The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
A Friend of Ricochet sent me this article this morning:
Two atheists - John Gray and Alain de Botton - and two agnostics - Nassim Nicholas Taleb and I - meet for dinner at a Greek restaurant in Bayswater, London. The talk is genial, friendly and then, suddenly, intense when neo-atheism comes up. Three of us, including both atheists, have suffered abuse at the hands of this cult. Only Taleb seems to have escaped unscathed and this, we conclude, must be because he can do maths and people are afraid of maths.
De Botton is the most recent and, consequently, the most shocked victim. He has just produced a book, Religion for Atheists: a Non-Believer's Guide to the Uses of Religion, mildly suggesting that atheists like himself have much to learn from religion and that, in fact, religion is too important to be left to believers. He has also proposed an atheists' temple, a place where non-believers can partake of the consolations of silence and meditation.
This has been enough to bring the full force of a neo-atheist fatwa crashing down on his head. The temple idea in particular made them reach for their best books of curses. ...
I'm not a terrific fan of John Gray and only mildly interested in Alain de Botton--they're fine, I suppose, but neither are authors I'd cross the street to read. I'm mostly posting this for the benefit of the many young people I meet in Turkey who seem trapped between two rigid ideologies. There is something called "Islam" on the one side, which they associate with adults who are keen to ban smutty books, a state that seems to want from them nothing but obedience, and a campaign to make Turkey look ridiculous in the eyes of Westerners. They now also associate it, very sadly, with the word "neoliberalism," a word they can rarely precisely define. On the other hand there is something called "secularism," by which they often mean "atheism" and usually, "Richard Dawkins," whose books and lectures on television are generally the only thing they know about atheism, science, or evolutionary biology. They sometimes have a vague idea that these latter concepts are naturally linked with "communism" or "anarchism" or "social justice" or perhaps being "Green," or maybe just associated with listening to a lot of God-awful heavy metal music, wearing a Che Guevara T-shirt and getting a tattoo.
And I feel terrible for these kids, because most of them want something of which I approve, deep down--freedom at least from the repressive hand of an authoritarian state and their authoritarian families--but they have no idea that there's a universe of really interesting thought about these ideas, whole libraries of books out there, that could spare them re-inventing the philosophical and intellectual wheels.
I know many will read this and think, "Well, that sounds like America." And I guess in some ways it is. But at least in America you have a reasonable chance of happening on a good teacher who says, "Look, kid, you need a decent education. Here are some important books to read."
The odds of it happening in Turkey just aren't that great. Not impossible, but not great.
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Oct '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Are these "important books" available in Turkish? I would imagine so, but perhaps there are wrinkles in the history of Turkish publishing that make it unlikely.
Sep '11
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Young people in Turkey can have access to every idea under the sun through the internet, provided they understand English. So my first question is, how many young people do understand English? Is English the first foreign language in Turkish schools? is it well taught? and (above all) are young people motivated to learn it, are they subject to the peer pressure which makes fluency 'cool' in other countries? If the answer is yes, then they will eventually discover these things for themselves.
Sep '11
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
I'd have thought that economics played against widespread translation of books that are not by and large bestsellers.
May '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Ditto.
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
I'm seeing more and more. There are a lot of books now available here--in English, at least--that weren't available when I first got here. And I'm seeing more translations into Turkish, too. But very few young people read English well enough even to begin with them, and without an educational system that insists upon it, no young person of his own accord will decide, "I'd best sit down and struggle with the classics of the Scottish Enlightenment." These books are just too hard. (That said, many do struggle with, or at least buy, a lot of difficult Marxist literature.) You need parents who know that their kids should read these things and an educational system that can teach their kids how to read a very difficult book for these ideas to get real purchase, I think. There will always be a brilliant handful of autodidacts, everywhere, and the Internet is great for them, but there won't be a generally high level of education.
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
It seems strange that Dawkins and his sort are being called "neo-atheists." Fierce hatred of religion and the equation of atheism with entirely distinct societal and political values has been a major feature of atheism ever since the French Revolution. For those irreligious chaps meeting at the restaurant to be "shocked" over neo-atheists suggests to me that they are not very aware of the history of their own strains of thought.
I also have only the barest sympathy for Mr. de Botton, whose new book is indeed quite dreadful.
Oct '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Do young people really have their eyes opened by actually reading Hume and Smith? Or is it more likely to be (deity forbid) Atlas silkindi/Atlas vazgeceti?
Aug '11
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
The conundrum is perhaps that exporting "McDonald's" has the effect of both enlightening some and further hardening others.
It would be nice to be able to rely on Google and Wikipedia for enlightenment, but if you're looking for ways to further honor Allah or Jesus or Satan or Yahweh or whatever, Google and Wikipedia are great for that too.
Oct '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Thinking about it, though, translating and publishing The Wealth of Nations would have been a (Marxist) revolutionary act.
