Religion and Science

No Reason! That's the true religion. No Reason! 

What an extraordinary grace has Heaven bestowed upon you!

-- Charles de Saint-Evremond (1728)

 

Secular progressivism is on the rise. Its proponents speak out loud, and their aggressiveness penetrates our political and educational realms. In denial of their ignorance and the shortcomings of their half- or even quarter-knowledge, it peaks in silly comments like, for instance, the one made by Bill Nye, the Science Guy on TV, in September 2012, who warned that creationist views might threaten science education and innovation in the US! 

As we will find out, precisely the opposite is true. The attempt to drive out religion from science classes, get rid of intelligent design, and focus exclusively on a theory of evolution, deprives the western culture of its holistic and spiritual depth. It diminishes rather than enhances our approach to deal with existential challenges of whatever kind. 

The problem is rooted in an epistemological misconception that entails ideological abuse and produces severe moral and ethical consequences, impacting all realms of human affairs. It demonstrates that education that does not comprise profound instruction in the history of Western thinking ideas is not worth much. 

Let us step back for a moment and ask what the cause for all this is? What brought about this "Disenchantment of the West" (Max Weber)? What is the reason for the emergence of the rational scientific mind that claims to be the all-encompassing model for comprehending reality? What led to the hubris of rejecting the transcendent dimensions of our existence by so many?

Against the backdrop of the history of ideas, it becomes clear that empiricism's dominant philosophical mainstream has dominated the Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-American tradition for the past two hundred years. With its limitation of reality on the observable and experimentally provable, it dominated the Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-American tradition for the past two hundred years. It prevented it from reaching a more holistic understanding of this world, and it pretends that the final truth can be attained based upon scientific experience alone. Nevertheless, Europe is not much better off. The prevailing philosophy of rationalism, culminating in the Hegelian idealism whose dialectic dynamic of rational progress, brings about the same result – autonomous reason asserts to produce truth out of itself. Essentially, the western mind got stuck in realism and materialism in one extreme and abstract idealism in the other, or a combination of both.

 

Warnings like Friedrich Nietzsche's to withstand the temptations of science "for science lives in a profound antagonism towards the eternalizing powers of art and religion" (Friedrich Nietzsche, Untimely Meditations, Cambridge 1997, p. 120), were thrown into the wind. Forgotten were the insights provided by transcendental philosophy and its most prominent representative, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), who has drawn, once and for all, the formal boundary between what can become reliable and unswerving knowledge for us and what cannot.

 

The bulk of intellectuals and educators of all scientific disciplines still behave as if Kant had never lived. If they only neglected or ignored Kant's teachings! It instead looks as if the core findings of transcendental philosophy are no longer even known and dealt with in the processes of science education and academic scholarly work. Who still finds it worthwhile to deal with the Platonic dimension of the dual aspect of the universe, for which transcendental philosophy introduced the terms noumenal (the real world, independent of experience) and phenomenal (the world of experience)?

 

In the present quagmire of a seemingly deadlocked discourse on the subject of religion versus science, only the findings of transcendental philosophy can illuminate us. Transcendental philosophy stipulates that no direct causal nexus exists between the two sides as the noumena do not cause phenomena. Instead, phenomena are how our mind perceives the noumena by way of its processes. Our mind applies the formal categories of time, space, and causality as a priori qualities and thus predetermines any object's cognition. Transcendental idealism recognizes that the objective order of nature and the causal necessity that operates within it are dependent upon the mind's processes. What becomes knowledge for us, particularly the systematic knowledge that science provides for us, must remain within the mind's operations' formal qualities. Consequently, human knowledge and scientific findings can never reach a final goal or arrive at the world's innermost nature, the noumenal, as the confines of the phenomenal world bound them. 

In more pragmatic terms: the religious claim for transcendent (beyond all possible experience) truth can never and will never be endangered by science; yet, scientific truth can rest contented as it will never be threatened by transcendent verities either. Both claims belong to different sides of this one world in which we all live. It is a colossal error of evolutionists to believe that we can overcome this epistemological dualism and obliterate its boundaries by scientific progress and development. It represents their fatal pretension. It is a utopian hope that can only befall those who, for whatever reason, remained or had to stay in the immature state of mind in which one finds himself when getting stuck in realism and materialism in the one extreme, or abstract idealism in the other.

