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A very instructive exchange between Gary Gutting, a philosophy professor at Notre Dame, and Philip Kitcher, a philosophy professor at Columbia, just appeared in The New York Times.
Kitcher describes himself as a proponent of “soft atheism,” an atheism distinct from the polemical variety espoused by Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. Unlike his harsher colleagues, Kitcher is willing to admit that religion can play an ethically useful role in a predominantly secular society.
I would like to draw attention to one move made in this interview, since it shows one of the fundamental misunderstandings of religion common among atheists.
Plurality of religious doctrines
Prompted by Gutting, Kitcher admits that he finds all religious doctrine incredible. He points to the plurality of religious doctrines: Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims, animists, etc., hold to radically different accounts of reality, the divine, human purpose, etc.