Thinking of Answers by AC Grayling
AC Grayling is a wonderful writer and a stimulating thinker. He has committed his life to returning philosophy to the public square. His latest book is a classic example: Thinking of Answers is a collection of essays on the stuff of everyday life: Water, Beauty, Celebrity, Laughter, Friendship, Education, Stem Cells, Sport…
These essays are mostly responses to questions raised by readers and editors of a number of publications to which he is a regular contributor including The Times and the Guardian. In his characteristic style, this is not a book about pat answers, but an invitation to the reader to wrestle with the issues and think clearly.
In his introduction he writes about the task of the philosopher to engage in conversation and recognise the dimensions of the issue, to make choices and seek to live according to them.
He writes against dogmatic termination of conversations, a hint of what is to follow. For Grayling has clearly identified himself as an atheist, and states that he sees religion as a "man-made" phenomenon, and Christianity as something "was dreamed up by illiterate goatherds 2,000 years ago". He sees the "empty name of god" as distracting from the pursuit of good.
Although he was described by The Age's Religion Editor, Barney Zwartz, as the "velvet glove" of the new atheists, he still packs quite a punch. Others have described his approach to converting believers to atheism as an example of "missionary zeal".
It is interesting that someone who borrows heavily from Aristotle and Confucius dismisses the belief systems that framed their philosophy.
When considering the other essays, there are some gems. Thinking about "happiness" in Aristotelian terms as not just a feeling, but human flourishing and satisfaction, brings a deeper consideration to questions of what people seek. In his essay on "friendship" he explains that one of the reasons it was seen in the highest terms by the Greek philosophers is because ultimately all loves are successful if they "mature into friendship at the last".
His provocative essay on drugs: "Which is more harmful, drug use or the criminalisation of drug use?" points out that drugs only became illegal less than a century ago. He is clear about where he stands on that question, but partly for a personal reason: a friend's son was experimenting with heroin, accidentally was given a very pure form, and was killed.
This is more an example of the "amazing folly" Grayling admits humans often display. When he writes about evil he selectively chooses those he describes as "morally insane". There are casual statements on "being happy is far more likely to make us good", with a lack of definition of good beyond "well-doing". In all this vagueness and ambiguity, having some absolutes and rules is a comfort.
The climax of the book is his essay on "The Meaning of Life". Having asserted that all religion is false, that self-interest is plainly what motivates us, it is no surprise that his answer is "the meaning you give it". He ends up by rewording the question: "What is the meaning that, out of my relationships, my goals, my efforts, my talents, my various doings and interests, my hopes and my desires, I am or should be creating for my life?"
It is not a big leap to point that question Godward, and reach for something that is less motivated, and impossibly warped, by selfishness, and more hopeful, transcendent, eternally significant, and likely to be powered by God's Spirit.
As Leo Tolstoy explained in his confession: "Whatever the faith may be, and whatever answers it may give, and to whomsoever it gives them, every such answer gives to the finite existence of [humanity] an infinite meaning, a meaning not destroyed by sufferings, deprivations, or death. This means that only in faith can we find for life a meaning and a possibility."