However, there is also a more practical reason for why the scientific mind intends, consciously or not, to oppress, if not eliminate, the more spiritual stance on existential matters. As the transcendental view on the world is far-reaching and entails immense consequences, there are also ideological forces that prevent its influence from taking hold. It is because the transcendental view dismisses realism and its social-political manifestation, materialism in all its forms, as fundamental absurdities and limits the control of knowledge over nature and man. It is adversarial to unlimited progress and the perfectibility of man and society and stands in the way of ever-wider secularism. 

Hard as it may be to accept that progress does not take place in all things, and future-making is limited, the discomforting re-orientation is inevitable if the Western man wants to find a worldview that unmasks the pretensions of functional rationality as dogmatic speculation and puts all the spiritual faculties and forms of cognition given to man back into their rights. 

In more pragmatic and more easily comprehensible terms, the most fundamental insight transcendental philosophy provides for us is this: There will forever be dimensions to our existence that cannot become the subject of verified knowledge. So we will never prove God's existence as an undeniable fact of scientific evidence. Though neither His non-existence. There will always be a demarcation line between what can be known and what can only be believed. No matter how far we push it, the scientific horizon will never encompass the entirety of human existence. 

Therefore, to creationists, I will say this: neglecting the reality and significance of the empirical world and the impact of science investigating it is naïve; but evolutionists (materialists, atheists) I need to tell the following: disregarding the confinements of science and overlooking the ineradicable relevance of metaphysical-religious and intuitive-prerational realities, is intellectually untenable, morally irresponsible and politically dangerous.

Ideological Misuse of Federalism leads to Bad Governance

When endorsing same-sex marriages, President Obama concurrently embraced the principle of federalism and expressed his personal belief that states have the right to define marriage. While this smells like shirking political responsibility, it begs the following question: "Why does the issue of gay marriage deserve special consideration in a concept of federalism?

 

Why is the same amount of attention not given to immigration, voter registration, health care, or abortion? Suppose Mr. Obama supports a more vital role of state legislation in political affairs. Why does he have his Justice Department sue a state that passed an immigration law to meet its specific challenges regarding illegal immigration? Why don't the states have the right to choose their immigration laws, decide the issue of abortion, or extricate themselves from Obamacare?

 

The answer is as simple as evident. If it corresponds with Mr. Obama's and his administration's ideology or spares them a political price to pay, they emphasize federalism and the vital role of sovereign states. If they disapprove of state decisions and legislation, they fight and engage in federal prevention.

 

However, apart from the ideologically driven appreciation of state rights and irrespective of the incumbent administration, the whole concept of federalism seems to need urgent review. Issues require decisions according to their actual material content along the lines of the concept of subsidiarity as an essential principle of good governance. The material content of an issue – and not ideological intent – must determine which level of (political) organization has to legally decide the matter. If individual states face specific immigration challenges, they should have leeway in safeguarding and enforcing federal immigration laws. Profound social and cultural issues – like abortion and same-sex marriages – that concern the entire nation and pertain to all citizens alike have to be subject to federal if not constitutional legislation.

 

Suppose the states continue to decide issues of nationwide relevance individually, with obviously different outcomes. In that case, the central government will have to reorganize the relations between federal and state authorities, and it will become inevitable to determine who legislates what.

Lessons from Muammar Gadhafi’s Demise

The thugs in the streets of Tripoli and Sirte are jubilating over the murder of Muammar Gadhafi. As it is clear that he was not killed, he was murdered. What else does one call the killing of a wounded prisoner other than murder? If a soldier of the U.S. military establishment (or of any other regular military force in a civilized nation) killed a defenseless prisoner, he would face court-martial and the death penalty. Nevertheless, the Kalashnikov-firing scum bags of the rebel movement in Libya and most politicians, T.V. commentators, and pundits in the U.S. and Europe, and elsewhere in the so-called free world expressed their delight over the killing of the Libyan leader. Human life seems easily dispensable as long as it does not fit our way of thinking or the expediency of our political goals. In a world of indifferent equality, not even being a political leader makes any difference anymore. 

