This volume collects recent essays and reviews by Thomas Nagel in three subject areas. The first section, including the title essay, is concerned with religious belief and some of the philosophical questions connected with it, such as the relation between religion and evolutionary theory, the question of why there is something rather than nothing, and the significance for human life of our place in the cosmos. It includes a defense of the relevance of religion to science education. The second section concerns the interpretation of liberal political theory, especially in an international context. A substantial essay argues that the principles of distributive justice that apply within individual nation-states do not apply to the world as a whole. The third section discusses the distinctive contributions of four philosophers to our understanding of what it is to be human--the form of human consciousness and the source of human values.
Secular Philosophy and the Religious Temperament
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"These essays are all written in Nagel's clear and familiar style; they combine substantial arguments and insights with the charms of a friendly conversation partner. Highly recommended to those interested in theism versus atheism and the current science-religion debate." --Religous Studies Review
About the Author
Thomas Nagel is University Professor, Professor of Philosophy, and Professor of Law at New York University. Among his books are The View from Nowhere, Equality and Partiality, and The Last Word.
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52 of 55 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
This book is a breeze to read. I read it in a day. Thomas Nagel's enormous strength (akin to Richard Rorty's) is his calm explanatory clarity. He is very good at getting to the heart of a thing, then discussing it with insight and measure. For example, there is an essay on Nietzsche in this collection that, for its clean, seemingly effortless prose---and the light that he casts upon his subject---is worth the price of the whole book. Nagel also discusses Hobbes, Rawls, Michael Sandel, Catharine MacKinnon, and Sartre admirably.
In this particular collection of essays, however, it is on the subject of religion and atheism that Nagel shines most brightly. He is very good at talking about naturalism, Richard Dawkins, and Intelligent Design. By contrast with the entrenched factions dug in around these subjects, Nagel is sane and insightful. My impression is that Nagel, when push comes to shove regarding purpose in the universe, inclines toward Camus's notion of the absurd. But he is just agnostic enough to keep other possibilities in play, and so not shut down discussion with eye-rolling contempt. This makes him, apparently, noxious in the eyes of New Atheists. And well he should be, for his is a still open mind.
In this particular collection of essays, however, it is on the subject of religion and atheism that Nagel shines most brightly. He is very good at talking about naturalism, Richard Dawkins, and Intelligent Design. By contrast with the entrenched factions dug in around these subjects, Nagel is sane and insightful. My impression is that Nagel, when push comes to shove regarding purpose in the universe, inclines toward Camus's notion of the absurd. But he is just agnostic enough to keep other possibilities in play, and so not shut down discussion with eye-rolling contempt. This makes him, apparently, noxious in the eyes of New Atheists. And well he should be, for his is a still open mind.
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
By Zosh
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
This is a collection of essays, save for the title essay, that were published previously and for the most part in non-specialist journals (The New Republic, NYRB, LRB, TLS, etc.), so they are accessible to the reader with no training in philosophy and make for pleasant reading. Nagel groups them under three headings: Religion, Politics and Humanity. All are thoughtful and thought-provoking, a judgment that will be of no surprise to readers of his work, and some are controversial. In "Public Education and Intelligent Design," for example, he argues that the "political urge to defend science education against the threats of religious orthodoxy . . . has resulted in a counter orthodoxy, supported by bad arguments, and a tendency to overstate the legitimate scientific claims of evolutionary theory." Although these essays will probably be thought to fall squarely in the so-called "analytic" tradition, they are neither narrowly technical nor riddled with jargon. Any open-minded reader will both enjoy and benefit from them.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
An Open Minded Atheist, who should be read by both sides of the I.D. Debate
August 27, 2011
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
"Secular Philosophy and the Religious Temperament
By Thomas Nagel
I devoured this book in less than a week, I enjoy reading Nagel that much. This book is a collection of essays dealing with religion, politics and humanity, often the subjects over lap, as in perhaps the most interesting essay of this book "Public Education and Intelligent Design" an essay for which previously I was only able to read an abstract.
Nagel in this essay and in the others dealing with religion proves himself to be quite an open minded atheist. Indeed, posting a few quotes from this essay and others to may face book page made atheist friends of mine quite uneasy. I had to laugh as he was accused of being a "new age Philosopher" and "guilty of religious thinking", read: "guilty of questioning scientific dogma, guilty of thinking". Here's an atheist willing to take on Dawkins for shoddy scholarship. Here is an atheist willing to say evolution, especially evolutionary reductionism, meaning the doctrine that all of life, even the origin of it, can be explained by evolutionary processes just doesn't make sense. He as a professor of constitutional law is also willing to argue that Intelligent Design can and probably should be taught in school if for nothing else to expose students to differing ways of thinking, though he thinks biology teachers might not be up for the task. Read into that what you want, I suppose.
Nagel himself, is one who seems to wish that evolution was true, but admits that so far it is less than convincing. He hesitates to endorse Intelligent Design, and holds to his atheism maintaining that there may be other alternatives. However, he blames the "fear of religion, something he himself admits as an influence in his own life, for leading many scientifically minded atheists to cling to a defensive, world flattening reductionism hobbling their own imagination and creativity that might lead to further scientific discoveries.
