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The religion of John Rawls
I sometimes jest with Robin Hanson that he is a Christian theologian, studying eschatology. In my dialogue with Peter Singer I described his thought in terms of a longstanding Jewish tradition of commentary on the idea of suffering, a successor to Spinoza you might say. In Law and Literature class I often ask my students: "What is the author's implicit theology?"
Now Kevin Vallier sends me this very interesting piece on Rawls:
When John Rawls died in 2002, there was found among his files a short statement entitled “On My Religion”, apparently written in the 1990s. In this text Rawls describes the history of his religious beliefs and attitudes towards religion. He refers to a period during his last two years as an undergraduate at Princeton (1941–2) when he “became deeply concerned with theology and its doctrines”, and considered attending a seminary to study for the Episcopal priesthood. But he decided to enlist in the army instead, “as so many of my friends and classmates were doing”. By June of 1945, he had abandoned his orthodox Christian beliefs. With characteristic tentativeness and a disclaimer of self-knowledge, Rawls speculates that his beliefs changed because of his experiences in the war and his reflections on the moral significance of the Holocaust. When he returned to Princeton in 1946, it was to pursue a doctorate in philosophy.
The article, by Joshua Cohen and Thomas Nagel, has much more of interest. It's one of the best mid-length essays I've read in some time.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on March 21, 2009 at 08:50 AM in Religion | Permalink
Comments
Your comment to Singer reminded me of Mencius Moldbug, which made my day. You could tell Singer did not want to be called a theologian.
Posted by: josh at Mar 21, 2009 9:23:54 AM
You link to the Cohen/Nagel article is not working.
This one works.
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article5931573.ece
Posted by: michael webster at Mar 21, 2009 10:32:13 AM
You are a very clever person Professor Cowan, and sometimes too clever for your own good. Engaging, publicly, as you do, with people like Singer, is a wonderful gift to the world. Engaging him on the aspects of his hypothesis where you share ground, and disagree, is surely only of benefit. However, reducing deep thought to ideology can be, in my opinion, very counterproductive.
As an academic exercise it is useful, but beyond that, ignoring ideology would be far more useful in general.
Posted by: JF at Mar 21, 2009 11:27:09 AM
JF, you may not be interested in theology, but theology is interested in you. Check out this Moldbug guy who everyone and their dog is talking about:
http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/2007/06/rawlsian-god-cryptocalvinism-in-action.html
Tyler, what's your implicit theology?
Cheers
Zdeno
Posted by: Zdeno at Mar 21, 2009 12:15:57 PM
When someone mentions eschatology, I think of Frank Tipler and his concept of the omega point intelligence. Although I think Tipler's theories of cosmology are likely wrong, I do give him and John Barrow credit for legitimizing eschatology as a scientific discipline and for making a religion a branch of science. Religion is really applied science as it is about securing immortality. Transhumanism is to conventional religion as astronomy is to astrology.
Posted by: kurt9 at Mar 21, 2009 1:53:18 PM
My implicit theology does not include worship of John Rawls. Cohen and Nagel have produced a superb essay about a subject which does not merit one.
If enough of us state our implicit theology,maybe we can tempt Tyler into also mis-stating his. My implicit theology is Bayesian, Gödellian and fails to include the notions of belief, faith and certainty. That said, it is in the tradition of Moses, Jesus and Mohammed; with touches of Buddhism and Taoism.
Posted by: Diversity at Mar 21, 2009 3:36:53 PM
Gödel was an theist. His philosophical studies brought him to the strong conclusion that the world is both rational and a Leibnitzian monadology with God as the central monad.
Posted by: Lee A. Arnold at Mar 21, 2009 3:54:40 PM
Let me retype that: Gödel was a theist, not an atheist. (So was the Rev. Bayes.)
Here are Gödel's own words, quoted in Hao Wang, A Logical Journey (MIT 1996). (Wang adopts a numeration system for most of Gödel's statements. Wang's clarifications are in brackets):
0.2.1 My theory is a monadology with a central monad [namely, God]. It is like the monadogy by Leibnitz in its central structure.
0.2.2 My theory is rationalistic, idealistic, optimistic, and theological.
(p. 119) The fundamental philosophical concept is cause. It involves: will, force, enjoyment, God, time, space. Will and enjoyment: Hence life and affirmation and negation. Time and space: being near = possiblity of influence.
4.3.15 The rulers find it hard to manipulate the population: so they use materialism to manipulate the intellectuals and use religion to manipulate the workers. Before the communists can conquer the world, they will have to have some rational religion. The present ideal is not a sufficiently strong motive. Can’t reform the world with a wrong philosophy. The founders of science were not atheits or materialists. Materialists began to appear only in the second half of the eighteenth century.