 

The friendly handshakes between the Libyan leader and the sitting American president and incumbent European heads-of-state had already been forgotten when NATO and U.S. forces began to support a dubious group of insurgents by launching an air campaign against the Libyan military and Gadhafi installations some six months ago.

This egregious violation of the sovereignty principle in international relations (for more on this see https://www.edwinseditorial.com/2011/03/us-and-european-foreign-policy-blunder.html), along with the betrayal of Muammar Gadhafi's trust in his fellow political leaders and "his friend" Obama, demonstrated the dubious condition of western and U.S. foreign politics. Forgotten was Gadhafi's atonement over the Lockerbie bombing, his payment of reparations to the victims' families, the damage of American cruise missiles as a justified answer to his misdeeds, his retreat from pursuing nuclear weapons, and his attempts to integrate his political regime more appropriately into the community of nations.

  

Giving premature and frivolous support to self-proclaimed revolutionary freedom movements by political and public encouragement, as happened in Egypt, is troublesome. To sustain these alleged "democratic" uprisings by way of violent armed support, as was the situation in Libya, clearly manifests the waging of unjust wars on the part of the western world and its supreme power. 

 

Education reform and teacher excellence are on everybody's mind. Nonetheless, even the political establishment lacks the educational foundation in political theory, moral philosophy, and cultural affairs. Instead of encouraging evolutionary developments toward more open and just societies, they support dubious revolutionary movements and foster their ethically questionable goals and morally problematic ways. Instead of considering the ethnic, religious, and cultural peculiarities of potential mission areas, they naively assume that the values and principles of western politics and lifestyle will be welcomed and accepted. Instead of using international power projection and the instrument of warfare wisely, military means are used and wasted light-heartedly, for dubious objectives, often in unsavory ways.

 

While politicians are still trying to convince their electorates of the reputable incentives behind their decisions, the recent political idiocies in foreign affairs (Afghanistan, Egypt, and Libya) have created a political pattern that appears to be most precarious and apprehensive. 

 

Only the return of thinkers and holistic analysts into the ranks of the political advisory bodies can provide remedial measures in the short term. A swift turnaround is needed to bring American and European foreign policy to its senses and prevent further damage to global affairs by way of more political foolishness committed by the West.

Anthony Weiner and Other Sex-Escapading Politicians!

 When will people realize that the sexual persona of a man stands outside his moral character?

I argued this for Clinton. I must argue it now for Weiner as well. The real problem with these politicians is not their extra-marital conduct and the living out of their weird sexual dispositions.  Those might be challenging on the level of their partnership relations.  What is truly problematic is their way of dealing with it once it had become public. Bill Clinton faced impeached because of his abominable attempts to cover up, distort facts by terminological niceties, and his cowardly lying about it under oath.
 
The same applies to Weiner’s case. Indeed, his obvious exhibitionist inclinations and efforts to compensate for inferiority feelings concern his wife and probably his psychoanalyst. However, the detestable way of his dealing with media questions, the repulsive conceitedness he demonstrated while putting forth these cheap lies and misrepresentations – those are what declares him unfit for any office of political representation.
 
Anthony Weiner has to resign and, if he does not, has to be forced out of office by his political peers and his constituency.

US and European Foreign Policy – the Blunder of Liberal Interventionism continues with Libya

Peoples have a moral right to political self-determination; (nation-) States have a juridical right to sovereignty and territorial integrity. 

 

The political mistake of consistently violating this main idea continues now, after the surge of international military interventions into sovereign nations' internal affairs in the 1990s, with Libya. Apart from the unwise decision to commit to intervening in Libya, the decision to intervene by establishing a no-fly zone came too late; the objective is unclear; the conduct of the operation is flawed. The Western coalition is neglecting a fundamental principle of the philosophy of just war – war should be waged only be waged if there is proportionality between objectives and cost. In other words, the damage and suffering the war causes should not be more significant than the hurt and suffering it aims to avert.

