical urge to frequently self-inflicted misfortunes of the Left are an impor- believe in a universe that is structured to vindicate their deep- tant part of the story of its sullen attitude towards science. To est moral urges. The relentlessly moralizing postmodernism understand how postmodernism became fashionable, one rampant in the academy is explicitly tied to a vision of the eth- must explore the legacy of twentieth-century political radical- ical destiny of our species. It may seem frivolous to link the ism. The nihilism of the postmodernists is a belated echo of a end-of-days theology of fundamentalists to the conviction that general despair that has afflicted our culture for eighty years humanity is about to abandon oppressive categories of gender and more—at least since World War I. As we emerge from the and sexuality. But both beliefs rest on similar psychological gruesome century just past, it is clear that the cataclysm of foundations, reflecting the propensity to think that the con- 1914-18 was the first, terrifying stage of a continuing tours of reality are obliged to confirm one's teleological hopes. avalanche of horrors. Something very close to postmodernism The postmodernist vision of paradise is in its own way a reli- was certainly in the air in the '20s, when surrealism and gious view, and, as such, it is challenged by the scientific cast Dadaism were the dominant modes of ironic discourse. Then, of mind. Like religious traditionalists, postmodern thinkers the only alternative to hopelessness for the socialist tradition tend brusquely to reject science as "a candle in the dark" sim- was to place one's faith in the Marxist regime that had seized ply because science is responsible in the first place for point- the fallen Russian Empire. There is no need to recount how ing out just how dark it is out there. that worked out. It was the first episode in a long chain of sim- The unacknowledged teleology that permeates postmod- ilar disappointments. The succeeding decades hurled the Left ernist thought chiefly derives from Marxism, with which post- from one desperate position to the another as it tried to find modernism is still deeply entangled. The strong resentment a leader or regime worthy of its ungrudging admiration. What against empiricism that marks postmodern sensibility is more it got, instead, was a long list of brutal megalomaniacs. The than just a re-scripted version of religious uneasiness with sci- record of radical intellectuals is a repetitious pattern of disil- ence. Postmodernism, with its doctrinal roots in political lusion immediately followed by fresh delusion. The pattern dogma, continues a tradition of "critical theory" that flows out only began to break down in the 1970s, as hopes for revolu- of the "Frankfurt School" of Marxist-oriented social thought. tionary transformation in the West and, worse, in the third Marxism itself, which clearly embodies the "triumph of hope world, were exposed as hopeless folly. At that point, the whole over experience," is spooked by the empiricism that holds the- system of moral and historical certitudes that had propped up

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the Left started to fall apart. Having flattered itself for THE DANGERS, SUCH AS THEY ARE decades that it understood everything, the Left finally had to face the fact that it understood very, very little. This disen- Postmodernist philosophy, social constructivism, and so forth chantment produced some apostates, but also opened a gap are intellectual popguns. So why should we take them serious- where the extravagances of new sages like Foucault and ly as dangers to science? Intellectual puerility, we know, does Derrida could enter. Basically, postmodernism allowed the not necessarily nullify the social toxicity of an idea, yet the intellectual Left to absolve itself of its old sins without really social base for postmodernism is minute. Nonetheless, real confronting them. Who had to worry about the Left's mischief has been done because of the power of scholarly pres- appalling willingness to cheer on Pol Pot in 1975 (for instance) tige. The damage has been relatively minor and largely when the new dogmas insisted that all the problems of the reversible. But the threat is recurrent and diverse. Scientists world flow from hegemonic discursive regimes, "the meta- and their sympathizers should be concerned, rather than physics of presence," the illusion of the bourgeois self, old- alarmed; panic would be inappropriate. But it will be neces- fashioned humanism, and similar phantoms? The professori- sary to devote a certain amount of energy to this issue over the al Left in particular easily convinced itself that all its prior next few years. bad judgments arose for want of these new-fangled sophisti- The most obvious damage is, ironically, the destruction of cations. Having repaired that deficiency, it swiftly resumed its prospects for the development of anything truly deserving the familiar moral self-certainty. name "science studies." There is a need for the systematic The insistence that only discourse and rhetoric matter, that study of science in relation to the political, economic, cultural, independent reality is an obsolete delusion, reflects the des- and artistic aspects of society. There was some hope in the late perate fact that the Left has been reduced to nothing but '70s that this would emerge as a serious field. Unfortunately, words. All the instruments of real power are far beyond its that hope was largely smothered by the craze for postmod- grasp. The ritual denunciation of "essentialism" that is so ernism and its philosophical affiliates. With the fake version much a fixture of postmodernist polemic reflects an unspoken well entrenched, it is unclear how to retrieve the true promise disappointment with the rigid categories of Marxist class of science studies, though some brave souls are trying. analysis. The rejection of "grand metanarratives" is also a But it is in science education at the elementary and sec- parable about Marxism, recording its failure to account for, ondary level that postmodernism has done the most real harm. much less predict, the historical mischances that have ren- Postmodernist "reformers" have skillfully exploited the status dered the Left impotent. In order to take these new myths seri- anxiety that haunts the science and math teachers who stand ously, however, one must pretend that reality is endlessly fluid deeply in the shadow of research scientists. Furthermore, and indeterminate, and that our seeming knowledge of it is many teachers and school administrators are eager to repair nothing more than the product of linguistic habits and social the evident disparities that have left minority children far convention. The downgrading of science to an idle language- behind in science education. Many science educators have game is one consequence of this. been lured into a pedagogical approach redolent of social con- The intellectual enterprise of the Left retains little but structivist views. They have been persuaded that science edu- resentments and daydreams. The old enemies persist, more cation, as traditionally practiced, is insufficiently egalitarian, powerful and secure than ever, but the only counterforce post- and that too much deference has been given to professional sci- modernism provides is the phony word-magic of "critical theo- entists. They now think that the way for young people to learn ry" Yet postmodern academics remain oddly content in their science is to to "construct" their own knowledge by trial and insularity. They eagerly flaunt their self-perceived moral supe- error and through discussion with other students, rather than riority to every stellar achievement of Western culture, artistic by absorbing ideas set forth as scientific truth. After all, isn't or scientific. Unsurprisingly, then, the postmodern academy this what working scientists do in their own research? The flaw constitutes a claque ready to applaud every attempt to deni- is that deep ideas that took centuries to mature are not to be grate science. rediscovered by average children in a few weeks. Construe- Beyond politics, mere academic tribalism has also played tivist pedagogy in practice sows confusion and breeds lack of an important role in the current hostility toward science, espe- intellectual cohesion, as well as grossly oversimplifying what cially among the social "scientists." For decades, sociologists "scientific knowledge" is all about. This kind of reform is also have been haunted by doubts about the rigor of their field, by infused with the postmodernist conceit that different ethnic suspicions that their methods are little better than subjective, communities have distinct ways of knowing and learning, to intuitive, and impressionistic. The contrasting rigor of the nat- which the enlightened teacher must adjust. Feminist theory ural sciences has been the source of countless odious compar- shows up as well; boys and girls are assumed to embody incom- isons. The invention of constructivist "science studies" is an patible epistemologies. Science classrooms guided by these ingenious move to reverse the accepted hierarchies and to put precepts naturally become platforms for familiar complaints a purported understanding of "the social" on top of the heap. against "Eurocentrism." One shouldn't necessarily think of the This isn't purely "postmodern": it began with the sociologists constructivist-minded reform advocates as hard-core decon- who rallied to the cause of the crank Immanuel Velikovsky structionists. The real lure of the constructivist approach was long before the vogue for postmodern theory. But the tactic that it promises (falsely) to provide a shortcut to more egali- only became widespread when it began to draw on postmod- tarian outcomes in science and math education. Serious battles ernist mystifications, along with the perennial outrage and have already been fought between these would-be reformers alienation of the academic Left. With these allies at hand, the and their critics in various arenas. The critics, supported or constructivists easily slipped their doctrinal camel into the championed by scientists, have been winning as a rule, but academic tent. there have been some close calls.

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Postmodernfsts have also made an effort to diminish the authority of orthodox science in the legal arena. The linchpin of their argument is that epistemological pluralism must pre- vail in law courts. Science, they maintain, is but one special- • interest group, whose judgments should not carry special ■ weight. The net effect of this doctrine would be to turn trials f into free-for-alls where junk science is put before lay juries on the same basis as the real thing. It is easy to imagine the free inquiry bizarre results likely to ensue. But the deconstructionist camp holds that trials are social negotiations, and can't be predicated on such fuddy-duddy notions as "scientific truth." Fortunately for the nation's health and safety, the legal com- Reader Services munity has recently been moving in the opposite direction, TO SUBSCRIBE OR RENEW striving to exclude junk science from the courtroom. (for rates see p. 4) Nonetheless, the proponents of the constructivist view remain • Call TOLL FREE 1-800-458-1366 strident and aggressive. (have credit card handy). In reckoning the public consequences of postmodernist • Fax credit-card order to 1-716-636-1733. fads, we must also pay attention to the dire situation of North American archeology. Here postmodern relativism is in league • Internet: www.secularhumanism.org with the simple-minded ethnic chauvinism of Native American • Mail: FREE INQUIRY, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226- militants. The mix of postmodern antiscience and the aborigi- 0664 nal version of creationism is well displayed in Vine Deloria's CHANGE OF ADDRESS grotesque book, Red Earth, White Lies—post-Kuhnian • Mail changes to FREE INQUIRY, ATTN: Change of nihilism in war paint. More concretely, throughout the country Address, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664 archeology has been brought to a halt by Indian activists who •Call Customer Service: 716-636-7571. insist that they have no use for the research findings of scien- • E-mail: [email protected] tists. They have been aided by gross bureaucratic misreadings of NAGPRA, a law that mandates repatriation of artifacts and BACK ISSUES human remains to tribal groups, but which clearly wasn't • $6.95 each; 20% discount on orders of 10 or more. Call 800- intended to stifle archeology as such. But that is precisely 458-1366 to order or to ask for a complete listing of back what has happened, the best-known instance being the now- issues. famous Kennewick Man controversy. It seems likely that the REPRINTS/PERMISSIONS courts will ultimately disallow the abuse of the repatriation • To order reprints of articles or to request permission to use laws, but it continues to be a hard, protracted fight. The most any part of FREE INQUIRY, write to FREE INQUIRY, curious thing about the episode has been the anti-scientific ATTN: Permissions Editor, P.O. Box 664, Amherst, NY attitudes of government officials. What drives them seems to 14226-0664. be a mix of bureaucratic survivalism, genuine sympathy for WHERE TO BUY FREE INQUIRY maltreated peoples, liberal politics distorted by postmodernist • FREE INQUIRY is available from selected book and maga- cant, and, probably, conservative politics distorted by zine sellers nationwide. Christian creationist cant. The most bizarre manifestation of postmodern anti- ARTICLE SUBMISSIONS science, though, is the peculiar tendency among postmod- •Complete submission guidelines can be found on the Web at ernist science critics to express strong sympathy for the bibli- www.secularhumanism.org/fddetails.html cal creationist viewpoint, a reductio ad absurdum of con- •All article submissions should be addressed to: Article structivist doctrine. Why, they argue, should the theories of the Submissions, ATTN: Tom Flynn, FREE INQUIRY, P.O. scientific establishment be privileged over creationist doc- Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. trine? Both are merely the beloved myths of their respective LETTERS TO THE EDITOR communities! As the political position of the postmodern • Send submissions to Letters Editor, FREE INQUIRY, P.O. scholarly subculture becomes more and more untenable, one Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. notes, it seems to evolve, by degrees, into its opposite. To me • For letters intended for publication, please include name, this presages a future when many erstwhile deconstruction- address (including city and state), and daytime phone num- ists will flee into the arms of religious orthodoxy. ber (for verification purposes only). Letters should be 300 Postmodernism is one of the many masks adopted by irra- words or less and pertain to previous FREE INQUIRY arti- tionalism and anti-science in our time. It turns up in connection cles. with all sorts of pseudoscientific crusades. Annoying as it may be, however, postmodernism is not particularly frightening. Though it can cite volumes of professorial authority, it is quite Check the latest news on vulnerable in open struggle with the scientifically knowledge- FREE INQUIRY'S Web site at able. But it is one of the annoying things that we who cherish http://www.secularhumanism.org both science and the rule of reason will have to keep an eye on, and to challenge aggressively from time to time. f©

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CHURCH-STATE UPDATE ems

overturn prejudices that Catholic officials might place their fealty to Rome The Calm(2) Before above their oaths of office, the pontiff commanded that "Christian legislators may neither contribute to the formula- tion of such a law nor approve it in par- the Storm liamentary assembly." Fortunately, the record of Catholic laypeople worldwide in obeying such Vatican pronounce- Tom Flynn ments is spotty indeed.

