Secular Morals in Parenting

My own ongoing research among secular Americans — as well as that of a handful of other social scientists who have only recently turned their gaze on secular culture — confirms that nonreligious family life is replete with its own sustaining moral values and enriching ethical precepts. Chief among those: rational problem solving, personal autonomy, independence of thought, avoidance of corporal punishment, a spirit of “questioning everything” and, far above all, empathy. For secular ...

 If Everyone is Altruistic

The day will come, says Spencer, when altruistic inclination will be so well embodied in our organism itself that people will compete for opportunities of self-sacrifice and immolation. When altruistic inclinations are implanted in everyone, how will opportunities arise to apply them? Either such a state presupposes the existence of persecutors, tormentors and tyrants, or else the general urge to sacrifice oneself will engender benefactors who will turn into tormentors and persecutors merel...

 Reflection is Destructive

So long as scientists and philosophers remain a caste, even the problem of morality, that is, of behaviour, will remain for them one of cognition and not of activity, a subject for study and not for practical application, something that just happens rather than something that must be done and, furthermore, done not by individuals but collectively. So long as scholars are not prepared to become a Commission for the elaboration of a plan of common action (and without this mankind cannot act a...

 Praise a Child's Character Rather than Actions

The researchers randomly assigned the children to receive different types of praise. For some of the children, they praised the action: “It was good that you gave some of your marbles to those poor children. Yes, that was a nice and helpful thing to do.” For others, they praised the character behind the action: “I guess you’re the kind of person who likes to help others whenever you can. Yes, you are a very nice and helpful person.” A couple of weeks later, when faced with more opp...

 Science is Libertarian

In the wake of the Bush presidency, the already-clear rift between the two dominant perspectives on the right—the small-government libertarians/anarchists and the theocratic fundamentalists—began to grow even wider. Far more than the conservative or liberal philosophy, it is who wins the argument between authoritarians, who value top-down control and conformity, and antiauthoritarians, who value bottom-up freedom and tolerance, that will drive the success or failure of the United States o...

 Mother Teresa as Campaigner

Mother Teresa has a theory of poverty, which is also a theory of submission and gratitude. She has also a theory of power, which derives from St Paul's neglected words about 'the powers that be', which 'are ordained of God'. She is, finally, the emissary of a very determined and very politicized papacy. Her world travels are not the wanderings of a pilgrim but a campaign which accords with the requirements of power. Mother Teresa has a theory of morality too. It is not a difficult theory to c...

 The Role of Religion

The role of religion is to integrate the Cosmology and the Morality, to render the cosmological narrative so rich and compelling that it elicits our allegiance and our commitment to its emergent moral understandings.