The Impaler's Wall

[RJLipkin at aol.com]

Mr.  Linden writes:
 
On the other hand, I have had atheists try to explain away the  lack-of-evils 
in real-world atheist societies by claiming that Communism   is "really" a 
religion. Does this mean that atheism and secular  humanism  are?

Wow!! Strange "atheists" in my  book.  If communism is a religion, then just 
about anything is  one.  In that case, "religion" loses any conceptual or 
analytic  significance. The problem is, I think, not distinguishing between 
dedicated and deliberative systems of beliefs and values.  Each can be  secular or 
religious. The former typically are (virtually) closed systems of  beliefs and 
values (and a whole lot more), while the latter systems are  (virtually) open 
(and a whole lot more). Communism seems a paradigmatic case of  a secular, 
dedicated system of beliefs and values, that is, not open to  deliberative 
criticism, while, with all due respects, some religions are equally  dedicated, but 
religious. By contrast, there are both secular and religious  systems of 
beliefs and values that are deliberative.   But since  I've addressed this 
distinction is several published pieces, and since I think  "shameless self-promotion" 
is shameful, I'll stop  here. 

Bobby 
 
Robert Justin Lipkin
Professor of Law
Widener University School of  Law
Delaware


Ratio Juris,  Contributor: _  http://ratiojuris.blogspot.com/_ 
(http://ratiojuris.blogspot.com/) 
Essentially Contested  America, Editor-In-Chief 
_http://www.essentiallycontestedamerica.org/_ (http://www.essentiallycontestedamerica.org/) 



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