Reversing Forward – Is Morality Just Rule Following?

I live on a one-way street.  However, I frequently observe cars going the wrong way up the street.  But even more interestingly, some people go the wrong way up the street in reverse.  Does this make it O.K.? 

Isn’t that the human condition, we know the right thing to do, but it can be inconvenient or painful, so we try to do something else?  But we have a nagging feeling that we need to do the right thing so we try to renegotiate the rules.  If I can’t drive forward in that direction, maybe driving the forbidden direction in reverse is a little better.  Not perfect, but then we are only human – right?

If we see doing the right thing as following the rules, there is a temptation to try to modify the rules so they are easier for us to comply with.  Further, if being ethical or living a morally good life merely involves following the rules, then our motives for doing so are of no consequence.  That is to say, we don’t drive the correct way down the street because it is the right thing to do but because we are just following a rule.

Religion and Violence

“Religion poisons everything. As well as a menace to civilization, it has become a threat to human survival.” – Christopher Hitchens (1)

We are often told that religion, including Christianity, is the cause of great evil in the world. That in the words of Christopher Hitchens - “religion poisons everything”. It is claimed that if religion is removed violence will be greatly diminished. In his book, God Is Not Great, the late Hitchens outlined in the second chapter entitled “Religion Kills” various conflicts and atrocities that he blamed on religion. (2)

I’m leaving aside the question of whether one can be good without God. I’m also not going to counter with the argument that atheist belief systems have been responsible for a greater share of evil and death, or enter the debate over whether communist states were atheist. I’m also going to avoid bringing up the thorny issue that if an atheist claims religion is evil they are committing themselves to a system of absolute moral standards.

Instead, let’s do a thought experiment. What if you had a magic ray gun that could remove someone’s religious beliefs instantly? Imagine further that you had a way to spread the effects of this ray gun over the entire earth, so that every person on the planet was struck, and no longer had any religious belief.

Through a Glass Darkly

For much of the past couple of years the majority of my posts at Songs of a Semi-Free Man have considered the idea that we are haunted by the sense we were meant for something more, or even that something else is going on in the background. In the words of St. Paul we see “through a glass darkly”. (1)

We grope for meaning in love, work, education, art, sport, family. We want to do great things; we want to be part of great things. It is not enough to live, mate, procreate, work and die. If this is our fate we reject it (even as we give intellectual assent to philosophical and scientific dogmas that promise such a pointless existence). Death pains most of all.

We dream of utopia but live in the shadow of the waking nightmare of Doomsday. We want to scream out – “I am and I matter.” Sometimes we even dare scream – “they matter too.”

Lack of Peace on Earth

Heaven on Earth
We need it now
I'm sick of all of this
Hanging around
Sick of sorrow
Sick of pain
Sick of hearing again and again
That there's gonna be
Peace on Earth (1)

Peace on earth. No trouble with being overwhelmed with that this year. Wars, rumors of wars, fear of economic collapse. It seems that nearly everyone has something to lose this year, or fears losing something. Indeed, just the normal rush to buy presents, decorate the house, visit relatives, and look like you’re having fun, can be trying by itself.

So Christmas with its message of peace and joy rings hollow to many. Why should we expect this time of year to be more peaceful and joyful than any other day of the year? All the giving, getting, and going just doesn’t seem to get us there.

Leaving It All Behind

You've got to leave it behind
All that you fashion
All that you make
All that you build
All that you break
All that you measure
All that you steal
All this you can leave behind
All that you reason
All that you sense
All that you speak
All you dress up
All that you scheme... – U2 “Walk On” (1)

We must leave everything to those who follow.  Our greatest treasures are the following generation’s junk.  Stuff they have to clear away.  If they have attachment to something it is because it reminds them of someone who has passed.   They have no attachment to the thing itself.

If you have ever gone through the stuff of someone who has passed away, you will probably have wondered why they kept some things, and then concluded that those things must have been valuable or useful in their time. 

Similarly, if you have ever been in the market for a house, and started looking at potential properties you will have seen things that make you wonder what the previous owners were thinking.  Home renovations are never in my experience undertaken lightly, so some thinking went into that floral wallpaper or wood paneling.

