Popular scientist Richard Dawkins proposes we start using the word “brights” to refer to atheists, agnostics, freethinkers, and humanists. Mostly they are naturalists as opposed to supernaturalists. (With emphasis especially on “as opposed to.”)
Dawkins and his fellow “brights” hope to use the word in the same way that the homosexual community used “gay” as a tool to overcome prejudice. Take a word with a positive connotation, get everyone to start using it instead of words with a negative connotation, and watch your group suffer less persecution. All in all, a good strategy.
But I have two problems with it. One, “brights” are not persecuted or oppressed, unless by “oppressed” you mean that they are less likely to be the high school quarterback than the president of the honor society. Unless by “persecuted” you mean that they are mocked for wearing Vulcan ears to the Star Trek convention. I could support the term simply on the basis that its easier than saying “atheists, agnostics, freethinkers, and humanists,” but “oppressed” they are not. True, they never quite claim out and out oppression, but the comparison to the gay community implies it, and they do say things like this:
Today’s Brights are all too invisible. They are ignored by most and their philosophical perspectives are disparaged by many. Unlike their fellow citizens whose worldviews are more culturally accepted, all too many Brights are reluctant to engage themselves fully and openly in civic concerns and the business of the nation.
This is akin to my friend’s mother claiming she is oppressed for her Christianity in her small town in rural Oklahoma. Brights are disproportionately successful university-trained professionals, often with advanced degrees. That’s not oppression.
Two, the hard and fast division between “natural” and “supernatural” is too easy, too antagonistic, too adolescent. In my own observation most brights cling to this easy dychotomy because of a hurtful social or family rejection by non-brights as much as for philosophical reasons. But these social rejections happen to anyone and everyone who stand up for what they believe regardless of social pressure, not just to brights. If brights wish to draw a thick dark line between “natural” and “supernatural,” that’s certainly their right and they’re welcome to do so. But the anger and hurt I’ve seen them display when explaining their beliefs is far out of proportion, especially when compared to another group (like Jews or gays) who have experienced more oppression than brights ever have or ever will.
While I consider myself “bright,” open minded, and the like, their self-definition seems to exclude my own beliefs in what they label the “supernatural” (a label I reject). As a panentheist, I believe there probably is no line between natural and supernatural, or if there is one, that it’s porous and moves around a lot.
But I am not a New Ager. I don’t believe in crystals. I don’t get my aura read. I don’t believe in Rod Brezny’s astrology even if I enjoy reading it in the local alternative weekly. (It’s quite good.)
So we need a term for those of in between the New Agers and the brights. I propose the “integrals.”
Walter Wink in his book The Powers That Be: Theology for a New Millennium describes the integral worldview:
In this worldview, soul permeates the universe. God is not just within me, but within everything. The universe is diffused with the divine. This is not pantheism, where everything is divine, but panentheism (pan, everything; en, in; theos, God), where everything is in God [sic] and God [sic] is in everything. Spirit is at the heart of everything, and all creatures are potentially revealers of God [sic].
Included among the integrals are my fellow panentheists, but also pagans, Matthew Fox’s creation spirituality, Celtic Christians, Meister Eckhart and the Rhineland mystics, philosphical Taoists, some neurotheologians, and some pantheists. (And perhaps others.)
(Hat tip to Plastic for the thought trigger and some of the links.)
I think adolescent is a perfect description of Dawkins’ position. Particularly in claiming to be both open-minded and a dogmatic naturalist.
You are right to point out just how inappropriate his whining about atheist oppression is. Indeed, Dawkins seems to be disappointed that his dogma (naturalistic atheism) hasn’t managed (he would suppose) to be quite as oppressive as some others.
I’m amazed at how naive these brilliant scientists when it comes to culture. Case in point, his claim that there is something despicable about referring to a particular child as a “Catholic child” or a “Muslim child” since clearly they are not mature or objective enough make decisions about their beliefs (and when does that happen anyway? after your first advanced degree?). Now, Dawkins would be right if one’s religious disposition/vocation were only, or even primarily, about “belief” — which, in Dawkins’ sense, would mean something like “assent to a proposition(s) concerning matter(s) of fact.” But since one’s religious disposition is (as with one’s scientific disposition) more a matter of a way of life than the assent to any set of propositional statements, wouldn’t it be just as appropriate (and useful) to refer to a “Catholic child” as it is to refer to a “Canadian child”?
You’re right about the distinction between faith as cognitive-propositional assent and faith as cultural-linguistic lifestyle. For the life of me I’ll never understand why brilliant techies think their expertise automatically extends beyond the laboratory walls.
ET pray home
I just read an intriguing article in the September issue of The Atlantic by Aussie philosopher Paul Davies. (Don’t ask me why the September issue just arrived now in late July.) It’s called “E.T. and God: Could earthly religions survive the discovery o…
Satan was bright and gay too – as Lucifer,the angel of music, he was covered in multi-colored jewels. After he fell from heaven, “bright and gay” was just a coverup for his ugliness, just as it is for these political groups today.
There is one more group to add to your list of those between Brights and New Age…Deists. Our core belief is based on a belief in God as revealed through nature and reason. You would find our ideas in line with those of Paul Davies and Thomas Paine. We hve chosen to come together and create a new reason based religion.
[…] “Integrals, anyone?” (On Dawkin’s coinage of the term “brights.”) 6/26/2003 […]