Michele Bachmann’s apotheosis (and I do think she is nearing it now) among the religious right has me ruminating on the benefits of faith. Bachmann is the one “true believer” among the Republican hopefuls. Santorum is a good catholic boy, but that makes him only slightly more desirable to evangelicals than mormon Romney. Bachmann is the real deal. However weird her positions may be they all make perfect sense to evangelicals. (Palin, by the way, was never entirely trusted by this group).

Anyway, back to faith. It’s a wonderful thing, especially the pure, hardcore form that you find among American evangelicals.

Given the limits of human intelligence–the ineffability of consciousness being the most glaring example–what is a mere mortal to do? We have two stark choices: accept our own inadequacy and nibble around the edges of intelligibility (what most philosophers do) or have faith. A faith that can undergird our conception of ourselves, the world and our place in it. Nothing soothes the soul like the assurance that one is absolutely right about some things. And if one is right about at least some things, one is more likely to be right about a lot of things: like economic policy, for example.

Watch out for Bachmann. She’s gonna kill in Iowa.

What a miserable wretched day. I’m literally losing my mind. Anyway, this Camping guy that predicted the end of the world (Oh if only he was right!) is kind of an interesting character. He built up this network of radio stations based in Oakland with his own money–of course he now receives piles of dough from foolish dupes that listen to his endless “Bible Studies.” What’s interesting about him is how unorthodox he actually is. For one thing, as I recall (I have actually listened to his broadcasts) he does not believe in hell, at least not the version espoused by other evangelicals. He believes in extinction. In his view it would be “immoral” for God to make people suffer for all eternity. Instead, they just get expunged. He is big on numerology, which is kind of hocus pocus stuff. Your typical evangelical run-of-the-mill christian is gonna spin the dial over to his station and hear boring hymns for a while and then a Camping “Bible Study” for an hour and have no idea that this guy is totally outside the mainstream of orthodox christianity. I give Camping credit for not believing in hell. Expungement sounds pretty good right about now.

(Just saw the cover story in this month’s National Geographic which is very interesting. A massive religious site that makes Stonehenge look rather boring has been excavated. A revolutionary theory emerges that turns human history on its head. A religious impulse first drew our hunter-gatherer ancestors together to collectively worship and create the spectacular temples. Agriculture may have emerged after this in order to support the religious activity. So civilization started because of religion not the other way around.)

Heidegger defines humans (Dasein) as the being that takes a stand on its being. This need to have a point, to explain the wonder, anxiety and strangeness of being human necessitates inspires religion.

What is worth worshipping? Contrary to the false religions of the prophets–those that claim historical authority–there is only one absolutely, verifiable power in the world that ought to be at the center of all religious activity: Tyche, accident, chance, luck, joss…

But in what form would such a religion take? How does one worship the mindless force of chaos that drives evolutionary progress but also rains destruction without warning? Wait a minute, that sounds a lot like the God of Abraham anyway. Is there any difference?

Suppose you are a rigid determinist and believe that the physical laws of the universe are fixed; all events are connected by a causal chain going back at least to the Big Bang. You don’t believe in chance–probability and statistics, of course these are scientific, but chance? No such thing. Or perhaps you are a Calvinist or a Muslim. These guys believe God/Allah determines absolutely every moment of history for His own purpose. It’s all part of His plan. Nothing happens in God’s universe by accident. The determinist takes comfort in the knowledge that everything happens for a reason. Free will is a chimera. Human beings, including all of human behavior, are fixed by either physics or the will of God. What appears to be choice is mere action. Part of the long chain of events leading to the Big Crunch or Judgment Day. Take your pick.

But is this view even remotely compatible with human experience? Even if either of these explanations were true, does it follow that there are no accidents?

What matters to a human being is meaning (intelligibility).

It doesn’t matter whether we have free will or whether the universe is materially determined or made up of collapsed probability waves. What matters is that we are limited bodies with unlimited imaginations. We tend to extend ourselves within an existential space and time and that stretching has lots of unintended consequences. One of which is our ability to imagine counter-factuals.

Working on ideas to honor Tyche, to cultivate a relationship with Tyche… Incorporate randomness into one’s life. Make chance events sacred. Utilize chance to a larger extent in decision making process. Practice unpredictability. Avoid routine. Wrestle with accident. The human side is to take the meaningless and make it meaningful. Take the randomly shaped lump of rock and make it into a mastadon. Manufacture meaning. Create significance. Tyche makes this possible. Without her, our creativity is totally derivative.

I’ve finally gotten around to reading Nietzsche. For years I avoided him. He was a kind of intellectual bogey man that lurked in the darkness. I ignored him. It didn’t help that he was trivialized in the extremely Anglo-American analytical philosophy department of my undergraduate years. But I should have read him even before my college years. The perfect timing would have been in my late teens when I was first attempting to formulate my own philosophy. And what did that philosophy boil down to? Life is Art.It was my motto. The notion that whatever I did could be transformed into a creative process was exhilarating. It’s a rather naive formulation of one Nietzsche’s best ideas.

