By Funom Makama
Humanism is a system of thought that considers solving human problems with the help of reasoning, which is regarded as more important than religious beliefs. It emphasizes on the fact that the basic nature of humans is good and should be the fundamental and ultimate factor during our consciousness, morality and sense of reasoning and responsibility.
The basic fact was tried to be made more axiomatic by the following thoughts. The biblical divine commandments are too repressive to our human needs and greatly restrict us to achieve fulfillment of the good Life (Paul Kurtz).
Humanists hope to find morality outside religious beliefs, but find it difficult to understand what it is asides God. The Humanist' view of morality explains it to be very dynamic and it is relative to all Individuals unlike the super naturalistic morality which is one way trafficked as must be adhered to in a unidirectional dimension. For instance, can good and evil be weighed by personal advantage or the advantage of every affected person? Can you find Truth in ethics? What about people's free will? Can result or principles measure morality? Also the importance of human rights and responsibilities cannot be missed. All these are different in Humans and super naturalistic morality may favor some while it will irritate some, hence the need for a consistent Humanist ethics.
Foundation
Kurtz, not pointing out to a specific foundation of the principles, believes that they are naturalistic and empirical phenomena. Mihailo Markovic also stated that Humanist have no unchanging standard that requires people to act in a certain way. As for Max Hocuff, the non existence of God signifies no absolute morality. But rather moralities are psycho-social packages created by Humans to suit their needs.
Therefore, Alasfair Hannay came up with this idea that another pathway for moral absolution must be derived. In concordance to this Hocuff concluded that since there is no God, an absolute morality can't exist but rather, man makes up His own rules since he is the highest being in nature. Furthermore, the British Humanist Association states "Humanists believe that Man's conduct should be based on human insight and reasoning. He must face his problems with his own moral intellectual resources, without looking for supernatural aid.
Slightly contrary to all these ideas, some Humanists try to merge ethics with biology in which Darwin's idea of the struggle of existence on which moral decisions are based. Friedrich Von Bernhard took advantage of such an idea to encourage war as a biological necessity of survival. With all these ideas put together, one would agree that the principle of Humanism is very much diversified and therefore stand out to have no solid foundation.
Strength and Weakness
Humanly speaking, the secular Humanist Ethics is quite logical; principle guided by deep reasoning and empirically oriented thoughts. Following the physical way man perceives, views, analyzes, observes and judges situations. I would rate the Humanist's ethics to be relatively satisfactory for the temporal man. Why?
Firstly, man as a complete entity has natural taste and desires for material and social substances which cannot be qualitatively explained. Man needs to enjoy Life the way it should be, after all her has the ability and in the free capacity to do so. Hence, has the world at his disposal to do what pleases him, besides even God himself gave Man the dominion over everything here on Earth, right!
Secondly, we are termed the highest creatures and most revolutionized; hence we may perceive situations differently in different instances. Take for instance an individual breaks into a farm and harvest a plant crop for a dying child to eat. If he is caught, the situation could be analyzed and judged in different dimensions. Should he watch the child die when there is food nearby even if it isn't his? Or should he steal in order to retain the child's Life? Both cases have a stain, so which one is more justifiable? In essence, one's personal thoughts are indeed necessary for critical analysis of situations. This ideology is quite reliable.
Having said all these, conflicts can easily arise due to different views, different individuals have. Also, from the previous illustration, we can see that man's intellect is not enough and can't be relied on for dealing with critical cases. If the man in the above illustration would be prosecuted, on what grounds? And what is the magnitude of the reason of prosecution? Some would say the child's situation is not his business and he dragged himself into stealing with the aim to mask his crime with the child's ill-health. While others would argue that He just saved a life and should be freed. And no man will listen to another man's opinion because we are all equal and entitled to our individual opinions. The only person's opinion which matters here is that of the owner of the farm. But what if he unjustly executes the individual who saved the Child's Life?
All said and done, a major constitution or morality enveloping all mankind is needed to guide us on a standard way of Life. A morality which should be one way and void of clashes with one standard and one foundation from someone highly above Man is needed. In that way, we only have conflicts only if we choose to or do not understand the morality itself. Such a morality cannot come from man because it will not be perfect. Man has emotions, feelings, inadequate insights and even foresights. And with such attributes an ultimate morality cannot be achieved. Worst of all, if we are all allowed to follow our instincts of what is right or wrong.
From these arguments above, we can deduce that the secular Humanist Ethics is indirectly giving man the license to do what he please, since it is moral to him. Imagine a world whereby your neighbor has the right to kill you, steal your food, sleep with your spouse and many more acts just because it is pleasing to his appetite or taster and hence morally right to him. Or even kill you because he suspects you to be a threat to his existence which of course is morally right to him. If this is the case, then I rather cling to the Christian morality even if it has no foundation or efficacy.
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