3 ms·

I think the shared belief, sense of purpose, and sense of something greater beyond this life _is_ a key to it. I don't think secularism can provide a strong eno

I think the shared belief, sense of purpose, and sense of something greater beyond this life _is_ a key to it. I don't think secularism can provide a strong enough motivation channeled into something productive. It can evoke strong emotion, but it usually ends with days of rage and such. Religion and belief in deity has pretty much always provided that (and even then there are lots of examples of that not working). I don't think we are going to buck the lessons of thousands of years of human history and find some kind of "enlightened secularism" that hasn't worked before.

bluetomcat 6y ago
I think the postmodern intellectual narratives are breaking it all in the West. The denial of objective truth, the rise of moral relativism, the notions about expressing the individual via many group identities, etc. It's a demoralizing view of life that is far-reaching in our contemporary culture. Even if you look at architecture, design and urban planning, you can find bits of that "wisdom" everywhere.
- agent008t 6y ago
  In addition, there is no positive vision of the future for society as a whole. What does the US look like in 2075 or 2100? All we get are dystopias. I get that the World, and Europe in particular, got badly burnt by Utopias in the 20th century. But still seems like something is needed - especially given the looming geopolitical changes.
xxpor 6y ago
How is this not an argument that the masses are too stupid to handle themselves and need to be brainwashed for social control and stability? That's essentially what religion is, especially Abrahamic religions based on nothing but completely made up stories.
- jazzyjackson 6y ago
  We're talking about purpose, not control. It seems true to me that most individuals (myself included) are not up to the task of inventing a reason to exist. You can moan about how the stories are made up til Kingdom come, the point of it is practicing the belief. Otherwise you get what we're talking about in this thread, billions of people growing up believing nothing, having no rational reason to believe they are valuable, no reason to think the future warrants their contribution.
lucretian 6y ago
> I don't think we are going to buck the lessons of thousands of years of human history and find some kind of "enlightened secularism" that hasn't worked before. this is a rather ethnocentric view of religion based on what is clearly a limited historical understanding evidently informed mostly by judeo-christianity. just to pick one counter-example: the ancient greeks sought virtue and purpose from philosophical inquiry, not from their religious practices, which were much more transactional.
dasudasu 6y ago
When I think of non-communist "grand secular societal program", the only thing that comes to mind are some aspects of the NSDAP’s program.

bluetomcat 6y ago

I think the postmodern intellectual narratives are breaking it all in the West. The denial of objective truth, the rise of moral relativism, the notions about expressing the individual via many group identities, etc. It's a demoralizing view of life that is far-reaching in our contemporary culture. Even if you look at architecture, design and urban planning, you can find bits of that "wisdom" everywhere.

agent008t 6y ago
In addition, there is no positive vision of the future for society as a whole. What does the US look like in 2075 or 2100? All we get are dystopias. I get that the World, and Europe in particular, got badly burnt by Utopias in the 20th century. But still seems like something is needed - especially given the looming geopolitical changes.

xxpor 6y ago

How is this not an argument that the masses are too stupid to handle themselves and need to be brainwashed for social control and stability? That's essentially what religion is, especially Abrahamic religions based on nothing but completely made up stories.

jazzyjackson 6y ago
We're talking about purpose, not control. It seems true to me that most individuals (myself included) are not up to the task of inventing a reason to exist. You can moan about how the stories are made up til Kingdom come, the point of it is practicing the belief. Otherwise you get what we're talking about in this thread, billions of people growing up believing nothing, having no rational reason to believe they are valuable, no reason to think the future warrants their contribution.

lucretian 6y ago

> I don't think we are going to buck the lessons of thousands of years of human history and find some kind of "enlightened secularism" that hasn't worked before. this is a rather ethnocentric view of religion based on what is clearly a limited historical understanding evidently informed mostly by judeo-christianity. just to pick one counter-example: the ancient greeks sought virtue and purpose from philosophical inquiry, not from their religious practices, which were much more transactional.

dasudasu 6y ago

When I think of non-communist "grand secular societal program", the only thing that comes to mind are some aspects of the NSDAP’s program.