Church-State Update closed after the Inauguration but before the Bush admin- Alndiana Loses Twenty Command- istration presented its first legislation on Capitol Hill. A welter of dangerous ments. Independent court cases ended bills on vouchers, charitable choice, and religion in public life are anticipated with two local governments forced to and will be covered in future Updates. remove Ten Commandments monuments. U.S. District Judge Sarah Evans Barker ordered Lawrence County (southwest of Indianapolis) to remove a recently erect- hurch-State Update tracks con- and America—will have to learn all over ed Decalogue from the courthouse lawn tinuing developments in impor- again that the best response to religious or face stiff fines. In July, Barker had C tant federal, state, and local diversity is to keep religious speech and barred the same monument from being church-state issues. Each item is pre- symbols out of the public square. installed on the lawn of the Indiana state- ceded by an up arrow (A) or a down house. Meanwhile, a three-judge panel of AVouchers Lose Ground Across U.S. arrow (V), based on the story's implica- the U.S. Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals Voucher backers lost big at the polls and tions for separation of church and state ruled that the city of Elkhart, Indiana, in court. Voucher initiatives in California and the rights of the nonreligious. must remove the Ten Commandments and Michigan failed by better than 2-1 monument that has stood in front of its margins last November. In December a VUniter of, Well, Some. George W. municipal building since 1958. Bush's inaugural address included eight federal appeals court overturned Ohio's experimental voucher program in references to God or the Bible and, in the VChristmas Suit Dismissed Again. Cleveland, noting that virtually all the pri- eyes of many, declared war on church- Cincinnati lawyer Richard Ganulin's vate schools where parents could use state separation. "Church and charity, quixotic fight to end the federal govern- their vouchers were strongly sectarian. synagogue, and mosque ... will have an ment's formal observance of Christmas Look for a Supreme Court appeal. honored place in our plans and in our suffered another setback. The Sixth U.S. laws," Bush said. Never mind (for now) VStamp Honors Muslim Holidays. Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's the promise of statutory assistance to decision dismissing the suit. Ganulin, "faith-based" charities. Think of all the Last fall the U.S. Postal Service, long- time vendor of constitutionally dubious who first sued in 1998, asked the American religious communities Bush Supreme Court to review the decision. breezily excluded: other-than-Jewish Christmas and Hanukkah stamps, temples, shrines, gurudwaras, pagodas, issued a stamp honoring two Muslim eids, or religious festivals. Church-State AChristian School Settles with Girl fellowships, mandiras, centers, tirths, Expelled for Sex. An Elsmere, even covens. In other words, if you're Update predicts high-profile lawsuits by several other minority religions Kentucky, Christian school will pay an religious but not one of the "people of the unspecified settlement in a case brought book," our new president considers you demanding to know why they can't have a stamp too. Ah, what a tangled web we by a member of the Council's First unfit for the body politic. (Where do Amendment Task Force. Edwin Kagin secular humanists fit? We see no sign weave when first we open the gate between religion and the Postal Service! sued Orchard Street Christian School on that the younger Bush disagrees with his behalf of an unnamed family. The fami- father, who once said outright that the APope: Yes, Church Law Does Trump ly's 15-year-old daughter was one of two godless couldn't be good Americans.) Civil Law. At an intimate meeting with girls called to the school principal's office Believers other than Jews, Christians, or some 15,000 legislators and officials and quizzed about their sexual activity. Muslims should've already known they from ninety-two countries, Pope John (No boys were so interrogated, media were in trouble when George W. Bush Paul II declared that the laws of all accounts say) When the girl answered said, "We are guided by a power larger nations must change to come into truthfully that she was sexually active, than ourselves who creates us equal in accord with church teaching. In particu- she was expelled from the school without His image." Looks like President Bush— lar, Catholic legislators are obliged to a hearing. The family has since moved to Tom Flynn is editor of FREE INQUIRY oppose laws that permit abortion or rec- another state. Kagin said the settlement and former coordinator of the First ognize same-sex marriage. Trampling shows that "church schools are not Amendment Task Force. decades of work by Catholic liberals to above the law" DE

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Errors of the Elohist Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) Background An appreciation of Ingersoll's "Source Mistakes • Born August 11, 1833, Dresden, New York. Little formal schooling. Began of Moses" career as a lawyer in Peoria, Illinois. Achievements • Attorney, orator, freethought activist. Robert M. Price Raised a Union regiment in the Civil War, earning lifelong renown as "Colonel Ingersoll." First Attorney re readers still conversant with General of Illinois. Despite his atheism, the Republican Party's leading Robert Ingersoll's "Some Mis- national speechmaker; during his pub- Atakes of Moses?" In his day, his lic life no Republican candidate for lectures of this title were so well beloved whom Ingersoll did not campaign reached the White House. Defended (and hated!) that people seemed to (and won) the lengthiest criminal trial regard them immediately as public in American history to that time. property, not the possession of the Foremost orator of America's Gilded speaker who had created them. So they Age: his critical lectures on religion packed the largest theaters of the day. rushed pirate transcripts into print and circulated them, much like bootleg CDs Some Notable Works • The Work of Robert Green Ingersoll in made from rock concerts and circulated twelve volumes (in later editions, thir- among fans today. teen including Lyman Kittredgé s biog- Today, the work's value and power raphy). Named for IngersolPs birthplace, it is known as the Dresden remain undiminished after 120 years, Edition. Currently in print from like gunpowder kept dry and ready to Prometheus Books: Some Mistakes of fire. It is no mere relic of outmoded Moses and On the Gods (speeches); polemic. Unfortunately it is generally Reason, Tolerance, and Christianity (debate); Robert G. Ingersoll: A Life treated like one. This neglect may be and The Best of Ingersoll. partly the result of the incautious, tact- one of the critical theories of Penta- Religious Beliefs less manner of Ingersoll, no longer polit- teuchal authorship, the famous Graf- • Self-described atheist and agnostic. ically correct. He understood that, if a Wellhausen theory that the five so- Reviled Christian dogma of eternal proposition is ludicrous enough, we lend punishment. Nonetheless he held out called Books of Moses were a textual inchoate hopes for life after death and it undeserved credibility when we fusion of four earlier documents. `J," the described his secular ethical idealism respond too politely. Yahwist Epic, consistently used Yahweh as a "religion of humanity." But Ingersoll's great critique of the as the divine name. "E," the Elohist Intellectual Passions Pentateuch certainly does not deserve Epic, calls God "Elohim" until the burn- • In addition to his critique of religion, the obscurity that is gaining upon it. Its ing bush story and then switches to Ingersoll was an expert commentator scholarship is by no means out of date, on science, literature, and political Yahweh or combines the two. "D," our issues of the day. He could give numer- as a close, literal reading of the biblical Book of Deuteronomy, is a law code pref- ous recitations from memory, ranging text never is. aced by a summary of J and E, already from his own trademark oratories Ingersoll's critique of the Bible and (often three to four hours in length) to sewn together in the Deuteronomist's complete plays by Shakespeare. His its deity were not predicated upon any time. "P," or the Priestly Code, is anoth- advocacy of women's rights, birth con- particular critical theory, whether in er vast legal corpus prefaced by stories trol, and racial equality still seems fashion or out. He referred throughout of the Patriarchs and Moses. This ele- fresh today. the book to Moses as the author of the gant and illuminating hypothesis held Motto Pentateuch, but only in a conventional the field for over a century. Had • "The time to be happy is now. The sense. He showed how the book must place to be happy is here. The way to Ingersoll made use of the JEDP hypoth- be happy is to make others so." have originated long after the time of esis, he might have been hailed as an Fitting Epitaph Moses's supposed dates. But who was astute biblical critic. But if he had, his • "How pale those speeches are in print, the author? My title makes reference to polemic would have depended on a but how radiant, how full of color, how blinding they were in the delivery! Bob thousand critical points of debate and IngersolPs music will sing through my Robert M. Price is professor of biblical would have waned as the theory itself memory always as the divinest that criticism at the Center for Inquiry waned. ever enchanted my ears." Institute. This article was excerpted And besides, it was unnecessary. —Mark Twain, in a letter to William Dean Howells after from a paper presented at the Robert G. Colonel Ingersoll was, after all, a mili- hearing an Ingersoll speech. Ingersoll Centenary Celebration in tary man, and he knew you don't shoot a Dresden, New York, in August 1999. mouse with an elephant gun. He was

111 http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 fighting the war for intellectual liberty to tell us all along! distinctive option, even if an obnoxious on a broader front. A few years ago, Science endeavored one, has bled out, and Christianity has Too great praise challenges attention, to show that it was not inconsistent humanized itself by moving ever closer to and often brings to light a thousand with the Bible. The tables have been humanism. Why not just go all the way? faults that otherwise the general eye turned, and now, Religion is endeavor- "Some Mistakes of Moses" has been would never see. Were we allowed to ing to prove that the Bible is not incon- read the Bible as we do all other sistent with Science. The standard left behind in the popular conscious- books, we would admire its beauties, has been changed. (p. 242) ness, and that is a tragedy, since it is far treasure its worthy thoughts, and from outdated in the cogency of its account for all its absurd, grotesque Supposed advocates of biblical moral- and cruel things, by saying that its authors lived in rude, barbaric times. But we are told that it was written by inspired men; that it contains the will Ingersoll's value and power remain of God; that it is perfect, pure, and true in all its parts; the source and standard of all moral and religious undiminished after 120 years. truth; that it is the star and anchor of all human hope; the only guide for man, the only torch in Nature's night. These claims are so at variance with ity (except for Reconstructionist zealots) arguments. It is at least as important to every known recorded fact, so palpa- do not advocate genocide or slavery any the perennial struggle for intellectual bly absurd, that every free, unbiased more than they believe the earth is flat, and social liberty as it ever was, per- soul is forced to raise the standard of even though the Bible says all these revolt. [pp. viii-ix] haps even more so. I am convinced that things equally. When pressed about these at least some of us must join that battle How did Ingersoll show that the Bible distasteful teachings, they will start using the same techniques as Colonel could be a sure guide neither to nature arguing for "progressive revelation." The Ingersoll used. If we hope to show bibli- nor to the supernatural? He first shows strategy is to follow the distinctive moral- cal fundamentalists the error of their the untenability of the seven-day cre- ity of the Bible as long as it does not inerrantist ways, we have to debate ation account as compared not only with become as offensive to them as it is to with them as they do with each other. To the fossil record but with what else we "unbelievers," and when it does, they be taken seriously we must, as Ingersoll know of ancient history. reverse course, claiming that the Bible, sought to do, demonstrate a superior He knew the next ploy would be to understood rightly, is as enlightened as understanding of the text of the Bible shorten the line of defense by cutting secular morality any day. By such a read literally and in detail. We must ask loose the natural data of the Bible, its process of gradual assimilation liberal what reading of the text makes the most erroneous statements about the age and theology was born from fundamentalist: sense, answers the most questions, shape and workings of the world, and to by and by, all that made Christianity a solves the most puzzles. That is the defend the inner courtyard instead: to only argument a biblicist can respect, claim that, though the Bible's teaching and rightly so! After all, it was precise- might be clothed in the terms of an ly such honest, unblinking scrutiny of ancient world-picture, its affirmations AND"MEN the biblical text that led many of us on morality and religion were still to be out of fundamentalism and into regarded as infallible. t D[ED. humanism in the first place. f B But Ingersoll saw the fortress crum- bling and pressed his assault. In a dev- astating tour-de-force, the Colonel laid bare the awful irony of the whole fundamentalist enterprise, what I like to call the "sliding scale of biblical infallibili- r- ty" It is this: biblicists start out claiming that the Bible is a divine revelation and should therefore govern both belief and behavior. Robust _ but naive biblicism lasts only so long before the facts of science (e.g., the sphericity of the earth) become problematical, and then biblicism becomes either fanatical (e.g., the Flat Earth Society) or sophistical. The latter case switches tactics and admits science is correct, Earth '4- flti~ is round, but says that science has only clarified what the Bible was trying

http://www.secularhumanism.org 50 were supposed necessary for man to do in order to gain the assistance, and Some Mistakes of avoid the anger of these gods. Out of this belief grew certain ceremonies, and these ceremonies united with the belief, formed religion; and consequently every Moses religion has for its foundation a miscon- ception of the cause of phenomena. All worship is necessarily based Robert Green Ingersoll upon the belief that some being exists who can, if he will, change the natural order of events. The savage prays to a he first five books in our Bible are joy and torment a profound secret from stone that he calls a god, while the known as the Pentateuch. For a the people of his choice. He thought it Christian prays to a god that he calls a Tlong time it was supposed that far more important to tell the Jews their spirit, and the prayers of both are equal- Moses was the author, and among the origin than to enlighten them as to their ly useful. The savage and the Christian ignorant the supposition still prevails. destiny. put behind the Universe an intelligent As a matter of fact, it seems to be well We must remember that every tribe cause, and this cause whether repre- settled that Moses had nothing to do and nation has some way in which the sented by one god or many, has been, in with these books, and that they were not written until he had been dust and ashes for hundreds of years. But, as all the churches still insist that he was the author, that he wrote even an account of his own death and burial, let us speak of him as though these books "The savage prays to a stone that he calls were in fact written by him. As the a god, while the Christian prays to a god Christians maintain that God was the real author, it makes but little differ- that he calls a spirit, and the prayers ence whom he employed as his pen, or clerk. of both are equally useful." Nearly all authors of sacred books have given an account of the creation of the universe, the origin of matter, and the destiny of the human race. Nearly all have pointed out the obliga- tion that man is under to his creator for more striking phenomena of nature are all ages, the object of all worship. To having placed him upon the earth, and accounted for. These accounts are hand- carry a fetish, to utter a prayer, to count allowed him to live and suffer, and have ed down by tradition, changed by num- beads, to abstain from food, to sacrifice taught that nothing short of the most berless narrators as intelligence a lamb, a child or an enemy, are simply abject worship could possibly compen- increases, or to account for newly dis- different ways by which the accomplish- sate God for his trouble and labor suf- covered facts, or for the purpose of sat- ment of the same object is sought, and fered and done for the good of man. isfying the appetite for the marvelous. are all the offspring of the same error. They have nearly all insisted that we The way in which a tribe or nation Many systems of religion must have should thank God for all that is good in accounts for day and night, the change existed many ages before the art of writ- life but they have not all informed us as of seasons, the fall of snow and rain, the ing was discovered, and must have to whom we should hold responsible for flight of birds, the origin of the rainbow, passed through many changes before the the evils we endure. the peculiarities of animals, the dreams stories, miracles, histories, prophecies Moses differed from most of the mak- of sleep, the visions of the insane, the and mistakes became fixed and petrified ers of sacred books by his failure to say existence of earthquakes, volcanoes, in written words. After that, change was anything of a future life, by failing to storms, lightning and the thousand possible only by giving new meanings to promise heaven, and to threaten hell. things that attract the attention and old words, a process rendered necessary Upon the subject of a future state, there excite the wonder, fear or admiration of by the continual acquisition of facts is not one word in the Pentateuch. mankind, may be called the philosophy somewhat inconsistent with a literal Probably at that early day God did not of that tribe or nation. And as all phe- interpretation of the "sacred records." In deem it important to make a revelation nomena are, by savage and barbaric this way an honest faith often prolongs its as to the eternal destiny of man. He man accounted for as the action of intel- life by dishonest methods; and in this way seems to have thought that he could ligent beings for the accomplishment of the Christians of today are trying to har- control the Jews, at least, by rewards certain objects, and as these beings monize the Mosaic account of creation and punishments in this world, and so were supposed to have the power to with the theories and discoveries of mod- he kept the frightful realities of eternal assist or injure man, certain things ern science. fO

113 http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001

little old ladies cross the street or are kind to animals, the paper might be Newspapers and interested. My 0-for-50 slump became 0-for-100 when I sent the fifty papers an account (much like the above) of the dismal fate Atheism of my essay and asked that it be recon- sidered. This obstinate ploy elicited only four replies: (1) "To expect editors to run Gary Sloan an unsolicited column on a subject with no topical interest whatsoever is intoler- ably stupid." (2) "We're still not interest- n his op-ed "When Journalism sidering it for publication in [name of ed." (3) "Why don't you try a magazine or Collides with Faith" (FI, summer newspaper]. Thanks. one of your local papers." The fourth 2000), Lewis Vaughn notes that jour- There were no takers. Eventually, I response may speak volumes: "I've been nalists are reluctant to critique articles received forty-eight written responses. covering the world of religion/nonreligion of religious faith. By and large, journal- One editor did initially agree to run it. for nearly 15 years and there are hosts of ists confine themselves to scandals, She said when she saw the title, her minority positions within the spiritual pageants, demographics, and other mat- immediate impulse was "to send it to realm that people inhabit with no need at ters peripheral to the basic tenets of all to discuss their views with other people. We've got Zoroastrians, Hindus, The journalistic critique of faith has the Buddhists, Joins, Christian Scientists, etc., living among us—and you wouldn't earmarks of an endangered species. know a thing about their faith in their daily lives unless you drew them aside and asked them about it. I don't under- faith. They shy away from "serious infinity and beyond," but, on finding the stand the desire of many atheists to discussion of what nearly everyone essay wasn't "thudding or thoughtless," engage in debate with others." regards as the vital cognitive core of she decided it would be "fun" to publish The magnitude of the challenge can religion—the doctrinal beliefs." A it. A few months later, a co-editor scarcely be overestimated: the journal- recent experience I had with newspa- informed me a decision had been made istic critique of faith has the earmarks pers reinforces Vaughn's thesis. I could- not to run it because of a heavy backlog. of an endangered species. m n't entice any editor to run a piece I Most editors offered innocuous rea- wrote critical of these core beliefs. sons for rejecting the piece: "does- In January 2000, I sent "Why I Am an n't fit our needs," "can't use it," Atheist" to fifty of the largest newspa- "no place for it." Three said pers in the United States, among which their readers wouldn't be in- were the New York Times, New York terested. Two editors said it Daily News, Chicago Daily Herald, was too long, but, when I sent Chicago Tribune, Philadelphia a shortened version, they de- Inquirer, Washington Post, Baltimore clined to publish it, too. Two Sun, New Orleans Times-Picayune, editors said they didn't run Los Angeles Times, Houston unsolicited contributions from Chronicle, Dallas Morning News, San readers out of their region. Francisco Chronicle, Atlanta Journal Several comments were Constitution, Detroit Free Press, curious. One editor said reli- Kansas City Star, Boston Globe, and gion bored him "down to his Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Along with socks," and, besides, if he the essay, I included the following letter: ran my essay, he would have H

Many Americans misunderstand why to run "fourteen others from B. J.

some educated people don't believe in fourteen sects." Another edi- 1.

