The Future of Religion: Richard Rorty and Gianni Vattimo by Richard Rorty (PDF)

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Though coming from different and distinct intellectual traditions, Richard Rorty and Gianni Vattimo are united in their criticism of the metaphysical tradition. The challenges they put forward extend beyond philosophy and entail a reconsideration of the foundations of belief in God and the religious life. They urge that the rejection of metaphysical truth does not necessitate the death of religion; instead it opens new ways of imagining what it is to be religious—ways that emphasize charity, solidarity, and irony. This unique collaboration, which includes a dialogue between the two philosophers, is notable not only for its fusion of pragmatism (Rorty) and hermeneutics (Vattimo) but also for its recognition of the limits of both traditional religious belief and modern secularism.In “Anticlericalism and Atheism” Rorty discusses Vattimo’s work Belief and argues that the end of metaphysics paves the way for an anti-essentialist religion. Rorty’s conception of religion, determined by private motives, is designed to produce the gospel’s promise that henceforth God will not consider humanity as a servant but as a friend. In “The Age of Interpretation,” Vattimo, who is both a devout Catholic and a frequent critic of the church, explores the surprising congruence between Christianity and hermeneutics in light of the dissolution of metaphysical truth. As in hermeneutics, interpretation is central to Christianity, which introduced the world to the principle of interiority, dissolving the experience of objective reality into “listening to and interpreting messages.” The lively dialogue that concludes this volume, moderated and edited by Santiago Zabala, analyzes the future of religion together with the political, social, and historical aspects that characterize our contemporary postmodern, postmetaphysical, and post-Christian world.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Not long ago an Amish teen from Chardon, Ohio, was killed when he tried to dislodge a sagging power line tangled in the wheels of his horse-drawn buggy. Such tragedies highlight the gaps between a faith-based existence and life in the modern world and reveal that we need to be mindful of how the other half lives. Philosophers Richard Rorty and Gianni Vattimo believe that the secular and faith-based worlds are becoming irrevocably estranged. This is what I take from my reading of “The Future of Religion,” edited and with an introduction by Santiago Zabala. I think this slim volume of two essays and a question-and-answer section will be open to a wide variety of readings; this reaction is only one interpretation.Rorty and Vattimo believe a drastic split is imminent between modern, secular life and traditional belief in mainstream religion. And they want to build a bridge between these worlds, to save something important to many people: belief in something larger than themselves. The only problem is that the religious life they suggest — an interior life of private meaning or the “nihilism” of Christianity — is probably either incomprehensible or offensive to most ordinary churchgoers. But you decide. I’m already on board.One way to grasp “The Future of Religion” is through a quote from philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche: “There are no facts, only interpretations.” But the authors want Nietzsche to add this phrase: “… and this is an interpretation.” This means that the authors believe our era is poised to grasp the relative nature of all beliefs, a theory that echoes Isaiah Berlin’s idea that there is “no Archimedean point” outside ourselves, our history, our language or our concepts where we can stand to achieve an objective viewpoint toward all that we claim to know or believe. It also relates to Ludwig Wittgenstein’s idea that “all testing, all confirmation and disconfirmation of a hypothesis takes place already within a system,” and that we are not taught truth but, “judgments and their connection with other judgments.”To the best of our knowledge the burning questions about “the truth of the matter” have reference to nothing more than our personal background or shared history. Understanding this concept strips away the deadly energy that fuels so many of today’s conflicts, or at least it would if it were widely understood. And it means that all the pressing issues and heated debates about science and religion — each of which wants to be the sole source of ultimate truth for humankind — may some day be seen as nothing more than a symptom of our inadequacies. Rorty and Vattimo help us transcend such facile debates through an understanding of the finer points of pragmatism and hermeneutics, and this is where the typical reader is likely to furrow his brow. Enlightenment is a tough sell.While I get more inspiration from Rorty’s views, Vattimo will shock the churchgoer with his belief that the modern secular world isn’t different from Christianity but the very culmination of it. He believes that when God incarnated himself in Jesus, he basically turned the world over to us lock, stock and barrel. Moreover, Vattimo believes the ultimate message of Christianity dissolves all notions of objectivity, eroding the very claims most believers cite as proof. Religion looks very different from this perspective. “This is not your father’s Oldsmobile!”Let’s get back to that tangled buggy and its relationship to our American way of life. Rorty and Vattimo promote their views as being crucial to democracy, and this is where they run head-on into President George W. Bush and his faith-based presidency. Rorty and Vattimo seem to be saying that fundamentalism and democracy can’t long endure together. Traditional religion depends on fixed and final truths; democracy is built on innovation and diversity — hence, the disconnect.We know that when the church bans same-sex marriage or women in the clergy, some people — those with one foot firmly in the open society — back off, the same way they would avoid a power line in tangled in their wheels. And they may decide to leave the buggy where it is and hitch a ride on something better. While it might take a while to grasp all the wonderful insights in “The Future of Religion,” once you catch on, you’ll know how to avoid the shock of transition when moving from one realm of belief to another.It’s a good thing to know.(See longer essay on […] 2005 home page)

