The Right's Academic Universe

What is the purpose of the universe, anyway? I hadn't started reading the Sunday papers with this question in mind, but after slogging through mass rapes in Congo, bombings in Baghdad, and K-Fed's worthiness as a father, I could no longer dodge it. Then, in the middle of the New York Times Week in Review section - some of the priciest real estate in the print industry - I came across a two full-page ad under the headline "Does the Universe Have a Purpose?"

The text of the ad was the responses of 12 scientist and philosopher-types, ranging from the purposeless (biochemist Christian de Duve), to the purpose-driven (Jane Goodall) and the just plain whiney, as in astronomer Owen Gingerich's "Frankly, I am psychologically incapable of believing that the universe is meaningless." (Suck it up, Owen, it's the only universe you've got.) I was miffed that I had not been asked to contribute my theory that this is a trial universe which has turned to be defective. But I was even more distracted by the sponsor of the ad - the John Templeton Foundation.

Just a couple of weeks ago the Templeton Foundation had showed up in the news in a somewhat less exalted context. John M. Templeton Jr., the president of the foundation, turns out to be one of the funders of Freedom's Watch, the new rightwing group which has been running pro-war commercials conflating Al Qaeda with whomever it is we're fighting in Iraq. You may have seen the one in which a veteran complains that stopping the war now would render the loss of his legs meaningless, much like the universe itself.

This is not John Templeton Jr.'s first or only venture into rightwing politics. In 2004, he started the group Let Freedom Ring, aimed getting out the evangelical Christian vote for George Bush. He recently joined the Romney campaign's National Faith and Values Steering Committee, a group which includes an anti-abortion activist and a fellow from the Heritage Foundation.

So the real question may be, "What is the purpose of the Templeton Foundation?" Founded by John Templeton Jr.'s father, Sir John Templeton, the investor, the foundation set out to bridge science and spirituality while - on a not obviously related track - promoting free enterprise. In just the last ten years, it has become a serious force in the academic world, generally funding anything too soft and fuzzy for the governmental grant-makers - studies, for example, on optimism, happiness, character, forgiveness and faith. This year, its $1.5 million annual Templeton prize went to Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor, who states, on the foundation's website, that "We urgently need new insight into the human propensity for violence."

Maybe he should have started by querying John Templeton Jr. on that one. Or maybe there was a mistake, and the foundation had intended the award, not for the Canadian philosopher, but for the Liberian warlord Charles Taylor.

And what are we to make of Templeton's stickiest project of all - an $8 million grant to create the Institute for Research on Unlimited Love, that last being defined by Templeton Sr. as "total constant love for every person with no exception"? Are there some major oedipal issues between the Templetons Jr. and Sr., or is the universe just a little too tricky for me?

But the Templeton's most famous baby is the young field of Positive Psychology, launched by University of Pennsylvania's Martin Seligman after his five-year-old daughter accused him of being a "grouch" and he resolved improve his outlook. Pos Psych carves out everything ordinary Psych, with its bent toward pathology, ignores, which is in itself an admirable ambition. In practice though, it tilts dangerously, for something that considers itself a science, toward the prescriptive. If you're not happy - or optimistic or upbeat - you better get to work on that now, and we have the "coaches" to help you.

Put all this happiness and optimism together with John Templeton Jr.'s political agenda and you could come up with some pretty paranoid scenarios: For example, that the Templeton Foundation is a plot to numb Americans into smiley-faced acquiescence to the status quo. And could it be a coincidence that Templeton helped finance the re-election of the most optimistic president we've had since Ronald Reagan?

So I attended the 6th Annual International Positive Psychology Summit conference in Washington DC last week to see what was up, and am happy - make that also optimistic, hopeful and almost positive - to report that this Templeton-spawned group could probably not plot its way out of a paper bag. The presentations I sampled occupied the full range from mediocrity to silliness. At the mediocre, or sub-mediocre, level was a paper on the effects of a Christian summer camp on teenagers, suggesting that it enhanced such virtues as self-control and patience. For silliness, you couldn't beat a couple of sessions featuring "coaches" and management consultants using their power points to illustrate how to make corporations more "positive" and "strength-based."

