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a week and a half behind us and we are now cruising into passover. i think it's a perfect time to have this conversation.

trust in polarized age. his most recent book. radical religious alternatives. our second speaker is the naval academy's who is professor of philosophy. his books include religious conviction and liberal politics. once again right at the heartland of our topic of justice and the justice war tradition. his special interest the various ways in which religion and warfare intersects. the profession of arms is i believe in the process of growing into a book. turning it over to -- are you

going first? okay. you go first. >> thank you so much. it is wonderful to be introduced by two absolute fabulous people. one of my favorite human beings on the planet. i've had the pleasure of getting to know for the last couple of years. kevin, all good things must wait kevin and i have collaborated. what we want to do is introduce a number of topics that religion and politics. there would open for, i don't know, a free-for-all? a really terrific conversation. i don't have a need videotapes. i have nothing but a piece of

paper. sixteen-17 minutes. the conversation that we've had over the last year should convince me i should be getting some comments on what a liberal democracy is. so, i favor a rather minimalist conception which i will introduce with a short statement from michael perry in 2003. we live in a time where demagogues come up polemicist and pundits have succeeded in returning the word liberal into an epithet. that is reclaim our discourse. americans are all liberals now. we affirm the true and full

humanity of every person without regard to race, mac, religion and so on. therefore certain basic freedoms it is this affirmation that makes democracy and liberal democracy political morality a liberal morality. there is conception that appeals to me for a number of reasons. it is true. each human being really a sacred it comports with important elements of the tradition. it is economical. even in our partisan and pulverized time. citizens affirm equal dignity in various rights grounded thereon. perhaps most personally for today it is compatible with very different conceptions of the proper role in public life. it is not uncontroversial.

different theorists employee competing conceptions of what makes democracy. dialectical mischief. another critic decries liberalism it turns out that what is objected is not liberal democracy but some controversial working at conception thereof. so, for example, if it is correct, liberalism is tied to a kind of enlightenment according to which basic political norms must satisfy. it is evident from self evidence it is liberalism with insatiable humanitarianism in which the state must be neutral between different ways of life. we are privileging particularly the life of sacrifice for military service.

so understood now a commitment to liberal democracy really did have that, then we should follow him and rejecting it. indeed we should do so for excellent liberal reasons. after all, whatever sum up whatever founders declared the claim that each human being is created equal is anything but self-evident. the standards attributing to liberalism would preclude a sense to that liberal harm. it would turn out to be incoherent. liberals have excellent reason to reject the constraints that undermine their basic commitments. moreover, the neutrality is both implausible on its face and contradicted by the regular practice of our government. liberals have excellent reason to promote our privilege

lifestyles that are essential to the defense of liberal democracy from its many enemies. as we do when we honor some and only some the medal of honor. incoherent and implausible, we should reject liberal democracy as it is construed but we should not reject liberalism it sells. does each human being enjoyed equal dignity. does each therefore possess basic rights to speak freely to own property as god conscious dictates. participating elections to determine the composition of the great governing authorities. if you respond affirmatively in each case, then you are a liberal democrat. so committed you are free to disagree with your fellow citizens almost like anything else. let's explore one of those

disagreements. is it morally acceptable for member of congress to vote grandma for heterosexual monogamy on the way of a grounded conception of human sexuality. that is the only reference to sex i will have today. [laughter] may citizen persuade to support a generous immigration policy to the most vulnerable and powerless to those created in the image of god. may a marine officer be led by jesus command that we love our enemies to impose on his subordinates that endangers the each of these cases, someone brings their faith into public life in a particular way by taking a religious reason as a basis for policy matter that inevitably affects the well-being of some who do not share that person's faith.

