My apologies for the delay, but I am pleased to announce Philosophy Carnival XV, covering the best posts from around the philosophy blogosphere for the month of June (and a few from late May). This month’s carnival neatly divides into three cat…

Clarification first, about public religion. Yes, people do practice most of their religion in private, but religion is not typically purely private (especially not in the case of Islam and Protestant Christianity). Further, the emerging consensus in these times is that moral law is only moral if it derives from and is rationalised through modern-liberal principle; religious arguments are discounted, and indeed rebuffed as attempts to install theocracy. This is carried under the banner of liberal neutrality, but I guess one of my points above is that it isn’t neutral at all, but an alternative idea of virtue in conflict with those of ‘religions’.

Disagreement, then. Following on from the above, Charlie, this is where I harbour doubts at the notion of liberal enlightenment objectivity. Don’t get me wrong: modernity has brought great benefits, especially through its application of method to the natural world; but in the human world, its consequences are more questionable.

Objectivity is a high ideal, and one I share, but it is only ever an ideal – and not one that can be achieved. And while we can all (I trust) endorse liberal procedures in discussing matters, the limits of discussion will always be set by our subrational assumptions. The modern mistake is to think that only religious people are constrained in this way; but we all make them. (And I might add, in the case of most Western atheists, many of those assumptions are inherited directly from Christianity.)

Phil: Agreed, especially about the ineffectiveness.

John: Yes and no. I do know that Political Correctness has real and damaging consequences. The workplace is the tip of the iceberg here – for me, its erosion of good/bad distinctions had led us down some very dangerous roads as a society. While I agree that PC is a subset of totalitarian ways – in that it represents a flight from truth.

As to motivation – well, I always take the cock-up line over the conspiracy. Most people are working for good (if misguided) intentions, even if they carry them too far.

PC ceased to be a harmless diversion some time ago, so on balance I think I will continue to be apoplectic in its presence.

We now seem to be entering a new phase of thought control with the introduction of the anti-hate laws, and yet I doubt that the man in the street will lose much sleep when this legislation is approved. For many, it would seem that as long they are carried from cradle to grave by the state, abstract notions (to them) such as freedom and free speech are irrelevant.

(For a longer version of this argument, have a look at: Nick Griffin arrested for racial hatred)

I think you’re perhaps a bit too generous to the religious, though. Religion is embarrassing for its practitioners (I know from experience) – hence the continuing desire for privacy (or at least the exclusion of non-believers). And yes, pornography is mostly private (if you exclude the Sun, etc.) but so is sex, for most people. About the only urge we yield to in public is eating.

And even if there is no longer a national consensus of morals, the ‘liberal enlightenment’ regard for objectivity still lives … not everything has gone post-modern.