One tension I'm looking forward to you exploring is that depicted by your statements that we should "rethink liberalism from the ground up," and, we need to "preserve liberal order." You get to this tension in the last sentence: "my liberalism is one of conservation and reform." How does one practically reform "from the ground up" and conserve at the same time?
Is it simply assessing, using reason, the parts of liberalism that are most likely to yield good outcomes moving forward, and trying to conserve those? Is it possible to use reason to do this? Can one appeal to tradition as tradition, or is that unpersuasive if you're rebuilding from the ground up?
Looking forward to the exploration of these ideas.
Thanks so much for joining the conversation! Here's what I'm thinking: we need to rethink liberalism as a kind of political theory and a set of liberal principles, out of which may spring a new approach to evaluating liberal institutions. I have my own approach to this, resting as it does on the need for social trust between diverse persons, and I think a trust-based approach generates a reformist approach to liberal order. Keep it over and against radicals on right and left, but recommend some important changes. i hope that makes sense.
The matter of tradition and the limits of reason is a complex one, and one about which I have quite a lot to say in time. I think there's both a role for a transcendental use of reason to ground liberal principles in morally objective principles, and a role for immanent critique of improving liberalism to fit better with its underlying logic. The latter form of critique is that one provided by what I think of as a kind of post-secular, post-Enlightenment doctrine of reason, so suitably chastened by history, tradition, etc., and drawn from them. But I also think we can, to some extent, provide some kind of objective rational justification for liberal order.
Maybe that's too unclear, but we'll see how things unfold, won't we? :)
Partly a selection effect. Christians good at M&E can get through discrimination in the profession with much less trouble, so we see more of them. Christians who write on politics will end up with heterodox views, or at least, many will suspect them of having heterodox views. So, the social price of being a Christian analytic political philosopher is tremendously higher than the social price of being a Christian analytic metaphysician.
Excited for the blog!
One tension I'm looking forward to you exploring is that depicted by your statements that we should "rethink liberalism from the ground up," and, we need to "preserve liberal order." You get to this tension in the last sentence: "my liberalism is one of conservation and reform." How does one practically reform "from the ground up" and conserve at the same time?
Is it simply assessing, using reason, the parts of liberalism that are most likely to yield good outcomes moving forward, and trying to conserve those? Is it possible to use reason to do this? Can one appeal to tradition as tradition, or is that unpersuasive if you're rebuilding from the ground up?
Looking forward to the exploration of these ideas.
Thanks so much for joining the conversation! Here's what I'm thinking: we need to rethink liberalism as a kind of political theory and a set of liberal principles, out of which may spring a new approach to evaluating liberal institutions. I have my own approach to this, resting as it does on the need for social trust between diverse persons, and I think a trust-based approach generates a reformist approach to liberal order. Keep it over and against radicals on right and left, but recommend some important changes. i hope that makes sense.
The matter of tradition and the limits of reason is a complex one, and one about which I have quite a lot to say in time. I think there's both a role for a transcendental use of reason to ground liberal principles in morally objective principles, and a role for immanent critique of improving liberalism to fit better with its underlying logic. The latter form of critique is that one provided by what I think of as a kind of post-secular, post-Enlightenment doctrine of reason, so suitably chastened by history, tradition, etc., and drawn from them. But I also think we can, to some extent, provide some kind of objective rational justification for liberal order.
Maybe that's too unclear, but we'll see how things unfold, won't we? :)
Curious: why do you think Christian philosophers avoid political philosophy? And do you see this changing soon?
Partly a selection effect. Christians good at M&E can get through discrimination in the profession with much less trouble, so we see more of them. Christians who write on politics will end up with heterodox views, or at least, many will suspect them of having heterodox views. So, the social price of being a Christian analytic political philosopher is tremendously higher than the social price of being a Christian analytic metaphysician.