 

To prevent interventions by the international community into sovereign nations' domestic affairs, the United Nations Charter introduced and acknowledged the sovereign equality of all nations. The United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2131 of December 21, 1965, reemphasizes this principle once again: "No state has the right to intervene, directly or indirectly, for any reason whatsoever, in the internal or external affairs of another State. Consequently, armed intervention and all other forms of interference or attempted threats against the personality of the State or against its political, economic, or cultural elements are condemned." 

 

This stipulation is a morally valid norm in a global society. As is currently the case in Libya, a government quelling violent political uprisings or revolutionary attempts that aim at its overthrow does not constitute a justifiable cause for intervention. A State can only lose the fundamental State right of sovereignty if a government commits crimes against humanity in the sense of religious or ethnic cleansing or pogroms on certain parts of its population. Cracking down on insurgents and revolutionaries does not fall under this category. 

 

Since the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, Western powers have begun to violate this principle profoundly. National uprisings received support by outright forceful intervention in some countries, but not in others. Apart from military feasibility considerations, ideological bias was the primary incentive for interventions.

Western powers began to breach the principle of national sovereignty during Yugoslavia's disintegration in the early 1990s. After they prematurely acknowledged the former Yugoslav provinces as independent nation-states, the subsequently fledgling states that had just seceded from the former Yugoslav Republic needed help. Thus was the NATO 1995 bombing in Bosnia and Herzegovina vindicated in the wake of the Srebrenica Massacre's apparent horrors. In the two years prior, despite an imposed no-flight zone by NATO, the war had raged on unrestrictedly on the ground before American and NATO airstrikes of Operation Deliberate Force finally paved the way for the 1995 Dayton Peace Accord. 

A few years later, Liberal Interventionism continued, as always for allegedly humanitarian reasons, in Kosovo. After Serbian police and military forces cracked down on Albanian freedom fighters (the Kosovo Liberation Army/KLA), the Euro-Atlantic alliance suddenly felt compelled to embark upon an air-campaign to prevent a humanitarian disaster and take out Serbian forces. Nobody mentioned that the KLA had advanced their case in Kosovo with violent means. Their acts of cruelties underlined the KLA's unjustifiable use of violent means. The reversal of cause and effect, in both ethical as well as political terms, was palpable. There is a good reason and evidence to believe that intervention caused increased bloodshed and intensified ethnic cleansing in both instances, at least in the short term, thus aggravating the humanitarian crisis it intended to prevent in the first place.

 

The same appears to be happening in Libya now. Encouraged by events in Egypt, a dubious group of insurgents, yet to be defined in their ethnic, religious, and political composition, seek to oust Muammar Qaddafi's regime. The callous Qaddafi did not kill his people before the uprising broke out. And he did not attack another country or neglect UN-resolutions over years and years. He crushed an uprising which every political leader – authoritarian or otherwise – would have done. There are no national interests at stake for the US and the EU. There is no humanitarian necessity for intervention, and there is no need to establish a no-fly zone. 

 

The reason for this ignorance in security matters owes to an unbearable unawareness about political theory, international affairs, and the nature of the armed conflict. Neither liberal left nor libertarian right, on both sides of the Atlantic, has ever understood the business of war. When dealing with political violence and armed struggle, they either do too much or too little. In the case of the current political administration in the US, this ignorance manifests itself in a lack of a consistent foreign policy strategy, exacerbated by an astonishing lack of leadership capability on the part of the president. 

 

If it consoles Mr. Obama or anybody, I shall mention that he is not alone. Some heads of government in the European Union contend for the number one ranking in committing foreign policy blunder.

Right becomes Wrong – Arizona Immigration Law Turned Down!

People are holding up a sign that shows an American flag in which the fifty stars are replaced by a swastika, thus claiming their protest against the Arizona Immigration Law! Mexicans are happily embracing each other because a federal judge has just turned down the core elements of this law, depriving it of its most essential elements for enhanced immigration enforcement in Arizona! 

 

There can be no doubt anymore! The right has become wrong; straight is now crooked; common sense turned into no(n)sense; the upstanding transforms into insincerity; upswing into downturn! What is the reason for all this? Why is it that the longer we walk toward the future in our civilization, the more we step backward, deteriorate, decline? 