God. The confusion occurs in part, per- 00

tor wondered how with my 2 haps, because the intellectual basis of ion atheism gets short shrift (or no shrift) "bleak philosophy" I found life t lec in many newspapers. In 'Why I Am an "tolerable." Commenting that l Co Atheist,' I try to clarify the rationale for newspapers are for news, not r ke unbelief. I would appreciate your con- for philosophical musings, a third r Yo editor recommended I importune w Gary Sloan is a retired English pro- Reader's Digest. Yet another said Ne The fessor who lives in Ruston, Louisiana. that, if I focused on how atheists help "Don't get secular with me, pal." ©

free inquiry http://www.secularhuranism.org of us come from?" The minister slapped him and the conversation was over. The Irrelevant Although apocryphal, the story raises a good question. Who did mate with Cain to perpetuate the species? One possible `God Debate' answer could be an incestuous relationship with Eve or a sister not mentioned in the Bible, but of course, this answer would not be satisfactory. Another Jeremy Patrick answer is that God created a new woman for Cain, but the Bible's complete failure "It is philosophy that supplies the here- subordinate or supreme, dead or to mention this would call its entire accu- sies with their equipment." alive; what trust or confidence can we racy into question. repose in them? What veneration or 2. The Injustice of "Original Sin." —Tertullian, The Prescriptions obedience pay them? To all the pur- According to orthodox Christian doc- poses of life, the theory of religion Against the Heretics trine, access to Heaven can only be becomes altogether useless...."' gained through faith in Jesus Christ "Certainly a little philosophy inclineth a Regardless of how successful either because all human beings are born sin- man's mind to atheism, but depth in phi- side is in making their arguments, the evi- ners; the cause of this "original sin," of losophy bringeth men about to religion." dence indicates that the debate has very course, was Eve's eating of fruit from —Francis Bacon, On Atheism little (if any) impact on the vast majority the Tree of Life. This act introduced sin of humanity. In the United States, for into the world. In effect, her act was hilosophical debate over whether example, between 95 percent and 98 per- imputed to us. God does or does not exist has cent of people profess a belief in God.' Upon reflection, the doctrine of orig- Ptaken place for millennia and Sadly, the skillful and powerful argu- inal sin seems terribly unjust; it violates seems unlikely to end anytime soon. ments of philosophers like David Hume, the maxim "Punish not the child for the Theists still trot out the old Aristotelian Antony Flew, and Kai Nielsen have lain sins of the father" (Deuteronomy 24:16). "First Cause" and "Argument from unnoticed by the "average" person. It was Eve who committed that sin; to Design," while nontheists respond with However, these "average" people are threaten everyone with the possibility of theodicy, Humean empiricism, and the ones who act on their religious eternal damnation because of it would arguments that the very idea of God is beliefs, whether it involves attending be a harsh punishment indeed. incoherent and undefined. The "God services every weekend, tithing, or mak- 3. The Irrationality of Prayer. A Debate" is a favorite topic in journals of ing medical decisions on the basis of belief in the necessity and efficacy of philosophy and theology. The problem, their faith. If philosophical inquiry into prayer is a fundamental principle of however, is that the debate is largely religion is to be more than an academic Christianity. The Apostle Paul com- irrelevant. exercise and actually influence lives, it manded: "Pray much for others; plead Even if these abstract reasonings must be conducted in a manner that is for God's mercy upon them; give thanks could conclusively prove the existence of relevant and understandable by laypeo- for all he is going to do for them" God, the revelation should have little ple. This might be accomplished by (1 Timothy 2:1). impact on our lives. Establishing the exis- examining and discussing the particular If, as Christian doctrine asserts, God tence of a deity is a far cry from proving tenets of each religion on a practical, is omnipotent and omniscient, prayer that this deity is intelligent or beneficent; common-sense level. could have absolutely no effect. God and, without these attributes, taking part For example, one might make the would already know what you want in most of the rituals associated with reli- "God Debate" more accessible to a before you pray for it, and presumably gion would still be irrational, or at best, Christian by using arguments drawn he is not going to change his mind nothing more than a crap-shoot. As David from Scripture or Christian doctrine as because you `verbalize" it. Another kind Hume said in his Dialogues Concerning opposed to general, abstract arguments of prayer is gratitude. Again, God would Natural Religion: about God. (My examples involve already know you were grateful before Christianity since that is the majority you prayed, and therefore the only func- While we are uncertain whether there tion of prayer would be to boost his ego is one deity or many; whether the religion in the United States and famil- deity or deities, to whom we owe our iar to most readers). Arguments along and self-esteem, which should be in existence, be perfect or imperfect, this line could include: pretty good shape as it is. 1. The Problem of Cain's Wife. One 4. Analogy to Slavery. Arguments Jeremy Patrick is a newspaper day after church was over, a little boy from analogy can be tremendously columnist in Nebraska awl chair of walked up to the minister with a con- effective when kept simple and short. the American Civil Liberties Union fused look on his face and said: "But if For example, when the rulers of Egypt chapter at the University of Nebraska Adam and Eve only had two children, said to the Jews: "You must obey me College of Law. and Cain killed Abel, where did the rest completely or I will torture and kill you,"

Ea http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 the ruler was a slave-master and the tain. The examples above might cause ments are used, the debate itself must Jew was a slave; Jesus said "You must someone to rethink their position, or be conducted on a level accessible to obey the Word of God and accept me as may only provoke a pithy "The Lord broader groups of people than just your Lord and Savior or you will face Works in Mysterious Ways." Some indi- philosophers and theologians. Other- eternal torture and damnation in Hell." viduals may even embrace Kierke- wise, the question of whether "God" The analogy is strong, but clear. gaard's belief that Christianity is not exists doesn't really matter at all. f 8 Arguments drawn from an individual rational and cannot be proven but that a religion's particular principles, are leap of faith is the only escape from Notes more relevant (and therefore effective) despair. As he said in The Sickness 1. Anthony Flew, ed., Writings on Religion (Peru, to worshipers of that religion. if the Unto Death, "Christianity! Yea, he who Ill.: Open Court, 1992). 2. above examples do not induce doubt, lit- defends it has never believed in it." Wendy Kaminer, "The Last Taboo," New Republic 215, 16; and Rodney Stark, Sociology, 5th edition tle will. Results, however, are never cer- Regardless of which particular argu- (Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth, 1994).

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neighbors. But that proved a tune that creationists were unwilling to whistle. God and Darwin The keynote speaker was biologist Kenneth Miller of Brown University Report from (the hero of the drama), and author of Oz the book, Finding Darwin's God: A Scientists Search for Common Ground Between God and Evolution. Square Off Miller, a man of considerable charm and 1 ebullience, delivered a razor-sharp critique of creationist attacks on evolution, Clay Farris a sock on the jaw to the atheistic zealots ... and a plug for his book. Miller sorted creationist positions f Michael Crichton were going to write ference would not follow the plot of a well- into three camps, which may be labeled a novel about the science-creationism researched blockbuster. There was no young earth (guys who think the world Ibattle, this is where he'd set it: right great crisis, no brilliant reversal, and no is 6,000 years old, 'cause the Bible tells here in Lawrence, on the hilltop campus calming dénouement. Instead, there was 'em so), irreducible complexity (biolo- of the University of Kansas, during a con- a chilling demonstration of how ill pre- gist Michael Behe's pet claim), and fixed ference. And these are the characters pared scientists are to defend their ram- formula (lawyer Philip Johnson's brief). he'd put in it: the embattled chancellor, parts from the fundamentalist besiegers. He then proceeded to cheerfully demol- ish their arguments with smart-bombs of information. From dinosaur copro- Scientists are often ill-prepared to fend lites to the origins of the Krebs cycle to off fundamentalist besiegers. the discovery of North American insect speciation during the history of the United States, Miller had a remarkable rotund, gray, and conventional, strug- The scene of the conference was a trove of refutations. gling to please all sides. The eccentric cathedral-like hall, fully loaded with the Having dispatched the anti-evolu- physicist, awkward and brilliant, with latest innovations in display technology. tionists, he then whirled about and a mop of curly hair and a Latka accent. A rather fitting arena, it seemed, for the mounted an attack on the atheists. The antagonist (Boo! Hiss!): a young- collision of science and religion. Miller, a self-declared Catholic, regards earth creationist, armed with Scripture Things got off to a peculiar start. A the scientific account of universal and and the latest allegations of failures wiry young man with wire-rimmed glass- biological evolution as consistent with of mainstream science. The female off- es and a mop of curly hair abruptly God's Plan. In spite of Miller's vigorous lead: a biologist given to exploring began to lecture us. (In Crichton's book, defense of theism, creationists in the "sacred depths" and possessed of the this would be the eccentric physicist.) crowd were unhappy. unlikely but somehow fitting surname "People think we're nerds," he said, as "Goodenough." And our hero? To reach he prowled like a caged professor at DAY Two, AND COUNTING the broadest possible audience, the Suits feeding time. "Well, let's be nerds, then." The next day dawned bright and full of would insist: he must be expert yet ple- Who is this guy?, I wondered. He hope, but indoors the atmosphere beian, brilliant yet plain-spoken, casual never did introduce himself, but eventu- turned stormy as the conference sailed yet stylish, handsome yet homespun, ally I twigged that he was Hume into the turbulent waters of cosmology, and, most important of all, a champion of Feldman, the co-organizer of the confer- geology, and biology. We began with both science and God! ence. (Named, perhaps, for the atheist Cosmology 101, as presented by P.J.E. Sadly, however, the weekend of the philosopher? I mused: could nomencla- Peebles, Einstein Professor of Physics Origins, Teaching, and Science Con- ture be destiny?). At the opening ses- at Princeton. Peebles is the man most sion, the chancellor of the University of credited with discovering the back- Clay Farris is the founder of the Kansas, Robert Hemenway, who has, we ground heat of the Big Bang. It seemed Lincoln, Nebraska, chapter of Ration, were given to understand, suffered the almost absurd to have the Einstein alists, Empiricists, And Skeptics of slings and arrows of outraged Kansans, Professor of Physics gently explaining Nebraska, known as REASON. The made a brief plea for peaceful coexis- the recession of the galaxies with the conference Mr. Farris writes about tence. He concluded with the declara- aid of a "little green man" cartoon— took place in April 2000. In the fall tion, "I believe in God, I believe in evolu- rather like having your first golf lesson elections, some officials who had tion, and I believe in gravity!" from Tiger Woods. supported the deletion of evolution Coexistence was to emerge as the leit- This cut no cheese with the young- from Kansas's education standards motif of the conference, as speaker after earth creationist in the crowd, who lit were defeated, and in February 2001 speaker offered variation on the idea into the whole cosmological scheme the the policy was at last reversed. that science and religion can be good moment Peebles was done. Several

® http://www.secularhumanism.org in spring 2001 physicists joined the fray, and for some a point of saying that science cannot tion on what geology knows and how it time the air throbbed with red-shifts and pronounce on the existence of God. knows it, emphasizing the dynamic background radiation and, of course, "Ultimacy," she declared, "is outside the nature of that knowledge. However, his the Big Bang itself. But Mark, the cre- bounds of science." In bounds, however, careful presentation gave way to barely ationist, sabred away all the scientific plenty of juicy biology remains to be articulate passion when Mark, the evidence with a claim that the speed of explored, and it is there (to judge from young-earth creationist, rose to ask light is failing, thus allowing a quasar her writings) that Goodenough finds her about research by "Dr. Steven Austin" that appears to be 12 billion light-years religion—in a communion with nature of the Institute for Creation Science on distant to actually be stationed a mere rather than an anthropomorphic deity. rocks at the top of the Grand Canyon. six thousand and change away. To my Goodenough outlined not one, not two, Mark contended that Dr. Austin's study regret, none of the "nerds" in the crowd but six—count 'em, six— wonderful proves radiometric dating always pro- was able to do a calculation swiftly ways of genetic variation. duces old readings no matter what the enough to show how rapidly the speed of John Geissman, a bright-eyed and sample source. Geissman grew so light would have to fall to accommodate mustachioed geologist from New Mexico, angry his mustache twitched. "That's such an illusion. My guess was that in a attempted to underscore the differences wrong!" he cried, referring to the slic- few days it would be moving slower than in lay and scientific terminology by starting method by which Austin presumably a city bus at rush hour. ing his presentation with a recitation of dated the rocks. But a creationist is The task of explaining biological evo- the National Academy of Sciences defini- always ready to move the goalpost. lution fell to the marvelously named tions of "theory" "hypothesis," and Mark triumphantly announced that Ursula Goodenough. A famed cell biolo- "fact." Unfortunately, these were project- these measurements were performed gist, she is also the author of The ed atop a background of blue skies and on whole rocks! "But!" Geissman sput- Sacred Depths of Nature, a popular craggy Western landscapes, making it all tered. "That's even worse!" paean to "religious naturalism." Like but impossible to read them. And no doubt it is, but the creationist the other presenters, Goodenough made He went on to give a great presenta- tactic of casting doubts on the legitima-

