Wednesday, April 12, 2006

 

Spiritual Progressives

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There is an interesting article in The Nation by Rabbi Michael Lerner.

After recounting how a funder of leftist causes reacted badly to the Rabbi’s bringing up God (!) in connection with economic activism, he goes on:

In my research on the psychodynamics of American society I discovered that the left's hostility to religion is one of the main reasons people who otherwise might be involved with progressive politics get turned off.

Wondering why there is such animus, Rabbi Lerner notes:

[C]onservatives have historically used religion to justify oppressive social systems and political regimes. But this can't be the whole answer, since it's not as if the left has never seen anyone misuse its own ideas to serve hateful and repressive purposes ...

The Rabbi considers a number of possibilities but concludes:

[T]he main reason that underlies the left's deep skepticism about religion is its members' strong faith in a different kind of belief system. Even though many people on the left think of themselves as merely trying to hold on to a rational consciousness and resist the emotionalism that can contribute to fascistic movements, it's not true that the left is without belief. The left is captivated by a belief that has been called scientism.

Although Lerner is one of the founders of a new organization called the Network of Spiritual Progressives, one of the goals of which is "defending science from interference by the state, religion or the capitalist marketplace," he is no fan of scientism:

Science, however, is not the same as scientism -- the belief that the only things that are real or can be known are those that can be empirically observed and measured. As a religious person, I don't rely on science to tell me what is right and wrong or what love means or why my life is important. I understand that such questions cannot be answered through empirical observations. Claims about God, ethics, beauty and any other face of human experience that is not subject to empirical verification -- all these spiritual dimensions of life -- are dismissed by the scientistic worldview as inherently unknowable and hence meaningless.

Scientism thus extends far beyond an understanding and appreciation of the role of science in society. It has become the religion of the secular consciousness. Why do I say it's a religion? Because it is a belief system that has no more scientific foundation than any other belief system. The view that that which is real and knowable is that which can be empirically verified or measured is a view that itself cannot be empirically measured or verified and thus by its own criterion is unreal or unknowable. It is a religious belief system with powerful adherents. Spiritual progressives therefore insist on the importance of distinguishing between our strong support for science and our opposition to scientism.

While I am not sure the Rabbi’s proposed methods are well suited to his political aims, it is hard to argue with this:

To be effective, a social change movement will need to make a place for everyone who shares the same political values, even though they may belong to different religious traditions or hold different philosophical positions. Speaking from a religious perspective should be normal in political meetings or at public events sponsored by the left -- and the left should work as hard to create an inclusive feel for this as it does to include any other constituency.

After all, the "big tent" has shown its usefulness in support of far less worthy causes.
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Comments:
Two of Lerner's assertions seem questionable:

Claims about God, ethics, beauty and any other face of human experience that is not subject to empirical verification -- all these spiritual dimensions of life -- are dismissed by the scientistic worldview as inherently unknowable and hence meaningless.

Sniff. Smells like straw.

There might be people taking that position, but I doubt it. Not every subjective claim is unknowable and certainly not meaningless. The issue is that such claims or positions on such issues are not resolvable by appeal to objective or extrinsic evidence.

The view that that which is real and knowable is that which can be empirically verified or measured is a view that itself cannot be empirically measured or verified and thus by its own criterion is unreal or unknowable.

This is an objection I have seen before, and it irritates me. It's a word game. If Lerner's intended audience were to consider it, they might realize this doesn't give religion the privileged position they want - it just reduces all positions to equal meaninglessness. Postmodern or nihilist? Probably neither, but not terribly useful either way.
 
There might be people taking that position, but I doubt it.

No, there certainly are people like that. They are sometimes described as "fundamentalist atheists" in t.o.

This is an objection I have seen before, and it irritates me. It's a word game. If Lerner's intended audience were to consider it, they might realize this doesn't give religion the privileged position they want - it just reduces all positions to equal meaninglessness. Postmodern or nihilist? Probably neither, but not terribly useful either way.

It is actually an objection raised by that arch-empiricist, David Hume, over 200 years ago. It is a simple recognition of the limitations of knowledge and an admission of where our choice of epistemologies becomes subjective rather than objective.

I don't know if Lerner is seeking a "privileged position" for religion -- it does not seem that way to me -- but I deny that, simply because empiricism can't itself be empirically justified, it is knocked out of a privileged position. It neither had such epistemological privilege to begin with nor does our confidence in it depend merely on the evidence of our senses. Certainly, my choice of a favored epistemology does not depend on all other epistemologies being worthless.

In short, I can choose empiricism as my preferred epistemology and still recognize its limitations and respect, at the very least, other peoples' choice of different ones.
 
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