One reason is the ubiquitous arbitrariness of values and convictions, generated and driven solely by individual and self-centered aspirations, making people lose sight of more comprehensive perspectives. Another reason is that educational institutions and processes no longer convey the profound foundation for understanding political issues on more or less all levels of schooling, teaching, and instruction. Who has learned about the subsidiary principle, the history of ideas of statehood, forms of state and government, division of powers, genesis, purpose, and necessity of state organization and state institutions? The knowledge about the holistic underpinning of Western culture alone provides the foundation for independent thinking and judgment.

The philosophical reason for the misconceptions of immigration and immigration control lies in what we might call a neo-cosmopolitan idea. It claims the individual human being, not the (nation-) state, to be the protagonist in interstate and international relations. While the traditional position sees the (nation-) state as the moral actor in political affairs through which individual rights can be guaranteed, the neo-cosmopolitan stance stipulates a radical reduction of state-sovereignty. It promotes the idea of a global social contract. Indeed, this position presupposes the state to be a mere transient circumstance of political relations whose regulatory and hindering mechanisms – such as borders and stringent immigration policies – stand in the way of individual freedom. 

 

For people thinking – or rather intuitively opinionating – along these lines, citizens' interests within the boundaries of any given (nation-) state are not and must not be considered superior or more exclusive vis-à-vis any other individual that stands outside these limits. For them, not the nation is the subject of the ius gentium, the law of nations, and the protagonist of international relations, but rather the individual human being. There are no international relations at the end of the day. It is only the individual who has and may stipulate legal claims in a global society's cosmopolitan community. This democratic universalism builds the nucleus of this particular strand of political thinking that rejects nation-states' right and political necessity to uphold clear rights (and duties) for their citizens and due process for attaining citizenship. 

 

Both positions – the traditional and the cosmopolitan – promote individual rights and are rooted in the normative ontology of individualism and human rights. However, the difference lies in what each side considers to be the protagonist of political relations. The traditional approach accepts the organization of the (nation-) state as the inevitable perennial model for the protection and promotion of human and individual rights and a potentially peaceful international order. The position of political cosmopolitanism considers the Westphalia nation-state model to be an instrument of oppression and failure that stands in the way of individual liberty and progress. phantasm

 

It would go far beyond the purview of this brief essay to outline all the epistemological, ontological, anthropological, and historical reasons why a world republic will forever remain a romantic illusion. Language and religion have been named two more pragmatic reasons for the impossibility of establishing a global society, no longer divided up by state boundaries and national confinements. The nation-state's condition, clearly defined by territorial borders and distinct legal order, is and will be the best form for a just social order in which the individual's rights are promoted and protected at the same time. We can only base a functional and indeed humane world order on the constitution of (nation-) states and their behavior toward each other guided by an international legal order. It is precisely through international relations that the community of states influences one another and promotes, by way of public opinion, diplomacy, and yes, under specific circumstances, forceful intervention into domestic affairs of a nation, the protection of individual human rights. 

 

The current political debate in the US shows that not even the federal government's exponents are aware of this circumstance. A liberal bias seems to precede the observance of one of the core purposes and tasks of any (nation-) state – to protect its borders and provide security and safety for its citizens. But the misperceptions in this particular regard join hands with the neglect of another essential principle of good governance – the principle of subsidiarity. The subsidiarity principle says that the level of (political) organization that is best able to deal with a task efficiently should take care of that task. While constitutional and federal rules should guide immigration and immigration enforcement, there is no doubt that particular regions and states face specific challenges that need countering in different and proportional ways. The immigration situation for states like California, Arizona, or Texas is different. The federal government must grant those states some leeway in how they safeguard and enforce federal immigration laws. 

 

It makes one wonder why immigration, while it clearly should allow for regional arrangements, is dominated by federal mandate. It astounds even more how liberal bias and political correctness undermines genuine police work. 

 

The results of these failed policies are apparent, and recent developments prove the authority of the outlined arguments. The case of Arizona attests that states take matters into their own hands when the federal government falls short of necessary relegation they should derive from the principle of subsidiarity.

