Hi Steve, Stout's what I would call a "heavy"; definitely a thinker to take seriously. He reads some of the biggest intellectuals surrounding religion and political philosophy in the last 50 years very, very closely and takes discussion and explication of the them very seriously. I've always profited from reading him. When you see someone like Rorty and Stout tangle, though, it makes you wonder whether you're missing something if you disagree with the outcome of the entanglement.
It was a good discussion. It forced me to think through some of these issues a lot more, and particularly about just what is being said. I'm not sure I've identified precisely enough yet what "public political discourse" means, and I think a lot of Stout's complaints about Rorty revolve around not having specified and distinguished enough of the different layers of discourse that happens between different communities in our culture, from one-on-one between friends, or around the watercooler, to at a church Sunday School Class or in a University seminar, or on TV between pundits or between Congresspersons on the Floor taped on C-SPAN. It's a tangled web that I think requires more nuanced unweaving (more nuanced than Rorty ever gave it in writing). Matt > Date: Sun, 15 Aug 2010 19:56:00 -0400 > From: [email protected] > To: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [MD] Theocracy, Secularism, and Democracy > > Hi Matt, > > I've defended Stout as well as I can, but I find your arguments pretty > convincing. I also reread Religion as a Conversation Stopper and have > a hard time finding much wrong with his arguments. I'll work on > rethinking the issue and get back to you. > > Best, > Steve Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org/md/archives.html
