Pluralism and the Place of Religion in a Democratic Society:Emphasizing Rorty’s View Journal Article

Khosrow Bagheri ' Abstract Asking about the place of religion in a democratic society refers straightforwardly to the kind of pluralism we adopt. Given that intra-societal tensions mark out a democratic pluralistic society, then it seems that there is no doubt that there should be a place for religion and religious people in it. What is crucial for a democratic society is taking a suitable view on pluralism. There could be, at least, two versions of pluralism: Incommensurable or radical and commensurable or moderate. It is argued that the incommensurable account of pluralism confronts with serious problems both theoretically (like the impossibility of outer critique) and practically (like replacing persuasion with force). Rorty advocates a commensurable pluralism based on pragmatic conventions or “know-how” skills without any meta-narrative or translation manual among the doctrines of rival views. However, along with Davidson, it is stated that some kind of translation among the rival views is inevitable. In addition, it is argued that commensurable pluralism could not be limited to merely know-how skills and it needs some know-that insights. This view of pluralism not only opens the door of dialogue, but also provides a basis for removing superficial differences or conflicts between the rivals. Real differences, however, could remain and should be tolerated.

Rorty advocates a commensurable pluralism based on pragmatic conventions or "know-how" skills without any meta-narrative or translation manual among the doctrines of rival views. The question that concerns here, namely the place of religion in the democratic society, will be answered following these two kinds of pluralism. Then, Richard Rorty's view on commensurable pluralism and the place of religion according to him will be explained. Among neo-orthodox theologians, Karl Barth, the most important Protestant theologian of twentieth century, held that science and religion have different characteristics in terms of subject-matter, method, as well as purpose or end (Galloway 1973). He has referred to seven forms of knowledge: Logic and mathematics, physical sciences, knowledge about 31 Pluralism and the Place of Religion in a Democratic Society ... Incommensurable pluralism admits a place for religion only if the latter could play a complementary role in relation to other institutions or branches of the society. This shows that, according to this view, the explanations of religion and science are of the same kind and this is exactly what Mackay concentrates his criticism on. In fact, the religion's claim is to provide a supportive source for human beings' cooperation by appealing to love of God. The other weakness in Rorty' s reductive account of religion is related to his formulation of the main question of religion in terms of fear. In addition, given Rorty's avoidance of any kind of human nature or meta-narrative behind different language-games, how could one talk about loving others.