what should we make of people that do this sort of thing? the question here is not what position we should take regarding marriage immigration but about whether we may rely on our faith commitments to determine which position to take regarding such matters. the question is not one of them all -- law about morality. religious arguments apply in the public life the way legislators moved. the public responsibilities. lighting 1000 flowers for many americans but they took is a critically important source. so, for example it sustains the conviction that each human being even the most vulnerable or socially insignificant and with dignity. it explains why this is the case

it specifies the many political implications thereof. four many americans, therefore, their assessment of competing policies perhaps decisively on their faith commitment. because it is morally excellent for us to support very policies that we conscientiously believed to be correct, it is easy to do so on religious grounds. we should not discriminate against it. rather equal treatment of the religious is the importer of the day. striving to adopt policy positions for which there is nothing to say. truly it is good for us to have as many persuasive reasons as we can muster. we should learn from our compatriots. taking seriously their criticisms. refusing to insulate from their criticisms.

we should exit from our own perspective. and attempt to discern for others to adopt the policies we favor. in short conscientiously with one another as we attempt to discern what policies they support. at the end of the day, our deliberative and persuasive powers run out. we may find ourselves conscientiously compelled to support policy position that depends decisively on our faith. religious as the case may be. we think, we deliberate together , we disagree, we bowed our conscious and then we live with the results. that is a very brief indication. happy to chat about it in the conversation. many disagree. many liberals disagree. particularly when public

officials say members of congress or officers in the military fulfill their public duties. why? what is the source? as i noted above a liberal democracy protects the rights to religious freedom when human beings are free to determine from themselves what to determine about religious matters they will inevitably disagree. if estate really does leave it up to citizens whether to believe in god, they will affirm very different conceptions of what god is like. as a consequence then of its core commitments the liberal democracy will inevitably include a pervasive -- unlike liberalism and enlightenment, liberal democracy and religious pluralism aren't explicitly designed. in that context, many advocate for a constrained role for religious arguments a more constrained rule that you and i favor.

we have to reach collective agreements on matters that affect us all. we must authorize the state to coerce compliance with our collective agreements and so we should try to provide with what they regard as adequate reason for our policy decisions. this is partly a matter of reducing alienation those with whom we deliberate together are likely to be less alienated by state coercion than those who we do not sub deliberate. partly a matter of respect. we affirm the dignity of those from whom we disagree by providing them with reasons that at least may persuade them that our favored policies are correct we do not just say because i said so. that is how we treat children out free and equal compatriots. thus line of argument constraints the role that religious arguments may play in public life. a state policy that cannot be justified without a religious argument leaves that without any

at all to read doris policy to provide them with only a religious rationale is the functional equivalent of providing with no reason at all. this is profoundly disrespectful it is insulting. it treats others like children. alienating to boot. something like this argument leaves many to show that it may not decisively depend on religious reasons for its justifications. moreover, citizens and state officials restraining themselves from overseeing policies that they realize depend decisively. one final point by way of explicating this more restrictive view, what kind of reason can provide this required expectation. how can we reach some collective resolution as to how we are to live together in a way that respects the dignity of all. we do so by appealing to common

ground. we do not just repeat the reasons that persuade us and affirm our disagreement but we appeal to share premises that provide some deeper basis for resolving the particular matter at hand. that is the kind of rationale that can justify coercion in the pluralistic liberal democracy our reasons that are shared by or at least in some respects shareable by a diversely committed population. the only shared or shareable reasons are secular. only the secular is the universal, natural and comment. it is invariably particular secretary and. religion always divides. the secular can least unite. only the secular, never the religious decisively justify state coercion. so, this restricted view is inconsistent with the more

inclusive conception that i favor. what is wrong with it? here is the first concern. suppose that you support the invasion of afghanistan on the ground that it is a response morally. i am a hard-bitten real list. [laughter] there is one in the audience that i know. opposing the invasion because it is detrimental to the security of the united states. we disagree. we may try to find some common ground though i have no idea how that would go. there seems to be no such common ground given our fundamentally different conceptions of the morality of war. are we therefore these options? of course not. you can appeal to my abiding realistic commitments in order to persuade me to change my mind you inhabit my way of thinking and construct an argument that you will persuade me to follow

you and supporting invasion. suppose you succeed. we reach an agreement, not by retreating to common ground but by following the implications of our distinct and incompatible. we agree on a policy but we are 180 out on the reasons for the policy. this is often how political argument works. we disagree profoundly. there is no way that we will resolve the disagreements, but we do not avoid them. i entered your perspective. it may be secular and it may be religious and i do my best to show that you should after all reach the same conclusions that i do. given my very different assumptions, experiences and priorities. i engage with you not is a generic human being but as a particular person you are. secular totalitarian, conservative catholic. i do the same for others.