But we don’t take this truth about the temporary worth of goods to heart.  We treasure our shiny, usually slimmer than yesteryear, treasures.

The recent launch of the new iPhone caused thousands to line up for days to be the first to have what in a few years will be obsolete and in thirty years – junk.  But they were willing to spend so much time for this ephemeral object, that in years to come will be perhaps found as a curiosity in an attic, similar to four-track players I found in my parent’s attic when I was a kid.  

It is exciting to have the latest first; to be an early adopter.  Some now cite this as an achievement.  And if you can keep getting the newest first, perhaps you can keep yourself satisfied.  But if you reflect, you will realize that you are paying a premium to own tomorrow’s junk first.

Summer

The sun was out the other day. It’s not something that can be counted on every day. Growing up in Ireland I learned quickly to be skeptical that the sun schedule was in anyway linked to the calendar. As many Irish people will tell you it seems more closely tied to exam schedules. But when it does appear it causes a change in mood – an elevation of happiness. 

I now live in Buffalo, New York. Not the place to go to chase the sun, but summer days in Buffalo can be almost perfect. 

There is something that seems natural about having a cold on a wintery, November day, or the flu on a frozen, February day, but being sick on a bright, hot summer day, seems a little unnatural - a contradiction of the natural order. 

Even death seems more appropriate in winter. Patrick Kavanagh, the Irish poet, wrote of how “October-coloured weather” reminded him of his dead father. (i)  Perhaps, it is because my father passed in November that summer seems to be correlated with life and not death. 

The aliveness of a perfect June day, when inside is as good as out, makes everywhere a comfortable place. This is the time to enjoy. A day it feels painful to be stuck in the office while the whole world is out playing. Is this a holdover from school holidays or vacations (divided by a common language and all that) that conditions us to want time off?

Rejection

Why do we want to be accepted and hate rejection so much?  After all, rejection is quite logical.  In most scenarios there are more people trying to achieve a goal they will not reach.  For example, you might want to be a star athlete but there are only so many places on professional teams for you to obtain.  Moreover, just achieving professional status, hard as that is to do, doesn’t guarantee stardom.  You might want to be successful musician or a writer, or the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, but the vast majority of people seeking those positions will not achieve them.

It’s true that anyone can start a band, write a book, or form a company, but to make it a success is something else entirely.  The odds are against us.  Still it doesn’t hinder some of us from reaching for the stars.  Hope springs eternal.

There are many who embrace the logic of rejection and don’t try to reach hugely ambitious goals, but they will face rejection from friends and potential romantic partners.  Even if you don’t want to be a corporate titan, most of us are not content to remain on the same rung of the ladder forever.  So even if we shy away from giant goals we can’t completely inoculate ourselves from rejection. 

Are we supposed to become accustomed to not achieving our dreams, and settle for the possible – to surrender to cynicism?  To sneer at those who try?

We seem destined to search for unconditional acceptance in a world where we face constant rejection. 

We know we are not perfect and so we need acceptance in spite of ourselves.  Close family can provide this to a certain extent, but our family members are often just as imperfect as we are. 

If there were a perfect person would they be disgusted by us?  Or would a perfect person be so gracious that only they could overlook our many flaws and accept us nonetheless?

If I were a truly “perfect” person I would likely console myself better that I was better than everyone else as I maintained splendid isolation. 

The Bible tells of a perfect God coming to live with hugely flawed people, some of whom couldn’t stand Him so much that they wanted Him dead.  But He offers acceptance – no matter what we have done.  That is good news.

For some thoughts on whether we are good people click here.

CSI Effect?

Radical skepticism and unquestioning credulity are strange bedfellows in today’s society.  We can’t rely on our own recollections because sometimes we make mistakes.  We don’t trust the testimony of others.  It’s not that we necessarily think others are liars, it’s just that everyone has their own perspective on the world – their personal narrative.

But at the same time we are experiencing the triumph of scientific knowledge, often to the detriment of other types of knowledge.  Science is concerned with accuracy, verifiability, and certainty.  And science is indeed magnificent.  The problem is that other types of knowledge have been downgraded.  If scientific evidence is triple A rated, other forms of evidence have junk status.