But the idea that probably would have done me the most good would have been Nietzsche’s amor fati– love of fate. Nietzsche is counted among the most important influences on existentialist thought, and for good reason. From what I have digested thus far (in Geneology of Morals & The Gay Science) his emphasis on the personal nature of philosophy presages the existentialist program that would follow in the 20th century. Yet this emphasis on the personal, his view of human nature as a will to power seems to be in conflict with fatalism. Why amor fati? He seems to hold Spinoza in high regard; he compliments the Russian personality for its fatalism. His theory of recurrence proves him to be a determinist.

The idea has got me thinking about the concept of fate. Much of religion, in my view, is window-dressing for various forms of fatalism. New York Times columnist Ross Douthat recently had a piece about hell and made the argument that without hell, human freedom made no sense. A damnation-free universe would amount to theistic fatalism. I don’t see how fear of hell, and its coercive implications, entail a greater degree of freedom, but that’s just me. Fatalism is attractive. So little is within our control. Accepting that things are the way they are and could be no other way is the basis of sound mental health. The question of what determines that things are the way they are may be a matter of taste and level of intellectual honesty (or intellectual conscience as Nietzsche calls it).

I experience moments of sublime contentment when I am most keenly aware of my utter lack of responsibility for the world’s state of affairs. To know how little I really matter is the sweetest of consolations. I am moved once again to do art; to act with intention and awareness. I am in constant struggle with accident, that most recalcitrant of artistic media. Only in such a state can I say to Nietzsche that I would be willing to live this life again and again.

Cataloging one’s beliefs is easier said than done. I am of the temperament that resists dogmatism. You could say I’m wishy-washy. Trouble is, for every firm conviction one might have, there is an equally firm conviction on the other side. Having the ability to understand both positions can lead to intellectual paralysis. Better to be skeptical of both positions and search for something deeper. My skepticism runs deeper than most, perhaps. I don’t find it particularly interesting to be skeptical about the usual things: superstition, the power of prayer, astrology, quantum physics and so on. Those are easy targets. My skepticism is of the more fundamental variety. Of what can I be certain? Lacking the genius of Wittgenstein, I’m kind of stuck with this persistent doubt about the things that of necessity are taken for granted.

The flip side of not being certain about most things, is that with little effort one can provisionally believe just about anything. I have exploited this phenomenon repeatedly. I have at least dabbled in multiple major religions. Multiple years of study have been sincerely devoted to both Buddhism and Christianity. These were not merely academic indulgences, but full blown conversions with all of the accompanying levels of activity necessary to be accepted among the faithful. One thing about religion is you really can’t understand it unless you are fully enmeshed in the whole “web of truth” that is spun and tended by the faithful. “Webs of truth” can be more or less permeable depending upon the density of the strands and the level of interaction that is allowed across the membrane. Different religions create different style webs. The Roman Catholic web, for example (another of my dalliances) has high permeability, but is made of incredibly strong strands. By contrast, certain evangelical protestant strains have dense webs of truth that resist permeability. Once inside, it becomes increasingly difficult to move in and out. Every human phenomenon becomes filtered through the web.

(Political affiliations have their own “webs of truth” also, but are of a different order from religion. I’m sure I’ll have some comment on that later).

I use the term “truth” in my formulation intentionally. I could say “web of belief” and that would be perfectly intelligible, but that these beliefs are “true” is itself more factually true. More on that later.

Back to what I believe. Given that I have already confessed to my propensity for vacillation anything I say about what I believe right now could change tomorrow. I do not rule out divine revelation as a source of belief. Maybe I will get struck by lightning. But what I am trying to do at present is unravel the “web of truth” within which I persist and see what’s at the bottom of it.

I believe that my existence has a definite beginning and that it will definitely end.

I believe that I am conscious at this time and I am not dreaming.

I believe that my intentions originate in myself and are not dependent on another being.

I believe that my ability to converse in a natural language is adequate to express my own experience.

I believe that other independent beings, similar to myself, exist and that I am able to converse with them intelligibly using natural language.

That’s a pretty paltry list, but represents those statements that I have the highest degree of certainty about. The last statement, obviously, blocks solipsism. The natural language stuff seems to be resistant to skepticism, but the other statements are not.

Now the holidays are over and I cast my mind to resolutions for the new year.

Here’s what I would like to be blogging about in 2011:

1. Catalog of beliefs. List of statements of the form “I believe that x is true.” (This could be a short list)
2. Persistence of contradictory truth. Can non-verifiable metaphysical statements acquire a status of “true” in the same way that created artifacts acquire status of “art”? This would not be relativism.
3. Establish criteria for the evaluation of political philosophy.
4. Read Merleau-Ponty. Looking for academic support for primacy of perception in the study of philosophy.
5. Begin defining religious categories (e.g. mythology, cult, dogma etc…)
6. Take an ethical position.
7. Religion as cultural art form.
8. Clear definitions of and relations between the following terms: chance/randomness/indeterminacy/causal opacity.

As always, your assistance is welcome and desired.

