Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-jr42d Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T06:24:12.357Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A phenomenological challenge to ‘enlightened secularism’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

IAN JAMES KIDD
IAN JAMES KIDD*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of Durham, Durham, County Durham, DH1 3HN, UK e-mail: i.j.kidd@durham.ac.uk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article challenges Philip Kitcher's recent proposals for an ‘enlightened secularism’. I use William James's theory of the emotions and his related discussion of ‘temperaments’ to argue that religious and naturalistic commitments are grounded in tacit, inarticulate ways that one finds oneself in a world. This indicates that, in many cases, religiosity and naturalism are grounded not in rational and evidential considerations, but in a tacit and implicit sense of reality which is disclosed through phenomenological enquiry. Once the foundational role of these temperaments is appreciated, it emerges that enlightened secularism relies upon a facile conception of the nature of religious belief – one that lessens its chances for success. The article ends with some positive proposals for incorporating phenomenological insights into debates about science, religion, and secularism.

Type
Articles
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 3 , September 2013 , pp. 377 - 398
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Baehr, J. (2011) The Enquiring Mind: On Intellectual Virtues and Virtue Epistemology (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennett-Hunter, G. & Kidd, I. J. (eds) (2012) Mystery and Humility, European Journal of Philosophy of Religion, 4(3).Google Scholar
Cooper, D. E. (1997) ‘Wittgenstein, Heidegger, and humility’, Philosophy, 72, 105–123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cooper, D. E. (2000) Metaphysics: The Classic Readings (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell).Google Scholar
Cooper, D. E. (2002) The Measure of Things: Humanism, Humility and Mystery (Oxford: Clarendon Press).Google Scholar
Cooper, D. E. (2009) ‘Mystery, world, and religion’, in Cornwell, J. & McGhee, M. (eds) Philosophers and God (London: Continuum), 51–62.Google Scholar
Cooper, D. E. (2012) ‘Living with mystery’, in Bennett-Hunter, G. & Kidd, I. J. (eds) Mystery and Humility, European Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 4(3).Google Scholar
Cottingham, J. (2005) The Spiritual Dimension: Religion, Philosophy, and Human Value (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cottingham, J. (2009) Why Believe? (London: Continuum).Google Scholar
Cottingham, J. (2011a) ‘The Meaning of Life and Darwinism’, Environmental Values 20: 299–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cottingham, J. (2011b) ‘Reply to Holland: The meaning of life and Darwinism’, Environmental Values, 20, 299–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dawes, G. W. (2011) ‘In defense of naturalism’, International Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 70, 3–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dawkins, R. (2000) Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion, and the Appetite for Wonder (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).Google Scholar
Dawkins, R. (2004) A Devil's Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).Google Scholar
Dewey, J. (1934) A Common Faith (New Haven: Yale University Press).Google Scholar
Feyerabend, P. (2001) Conquest of Abundance: A Tale of Abstraction versus the Richness of Being, Terpestra, B. (ed.) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press).Google Scholar
Goldie, P. (2000) The Emotions: A Philosophical Exploration (Oxford: Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Goodenough, U. (1998) The Sacred Depths of Nature (New York: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haught, J. (2006) Is Nature Enough? Meaning and Truth in the Age of Science (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hinde, R. A. (2010) Why Gods Persist: A Scientific Approach to Religion, 2nd edn (London: Routledge).Google Scholar
Hookway, C. (2002) ‘Emotions and epistemic evaluations’, in Carruthers, P., Stich, S., & Siegal, M. (eds) The Cognitive Basis of Science (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 251–262.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
James, W. (1897) The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy (New York: Longmans, Green, and Co.).Google Scholar
