Let's define humanism

Humanism
30

I understand.

IMO, humanism is a goal (or a meaning of life), AND a means to achieve this goal, AND the insurance that the goal is reached by these means.

The good goal, the efficient means, and the positive consequences are indivisible, otherwise it is not humanism, and it can lead to catastrophe.

  • The goal:

self-preservation (access to life) → welfare (access to health and psychological/intellectual autonomy) → individual development/fulfillment (happiness and individualism)

  • The means:

_Science
Human Sciences: feminism, happiness, toleration, clarity, material reality, logic, individualism, consequentialism, humanism
Natural sciences: biology, physics, etc.

_Technology: computer sciences, medicine, craftmanship, etc.

_Art: entertainment or sensitive objectivity

_Politics: free-market, democracy, rule of law, republic, separation of Church and state

  • The consequences:

Keeping tracks of whether these goals are really achieved, the concrete positive consequences being as, if not more important, than the values (happiness, niceness, etc.). In philosophy, this is what we call consequentialism.
This is why, in my definition, you won’t find a lot of “vague ideas” (like niceness, fulfillment, etc.). I just care about a fairly easily measurable (this is where you people from science and technology come into play) thing: welfare.

Consequentialism can help to spot those ill-intentioned people/ideologies who hide behind “humanist” values (niceness, empathy, sharing, etc. you name it), differentiating clearly between what they pretend and what they really do.

  1. All modern human sciences (sociology, history, psychology, etc.) enter into “human sciences”.

  2. By “entertainement” I mean normal art, like the movie you shared, or the music you guys shared from post 79 here.

  3. By “sensitive objectivity” I mean “realist” schools in art: Dickens, Stendhal, Hopper, etc.

  4. I think satirical art and journalism are important, and I would put them at the more subjective end of human sciences.

  5. You will notice that I added “humanism” to “human sciences”. Indeed humanism is defined by human sciences, so it is also a field and a value in “human sciences”.