Echoes
Dogmatism, we were talking about the other day. Via this remark by Simon Blackburn in Truth.
Today’s relativists, persuading themselves that all opinions enjoy the same standing in the light of reason, take it as a green light to believe what they like with as much conviction and force as they like. So while ancient scepticism was the sworn opponent of dogmatism, today dogmatisms feed and flourish on the desecrated corpse of reason.
A day or two after posting that I read a related comment by Hume.
You propose then, Philo, said Cleanthes, to erect religious faith on philosophical skepticism; and you think that if certainty or evidence be expelled from every other subject of inquiry, it will all retire to these theological doctrines, and there acquire a superior force and authority. Whether your skepticism be as absolute and sincere as you pretend, we shall learn by and by, when the company breaks up: We shall then see, whether you go out at the door or the window; and whether you really doubt if your body has gravity, or can be injured by its fall…
That’s from the Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, and it’s the epigraph to chapter 4 in Francis Wheen’s Mumbo Jumbo.
There’s another thing I quoted from Blackburn.
In the intellectual world, toleration is the disposition to fight opinion only with opinion; in other words, to protect freedom of speech, and to confront divergence of opinion with open critical reflection rather than suppression or force.
Yesterday I re-read this article on Islamophobia-phobia by Piers Benn.
The real lesson of tolerance is that disputes should be settled by reasoned dialogue rather than abuse or violence, and that we should always accept that we may have much to learn from people whose beliefs initially appear strange. But these virtues are a far cry from the sentimental pretence that all claims to religious truth are somehow ‘equal’…
There, you see? It all ties up. Skepticism and relativism can be hijacked to the purposes of dogmatism, and tolerance doesn’t mean never disagreeing with anyone, it means disagreeing by means of reasoned dialogue not by force. Both of those points are quite useful to keep in mind.
Actually, G, I don’t think it’s the believers this time. It’s more the twerps who are falling over themselves to second guess anyone who might squawk if their religion is so much as mentioned. Like all the silly stories about Christmas decorations being banned in offices. Many ordinary moslems are annoyed that they are characterised as hyper-sensitive when in reality they don’t give a monkey’s.
On a related point, check out the thread on Pickled Politics (2/3 down the page) on the Burger King ice cream fiasco.
Come to think of it, if someone wanted to damage the reputation of mainstream moslem society in this country by depicting them as demanding, narrow- minded obsessives, then this is exactly the sort of thing they would do.
Having said that, I guess it only takes one. Maybe Deuchar was thinking of Theo Van Gogh.
oops. confused. meant to comment on the Tate thing.
“Many ordinary moslems are annoyed that they are characterised as hyper-sensitive when in reality they don’t give a monkey’s.”
That’s the thing. That’s one reason it’s so irritating that the news media treat the hyper-sensitive MCB as the official representative spokesbody for Muslims.