A favourite subject of mine, Chris. Thanks. In conversation recently with an atheist, his claim against religion was that it seeks answers to all questions through scripture. Science, to his mind, seeks answers in the natural world. He acknowledges that science is often presented as more true than it deserves, but he also hates religion. That is, his position is irrational. I'm sharing to help flesh out the perspective that folks hold.
I find that most atheists are pragmatically of a Christian denomination (aChristian?), in that 'religion' is a stand in for Christianity, usually protestant-flavoured. Few possess much knowledge of other world religions, and most seem to assume that they can project their dark mirror reflection of Christianity onto all other practices.
Frankly, as is obvious to anyone who talks to a wider sampling of the religiously minded, even within Christianity blunt generalisations fail horribly. However, I find it fascinating that so many that vehemently reject the authoritarian tendencies of certain eras of organised religion are open to it when it is secularised and aligns with their own beliefs... Perhaps, however, this should not surprise me after all...
I am very fond of the Latour book that this piece riffs off, On the Modern Cult of the Factish Gods, and it amuses me that the diehard Latour fans, who had eaten up We Have Never Been Modern as groundbreaking, could not handle this one at all. They couldn't handle Factish Gods because they all in their own way held staunch anti-religious positions that they were incapable of introspection about. Most were too educated to settle on 'atheist' as a self-descriptor, almost all went for a trendy ontology as a substitute for theology (usually a form of object-oriented ontology). I personally consider Factish Gods to be among Latour's greatest books. I hope this piece helps capture why.
Haven't read Latour. Thanks for the introduction. The person I had in mind was raised Catholic. Many of the folks I've met in these parts who absolutely loathe religion were raised Catholic.
Could you explain what you mean by "object-oriented ontology"?
Ha ha ha, I could, but it would take a while - I'll try and provide a brief overview.
It is Latour and Woolgar's Actor-Network Theory that kicks this off, but they never identified as object-oriented ontologists ever. This initial idea was run up into a hot new intellectual topic called OOO (even the name sounds incredulous!) by Graham Harman, Levi Bryant, Timothy Morton, and Ian Bogost, all of whom I know personally to one degree or another. In brief, the idea is to decentralise the human by thinking of collections or networks of action instead of just people.
For Latour and Woolgar, the point was to put the role of objects back into focus in human activity. This struck me as sensible, frankly - things have influence on behaviour if only in terms of how they curate the available possibilities for action. However, for the object-oriented ontologists this process becomes a kind of alternative to theology for people incapable of dealing with theology. It was very popular in the 2010s among secular intellectuals. Today, I would say its star is on the wane and there is plenty of criticism of the approach around.
One final remark: for me, the fact that the object-oriented ontologists dealt so poorly with the ontological aspects of the recent Nonsense was a mark against their approach: if your ontology isn't bringing you clarity on the important events, what good is it...? Those who approached these issues from a theological perspective generally did much better at understanding what was going on.
I'm probably the wrong person to come at it, since most of my engagement with OOO has been critical. Also: it's hard to summarise, because it's pretty abstract and conceptually obscure. But I probably won't ever write about it, since there are so many more interesting topics! 🙂
A favourite subject of mine, Chris. Thanks. In conversation recently with an atheist, his claim against religion was that it seeks answers to all questions through scripture. Science, to his mind, seeks answers in the natural world. He acknowledges that science is often presented as more true than it deserves, but he also hates religion. That is, his position is irrational. I'm sharing to help flesh out the perspective that folks hold.
I thought you'd like this one, Asa!
I find that most atheists are pragmatically of a Christian denomination (aChristian?), in that 'religion' is a stand in for Christianity, usually protestant-flavoured. Few possess much knowledge of other world religions, and most seem to assume that they can project their dark mirror reflection of Christianity onto all other practices.
Frankly, as is obvious to anyone who talks to a wider sampling of the religiously minded, even within Christianity blunt generalisations fail horribly. However, I find it fascinating that so many that vehemently reject the authoritarian tendencies of certain eras of organised religion are open to it when it is secularised and aligns with their own beliefs... Perhaps, however, this should not surprise me after all...
I am very fond of the Latour book that this piece riffs off, On the Modern Cult of the Factish Gods, and it amuses me that the diehard Latour fans, who had eaten up We Have Never Been Modern as groundbreaking, could not handle this one at all. They couldn't handle Factish Gods because they all in their own way held staunch anti-religious positions that they were incapable of introspection about. Most were too educated to settle on 'atheist' as a self-descriptor, almost all went for a trendy ontology as a substitute for theology (usually a form of object-oriented ontology). I personally consider Factish Gods to be among Latour's greatest books. I hope this piece helps capture why.
With unlimited love,
Chris.
Haven't read Latour. Thanks for the introduction. The person I had in mind was raised Catholic. Many of the folks I've met in these parts who absolutely loathe religion were raised Catholic.
Could you explain what you mean by "object-oriented ontology"?
Ha ha ha, I could, but it would take a while - I'll try and provide a brief overview.
It is Latour and Woolgar's Actor-Network Theory that kicks this off, but they never identified as object-oriented ontologists ever. This initial idea was run up into a hot new intellectual topic called OOO (even the name sounds incredulous!) by Graham Harman, Levi Bryant, Timothy Morton, and Ian Bogost, all of whom I know personally to one degree or another. In brief, the idea is to decentralise the human by thinking of collections or networks of action instead of just people.
For Latour and Woolgar, the point was to put the role of objects back into focus in human activity. This struck me as sensible, frankly - things have influence on behaviour if only in terms of how they curate the available possibilities for action. However, for the object-oriented ontologists this process becomes a kind of alternative to theology for people incapable of dealing with theology. It was very popular in the 2010s among secular intellectuals. Today, I would say its star is on the wane and there is plenty of criticism of the approach around.
One final remark: for me, the fact that the object-oriented ontologists dealt so poorly with the ontological aspects of the recent Nonsense was a mark against their approach: if your ontology isn't bringing you clarity on the important events, what good is it...? Those who approached these issues from a theological perspective generally did much better at understanding what was going on.
Hope this is helpful!
Chris.
Still don't get it. Maybe you'll write a piece about it one day.
I'm probably the wrong person to come at it, since most of my engagement with OOO has been critical. Also: it's hard to summarise, because it's pretty abstract and conceptually obscure. But I probably won't ever write about it, since there are so many more interesting topics! 🙂