Shameful decision by federal judge in California!

The decision of a federal judge in California to overturn Proposition 8 and rule that the State's ban on same-sex marriages violates the constitutional right to equal protection is but one more proof that our culture's moral underpinning is in severe danger.

 What underlies this and, more or less, all socially contested issues is both an undifferentiated misconception and misuse of the principle of equality. This tendency in the political and juridical realms must be considered the most pernicious trend that has begun to destroy American and Western culture's social fabric.

In addition to the philosophical misconception of the equality notion, ideological strategies are applied in the public and political realms to insulate the concept and prevent a critical debate from taking hold. Whoever attempts to question equality aspirations is denigrated as discriminating, antiquated, a violator of human rights. As far as the issue of same-sex marriages is concerned, even as homophobic. This intolerable state of public debate needs urgent change. The essential prerequisite for a turnaround would be the proper theoretical understanding of the notion of equality, as only sound theory can ultimately provide for good (political) practice.

It is clear that in terms of their human dignity, all men are equal – male and female, people of any ethnic descent, skin color or sexual orientation, infants and geriatrics, everybody. Yet, in addition to their biological and sexual differences, all humans are different regarding their concrete way of being. How would we otherwise justify different income levels, responsibilities and entitlements, property, and tenure?

For the proper dealing with equality, it is thus inevitable to differentiate two levels of equality – the formal or primary one, on which all men are equal; and the factual or secondary one, based on the former, differentiation and disparities are allowed. This fact grasped, equality clearly forbids a schematic equal treatment and not only affords but even demands differentiations that have to be justified by objective and factual rationales. The only thing the principle of equality forbids is arbitrary and groundless differentiation.

It is the perennial task of politics and its legislative and juridical proponents – at any given time and any stage of societal development – to decide which differences are justifiable and which are not. This principle defines what is meant by social justice and demonstrates that a one-dimensional concept of equality must not be confused with justice. (Social) justice can only happen when the two levels of equality – the formal-normative and the factual-contextual – are reconciled and synthesized on objective grounds.

Only the violation of formal equality's outer boundaries or absence of a factually evident reason for any stipulated regulation violates the principle of equality.

This outlined dualism of form and content forbids the schematic treatment of gender issues and any other aspect of social disparity, including the issue of same-sex marriages. To treat the latter different from traditional marriage does not at all violate the principle of equality. The (moral) imperative to upkeep traditional marriage in its exclusivity in both its respects – as a religious sacrament and a civil union – derives from the idea that every social claim has to be designated its proper place in the cultural cosmos of (occidental) values and credos. This cultural underpinning cannot and must not be altered by impulses of individual hedonism and personal gratification, which seem to have become the driving social forces in our societies. Instead, the stakes of the common good and humanistic considerations have got to return to our public, political, and legal discourses.

 But in the given context, we must not deceive ourselves over the fact that it is about more than the desire to satisfy individual sensitivities and personal preferences when it comes to the claims of the gay communities and particularly same-sex marriages. When we deal with gender issues and related topics, we face actions that aim to create new power structures and identity designs, intending to alter our societies substantially. The termination of the traditional binary gender code in the name of equal treatment and anti-discrimination, as a precondition for the destruction of traditional marriage, is supposed to pave the way for an amorphous society that allows for all possible combinations of social coexistence and ways of life.

An adequate understanding of equality is necessary to grasp the issue in all its far-reaching implications, comprehend its multi-faceted impact on society, and unmask the ideological strategies pushing the problem in the various societal contexts.

It appears to be utterly essential to revive and preserve the fundamental values of gender relations and deny arbitrary designs of same-sex unions to being put on level par with traditional forms of human cohabitation. The importance of the issue is paramount and rests at the core of our cultural identity. We will soon find out if our collective social reason will recover the strength to overcome the onslaught of the impertinent forces of irresponsible social engineering and reverse the course of moral deconstruction.

A California federal judge's recent decision is one more example of why we must not leave same-sex marriages to regional sentiments and state legislatures' arbitrariness. It will not be long until federal constitutional regulations must settle the issue in a way with which the entire nation can live..