Somewhere in the great heap of boxes we moved here a year ago, there is an almost 900 page book titled, "A Secular Age", by Charles Taylor. I have slogged my way as far into that book as I could, before I exhausted myself with well-doing. I concluded that the book should have been titled, "A Nostalgic Age". Charles Taylor has indeed vacuumed up a grand heap of secular evidence, praising it ambiguously as he goes, but it eventually becomes clear that he thinks it is all useful, but unsatisfying, stuff because he has something else in mind.
Charles Taylor wants to believe in God, and he think that all of us want to believe in God because God has made us such that we have a great need to want to believe in in God. It is tough to lose that argument: we want to believe, therefore it is not a secular age.
That is, unfortunately, a little like arguing that there must be tooth fairies because it was really very satisfying when we believed in tooth fairies.
Well, of course things made satisfying sense when we made sense of then that way. We still talk as we used to, historically, in the West, at least. When nothing made sense, we said God has a plan. When death came unexpectedly, or when wars devastated us, we said that if we believed, everything would come out all right. There were no irrational famines, no senseless tragedies: we said, "God". If murderers got away with savagery, we trusted to eventual justice. And, indeed, there was a kind of satisfaction in believing that.
It is easier to say that life came from God, and that when it is all over, someday, it will be God, again. It is much harder, in some ways, to have to figure it out for ourselves; to try to imagine how life began, and how it goes along. It is a damnable nuisance, and painful to admit, that if we burn all the coal we can find, or if we fill the atmosphere with CO2, that we might destroy our own lives, but it is undoubtedly true.
It might be that Fourth of July picnics in a small town were grand, with sparklers and rockets and speeches by the Mayor. But we do not live there, anymore, even if we would like to.
It is not a secular age, today, if by that we mean that there still are religious people, all around, but it is not a religious age, either, if by that we mean that we will continue to think the way we used to think in the first or the fourteenth century. There are scientists who are religious, and it may be that they are comfortable calling something a "God-particle", but it isn't a God particle they are observing. It is matter and energy, doing what matter and energy do.
When Laplace published his theory of how the solar system was formed, Napolean asked him how God fit into his theory. Laplace said, "Sir, I have no need of that hypothesis."
Science does not speak of God. It neither confirms nor denies God. It is not about that. So say, "God", if you wish. But science is not about that. There is no need for that hypothesis, and that is a huge change.
Charles Taylor wants to believe in God, and he think that all of us want to believe in God because God has made us such that we have a great need to want to believe in in God. It is tough to lose that argument: we want to believe, therefore it is not a secular age.
That is, unfortunately, a little like arguing that there must be tooth fairies because it was really very satisfying when we believed in tooth fairies.
Well, of course things made satisfying sense when we made sense of then that way. We still talk as we used to, historically, in the West, at least. When nothing made sense, we said God has a plan. When death came unexpectedly, or when wars devastated us, we said that if we believed, everything would come out all right. There were no irrational famines, no senseless tragedies: we said, "God". If murderers got away with savagery, we trusted to eventual justice. And, indeed, there was a kind of satisfaction in believing that.
It is easier to say that life came from God, and that when it is all over, someday, it will be God, again. It is much harder, in some ways, to have to figure it out for ourselves; to try to imagine how life began, and how it goes along. It is a damnable nuisance, and painful to admit, that if we burn all the coal we can find, or if we fill the atmosphere with CO2, that we might destroy our own lives, but it is undoubtedly true.
It might be that Fourth of July picnics in a small town were grand, with sparklers and rockets and speeches by the Mayor. But we do not live there, anymore, even if we would like to.
It is not a secular age, today, if by that we mean that there still are religious people, all around, but it is not a religious age, either, if by that we mean that we will continue to think the way we used to think in the first or the fourteenth century. There are scientists who are religious, and it may be that they are comfortable calling something a "God-particle", but it isn't a God particle they are observing. It is matter and energy, doing what matter and energy do.
When Laplace published his theory of how the solar system was formed, Napolean asked him how God fit into his theory. Laplace said, "Sir, I have no need of that hypothesis."
Science does not speak of God. It neither confirms nor denies God. It is not about that. So say, "God", if you wish. But science is not about that. There is no need for that hypothesis, and that is a huge change.
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