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The Age of Atheists: How We Have Sought to Live Since the Death of God

Page 70

by Watson, Peter


  36.Jürgen Habermas, Postmetaphysical Thinking: Philosophical Essays, Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 1992, p. xv.

  37.Jürgen Habermas, Between Naturalism and Religion, Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008, p. 29.

  38.Jürgen Habermas, Philosophical Essays, trans. Ciaran Cronin, Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2008. And Postmetaphysical Thinking.

  39.Jürgen Habermas, An Awareness of What Is Missing: Faith and Reason in a Post-secular Age, Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2010, p. 211.

  40.Habermas, Awareness of What Is Missing, p. 142.

  41.Ibid., pp. 139–40.

  42.Ibid., p. 37.

  43.Alain de Botton, Religion for Atheists: A Non-believer’s Guide to the Uses of Religion, London: Hamish Hamilton, 2012, p. 44 and passim.

  CONCLUSION: THE CENTRAL SANE ACTIVITY

  1.Salman Rushdie, Joseph Anton, London: Jonathan Cape, 2012, p. 476.

  2.Harold Bloom, The Anatomy of Influence: Literature as a Way of Life, New Haven and London (2011). Robert Bellah et al., Habits of the Heart: Individual and Commitment in American Life, Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California Press (1985). Richard Sennett, The Fall of Public Man (2002), Respect (2003), Craftsmanship (2008) and Together: The Rituals, Pleasures and Politics of Cooperation (2012), all London and New York: Allen Lane, Penguin Press. Alan Dershowitz, Rights from Wrongs: A Secular Theory of the Origin of Rights, New York: Basic Books, 2004.

  3.George Levine (ed.), The Joy of Secularism: Eleven Essays for How We Live Now, Princeton and London: Princeton University Press, 2011, p. 4.

  4.John Gray, Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals, London: Granta Books, 2002, p. 74.

  5.Gordon Graham, The Re-enchantment of the World: Art versus Religion, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007, pp. 82–85. Simon Blackburn, Think: A Compelling Introduction to Philosophy, Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 298.

  6.Christopher Hitchens, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, New York: Twelve, 2007.

  7.Gray, op. cit., p. 43.

  8.Jonathan Lear, Happiness, Death and the Remainder of Life, Cambridge, MA, and London: Harvard University Press, 2000, p. 138.

  9.Cynthia Ozick, The Din in Our Head, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006, ch. 14.

  10.Seamus Heaney, The Government of the Tongue, London: Faber and Faber, 1988, p. 189.

  11.Rebecca Stott, “The Webfooted Understorey: Darwinian Immersions,” in Levine (ed.), The Joy of Secularism, pp. 216–21.

  12.Gray, op. cit., p. 198.

  13.Richard Kearney, Anatheism (Returning to God After God), New York: Columbia University Press, 2010, pp. 73, 80, 180.

  Index

  absolute/Absolute, 72, 274, 338, 456. See also specific person’s views

  Abstract Expressionism, 394, 395, 397–400, 402

  action:

  Abstract Expressionism and, 399

  beliefs as rules for, 57

  change and, 400

  existentialists and, 340

  political, 439–40

  Adler, Viktor, 33, 241, 352, 370, 371, 438–39

  Adorno, Theodor, 144, 372, 378–79

  aesthetics: counterculture and, 425–27

  affluence, 239, 243, 255, 432–33

  afterlife, 178, 225, 229–30, 274, 277, 283, 316–17, 318–19, 472, 484, 550

  agape (law of love), 367, 527–28n

  Agassiz Club. See Metaphysical Club “Saturday Club”