James, W. (1912) Essays on Radical Empiricism (New York: Longman, Green, and Co).Google Scholar
James, W. (1920) A Pluralistic Universe (London: Longmans, Green, and Co.).Google Scholar
James, W. (2002) The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature: Centenary Edition (London: Routledge).Google Scholar
Kidd, I. J. (2012) ‘Receptivity to mystery’, in Bennett-Hunter, G. & Kidd, I. J. (eds) Mystery and Humility, European Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 4(3).Google Scholar
Kidd, I. J. (2013) ‘Feyerabend on the ineffability of reality’, in Kasher, A. & Diller, J. (eds) Models of God and Other Ultimate Realities (Dordrecht: Kluwer, in press).Google Scholar
Kidd, I. J. (forthcoming) ‘Is naturalism bleak?’, Environmental Values.Google Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2001) Science, Truth, and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2006) Darwin's Legacy: What Evolution Means Today (Oxford: Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2007a) Living with Darwin: Evolution, Design, and the Future of Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2007b) Joyce's Kaleidoscope: An Invitation to ‘Finnegan's Wake’ (New York: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2008) ‘Science, religion, and democracy’, Episteme: A Journal of Social Epistemology, 5, 5–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2011a), ‘Militant modern atheism’, Journal of Applied Philosophy, 28, 1–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2011b) Science in a Democratic Society (New York: Prometheus Books).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, P. (2011c) The Ethical Project (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitcher, P. & Schacht, R. (2004) Finding an Ending: Reflections on Wagner's ‘Ring’ (New York: Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Kolakowski, L. (1988) Metaphysical Horror (Oxford: Blackwell).Google Scholar
Kolakowski, L. (2001) Religion (South Bend: St Augustine's Press).Google Scholar
Lightman, A. & Brawer, R. (eds) (1990) Origins: The Lives and Worlds of Modern Cosmologists (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Longino, H. E. (2002) ‘Science and the common good: thoughts on Philip Kitcher's Science, Truth, and Democracy’, Philosophy of Science, 69, 560–568.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McGhee, M. (2006) ‘Seeke true religion. Oh, where?’, Ratio, 19, 454–473.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, G. (2006) ‘Geoffrey Miller forecasts the future’, New Scientist, 2578 (18 November), 59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nozick, R. (1981) Philosophical Explanations (Oxford: Clarendon Press).Google Scholar
Ratcliffe, M. (2005) ‘The feeling of being’, Journal of Consciousness Studies, 12, 43–50.Google Scholar
Ratcliffe, M. (2008) Feelings of Being: Phenomenology, Psychiatry, and the Sense of Reality (Oxford: Oxford University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ratcliffe, M. (2011) ‘Stance, feeling, and phenomenology’, Synthese, 178, 121–130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ratcliffe, M. (2013) The Modalities of Melancholy: A Phenomenological Study of Depression (Oxford: Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Ratcliffe, M. (forthcoming) ‘Phenomenology as a form of empathy’, Inquiry.Google Scholar
Raymo, C. (1998) Skeptics and True Believers: The Exhilarating Connection between Science and Religion (New York: Walker and Company).Google Scholar
Roberts, R. C. & Wood, W. J. (2007) Intellectual Virtues: An Essay in Regulative Epistemology (Oxford: Clarendon).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruse, M. (2010) ‘Atheism, naturalism, and science: three in one?’, in Harrison, P. (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Science and Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 229–243.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Russell, B. (1997) Last Philosophical Testament: 1943–68, Slater, J. G. & Köllner, P. (eds) (London: Routledge).Google Scholar
Sartre, J.-P. (1957) Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology, Barnes, H. (tr.) (London: Methuen).Google Scholar
van Fraassen, B. C. (2002) The Empirical Stance (New Haven: Yale University Press).Google Scholar
Weinberg, S. (1992) Dreams of a Final Theory (New York: Pantheon Books).Google Scholar
Wielenberg, E. (2005) Value and Virtue in a Godless Universe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).Google Scholar
Wynn, M. (2005) Emotional Experience and Religious Understanding: Integrating Perception, Conception and Feeling (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar