Nouslife: Evolutionary Metaphysics | open source theology

16 March 2006

Evolutionary Metaphysics | open source theology

Since I have long thought that the similarities between 'religion' and 'atheism' make some visions of a secular society a permit for the non-religious to oppress the religious, I found this post on Open Source Theology interesting. It seems to hold out the promise of reframing the issue in a way that is consonant with the insight I have tried (when I have the opportunity) to press upon some 'secular' institutions that the real issue about so-called religious diversity is actually how to help people of different views to work together for the common good rather than insisting that they all conform to a non-religious praxis in certain areas. To do that is actually to raise one metaphysic above the others under the misapprehension that some kind of neutrality is achieved by it.

Asking the question - "does God exist?" - is kind of pointless, because in reality, it has never been a question of whether some arguable historical sectarian definition of the word ‘God’ exists, but rather a question of whether life has any higher meaning that can be derived from a cosmic purpose.
So when the question is instead asked - "does life have any higher meaning that can be derived from a cosmic purpose?" - you find that the respondents are no longer divided along the lines of the secular and religious, because many secularists are also humanist idealists who believe that life does have some kind of higher meaning, even if they are unprepared to define the cosmic source of this meaning.