  Aiken, Conrad, 66

  Alexander, Eben, 11, 553

  alienation, 97, 202–3, 365, 442, 451, 499

  Allen, Frederick Lewis, 241

  Altizer, Thomas, 383–84

  altruism, 82, 276, 477

  American Foundation of Religion and Psychiatry (AFRP), 360, 362

  American Society for Psychical Research, 178

  “the American way,” 363

  analysis, 76, 278, 543

  anarchy, 207, 211, 250, 251

  Anderson, Sherwood, 238–39, 240, 241, 242, 243, 543

  Andre, Carl, 391, 392

  Andreas, Friedrich Carl, 227

  Andreas-Salomé, Lou, 227, 436

  androgynous man, 268

  Anouilh, Jean, 339

  anthropology, 88, 337, 412

  anthroposophy, 212, 287, 318, 323

  anti-Semitism. See Jews/Judaism

  anxiety, 86, 87, 119, 242, 308, 436–40, 534

  “The Apostles” (Cambridge Conversazione Society), 77–78

  “archaic man”: Jung’s views about, 286

  archetypes: Jung’s theory of, 286, 288–89, 290, 380, 419

  architecture, 35–36, 38, 160, 498

  Arendt, Hannah, 58n, 192, 226, 440

  Aristotle, 60, 63, 214, 280, 501, 502

  Arnold, Matthew, 24, 466

  Aron, Raymond, 58n, 339

  art/artists:

  abstract, 182–83, 454

  aim/purpose of, 183, 209, 236, 263, 504, 537

  and art for art’s sake, 151, 153

  beauty and, 456

  biological origin of, 483–84

  collective, 118

  color in, 111, 113, 115–17, 183

  counterculture and, 414

  as dialogue, 456

  education and, 400

  as escape from time, 503–5

  as existential, 75

  expanded community of, 124

  as experience, 400

  as explaining change, 90

  heroes in, 114, 116

  high, 454, 456

  importance of, 91, 111, 146, 152

  innovation in, 111

  art/artists (continued)

  knowledge and, 88

  language of, 118, 455

  light in, 112, 113–14, 120

  as making a difference, 91

  meaning of, 392

  minimalist, 391–93

  mysticism and, 484

  nature in, 121

  Nazis’ looting of, 318

  “new spirit” in, 122–24

  phenomenology and, 73

  postmodernism and, 499

  progression of, 456

  reality and, 124

  and realms of life, 554

  religion of, 142, 144–45

  as replacement for religion, 450

  science compared with, 455

  spiritual in, 180–84

  theothanatology and, 383

  truth and, 456

  twentieth-century, 124

  See also specific person’s views or type of art

  Aschheim, Steven, 24, 33, 38, 39, 48–49, 188

  Ascona, Switzerland, 40–45, 46, 47, 48, 401

  astrology, 287, 318, 470, 500

  astronomy, 471, 512

  atheism/atheists:

  as alternative religion, 214–17

  increase in, 21

  as intellectually fulfilled, 542

  militant, 7–8, 204, 215, 216, 217, 219

  psychological causes of, 354–55

  religious, 519, 522

  retreat of, 9–10, 17

  scientific, 204, 217

  traditional, 336

  during World War II, 219

  See also specific person’s views or topic

  atomic bomb, 330, 380, 381, 388, 450, 451

  Auden, W. H., 83, 89, 176, 177, 291, 458, 459–60, 463, 464, 539

  Augustine, Saint, 353, 536n

  Auschwitz, 330, 331, 372, 374, 375, 377, 378, 379

  authenticity, 365, 404, 506, 521

  authority, 86, 92, 154, 239, 258, 260, 363, 365, 366, 391, 457, 476, 484

  autokinesis, 179

  automatic
writing, 174, 179, 198

  avant-garde, 39–40, 118, 122–23, 128

  Ayer, A. J., 58n, 273, 274, 275–78

  Baker, Carlos, 242

  Bakunin, Mikhail, 211

  Balakian, Anna, 147, 148

  Ball, Hugo, 47, 119

  Barrès, Maurice, 189

  Barth, Karl, 57n, 311, 312–13, 382, 384, 455, 473, 500, 534

  Bartók, Bela, 396

  Bataille, Georges, 336

  Baudelaire, Charles, 71, 73, 130, 460, 536

  Baumeister, Roy F., 17–18

  “beat” writing, 394, 395, 397, 403–6

  beauty, 112, 117, 119, 189, 456, 516, 522–24, 536, 549. See also specific person’s views

  Beauvoir, Simone de, 334, 339, 340, 367

  bebop, 394, 395–97, 398

  Beckett, Samuel, 8, 252, 254, 293, 387–91, 406, 407, 408, 430, 537

  Beethoven, Ludwig von, 144, 145

  Behrens, Peter, 35–36

  being/Being, 337, 350, 385, 414, 458, 536–41, 542. See also specific person’s views