The CSI Effect

Criminal lawyers have commented on the existence of what they have termed the CSI effect.  They have theorized that juries have been influenced by the rash of criminal forensic T.V. shows such as CSI, and now expect heightened scientific evidence to be presented at trial.  Jurors prone to the CSI effect are also theorized to be more likely to dismiss other forms of evidence such as eyewitness or circumstantial evidence.

Sickness

This week a particularly nasty stomach bug has infiltrated our home.  I will spare you the details, but it has not been a pleasant experience.  I spent most of yesterday trying to summon the energy to get out of bed, which I managed to do a couple of times, immediately regretting the decision each time.

The illness that I am experiencing this week is annoying but not life-threatening.  Unfortunately, not all illness is so easily recovered from, and some diseases have no recovery. 

While we are healthy we don’t think about sickness.  We sometimes pause to reflect on our wellness when we see others suffer, but for the most part sickness seems alien to us.  Something is wrong.  We know it happens, and it could happen to us, but when it strikes, it seems so unfair.

Winning Through Negativity

I assume that negative political advertisements work – otherwise why would they be paid for?  That is, if they didn’t work we would be rid of them by now.  But do they convince or merely cement the opinions of those already inclined to the position being advocated (if the negative ads can be described as advocating).  This kind of discourse is not going to bring about positive change. 

To change someone’s opinion requires that person to make a choice.  It cannot be forced upon them.  It also requires openness to new ideas, especially those we might not be accustomed to entertaining.
   

Civilization is the willingness to listen to others, trying our best to keep our prejudices and preconceived ideas in check.  That is not to say that all ideas are equally valid, I firmly believe that truth is objective and not subjective, and that reasonable persons can get to it.  If history has shown us anything, it is that ideas can be the most dangerous things of all.  But all ideas deserve a listen until we figure out their value.

But, the exchange of ideas without civility can have the opposite effect.  If we go beyond the bounds of legitimate persuasion towards coercion, we may get our way for a while, but resentment of those forced to toe the line will grow and we will find ourselves in a worse position than before.

Cometh the Hour, Cometh the Man

Three minutes and 20 seconds into added time.  Manchester City were about to finish behind Manchester United.  Their first change to win the English league title for 44 years was slipping away.  Worse, their city rivals, Manchester United, were about to win it in their stead. Pain was etched on the faces of the City supporters.  Many started to leave.  Then to use a sporting cliché, “cometh the hour, cometh the man”, Sergio Aguero, goal.  Manchester City were champions.

Where does this phrase come from? This idea that the hero will appear at the right time to save the day, or that when the time comes someone will step up and become the hero?

This is a sporting cliché, but it resonates with us.  Could we live with the idea that there will be no hero?  That when things are at their very darkest, no one steps in  (well, as a Liverpool fan, I’ve witnessed that scenario a few too many times this season).  That we are all standing by watching helplessly as everything goes to pot.

We look to heroes who promises that will lead us to better times.  Just look at the euphoria of President Obama’s election victory.  In France, President Hollande has promised to ease the European economic crisis without crushing austerity measures. 

Interestingly, we see potential heroes fail, or at least fail to deliver on their promise all the time.   For example, I don’t think that anyone, no matter what side they face politically, would deny that Obama has not delivered all that he promised in 2008.  Similarly, Hollande may struggle to painlessly ease the French and the wider European debt crises.

But we still believe.  We still hope.  We may even pray.

Why?

Nothing New Under the Sun

We have advanced greatly in knowledge, but this problem of meaning is no nearer to a solution. The ancient writer of Ecclesiastes, thought to be Solomon circa 970 B.C., highlighted the meaningless of life; that life has no meaning if there is nothing to it besides being born, living and dying, and attempts to find meaning in success are doomed to fail. Success is fickle and fleeting, and as the ancient writer points out, it never satisfies.

“Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher.  “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” (i)

And

I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my labor, and this was the reward for all my toil. Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun. (ii)

Millennia later existentialist thinkers such as Jean-Paul Sartre echoed the ancient lament of Ecclesiastes that life is without meaning. Sartre pointed out that we then have to make our own meaning in such a world without equality or fairness or direction.

I exist, that is all, and I find it nauseating. (iii)

However, the ancient philosopher pointed out there is a meaning. There will be equality. God will judge all actions. Jesus stated that in His Kingdom “first will be last and last will be first”.  (iv)

Sartre, himself recognized that without belief in the supernatural there can be no meaning to life. He rejected belief in God as “bad faith”, but his solution that everyone make their own truth is hardly any better. If we each labored under the guise of our own truth, society would break down. If no one recognized the truth of standards such as criminal laws or the rights of others, the world would be a horrible place.

There is a choice in front of us. Is life truly meaningless because it is unfair or can we find solace in the fact that God will usher in a world of fairness – the world we want to live in?

(i)  Ecclesiastes 1:2 (New International Version).
(ii) Ecclesiastes 2:10-11 (New International Version).
(iii) Jean-Paul Sartre, Nausea.
(iv) Matthew 19:30 (New International Version).

Some Thoughts on “Civilization: The West and the Rest” by Niall Ferguson

I’ve written quite a bit lately that a shared concept of truth is necessary to establish trust in society; and that a shared sense of trust leads to a better society. In particular, in personal and business relationships it is imperative that the counterparty or friend can be trusted at their word.

Reading Harvard historian Niall Ferguson’s latest book, Civilization: The West and the Rest, I was struck by this yet again.

In Civilization, Ferguson objectively examines why so-called western nations have been so successful over the last five hundred or so years. He points out that in 1500, China was far ahead of western countries by any standard of measure.[1] He proposes that the western use of what he calls “killer apps” - competition, science, democracy, medicine, consumerism and the work ethic were the source of this rise of western countries.

At the end of the book Ferguson looks at the reasons why the western countries are now losing their way, while nations like China are rising.

Ferguson does not list Christianity as one of “the killer apps” of western civilization. But that is perhaps because it is deeper than that. He points out that capitalism and consumerism without limits can be equally destructive. Much of the western world has spent itself broke. He points out that Christianity encourages competition and entrepreneurship coupled with asceticism. That is to say, one can work hard and generate profit, but still have a firm belief that personal gain is not the end goal. He writes that in China the explosion of capitalism going hand in hand with a high personal savings rate is a key to the rise of China.

My Word Is My Bond

The basis of all human transactions is trust.  Trust that others will keep their word and do what they said they will do.  Let me rephrase: in a well-functioning society the basis of human transaction is trust that other people will keep their word.

In a society where some use power or force to get what they want, or others deceit, there will be considerable costs to us as individuals, and to society as a whole. 

You pay the plumber to fix the sink trusting the leak will be fixed; you take a job trusting you will be paid; you sign a business contract trusting your partners will hold up their sides of the bargain; you get married trusting your spouse will be faithful.

There are ways to mitigate the costs of the inability to trust others.  If we are working for someone else we can ask to be paid up front (although others may be reluctant to pay up front afraid there will be no incentive to finish the project).  We can bring those who fail to live up to their promises to an independent body for dispute resolution.  Couples can enter into pre-nuptial agreements. But, of course, these mitigations cost time and money.

It is extremely difficult to enter into any relationship where parties do not feel bound by their word.  This is true whether we are talking about romantic or business relationships.  At first, everyone makes wonderful promises and aspires to great things.  But if everyone decides to do what best suits him or herself when things don’t go as planned, the venture will not be long for this world.

For example, if two parties think they have come to a business agreement only to arrive at the next meeting to find that the terms they thought were set in stone are being renegotiated, the deal will not get done.  The same is true for romantic relationships.

Bankers Into Plowshares?

Listening to the radio the other day I was struck as a reporter described a sign held by an activist at an Occupy Frankfurt rally. Translated from German the sign read “[turn] bankers into plowshares”. The activist was referencing the phrase “swords into plowshares”, the image of swords, as weapons of war, being turned into plowshares, agricultural instruments. This phrase looks forward to a time when we will have no conceivable use for weapons of war. When there is permanent disarmament, and we till the earth in peace.

