Customer Reviews

Between Naturalism and Religion: Philosophical Essays

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I was looking particularly for Habermas' views on religious tolerance, and found a thorough analysis of Immanuel Kant's political constitution (Perpetual Peace, and Other Essays on Politics, History, and Morals (HPC Classics Series)). He compares it with the success of the United nations in weathering attempts to marginalise it and proceeding with substantial reforms. He maintains that "we can still take a cue from Kant's cosmopolitan condition provided that we construe it in sufficiently abstract terms".
Then I discovered that Habermas enters into further discussions about the current trend of growing political influence of religious orthodoxies. He revisits his discussions with John Rawls' about his `veil of ignorance' in his formation of societies of peoples that had resulted in Rawls' Proviso (Political Liberalism (Columbia Classics in Philosophy)). Habermas could only respond to this after Rawl's death, and suggests in this book that secular citizens should accept the input of religious (and other) worldviews, provided they are translated from a religious language into generally accessible or even political language. This gives Rawls' proviso certain legitimacy.
The other aspect he discusses is the reappearance of naturalistic trends, that argue that human actions are predetermined by external causes. I thought this was left behind soon after Baruch de Spinoza's worldview had lost ground. This revival is due to some neurological experiments that are attempting to prove that a pre-determined cause exists for a limb to move, and where the subject's belief that this was done as a result of his own decision rests in self-deception. Habermas' demolition of this view is quite amusing, and enters into a wider discussion about reason verses nature.
I am an admirer of Habermas, and have read him in both English and his native German. This book is an enjoyable read with deep analyses of the aspect of religious tolerance in our age.

Habermas reveals some of his most lucid arguments in favour of a neo Kantian inspired formal pragmatics in this extremely well structured text, which follows on the heels of his magnificent indictment of neoconservative ideology in The Divided West. Habermas has found the right balance both politically, ideologically and philosophically between the rocky political, religious and ideological extremes in our present global society, which is currently undergoing an extremely painful financial transformation.

If we had listened to some of Habermas' earlier warnings concerning certain aspects of unfettered capitalism (and the manipulative forms of communication it can engender) we might not have found ourselves in such a dire financial circumstance. Years ago Habermas warned of the ideology which was gaining momentum in philosophical circles (neoconservatism). Luckily many of his themes are starting to become practically possible in the American political environment in terms of a focus on communication and building consenus through international law. But we will have to see how America will resolve this current crisis, but the American political public (and those about to take office) would do well to heed his advice.