eventually, i articulate a spread of secretary and reasons that provide many others with what they regard as persuasive reasons for my favorite policies so far as i can tell, policies justified by such a diverse spread of reasons can be every bit as respectful as appeal to a shared or shareable rationale. shared reasons may be nice, but they are not morally necessary. answer religious arguments may play exactly the same justifying role as do secular arguments. they provide reasons that appeal to others in their particularity here is a second concern he had the requirement that state policies must be justified by shared reasons is supposed to provide a filter. through which political arguments must pass. because religious arguments are never shared and world democracies cannot justify

coercion. they are filtered out. this is only one instance of a much more general strategy. to identify some filter that screams out for religious but not the secular. so, for example, have proposed some kind of epistemic filter. the reasons that may justify state policies and here you take a pic from a wide variety of options. they must be no monster bowl accessible valuable, criticize a bull in the ideas of religious reasons are none of those things , some secular reasons are only the secular and never the religious can justify this. so, i cannot assess each proposed filter. let me indicate my most general reasons for skepticism of the view. any filter on political arguments must be porous enough to allow us to rely on a spread of secular reasons that enables us to resolve the kind of policies we cannot avoid.

but it cannot be so porous that it allows any religious reason. but whatever the filter, some religious region -- reasons will sneak through. to drop the metaphor there just is not any relevant property that all coercion justifying secular reasons that all religious reasons or lack. time constraints preclude me from providing what really needs to be an extensive exploration of that claim. i will just have to substitute examples for argument. so, i take it as given that liberalism is a militant degree. we liberals cannot avoid determining when the use of military violence is permissible and when it is not. any determination must provide, must involve some kind of a proportionality assessment. for example, the invasion of the u.s. invasion of afghanistan was just, i will only use one of these like p as the name of the statement i will make.

i will keep referring to that and what i'm referring to is the next sentence. the goods achieved by the invasion of afghanistan were proportionately evil as accustomed to the invasion. for the invasion of afghanistan. so, here we go. i take that claim to be a kind of reason on which the most brutal kind. but, for, the required kind of proportionality between goods and evils, the liberal democracy will not wage war. placing justifying role disallowed to any and every religious consideration. possibly proportionality judgments of this sort are secular. so then inquiring minds want to know. what is so impressive about p. what is it about secular p such that it can play a justifying role to any and every religious reason. i doubt that there is a principled and otherwise

defensible answer to that question. my suspicion is that the proportionality judgment differs in no relevant epistemic sociological or moral respect from at least some religious crimes. it is not shared in respects that religious reasons are not. when people are free to make up their own mind as the secular claims, they will disagree every bit as much as they do on religious matters. as recent defense testified proportionality is a realm of the inevitable and the unavoidably contentious. again, it is doubtful that they possess any epistemic evidence unavailable to any at all religious reasons. frankly that is because they are not that epistemically impressive. our basis for believing it is subjective, contentious in ways that must truly remind us of the basis for any religious reasons. recent events testify to just how tenuous the hold we have on such difficult judgments. that is why it is hard to

believe that no religious reasons enjoy the epistemic credentials needed to avoid being filtered out. it turns out that it is arbitrarily included -- exclusionary to claim that only the secular and never the religious can decisively justify state policies on liberal democracy. liberals must make certain policy decisions. certain secular reasons may play a decisive role and there is no relevant difference between those acceptable secular reasons and familiar kinds of religious reason. again, equal treatment is the order of the day. both secular and religious reasons may play a decisive role let me end at the beginning. many liberals affirmed general restrictions in which they may play in public light. they guard those restrictions as a morally necessary response to the religious pluralism and

gender are. in so doing they built highly contentious commitments into their favorite conception. this is bad for liberal democracy. we are already polarized enough. we should not make enemies will be do not need to. rejecting liberalism in part of the exclusionary treatment of religion. he lightly rejects that treatment but he is wrong to join liberalism himself. the two are no more intimately related. they are much more inclusive to this. one that welcomes robust religious contributions to public life. it is great for the united states and it's great for religion as well. >> thank you. [applause]

