Ross Douthat and Bad Religion and "Common" Sense

“'Reason alone' has not led people to agree about morality or meaning any more than 'scripture alone' did."
~Bionic Mosquito

Bad Religion author Ross Douthat appeared on Real Time with Bill Maher (yeah, I know) in 2016 to discuss the role of religion in modern life. In the course of their discussion, Douthat pointed out that the very idea of "universal human rights" is a metaphysical concept and therefore, in some sense, religious.

Maher dismissed Douthat's observation out of hand. "Rights are pretty much common sense," he mumbled into his neck.

Really? If that's the case, I suggest he invite Cato's Tom Palmer, the Mises Institute's Walter Block, and internet commentator Stefan Molyneux for a panel discussion on his show. Maher has called himself a libertarian, as have Palmer, Block, and Molyneux. All four are unbelievers. All four surely fancy themselves masters of "common" sense. They should come to substantial agreement on that lofty "universal human rights" thing, no?

Consider the burning issues of the day: abortion, immigration, war, free speech and national security, freedom of disassociation. How long would the discussion remain civil? How soon before one of the panelists accuses another of spouting "religion"?

Normally, you couldn't pay me to watch that supercilious twit. This I would pay to watch. Maher might well learn, as the 19th century prelate Henry Edward Manning observed, that "all human conflict is ultimately theological."