"The Idiot's Guide to New Atheism"

Macht (at Prosthesis) has just written an excellent summary of the "new atheism." He distinguishes it from other forms of atheism, lays out the essential character of this newest version, and shows some of its internal tensions and contradictions. To whet your appetite:

"According to the new atheists, it is this modern, secular society that we should be striving for. However, one of the problems with this, as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, is that we see various atheisms in various cultures, some of them pre-modern. Each of these atheisms have had, as Taylor puts it, their own "positive visions of the good." The new atheists mistakenly think that atheism is what is left over when you strip a culture of silly religions, superstitions, and traditions. In reality, however, the new atheists have their own 'positive visions of the good.' So there is a fundamental tension between the new atheist rhetoric and their actual beliefs.

...

"The new atheists have a 'positive vision of the good' just as much as any religious person. In fact, the previous paragraph gives a pretty good overview of what that vision is. But this means that the new atheist vision must be seen as an alternate vision from the Christian vision or the Muslim vision or the Wiccan vision. But this directly contradicts the new atheist view that atheism is just what you have left over when you strip these cultures of their unreason. The new atheist view is that when it comes down to it, we are all atheists - the problem is that most of us are wearing a burka of religious or superstitious beliefs. Atheism isn't a competing vision, it's what you have when you take your burka off. Clearly, this is a serious contradiction."

Posted: Tue - July 17, 2007 at 12:12 PM |

Thinking Christian by Tom Gilson getCategoryName("<$CategoryUUID$>");

"The Idiot's Guide to New Atheism"

Thinking Christian by Tom Gilson