>> thank you so much for that. i've been talking about these religion and politics issues for a long time. really since the dissertation committee. i decided to invite chris because in 2002 there was this really remarkable book. today, remaining a systematic critique at the kind of mainline approach to liberalism and politics. i commend to you all. as old friends we decided to coordinate our talks. what i want to do is take you through the kinds of stages of academic debate about religion and politics that carry on. there is roughly three. spirit the first is when this religion in public discourse debate kinda began. the late '80s through the

early 90s. and then i will talk a little bit about, well, it kind of died in part because we started arguing about religious exemptions. that debate kind of died because now we are talking about liberalism. so, someone who is trying to contribute to these debates and trying to follow them i think you may just find useful a roadmap, a history of how artists discussions have evolved and changed. so, what happened is a number of important deliberated democratic theorist that wanted to talk about public discourse. in the ethics of public discourse in the role of religion in that. these included this. who together were the most influential political philosophers of that time. both of them originally held something like a position that

chris describes. but their position became unstable and they both moved not to wear chris's, but they moved in that direction. as did the pure analytic distributors at this date. they all had held this very restrictive view and the weirdest thing about this debate is all the bigwigs and it changed their minds in the same direction. they change their mind in the same direction. which is remarkable. because of how rare that is. i think that the thought was this. we are liberals. there is a lot of religious people really pushing back against us. coming to take religion very seriously. even today. more and more seriously.

and, so, you know, a lot of the other figures thinking in these terms as well. a group of religious critics often called religious critics of the doctrine. and then a third position arose. the university of arizona where the thought was we could reject restraint and maintain the ideal public reason. if what we did was to say that within the liberal tradition we can focus public discourse to

see if the justification to those diverse reasons could occur. that is what would legitimize coercion. so you did not have to focus on shared reasons. this is just to say that what mattered was the overlapping consensus. that is what ultimately morally mattered. i apologize for what i just said so, much of the debate was, you know, still going in the journals and books and so on. really until obamacare. obamacare raised the question of the contraception mandate. we had the wedding vendor exemptions. and that became something that we were talking about. with the consensus theorist, the reasons people kind of holding, you know, hostility to exemptions, but they certainly

were on one side of a lot of these debates. the arizona convergent theorist and the critics of public reason like chris were on the side of more expansive exemptions. so, you can roughly date the religion of public discourse. something like 1992 maybe 2009 or 2010. then we had this debate about exemptions. but, i found that even though it got really, really hot, by 2018, it started to receipt as well. the very simple reason for that was donald trump was elected and his supreme court justices basically allow us to forecast how a lot of these issues are going to be resolved. there were whole books written i think expecting a hilary presidency where a lot of these issues may still be contentious. the trump election really did

change things. the academic debate here continued. something happened when trump was elected that shifted the academic debate, intellectual debate outside of the academy. talking a bit about how that happened to be at elected, it was earth shattering in terms of intellectual discussion on the right. views that were totally, seanez unreasonable or gross or evil, all of a sudden were given air to breathe. claremont folks that had some influence, began to expand, you had sort of these secular people yet the catholic post liberals who in their pure form. much of the people in the academic debate in the academy had missed the energy had shifted. all of our debates where

liberals versus liberals. all the debate among liberals. as i have gone around the country talking to liberals based on my recent book which among other things looks at radical religious alternatives to liberalism, young people, they really want to talk about the basics. they really want to know what is liberalism, is liberalism true or not. using liberalism to talk about progressivism. a different kind of debate that was over a much more narrower set of visions. so much of the energy now is digital. you know, religion of public discourse literature we published during articles, books and so on, it is still going on, but, really, in my experience, particularly in young people has utterly, utterly changed.

