Sir, – David McConnell's review of Edward Wilson's The Social Conquest of Earth (Arts & Books, April 19th) shares with its subject a basic mistruth: that "myths [are] the core of organized religion" ).
Ritual is in fact the core of religion: it patterns ceremonial gatherings and, by extension, the lives of regular participants. To borrow McConnell’s own words, it “harnesse[s] by habit, custom, democracy and law” those who partake. Religious and scientistic fundamentalists alike risk impoverishing our culture with their monolithic certainties. Perhaps we are due a “New Enlightenment” as Wilson suggests, but one in which Kant’s “Dare to know” is balanced by the less fashionable “Dare to wonder”. Yours, etc,
GALEN Mac CÁBA
Victoria Street,
Dublin 8