Many who are committed to reason and science have turned against religion altogether and treat it with fear and contempt. Allen W. Wood More Quotes by Allen W. Wood More Quotes From Allen W. Wood There is a lot in Adam Smith that reflects the insights of Rousseau and anticipates those of Marx. Allen W. Wood anticipate adam insight My own view is that Kant's conception of the duality of the good (morality and happiness, the good of our person and the good of our state or condition) is a distinctively modern view. Allen W. Wood modern morality views Adam Smith was aware of the way that economic interests could have a distorting and destructive effect both on the market and on politics. Allen W. Wood adam economic way Smith could not be expected to have anticipated the horrors that were to come. But even in his own time, he was a defender of certain state actions that he thought necessary in order to safeguard the good effects of commercial society (Smith did not speak of 'capitalism' and was acquainted only with an early undeveloped form of it). Among these state actions the chief was general public education. Allen W. Wood horror action order Those who see Smith as a defender of capitalism - as it existed in Marx's day, or as it exists today - show above all that they are not living in the real world. They are behaving as though the undeveloped form of capitalism Smith studied is still with us. Allen W. Wood real today world What Smith and Marx have in common is that they were both philosophers of great vision and perceptiveness, deep humanity, and a sense of social reality that has been lost in the abstractly formalistic economic theories that have dominated the field since the last third of the nineteenth century. Allen W. Wood vision humanity reality Capitalism has proven to be a far more terrible system than Marx could ever bring himself to imagine. Those who are so deluded as to find something good in it, or even feel loyalty toward it, are its most pitiful victims. Allen W. Wood imagine loyalty victim Capitalism now seems more likely a swamp, a bog, a quicksand in which humanity is presently flailing about, unable to extricate itself, perhaps doomed to perish within a few generations from the long term effects of the technology which seemed to Marx its greatest gift to humanity. Allen W. Wood technology humanity long Capitalism has not proven to be a transitional form, a gateway to a higher human future. Allen W. Wood gateways higher form It has taken me a long time to realize where I most disagree with Marx. His assessment of capitalism is far too favorable. He took its instability, inhumanity and irrationality to be signs that it was a merely transitional form, which had delivered into humanity's hands the means to a much better way of life than any that have ever existed on earth. Marx could not bring himself to believe that our species is so benighted, irrational and slavish that it would put up with such a monstrous way of life. Allen W. Wood taken mean believe It is absurd for anyone to think that Soviet "Marxism" is a correct application of the thought of Karl Marx. No doubt Soviet propaganda represented it this way. But who believes Soviet propaganda? It is remarkable (but maybe not so remarkable after all, when you consider their motives) that apologists for capitalism, who would not accept Soviet propaganda on any other point, are eager to agree with it on this point. Allen W. Wood doubt believe thinking Marx's own illusion was to think that the working class movement, which he devoted his life to creating and strengthening, would both be socially and politically successful in the industrial nations of Western Europe, and that it would develop an entirely new way of human social life that would retain and even enhance the productive benefits of capitalism while overcoming the inhumanity and exploitation of capitalist social relations. Marx himself had no solutions to these problems. His object of study was capitalism itself. Allen W. Wood successful europe thinking Karl Marx left it to others to find the way beyond capitalism to a higher form of society. He saw his role as giving them as accurate a theory as he could of how capitalism works, which would also show them the reasons why it needs to be abolished and replaced by a freer and more human form of society. Allen W. Wood roles giving needs We are generally forced to choose one way or the other of distancing ourselves from Kant. I suppose I tend to choose the irreligious way. But I regret that Kant's path has not been followed. Allen W. Wood regret path way I wish that our culture could retain the symbolism and emotional power of traditional religion while combining it with reason and science and using the combination to enhance our humanity rather than impoverishing it by choosing the one side or the other. Allen W. Wood emotional symbolism humanity Kant certainly was sympathetic with the metaphysical tradition of rational theology that he criticized. Allen W. Wood sympathetic metaphysical tradition The species of anti-Enlightenment religion we find among evangelical protestants is far more impoverished, anti-intellectual and downright wretched. Allen W. Wood evangelical enlightenment intellectual There is a tradition of "modernist" theology arising out of post-Kantian thought - Fichte was the real father of it, but Schleiermacher and others also developed it - which might have more promise if it had greater influence on popular religion. Allen W. Wood real father promise Kant's treatments of rational theology and metaphysics were aimed primarily at theoretical questions. His attitude toward the pseudo-sciences of "special metaphysics" in Wolff and Baumgarten was always double-edged. He did see them as pseudo-sciences but also valued their doctrinal value and especially their regulative value for the empirical sciences. Like his views about religion, I don't think any of this is any longer viable in its original form. Allen W. Wood views attitude thinking Kant can provide, and has provided, a good model for philosophers to think about the relation of metaphysics to science and scientific methodology. Allen W. Wood philosopher methodology thinking