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
They have their "eyes opened" by being in an environment where someone is constantly telling them, "There is a large literature about Idea X. Here's a reading list. You will write an essay every week about these books, and if you plagiarize, I will smell it instantly and fail you. You'll have to take a midterm and a final exam. You'll be expected at least to know that many people have thought about these things before you, and to know the outlines of what they thought. If you can't do this, you'll fail the class."
I'm not really into "opening eyes" these days so much as discipline. "Opened eyes" come a lot later, after people have been given the basic tools.
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Ragip? Who's defending bans on speech from his prison cell? He doesn't want freedom of expression, he wants freedom of expression for ideas he likes. Unfortunately, all that reading didn't sink in.
Oct '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
While a liberal arts education with a wise and stern tutor is a mighty fine thing, recent history has shown that (a) it is not suitable, affordable or deliverable to more than a tiny fraction of the community; and (b) increasing exposure to good ideas does not cause common sense to break out, individually or in the community as a whole.
(By the way, is it just me - quite possible - or has the term 'liberal arts' started to exclude pure maths and pure science?)
Oct '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Well, indeed. I didn't mean 'revolutionary' (or 'Marxist') in a laudatory sense. And as much as you translate Smith, if you're also translating Perry Anderson's stuff, you do run the risk of thinking all sorts of nonsense.
And perhaps some not-nonsense:
Is this in fact an accurate forecast of Blairite New Labour and Clinton's triangulation?
Which is to stray from the point, that there is a vast treasury of ideas that, were they available to (or availed of by <screams of syntax fill air>) the youth of Turkey, might alleviate - or, at least, transform - their psychic and - potentially - political suffering.
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
genferei
While a liberal arts education with a wise and stern tutor is a mighty fine thing, recent history has shown that (a) it is not suitable, affordable or deliverable to more than a tiny fraction of the community; and (b) increasing exposure to good ideas does not cause common sense to break out, individually or in the community as a whole.
I don't know that it needs to go to more than a fraction of the community. But it needs to go to a sufficient fraction for "liberal ideas" to take hold. What percentage, I'm not sure.
What "causes common sense to break out?"
Sep '11
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Claire Berlinski, Ed.
Ragip? Who's defending bans on speech from his prison cell? He doesn't want freedom of expression, he wants freedom of expression for ideas he likes. Unfortunately, all that reading didn't sink in. · 3 hours ago
Claire, I think that's a bit unfair. The speech Ragip now wants banned *does* cause harm - that is the problem. I disagree with him, and with those in my country who support legislation against hate speech, but I am not foolish enough to think there isn't a mischief that these laws are intended to address. But in my opinion the cure is worse than the disease.
Nov '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Claire Berlinski, Ed
What "causes common sense to break out?" ·
Off hand, one of the greatest drivers of this seems to be simple diversity combined with materialist culture. I don't think that it would be far off the mark to note that the great centers of human development in modern history, especially since the Reformation, have also been those that accepted large numbers of immigrants, tolerated diverse religions and philosophies, and were largely capitalistic. Examples might include Golden Age Holland, Paris, Great Britain, modern Israel, Beirut (for awhile), the US, especially NY and LA.
Of course, looking at the ethnic and religious make-up of Turkey is not heartening.
Jun '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
What do atheists love above all other things? I don't know. Is it just the person they're closest to in life? Is it an idea? If it's an idea, and they love that idea passionately, that seems an awful lot like a religion. No?
Oct '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
HalifaxCB
Claire Berlinski, Ed
What "causes common sense to break out?" ·
Off hand, one of the greatest drivers of this seems to be simple diversity combined with materialist culture. I don't think that it would be far off the mark to note that the great centers of human development in modern history, especially since the Reformation, have also been those that accepted large numbers of immigrants, tolerated diverse religions and philosophies, and were largely capitalistic.
Well, except for the last, that would be the opposite of 18th Century Scotland. On the other hand, Scotland at the time did have twice as many universities and one tenth of the population of England.
Aug '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Well the article was a ripe ground for picking. The thoughts of the reformed atheists causing anger in their ranks is so funny. As the passing of James Q Wilson reminding us of the massive void in the atheists armory. The telling sentence was one about the collapse of the Western Civ Judeo Christian structure being replaced by Islam. Will Islam be "up to it" when it comes to supplying a wealth of philosophy, intellectual diversions, culture, art and the sciences required by the maw of corporatist profitmaking ? Is Islam a utopia ? Does it pretend to be or is it an empire with no emperor ?
Nov '10
Re: The Conflation of Secularism and Neo-Atheism
Thanks genferei. Scotland was on my mind when I posted that, but I really don't know much about its cultural history. I wonder though if they could have gained many of the same things from the the Scot tendency to travel and engage in politics and commerce on an broad international level? I have some reading to do :)
Edited on March 6, 2012 at 4:16pm