The activist was trying, I think, to get across the idea that without bankers society would be better – fairer and more just and peaceful. I’ll leave it up to the reader to decide their personal position on bankers and the world financial crisis, that’s not what interests me here. What caught my ear was the use of language.

This phrase comes from the Biblical prophet Isaiah, describing the world after God’s kingdom is established on earth and all things are made right. Here is the phrase in context:

Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the temple of the God of Jacob.  He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.”  The law will go out from Zion, the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.  He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples.  They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.  Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. (1)

I previously wrote a piece on man’s constant urge for a better world for peace and justice, and the inability to achieve it, which you can read here. I don’t want to repeat myself, but the current wave of protests against the financial systems of the world and reference to the swords into plowshares intrigued me.

Equality

The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all.  – Ecclesiastes 9:11.

Equality

We are told as children that everyone should be treated equally.  Stories of those who fought to make things equal are celebrated.  It is apparent to even the youngest school child that we don’t live in an equal world – otherwise why would Rev. Martin Luther King have struggled.  So it is not the idea that equality is the status quo but that it could be the future default mode.

We are taught that because the world is equal hard work and talent will always rise to the top.  Work hard in school, turn up on time, do your best.  So an equal world does not mean that everyone will be the same – after all there can only be one President of the United States – but that everyone has a chance of success.  It also should mean that those that do succeed deserve their status because of inherent talent and diligence. 

Therefore, according to this theory, while we may not agree with those in influential positions, we cannot say they don’t deserve to be there.  However, many of us have experienced people in power over us to be somewhat less than brilliant.  I’m not talking about jealousy, but about the smart and talented being bossed by those less so.

Finale?

“Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we die.”  (1)

We have an inbuilt desire to do things that matter.  But what if everything we build and love and fight for is gone someday?  Without a trace.  As if it never was.  Would it matter that we existed for an instant in the face of an eternity without us?  The inescapable answer is that it would not.

The problem is that we know, with the rarity of absolute certainty, that we will die. 

However, modern science tells us the universe is not about us.  It tells us via evolutionary biology that we owe our existence to chance.  With all the potential apocalyptic disasters looming over our heads, it is possible that we as a species will not endure forever. We know we have our own expiration date.  Yet, the thought of our non-existence causes us great angst.

 “Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we die.”  This is how Paul of Tarsus, the writer of much of the New Testament, which is the second part of the Christian Bible, summed up life if death is our final curtain call.

But even hedonism, the pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of pain, doesn’t work out.  We can’t do what we want because of limitations that all of us (to some extent or another) face.  We may lack the material resources: money, power, or physical capacity, to do what we want.  Further, more often than not, our desire to do something will conflict with someone else’s desire to do something else.  Someone may prevail (there is a possibility that neither person will get what they want) but it may not always be you.  We also know that many aspects of our lives are beyond our control.  Disease, natural disaster, war, economic collapses, and political convulsions, can all radically alter the course of our lives.  As we are all too painfully aware, there is little we can do to insulate ourselves from these things.  So the best we can hope for is to strive to eat, drink, and be merry as it is not within our power to achieve even this modicum of happiness.

Why do we feel this need for significance in the face of our insignificance?  Is it some kind of cosmic joke?  If so, I don’t hear too much laughter.

The Bible reassures us that there is a meaning to all of this.  The writer of Ecclesiastes, a part of the Old Testament, the first part of the Bible, outlines the meaningless nature of life coming to the conclusion that life only has meaning because God judges everyone in the end.  The Bible tells us there is a life after this – heaven and hell.  After advising those who reject the resurrection of Jesus, the central element of Christianity, to “eat and drink, for tomorrow we die”, Paul points out the difference for Christians is that we have a hope because the end of this life is not our end.  For those who believe and obey Jesus, who defeated death, there is a hope that will never be destroyed.  Paul writes: “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” (2)

You may choose to reject the idea of eternal life through the death and resurrection of Jesus, but if this life is all there is, any attempt to find meaning is doomed, fulfillment is fleeting, and significance illusory.