so, let me say a little bit about how i understand most liberalism. one of its leaders will speak later today. sometimes it is kind of hard to pin down because i think there's a certain conception that they criticized which i think only one strand of liberal tradition. it is generally thought that liberal order carries with it a kind of anti-christian in particular ethnic about sort of autonomous self creating individuals. this creates a kind of social itemization and social decay that liberals made her cry. ultimately on them even if they do not realize it. the goal here is to pursue comprehensive doctrines, but not liberal ones that say all by the way, that is a good life. no, no, it is what thomas would

tell you. and, so, this debate with most liberalism, you have a comprehensive perception of the good in their critiquing liberalism which they take to be a comprehensive conception of the good. that is an important assumption. that may be false. and then whole. now they are almost very tend ty centura spirit but this is really, i think, there can turn is about the spread of toxic liberal values. that is just fastest or whateves them up at how i will protect my kids from this cultu. and the sense among post- liberals, their problems in the

culture but there baked in local democracy from the beginning. it is not like they just started it is always been there and now it is just getting worse. one of the more radicals, liberalism from out of which the insect progressivism comes. it is a sense that progressivism is ultimately going to be the result of liberal order. and the result is post liberals, it is really hard to have a conversation because it is really hard to communicate. what i want to end with this talk about what i think the interesting points of debate are now. a lot of you are contributing to this debate in making valuable contributions. i think it is good to get the hard questions, the burning questions on the table. first thing we need to do is

actually understand each other. many liberals greeted as this is just unreasonable. it is not worth talking about. you just have to stop people. they don't know how to talk theologically. totally unfamiliar altogether. the post liberals are completely comfortable starting from theology. that is mostly what they are comfortable with. they tend to not like economic arguments as much. they want to speak from spiritual matters first and foremost and liberals are basically from their gut, don't do that. that is one reason there is cross talk. even the kind of arguments they find persuasive in many ways different. there is also reading what one another have said. post- liberals have a difficulty here because they focus on one too much called the john.

the liberal traditions are much more than this. this sort of equated with i think some of the objectionable doctrines of that, of those guys so, a really important question is, you know, what is the liberal political tradition. another thing that is important business. can we separate liberalism as an ethic of life, a story of the meaning of life from liberal democracy as such. liberal democratic institutions. i think that what they tend to think is liberalism is a way of life. a theory of meaning. liberal institutions, i think they can be taken apart. that is a really complicated question both philosophically and institutionally. can you separated as an ethic from local democracy as a set of

institutions? here is another question and then i will stop. post liberals like to talk a lot about order. one of the most influential publications is the post liberal order. they have an idea that it is not just liberal moral principles that are wrong, it is liberal order, it will break down. a source of disorder and chaos. ultimately, a post liberal order is one that will be stable or at least more stable than liberalism. a huge part of this argument and why it fails is it destroys itself. this is part of the empirical elements of post liberalism. they predict that it would fall based on certain kinds of arguments or generations. but here's the interesting thing

about this that they miss. liberals have been very supportive. the most influential economists of the back half of the 20th century. john maynard keynes inking about liberal order. john dewey thinking about liberal order. this tradition contains a remarkable range of figures that are thinking about what makes for stable institutions. what are ways to sort of learn things but retain stability. often resisting the revolutionary left and conservatives at the same time. look, we need reform. to the engagement between liberal philosophy in the critical sciences. there is a way in which it is different today. the empirical and normative. the united states is dealing with the trust crisis. political polarization. a question of order here. how long can the order remain

