Heartless Humanism?
January 2, 2014 at 2:15 am
(This post was last modified: January 2, 2014 at 3:37 am by mralstoner.)
GetMeRex, despite his poor communication, raised some valid points. The last thread degenerated, so I've started a new topic.
Rex's main gripe with atheism/humanism is that it is unemotional, individualistic, disorganised, negative/reactionary, philosophically backward, etc.
These are all valid concerns and they have been noted by academics such as Alain de Botton, Jonathan Haidt, Paul Kurtz, Frans de Waal, etc.
Alain de Botton's Atheism 2.0 TED talk is an example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Oe6HUgrRlQ
And down through history, we have had philosophers who acknowledge the heart as well as the head e.g. David Hume "slave of the passions", Epicurus "pleasure is our first and kindred good", Jeremy Bentham "nature has placed mankind under the governance of ... pleasure and pain", Bertrand Russell and desires, Aristotle and eudaimonia, Plato and his horses, etc
And among neuroscientists and psychologists there is widespread acknowledgement of the motivating role of emotions.
So it's not true that humanism is completely unemotional and philosophically backward.
However, there is a problem at the heart of humanism, and it's the reason humanism is not well developed and organised. The problem is that human nature is geared towards assimilating into a specific culture/tribe with strict beliefs, and yet humanism acknowledges wide cultural variation, and so has a hard time advocating a specific way of life for its followers.
Most of the atheists on this forum (and the internet) are rabid anti-authority individualists, and these people welcome anarchy. So you won't find much recognition of this problem here. But smarter people know that individualism is a recipe for civilisational suicide. It is only cohesive groups that survive in a competitive world.
How humanism overcomes cultural variation, I don't know. Humanism will probably have to factionalise and offer the masses a more supportive and articulate community with a more specific culture/lifestyle.
So there's a long way to go before humanism becomes a flourishing movement. But it's not as gloomy as Rex thinks it is.
Rex's main gripe with atheism/humanism is that it is unemotional, individualistic, disorganised, negative/reactionary, philosophically backward, etc.
These are all valid concerns and they have been noted by academics such as Alain de Botton, Jonathan Haidt, Paul Kurtz, Frans de Waal, etc.
Alain de Botton's Atheism 2.0 TED talk is an example:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Oe6HUgrRlQ
And down through history, we have had philosophers who acknowledge the heart as well as the head e.g. David Hume "slave of the passions", Epicurus "pleasure is our first and kindred good", Jeremy Bentham "nature has placed mankind under the governance of ... pleasure and pain", Bertrand Russell and desires, Aristotle and eudaimonia, Plato and his horses, etc
And among neuroscientists and psychologists there is widespread acknowledgement of the motivating role of emotions.
So it's not true that humanism is completely unemotional and philosophically backward.
However, there is a problem at the heart of humanism, and it's the reason humanism is not well developed and organised. The problem is that human nature is geared towards assimilating into a specific culture/tribe with strict beliefs, and yet humanism acknowledges wide cultural variation, and so has a hard time advocating a specific way of life for its followers.
Most of the atheists on this forum (and the internet) are rabid anti-authority individualists, and these people welcome anarchy. So you won't find much recognition of this problem here. But smarter people know that individualism is a recipe for civilisational suicide. It is only cohesive groups that survive in a competitive world.
How humanism overcomes cultural variation, I don't know. Humanism will probably have to factionalise and offer the masses a more supportive and articulate community with a more specific culture/lifestyle.
So there's a long way to go before humanism becomes a flourishing movement. But it's not as gloomy as Rex thinks it is.
