Right Reason

If you are a scholar who has authored a book in philosophy or theology, published by a reputable publishing house, then I want to hear from you if you’re interested in what follows.

In the humanities (maybe in other fields too, but who cares), one of the best ways to have a book published is to have an already published scholar take an interest in the project and to recommend it. As this would be the first such project that I have attempted, the advice of someone who has been there and done that would be invaluable.

As indicated above, the type of book I am talking about is a book with high quality essays from a number of writers (up to 15). In order to raise the profile of the project, I would like to have a few/couple of essays in the volume to be contributed by people who are already established scholars with well received published works.

If you are someone who might be able to help in either of these roles, then I want to hear from you. If I don’t hear from anybody through this announcement/request then I will be looking around for advice on who to contact, but if you’re reading this and you think you fit the bill, then this process can be made all the simpler.

What sort of people am I looking for? You’ll need a PhD in philosophy, in theology, or in political science (or something that relates closely to one of these like jurisprudence or religious studies). You’ll need to be active in academia, preferably as a faculty member in one of these areas at an accredited university or college. You’ll have an interest in the relationship between political, moral or social philosophy or law on the one hand, and theology or philosophy of religion on the other. In particular, you’ll have an interest in the subject of religion in the public square. Importantly, you’ll have had works published in these or similar fields, and these works will be generally well received by their target audience.

If you’re interested in contacting me as someone who might take up one of these two roles, the nature of the project is as follows: The book will be a collection of high quality scholarly essays on various aspects of the relationship (or appropriate lack thereof) between religious convictions and social, political and legal arrangements. The book will be written by emerging scholars – people who have graduated with PhDs in their respective fields but who are not yet established in the literature. The book aims to be a serious multi-faceted contribution to the case against the modern western liberal democratic doctrine that religious beliefs should not serve as the basis of political or legal arrangements, doctrines or policies. My own contribution to the work will be an essay arguing that a thoroughgoing secular outlook cannot account for a descriptive doctrine of human equality, and that the doctrine is best construed as one that requires theological presuppositions.

Subjects for other essays in the volume might include:

• The major contributions that religiously motivated laws and policies have made in history to the good of society in the liberal democratic or classical liberal tradition.
• Whether or not there exists a defensible non-religious account of p, where p is some important principle needed to ground a liberal democratic polity.
• Critical and original reflections on an argument or set of arguments for the removal of religious convictions from political and public decision making and policy advocacy.
• Proposals to tackle the issue of competing or clashing religious (or secular) ideologies in a pluralistic democratic society – if we allow political advocacy for religious reasons.
• Difficulties in avoiding religious discrimination in legislation – or the levels of acceptable discrimination.

– as well as many other possibilities.

The ideal publisher for this project would be a major university press (Oxford, Cambridge, Princeton, Yale, Harvard) or mainstream academic publisher in the humanities such as Routledge, Blackwell, or Sage (naturally, these are examples only).

If you might be interested in one of the ways described above, please contact me using the “Contact Us” button over on the right hand side.

Glenn Peoples

You know, it’s actually hard work coming up with new subjects to write podcast episodes on. I’ve done thirty-seven so far and you’ve all just sat back and soaked it up.

So now it’s time to get involved. I want to hear from listeners about what they’d like to hear episodes on. Anything in philosophy, theology, biblical studies or anything you think might suit Say Hello to my Little Friend. You can leave a comment on this blog entry, or (and) get in touch via the “Contact us” button over on the right.

Jeremy has posted the September 2010 Biblioblog rankings. It ranks a bunch of serious blogs that cover theology and biblical studies (and it also includes John Loftus’s blog – we all feel bad for the guy). Apparently I’m number 8. For now.

Recently I was interviewed on the Theopologetics podcast, which is run by Chris Date. The title of the episode was “Let’s Get Physical,” and Chris invited me to discuss my belief in physicalism as a philosophy of mind from a Christian and biblical point of view. Check out that episode here, or at the iTunes store.

In my discussion with Arif Ahmed on the Unbelievable radio show, Dr Ahmed rejected my position that moral facts are best explained in terms of a non-natural person. Now, he doesn’t accept that there are any moral facts at all, but if there were, he indicated, they wouldn’t suggest the existence of a non-natural person.

Arif’s main argument against this view was an argument via counter-example. He used the counter example of logic. There are norms of logic (just as I think there are norms of morality), but that doesn’t imply that there’s a great, personal, non-natural logician out there. So why should the existence of moral laws imply the existence of a moral law giver?

As you’ll hear in the recording of the discussion, I attempted to offer one kind of reply at the time. That reply was (or at least was meant to be) that the idea of “law” is different in each of these cases. If we engage in a logical error then we’ve made an error of some sort, but people don’t find the same kind of fault with us as when we engage in moral wrongdoing. Stated differently (although I don’t recall using this term at the time), we aren’t blameworthy in the same way, and we don’t have reason to feel guilt in the case of logical error. Logic doesn’t make requirements of us. I wish I’d used this term at the time, because I think it clarifies things even further: There is a kind of social element in moral wrongdoing that just doesn’t seem present in logical blunders. That’s one difference between laws of logic and laws of morality.

As with my previous blog post about this discussion, there was only really time and opportunity for one brief response, but other responses are certainly possible. That response is actually related to my previous blog about this discussion: Laws of logic are analytic truths. A claim like “A = A” is true by definition. As soon as you comprehend the claim, you realise that experience has nothing to do with knowing that the claim is true. It is self evident because the very meaning of the terms involved makes it true. People don’t make analytical truths come about. They are merely matters of the meanings of terms.

Moral claims, by contrast, are not true by definition. When we ask a question like “is it wrong to torture people for fun,” the meaning of the word “wrong” is not at all bound up with the meaning of the words “torture” or “people” or “fun.” A moral claim is not an analytic claim but a synthetic claim, bringing together the idea of wrongness and the idea of torture (in this case). And synthetic claims, unlike analytical claims, are the kinds of claims that people can cause to be true. For example “my car is red” is a state of affairs brought about by the fact that somebody painted my car the colour red. Similarly, since the claim “rape is wrong” is a synthetic claim, it isn’t like a logical axiom. We can note that it is a fact claim about what we ought to do, and then (so say I) we can sensibly ask what makes the act wrong, which is where the moral argument for theism kicks in.

So the mere fact that “moral law” and “law of logic” are both phrases that contain the word “law,” this doesn’t imply that the must either both be things that require a lawmaker or else they must both be things that do not require a lawmaker. That would be a case of equivocation.