http://www.secularhumanism.org cy of science in the language of science for the laity, but when he was done, the God's power) is enormous, while the proved its mettle here. The scientists debate was over. Verdict: creationist benefit of science appears to be avail- were rarely prepared to debunk their objections to radiometric dating are able whether individuals believe in its accusers in plain language. And when only persiflage for the uninformed. claims or not. I saw a bumper sticker the they got angry, they sometimes sounded Moreover, Miller scored the winning other day that summed it all up: "If you like the ideologues creationists accuse point of the conference when he don't believe in God," it read, "you'd bet- them of being. described the way he teaches evolution ter be right." Printed flames from below Things got even worse during the to students "who believe they will lose lick at the words. It's Pascal's Wager all geology discussion period. KU astro- their immortal souls if they learn this over again. physicist Adrian Melott had begun the stuff." He tells them they don't have to The challenge, then, is to explain morning looking much like the Buddha believe it, they only have to understand why Americans should believe in sci- after a good breakfast. By the afternoon, how the theory works. No one in ence, at least enough to preserve it in however, his chin jutted, his brow America has to believe in evolution. the public sphere. They need to answer creased, and his eyes smouldered. the question in political terms. A start Finally, he could bear no more. AFTERMATH might be to tell religionists that science Denouncing creationists as charlatans, When I got back on the road, twenty- provides a neutral buffer between he accused some of them of "bearing four hours later, nothing had been aggressively competing religions, that false witness." A nice turn of phrase. No resolved. without it we would be on the road back doubt he is in their prayers even now. To be fair, the Origins, Teaching, and to religious oppression as various sects And at another discussion, Hume Science conference surely had no ambi- and religions battle to seize the govern- Feldman rung down the curtain by pro- tion of altering the landscape. It set out mental imprimatur. nouncing: "There are some things we to tackle a handful of questions: What In Crichton novels, a bit of scientific just know! The universe may be 10 bil- do we know? How do we know it? Why deus ex machina has a way of creeping lion years old or it may 14 billion years are we confident in our knowledge? In in. Remember in The Andromeda old, but we know it is not ten thousand answering these, the conference did Strain how evolution itself took a prov- years old!" offer comfort, encouragement, and a idential hand in the resolution? Perhaps Well, sure, as a summary of the sci- wonderful refresher course to the if Crichton had written this scenario, the entific consensus, that's fair enough. imperiled science teachers in atten- roof would have parted and the Old Man But to lay ears, that sounds very much dance. It may also have helped some of in the Sky would have commanded his like hardshelled dogma. In the hands of the scientists who took part to better followers to quit kvetching and accept a propagandist that can be made to understand each other's disciplines. evolution. Or perhaps the hero would sound like anti-biblical prejudice. But friends of science and science have stumbled onto a discovery so pro- The scientists, for the most part, teaching must understand this: the ques- found that everyone, believer and infidel were unprepared to explain the tenta- tion many people silently ask themselves alike, would have altered their world- tive yet cumulative nature of their is, "Why should I believe in science?" view forever. But, alas, the conflict knowledge. It was a very curious thing. Given their frame of reference, the cost between science and religion will not be Apart from the rudimentary terms of belief in science (a diminution of so simply resolved. f © offered by Geissman, they seemed to lack an epistemological theory. Isaac SOS Exclusive Offer Collectors Item to Treasure for Years to Come! Asimov would have said, "Of course science is wrong! It was rather wrong yes- SOS Presents .. . terday, and it is, admittedly, somewhat wrong today, and it will be ever-so- An Evening with slightly wrong tomorrow! But it is con- tinually becoming less wrong, and it is demonstrably closer to the truth about nature than any other form of knowl- Stßve edge. Now, kindly tell us, where is your religion wrong?" (See Asimov's essay, "The Relativity of Wrong.") u1en Fortunately, there was at least one scientist at the conference who was a Videotaped live at the Center for Inquiry—West, Friday evening, August 11, 2000. The S0S Conference 2000 reception evening features Mr. Steve Allen's signature wit two-fisted pugilist on matters theologi- and wisdom in an exclusive one-hour performance. The late Mr. Allen concludes his cal and scientific. That would be Ken performance with a stint at the piano and answers questions from the audience. Miller. When the Kansas State geologist Chuckle. Giggle. Laugh out loud. Don't miss this opportunity! bogged down in a trench fight with Mark the creationist over radiometric dating, Only Special Miller bounded to the front of the room. All proceeds benefit SOS, a non-profit addiction recovery organization. To purchase this special videotape, Price! He seized a marker and, with rapid write to SOS, Box 5, Buffalo, NY 14215-0005. Add $20oo strokes, graphed the decay of rubidium $2.00 for postage and handling. Limited Time Offer! into strontium. It was all a bit technical

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 REVIEWS

weight instead of a war—confounded all TURNER DIARIES LITE their predictions. In 1995, two novels by major funda- The Left Behind tribulation novels mentalist Christian leaders appeared, depicting a revised end-times scenario to accommodate the post-Cold War situ- Edmund D. Cohen ation: The End of the Age by Pat Robertson' and Left Behind, the first The following books by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins have been published by Tyndale installment of LaHaye and Jenkins's House in Wheaton, Illinois, and are available in hardcover for $22.99 each: Left Behind, series. In each, a non-manmade disaster 1995, ISBN 0-8423-2911-0; Tribulation Force. 1996, ISBN 0-8423-2913-7; Nicolae, 1997, destabilizes the world's nations, allow- ISBN 0-8423-2914-5; Soul Harvest, 1998, ISBN 0-8423-2915-3; Apollyon, 1999, ISBN 0- ing a charismatic political leader 8423-2916-1; Assassins, 1999, ISBN 0-8423-2920-X; The Indwelling, 2000, ISBN 0-8423- —the Antichrist, promising peace and 2928-5; and The Mark, 2000, ISBN 0-8423-3225-1. prosperity—to rise. He institutes a one- world totalitarian government with its capital in Iraq, the site of ancient arry Potter is not the only super- away, and garbles the well-crafted, dra- Babylon. He also institutes a cashless naturalistic fiction series taking matically effective last chapter. The world economy, and requires all to have Hthe book trade by storm. Tim importance of the book series ought not an identifying number—the "mark of LaHaye, the long-time Christian funda- be underestimated on the film's account. the beast"—affixed to the body or else mentalist leader, and Jerry B. Jenkins, a Why should end-times fiction come to not be allowed to buy or sell. Plagues prolific popular fiction author, have so far the fore now? All during the Cold War, and wars come during a period called brought out eight novels in a series por- didactic end-times books abounded, the Tribulation. The Antichrist is traying the last years of this world defeated at Armageddon. Christ returns according to Revelation. Twenty-three to establish his thousand-year kingdom. million of these books are in print, leav- LaHaye's theory of end-time events ing aside the accompanying children's —his eschatology—is more thoughtful series and the many foreign editions. As and nuanced than Robertson's. LaHaye with Harry Potter, each new Left Behind differs from Robertson and from most of novel draws throngs of people to stores. fundamentalist seminary academia in The Harry Potter books are read by espousing a pre-Tribulation Rapture: kids who take them for the parables of Christ returns and catches all who are middle childhood that they are meant to saved up into the clouds. The Tribulation be. Kids innately understand that the and all the drama involving the Antichrist witchcraft stuff is make-believe. The come after that. People can still become Left Behind books are consumed by saved after the Rapture. But they must go grownups who receive them as deadly through all sorts of travail that the rap- serious instruction about soon-to-come tured believers are spared. LaHaye cataclysmic events. The mainstream avoids some unpalatable implications by media miss that essential difference, allowing the rapture of all children born and treat the Left Behind books as and unborn, and some Catholics, too. cheerful Sunday school curiosities. Robertson shortened his "post-Trib" They are a lot darker than that. Coming scenario into one volume: it begins with as they do from a prominent figure on an asteroid hitting the earth, and ends the politicized Religious Right, the real- with the believers inhabiting the new world ramifications of the series ought Children's flower memorial at the Alfred P. Murrah heavens and new earth in their glorified, not be let pass unnoticed. Federal Building, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The resurrected superbodies. For LaHaye, In order to carry the series' evangelis- Turner Diaries, believed to inspire bomber Timothy the Rapture itself is the disaster that tic thrust to movie theaters and living McVeigh, shares many elements with the Left Behind series. destabilizes the nations. A few newly rooms, the first of the Left Behind books converted, inexperienced believers must has been made into a film. It is a rather presenting a thermonuclear third world then negotiate a world in turmoil. With a lethargic action film, with indifferent war and then the Second Coming. Hal "pre-Trio" Rapture, the dramatic possi- casting, cheesy special effects, and an Lindsey and Edgar C. Whisenant bilities multiply. It's The Pilgrim's incomprehensible plot.' It throws some of became famous with such books in the Progress for the twenty-first century. the book's most ingenious story elements 1980s. Pat Robertson used his television pulpit to predict that such a scenario CRISIS AND AFTERMATH Edmund D. Cohen is the author of The would unfold in 1982. The way the Cold Left Behind opens with airline captain Mind of the Bible-Believer (Prometheus War actually ended—with the collapse Rayford Steele flying along on a routine Books). of the Soviet empire under its own dead run. He thinks about his wife and son,

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org m who are deeply enmeshed in a funda- one-world government. Rosenzweig, the tion, Rayford becomes Nicolae's person- mentalist church near their home in London financiers Jonathan Stonegal al pilot. Chicago. A fault line has opened in their and Joshua Todd-Cothran, and a shad- Back in Chicago, Bruce soon comes family, with the two believers on one owy organization called the Council of to realize that Nicolae is the Antichrist. side, and Rayford and their smart-aleck Ten are grooming an attractive young Bruce outlines for the others the college freshman daughter, Chloe, on politician, Nicolae Carpathia, to front the plagues and calamities soon to come. the other. The beautiful but vacuous one-world government cause. Nicolae The four discuss the need for their head flight attendant, Hattie Durham, has risen meteorically, from backbench group to be "spiritual Green Berets." with whom Rayford is guiltily working member of the Romanian parliament to They decide to call themselves the up to having an affair, comes to the flight president. He is blonde, blue-eyed, and Tribulation Force. The last sentence of deck telling a story Rayford cannot said to be descended from Roman patri- Left Behind reads: "The task of the believe: many of the passengers are cians. Rosenzweig and the financiers Tribulation Force was clear and their missing. Their still-buttoned clothes and finagle Nicolae's appointment as goal nothing less than to stand and fight personal effects lie in little heaps. From Secretary General of the United Nations. the enemies of God during the seven the transceiver, Rayford finds most chaotic years the planet out that the disappearances are would ever see." widespread, and some planes Left Behind closes with the have crashed because their flight promise that Tribulation Force crews disappeared in similar will become a militia group. The fashion. Among the passengers subsequent novels are slow to still on board is Cameron "Buck" keep the promise. The second Williams, the crack Wunderkind installment, titled Tribulation journalist for a Newsweek-like Force, fills out the prophecies to magazine. He interviews Hattie, be fulfilled and furnishes back- among others, regarding the dis- ground about Nicolae Carpathia. appearances. More recurring characters are Among the missing are introduced: Rosenzweig intro- Rayford's wife and son. When duces Buck to Tsion Ben-Judah, an eminent, although fairly Rayford returns to his sad, empty Captain Rayford Steele (Brad Johnson) trying to have a quiet moment home, Assistant Pastor Bruce with flight attendant Hattie Durham (Chelsea Noble). young, rabbinical scholar who Barnes visits him. The church's heads an Israeli government- senior pastor, who has also disappeared, Nicolae has the power of mind-con- sponsored research program to compile foresaw the contingency and left behind trol over all people except the saved. All a definitive list of criteria for the messi- a videotape of himself explaining the world leaders, including a clownish ah. Ben-Judah and Buck go to the Rapture. Viewing it makes Bruce feel Democratic president of the United Temple Mount together, to see the two stricken, since his being left behind States, instantly acquiesce hi his plans: witnesses. These are two disheveled shows up his devotional shortcomings they will scrap 90 percent of the world's men in hooded robes who at first appear and false vocation. Rayford views the armaments, and turn the remaining ten to be disturbed vagrants declaiming tape, becomes convinced that the percent over to the United Nations their delusions in Bible-speak. (There Rapture is the right explanation for the under Nicolae's personal control. The are many like that in real-life disappearances—and has his Damascus national governments they head will be Jerusalem.) But these two speak in New Road experience. Through Hattie, Buck dissolved, and the world redistricted Testament lingo. Whenever someone contacts Rayford, wanting to interview into ten regions, each ruled by a poten- tries to interfere with them, pillars of the fateful flight's pilot. Buck meets tate. The UN will be reconstituted as the fire issue from their mouths to inciner- Chloe. They become saved and marry. Global Community (GC) and relocated ate the offender. Ben-Judah converts to Rayford, Bruce, Buck and Chloe become to New Babylon, Iraq, freshly built on Christianity. When the GC murders the inner clique of Bruce's church. the site of ancient Babylon outside Bruce by slow poisoning, Ben-Judah Among Buck's VIP contacts is Chaim Baghdad. Nicolae will reign from there, becomes the spiritual leader of Rosenzweig, the Israeli Nobel-laureate first as supreme potentate and later as Tribulation Force. Christians come to be biologist and statesman who has invent- god in his very own compulsory New known all over the world as Judah- ed a miracle fertilizer that can make the World Order religion. ites." At its height, Ben-Judah's Internet most arid region blossom. Earlier, Buck, Rosenzweig introduces Buck to cyberministry reaches a billion rank and Rosenzweig witnessed an incident Nicolae. Hattie gets Buck to introduce and file Judah-ites. The remaining main where the Russian Air Force attempted her to Nicolae, whom she has seen on character, David Hassid, is a Sephardic to attack Israel. Before the Israeli Air television. Hattie becomes Nicolae's Jewish Israeli who becomes a high level Force could scramble, the Russian jets personal assistant, then his fiancée. GC functionary, and then a Judah-ite. all flamed out and plunged to Earth.' Nicolae buys up all the world's commu- Eventually, he too is inducted into the In the world of Left Behind, Israeli nication media, making Buck his unwill- Trib Force. political liberals become advocates of ing employee. On Hattie's recommenda- In the next four installments—