  Belgrad, Daniel, 394, 396

  belief/beliefs:

  belief in, 473, 474

  “bricolage,” 499–500, 501

  evidence of, 514

  faith differentiated from, 514

  justification of, 62

  over-, 59

  postmodernism and, 499–500

  as public, 512–16

  ready-made, 499

  as rules for action, 57

  therapeutic approach and, 446

  trust in, 197

  Vienna Circle and, 274

  See also specific person’s views

  Bell, Clive, 79, 80

  Bell, Quentin, 191, 193

  Bellah, Robert, 533

  Benbassa, Esther, 373, 378, 379, 445

  Benedict, Saint, 502

  Benedict XVI (pope), 546

  Benjamin, Walter, 233

  Benn, Gottfried, 49–50, 464

  Bennett, Arnold, 190, 257, 258

  Berdyaev, Nikolai, 208

  Bergeinsamkeit, Zarathustrian cult of, 36–38

  Berger, Peter, 9–10, 13–14, 21, 445

  Bergson, Henri, 75–77, 88, 95, 99, 101, 123, 124, 142, 170, 189, 426, 534

  Berlin, Normand, 253, 254

  Berry, Philippa, 499

  Bertram, Ernst, 150–51

  Beveridge Report (1942), 333

  “big crunch,” 493

  biology, 161, 272, 472, 481, 483–85, 488. See also evolution

  biophilia, 479, 482–83

  Bishop, Elizabeth, 551–52

  Bishop, John Peale, 240, 241

  Bismarck, Otto von, 333

  black magic, 169

  Black Mountain College, 394, 400, 401, 402, 403

  Blackburn, Simon, 539

  Blake, William, 128, 422, 455, 465

  “blank spots”: humanitarian disasters as creating, 449

  Blavatsky, Madame Helen, 167–69, 181, 182, 183, 280

  “blood flag,” Nazi, 321

  “blood and soil” concept, 313, 317, 319, 323

  Bloom, Harold, 293, 406–7, 408, 465, 515, 533

  Bloomsbury Group, 78–79, 80, 82–83, 193

  Blunden, Edmund, 195–96

  body, 268, 340–41, 387, 394, 395–97, 398, 400–402, 404, 414. See also mind-body

  Boehme, Jacob, 169

  Boethius, 295

  Bogdanov, Aleksandr, 205, 206, 208–9, 210, 213

  bohemia, 394, 416, 450

  Bohlmann, Otto, 163–64

  Bohr, Niels, 58n, 545

  Bolsheviks:

  Nietzsche’s influence on, 205–14

  in Russia, 200–219, 541n

  See also communism; Marxism; specific person’s views

  Bonhoeffer, Dietrich, 131, 311, 382, 383, 385, 386

  Boutroux, Émile, 142–43

  brain: size of, 517

  Brâncuşi, Constantin, 183, 184

  Braque, Georges, 111

  Brecht, Bertolt, 422

  Brentano, Franz, 72

  Breton, André, 198

  Breuer, Josef, 59

  “bricolage” beliefs, 499–500, 501

  Brodsky, Joseph, 449, 459

  Brooke, Rupert, 77, 189–90, 195

  Brooks, Van Wyck, 66, 165, 239

  Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 128

  Buber, Martin, 311

  Buchan, John, 189

  Buckley, Jerome, 93

  Buddha/Buddhism, 42, 58, 390, 395, 412, 414, 516. See also Zen Buddhism

  Bukharin, Nikolai, 212

  bullfighting: Hemingway’s comparison of church ritual and, 242

  Bultmann, Rudolf, 58n, 311, 312

  Butler, Christopher, 264

  Byron, Lord, 92, 211

  Cage, John, 394, 400, 401

  Calder, John, 387, 390

  “the calling”: Weber’s views about, 259–60

  Calvin, John, 353, 474

  Calvinism, 259–60, 357, 359

  Cambridge Conversazione Society “the Apostles,” 77–78, 303

  Camus, Albert, 329–30, 331, 339, 349

  capitalism:

