Not being an "aggressive" or "destructive" atheist: You are doing it wrongly
Definitely on Team Dawkins rather than Team de Bum on this one. While in general I sympathise with the view that the Dawkins way of going about things is a bit counterproductive, Alain de Bottom is actually, literally proposing to build a 151ft tower, purely in order to tell Richard Dawkins to fuck off, and he does not seem to realise that this too is, in an important sense, quite a rude and aggressive thing to do.
A space devoted to rational inquiry, open debate, and public spirit, in the City? That's the Bank of Ideas, isn't it?
ReplyDeletebitheway, if De Boton thinks you can get a ten storey tower built in the City for one million sterling, he has not done much in the way of a "rational inquiry" into what it might actually cost. I doubt you could buy the bricks for that.
ReplyDeleteComte would have loved this. He founded positivist religious orders, with gowns and ceremonies and so one.
ReplyDeleteHave de Botton nailed to a cross, if he's so very keen on symbolism. No shortage of volunteers to wield the hammer, I'll be bound.
ReplyDeleteFor one million, he might be able to find a few rooms in a nicely renovated former church.
ReplyDeleteThis would be the Soviet solution: back in the USSR, there were many beautiful and inspiring "museums" of atheism-- that were of course simply cathedrals that had been remodeled a bit and had a new sign hung up.