⭐I bought this book for these philosophers’ assessment of “The Future of Religion” in order to compare their ideas with mine in “Concepts: A ProtoTheist Quest for Science-Minded Skeptics.” As a bonus it gave me insight into why postmodernists don’t seem interested in my scientific assessment of religion’s past and future.I’ve read this little book twice in an attempt to understand postmodernists. But perhaps `understand’ is not an appropriate word for a postmodern work; `interpret’ would be better since they hold that “there are no facts, only interpretations” (p.52, quoting Nietzsche), that everything is subjective as interpreted by whoever is doing the experiencing and that knowledge is arrived at thru inter-subjective dialog. True to form, they respect one another’s points of view eventho’ Vattimo is a devout (tho’ not uncritical) Catholic whereas Rorty has called himself an atheist (altho’ now he prefers `anti-clericalist’). Both seem to reject supernatural powers (altho’ Vattimo speaks of salvation), referring to our age as post-metaphysical.I agree that everyone’s entitled to their own opinion but only if they’ve done their homework (to quote Harry T. Cook), only if they’ve endeavored to first get the `facts’; otherwise a dialog among such folks is only pooled ignorance. But even if they’ve done their homework, postmodernists seem attuned more to history than to scientific explanations (episodic thinking rather than paradigmatic thinking, in Merlin Donald’s terminology). Indeed these postmodernists speak of `historicity’ and `anti-essentialism’. Certainly, our brain/mind must interpret (mostly pre-consciously) the sense data coming into it, using clues from others, in order to guess what’s outside of us. Even so, most of our guesses are pretty good else we’d never survive in this world. Denying that there’s any objective reality seems absurd. Admittedly our ancestors have made some bad guesses, such as believing in a flat-earth or in gods, but in recent times science has imposed burdens of proof.So I can recommend this book if you want to see where postmoderns are coming from and where they think religion is going — they have some intriguing ideas. But if you’re receptive to the explanatory ability of science, I’d suggest Pascal Boyer’s “Religion Explained,” Dean Hamer’s “The God Gene,” Sam Harris’ “The End of Faith,” M.D. Faber’s “The Psychological Roots of Religious Belief” and/or my book.

⭐FIRST ADD TOGETHER:1. A superb publisher of post-modern work like Columbia university press.2. Zabala’s real gift for clarity and comprehensive understanding of the context of post-modern thinking.3. Vattimo’s true creativity in presenting the hermeneutics of “weak thought”4. An finally, Rorty , who has generally been ignored and deserved some exposure.AND WHAT DO YOU GET: A FAILURE (what?)The three great thinkers here present us with a triad of the post-modern context: 1. RORTY 2. VATTIMO 3. ZABALAthe problems that exist with this project are as follows:1. Rorty deserved more space and needed it to produce more content. (I had to go on-line and supplement the Rorty essay because of this “lack”.2. Zabala needed to introduce the writers in a more structured manner and especially so that Rorty’s invisibility could become visible.3. The expected guidelines sent to each writer, in advance for the project, should have been more demanding with regard to content. At least an outline of : deconstruction, re-construction, positing , and finally mediation. Columbia press already knows this (they are post-modern experts). But these guidelines and expectations were missing.4. The concluding summation by Zabala is overly- slanted towards Vattimo (I get it. He is a co-writer with Vattimo on other projects).If you are in the process of submitting a proposal for your master’s thesis (not PhD); this outline would be excellent to undertake and write correctly, with real substantial content.the project is superb; the result was horrible. But Zabala has other great work. 2 generous stars. Skip this half-book.

⭐excellent copy

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