THE TANDEM PROJECT
UNITED NATIONS, HUMAN RIGHTS,
FREEDOM OF RELIGION OR BELIEF
THE NEURAL BUDDHISTS - WHEN BRAIN
RESEARCH MEETS THE BIBLE
Issue: The Scientific Revolution what it may mean for
Inter-religious, Inter-cultural Dialogue
For: United Nations, Governments, Religions or Beliefs,
Academia, NGOs, Media, Civil Society
Review: [Neural Network - the Sensory, Motor and Associated
Neurons to the brain] The Neural Buddhists –
When brain research meets the Bible, is an Op Ed piece in the New
York Times by David Brooks, 13 May 2008. David Brooks in saying the scientific
revolution will have a big effect on culture says this: Researchers now spend a
lot of time trying to understand universal moral intuitions. Genes are not merely selfish, it appears.
Instead, people seem to have deep instincts for fairness, empathy and
attachment…This new wave of research will not seep into the public realm in the
form of militant atheism. Instead it will lead to what you might call neural Buddhism.”
“In their arguments with Christopher Hitchens and
Richard Dawkins, [new atheist movement] the faithful have been defending the
existence of God. That was the easy debate. The real
challenge is going to come from people who feel the existence of
the sacred, but who think that particular religions are just
cultural artifacts built on top of universal human
traits. It’s going to come from scientists whose beliefs overlap a bit with
Buddhism…In unexpected ways, science and mysticism are joining hands and
reinforcing each other. That’s bound to lead to new movements that emphasize
self-transcendence but put little stock in divine law or revelation.
“Orthodox believers are going to have to defend
particular doctrines and particular biblical teachings. They’re going to have
to defend the idea of a personal God, and explain why specific theologies are
true guides for behavior day to day. I’m not qualified to take sides, believe
me. I’m just trying to anticipate
which way the debate is headed. We’re in the middle of a scientific revolution.
It’s going to have big cultural
effects.”
This illustrates the case
for compliance with General Comment 22, Article 18, International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights, UN Human Rights Committee, 20 July 1993
(CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.4): Article 18: “protects theistic, non-theistic and atheistic beliefs, as well as the right not
to profess any religion or belief.” Extracts from past Tandem Project
Issue Statements relevant to this New York Times article follow Extracts from The Neural Buddhists.
Extracts from The Neural Buddhists begin on the
third page followed by an Issue Statement
International Standards for
National and Local Applications
Objective: Build understanding and support for
Article 18, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights –Everyone
shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion - and the
1981 UN Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and
Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief. Encourage the United Nations,
Governments, Religions or Beliefs, Academia, NGOs, Media and Civil Society to
use international human rights standards as essential for long-term
solutions to conflicts based on religion or belief.
Challenge: In 1968 the United Nations deferred work on an
International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Religious
Intolerance, because of its apparent complexity and sensitivity. In the
twenty-first century, a dramatic increase of intolerance and discrimination on
grounds of religion or belief is motivating a worldwide search to find
solutions to these problems. This is a challenge calling for enhanced dialogue
by States and others; including consideration of an International Convention on
Freedom of Religion or Belief for protection of and accountability by all
religions or beliefs. The tensions in today’s world inspire a question such as:
Response: Is it the appropriate moment to
reinitiate the drafting of a legally binding international convention on freedom
of religion or belief? Law making of this nature requires a minimum consensus
and an environment that appeals to reason rather than emotions. At the same
time we are on a learning curve as the various dimensions of the Declaration
are being explored. Many academics have produced voluminous books on these
questions but more ground has to be prepared before setting up of a UN working
group on drafting a convention. In my opinion, we should not try to rush the
elaboration of a Convention on Freedom of Religion or Belief, especially not in
times of high tensions and unpreparedness. - UN Special Rapporteur on
Freedom of Religion or Belief,
Option: After forty years this may be the time,
however complex and sensitive, for the United Nations Human Rights Council to
appoint an Open-ended Working Group to draft a United Nations Convention on
Freedom of Religion or Belief. The mandate for an Open-ended Working Group
ought to assure nothing in a draft Convention will be construed as restricting
or derogating from any right defined in the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, the International Covenants on Human Rights, and the 1981 UN
Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of
Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief. One writer has said; “Religion raises the stakes of human conflict much
higher than tribalism, racism, or politics ever can…it casts the differences
between people in terms of eternal rewards and punishments.”
