Chris Insole

Project leader:

Prof. Chris Insole (Durham University and Australian Catholic University)
with Dr Ben DeSpain (Australian Catholic University)

Title:

Negative Natural Theology: Freedom and the Limits of Reason

Description:

Walter Benjamin wrote that, ‘much late modern philosophy is an eleventh-hour flight from the honesty of Kant’s dualism between nature and freedom’. In his reflections on ‘nature and freedom’ Kant is concerned with the confrontation that arises when we regard ourselves from the perspective of (mechanistic) nature, and from the perspective of (transcendental) freedom. Kant’s formulation of the problem is the originating source for a whole tradition of post-Kantian philosophy, centrally concerned with the irreconcilable confrontation and tension between the internal and external perspective upon our lives. The same problem can be variously formulated: as the tension between the subjective and objective perspective, or the agential and observer perspective.

The central question of this project will be the relationship between the concept of the divine, and this irresolvable tension between the subjective and objective perspectives, which tension flashes with particular intensity when thinking about freedom. Specifically, the project will test the following hypothesis: that a distinctively religious moment can arise when one attempts to reach towards a hope for a tessellation, or a harmony, or an overcoming and transformation of the sense of alienation of the internal and external perspective upon our lives.

There is an urgent intellectual context for this project. In academic circles where there is a preparedness to engage with this confrontation of the subjective and objective perspectives, there is a similarly ardent attempt to avoid altogether the category of religion and theology. This comes at a cost: philosophy misses out on a vital conversation partner, and theology fails to spread its wings, and to address an audience who could be gripped by its traditions of enquiry. In the face of this intellectual crisis, the insights of continental philosophical theology are a vital resource.

Final Report:

The second workshop for the project was held in Durham in July 2023, and was a success. The nine participants discussed the shape of the multi-authored publication that will emerge from the project, with essays to be submitted by February 2023. Each participant will respond to the following shared question, from a different perspective, drawing upon their own discipline and commitments:

What modes of philosophical discourse might generatively bring together in a shared conversation those drawn to the language of the divine, and those not, and to different conceptions of divinity?

I have completed one 80,000 word monograph, which has been accepted for publication by Oxford University Press. This text is called ‘Negative Natural Theology: God and the Limits of Reason’. in this book, I excavate some approaches to the category of the divine that can be found in post-Enlightenment strands of philosophy, but which are largely neglected, or latent, or unfashionable, or out of repute. I join these up with some still living and practiced forms of intellectual or cultural life, to see if some life can be breathed on the dying embers, a tiny lick of flame, with a bit of heat, maybe some light.

Having surfaced some of these latent fragments of belief in the divine, the book seeks to explore what might be at stake in the choice (if it is that) to talk about God/the divine, and different conceptions of the divine, or not to do so. By ‘what is at stake’, I mean: what moves people, or persuades them, or blocks them, or enables them, to want to speak about of the divine, or not, in different ways? We can embrace a wide and deep curiosity about what this might include: reasons, evidence, and arguments, certainly, but also more intuitive and affective dimensions, including imagination, and feelings about what is valuable. Also relevant are unconscious drives and factors. Concepts can convince, or fail to convince, but, also, they can attract and repel. At times, ‘what is at stake’ may only be fully drawn out using a range of types of thinking, drawing on a range of disciplines. This might include psychology, anthropology, literature, and psychodynamic approaches, which explore the preconscious and unconscious. At points in the book I lean into some of these disciplines.

I have a draft of a second book, ‘Unhinged: the God Question’, which aims to be a more widely accessible book, which experiments with some life-writing as a form of philosophical and theological reflection. 

I have given papers arising from the project at Meynooth, at the Durham Theology and Ethics Research Seminar, the Centre for Catholic Studies Research Seminar, and at a Philosophy and Theology discussion group, organized by John Cottingham and Clare Carlisle. We held a well-attended panel on ‘Negative Natural Theology’ at the 2023 meeting of the European Academy of Religion in St Andrews.