Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Good Dialectic on the Religious Question

I have come across this last week or so some engagements with the question of religion that are exceptionally dialectical. (Frequently, at Arts & Letters Daily.) My supposition is that such are now coming into prominence in response to the intensely partisan nature of the recent polemic from the anti-religion side. (In fact, I believe this is said by implication in two the examples here.)
  • The first is an interview on Canada's State media by Jian Gomeshi with the estimable Camille Paglia—who describes herself as a "lesbian, Atheist, sex-positive Feminist"—arguing for the value of the Christian religion. Click here for the podcast. Be warned: Paglia is a force of nature and just listening to her is to stand against a hurricane.
  • The second is an interview in The New Humanist with Economist journalists John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge. They have co-authered a secular book on religion, which, as this interview shows, is a textbook case of a dialectic treatment—and an example of the power & glory of dialectic over polemic. Click here for the article.
  • The third is an article by science writer Robert Wright—founder of bloggingheads.tv and meaningoflife.tv—summarising his new book The Evolution of God. Here again, you will see a formal example of a dialectical approach—in this case, actually structured dialectically. Click here for the article.

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