I WOULD LIKE to express my gratitude to Richard Rorty and Gianni Vattimo, who accepted the idea of this book from the first, for taking a whole morning in Paris to answer my questions for the dialogue. Also, I must kindly thank the editorial staff at Columbia University Press, especially Wendy Lochner, Michael Haskell, and Jennifer Crewe, for their collegiality during the whole publishing process. Finally my debt of gratitude goes to Ugo Ugazio and William McCuaig, who revised the whole text and suggested important changes.The text by Richard Rorty, “Anticlericalism and Atheism,” appeared first in Mark Wrathall, ed., Religion After Metaphysics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 37–46.
The text by Gianni Vattimo, “The Age of Interpretation,” was translated by Santiago Zabala. An earlier English translation appeared in Between the Human and the Divine: Philosophical and Theological Hermeneutics, ed. A. Wiercinski (Toronto: The Hermeneutic Press, 2002)
The dialogue “What Is Religion’s Future After Metaphysics?” took place in Paris, 16 December 2002.
SANTIAGO ZABALA