stable with rolling trust and rising polarization. it is a very difficult question. i have been working in war for some time. falling trust and rising political polarization. that i think is one of the key questions about liberal order in the united states in the 21st century. what can we determine about the perversity's and problems in our society because one of the things that drives post liberalism i am convinced of this, these young people, they have grown up in their minds have been shaped by a low trust society with high political polarization. they have not grown up with the sense of i have something to learn from that. it is apocalyptic. if the other side wins, racism one or something. if another side wins, you know, some kind of radical walk is on. there is an ideological story

that you have to have. but there is also the study of mass psychology. fortunately, that is not new to liberalism at all. those are some ways that i think we can move forward. this debate about religion in public life just getting more and more hot to the point it is on fire among young people. maybe that is, you know, the way that we could go forward. things have gone a long way in a short time. thank you. [applause] >> we have time for questions. anyone who has a question, please come to the microphone spirit please go ahead. >> good morning, professor. this is for you. some philosophers will argue religion and christianity.

the frame of reference, arguing that christianity is beneficial in the tradition because it kind of perpetuates this christian forgiveness and absolution in war. while waging war. how would you counter that viewpoint, secularist viewpoint? >> well, i am a big fan of nigel i would not be inclined to object to his view of that christianity reinforces the just tradition like constraints. >> so you would argue that christian nations wage war better than non-christian nations? >> that is really hard comparative judgment to make. that would be very difficult. but i think what he says is very plausible.

basic christian claims reinforce the most important constraints. they provide motivation, they provide moral guidance and so all i think you need to say is that they are helpful for people who adhere to the christian faith adhering to some very difficult, yeah. sorry. they are just helpful in motivating people to adhere to what are often very difficult constraints to abide by. i just see these things as overlapping. i don't think you need to be a christian to abide by this at all although the i think there may be differences between people of different phases on how to apply those in different circumstances. that is certainly something that i want to do next year. very specific cases that i'm interested in reflecting upon. as a general matter, i see these things as mutually supportive. >> thank you.

>> yeah. >> i think that i am much more comfortable with religious reasons being in the public debate and supporting public democracy. then you offer a case of a military leader offering religious reasons to subordinates. this is markedly non-democratic organization. are you okay with religious reasons in that context? >> i am, yeah. it is a complicated question. the way i see it is military officers are bound by law. pretty severe constraints on what military officers can do. but, law and regulation provide room for discussion as to how you apply those laws in given circumstances. it is in the context of your discretionary judgment that you can rely on your faith to determine what specifically you should do. i have some very specific examples, it would be fun to chat with you.

i do not think that officers should just have their severely constrained by regulation law. but those do not normally determine specifically or in some cases they don't determine specifically what you want to do in that case as an officer you have to rely on your moral judgment. provide your best judgment. again, my general view is there is no reason to discriminate between religious and secular moral judgments. if we want officers to be guided in their application of the law by their moral convictions they will also be guided justifiably by the religious convictions. does that make sense to you? >> yeah, it does. >> great. wonderful. thank you. i do not need to tell you that this is or can be again for very high stakes. a jewish post liberal, already

been referred to the leaves that if there is a majority or religious based that that may be the public, the established religion as a whole despite the fact that they do not share that what is wrong with that move. what is defensible of american-style which precludes any such what we call establishment. i don't need to tell you. students doing the same thing it many secular post liberals are very comfortable when they are

rigid religiously and forced order. i am not and i think most are not either. what are the arguments? >> so, taking us a little bit back to the academic debate for philosophy. first, at least on my view is kind of a, you know, both opposed to some. and, so, i have a view that coercion has to be justified by their own lights. leave out all the shared recent stuff. you don't need them. so the thought here is you appeal to people's diverse reasons. people bringing their diverse reasons so can minority of religious groups. and that means that establishes

terrien by the religious majority are illegitimate in this society. the way we talk about in this literature is to say that the religious minority, the secular minority have to feeders or defeat her reasons for the kind of coercion that has only proposed. you have a basic principle of legitimacy. you have this ultimate idea that the way to provide a public justification is to find laws and policies and people can converge on diverse perspectives and once you have that as your standard of legitimacy, you can rule out the kind of establishment. >> that is one of the sort of mainline spirit. >> this might be an example of reaching a similar conclusion from a very different perspective. i am somewhat weak on establishment. i think that establishments are

