In 2011, professors Dreyfus and Kelly responded to Charles Taylor’s 2007 claim in “A Secular Age” that the Christian world view is most convincing with a history of philosophy and a proposal to return to the Homeric Greek polytheistic view of engaging with the pantheon of the “gods”: not literally but essentially. I’ll do my best to summarize their proposal which attracted great intellectual attention.

Most Important

They don’t buy into Taylor’s view that you must have either a fully materialistic or a traditional supernaturalist system. They argue, like Taylor and his “articulator” James K. A. Smith, that receptive individuals do indeed experience some version or impression of the supernatural. We all experience situations of awe, beauty, love, meaning, purpose, divine, sacred, transcendence, and “the good”. The authors see the critical importance of these experiences for living a “good life” or for simply avoiding despair in a postmodern world after Nietzsche’s “death of God”. They don’t see these experiences automatically pointing towards a monotheistic god, universal principles, certainty or an integrated, explainable universe. These experiences are essential but should only be interpreted as the “best way” that humans can interface with the universe.

We cannot bottle or control the supernatural, divine, eternal, transcendent. We can’t really understand it. Yet, we experience it repeatedly. We approach it. It moves away. We seek it. It hides. We apply philosophy, but it fails to reduce the experience. We live a natural, analog life but also experience something more. We feel and sense “something else”. We desire to “know”. We desire to “connect”. We sense the eternal, infinite and universal. We cannot capture it outside of myths and art. Our connections are indirect, dreamlike, intuitive, speculative, indescribable, brief, fuzzy but undeniable.

Main Principles

The key to life is to engage in a “right relationship” with the world as it is experienced.

No reductionistic view of the universe can account for human experience or nature.

The inner view of the subjective individual must be balanced with his connections with external reality. Community matters.

There are multiple truths, insights, perspectives, dimensions, approaches, patterns, models, feelings, and intuitions. Light is a rainbow and white.

The world is dynamic. Everything changes, even truths and the transcendent.

Live in the present. Be present in each moment as you can. But not to a crazy extreme where you try to transform boredom into mysticism.

We can’t know “ends” with fixed certainty, so focus on optimizing the “means”.

Morality flows naturally from aligning yourself with experience. (Not Christian “natural law”, per se). It is simple, naive, pragmatic, obvious. It doesn’t require a connection with God.

Principles Rejected

Monotheism, universal, integrated, fully defined reality.

Certainty.

Simple materialism. Reductionism.

Strictly fixed scientific, religious or metaphysical views (even theirs!)

Control, self-control, possibility of control.

Technology, rationality as a guide to life and meaning.

A solely subjective, internal, individual world view.

We have a version of romanticism, organicism, dynamism, existentialism, experientialism, essentialism, pragmatism. Christian and scientific modernity don’t work. Empty postmodernism fails. Let’s try to create a romantic version of existentialism.

Goals in Life

Experience all of life, broad and deep.

Seek hope, joy and comfort.

Align with reality. Respond to reality. Honor, respect and revere reality.

Focus, prioritize life on experiencing the “best stuff”: transcendent, community, beauty, art, nature, peak experiences, excellence, perfection, insights, flow. Although we are material creatures, the immaterial, spiritual?, supernatural?, indescribable, infinite, approached but not reached, transient, ephemeral, mystery, paradoxical, organic, complex, dynamic, irreducible is the key!

Be guided by the experience of life. Focus on the relationship between the world and the subjective individual. Verbs, adverbs and adjectives, not nouns.

Respect the experience of life. It’s feedback. It’s goals. It’s beauty. Art. Align and resonate with this experienced reality.

Always seek to employ your full human capacity.

Connect with communities. Experience their ineffable essence and possible transcendence.

Morality matters. It is defined by your interactions. It is obvious. Pursue the best. Reject the opposite.

Accumulate wisdom and morality from your experiences.

Ride the waves. Reality provides fleeting opportunities. This is as good as it gets.

Best Practices

Respond, follow, resonate, hope, appreciate, revere, awe, participate, engage, interact, flow, craft, judge, sense, be aware, create, share, fullness, alive, align.

Reality is always there for you. Develop the skills, habits, sensitivities, and perspectives to extract the most possible from every situation.

Domains of Practice

Sports, work, crafts, art, production, navigation, communication, community, nature, people. The opportunity to fully, deeply and meaningfully engage is nearly unlimited once you adopt the proper perspective.

Summary

The authors severely criticize the history of individualistic, enlightened, progressive, monotheistic, scientific, technological progress as a basis for living a good life. We have reached a “dead end” from Nietzsche through existentialism to postmodernism. The historical God may be dead, but we certainly don’t want to conclude that all life is meaningless. There is clearly “something” beyond reductionism or pure materialism. It is undeniable. We should relentlessly pursue and embrace this valuable and saving “something”.

Criticism

I think the authors have described a plausible purely secular path to pursuing a good life, overcoming existentialist angst, anxiety, dread and hopelessness. There is “something”. It cannot be reduced to a religious, scientific or philosophical certainty, but I cannot deny its existence or importance. I will dance with it.

I don’t think that this approach will satisfy many people. We deeply want to know “where’s the beef?”. What is the point? What is the “end game”? “How is it we are here; on this path we walk?”. The desire to resolve “matters of ultimate concern” seems to be intrinsic to human experience. This may be an evolutionary error or bug, or it may reflect our true essence.

How (NOT) to be Secular: Reading Charles Taylor

https://www.amazon.com/Secular-Age-Charles-Taylor/dp/0674986911/ref=sr_1_1?crid=26HTP6F79V521&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.Av6BmguydTscgNBfEfGg0IbJrW67ZGdfaF_sra5VwN-NvgxwCRWpPgNSTy4OOZa8qILobTnZqE7eoOGz5ZiaPwTIQxscUhFEqTRek5OAEdWLg-PcsTX6IAJDu99X0zOg8UhhMZaFdey4zlv2KFTCqBzur8ul3wicbOhMZoehvl65f0f70fIruZTAt_lB3XIJuLq_JLkCj4TRp305hNVmMWt9QYVs8HzG_nUMWyZhU68.lvMq476OqmKLBX8CwPAuuY-9N8xha1gY0QKvjmpd-JU&dib_tag=se&keywords=a+secular+age&qid=1736482539&s=books&sprefix=a+secular+age%2Cstripbooks%2C233&sr=1-1

Only the Individual?

Top Scientific Discoveries: Do They Promote Science (Materialism) or Religion (Supernaturalism)?

The World is Not Atomistic, Deterministic, Materialistic

https://theinvisiblementor.com/you-cannot-step-into-the-same-river-twice/