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 REVIEWS

Nicolae, Soul Harvest, Apollyon, and entirely underground and cease all par- themselves—the guerrillas have to kill Assassins—the series settles down to a ticipation in the licit economy. So, it while breaking the System and extermi- routine of the Trib Force members trot- appears that, in coming installments, nating all others, they are to do so. Early ting the globe in planes, helicopters, and the Trib Force will have no choice but to on, Turner blows up the Federal Bureau sports utility vehicles, talking on cell become an all-out, any-means-neces- of Investigation's headquarters with a phones and spouting stiff, homiletic dia- sary survivalist militia. fertilizer bomb' to destroy a computer logue at one another. Nicolae atom being readied to drive an internal-pass- bombs those parts of the United States DÉJÀ VU port mark-of-the-beast system. Turner where militia groups—not the Trib When I first became acquainted with calmly reports his participation in ever- Force—challenge the authority of the this story, I had the nagging feeling that bloodier sabotage missions. In a hokey regional potentate. The wreckage gets I had run into it before. That prompted ceremony with hooded gray robes, he is inconveniently in the way of Trib Force me to reread The Turner Diaries.° The initiated into the secret inner leadership auto travel. The Trib Force principals parallels between it and the Left priesthood, the "Order." He writes his spend most of their time rescuing one Behind saga are stunning. last diary entry just before leaving on a another, and rarely get around suicide mission to drop a minia- to doing the GC any real dam- ture atom bomb on the Pentagon age. There is an isolated bloody from a low-flying crop dusting episode where GC police and biplane. His belief that he will Trib Force have a shoot-out in gain immortality of a sort in the an abortion clinic.' Rarely does memories of his peers, and that the GC bother to repress the he has served a holy cause, Trib Force. brings him satisfaction. The epi- In The Indwelling, Rosenz- logue indicates that the weig, feeling like The Sorcerer's Organization subsequently suc- Apprentice, feigns a crippling ceeded in touching off a ther- stroke so that he can get near monuclear third world war. No Nicolae in a wheelchair at a cere- non-Whites or Jews survived, but mony in Jerusalem. Rosenzweig a few pure Whites remained to conceals a scimitar made of spe- build the world anew. (From left to right) Director Victor Sarin, guiding Kirk Cameron (as Buck) cial, semi-magical Israeli metal and Brad Johnson (as Rayford Steele) through a scene. The Left Behind series and that cuts without physical con- The Turner Diaries each pre- tact. It is not clear whether Rosenzweig The Turner Diaries are presented sent a nightmarish, through-the-looking- stabs Nicolae in the lower back or puts as the ancient journal of an urban guer- glass world. Each work's hero is an the blade up his rectum.' Rosenzweig rilla in the Washington, D.C., area dur- insurgent against an insidious, uncanny subsequently becomes a Judah-ite and a ing the early 1990s. It is annotated by conspiracy of world domination originat- Trib Force member. Later, he and Ben- scholars in the distant future when the ing in Israel.' Each is an evangelist, Judah will reside in the same safe house world is all Caucasian and ruled by an always on the lookout for qualified outside Chicago. Aryan priesthood called "The Order." In recruits. The parallelism of GC and the At his stupendous funeral in New their day—the "New Era"—few records System, Judah-ites and the Organi- Babylon, Nicolae is dramatically resur- from the old era survive. Turner's diary zation, the Trib Force and the Order is rected. Thereafter, whenever one GC cit- is a venerated relic. clear enough. (For all Turner knows, izen greets another, he will say, "He is The guerrilla, Earl Turner, finds the there could be a conspiratorial, Jewish risen!" The other will respond, "He is "race mixing" and social decay around Nicolae-counterpart behind the scenes.) risen indeed!" Nicolae takes on an him disgusting. When the "Cohen Act" The Trib Force has supported itself thus altered, Satan-indwelt personality, far outlawing all private ownership of far by embezzling from the GC. The meaner than before. He no longer firearms becomes law, that is the last Organization financed its rampages by requires sleep, and works twenty-four straw. Turner joins a militia group armed robbery and counterfeiting. hours a day, seven days a week on his called "the Organization" bent on over- Rayford Steele's sights are set on a plans to destroy Jerusalem. throwing "the System." In Turner's believers-only utopia; Earl Turner's on a In the current installment, The world, familiar American civic institu- gentiles-only utopia.' Mark, the GC prepares its version of the tions exist, but are irrelevant. The real In The Turner Diaries, everything mark of the beast: Everyone must power is exercised preternaturally by depends on the effectiveness of the guer- accept a tattoo along with injection of an "the Jews," a conspiracy as brilliant as rillas. The book is straightforwardly identity chip and worship Nicolae as it is evil. Clownish elected officials intended to incite people to go out and god, or else be executed on the spot by receive their instructions through the fight "the System." In Left Behind, the guillotine. Without the implanted chip, Israeli embassy. outcome is predetermined. That makes no one can buy or sell. Since salvation is The Organization's ultimate goal is a the Tribulation a personal, largely inte- barred for those who willingly take the world with no non-Whites or Jews. No rior, testing program for each believer, mark, the Judah-ites will have to go matter how many Whites—including not a temporal situation where common

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org 60 effort can alter the outcome. The main ments to upholding democratic institu- armageddon.html. characters in Left Behind are curiously tions, to making them work—to getting 3. The notion of Russia attacking Israel but being turned back despite overwhelming- self-involved, even narcissistic. Left along with those from whom one is dif- ly superior numbers, after Ezekiel 38:14-16, Behind's purpose in the fundamentalist ferent or with whom one disagrees— often appeared in Cold War end-times sce- church scheme of things is devotional. It are false, futile, sinful, discredited val- narios. Although Robertson made it the cen- is a sugar-coated fear manipulation. To ues.'° tral event in his Armageddon in a 1982 sce- the fear of going to burn in eternal fire if For the Trib Force and for the Order nario, he omitted it from his novel. 4. Hattie becomes pregnant with Nicolae's one's devotional life is not right is added alike, chaos, bloodshed, and devasta- child. Because she will not keep her mouth the more easily imaginable fear of being tion are to be welcomed and joyfully shut, Nicolae has her imprisoned. The shoot- left behind to suffer through the embraced. They are mere milestones out ensues when the Trib Force rescues her Tribulation—and perhaps not make the along the way to the devoutly desired, from a coerced abortion. The authors do not pick up on the Rosemary's Baby scenario cut even then. With each installment, radically transformed utopian destina- suggested by the pregnancy. what the errant believer ought to be tion. That thousand-year kingdom is 5. The autopsy physician says the corpse afraid of is made more lurid. The point is neither a democracy nor a republic. It looks "like a cocktail wiener with a sword to keep the devotee too afraid to think is a totalitarian, theocratic monarchy. poking through him." outside that box. One has to feel sorry Such are the "values" LaHaye and 6. By Andrew Macdonald (William L. Pierce) (New York: Barricade Books, 1996). Pierce, the real author of this pseudonymous work first published in 1978, is a well-known racist and anti-Semitic activist. 7. This is the model Timothy McVeigh followed in carrying out the Oklahoma City There is a scurrilous political bombing. 8. For an overview of the sort of conspira- message to the Left Behind books cy theory that drives Turner Diaries and forms at least an integral part of Left that I hardly think the authors Behind, see Daniel Pipes, Conspiracy: How the Paranoid Style Flourishes and Where consciously intend. It Comes From (New York: The Free Press, 1997). In Robertson's novel, the conspiracy theory element is downplayed. His villains are nondescript, swarthy third-woriders, and his for people caught inside those morbid, Jenkins bring to the "public square." compulsory one-world religion is New Age. fictitious preoccupations. In this millennium, those values are There are no Jewish protagonists: Jews play There is a scurrilous political mes- slow poison. little role, except that the population of Israel sage to the Left Behind books that I In the short run, Left Behind does not gets exterminated with a neutron bomb seem likely to incite anyone to drastic dropped on Haifa near the end. hardly think the authors consciously However, four years before the novel intend. If one were to ask them or their action. Still, how dissatisfied must the Robertson went through an intense conspira- readers how they feel about public and fans of these books be with normal, quiet cy theory phase, resulting in his didactic civic life in America, I am sure they lives—how much repressed anger book, The New World Order (Waco, Tex.: would access a different logic-tight men- against those in authority over them Word Publishing, 1991). In it, Robertson rehashed conspiracy theories long associat- tal compartment and declare their loyal- must they harbor—to identify so strong- ed with anti-Semitism, and cited openly anti- ty to the Constitution and their reverence ly with Trib Force? Why is the idea of the Semitic sources. When it first appeared it for the Revolutionary Founding Fathers. world they know being torn to pieces so was all but ignored, despite its many weeks Some of them would no doubt claim that alluring to them? It is troubling to con- on The New York Times hardcover bestseller such loyalty and reverence are exclusive- template what mischief might develop as list. Michael Lind's article in The New York Review of Books, "Pat Robertson's Grand ly conservative Christian virtues. masses of North Americans, induced International Conspiracy Theory," February But look at the public scene por- year after year to become so fundamen- 2, 1995, p. 21 ff., revived interest in it and led trayed in these books. In this respect, tally alienated, get tired waiting for God off a bout of negative press coverage. Left Behind and Turner Diaries are to send up the balloon. f© The mainstream media never delved into the reasons why a meretricious, four-year- exactly the same. In both, mainstream Copyright © 2000 by Edmund D. Cohen old book should suddenly arouse a flurry of American public life and civic leaders interest. Until then, Robertson had had good are depicted as degenerate, irrelevant, Notes relations with Jewish leaders, who welcomed useless, and ready to crumble. Demo- 1. Left Behind: the Movie, Cloud Ten his support for Israel and its Likud leader- Pictures, 2000. A wide theater release, ship. Robertson basked in the respectability cratic institutions play no role at all. planned for February 2, 2001, will have taken he derived from the Jewish leaders' approval. No Communist or Nazi propaganda place when this issue of FI has gone to press. When the Labor Party came to power in ever treated them any worse. Neither Cloud Ten Pictures has produced several Israel and began the Israeli-Palestinian work has the slightest use for other Tribulation epics. peace process, Robertson condemned its pragmatic, tacitly secular Ameri- 2. Published by Word Publications in actions as contrary to biblical prophecy. In Waco, Texas. See my review, "Pat January 1994, he had Ralph Reed attempt to can civilization. LaHaye and Jenkins Robertson's Postmodern Armageddon," The intervene by lobbying some members of are indirectly teaching millions of Freedom Writer, December 1995. Link: Premier Rabin's parliamentary coalition to Americans that passionate commit- http://www berkshire.net/—ifas/fw/9512/ defect, and bring the government down. Such

111 http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 organizations as the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee—after A FEMINIST CASE AGAINST A having observed what amounted to a morato- rium on criticizing Robertson for many years—now became willing to brand him a MATRIARCHAL PAST right-wing extremist. Robertson's abhorrence for "New World The Myth of Order" rhetoric had made his support for Matriarchal President George H.W. Bush ironic. When Joan Kennedy Taylor Bush was defeated in 1992—Robertson having announced that God told him Bush would win—Robertson opined that the loss The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory: Why an Invented Past Won't Give expressed God's disfavor on Bush's deci- Women a Future, by Cynthia Eller (Boston: Beacon Press, 2000, ISBN sion not to depose Saddam Hussein in the 0-8070-6792-X), 276 pp. Cloth $26.00. Gulf War. 9. Although Left Behind pales in comparison to The Turner Diaries in ethnic ani- mus, it is not unobjectionable. Left Behind ynthia Eller is an interesting and What is the myth? It is that patri- seems all very friendly to Jews. In the top appealing writer who clearly archy, the domination of men in the fam- leadership of the Trib Force, Israelis out- shares a number of feminist con- ily and society, was preceded in prehis- number WASPS three to two. But the three C are of a kind almost as scarce as unicorns in cerns about sexism and male domina- toric times by a universal golden age of real life: Israeli Jewish converts to Chris- tion but is impatient with any attempts matriarchy that lasted for millennia tianity. In Israel, that still violates a strong to solve social problems by abandoning before written records existed. Women taboo. To contend that Jews must either con- reason or fudging the facts. Since the were revered and even worshiped vert or else go to hell demeans the vast majority of actual Jews who are secular or days of the nineteenth-century Woman because they bore children. In addition, traditionally religious. There is more. In Left Movement, those who want to advance these societies were peaceful and god- Behind, 144,000 Jewish "witnesses" are to the cause of women have been divided dess-worshiping. Then, roughly about convert and become spiritual leaders. That over whether they wanted to celebrate 3,000 B.C.E., something unknown number—far less than one percent of the the ways in which women and men occurred, and we have had a near-uni- Jewish population in the world now—represents a strict quota. There is no quota on the share a joint humanity, and therefore versal patriarchy ever since. This sup- number of non-Jews who may become ask that women be admitted to social, posed change has been attributed to "Tribulation saints." In The Mark, Nicolae's educational, occupational, and political events as varied as the invention of agri- preparations to destroy Jerusalem prompt equality with men; or whether they want culture, the invention of writing, the Rayford to ready the Judah-ite network to airlift the Jews out of Israel. That will appar- to emphasize the sexual differences and onslaught of evil invaders, or, especially, ently play out in the next installment. What a different gender roles of men and the discovery of paternity: the fact that way to broach the subject of disestablishing women, and ask that society glorify and children had fathers as well as mothers. Israel and subjecting its people to yet anoth- protect women because of these differ- If there are no written records, how er exile! Like Rosenzweig's scimitar, these ences. Eller belongs to the first group, can we know? We can gather data books cut without making contact where Jews are concerned. and sees most supporters of what she through analysis of oral traditions and There are a couple of token Arab converts chooses to call "The Myth of Matriarchal myths, through findings in archeological in Left Behind. But Muslims seem to be com- Prehistory" as members of the second. sites, and perhaps through linguistic pletely quiescent. Even in Iraq, they are seen Why, she asks, should we accept as valid and genetic analysis showing migratory but not heard. (Where is Saddam Hussein when one wants him?) all the reasons that women have tradi- patterns. Eller examines much of the African Americans fare no better. There tionally been socially disvalued, namely cited evidence in some detail, and finds is one minor and unsaved African-American the view they are and should be primar- that there is really no support for the character. The film adds a nice touch in cast- ily occupied with childbearing and child theory of a universal matriarchal past. ing African Americans as Bruce and his pre- care (and further, that they epitomize However, in southeast Europe and the decessor (seen only on the Rapture instruction video). the earthy, the "natural," and the sexu- Near East, there is some evidence on 10.In conservative Christian circles, there al), in order to proclaim that such char- which a hypothesis of a possible matri- has been much recent discussion as to acteristics make women superior to archal prehistory might be based. whether the Moral Majority/Christian men rather than inferior? Archeological digs have turned up Coalition style of religion in politics was a good female statues that might be goddesses idea. When outsiders look at the matter, they see a formidable constituency added to the Joan Kennedy Taylor is the author of and some indication from burial sites Republican electoral coalition. When insiders Reclaiming the Mainstream: Individ- that certain women may have been hon- view it, they see that they have neither taken ualist Feminism Rediscovered and ored; myths in Greece and Crete and over the political system, nor scored a decisive What to Do When You Don't Want to Sumer speak of priestesses and the win on any of their key issues. There is sincere worry that the pursuit of right-wing politics Call the Cops: A Non-Adversarial overthrow of goddesses. And there is may have been at the expense of evangelism. Approach to Sexual Harassment. She is evidence of a possible late Neolithic The nagging issue of God's disfavor evidenced the national coordinator of the migration from the steppes of Russia by political activity not gone right intrudes. Association of Libertarian Feminists that could lend credence to the idea that The radical civic alienation of the Left Behind peaceful and prosperous European sites books may be an overdramatization of that and the vice president of Feminists political frustration. f © for Free Expression. were invaded and, presumably, con-