Concept: Separation of Religion or
Belief and State – SOROBAS. The starting point for this concept is the First
Preamble to the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights; “Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable
rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice
and peace in the world. It suggests
States recalling their history, culture and constitution adopt fair and equal
human rights protection for all religions or beliefs as described in General
Comment 22 on Article 18, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
UN Human Rights Committee,
Dialogue & Education
Dialogue: United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki
Moon, at an Alliance of Civilizations Forum said; “Never in our lifetime has
there been a more desperate need for constructive and committed dialogue, among
individuals, among communities, among cultures, among and between nations.” An
author in another setting has said, “The warning signs are clear: unless we
establish genuine dialogue within and among all kinds of belief, ranging from
religious fundamentalism to secular dogmatism, the conflicts of the future will
probably be even more deadly.” There are varying degrees of cooperation,
competition and conflict within and between religions or beliefs. International
Human Rights Standards on Freedom of Religion or Belief is international human
rights law and a code of conduct to promote cooperation, regulate competition
and resolve conflicts. To include the value and use of these International
Standards for world peace is genuine dialogue on freedom of religion or belief
Education:
______________________________________________________________________________________
Extracts: Extracts are presented under the Eight Articles of
the 1981 U.N. Declaration on the Elimination of all Forms of Intolerance and of
Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief. Examples of extracts are presented
prior to an Issue Statement for each Review.
1. 1 Everyone shall have the
right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This right shall include
freedom to have a religion or whatever belief of his choice, and freedom,
either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to
manifest his religion or belief in worship, observance, practices and teaching.
In 1996, Tom Wolfe wrote a brilliant essay called
“Sorry, but Your Soul Just Died,” in which he captured the militant materialism
of some modern scientists…Wolfe understood the central assertion contained in
this kind of thinking: Everything is material and “the soul is dead.” He
anticipated the way the genetic and neuroscience revolutions would affect
public debate. They would kick off another fundamental argument over whether
God exists.
Lo and behold, over the past decade, a new group
of assertive atheists has done battle with defenders of the faith. The two
sides have argued about whether it is reasonable to conceive of a soul that
survives the death of the body and about whether understanding the brain
explains away or merely adds to our appreciation of the entity that created it.
The atheism debate is a textbook example of how a
scientific revolution can change public culture. Just as “The Origin of
Species” reshaped social thinking, just as Einstein’s theory of relativity
affected art, so the revolution in neuroscience is having an effect on how
people see the world…Any yet my guess is that the atheism debate is going to be
a sideshow. The cognitive revolution is not going to end up undermining faith
in God; it’s going to end up challenging faith in the Bible.
Researchers now spend a lot of time trying to
understand universal moral intuitions. Genes are not merely selfish, it
appears. Instead, people seem to have deep instincts for fairness, empathy and
attachment…This new wave of research will not seep into the public realm in the
form of militant atheism. Instead it will lead to what you might call neural
Buddhism.
In their arguments with Christopher Hitchens and
Richard Dawkins, the faithful have been defending the existence of God. That
was the easy debate. The real challenge is going to come from people who feel
the existence of the sacred, but who think that particular religions are just
cultural artifacts built on top of universal human traits. It’s going to come
from scientists whose beliefs overlap a bit with Buddhism…In unexpected ways,
science and mysticism are joining hands and reinforcing each other. That’s
bound to lead to new movements that emphasize self-transcendence but put little
stock in divine law or revelation.
Orthodox believers are going to have to defend
particular doctrines and particular biblical teachings. They’re going to have
to defend the idea of a personal God, and explain why specific theologies are
true guides for behavior day to day. I’m not qualified to take sides, believe
me. I’m just trying to anticipate which way the debate is headed. We’re in the
middle of a scientific revolution. It’s going to have big cultural effects.
Open this link to read the full New York Times
article, The Neural Buddhists – When brain research meets
the Bible.
http://www.nytimes.com/pages/opinion/index.html
Extracts from other Tandem Project Issue Statements
that relate to this New York Times article by David Brooks:
4. 1 All States shall take effective
measures to prevent and eliminate discrimination on the grounds of religion or
belief in the recognition, exercise and enjoyment of human rights and
fundamental freedoms in all fields of civil, economic, political, social and
cultural life.
