The optimistic view of human progress towards a perfect future, he believed, is invalidated by the sufferings of individuals throughout history. Gurney couldn't have foreseen the genetic and pharmacological possibilities. The higher life, says the author, is fed by science, morality and art, embodying the classic triad of the True, the Good and the Beautiful, and the practice of these three leads us to the vision of nature as a divinity. It's remarkable how similar this is to a powerful current of thought in our own day, which flows through scientific pantheism, Gaia-worship, deep ecology, paganism and much New Age woolliness. He doesn't believe in the vision of nature as a divinity.
Life has no value in itself.
Religious belief Gurney rejects the idea of a personal god. If not, he's logically superfluous, adding nothing to the concept of an evolving universe. But a tertium quid , a definite position distinct from all other positions, has been overlooked . . . Gurney hopes, like the Hegelians, Bergson later, and proponents of the strong anthropic principle in our own day, that evolution may be the manifestation of some transcendent unity beyond our understanding. Only this hope makes life worth living, rather than something to be endured.