A New Beginning
I’m re-appropriating this blog. I’ve been wanting to write and think philosophically more, and I’m making this my outlet.
Originally, I started this blog as a way to keep notes on conversations I was having with my brother-in-law, principally debating religion. We’d been talking in circles quite a bit, and I wanted a resource to look back on if a question came up again, hopefully enabling us to make better progress. It was fun while it lasted — about three posts’ worth — and then a full year went by without another discussion.
During the year or so since we last talked, whenever I thought about it, I felt frustrated. Despite my keeping records and making (what I thought were) pretty solid arguments, we still kept circling back to the same questions, not gaining any ground.
Last summer, I read Pascal’s Pensees. Among other things, this famous book discusses the limits of human reason, especially when it comes to religious claims. Although Pascal presents some argument for Christian belief — historical evidence and the coherence of Christian writings, for example — in the end, he asserts, it basically comes down to disposition. Belief is more a matter of the heart than the head.
More recently, I read How to Have Impossible Conversations by Peter Boghossian and James Lindsay. The book repeatedly makes the point that people arrive at their views more often through emotion and social pressure than by reason. Because of this, when they’re pressed in debate, they’ll be reluctant to change their mind even if logic and evidence suggest that they should.
After this experience, I’m inclined to agree. I think there are strong arguments in favor of Christian faith, but the extent to which they are compelling seems to depend some prior disposition — openness to being compelled, if you will. Whether or not God exists, etc., has a lot of ramifications for who we are and how we live our lives. There’s a lot at stake, especially in our age of identity politics where beliefs are so essential to who we are. It stands to reason that this dynamic plays a role in how we take up the question. It’s naïve to say that anyone could look at the matter “objectively.” Truth is never just “out there.” Truth is always truth-for-us, which is what I think Kierkegaard meant when he said that truth was subjectivity. This isn’t to say that there’s no place for rational argument at all — just that it’s only a piece of the puzzle, and a small piece at that.
At this point, it would be easy for me to criticize my interlocutor — saying, essentially, that I should have “won” the argument if it weren’t for his subjective commitments. Rather, I’m going to try the humble route, taking this as my cue to examine my own motivations. In our conversations, I was hypocritical. I expected my partner to have an open mind, but I was completely closed off. I find secularism not only irrational but deeply unappealing, and I wasn’t interested in any arguments to the contrary. I don’t think I once honestly tried to understand his viewpoint. So, if and when we get together again, I think my main goal will be to try to understand how secularism appeals to him. That’s an honest question I can ask that won’t turn into a “gotcha.”
The irony is not lost on me that, having resolved to be less argumentative in real life, I’ve also decided to write more on this blog. Well, I enjoy the “thrill of the hunt” too much to give it up altogether. And to be honest, I’m just an egotist. It pleases me to see my own thoughts in writing. Apparently, the trivial vainglory of anonymously blasting sketchy opinions onto an obscure website is enough to motivate me. But perhaps over time the discipline of doing it will transform that motive into a nobler one.