4.1.4 & 5: Social and Cultural Life (academic science and religion)
For millennia the question of free will was the
province of philosophers and theologians, but it actually turns on how the
brain works. Only in the past decade and a half, however, has it been possible
to watch the living brain in action in a way that begins to show in detail what
happens while it is happening…Science is not yet threatening free will’s
existence: for the moment there seems little prospect of anybody being able to
answer definitively the question of whether it really exists or not. But
science will shrink the space in which free will can operate by slowly exposing
the mechanism of decision making. - Free to Choose? -
A bevy of experiments in recent years suggest that
the conscious mind is like a monkey riding a tiger of subconscious decisions
and actions in progress, frantically making up stories about being in control.
As a result, physicists, neuroscientists and computer scientists have joined
the heirs of Plato and Aristotle in arguing about what fee will is, whether we
have it, and if not, why we ever thought we did in the first place. - Free Will: Now You Have It, Now
You Don’t, by Dennis Overbye, The New York Times, Science Times Section,
These days there seem to be fewer new big concepts
around, and experiments are often conducted in the expectation of particular
results. But neuroscience is one area where big concepts certainly remain to be
discovered. And when they are, they are likely to upend humanity’s
understanding of itself. – Free to
Choose? -
Free will is one of the trickiest concepts in
philosophy, but also one of the most important. Without it, the idea of
responsibility for one’s actions flies out the window, along with much of the
glue that holds a free society (and even an un-free one) together. - Free to Choose? -
Without a belief in free will, an ideology of
freedom is bizarre. Though it will not happen quickly, shrinking the space in
which free will can operate could have some uncomfortable repercussions. - Free to Choose? -
Is it an illusion? That’s the question,’ said
Michael Silberstein, a science philosopher at
ISSUE STATEMENT: The issue here is how to build consensus
on human rights instruments that seem to be in conflict with the religious or
cultural beliefs of U.N. Member States; the morality of
one country or culture is the immorality of
another country or culture. This is evident in the lack of consensus on the
Human Rights Council between
General Comment 22 on
Article 18, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, UN Human
Rights Committee,
Article 18: Paragraph 2: protects theistic, non-theistic and atheistic beliefs, as well as the right not
to profess any religion or belief.
The terms belief and religion are to be broadly construed. Article 18 is not
limited in its application to traditional religions or to religions and beliefs
with international characteristics or practices analogous to those of
traditional religions. The Committee therefore views with concern any tendency
to discriminate against any religion or belief for any reasons, including the
fact that they are newly
established, or represent religious minorities that may be the subject of
hostility by a predominant religious community.
Article 18: Paragraph 8: permits restrictions to
manifest a religion or belief only if such limitations are prescribed by law
and necessary to protect public safety, order, health or morals,
or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others.
Article 18: Paragraph 8: the Committee observes that
the concept of morals derives from many social, philosophical and religious
traditions; consequently, limitations on the freedom to manifest a religion or
belief for the purpose of protecting morals must be based on principles not deriving from a
single tradition.
______________________________________________________________________________
Reply: The Tandem Project Country & Community Database
collects information worldwide on United Nations Human Rights Bodies. The
information is used for UN Human Rights Council Universal Periodic Reviews
(UPR); UN Treaty-based Reports; UN Special Procedures, Special Rapporteur Reports.
Click on the link below to open the Database. Read the Instructions & Table
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The Tandem Project: a non-profit, non-governmental
organization established in 1986 to build understanding and respect for
diversity of religion or belief, and prevent discrimination in matters relating
to freedom of religion or belief. The Tandem Project has sponsored multiple
conferences, curricula, reference materials and programs on Article 18 of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights – Everyone shall have the
right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion - and the 1981 United
Nations Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and
Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief.
The Tandem Project initiative
was launched in 1986 as the result of a co-founder representing the World
Federation of United Nations Associations (WFUNA) at a 1984 United Nations
Geneva Seminar, Encouragement of Understanding, Tolerance and Respect in Matters Relating to Freedom of
Religion or Belief, called by the UN Secretariat on ways to
implement the 1981 UN Declaration. In 1986, The Tandem Project organized the
first NGO International Conference on the 1981 UN Declaration.
The Tandem Project
Executive Director: Michael M. Roan, mroan@tandemproject.com.
Documents Attached:
THE NEURAL BUDDHISTS - When brain research meets the Bible
UN HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL ADOPTS RESOLUTION ON FREEDOM OF RELIGION OR BELIEF
CULTURE - Is it a root source of religious & racial discrimination
The Tandem Project is a UN NGO in
Special Consultative Status with the
Economic and Social Council of
the United Nations