Between Naturalism and Religion (PDF)

Two countervailing trends mark the intellectual tenor of our age
- the spread of naturalistic worldviews and religious
orthodoxies. Advances in biogenetics, brain research, and robotics
are clearing the way for the penetration of an objective scientific
self-understanding of persons into everyday life. For philosophy,
this trend is associated with the challenge of scientific
naturalism. At the same time, we are witnessing an unexpected
revitalization of religious traditions and the politicization of
religious communities across the world. From a philosophical
perspective, this revival of religious energies poses the challenge
of a fundamentalist critique of the principles underlying the
modern Wests postmetaphysical understanding of itself.

The tension between naturalism and religion is the central theme
of this major new book by Jürgen Habermas. On the one hand he
argues for an appropriate naturalistic understanding of cultural
evolution that does justice to the normative character of the human
mind. On the other hand, he calls for an appropriate interpretation
of the secularizing effects of a process of social and cultural
rationalization increasingly denounced by the champions of
religious orthodoxies as a historical development peculiar to the
West. These reflections on the enduring importance of religion and
the limits of secularism under conditions of postmetaphysical
reason set the scene for an extended treatment the political
significance of religious tolerance and for a fresh contribution to
current debates on cosmopolitanism and a constitution for
international society.