Australian news website, New Matilda posted an article by Jeff Sparrow noting that progressive atheists don't do much to shout down the New Atheists who preach Islamophobia
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Isn't it weird, though, that those very 'enlightenment' values are being propped up as justification for denying enlightenment values? "Women should be banned from wearing this and that in public because we want them to feel free in accord with good Western enlightenment values." "Islam is inherently violent, and so, in accordance with good Western enlightenment values of peace-loving freedom, we need to declare war on the religion itself."
How absurd do these self-contradictions have to get before the people spouting them realize what they're saying?
"'Women should be banned from wearing this and that in public because we want them to feel free in accord with good Western enlightenment values.'"
This seems pretty consistent with Enlightenment values.
"'Islam is inherently violent, and so, in accordance with good Western enlightenment values of peace-loving freedom, we need to declare war on the religion itself.'"
At least the condescension toward other cultures which underlies this sort of judgments seems pretty consistent with Enlightenment values too.
The narrative of western superiority, and that western-ness looks a certain way--as e.g. a certain style of dress--is intractably bound to the narrative of the Enlightenment.
It is really from the counter-Enlightenment that we get an ethics of individualism that will object to these sorts of measures.
Sure. Just try wearing the wrong clothes during the French Revolution. Or think about Hegel, and this idea that the meaning and telos of history is found in the states of Europe.
In a nutshell, they are coming from the Enlightenment tradition of scientific inquiry, which is why so many of the New Atheists - heck, probably all of them - are also associated with evolutionary psychology. What they do not grok is that the Enlightenment was also a spirit of political liberation and emancipation.
Thus when confronted with the dichotomy of "It would be irrational to wear this-and-that" and "It is everyone's right to wear this-and-that" they end up having to justify their one-dimensional view by denying political rights on the grounds that the wearer is mentally deficient and ergo, undeserving of rights.
It is also explains why Harris - who fancies himself a moral theorist of all things - can come up with absolutely abhorrent comments such as it is ethical to kill people because of their dangerous beliefs. He considers certain individuals, particularly religious individuals, as being insane and persuasive - and therefore undeserving of liberty.
"In a nutshell, they are coming from the Enlightenment tradition of scientific inquiry, which is why so many of the New Atheists - heck, probably all of them - are also associated with evolutionary psychology."
What's the connection between EP and "the Enlightenment tradition of scientific inquiry"? EP seems closer to late 19th century criticisms of the Enlightenment, e.g. Nietzsche.
"What they do not grok is that the Enlightenment was also a spirit of political liberation and emancipation. Thus when confronted with the dichotomy of 'It would be irrational to wear this-and-that' and 'It is everyone's right to wear this-and-that' they end up having to justify their one-dimensional view by denying political rights on the grounds that the wearer is mentally deficient and ergo, undeserving of rights."The Enlightenment certainly lays claim to "a spirit of political liberation and emancipation", but it identifies the actuality of this liberation and emancipation with the cultural forms of Enlightenment Europe. The view that certain
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What's the connection between EP and "the Enlightenment tradition of scientific inquiry"? EP seems closer to late 19th century criticisms of the Enlightenment, e.g. Nietzsche.
I'd be interested in hearing more of how you think this. EP argues that mental traits are evolved adaptions based on the evidence (I don't necessarily agree with that position, but that's what it is). Nietzsche's opinion of mental traits was orientated towards the individual will to power and immoralism.
The view that cultural diversity validly arises from the diversity in our free right to individual expressions of an indeterminate human nature is more associated with the counter-Enlightenment, if we wish to make that distinction.
I'm not sure how the political and religious absolutism of blood-and-throne would concur with this. Peter Gay would certainly disagree.
"EP argues that mental traits are evolved adaptions based on the evidence..."
Well not really: they don't and can't have any evidence of either their ancestral cognitive modules nor the hypothetical adaptations such modules undergo. Both are purely theoretical posits.
"Nietzsche's opinion of mental traits was orientated towards the individual will to power and immoralism."A reduction of Nietzsche's moral thought to the ultimate ground of a will to power would directly parallel the reduction in EP theory to the ultimate ground of hyper-adaptationism. Both understand this ultimate ground as undergoing a complicated series of adaptations in history. So on the points you have raised, there seems to be a parallel rather than a contrast
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I don't disagree with you there; although they do posit quite a wealth of circumstantial evidence.
So on the points you have raised, there seems to be a parallel rather than a contrast.
In a parallel in the sense that they are so far apart they're not even binary opposites.
Does he supply a disagreement which can be introduced as a substantial contention here?
Sure; the title of one his more accessible books "The Enlightenment: The Rise of Modern Paganism" should give a pretty broad hint of the commitment of the enlightenment philosophers to religious pluralism.
"In a parallel in the sense that they are so far apart they're not even binary opposites."