(1)           1 Corinthians 15 v.32.  King James Version.

(2)           1 Corinthians 15 v. 55. Kings James Version.

Conspiracy Theory

Many today are obsessed with conspiracy theories. They believe that hidden from view those with great power and influence manipulate everything for their personal gain. Behind wars, economic disasters, disease lies the guiding hand of an unseen group of politicians and bankers who really rule the world. They think there is a double-game; a powerful group of kingmakers and breakers meeting in secluded luxury to decide the fate of the world; that they are not being told the truth; that something deeper is going on.

We humans will never be satisfied until we can explain everything and remove every mystery. Science has also got into the act with the search for theories that explain everything and the quest for the end of inquiry. Philosophers have also sought to find great forces that cause the changes that we see around us. Karl Marx theorized that class warfare was the driving force. Adam Smith believed in the invisible hand that guided human commerce. In addition, we think the explanation will boil down at its core to some overriding cause or principle behind everything.

Today, we want to see that cause as something physical or material and not metaphysical such as an omnipotent God. Indeed, religion and Christianity in particular, are theorized to be great conspiracy theories at their heart. The wildly popular novel the Da Vinci Code, purported to expose a conspiracy to conceal the fact that Jesus Christ married Mary Magdalene. Even though numerous authorities have exposed this theory to be pure hokum, more than eighty million people have read this book.

Why do we look for a cause that links everything together? What if instead of a hidden group in control of everything, there is no one pulling the strings. Chaos. Every man and woman for his or herself? Frightening? Definitely. But we don’t think like that.

The Bible provides an answer why we have this sense of something deeper going on. That reality is not all that meets the eye. The Bible presents a world where there is an unseen spiritual dimension that determines what occurs in the physical world.

In the movie the Matrix, the hero Neo has an inkling that there is more to life than his hum-drum existence as a corporate cubicle-clone. Neo’s eyes are opened after he comes into contact with Morpheus and his cohorts. The grey everyday world in which he has existed was a sham all along. This movie exploits the familiar feeling that surely this can’t be all there is.

Plato described this feeling as living in a cave sitting in front of a fire watching shadows on the cave wall made by people and objects that pass the entrance of the cave. He claimed that like the cave dwellers we only see shadows of reality in our everyday existence and not the true reality that exists outside of the cave.

Some might argue that one day science will demystify this sense of the spiritual. But this claim is profoundly unscientific. Science deals with what can and has been proved. So until science proves this spiritual sense away, this argument has no power. To claim it is an answer is to make science a religion.

This idea that for all we know, our everyday physical world is a shadow of something greater, obviously has legs. Plato’s cave allegory and the Matrix are separated by over two thousand years. The sense that we live our lives in monochrome while a technicolor universe lies hidden behind every curtain - from time to time brilliantly shining through to expose the drabness of the quotidian - has not diminished since ancient times. Try as we might we can’t seem to shake the sense there is something else happening on a greater stage.

A Post-Modern World?

Today there is much talk about how we live in a post-modern world. What does that mean? What does it mean to assert that we have moved from modernism to post-modernism? Has the nature of truth changed or just our view of it? What was the motivation for this change – whatever it is?

Let us define the terms. Modernism is the view that asserts that there are objective truths out there to be discovered. It maintains however that these objective truths are material truths that can be discovered by empirical scientific discovery.

Modernism, marked a change from what went before as it explicitly rejected the existence of spiritual or metaphysical truths; modernism was driven by the Enlightenment and the explosion of scientific discoveries that followed. In other words, that everything about our world, where we came from, art, love, hate and the morality that binds us could be discovered and broken down into material, empirical terms.

Before modernism the prevailing view was that our world had a material as well as a metaphysical or spiritual dimension. It was also held that we humans had a dual nature – a material physical body and a spiritual soul. [1] The traditional answer to why we have a drive to be good, to why we are exhilarated by great art, to why we dream of utopia, was that these concepts, which were grounded in a higher spiritual reality, touched our souls in an intangible way. Throughout much of the world it was believed that Christianity explained this higher reality.