not problematic. we have always had a week establishment in the united states. we have all kinds of religious affirmations from our founding documents to post that we take. but it is light. a ceremonial bms them. that is an establishment. a very light. from my perspective the establishment of christianity as the official religion has to do with its effect on religion and establishments are bad for religion religious reasons to reject religious establishments. i do not want the dmv or anything like the dmv to determine who my pastor will be. as a consequence, what i say, i mean, my view is, light establishments no problem. much more coercive

establishments, bad for religion that is having articulated a religious exemption to the establishment. those have been around for years a similar conclusion, i don't know what you think about religious establishments, i have no problem with them. >> do you want to answer that? swell —-dash well, the problem is i've changed my view on this. explaining it less hostage than i was before. >> people have to pay and go to places in public buildings. you know, they are drawn into certain kinds of public venues. if you throw the 10 commandments in there, i think that is a way to have a front to their name equally represented by their government. >> what if i say, hey, the kind of establishment i favor is, let's like throw said -- citations on the declaration of

independence and every courtroom god has created each human being equal in dignity of work. that is not his -- exclusionary. it is a logical way of including >> it depends on the reasons you do it. if you are doing it because you think deism is true and you have a representative democracy that includes people that think it is false, i am a christian i have thought a lot about of these establishment questions but i have many friends in the profession. i, for them, oh yeah, kind of ceremonial thing who cares. but if the idea is that this will lead to more realistic coercion and time, a sign of that or a symbolic conveyance that that is what we will do and that will be licensed, then i start to worry.

>> thank you very much. this is really a fascinating debate. i am wondering what you all made day about the sense of, especially from the deliberative camp. i'm thinking maybe josh : or certain extents. that one of in this view is that it puts people on a playground to develop in which everyone can be responsive to everyone's reasons. if there is a sense in which i know they have an appeal to religious reasons that i do not accept then we can only have shallow responsible's to each other. but we want deep responses to

each other. if we are willing to constrain our reasons despite because of our religious differentiations, we will be better at having a deeper political community where we can continue conversations in a deeper level rather than just, oh, we have reached where we will speak past each other so we just have to stop talking. >> so, i articulated consumption of how you have conversations with people. political arguments with people that disagree with you. you have to be willing to inhabit their particular mindset if you are willing to do that, you can have as deep a conversation as you want. a great book. a book by kevin valley a and this is his book length engagement for people who think

very, very differently than he does. this is how he ended his conversation. i recommend the book. it is very accessible. it is a way, kevin had to do massive amounts of work in order to understand the history and theology of people that very differently than he does. and that, to me, is how political argument can work. my view is, it relies on shared reasons. you want to figure out what does this particular person in front of me think about this. how can i leverage this person into thinking, reaching the same kinds of conclusions as i do. that is what i see. >> thank you. you are too kind about the book. when you are thinking about

training for intellectual virtue , there is been work on this racing by conjecture. doing exactly what chris describes. even ross thinks this will be a virtue developing practice because you have to learn about someone else's view. as my friend put it in the american political science review, the discourse is a kind of blood, a way of showing that you are serious to other people because you care enough about them to learn their view. if we just stick the secular or shallow reasons, it is far more easy to think they are insincere it is a costly signal when you have this discourse. i think it's a better way to develop virtue. >> thank you all. >> gentlemen, i will address the element in the room when it comes to tolerance of intolerance.