This isn't a science text book, nevertheless he applies an open mind, all the more open because he is willing to face his fear after acknowledging it, to the subjects of evolution and intelligent design. He also argues that evolution has worked itself into a bind when it comes to DNA in that "The problem that originally prompted the argument from design, namely, the overwhelming improbability of such a thing (DNA) coming into existence by chance, simply through the purposeless laws of physics, remains just as real for this case. Yet this time we cannot replace chance with natural selection." He also hints that the overwhelming acceptance of evolution originally, as an alternative to design theory, may have been more due to the desirability of the results, the elimination of a need for God, than to any great evidence in its favor.
His essays on Politics concentrate more in the realm of international law than anything else. I am sympathetic to his thoughts here as well. Acknowledging a responsibility to fellow man and the spread of human rights to those born in other societies, especially those to whom we are connected in trade, he yet believes that "the global scope of justice will expand only through developments that first increase the injustice of the world by introducing effective but illegitimate institutions to which the standards of justice apply, standards by which we may hope they will eventually be transformed." He bases this argument on the way in which sovereign states in the west have risen and reformed themselves, and points to organizations such as the World Trade Organization and its clout to get countries to conform to standards of human rights in order to foster trade. He points to Turkey's massive reforms to join the U.N. Yet he sees that there is a need for countries to protect their sovereignty also, and though he seems to detest the Bush administration, understands and agrees with them for not having signed the Kyoto protocols.
In the process of all this he offers some intriguing critiques of the political philosophy of Rawls both where domestic and foreign policies are concerned. Nagel it seems is less willing to play what if games, and rather tackle the questions of what is, and what should be.
By Thomas Nagel
I devoured this book in less than a week, I enjoy reading Nagel that much. This book is a collection of essays dealing with religion, politics and humanity, often the subjects over lap, as in perhaps the most interesting essay of this book "Public Education and Intelligent Design" an essay for which previously I was only able to read an abstract.
Nagel in this essay and in the others dealing with religion proves himself to be quite an open minded atheist. Indeed, posting a few quotes from this essay and others to may face book page made atheist friends of mine quite uneasy. I had to laugh as he was accused of being a "new age Philosopher" and "guilty of religious thinking", read: "guilty of questioning scientific dogma, guilty of thinking". Here's an atheist willing to take on Dawkins for shoddy scholarship. Here is an atheist willing to say evolution, especially evolutionary reductionism, meaning the doctrine that all of life, even the origin of it, can be explained by evolutionary processes just doesn't make sense. He as a professor of constitutional law is also willing to argue that Intelligent Design can and probably should be taught in school if for nothing else to expose students to differing ways of thinking, though he thinks biology teachers might not be up for the task. Read into that what you want, I suppose.
Nagel himself, is one who seems to wish that evolution was true, but admits that so far it is less than convincing. He hesitates to endorse Intelligent Design, and holds to his atheism maintaining that there may be other alternatives. However, he blames the "fear of religion, something he himself admits as an influence in his own life, for leading many scientifically minded atheists to cling to a defensive, world flattening reductionism hobbling their own imagination and creativity that might lead to further scientific discoveries.
This isn't a science text book, nevertheless he applies an open mind, all the more open because he is willing to face his fear after acknowledging it, to the subjects of evolution and intelligent design. He also argues that evolution has worked itself into a bind when it comes to DNA in that "The problem that originally prompted the argument from design, namely, the overwhelming improbability of such a thing (DNA) coming into existence by chance, simply through the purposeless laws of physics, remains just as real for this case. Yet this time we cannot replace chance with natural selection." He also hints that the overwhelming acceptance of evolution originally, as an alternative to design theory, may have been more due to the desirability of the results, the elimination of a need for God, than to any great evidence in its favor.
His essays on Politics concentrate more in the realm of international law than anything else. I am sympathetic to his thoughts here as well. Acknowledging a responsibility to fellow man and the spread of human rights to those born in other societies, especially those to whom we are connected in trade, he yet believes that "the global scope of justice will expand only through developments that first increase the injustice of the world by introducing effective but illegitimate institutions to which the standards of justice apply, standards by which we may hope they will eventually be transformed." He bases this argument on the way in which sovereign states in the west have risen and reformed themselves, and points to organizations such as the World Trade Organization and its clout to get countries to conform to standards of human rights in order to foster trade. He points to Turkey's massive reforms to join the U.N. Yet he sees that there is a need for countries to protect their sovereignty also, and though he seems to detest the Bush administration, understands and agrees with them for not having signed the Kyoto protocols.
In the process of all this he offers some intriguing critiques of the political philosophy of Rawls both where domestic and foreign policies are concerned. Nagel it seems is less willing to play what if games, and rather tackle the questions of what is, and what should be.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Voice of Sanity in a Crazed Dialectic
Finally, someone who can logically express himself about the feud between creationists and Intelligent Design advocates on the one hand and the equally irrational, over-reacting... Read more
Published 13 months ago by William Roe
4.0 out of 5 stars
Seeking a secular alternative
This collection of essays from 2002 to 2008 is divided in three parts: Religion, Politics and Humanity. Read more
Published 23 months ago by Niklas Anderberg
3.0 out of 5 stars
Drifted from title topic
I enjoyed the first third of the book, After a while the essays drifted from the title topic more than I would have wished.
Published on March 14, 2011 by Kristina Simms
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