Ya know like the people like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris? The “facts and logic” people who absolutely hated religion and blamed it for everything bad?

What’s a material Marxist analysis of this?

  • Lemonwoodghost@vlemmy.net
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    1 year ago

    In writing of any investigation in existential, metaphysical and epistemological questions in the name of science, the New Atheists not only reject religion, but philosophy in general including political philosophy, Marxism and crucially the philosophy of science itself.

    For them, there is no need for any of that, because their trivial, superficial and ill defined understanding of “facts and logic” is seen as the end all be all. Similar to those who claim neoliberalism and US hegemony mark “the end of history”, these people claim the end of philosophy. They are right in a way, because if everyone adopted their views, philosophy would indeed be solved, as there would be no reason to discuss any philosophical questions any more. In this way, they are reactionary and seek to strengthen the status quo.

    While claiming to be progressive, this idealist ideology of linear historical progress is anti-materialist and anti-dialectical.

    That said, there are of course important and valid marxist critics of existing religious institutions, but that wasn’t the question.