Abstract:
This paper is an enquiry into some commonalities between fiction and atheism. It suggests that \'disbelief\' may be a state of mind shared by both and asks how a meaningful semantics might be derived from the mental stance of disbelief. Albert Camus\' The Plague, published in 1947 post the trauma of two successive world wars, is a key \'existentialist\' text that focuses on this dilemma. Not only is this work of fiction especially relevant to our current times of natural, political, economic and psychological distress gone \'viral\', it is also one in which a blunt question is posed to the atheist hero of the novel, Doctor Rieux, in Oran, a small French Algerian town fighting a terrible pandemic: \'Do you believe in God, doctor?\'. Rieux\'s answer is telling: \'No, but what does that really mean? I\'m fumbling in the dark, struggling to make something out.\' It is this human \'struggle\' to discern the contours of the invisible \'in the dark\' that could animate the thought worlds of fiction as well as of atheism. The paper seeks to draw out some of these putative similarities through the lens of \'ordinary language philosophy\' and J.L, Austin and John Searle\'s classification of basic speech-acts. It also considers the evolutionary, affective and cross-cultural appeal of the parallel narratives of science and religion. Oran\'s most remarkable aspect, Camus insists, is its \'ordinariness\'; yet, it is here that the \'extraordinariness\' of the plague strikes. Quotidian local circumstances thus paradoxically set in motion the sorts of \'universal\' inquiries into \'what it means to be human\' that, my paper argues, alike motivate the fiction of atheism and the atheism of fiction.
摘要:
本文探讨了小说与无神论之间的一些共性。这表明“难以置信”可能是双方共同的一种心态,并询问如何从难以置信的心理立场中得出有意义的语义。AlbertCamus\'瘟疫,1947年出版的《连续两次世界大战的创伤》是一个关键的\'存在主义\'文本,专注于这个困境。这部小说不仅与我们当前的自然时代特别相关,政治,经济和心理困扰已经“病毒式传播”,这也是对小说中的无神论英雄提出的一个直率的问题,Rieux医生,在奥兰,一个法国阿尔及利亚小镇与一场可怕的流行病作斗争:“你相信上帝吗,医生?\'Rieux\的回答很有说服力:\'不,但这到底是什么意思?我在黑暗中摸索,挣扎着去做一些事情。正是这种人类的斗争来辨别“黑暗中看不见的”的轮廓,可以使小说和无神论的思想世界充满活力。本文试图通过“普通语言哲学”和J.L的镜头得出这些假定的相似之处,奥斯汀和约翰·塞尔对基本言语行为的分类。它还考虑了进化,科学和宗教平行叙事的情感和跨文化吸引力。奥兰最引人注目的方面,加缪坚持,是它的“平凡”;然而,正是在这里,瘟疫的“非凡”罢工。因此,自相矛盾的是,当地的情况引发了对“人类意味着什么”的“普遍”调查,我的论文认为,同样激发了无神论的小说和无神论的小说。