Daniel Dennett And Robert Thurman Debate the Merits of Faith and the Source of Ethical Action

On a cold New York City night after a giant snowfall, philosopher Daniel Dennett and Buddhist scholar Robert Thurman took to the stage to debate the science of religion and the religion of science. A prelude to the forthcoming Mind And Reality Symposium [1] at Columbia University, it was clear that sparks would fly. In this clash of academic titans, much was at stake. The question posed was whether the values of scientific “enlightenment” or religion are responsible for the destruction of the planet. But it was the very fabric of our reality, not merely the value of religion, that was being debated.

Meet Daniel Dennett

Daniel Dennett [2] is a celebrated philosopher on tour promoting his new book, Breaking The Spell [3]. With his white beard and calm, composed demeanor, he resembles a classic caricature of God, or perhaps of Charles Darwin,two characters who get a lot of play in his in book.

Although Dennett is a philosopher, evolutionary biology [4] provides the primary lens through which he understands the world and religion. In his presentation Dennett explained the thrust of his new book, that religion causes humans to act in ways that are not beneficial to the organism—ways that are crazy, if not outright harmful. Dennett contends rationality is man's crowning achievement and is suspicious of anything that's not scientifically testable. In short, Dennett believes religious ideas are mostly irrational.

Enter Robert Thurman

Buddhist scholar Robert Thurman [5] praised Dennett's ambitions to study religion as cultural phenomena, to dialogue with religions, and to explore religious ideas through the lens of evolutionary biology.

Thurman then proceeded to argue that Dennett's faith in scientific materialism [6] smells a lot like religion, providing a set of world views from which stem particular social and moral functions. That seems reasonable.

Do Our Ideas About Death Affect The Way We Live? Over the course of their conversation, a larger, but much more subtle, issue ripened. Thurman took aim at the effects of scientific materialism on culture. In a nutshell, Thurman equated scientific materialism, nihilism, and even religions that proffer an afterlife in heaven as the primary cause for the horrible state of the world—because each of these belief systems provide an escape clause for an individual. Only the theory of karma [7] provides an ethical foundation where there is no way out, no illusion that an individual can “win” and escape the fruits of unkind or selfish behaviors. The dire state of the planet, Thurman continued, with its wars, pollution, disease, and greed [my illustated emphasis], is a direct outgrowth of the materialism that rules the world's institutions, like science.

At the end of the evening, the question still remained, which is better for humanity, being a bright [8] or being a (Buddhist) supra-rational [9]? You decide. And let us know.

[ Photo credit: Will Davis, Columbia Spectator [10] ]