Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2003 19:35:39 +0000
From: "steve.devos" <steve.devos-AT-krokodile.co.uk>
Subject: Re: what is religion and why should we bother?


yes - ok ... except I think Neitzsche was necessarily incorrect in the 
christian reference... but acceptable if you subsitute indo-european for 
the 'christianity'...

Do you include science and technology within the 'rationality' ? Or is 
it merely 'rationality' as within the philosophical frame ?

regards

steve

Eric wrote:

>Steve,
>
>I guess in my view philosophy occupies a position distinct from that of
>either science or religion. If we examine the classical philosophies of
>the Stoics, Cynics and Epicureans, it clearly seems that they offered
>something more than mere doctrine or dogma. They each taught that by
>following the dictates of one's 'nature' (conceived differently in each
>case) one could realize virtue and human flourishing (eudaemonia -
>usually mistranslated as happiness.) 
>
>I am not the first to observe that these philosophies offered something
>much closer to what we would call today 'therapy' as opposed to merely
>establishing the metaphysical and epistemological foundations capable of
>grounding knowledge.  
>
>In a similar way, Spinoza, echoing the ancients, called his philosophy
>an ethics to emphasize that it was more concerned with a way of living
>than a kind of doctrine. Perhaps that is one reason why Foucault also
>referred to the project of D&G as establishing an ethics as well.
>
>Nietzsche with his genealogical approach interpreted modernism as
>secularized Christianity and argued that socialists, utilitarians,
>so-called free thinkers and others merely continued the metaphysics of
>Christianity without making the transvaluation of values that was really
>required.  
>
>It certainly isn't just the failure of rationalism, but positive
>pressures as well that allow religion to endure, and perhaps even
>proliferate, in the present era. I am not attempting to defend or make
>apologies for this resurgence. I am simply pointing out it needs to be
>better understood if it will really be superceded in some future period.
>
>eric
>
>
> 
>
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