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org co quered by patriarchs. But much of this is ideas by feminist anthropologist schol- archeological finds, it still has no expla- entirely inconclusive. Eller shows pho- ars. The second is the rise, beginning in nation for the changes that occurred. tographs of objects said to represent an the 1970s, of the feminist spirituality Why, she asks, does this myth per- abstract representation of a woman's movement, which early became interest- sist even though there is no real evi- breasts connected to her internal ed in any indication of historical god- dence that prehistoric societies were organs, and by photographing these in dess worship. And the third factor is the radically different and no reason to various positions shows that they could somewhat controversial work of a expect that they were? Because it pur- just as well be phallic representations. knowledgeable Lithuanian archeologist, ports to answer troubling questions And she points out that literate societies Marija Gimbutas, who came to this about the origins of inequity and offers show that artistically representing country from Europe in 1949 and difference as a source of pride. Should women has no necessary connection worked first at Harvard's Peabody we then keep it as a useful myth, and with revering them, particularly when Museum and became a professor at the simply stop considering that it has his- they are depicted in erotic poses. University of California at Los Angeles toric validity? Eller thinks not. She Despite the fact that this myth is pro- in 1963, gradually specializing in find- finds it dangerous for feminism to grav- mulgated today in the name of feminism, ings that indicated prehistoric goddess itate to such strong theories of sex dif- it was first articulated by scholars inter- worship. Gimbutas read twenty lan- ference, and notes with concern that ested in evolutionary anthropology in the guages and personally examined a num- many devotees of the myth focus so nineteenth century and for a while was ber of the European and Near Eastern strongly on the postulated golden age considered almost as dogma. The idea archeological sites that contained that they discount all the advances pre- appealed to Marx and especially Engels, remains from the Upper Paleolithic to sent in our culture and long instead for and was consequently held by Soviet Neolithic period—that is, from about a "more natural" life of living off the anthropologists as late as the 1950s. It 8000 to 3000 B.C.E. Her first book dealt land in a foraging society. Anyway, she was later picked up by some psycholo- with both gods and goddesses in prehis- claims, feminists don't need such a gists, including Freud, some Jungians, toric times, but her two later works myth, since our present society has no and Wilhelm Reich, as well as by writers were concerned first with The inherent barrier to equality, and offers like Robert Graves. Eller notes that one Language of the Goddess and, finally, us better ways to remake our lives. group that in general rejected the idea The Civilization of the Goddess. "The fact that anatomy once was des- consisted of feminist anthropologists, Eller apparently examines the exist- tiny, then, does not mean that it need be except for a few who were explicitly ing scholarship carefully, and concludes so any longer." And she concludes with socialist. As scholarly research in related that indications of the existence of pow- a ringing call for action based on ratio- areas increased, the myth seemed to erful women within a civilization does nality: "If we are certain that we want have less and less factual basis. not mean that such civilizations are not to get rid of sexism, we do not need a Three factors shaped the present- male dominated—either now or then. mythical time of women's past great- day form in which the myth is promoted, The myth, she concludes, is "a house of ness to get on with the effort toward however almost exclusively by femi- cards." Even in areas where the myth ending it.... We need to decide what nists. The first is the rejection of these offers one possible explanation for we want and set about getting it." f ©

excludes miracle stories. We might infer LESS IS MORE that, if we had comparably good sources from which to reconstruct the life and teaching of Jesus we would come out with something similarly sane (however Robert Price uninspiring). But all this presupposes a picture of The Quest for the Historical Muhammad, Ibn Warraq, ed. and trans. Islam, the Koran and the traditional (Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books, 2000, ISBN Hadith (sayings and deeds of 1-57392-787-2), 568 pp. Cloth $34.95. Muhammad) that recent scholarship Ikn has violently swept away. The Quest for the Historical Muhammad, like its or many years, the question of parison between Islamic origins as we predecessor The Origins of the Koran Koranic and Islamic origins has thought we knew them and the vexing (Prometheus, 1999), does everyone a Fseemed a pretty simple matter. quagmire of Christian origins, as if to great service by assembling otherwise We supposed we had a fulsome deposit tease Christian apologists as well as of the inspired preaching of the founder, serious New Testament scholars: "Too Robert M. Price is director of the as well as a great fund of traditions, bad you can't point to the same kind of Center for Inquiry NJ/NYC, a member many of them stemming from eyewit- evidence, eh?" The comparison was of the Jesus Seminar, and professor of nesses, about his character and career. especially tempting because the biblical criticism at the Center for Some scholars made an invidious com- received account of Muhammad's life Inquiry Institute.

m http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 REVIEWS

unobtainable sources, some hitherto have, seemingly in one fell swoop, they so preoccupied Muhammad's mind untranslated, and adding insightful learned all these things and already that he could not help retelling the sto- commentaries and summaries of the produced compelling alternative ac- ries of Noah, Moses, and Abraham by research. The parallel with Albert counts of Islamic origins rivaling those exact analogy to his own: same jibes, Schweitzer's Quest of the Historical of Walter Bauer (Orthodoxy and same opponents, same responses Jesus: From Reimarus to Wrede, sug- Heresy in Earliest Christianity), coached by Allah. And it would make gested by the title, is a true one, not James M. Robinson and Helmut Koester sense that way. But why not turn the least in regard to the arresting and pen- (Trajectories Through Early Chris- thing right around? Why not say there etrating observations made by editor tianity), and Burton Mack (A Myth of was a standard topos of the heckled Ibn Warraq. Innocence; The Lost Gospel; Who prophet (as there certainly was of the It is like the sweet blast of air condi- Wrote the New Testament?) for early persecution of prophets), and that the tioning amid the swelter of New Jersey Christianity. Perhaps it seems such a conformity of Muhammad to the type in July (my "scene of writing") to read precipitous landslide because of the was as arbitrary and fictive as the set forth plainly what one had often rapid-fire sequence in which we read assimilation of Moses and Noah to it? vaguely suspected: that Western schol- them in the present collection. But most And further, if we suppose the whole arship on Islam had completely abdicat- of the relevant writing is pretty recent. thing to have emerged from the Syrian ed the critical enterprise and, to put it And now the lid is off. sectarian matrix that included Jewish bluntly, sucked up to Muslim orthodoxy. If all the hadith are tendentious fic- Christianity, we might posit that it was It is as if Jewish scholars had simply tions arising, precisely as Bultmann the Ebionite/Elchasite/Manichean doc- swallowed the classic paradigm of the said the gospel apophthegms did, as trine of the True Prophet reincarnated Roman Catholic Church with the sole narrative interpretations of cryptic say- again and again throughout salvation difference that Jesus was not the Jewish ings (in this case, enigmatic or incoher- history that accounts for the assimila- Messiah. In large measure, this has ent Koranic passages); if the archaeo- tion of all these prophets to the same been the result of wild-eyed ecumenists logical evidence shows Mecca held no topos. It happened the same way in who in the name of dialogue are all too special prominence in the economy of each case because it was the same willing to give away the store if only the Hejaz (northwestern Arabia) at scene being replayed over and over. their dialogue partners will like them. Muhammad's time; if the surprisingly It is remarkable, astonishing, just Witness the grotesque spectacle of numerous contemporary non-Islamic how little we are left thinking we know Rabbi Pinchas Lapide confessing that accounts of Islamic origins indicate about Muhammad in the wake of the new God raised Jesus from the dead in order there was only an Arab conquest, not scholarship. And the resultant skepti- to jump-start Christianity as a kind of yet a Muslim one, that the Islamic cism (if I may continue on this hobby- "Plan B" Judaism for the Gentiles. In the Shari'ah (Law code) had nothing origi- horse for a moment) tends to add plausi- same way, Western scholars of Islam nally to do with the Koran; if bility to the skeptical stance taken by (whether Christian, Jewish, or secular) Muhammad was at first the herald of the many of us with regard to the historical have dissented from the orthodox Messiah `Umar—where are we? Where Jesus. For one thing, it now becomes pos- Islamic account in the sole point of mak- is Islam? It would seem that Arabs had sible to wonder if "Muhammad" is after ing Muhammad the channeler of his own cobbled together a monotheistic religion all what it has always sounded like: an prophetic subconscious, rather than of to provide theological legitimacy for honorific title, not a personal name. It Allah himself. themselves among their conquered means "Illustrious One," just as Jesus But what if scholars of Islam did Christian, Jewish, Mandean, and other sounds suspiciously titular, meaning what Rabbi Jacob Neusner did when he sectarian subjects. Islam was the result, "Savior" or "Salvation." We thought we learned methodological skepticism from and its birthplace was Syria/Mesopo- knew when Muhammad was born, but it Bultmann and other radical New tamia, not in Arabia at all, except in turns out that the earliest treatments of Testament critics, and applied it to the imaginary retrospect. This picture, how- the subject allow a latitude of some Midrash and Talmud? What if scholars ever shocking, makes a lot of sense of a eighty-five years just as Jewish sources of Islam learned to understand the lot of things, even of some puzzles not place Jesus 100 B.C.E., just as Irenaeus Koranic surahs as variant versions of yet raised by the original theorists. has Jesus reach the age of fifty before he oral traditions and pre-Islamic text frag- For example, John Wansbrough died. How could people be so confused ments authored by disparate, unknown makes the seemingly mad suggestion about these things if they were matters of individuals? What if they learned to that the prophetic self-consciousness well-known recent fact? Tradition attrib- decode stories ostensibly about the life everywhere evident in the Koran stems utes a number of sons to Muhammad, but of the Meccan Prophet as instead stem- from no one individual but is rather a lit- tradition-criticism reveals them as theo- ming from and relevant to later situa- erary topos derived somehow from the logical fictions. May the same be so for tions in the history of Islam? What if we sectarian milieu in which Islam was first the list of Jesus' supposed brothers in admitted, as we should have learned forged, and that by scholars, not Mark 6:3? That passage looks suspi- from Collingwood long ago, that histori- prophets. I had always taken the end- ciously like the list of the Twelve in Mark cal falsehoods may yet be evidence for less and redundant accounts of the 3:13-19. Are both fictive lists, competing the history of propaganda? Prophet's back-and-forth with hecklers for clout, between later groups who Islamicists, if not Muslim savants, to be historically authentic, and that sought to associate themselves after the

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

fact with a mythical founder, one as pared to the Christian, Peters now pities less is more. The more of the origin sto- "Companions/disciples," the other as the newly insecure situation of ries of the great religions we learn is fic- "relatives/Heirs"? Islamicists compared with the firm foun- tive, the more light is shed, paradoxical- In light of all these possible parallels, dation of gospel historicity, a rosy pic- ly, both on their actual origins and hith- it is exasperating, as one proceeds ture he has derived from the most retro- erto-unknown intermediate stages of through this book, to smack up against grade ax-grinders available, conserva- their evolution, enshrined, if one knows E E. Peters's utterly clueless attempt at tive apologists Stephen Neill, N.T. how to read it, in the stele of propagan- comparing historical Jesus and histori- Wright, and John A.T. Robinson. da and legend. The same pattern of dis- cal Muhammad scholarships. Exactly As this wonderful set of scholarly covery and rediscovery meets us in the reversing the comparison I made at the documents shows, we are in the midst of case of Christian origins theory, Old outset, whereby the Islamic question an exciting time of historical reconsid- Testament "minimalism," and, now, was considered simple and clear com- eration which has begun to show that Islamics. f©

park (September 1977), where THE DEVIL'S LAUGHTER Adventureland offers the Middle East and the Cosa Nostra ("They also own this theme park"), and Frontierland Brian Siano showcases the provision of cholera- infected blankets to Native Americans, Totally MAD, The Learning Company/Broderbund, 7 CD-ROMs, while visitors at a recreated slave auc- $69.95, Windows 95/98, NT. tion can "inspect their almost authentic teeth and whip their quivering backs." To see the Devil as a partisan of Evil may even find yourself recalling the And for those bigger questions, try the and an angel as a warrior on the side exact words of certain articles as you "Religion in America Primer" of Good is to accept the demagogy of (September 1972): the angels. Things are of course more reread them for the first time in complicated than that. decades. The Priest helps Catholics in time of For example—just one out of 20,000 need. —Milan Kundera, The Book of He helps them solve business prob- Laughter and Forgetting pages— older readers may recall some- lems, thing like Gary Belkin's "A Realistic Even though he has never been in Children's Book for Realistic Kids," business. he box doesn't lie this time. A from September 1961: He helps them solve marriage prob- childhood dream has come true. lems, "A Mother is to hide behind when even though he has never been mar- TEvery issue of MAD Magazine. Daddy gets mad at you." ried. Every movie parody. Every "Spy vs. "Tears are to get your own way." He helps them solve sexual problems Spy," every Fold-In, every Primer, and "Mother's Day is for Daddy to buy Even though he has never had sex. every Snappy Answer to every Stupid Mommy a present and say it's from Now you know why the Catholic Question. The MAD Zeppelin is there, as you." Church Believes in miracles! is the notorious MAD Flag Poster from Now, this is stuff every kid knows is Special #5. For less than a hundred dol- true, but it's also something a kid never Parody is a simple technique in lars, you can now own every fershlug- hears from anyone in authority. But humor, but it was one of MAD's best giner issue of MAD. MAD drew you into confidence and tricks. Issue 12 sported a digestlike The Universe has opened, and whole whispered, even though you're a kid, "High Class" cover, which "makes people new meanings of the word covet have and no grownup will admit it, you're think you are reading high-class intellec- become manifest. right. It's as though someone explained tual stuff instead of miserable junk." The And yes, there are good reasons the sleight of hand behind a really good cover of issue 20 was designed to look we're discussing it here. The first magic trick. like those pebbledy-black composition involves a fearless prediction about vir- Did you want to hear some more? book covers that are still used today, tually anyone who buys Totally MAD. MAD introduced us to Mr. A.K. Kut- "designed to sneak into class." You will load the software, toy with the trayte, June 1963's "Discount Store Even with these simple acts of interface a little, and then you will hunt Owner of the Year," who explained the typography, MAD could make the origi- down the first issue you ever read. You racket behind his sale prices—"See, the nal look empty, ridiculous, or fraudu- trick is to make up a ridiculous list price lent. In the excessively tactical lan- Brian Siano writes about /'tried top- for the tag and then sell the item for guage of academics, this is called ics such as rccorered memory thera- more or less what it usually sells for in "appropriation," which is a "strategy" py, political correctness, scientific the first place! ... We raise the list price of "transgression." But kids under- racism, and the public relations to $139—and still sell it for $64! Get it?" stand that MAD magazine has stolen industry. There was the "Reality World" theme the mojo, and used it against its own-