No, obviously not a parallel in this sense. Rather, a parallel in the sense stated, namely: that both ground their histories on theoretical posits, in contradiction to your thesis that EP must be distinguished from Nietzsche as being grounded "on the evidence"; that EP reduces to the ground of hyper-adaptationism, which is equally immoralistic and a will to power as the concept Nietzsche designates with that name, in contradiction to your thesis that Nietzsche must be distinguished from EP for his immoralism and foundation of a will to power; and that both connect these two points in the same way, understanding "this ultimate ground as undergoing a complicated series of adaptations in history."
"Sure [he supplies a disagreement which can be introduced as a substantial contention here.]"
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How absurd do these self-contradictions have to get before the people spouting them realize what they're saying?
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This seems pretty consistent with Enlightenment values.
"'Islam is inherently violent, and so, in accordance with good Western enlightenment values of peace-loving freedom, we need to declare war on the religion itself.'"
At least the condescension toward other cultures which underlies this sort of judgments seems pretty consistent with Enlightenment values too.
The narrative of western superiority, and that western-ness looks a certain way--as e.g. a certain style of dress--is intractably bound to the narrative of the Enlightenment.
It is really from the counter-Enlightenment that we get an ethics of individualism that will object to these sorts of measures.
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Wow, the Enlightenment sucked.
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Before the Restoration or after? I think I'd need more than one closet.
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Thus when confronted with the dichotomy of "It would be irrational to wear this-and-that" and "It is everyone's right to wear this-and-that" they end up having to justify their one-dimensional view by denying political rights on the grounds that the wearer is mentally deficient and ergo, undeserving of rights.
It is also explains why Harris - who fancies himself a moral theorist of all things - can come up with absolutely abhorrent comments such as it is ethical to kill people because of their dangerous beliefs. He considers certain individuals, particularly religious individuals, as being insane and persuasive - and therefore undeserving of liberty.
Reply
What's the connection between EP and "the Enlightenment tradition of scientific inquiry"? EP seems closer to late 19th century criticisms of the Enlightenment, e.g. Nietzsche.
"What they do not grok is that the Enlightenment was also a spirit of political liberation and emancipation. Thus when confronted with the dichotomy of 'It would be irrational to wear this-and-that' and 'It is everyone's right to wear this-and-that' they end up having to justify their one-dimensional view by denying political rights on the grounds that the wearer is mentally deficient and ergo, undeserving of rights."The Enlightenment certainly lays claim to "a spirit of political liberation and emancipation", but it identifies the actuality of this liberation and emancipation with the cultural forms of Enlightenment Europe. The view that certain ( ... )
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I'd be interested in hearing more of how you think this. EP argues that mental traits are evolved adaptions based on the evidence (I don't necessarily agree with that position, but that's what it is). Nietzsche's opinion of mental traits was orientated towards the individual will to power and immoralism.
The view that cultural diversity validly arises from the diversity in our free right to individual expressions of an indeterminate human nature is more associated with the counter-Enlightenment, if we wish to make that distinction.
I'm not sure how the political and religious absolutism of blood-and-throne would concur with this. Peter Gay would certainly disagree.
Reply
Well not really: they don't and can't have any evidence of either their ancestral cognitive modules nor the hypothetical adaptations such modules undergo. Both are purely theoretical posits.
"Nietzsche's opinion of mental traits was orientated towards the individual will to power and immoralism."A reduction of Nietzsche's moral thought to the ultimate ground of a will to power would directly parallel the reduction in EP theory to the ultimate ground of hyper-adaptationism. Both understand this ultimate ground as undergoing a complicated series of adaptations in history. So on the points you have raised, there seems to be a parallel rather than a contrast ( ... )
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I don't disagree with you there; although they do posit quite a wealth of circumstantial evidence.
So on the points you have raised, there seems to be a parallel rather than a contrast.
In a parallel in the sense that they are so far apart they're not even binary opposites.
Does he supply a disagreement which can be introduced as a substantial contention here?
Sure; the title of one his more accessible books "The Enlightenment: The Rise of Modern Paganism" should give a pretty broad hint of the commitment of the enlightenment philosophers to religious pluralism.
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No, obviously not a parallel in this sense. Rather, a parallel in the sense stated, namely: that both ground their histories on theoretical posits, in contradiction to your thesis that EP must be distinguished from Nietzsche as being grounded "on the evidence"; that EP reduces to the ground of hyper-adaptationism, which is equally immoralistic and a will to power as the concept Nietzsche designates with that name, in contradiction to your thesis that Nietzsche must be distinguished from EP for his immoralism and foundation of a will to power; and that both connect these two points in the same way, understanding "this ultimate ground as undergoing a complicated series of adaptations in history."
"Sure [he supplies a disagreement which can be introduced as a substantial contention here.]"
Are you going to introduce it?
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