you had mentioned that often times young people these days are in this kind of apocalyptic conversation. and, you know, as an older millennial i had the luxury of growing up and experiencing a political and religious discourse that was not quite on the level of this kind of apocalyptic situation. specifically as a woman these days, i would argue that it may not be an apocalyptic situation but for very young women it is an apocalyptic situation. the right to serve. i might be threatened by some of these ideals. so, my question to you, gentlemen on the stage, as a young woman, as a cadet who is in this situation as a young person today, how may they engage in some of these

conversations that can be very personally and politically fraught in a way that puts forth both religious and secular arguments that can protect themselves and their communities thank you. >> you are welcome. [laughter] >> my sense about this, my view does not work. my inclusivity does not work without a lot of virtues of people engaging in these conversations. so, humility is critical, i mean , to this kind of work. you have to realize that people in good conscience will disagree with you on fundamentally important things. to me, it is been a while, but that is one of the things, who is, i guess, he has an enemy. i mean, there is a lot of value

in his basic impetus. like reason is not going to lead us to agree with each other about the most important things in life. we are all bound by epistemic limitations that result in our disagreeing upon some of the most important things in our life. that means that you have two interact with your fellow citizens in a humble way. they will disagree with you and there will be people of good conscience. epistemic lead confident. you are 180 out with them on very important issues with yourself. and, so, that is the first part. the second part, may be because they disagree with you so fundamentally there is a lot to learn from somebody, from this person who is maybe advocating things that are threatening to

you. these are people that disagree fundamentally with kevin, but there is something of value in what they are saying. you may learn something from them. i don't know if that helps at all but that is my view on your question. >> we have time for one more question. >> in today's discussion, you all focused on formulating a consensus in policy. i am hoping you can comment on the role of religion and the forms of government. a sheriff's department putting in god we trust on the back of their vehicles and even opening a session of congress with prayer. >> are you good? >> i think it is contiguous. i would address that in the same kind of way.

for me, a lot of it depends on the reasons people are doing this. .... .... we are going to disagree about the mentally different things but that doesn't mean you keep your abuse to yourself. it means you articulate them and other people articulate them and that's where i get an opportunity to learn from them. going back to the conversation the book is wonderful.

there's a lot to learn from it not just by christians in the christian theologian but people who don't share his faith so he articulates and there's a lot to learn from him and take what you can from him. >> i'm going to abuse the moderators privilege to ask some questions but a couple of years ago i went to an international conference to give a speech in florence and we had speakers from all over the world and all of them were reporting on the same thing and a gigantic uptick in about inciting great acts of violence in this country in the past year the number of anti-semitic violent incidents have dramatically increased. i have little doubt that -- both

of you put the importance of religious reasons in a central position but how do you stop, how do you stop the open sewer of religious hate speech in india which we see in europe, which we see in eastern europe in which we see in the united states. it's a simple question. [laughter] >> i began by saying look there's this global phenomenon of religious anti-liberalism which i would distinguish from the religious hate speech but there's a physiological connection between the two, not necessarily ever leads to it but i think there's a relationship there because it creates a great deal of resentment.

so what i see is going on at least at the intellectual level is that foremost of recorded history the great religions inform basically all of public and private life. the 20th century is very strange because it was the first one to have a globe or -- global secularizing movement at truly global movement and i think it let us think we could successfully exclude religion from politics because it becomes private or socialists are trying to suppress it or whatever. that turned out to be false and they think what happened in the 21st century is that humanity is returning to its religious political him means. people are just going to come to

the table with deep religious convictions in politics but then because and i don't want to sound too here but global elites are converging around the kind of progressives morality. one of which that these people, billions of people think of as a fundamental threat so i think the only way to solve this problem is to get knee deep into the ideas that are driving a lot of these behaviors. in the book i look at chinese confucianism which can change a liberalism. it did bark and i came to hindu nationalism so i think the only thing to do is to meet the people who are articulating the ideas that are being used in the wrong way, except that we are going to have to reason about

these issues from the inside inhabit these views that are radically different from ours and i think we have to begin by accepting these kinds of impulses that are spiritual and political beings and people are going to drop this together means that the global conversation about proper free orders is going to have to be part of the theological conversation so i think that's where i would begin by saying look we have got to understand the different ideas for different ideologies that are here and we can assume they are going away because they come back to life. >> let's give our speakers a round of applause. [applause] >> thank you david and good questions and thank you for all the great questions and i'm glad i did not have to answer them.