The British philosopher Colin McGinn gives us that old-time irreligion in this essay “Why I Am an Atheist“.
I normally can’t take very much of this well-worn atheism-vs.-agnosticism stuff, but McGinn pulls it off very well & I found myself reading to the end, in spite of those too-long paragraphs.
He actually admits he can’t take much of it either:
I have also reached the point (I reached it long ago) that the issue of God’s existence no longer strikes me as an interesting issue. I mean, when it comes up I tend to glaze over, because all the moves are so familiar and the debate seems so antiquated. I find it hard to get fired up about it. It just seems dull. No intellectual sparks fly off it. The question has important political and cultural significance, to be sure, but as an intellectual issue in its own right it lacks vitality.
Now I’m even more puzzled that I read the whole thing …
I am not competent to judge McGinn’s status as a philosopher. He writes well, and I always enjoy his articles. (I have never read any of his books.) He is a handy prop when discussing education, though. Thus:
Like me, McGinn grew up in England under the “eleven plus” regime of school assignment. The way it worked was, everyone who passed through the state-school system (private schools were hors de combat) did six years in elementary school, then at the age of, of course, eleven plus took an IQ test. That’s what it was: a frank, straightforward IQ test.
Based on your test score you were then assigned to one of the three categories of school:
- “Grammar school”: Very academic, lots of homework. Latin, Greek, modern languages, higher math, economics, … the works.
- “Technical school”: Less academic, more vocational, but the cognitively demanding kind of vocational — aiming to produce electronics engineers, not plumbers.
- “Secondary modern”: Prole school. You’re going to be a factory hand, but you’re too young to start yet. Hey, let’s have a game of football!
I forget the proportions, but they seem to have been very roughly 20-40-40. It wasn’t a bad system, though it might not work in a post-industrial economy.
Anyway, one of the objections raised to the system (which was swept away in 1970s reforms) was that once assigned to a technical or secondary modern school a child would accept his place in society and give up on anything cognitively demanding. The notion that anyone should accept his placein society was loathsome to the egalitarian New Class that was taking over the 1960s-70s British establishment. Hence those reforms.
(Most of the New Class reformers were graduates of the Grammar Schools, by the way. The rest had been privately educated. And this line of thought was, as you may recognize, ancestral to the “stereotype threat” flim-flam currently popular with U.S. educationalists.)
In fact the system was more flexible than that. Mis-assignments and late bloomers could transfer up to better schools. I was at university with a girl who’d been assigned to a secondary modern school.
Well, McGinn is the star exhibit here, having been assigned to a secondary modern school in gritty,greasy Blackpool circa 1962.
I took the 11-plus in 77 in one of the few parts of the country that still has selective schools today. I still remember the day all the envelopes with the results arrived and the thrill of seeing the pink form (selected. Non-selected was blue). I remember the pass:fail ratio at my school being closer to 20:80 though.
The 11-plus in my borough made no distinction between technical and grammar schools But, even if you were “selected” you still had to apply to and be accepted by an individual school. My borough had about an even mix of both. I had wanted to go to the “cooler” technical school (where they had a football team!) but my mother persuaded me to go to a grammar instead (rugger only). I have been forever grateful as it set me up for a lifetime of success.
The most important point that you make though, Derb, is that there were plenty of opportunities for brighter kids to transfer out of a secondary modern and, even if you didn’t, you weren’t exactly destined for the factory floor. My sister and two of her sons went to secondary moderns and all three went on to successful careers in banking. One nephew was already manager of a small branch while his cohort was still finishing college.
In my opinion, the supposedly more egalitarian system in the USA provides far less opportunities for people to transcend the circumstances of their early upbringing.
Having now read McGinn’s essay, I find that he captures my own post-a-theist attitude almost exactly. I love his idea that we, as a society might come to “make-believe in God”.
It seems to me that this is precisely the role of the Church of England. There is a substantial group who aren’t in on the joke but I’ll wager that a goodly proportion of CofE members are make-believers.
A recent survey by the Equality and Human Rights Commission – http://www.equalityhumanrights.com/uploaded_files/publications/religion_or_belief_briefing_paper.pdf – suggests evidence for this proposition with 70% of Britons self-identifying as Christian while only 42% claim to believe in God.
Kevin, I think that’s true all over Europe. In the north Lutheranism has remained surprisingly relevant even though most are atheists. Ditto Catholicism in a lot of other places. It’s tied I think to a kind of cultural marker. Both as a connection to the past but also to provide a sense of community – and in its darker side to mark those part of out-groups.
I honestly have a hard time understanding that attitude as an American. But then religion in Europe never seems to have quite the commitment and expense that it did in much of America. In Europe maintaining religion seems more on par with paying for somewhat expensive museums and landmarks that people visit very infrequently but seem culturally important. In America it seems more akin to belonging to a health club where you meet a personal trainer who berates you for not doing enough sets of a weight.
Dear Bradlaugh !
For those of us, who did not go through British school system (I did not), this reference may be useful:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleven_plus_exam
Your always, F.r.
I managed to get about two thirds of the way through the article before I accumulated too many objections to continue. I find I remain comfortably “convinced” in my agnosticism. His arguments about Santa Clause and Draggy were silly. With Santa, the preponderance of evidence is strongly against, and with Draggy, who cares (the thing just doesn’t interact with the universe I live in)?
He also argues “For every theist is also an atheist.” The problem here is that (as I understand it) the early Christians did believe the Roman gods existed, but they classified them as demons. Also, (I have read that) C.S. Lewis argued that Muslims were actually following Satan, another well-known demon.
I think the key sentence in the article is: “The idea of a disembodied being with infinite causal powers existing imperceptibly is contrary to reason.” I think this is the dividing line between atheism and agnosticism, and points to the arrogance of atheists.