Bill Maher: "Rationalist"

I had to post this before I forget about it. Bill Maher, forgettable comic turned self-appointed political expert, stated tonight on the Larry King show (yes, I admit I watched it) that he is a "rationalist." Religion, he said, was how people explained reality before we "knew about germs and atoms," thus religion, Maher pontificates, is "dumb."

Unknown to Maher, rationalism is the doctrine that reason alone, not observation or experience, justifies knowledge. This is a view that predates modern science; the last great rationalist philosopher was Gottfried Leibniz, who died in 1716. A great deal has happened in intellectual history in the last three hundred years, and it is a fair statement that rationalism is now archaic. It is forgivable that Maher does not know this. After all, there is no reason why he should. What is less forgivable is his pungent combination of ignorance and condescension.

Nevertheless, Maher's existence on this planet is justified because he illustrates the antithesis of conservatism: he believes that he knows much, much more than he knows.