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 ers. And it forces you to wonder: if it's like racial prejudice, famine, incompe- idating the world is going to be. They this easy to fake the stuff we're sup- tent rulers, and nuclear war. Under the have the sincere desire that life will be posed to respect, well ... does it mean light of television and the shadow of able to provide some positive magic for that that stuff might be fake, too? the Bomb—or vice versa—a thousand them. And they've grown into the capa- satirists bloomed, ranging from the- bility to understand a good, enticing Things deprived suddenly of their sup- atrical groups (The Compass, Second posed meaning, of the place assigned explanation for it all. It's usually at this to them in the so-called order of City) and comedians (Mort Sahl, Lenny age that Catholics are confirmed, Jews things, ... make us laugh. In origin, Bruce) to writers (Terry Southern, are mitzvah'd, techies read Ayn Rand, laughter is thus of the devil's domain. Joseph Heller) and cartoonists (Jules and the lucky tribes get the peyote but- It has something malicious about it Pfeiffer). It was a field that many tons. (things suddenly turning out different from what they pretended to be), but reviled as "sick" or "black." This is the other reason why we're to some extent also a beneficent relief Tony Hendra, whose own pedigree talking about it here. MAD has spent fifty (things are less weighty than they includes the Cambridge Footlights and years reaching those isolated young appeared to be letting us live more the National Lampoon, outlined the Martians who are wondering about that freely, no longer oppressing us with history of this Black Plague in his their austere seriousness). [Milan real-and-fake question. Don't look for Kundera, The Book of Laughter and engaging Going Too Far. At the time, some higher morality behind MAD, as Forgetting] what Hendra calls "Boomer humor" though satire were some kind of public had a clandestine feel of shared service program, like polio shots. MAD MAD was born from austere serious- strangeness, where the practitioners told us that it was all fake—govern- ness. In the early 1950s, moral cru- and audience alike were "sending up ments lie, religions are gibberish, corpo- saders and a Senate Judiciary flares for one another, tentatively rations sell you garbage for a quick Committee shut down publisher William drumming out messages in the night, buck, the world is in the hands of idiots Gaines's horror comics, leaving him leaving notes in hollow trees; 'I too am and con men, and even your own parents with nothing but MAD to publish. Co- a Martian.— John E Kennedy may have are lying to you most of the time. MAD founder Harvey Kurtzman turned it into talked about passing a torch to a new has cultivated millions of doubters, skep- a magazine before leaving after a few generation... but the people in charge tics, anarchists, and cynical little bas- issues, so Al Feldstein took over. didn't want that generation playing tards among several generations of American humor was liberating with matches. America's kids. itself from vaudeville wheezes to Somewhere between the ages of MAD has given us the Devil's address subjects previously off-limits, eight and twelve, kids realize how intim- Laughter. f f3

A HOLLOW VISION ON impossible. Therefore in the presence of comes the second, and unique, thrust of religious diversity, a protected forum is his argument: Connolly argues that CHURCH AND STATE required from which the language, modern secularism erodes diversity. It is claims, and value judgments of religion limited by the presumptions of the Why I Am Not a Secularist, by William E. Connolly (Minneapolis: University of can be excluded. Only thus can the peo- Christian milieu in which it arose, while Minnesota Press, 1999) 210 pp. Cloth ple's business go forward unimpeded by its clumsy attempts to erect a cordon $29.95 ISBN 081663312, paper $19.95 sectarian contention. To be sure, this sanitaire around the public square ISBN 081663320. approach has its difficulties: While reli- stand in the way of full-throated social gion engages believers' deepest meta- dialogue. Expect to hear a lot about Why I Am Not physical and ethical commitments, sec- Connolly slings postmodernist jargon a Secularist. This influential postmod- ularism requires participants in public with a heavy hand. "To change an inter- ern critique is already spawning approv- debate to accept a pact to eschew reli- subjective ethos significantly is to modi- ing neoconservative seminars. Its gious appeals. fy the instinctive subjectivities and author, a professor of political science at Connolly makes the most of those dif- intersubjectivities in which it is set," he Johns Hopkins, is an atheist who adds a ficulties. He begins with the familiar writes. "But this may sound like mumbo novel thrust to familiar neoconservative neoconservative argument from "moral jumbo to many secularists" (p. 28). No claims that America, is "outgrowing" sec- capital": American democracy relies on comment. Anti-science is a postmodern ularism. Stripped of its worst postmod- a Tocquevillian ethical deposit that staple, but Connolly raises the bar with ern excesses, Connolly's analysis will be sprang from Christianity and is now his seemingly serious contention that echoed by many opponents of church- being depleted. Neoconservatives like "several human brains" are "involved in state separation. Richard John Neuhaus and Irving our thought-imbued emotional life" (p. To secularists, church-state separa- Kristol see this as reason to return to 28). He describes the amygdala as "a tion benefits not only the church but the social Christianity. The postmodern small, almond-shaped brain" (p. 28) and state as well. Democratic debate Connolly seeks a "deep plurality" or, as speaks knowingly of "higher brains demands compromise, yet zealous reli- he often calls it, plurivocity (a plurali- such as the hippocampus and the pre- gious belief can make compromise ty of voices). From this perspective frontal cortex" (p. 175). The stomach is

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org a brain, too (p. 175). "Since the multiple DEFICIENT DIRECTORY denial, not indulgence. brains in each human have a complex The mayor (Alfred Molina) takes a social structure, with numerous sites Who's Who in Hell: A Handbook and particular disliking to Juliette and gets existing in domestic, foreign, and war- International Directory for Humanists, most of the townies believing she's like relations, you work on several reg- Freethinkers, Naturalists, Rationalists, and Hitler, Mussolini, and Howard Stern all isters of subjectivity and intersubjectiv- Non-Theists, compiled by Warren Allen rolled up into one. Nevertheless, Judi ity in relation to each other" (p. 176). To Smith (New York: Barricade, 2000), $125. Dench, who plays Juliette's cranky do this work, Connolly counsels landlord, takes a liking to the Queen of shamanistic "arts of the self" inspired This volume purports to be both an Candy, as do a few other select towns- equally by Nietzsche and Michel encyclopedia of nonbelievers past and a folk who appreciate her unconditional Foucault. Again, the secularist's blood- directory of nonbelievers present. It is friendship—not to mention her Viagra- less rationalism only gets in the way. marred by its unfortunate title; even in-a-bonbon (forty years before its Secularism fails because it short- though written with tongue in cheek, it time.) changes "the visceral register" (p. 3). It is is sure to stoke the fires of the critics of In case Alfred didn't have enough deaf to the power of intuitive moral unbelievers. There are many inaccura- reasons to be sanctimonious, enter responses like disgust. Connolly calls cies in the work, and they are exces- Johnny Depp as the rugged Irish river instead for a polity of the receptive yet sive. For example, the volume never rat, who is roundly hated by the inhabi- thick-skinned, an ideal society in which mentions that Michael Ruse has written tants of whatever shore he docks at each person's deepest religious or meta- books on Darwinism, nor does it give (despite his charms and good looks). Of physical convictions can become the stuff his year of birth. It leaves out a line in course, Johnny and Juliette hit it off, its listing of Thomas Flynn and most of public debate. Under his "multidimen- which only chaps the hides of the intol- sional pluralism," "many partisans affirm signers of Humanist Manifesto 2000. erance league even more. It does not mention the fact of James without deep resentment the contestable Anyway, the forces of rigidity and character of the fundamental faith they Farmer's death in 1999, nor that he was dogma clash with those of tolerance and honor most" (p. 39). This is a plea for mul- a leader in the civil rights movement compassion, and t & c win because Humanist Manifesto tilateral epistemological humility, yet it's and a signer of they're more fun to be around. The End. does not never clear how Connolly hopes to II. The section on Gilbert Ryle I don't mean to belittle this story, The achieve it without the metaphysical cite his most important book, because it's well done in many ways. On There are many buffering that secularism provides. Ghost in the Machine. the surface, Chocolat is nicely shot, other egregious errors and omissions, well-acted, and features music that both Democratic debate requires almost on every page. If only the editor fits and entertains. Jacobs's script is protection against the had checked the facts carefully before solid and effective. publication. This volume is not without divisive, ultimately A bit deeper, we find a clear message some merit, though as a reference work about how dogma and authority should nonnegotiable it is seriously deficient in scholarship. demands of faith. never supersede the warmer aspects of Warren Allen Smith is to be congratu- our humanity. A woman who only seeks lated for conceiving of the need for such Staunch believers in exclusivistic to bring moments of pleasure to a drab a directory. However, it should have creeds generally refuse to acknowledge little town is widely condemned because the "uncertainty and profound contesta- been impartial. Rather, it is full of pleasure is thought to distance one from Smith's own subjective predilections, bility" of their own worldviews (p. 185). God. Juliette's flat-out rejection of an gossip, and innuendo rather than objec- Though Connolly disapproves, millions invitation to attend church early in the tive citations. of people do "insist upon the incontro- movie places her squarely in the enemy vertibility" of their creeds (p. 187). camp. Someone mentions the A' (athe- Therein lies the fatal flaw in his argu- CHOCOLAT 1, GOD 0 ist) word soon after, and the leap to ill- ment - and the reason why a religiously repute becomes a short one from there. Chocolat. Directed by Lasse Hallström. diverse democracy needs secularism. Screenplay by Robert Nelson Jacobs. Novel Believers will probably come out of Democratic debate requires protection by Joanne Harris. this thinking that this is another exam- against the divisive, ultimately nonnego- ple of God's true message being man- tiable demands of faith. Connolly thinks This is the fairytale-like story of a sin- gled by his misguided followers. Secular it "unrealistic ... to pretend to bypass gle mother (Juliette Binoche) who humanists will more likely see them- this dimension of politics" (p. 187). I'd blows into a small French town with selves in the persecuted woman's shoes, suggest that secularism's way of shield- her young daughter (Victoire Thivisol) and pine for a world where religion ing democratic debate from pious abso- during Lent, and opens up a chocolate couldn't have started this mess in the lutism is absolutely necessary. At least, shop. She uses an old Mayan recipe first place. it is in a world where human beings that sparks the passions within her The moral of this story is to see or have only one brain. patrons, thereby causing the local stiffs rent Chocolat if you get the chance. It's (most of the town) to get their girdles in lip-smacking good. —Tom Flynn a bunch. Lent, after all, is a time of —James Underdown f f3

CEI http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001

(Letters contó from p. 23) the opening of a session of the Senate. are no more than "verbiage borne by the If one turns to Psalm 46 in the King wind on their way to nowhere." why, in the long run, ethical behavior is James Version—no other version will K.B. Keveren CWO-W4 USN (Retired) in their best interest. work here—and counts the words from Lukeville, Arizona There should be a position between the beginning, one finds that the 46th the "democratized" classroom and the word is shake. Then, if one counts the "authoritative" classroom. I would say words backward from the end—dis- to the student, "These rules have been regarding the musical notation, Selah, The Never-ending established after much study by many at the end—one finds that the 46th word Question qualified thinkers. If you think a rule is is spear. The King James Version was pub- wrong, feel free to submit your argu- Theodore Schick, Jr., presented a lished in 1611. William Shakespeare's ments. Until you can show that the rule cogent argument for a "scientific" proof baptism was recorded in Stratford- is wrong, you will be expected to learn that a theistic God does not exist ("Can upon-Avon, Warwickshire, on April 26, and practice it as taught." Science Prove that God Does Not 1564; it is commonly held that he was Ardith Wayne Eaton Exist?," FI, Winter 2000/01). I think his born about three days earlier. Thus, Silver City, New Mexico distinction between logical proof and Shakespeare was in his 46th year from scientific proof has merit as a response April 1610 to April 1611, during the time to the "Intelligent Design" idea—logi- that the translation of the King James Sommers's essay is all rant and no rea- cally, we can't say it isn't so, but maybe Version from Hebrew and Greek into son. She overgenerali7es about "a thirty- we can scientifically, and that is as English was being completed. year experiment with moral deregula- good as we can hope for in a world that Several questions arise: (1) Did one tion" in schools, but offers only quotes is fundamentally uncertain. Science, of the translators arrange the word from educational theorists as evidence. however, still can't explain many, many order in the English version of Psalm This fatuous claim is rebutted by her own phenomena, most importantly, the ori- 46 as a clandestine tribute to the reference to the character education gin of life. Shakespeare, who seems to have movement. (Indeed, my children's public Although Professor Schick said he moved in about 1610 (some say 1612) school teaches "Character Counts.") was writing about a theistic God, his from London back to Stratford and into Sommers speculates about Colum- description ("to explain various phe- semi-retirement? (2) Did Shakespeare bine as if it were the norm and romanti- nomena, such as the origin of the uni- himself participate in the translating cizes about a past when moral education verse, the design of the universe, and and hide his own wry little joke in was standard. Standard moral education the origin of living things") seemed to Psalm 46? (During his childhood he was—let's face it—largely religious more nearly concern an impersonal attended the free Stratford Grammar indoctrination. It not only didn't prevent deistic God. Doesn't this leave him in School where a gifted child might have freak murders (Leopold and Loeb, for the position of asking science to studied the classical languages.) (3) Is one), but it did nothing to prevent the explain morality, without a theistic the entire matter nothing more than a widespread horrors of lynching. God? E.O. Wilson thinks science can do curious coincidence? Beyond the lessons of tolerance, this eventually. Are there some Shakespearean schol- equality, and character that most Allan D. Halderman ars among FREE INQUIRY'S readers who schools I know teach, what "indoctrina- Tucson, Arizona tive" training about right and wrong could shed some light on this matter? would Sommers have schools impose? Richard Rymer She doesn't say, but I have little doubt Kent, Ohio that it would be an invitation to the Religious Right to infuse its oppressive WRITE TO FI theology into the public curriculum. Chaplains in the Senate, the House of Clayton Naff Representatives, and the military •Send submissions to Norm Allen, Jr., Lincoln, Nebraska should be paid by the cults that spawned them. Chaplains offered to the Letters Editor, FREE INQUIRY, P.O. military should not be commissioned or Box 664, Amherst, NY 14226-0664. noncommissioned officers. Chaplains •For letters intended for publication, should not be allowed to don the uni- Prayer in the please include name, address form of the service to which their cult (include name, address (including has assigned them. If chaplains must Senate city and state), and daytime phone plant their posteriors in the soft seats of number (for verification purposes In Robert S. Alley's article, "The Senate the Congress, they should be attired in only). Letters should be 300 words Chaplain and God as Ex-Officio Member" their traditional habits. or less and pertain to previous (Winter 2000/01), the author refers to the It is a disgrace that Chaplain Lloyd FREE INQUIRY articles. U.S. Senate chaplain's having quoted Ogilvie receives $320 per day of our fed- from Psalm 46 during a prayer given at eral tax monies to issue prayers that

free inquiry http://www.secularhumanism.org D (God contd.. from p. 6) specifically defended the morality of ists. One does not have to be a theist in atheists (in a letter to Thomas Law in order to demand equal protection of this was irrelevant to his role as presi- 1814). This principle applies all the the laws. They apply equally to unbe- dent. In our view, the president and his more to citizenship, where a person's lievers. Justices William Rehnquist, or her administration should remain private religious beliefs should be irrel- Antonin Scalia, and Clarence Thomas neutral about religious questions and evant. The United States is perhaps the have opined that the Establishment not seek to impose anyone's religious most pluralistic society on the planet— Clause means that the government faith or lack of faith on the country. It also means that neither the president nor the Congress will make any law The candidates tried to outdo each respecting the establishment of religion or denying the free exercise there- other in God-blessing everyone. of. This entails the right to believe and the right not to believe, a core con- virtually every ethnic, national, racial, should not favor one sect of religion tention of church-state jurisprudence and religious group is represented over another; it does not mean that for more than five decades. The rights here; and this includes not only irreligion deserves equal protection of unbelievers should be protected as Christians, Jews, Mormons, Scientolo- with religion—contrary to the well as those of believers. gists, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, and Supreme Court's rulings in the famous Secular humanists need to make two Buddhists, but also atheists, agnostics, McCollum (1948) and Zorach (1952) points loud and clear in the continuing and secular humanists. We need to decisions. Should future Supreme public debate about the role of religion demonstrate by deed as well as word Court appointees agree with them, the in public affairs. First, one can be moral that belief in God is no guarantee of viability of our secular republic will be and need not accept the Judeo- morality and should not be used as a seriously threatened; and unbelievers Christian religion, and conversely be test of political reliability. may very well be reduced to the status devout and immoral; and second, one When Bush's Supreme Court ap- of second-class citizens, de jure as can be a responsible citizen and not pointees come up for confirmation, well as de facto. All those who cherish believe in God. Jefferson, Madison, and these same questions will spark fresh freedom of conscience will need to be many of the Founding Fathers were contention. We think that the views of vigilant and ready to join in battle to Deists, not Christians; but they respect- likely nominees on this issue are of prevent this dangerous reinterpreta- ed freedom of conscience. Jefferson central importance for secular human- tion of the First Amendment. f©