6.1.2 Either the human mind surpasses all machines (to be more precise: it can decide more number-theoretical questions than any machine) or else there exist number-theoretical questions undecidable for the human mind. [It is not excluded that both alternatives may be true.]
6.3.1 Note that the question of whether there exist finite non-mechanical procedures (such as those involving the use of abstract terms on the basis of their meaning,) not equivalent with any algorithm, has nothing whatsoever to do with the adequacy of the definition of “formal system” and of “mechanical procedure.” ...Note that the results mentioned in this postscript do not establish any bounds for the powers of human reson, but rather for the potentiality of pure formalism in mathematics.
9.1.1 I believe that the most fruitful principle for gaining an overall view of the possible worldviews will be to divide them up according to the degree and the manner of their affinity to, or renunciation of, metaphysics (or religion.) In this way we immediately obtain a division into two groups: skepticism, materialism, and positivism stand on one side; spiritualism, idealism, and theology on the other.
9.1.5 There is no absolute knowledge; everything goes only by probability. Husserl aimed at absolute knowledge, but so far this has not been attained. Even if there were absolute knowledge, it could not be transferred to somebody else, orally or through written material. Skepticism is temporary [or provisional].
9.1.8 It is an idea of Leibnitz that monads are spiritual in the sense that they have consciousness, experience, and drive on the active side, and contain representations (Vorstellungen) on the passive side. Matter is also composed of such monads. We have the emotional idea that we should avoid inflicting pain on living things, but an electron or a piece of rock also has experiences. We experience drives, pains, and so on ourselves. The task is to discover the universal laws of the interactions of monads, including people, electrons, and so forth. For example, attraction and repulsion are the drives of electrons, and they contain representations of other elementary particles.
9.1.9 Monads (bions, etc.) are not another kind of material particle; they are not in fixed parts of space; they are nowhere and, therefore, not material objects. Matter will be spiritualized when the true theory of physics is found. Monads only act into space; they are not in space. They have an inner life or consciousness; in addition to relations to other particles (clear in Newtonian physics, where we know the relations between the particles,) they also have something inside. In quantum physics the electrons are objectively distributed in space, not at a fixed place at a fixed moment, but at a ring. Hence, it is impossible for elctrons to have different inner states, only different distributions.
9.1.17 One needs some Arbeitshypothese or working hypothesis in considering the question whether one should pursue certain metaphysical projects now. My working hypothesis is that the project under consideration has not yet been studied from the right perspective. Specifically, previous attempts have been hampered by one combination or another of three factors: (1) lack of an exact development of science;
(2) theological prejudices; and (3) a materialistic bias. The pursuit, unhampered by any one of these three negative factors, hasn’t been tried before.
And, from page 316: "On another page [written around 1960], under the rubric “My philosophical viewpoint,” Gödel lists fourteen items which appear to be an attempt to outline his fundamental philosphical beliefs:"
1. The world is rational.
2. Human reason can, in principle, be developed more highly (through certain techniques.)
3. There are systematic methods for the solution of all problems (also art, etc.)
4. There are other worlds and rational beings of a different and higher kind.
5. The world in which we live is not the only one in which we shall live or have lived.
6. There is incomparably more knowledge a priori than is currently known.
7. The development of human thought since the Renaissance is thoroughly intelligible (durchaus einsichtige).
8. Reason in mankind will be developed in every direction.
9. Formal rights comprise a real science.
10. Materialism is false.
11. The higher beings are connected ot the others by analogy, not by composition.
12. Concepts have an objective existence.
13. There is a scientific (exact) philosophy and theology, which deals with concepts of the higherst abstractness; and this is also most highly fruitful for science.
14. Religions are, for the most part, bad -- but religion is not.
It is not clear what Gödel thought of Rawls, although Wang held Rawls in very high esteem indeed.
Posted by: Lee A. Arnold at Mar 21, 2009 5:01:37 PM
But see Peter Berkowitz, "John Rawls and the Liberal Faith"
http://www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=wq.print&essay_id=8468&stoplayout=true
Posted by: BenjaminL at Mar 21, 2009 6:02:11 PM
I doubt if Rawls's loss of Episcopalian faith between 1942 and 1946 was particularly driven by the Holocaust, which at the time was largely considered just one of the many horrors of WWII. I suspect in his note he was projecting backwards views of several decades later, by which point the Holocaust had ascended to its current historical / theological status.
Posted by: Steve Sailer at Mar 21, 2009 7:49:23 PM
I doubt if Rawls's loss of Episcopalian faith between 1942 and 1946 was particularly driven by the Holocaust, which at the time was largely considered just one of the many horrors of WWII.
Dare one speculate that perhaps Rawls was sufficiently sensitive that the Holocaust affected him especially, without its first becoming a miniseries?
Observe the references to the Nazis in quotes from his thesis.
Posted by: Anderson at Mar 23, 2009 5:48:31 PM
