Hi again Gus,
Again, with all due respect, I believe you are wrong.  I'm not
particularly interested in how CRICHTON employs the term, "religion."
It fascinated me that you made the global statement below,
"Environmentalism is NOT a religion and no matter how often . . .
[X, Y, or Z] . . .  says it is so doesn't make it so."

We have left the realm of Crichton's (or X's, Y's, or Z's) discussion
of religion and have now entered the diZerega zone.   :-)

I think again that you are seriously mistaken in making the claim,
"Environmentalism is NOT a religion."  I offered a partial analysis
of how one might go about comprehending environmentalism as a
religion.  I did not nor do not anywhere suggest that Crichton (for
example) employs a Durkheimean analysis of religion anywhere in his
piece.  But then again, I wasn't really responding to his piece: I
was responding to *yours*.  And *your* piece is where I encountered
the global assertion, "Environmentalism is NOT a religion."  I think
you need to explain WHY you believe that to be a true statement.  I
believe it to be a FALSE statement.

that's all.

Jim


>Quoting James A Tantillo <[log in to unmask]>:
>
>>  aww, c'mon Gus . . .  tell us what you really think.
>>
>>  :-)
>>
>>  You've given us all a lot to chew on, and I'd definitely like to read what
>>  you've written more carefully and perhaps respond in more detail later,
>>  but I must draw attention to one comment that you make in response to
>>  Crichton's statement, "There are two reasons why I think we all need to
>>  get rid of the religion of environmentalism."
>>
>>  You reply:
>>
>>  "Environmentalism is NOT a religion and no matter how often Crichton and
>>  the wise use crowd says it is so doesn't make it so."
>>
>>  I think this is simply a dogmatic (and wrong) statement on your part, and
>>  it seems to me that you are guilty of committing some of the same logical
>>  sins you've condemned Crichton for--for no matter how often diZerega and
>>  the dumb use crowd says it *isn't* a religion doesn't make it so, either.
>>
>
>Religion can of course mean whatever you want it to mean if you don't mind
>about communicating clearly with others.  Here are some reasons why the claim
>that environmentalism is a religion in the sense that Crichton uses the term
>does not work very well for many (most) environmentalists:
>
>1. A great many people who identify with OTHER well established religions not
>only consider themselves environmentalists, they even sometimes have the
>apocalyptic view Crichton criticizes.  There are green Christians - even
>Mormons and Evangelicals - as well as Buddhists, Jews, Pagans, and on and on.
>
>2. Religion in the sense that most people who consider themselves
>religious use
>the term involves living with, or attempting to live in a right relation with
>the super-human.  By analogy, secular people have enlarged the term to include
>Marxism, and indeed any view that is strongly felt and gives someone
>meaning in
>his or her life - but that is not even close to what Chrichton is getting at.
>He identifies it with the "irrational" that is impervious to fact and lives in
>myth.  That definition does not even do justice to theistic religion.
>
>3. Environmentalism is a religion to some people in the sense that they find
>personal fulfillment in nature.  But this is not Crichton's
>definition.  And in
>popular parlance the word clearly means more than that as well.
>
>>  If you take Emile Durkheim's distinction between "substantive" and
>>  "functional" concepts of religion seriously, then it is clear that many
>>  secular worldviews can, and do in fact, *function* as a religion.  This is
>>  a commonly understood point in virtually all the humanistic disciplines,
>>  including the humanistic social sciences such as anthropology and
>>  political science.  As an empirical matter, environmentalism does in fact
>>  function like a religion, and so is in fact, as an empirical matter, a
>  > religion for many people.
>>
>See above.  This is not Crichton's use of the term, which is the only one I am
>addressing.
>
>>  Even John Rawls, as I expect you would know from his book _Political
>>  Liberalism_, argues that when a secular philosophy such as liberalism
>>  becomes an overall worldview, which clearly is the way it can function,
>>  say, for certain academics in the modern academy, then it ought to be
>>  considered a "comprehensive doctrine" just like Christianity, Judaism,
>>  Marxism, etc.  Just because a comprehensive is not a substantive,
>>  denominational faith in the "substantive" Durkheimean sense does not mean
>>  it is not a religion, for it is still a religion in the "functional"
>>  sense.
>>
>
>Again - Crichton does not use the term religion as meaning "comprehensive
>doctrine."  Indeed, his view of science is as a comprehensive doctrine - and I
>very much doubt that Crichton would describe science as a religion.  He wants
>to subordinate environmentalism to science after all - and ast the ame time
>remove it from "religion."
>
>Personally, I think it is more confusion than clarity to equate "comprehensive
>doctrine" with "religion".  But that is not the issue at hand.
>
>>  All one need do to see environmentalism expressed as a comprehensive
>>  doctrine (cf. "Again - names, please") is to take a look at a book like
>>  Edward Goldsmith's _The Way: An Ecological World-View_ (London: Rider,
>>  1992).  Goldsmith truly means it when he says that environmentalism is THE
>>  way.
>>
>I never said there were no environmentalists who regarded it as a religion -
>different ones depending on the definition given the term "religion."  My
>criticism was on Crichton's use of the term and to whom he applied it.  I did
>not deny there were such - and even pointed to some - but I did deny that they
>were representative of environmentaliosm as a movement.
>
>Here is what I wrote in my post: "The question Crichton does not even attempt
>to answer is how representative they are either in absolute numbers or
>among the leading lights."
>
>I will put my list of names up against the ones you mention any time in terms
>of influence on the environmenental movement.
>
>By analogy, abolitionism and feminism were complete ways of life for some, but
>those who called themselves abolitionists, or who call themselves feminists,
>include a far wider range of folks than that.
>
>>  For an explicit analysis of a secular worldview that is closer to
>>  environmentalism than liberalism as "functional religion," see e.g., the
>>  following article by Wesley Jamison et al. that appeared in Society and
>>  Animals not too long ago:
>>
>>  Jamison, Wesley V., Caspar Wenk, and James V. Parker. 2000. "Every Sparrow
>>  that Falls: Understanding Animal Rights Activism as Functional Religion."
>>  _Society and Animals_ 8 (3):305-330.
>>
>I think Callicott has done an excellent job of showing the very real tensions
>between animal rights and animal liberation and any coherent form of
>environmentalism.  His criticisms of these positions seem to me quite
>persuasive.  And you admit that animal rights is "closer" to environmentalism
>than liberalism.  Closer is very far from identity.  Mars is closer to earth
>than Saturn, after all.
>
>I made a strong ethical argument for the compatibility of the Scottish
>Enlightenment's liberal tradition with deep ecology in the journal Review of
>Politics, by the way.  (Fall, 1996)  It is also on my web site
>www.dizerega.com, under "ecology."  It comes at the matter differently than
>Callicott.  So I would argue that in important respects
>environmentalism can be
>closer to some kinds of liberalism than to animal rights views.
>
>>  Anyway.  I very much enjoyed your comments and hope they spark a lot of
>>  discussion.  But I fear on the religion assertion you are very much
>>  mistaken.
>>
>As you see, I am not convinced that my abbreviated comments were wrong!
>
>best wishes,
>
>Gus
>
>>  kind regards,
>>  Jim
>>
>
>
>
>
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