Strangest of all, Pos Psych's founder Martin Seligman appeared, to the dismay of many in the audience, to renounce the whole enterprise, stating from the podium that "I've decided my theory of positive psychology is completely wrong, so I've put forth a different notion." All I can report is that the new notion expands Pos Psych's jurisdiction to include anthropology, political science and economics, and seems to be based empirically on Seligman's love of bridge - the card game, that is, not the link between the spiritual and the scientific. Beyond that, my lengthy and detailed notes offer no enlightenment.

When that session came to an end, I cornered the young psychologist who had been appointed by the Templeton Foundation to give out this year's Martin E.P. Seligman Award for Outstanding Dissertation Research in Positive Psychology. "What about John Templeton's funding of pro-war commercials?" I asked him. "No comment," he responded at great length, mentioning along the way that he's been asked that question before.

And well he might be. The Templeton Foundation's academic beneficiaries include not only opportunists and self-help gurus, but some serious scientists, and they need to dissociate themselves from the reckless belligerence of John M. Templeton Jr. I'm not saying they should return their grants, just chip in a little of that Templeton largesse for a full-page ad in the New York Times with an intriguing headline like "What Is the Purpose of Science? Clue: It's Not War." Charles Taylor, with his $1.5 million award, should organize the effort.

Comments

[Errour]

Was this the same group that just missed boarding a passing comet a few years back?

[pamelathompson]

There are several seriously false assumptions made in this article.

The Foundation is, and always has been, run in accordance with the wishes of Sir John Templeton Sr, who laid very strict criteria for its mission and approach. Most importantly, the Foundation is a non-political entity with no religious bias. Our mission is to support projects which seek to provide answers to life"s biggest questions through rigorous scientific research and related scholarship.

To be absolutely clear, the John Templeton Foundation is totally independent of any other organisation and therefore neither endorses, nor contributes to political candidates, campaigns, or movements of any kind.

Pamela Thompson
John Templeton Foundation

[Hattie]

In a way this stuff is nothing new, right down to the "professionals" who take the money in return for spouting bilge.
Straying a little off topic: Everyone should read "Origin of Species." It's available for free from Project Gutenberg. I'm reading it on my nifty Sony Reader. It's wonderful to look again at the words of this scientific genius, written so long ago, and to remind myself again of what science means, this way of thinking that defeats all the consoling but limiting myths of religion. Darwin was a grown up. Well, even today most people don't want to grow up but would rather believe in a big Dad in the sky who created everything, loves us, and tells us what to do and what not to do. As Darwin pointed out, who are we to say what the purposes of god are, should he exist? Let's just stick to what we can figure out with the evidence we can muster. That was his attitude.
And the universe just is. It does not need a purpose. It is a flaw in logic to think that the universe (whatever that means) has a purpose. Call it Creation, and it still does not have to have a purpose.
But I wax philosophical.

[Aunt Shecky]

"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."Whenever any so-called expert cites "positive
psychology," I want to head for the hills. We've seen, for example, what an emphasis on
"self-esteem" has done to our public school system. Whether or not the Universe has a purpose is beyond our still-underdeveloped intellectual capacity as humans. Remember the
lines from Stephen "The Red Badge of Courage"
Crane?
A man said to the Universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the Universe,
The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."

[Caddisfly]

To be expected in the EBS (Era of Bullshit) that we find ourselves tiptoeing through these days. Political discussion, News programing, and the thought processes of America are now dominated by the new zietgiest of the times...EBS

[DasBoot]

Thank you so much Ms. Ehrenreich. I had been wondering about those purpose of the universe ads myself.

For historical background: Let's not forget that academic psychology in this country became what it is today during World War II, when the military needed studies on how to turn citizens into good soldiers. During the Cold War, civilian morale was a high priority, and again many academic psychologists made their fortunes in military-financed studies. I highly recommend the book "The Romance of American Psychology" by Ellen Herman on this subject.