  counterculture and, 410

  existentialists and, 336

  happiness and, 433, 436

  impact of financial crisis of 2008 on, 19

  Marx-Engels’s views about, 499

  materialism and, 250

  as Musil’s “normal” condition, 235–36

  Nietzschean Marxists and, 38

  postmodernism and, 499

  science and, 540

  socialism as replacement for, 137

  and things we want next, 20

  World War I and, 193, 332

  See also specific person’s views

  Capra, Fritjof, 490

  “cargo of life”: Nietzsche’s views about, 25

  caring:

  as layer of ethics, 516

  for the world, 224, 225, 227, 487

  Carnap, Rudolf, 273, 274

  Carson, Rachel, 485

  Castaneda, Carlos, 417

  Catholics/Catholicism, 119, 132, 142, 180, 310, 314–20, 322, 324, 325, 366, 383

  certainty/uncertainty, 17, 62, 413, 446, 456. See also specific person’s views

  Cézanne, Paul, 50, 71, 73–74, 111, 115, 130, 181, 229, 550

  Chadwick, Owen, 27, 29

  Chagall, Marc, 111

  Chamberlain, Houston Stewart, 316, 319

  chance, 118, 119, 138–39, 509, 534

  change:

  art as means to explain, 90

  Expressionism and, 119

  Futurists and, 210

  in late nineteenth century, 110

  life as, 95

  in modern society, 428–29

  postmodernism and, 499

  pragmatism and, 95

  resistance as means of, 400

  technological/innovative, 110

  theothanatology and, 383

  See also specific person’s views

  chaos, 120, 146, 199, 498. See also specific person’s views

  charisma, 14, 15, 178, 258

  Chekhov, Anton, 97, 105–9, 265, 536

  chemistry: physics links with, 542, 545

  Chesterton, G. K., 19n, 165, 190

  chicken experiment, Thorndike’s, 56–57

  child-man: and “new spirit” in art, 123

  children:

  as battleground of instinct, 118

  Beckett’s views about, 390

  Freud’s views about, 86, 118, 282, 284, 356

  happiness and, 436, 443

  Hor
ney’s views about, 359

  and “new spirit” in art, 123, 124

  Russell’s views about, 308

  science education for, 541

  sex and, 284, 308, 356, 357

  sin and, 356

  Spock’s views about, 356–57

  teaching a belief system to, 474

  therapy for, 443

  See also parent-child relationship

  Chinese: Malraux’s comments about, 340

  choice, 513, 516, 521, 538

  choreosophy, 48

  Christians/Christianity:

  Bolshevik crusade and, 204

  communism and, 214

  as community, 202

  “counterfeit,” 500

  decline of, 319

  “discursive,” 28

  happiness of, 15

  health of, 15

  Nazis and, 311–12, 313–15, 322, 324–25

  “New Age” and, 500

  occult and, 167, 180

  Positive, 314–15

  postmodernism and, 498, 500

  shadow culture and, 179

  as “slave morality,” 204, 209

  theosophy and spiritualism as giving credibility to, 197

  theothanatology and, 383–84, 385

  World War I and, 188, 196

  See also fundamentalism, religious; specific person’s views

  church:

  attendance at, 15, 16, 21

  factories as substitutes for, 217–19

  circle, George’s, 147, 152–60, 191–92

  civil rights movement, 334, 383, 410, 421, 474

  clairvoyants, 182

  clay pottery, 402–3

  clergy:

  women as, 367

  See also pastoral psychology/counseling; specific person’s views

  Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 93

  colonialism, 37, 452

  color: in art, 111, 113, 115–17, 183

  comedy, 68, 70, 123, 267. See also humor

  common sense, 82, 267, 274, 275, 435, 440

  communism, 202, 204, 212, 214–17, 218, 307, 366, 383. See also Marxism

  community:

  Christianity as, 202

  counterculture and, 411

  expansion of art, 124

  Expressionism and, 50

  hope and, 547

  importance of, 546, 554

  Jews as transnational, 379

  meaning and, 546

  and Mussolini’s cult of personality, 317n

  naming and, 554

  Nazis and, 315

  pragmatism and, 65

  “total”/redemptive, 39

  totemism and, 142

  truth and, 547

  Übermensch and, 51

  Unitarians and, 324

  war as restoration of, 190

 

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