“You know Thomas Jefferson thought that every generation of US citizens should hold a constitutional convention and write a new constitution every generation! Religions need something along the same lines. My hope isn’t for religion as it is practiced now. The problem of all religions is that they tend to be very conservative.” From: http://ccbs.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-MISC/101794.htm

Thanks Stephen for that link. Interesting topic–consumerism as religion. But religion has always been for sale, so nothing too new there. The real problem there is superficiality, in my view. There are, in Japan and I would presume everywhere else, deeply religious and sincere people that practice their faith more or less in spite of their religion.

So as Loy says, religion is by its nature conservative. How could it be otherwise? To acknowledge fallibility, particularly about anything fundamental, is a form of self-laceration (from the religion’s perspective). Opening itself to interpretation becomes a path to a death by a thousand cuts. (The phenomenon of schism has done a great deal to prevent this demise among all the great religions).

I will be adding content to the religion page from time to time. I made an update there yesterday and will try to update regularly. I am in the process of trying to work out how to go forward with the idea of doing creative philosophy and whether or not a religious system, however artificial, is the proper output of such an exercise. Any suggestions or input on this topic would be greatly welcome.

The first real philosopher I ever read was Bertrand Russell. And I didn’t read him for his philosophy; I read his classic atheist treatise Why I am Not a Christian. I was still in high school, and a budding materialist. But something about the tone of his book didn’t sit right with me. I recently got another taste of it after reading Christopher Hitchens’ God is Not Great. There is so much ammunition at hand when one takes on religion, it seems to become irresistable to the religious antagonist not to pick up stones and start hurling them in every direction. It was true of Russell, whose philosophical writing was not considered polemical, and it is true of Hitchens.

Skepticism about God–regarding his existence, properties and so forth–is intellectually necessary, in my view. In the absence of direct revelation, I cannot understand faith, and yet it exists everywhere. But I cannot argue that just because so many believe it, it has to be true, since upon examining the details of such faith amongst a wide variety of individuals, first hand, over many many years, I have never detected any rational basis for faith even among the most intelligent adherents. At the base of it all is–I was going to say infantilism–but instead I will leave it at emotionalism.

I cannot rejoice over the inevitable end of meaning entailed by the lack of a god-perspective in the universe. We are end-oriented creatures, with a conscious awareness of time. Our teleological prejudice litters our language. It is inescapable. We cannot merely be, we must persistently strive toward. And what is the reward of all that striving? Merely being. It’s a joyous circle or a vortex of doom.

Religion is the ultimate world-creating activity. Its aim is to stitch all of the little threads that dangle off of us into one tidy tapestry of truth. Science cannot replace it, and though I respect my “Realist” and atheist brethren for their attachment to scientific truth (reality), I can’t be comforted by it. What difference does it make to me whether a rock is a billion years old or a hundred years old? Science must be admired, respected and encouraged. But constitutive answers are not exhaustive.

So I won’t be gloating over the death of God. Would the world be a better place without religion? Not with humans in it. It is impossible. We create worlds. That’s what we do. I don’t know why.

So, this whole enterprise is so serious. Let’s drop the pretense and discuss something of greater interest. Where does the spiritual meet the material? In the hands of the artist. And is this the key to our dilemma? The creator makes new worlds ex nihilo nihil fit without determination. (We reject determinism). This world-creating activity is broad and beyond the limits of craftsmanship. There is no greater work of art than religion, when it sticks. Only a handful of “prophets” have successfully pulled it off. But even the small version of this process can be rewarding. Is “private religion” possible or is it akin to “private language” and impossible (as Wittgenstein proved). We are existentialists for the day. Existence precedes essence insomuch as our “faith” is free and we direct our “leap” only toward those objects that we can imagine are real in virtue of our own imaginings and not “second hand.” So the creative process is fundamental to the religious exercise.

About twenty five years ago one of us tried axiomatizing this process. It begins with an existentially potent phrase: Life is Art. But the next step is more difficult: Art is Religion. The doing of world-creation (art) as one’s sole source of satisfaction in this world (life) becomes a worshipful (meaning-making) belief system (religion).

Is Life Art? Is this really axiomatic? If human beings are truly free, i.e. at liberty to choose how each will live (the strong existentialist view) and not determined by anything, then the best analogy available for the sum of those free choices is art-making. This kind of art is not the craft of the painter, but more like the struggle of the poet who chooses from among a seemingly endless array of meaningful terms, with all their baggage, and assembles them in a unique way to create something far greater than the sum of its parts. Each choice we make is overladen with baggage and unimaginable possibilities. Our eternal collaborator — tyche – conspires both for and against us as we strain to see the product of our labor emerge as a unified whole — a world unto itself.

And the strain of religious hymnody always echoes in our ears. For we want our meaning to be your meaning. But alas, that is a gulf too great for even the cross of Jesus to span. Our everlasting disease of isolation and separation cannot be healed. We are sending smoke signals to each other. And each of us is, in some way, a solipsist, though few would ever admit it. But the artist is not concerned. He is most amazed at his creation. The cataclysm may come, but in the ruins the artist rejoices! Here are broken down buildings to build up again! Piles of broken glass are portholes to a new sun! Destruction brings joy to the survivors. All will be remade in my own image.