Oh yes, and the father of positive thinking, Norman Vincent Peale, was of course an ardent McCarthyist.

So the Templeton Foundation's pro-war stance makes sense, in its own whacko way.

[dictatortot]

Radical feminist leftwing academic or radical rightwing Repubican businessman...why not let both express their philosophies as they see fit?

As silly as some of Templeton's beneficiaries seem to be, are they any moreso than someone who thinks we should track down every illegal alien who's ever worked in the US to return their social security deductions, or that most consensual sex within marriage is really rape?

As for the universe, I think It can handle being called defective by Ms. E.

http://www.newsprism.com

[RumiSouth]

Another outstanding foray into investigative journalism, Barbara. The quacks you describe sound an awful lot like the happiness gurus of yesteryear -- $cientologists, Moonies, yogis, early-A.M. wellness coaches... It's all the same garbage wrapped in a different ribbon. I just hope they're as harmless as you think.

http://www.osborneink.com

[TheDude1369]

i bet the research will be strikingly similar to buddhist thought. as if existential thought was born in france. another western burglary.

[Coolshoes]

An ad I'd like to see: What is the Purpose of Money?, with answers provided by those who don't have, can't get, and truly need some -- or at least the things it can buy. Run it on full pages in Fortune, Departures, and whatever other magazines billionaires read these days. Send the bill to Templeton, with a smiley face sticker on it!

[TheDude1369]

the foundation is centered on a concept researched and practiced for over a 1,000 years by tibetan buddhism, but no buddhist serves the foundation. the west sees its' ill-conceived dualistic logic is doomed to self destruction. funded by a true capitalist, who washed his hands of greed when immortality smacked him upside the head. go fiqure. millions of dollars of research to document a concept studied by the east and found in any nursing home. we are all connected and loving-kindness promotes wisdom. i guess he can waste his money anyway he wants.

[Twichell]

("...the Liberian warlord Charles Taylor...") Especially carbonated beverages being expelled through noses is perhaps more amusing for onlookers than others.

Positive psychology seems to have the potential to allow those discharging "pastoral" duties to make continual reference to a sort of materialistic here and now rather than "regaining hope" of "a great and magic grassland in the sky" or something. On the other hand the Am.Psych.Assoc. has refused opportunities to discipline members who help torturers. So it's a balance, I suppose.

Am.Phil.Assoc. should seriously consider changing its name, though. (Sharing initials shouldn't really imply guilt by association. Yet, oddly, it does.)

[CrankyCurmudgeon]

Wonderfully reported, Barbara. I'm positively optimistic about the future of the universe . . . now. Wow!

[alcarcalimo2364]

I just have to say I love your post. I've been reading your work since my freshman year in college when I was forced to read Nickel & Dimed, which ended up being my favorite book I've read in college so far! I don't how my life could operate without your wit and sensibilities!

[schatsie]

US Grant wanted to do away with favorable tax incentives for charities... As we can now see, the money is funding quasi political activity and the taxpayers are being handed the bill...

they will not be happy until we are all in the poorhouse...or as Babs Bush said in a better place then they were.

[ERose]

Well I think Babara means CHARLES Taylor (not James Taylor) in the last line....but once again Barbara...you rock!

Thanks for keeping your eyes open and your mind working, and be willing to dig a little deeper just so you can pass the info on to the rest of us (who BTW are weighed down with the traces and trails of evidence of dangerous mediocrity and silliness that we spot all by ourselves, stringing the clues together as we surf the net). It's depressing...but as you say not apparently organized, but no less dangerous for that.

You are still my hero.

[jeskiley]

I'd like to see instead, "What is the responsibility of our community?" and branch off from there.

[SamThornton]

America's mad billionaires seem to be getting madder and madder as time marches on.

Wonder how long it'll be before they make Nero and Caligula look sane by comparison? Or have they already passed those benchmarks?