The end goal to which modernism was travelling was to make sense of the world without metaphysics – without God. Modernism wanted to answer these questions about morality, art, love and human aspiration, without resorting to positing the existence of a Supreme Being. But modernism concerned with only examining the tangible proved not to be so good at explaining the intangible.

The end point of modernism in a philosophical sense was logical positivism, a philosophical movement that held that any statement that was not a logical tautology or that could not be empirically tested and verified was meaningless. [2] This left ethics, art, love out in the cold.

Post-modernism is a reaction to the failure of modernism to account for essential facets of humanity such as poetry, politics, love and morality. Since objective answers to these questions proved impossible to come by so there was a migration to a different paradigm of truth that was subjective. Post-modernism rejected of the dogma of objective empiricism and instead insisted that truth was based on community. The post-modern worldview asserts that our values about ethics, art, politics, love and hate evolved over time as humans evolved and formed societies. [3] Post-modernism is therefore another attempt to come up with satisfying answers to the essential human questions without the need to talk about metaphysics and spirituality. Its solution is that there is no objective truth and we haven’t discovered it because we’ve been looking for something that isn’t there. On this view all of our current values are the result of historical accident and could have been otherwise – they are contingent.

According to a post-modern view, truth is pragmatic, subjective and contingent. Truth is made not discovered. But this also means that truth changes over time. Nothing is absolute. Nothing is guaranteed.

The problem with post-modernity is that if truth is contingent and subjective, nothing has any meaning. If our concepts of truth are based on society they could change at any moment, and there is no basis for calling action something right or wrong, beautiful or hideous. Everyone is right and wrong at the same time.

So I don’t think that post-modernism provides meaningful answers. Many people insist that the prevalence of post-modernism is a death knell to belief in the spiritual and therefore to traditional Christianity. However, I think the opposite is true. The failure of modernism and the inherent contradictions at the heart of post-modernism show that attempts to reject a spiritual or metaphysical dimension to this world do not cut the mustard. Indeed, belief in spirituality among “non-religious people” is marked. [4]

Instead I think there are cosmic clues that alert us to the fact that there is more to the world than meets the physical eye – a spiritual as well as a material dimension to our world. Our desire to be good, our desire for utopia, our love of art, our wonder in the face of nature, our fear of the end are some of these clues. The modernist project to ground these clues in the physical world has come up empty, the post-modern attempt to ground them on society has not provided any answers to the big questions just denied there are such big questions to be answered.

What’s the upshot? First, new atheism is in trouble. Much of the current crop of new atheists, such as Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris, are modernists. They answer questions about morality, love, society and art by reducing them to material terms. If modernity has been replaced by post-modernity, this approach has been widely rejected. Second, post-modernism doesn’t provide meaningful answers. If you want meaningful significant answers they must be objective. Searching for objective answers about morality, art and love inevitably leads to contemplation of the metaphysical or the spiritual. The surge in interest in spirituality provides evidence for this thesis. Human attempts to answer these questions in terms of science and society have failed. Maybe that’s because we had the answer all along.

1. Plato. Republic. Trans. Waterfield, Robin. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994; Descartes. Discourse on the Method and the Meditations. Trans. Sutcliffe, F.E. Penguin Books. Middlesex: 1971.

2. See, for example, Ayer, A.J. Language, Truth and Logic. New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1952.

3. See, The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy. Ed., Robert Audi. Cambridge: University of Cambridge, 1995; 634-35; Wittgenstein, Ludwig. Philosophical Investigations, Anscombe, G.E.M., Hacker, P.M.S. and Schulte, Joachim trans. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, 2009; 99, Investigation #261; Rorty, Richard. Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989.

4. See Hemmingway, Mollie Ziegler. “Look Who’s Irrational Now”. Wall Street Journal 19 Sep. 2008: W13. Available at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122178219865054585.html.

Earth Day

The world of the living contains enough marvels and mysteries as it is – marvels and mysteries acting upon our emotions and intelligence in ways so inexplicable that it would almost justify the conception of life as an enchanted state. – Joseph Conrad, Author’s Note to The Shadow Land (1)

I recently attended an earth day celebration with one of my children. The kids sang a couple of songs celebrating the earth and proclaiming the virtues of tree planting and not littering. Of course, these are positive things to tell our children to clean up after themselves and to recycle where possible. But earth day, or international mother earth day as the international version is called, is not just about cleaning up litter or recycling – it’s much more than that.