(Humanity contó from p. 42) Furthermore, experiments have found together by accident and evolving direct evidence for backward causality according to no special purpose or plan Even earlier, Boltzmann had suggest- at the quantum level. It seems very like- in an underlying reality having no ed that the direction, or "arrow" of time ly that time is fundamentally reversible. beginning, no end, and no distinction was simply a convention that applies Boltzmann's arrow of time remains between past and future. only to many body systems, such as the a valid emergent concept applicable to Our highly evolved cognitive capabil- macroscopic systems of everyday obser- human experience. However, ultimately ities enable us to comprehend this, but vation. No arrow of time can be found in time has no direction and thus no only after a huge infusion of data from the equations of classical or quantum beginning or end. At this level, cause beyond pure sensory experience. As physics. The second law of thermody- and effect are interchangeable, and, as long as we continue to extend the fron- namics is nothing more than a definition most interpretations of quantum tiers of that experience, we can hope for of the conventional time direction. mechanics imply, events can happen in further improvements in understanding In 1948, Richard Feynman showed the universe without cause. ourselves. Ignoring the data from that anti-particles could be viewed as Those who ponder human nature advanced scientific instruments and particles travelling backward in time. and the human condition cannot simply going back to relying solely on the data The highly successful theory of elemen- ignore the nature of humanity and its from everyday life will only result in a tary processes that was developed sub- position in time and space as revealed degradation of knowledge and a return sequently, going today by the too-modest by the instruments of modern physics to barbarism. m name "standard model," makes no basic and cosmology. They must cast off the distinction between past and future or traditions of thousands of years and Acknowledgments cause and effect. Although conventional accept that we are not special, indeed time-directed language is often used in not at all important in the grand Thanks to Jonathan Colvin, Ron Ebert, written descriptions, the more precise scheme of things. We are made of the Justin Lloyd, and Roahn Wynar for their equations contain no such prejudice. same stuff as everything else, thrown comments.

http://www.secularhumanism.org ® spring 2001 Edward Buckner Eddie Tabash to ing that election cycle. He is chairman of Center for Inquiry West, the Southern Named Executive Head Council's First California regional office of the Council Director Amendment Task Force for Secular Humanism and the Committee for the Scientific Investigation Long-time secular humanist activist Eddie Tabash, a prominent constitution- of Claims of the Paranormal. Dr. Edward Buckner has joined the al and civil rights lawyer based in Council for Secular Humanism as its Beverly Hills, California, has been new executive director. With his wife named coordinator of Council for Diane, Buckner relocated to Amherst, Secular Humanism's First Amendment Quentin Smith Accepts New York, in the middle of a snowier- Task Force (FATF). FATF brings togeth- Editorship of Philo than-normal Buffalo-area winter. er attorneys, academics, and other spe- Buckner, a retired Georgia State cialists to monitor actions related to The Society of Humanist Philosophers, University professor, has been a long- the separation of church and state, the publisher of its official journal, time activist in the humanist and comment on court cases and legislative Philo, is extremely pleased to welcome freethought movements, and hopes to initiatives, and take selected legal Professor Quentin Smith as the jour- put his practical experience as a region- actions to defend the civil rights of nal's new editor. Professor Smith suc- al leader to use on the world stage. As the nonreligious. It currently includes ceeds Keith Parsons, of the University of executive director, he will helm the twenty attorneys and activists from the Houston, Clear Lake, who helped to Council's Associate Membership, out- states of Arkansas, Arizona, California, launch Philo in 1998. reach, and advocacy programs. Colorado, Connecticut, the District of Smith is professor of philosophy at Buckner received his Ph.D. from Columbia, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Western Michigan University. A specialist Georgia State University in 1983 and is New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. in metaphysics, philosophy of religion, a past president of the Atlanta Free- Tabash succeeds Tom Flynn, founder philosophy of language, and philosophy of thought Society, regional director of the of the Task Force and now editor of science, he has authored over one hun- Council for Secular Humanism, and FREE INQUIRY. dred scholarly articles and numerous member of the American Civil Liberties Tabash graduated from the University books, including The Untreated Union. He also has been active in poli- of California at Los Angeles in 1973, Universe (co-authored with Adolf tics, and was an elected chair for a magna cum laude. He graduated from Grünbaum, Oxford University Press, Georgia Congressional District. Loyola Law School of Los Angeles in 1976 forthcoming) and Ethical and Religious "This is a great opportunity to help and was admitted to the California Bar Thought in Analytic Philosophy of advance the causes of reason, critical that same year. He has chaired the Language (Yale University Press, 1997). thinking, and humanistic philosophy," National Legal Committee of Americans One of the most distinguished athe- Buckner said." I believe we are on the United for Separation of Church and ist philosophers in the English-speak- verge of a great worldwide advance in State since 1995. He has successfully rep- ing world, Professor Smith has served the acceptance of those who choose sci- resented secular humanism in public as an editorial advisor for many philos- ence over dogma and critical thinking debates against three major Christian ophy journals. over superstition, but we certainly have philosophers, Peter Van Inwagen, Greg His dedication to Philo promises to great challenges ahead in this religious- Bahnsen, and William Lane Craig. In dramatically increase its visibility and ly conservative era in America." election year 2000, he finished second out prestige among professional philoso- Ed can be reached at FREE INQUIRY'S of four in a primary for the California phers and theologians. Visit Philo's new mailing address, at (716)636-7571 ext. State Assembly. He was the only open Web site at www.PhiloOnline.org. 215, or by e-mail at ebuckner@center atheist to be a major contender for a state forinquirynet. legislative seat in the United States dur- —Austin Dacey f©

W. V. Quine (1908-2000) Willard Van Orman Quine, considered tributing editor of Philo, the leading freethought theoretical to be one of the leading contemporary magazine in the world, now published by the Council for American philosophers, died on Secular Humanism. Quine was one of the original Fellows of the December 25, 2000. He was a strong Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the supporter of secular humanism. A pro- Paranormal. He taught all during his life at Harvard University. ponent of pragmatism, he was a defend- He became president of the American Philosophical Associa- er of scientific methodology as the most tion. Among his writings were From a Logical Point of View reliable path to knowledge. (1953), Word and Object (1960), Pursuit of Truth (reissued in Quine was elected as a Humanist Laureate of the Inter- 1992), and From Stimulus to Science (1995). national Academy of Humanism. He was also a founding con- —Paul Kurtz

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Box 346, Somis, malley Ln., Dallas, TX 75248-2325 (972) 490-8892 Maryland - DC Chapter (MDC) Of WASH, CA 93066 (805) 386-4232 P.O. Box Freethinkers Association of Central Texas, P.O. Box 15319, Washington, DC 20003 (301) 474-2896 Humanist Association of San Diego, P.O. Box 86446, 160881, San Antonio, TX 78280 (210) 491-6829 San Diego, CA 92138-6646 (619) 280-8595 MICHIGAN - Freethought Association of West Houston Secular Humanists, P.O. Box 925872, Humanist Community of San Francisco Michigan, P.O. Box 9873, Wyoming, MI 49509-0873 Houston, TX 77292-5872 (2811 332-5491 P.O. Box 31172, San Francisco, CA 94131 Great Lakes Humanist Society Humanists of Ft. Worth, P.O. Box 291301, (650) 342-0910 P.O. Box 1183, Mt. Pleasant, MI 48804 Ft. Worth, TX 76129 (817) 370-2171 Humanist Society of Santa Barbara, P.O. Box 30232, Secular Humanists of Detroit, 220 Bagley, Room 908, UTAH - Secular Humanists of the Great Basin, Santa Barbara, CA 93130 (805) 687-6316 Detroit, MI 48226 (313) 962-1777 10271 S. 1300 E. PMB 190, Sandy, UT 84094 Rational Inquirers of Orange County, 1931 E. Meats MINNESOTA - Humanists of Minnesota VIRGINIA - Central Virginia Secular Humanists P.O. Box 582997, Minneapolis, MN 55458-2997 #115, Orange, CA 92865 (949) 425-0425 (CVSH), RO. Box 184, Ivy, VA 22945 (804) 979-2508 (651) 335-3800 Humanist Society of Santa Barbara, P.O. Box 30232, Northern Virginia Secular Humanists, 6400 Lyric Lane, Santa Barbara, CA 93130 (805) 962-6316 Minnesota Atheists, P.O. Box 6261, Minneapolis, MN 55406-0261 (612) 588-1597 Falls Church, VA 22044 (703) 256-4192 Secular Humanists of the East Bay, P.O. Box 830, Richmond Area Free Thinkers, P.O. Box 3916 MISSOURI - Kansas City Eupraxophy Center Berkeley, CA 94701 (510) 486-0553 Richmond, VA 23235 (804) 560-6903 6301 Rockhill Road, Suite 412, Kansas City, COLORADO - Atheist of Northern Colorado, P.O. WASHINGTON, D.C. - Washington Area Secular Box 2555, Loveland, CO 80539-2555 MO 64131 (816) 822-9840 Family Freethought Alliance, P.O. Box 260067, Humanists (WASH), P.O. Box 15319, Washington, DC CONNECTICUT - Northeast Atheist Association 20003 (202) 298-0921 P.O. Box 63, Simsbury, CT 06070 (203) 596-0545 St. Louis, MO 63126 (314) 825-6422 WASHINGTON - Humanists of North Puget Sound, Humanist Association of Central Connecticut, 27 Thorn- Rationalist Society of St. Louis P.O. Box 405, La Conner, WA 98257 (360) 293-8128 ton St., Hamden, CT 06517-1321 (203) 281-6232 RO. Box 2931, St. Louis, MO 63130 (314) 664-4424 WISCONSIN - Atheists and Agnostics of FLORIDA - First Coast Freethought Society, NEBRASKA - REASON, P.O. Box 24358, Omaha, P.O. Box Wisconsin P.O. Box 290, Madison, WI 53701-0290 558, Ponte Vedra Beach, FL 32004 (904) 285-1205 NE 68124 (402) 553-5607 (608) 233-7239 Free Inquiry Society of Central Florida, P.O. Box 4365, NEW HAMPSHIRE - Secular Humanist Friendship Winter Park, FL 32793-4365 (407) 262-1915 Group of Merrimack Valley, P.O. Box 368, Humanist Quest of Milwaukee,1312 16th Ave., Grafton, WI 53024-2006 (262) 376-8905 Freethinker Society of Sarasota Bay, 5230 Lake Londonderry, NH 03053 (603) 434-4195 Village Dr., Sarasota, FL 34235 (941) 379-5137 NEW JERSEY - New Jersey Humanist Network, P.O. North East Wisconsin Humanists, P.O. Box 8114, Humanist Society of Gainesville, 1708 N.W. 10th Box 51, Washington, NJ 07882 (908) 979-9004 Green Bay, WI 54308-8114 (920) 866-9707 Ave., Gainesville, FL 32605 (352) 336-6343 The Sect of Zarathustra, 30 Stockton St., Bloomfield, Secular Humanists of Madison, WI, 5322 Fairway SPLASH-St. Petersburg/Largo Area Secular NJ 07003 (973) 748-8166 Drive, Madison, WI 53711 (608) 274-2152 Humanists, P.O. Box 8099, Madeira Beach, FL 33738- NEW YORK - Capital District Humanist Society CANADA- British Columbia Humanist Association, 8099 (727) 391-7571 P.O. Box 2148, Scotia, NY 12302 (518) 381-6239 P.O. Box 47046, Denman Place, Vancouver, B.C. Humanist Association of West Central Florida, P.O. Hudson Valley Humanists, P.O. Box 961, Saugerties, V6G3E1 (604) 739-9822 The Center for Inquiry proudly presents SCIENCE AND RELIGION: ARE THEY COMPATIBLE?

Thursday, November 8 to Sunday, November 12, 2001 Atlanta, Georgia

Please join us for the Center for Inquiry's first major conference, a joint venture of the Council for Secular Humanism and the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal. Watch future issues of Free Inquiry for details.

The Robert Green Ingersoll Memorial Committee presents its biennial conference:

Freethought orator Robert Green Ingersoll was born in New York's MORMON ORIGINS IN Finger Lakes region. So was the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons). Church founder Joseph Smith published the Book INGERSOLL COUNTRY of Mormon at Palmyra, just a short drive from the Ingersoll birthplace. At this conference, historians and other experts will probe how Mormonism really began. Participants will visit the Ingersoll Museum, July 6 to 8, 2001 tour Mormon historic sites, and attend the Hill Cumorah Pageant, Mormonism's annual outdoor spectacular with a cast of thousands. Also Ramada Inn Geneva Lakefront featured: historian SALLY ROESCH WAGNER performing her famed Geneva, New York impersonation of feminist freethinker Matilda Joslyn Gage. Enjoy history, freethinking company, and the beauty of the Finger Lakes.

FOR MORE INFORMATION call (716) 636-7571 ext. 213 E-mail [email protected]