The traditional Christian view that the earth and all that exists is the result of divine creation has been rejected as unscientific - fine to teach at home but not suitable for the classroom. However, the idea of celebrating mother earth is also unscientific when viewed through the paradigm of evolutionary theory.

The dominant scientific theory regarding the origin of the earth presents the world gradually through the process of evolution. Leaving aside any argument regarding the truth or falsity of evolutionary theory, is an evolved earth a sensible thing to celebrate? Earth day as a secular celebration is celebrating an earth that we find today as the result of evolution.

Evolution we are told occurred because of a unique set of circumstances that resulted in the world we live in today. If anything was the slightest bit different as evolution worked its way along, life as we know it would not exist. (2) So it isn’t as if mother earth somehow set out to make us what we are. So what are we celebrating on earth day – random chance that somehow worked out in our favor. That is a scientific and rational basis for a truly secular celebration of nature. But that doesn’t make you feel warm and fuzzy inside. In fact the opposite is true. If you truly embrace the idea that life itself is the result of a series of random events the rational person won’t see much purpose. You can’t sing too many happy songs about that.

The Bible states that the wonders of nature point to God. (3) Evolutionary theory contends to have demystified nature and exposed divine creation as a myth. However, we are still spellbound by nature.

Atheists state that there is no need to appeal to the divine or the supernatural to experience awe and wonder. Instead they argue that nature itself is a wonder. See the quote at the beginning of this piece by Conrad that Christopher Hitchens quotes in his book God Is Not Great. But doesn’t this beg the question?

When surrounded by the wonders of nature do you think that it’s really amazing that everything here happened by chance? Or do you have an inkling that this couldn’t have just come about by pulling the lever on some cosmic slot machine.

Unless of course you think nature is indeed a terrible mess. But we have to be taught to think like that. Left to our own reflection on a summer day we have an intuition that nature is in fact truly wonderful. Beautiful even. Some atheists agree that nature itself is amazing and wonderful except when they want to criticize the notion that nature did not come about by chance but by design.

Earth day cannot be rationally explained. It is not a celebration of nature as the prevailing scientific worldview paints it. The best explanation is that it is the celebration of nature itself as if nature were responsible for making itself and us – as if it were mother earth. This is surely totally irrational. Yet many do it. We claim that science has disproved the idea of divine creation but instead of truly embracing the non-teleological nature of evolutionary theory (that is to say that nature is essentially random and purposeless) we celebrate mother nature as if it was teleological or purposeful.

The Bible states that humans have two modes when it comes to nature. Either we worship God as creator or nature itself (4). Paul of Tarsus wrote these words two thousand years ago, and despite the myriad of technological changes, very little has changed. This is not surprising as the Bible, whatever you think about it, provides much valuable insight into our world today, e.g., that there is nothing new under the sun (5).

It seems that the natural world inspires us to think there must be some purpose to all of this. We have to place this purpose somewhere – either in the mind of a divine being that created the world or in nature itself. Evolutionary theory prevents us from locating purpose in nature so either we remain consistent to this worldview and refrain from deifying random chance or embrace the idea that the natural world is evidence of something higher.

But if after tracing these thoughts through you still celebrate nature for its own sake you should remain aware that doing so is no more "rational" than worshiping God as creator of the world. If you can’t bring yourself to see nature as purposeless and random, maybe you should consider the possibility that there is a divine purpose behind the natural world.

1. Quoted in Christopher Hitchens. God Is Not Great. Twelve. P.73.

2. Hitchens. God Is Not Great. P. 92-93. Quoting Stephen Jay Gould.

3. Holy Bible. New International Version. Psalm 19 v. 1-4

4. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles. Holy Bible. New International Version. Romans 1 v 20 -23.

5. What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new”? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time. Holy Bible. New International Version. Ecclesiastes 1 v 8-10.