Why I'm a Secular Humanist
"Who are the secular humanists? Perhaps everyone who believes in the principles of free inquiry, ethics based upon reason, and a commitment to science, democracy, and freedom. Perhaps even you."
If you’ve read my articles with skeptical takes on technology and AI in particular, you could wonder why on Earth I discuss apparently philosophical matters. You may consider, rightly so, that I don’t have a real qualification in these areas, as my “Doctor in Philosophy” title from my graduate studies doesn’t actually relate to studying philosophy.
But as a matter of fact, my work for 30+ years as a researcher in the field of Artificial Intelligence (yes, at that time almost nobody talked about AI) in a way helped me make a more personal transformation, as I explain in my article “AI May Have Made Me an Atheist.”
You see, when you work in research, it’s all about evaluating evidence. Research papers can make claims about why their methods or inventions work, but they have to provide evidence; otherwise, the paper is rejected. I have reviewed — and eventually rejected — hundreds of scientific articles. And without accepted papers in journals and conferences, your academic career stalls.
After years and years of providing evidence and asking for evidence in my work, I asked myself a simple question:
“Why don’t asking for evidence about beliefs in other areas besides research, such as religious beliefs?”
I have to say this is not a very popular question, even among researchers. Most of my fellow researchers did their evidence-demanding tasks perfectly well from Monday to Friday, and on Sundays they attended Church for their religious service.
But when you care about what is actually true, objectively true, settling for a religious worldview doesn’t make much sense. Catholics, for instance, believe that Jesus walked on water, resurrected from the dead, and ascended to the skies.
Wait, if Jesus walked on water, didn’t gravity apply to him? Or did he develop a surface-tension-based way to walk on water as spiders do? Isn’t it simpler to realize that the whole story was made up?
Or take the Jesus ascension to the skies. If you consider that the Earth is round (I’m assuming you’re not a flat-Earther), then the direction towards the skies in the Levant is very different from the direction to the skies in French Polynesia — it’s actually the opposite — so following the same direction there would be going downwards instead of upward.
But in Jesus’ times, people weren’t aware of the round shape of the Earth. Hence, biblical accounts, most likely written by people of that time, assumed the same worldview everybody had back then.
I share many of these and other uncomfortable questions I made myself in a chapter of a book I published recently, “Becoming an Atheist in One Week: A Guide to a Personal Transformation.” And yes, once it became almost evident to me that the sacred scriptures were all made up, as I argue in my book, I also realized that I had become a proper atheist.
Well then, perhaps the stories of someone walking on water don’t hold — pardon — water, but if you don’t believe outlandish stories, invented when there were no ways of verifying miracles, then what do you believe in?
That was, indeed, another uncomfortable question, one that many atheists don’t dare to ask. Some of them feel content with mocking believers, even in hurtful ways, or enjoy getting involved in confrontational arguments to look smart.
“Atheist” or “non-believer” are by nature negative words; they tell what you reject but not what you propose. Those words don’t tell what you consider valuable, or what you try to accomplish in your lifetime — which, of course, have higher stakes when you don’t have the eternity afterward.
Fortunately, I wasn’t the first person to have those kinds of thoughts, and I was surprised to find out that some folks have been asking this question since the 18th century, during the so-called “Enlightenment.”
Thinkers from the Enlightenment such as Voltaire started to talk about values that were not tied to religion, taking the value of human beings instead as the main reference point. Some called this “Humanism.”
Most of the French Enlightenment philosophers were also “secular,” meaning “non-religious,” and in a way it’s a direct consequence of taking humans, instead of deities, as the source of their values.
So, putting together the two terms in the title of this article as “secular humanist” is a bit redundant, but it perhaps clarifies the source of our values, and is anyway preferable to “atheist” because “secular humanist” is positive while “atheist” is negative.
Now, the term “secular humanism” is not my invention either. One of its main proponents was Paul Kurtz (1925–2012), author of the quote at the start of this article, and founder of the Council for Secular Humanism and the Free Inquiry Magazine.
While not all the supporters of the “secular humanism” flag share exactly the same ideas (for instance, the secular humanist H.G. Wells supported atrocious ideas related to eugenics), below I explain the central tenets of secular humanism that I embrace: a naturalistic worldview, an evidence-based source of what we think is true, and a humanity-rooted ethical system. Let’s check them.
Naturalistic worldview
We, the secular humanists, assume as most likely that all we have seen and heard comes from the natural world; that is, there are no miracles or supernatural phenomena. There is no divine revelation and no sacred books we must revere.
Now, a very different thing is to claim that Science (with capital “S”, mind you) has unveiled the laws of the universe: that would be pseudoscientific hubris and baseless arrogance. We know a fraction of what exists out there, and perhaps there are aspects of nature we currently know nothing about, but all of it would be part of the natural world, not the “supernatural” or religious one.
This naturalistic view has several implications: for instance, the evidence that we humans come from the evolution of earlier species is overwhelming. We share a common ancestor with chimps, which lived about 7 million years ago. We could pretend we are masters of the universe, that we are the most special creature that has ever lived, but our origins are modest.
The naturalistic point of view is humbling in the aspect that we inhabit a corner of the universe; we’re not the center of it. Then, we are only one more mammal, and it has been pointed out and supported with experiments that most mammals are, in a way, sentient creatures. We are only one more of the fellow sentient creatures, which should make us be more empathetic towards them.
Evidence-based source of truth
Since we accept no divine revelation as the source of truth, we have the responsibility of refining evidence-gathering and testing methods, much of which are part of the body of science.
But you don’t need to be a scientist to follow the most fundamental aspect of evidence-based reasoning: just think for yourself. Don’t take at face value whatever you are told.
Thinking for yourself and asking for evidence is sometimes called “skepticism,” and is part of a very important thinking discipline nowadays, called “Critical Thinking.”
Many say that Critical Thinking is the most important skill in this 21st century: information is not scarce, as it was in previous centuries; on the contrary, we are flooded with information, but the problem is that not all of it is reliable. Good information is mixed with commercial (and often false) hype; political views are polarized, and more often than not false claims are made about themselves as well as their opponents.
When you ask for evidence, local loyalties don’t matter anymore; what matters is not what you want to be true (this is called “wishful thinking”) but what is likely to be true given the available evidence.
Humanity-rooted ethics
Many religious people think that, without religion, most of us will become evil and do whatever wrongdoing crosses our mind. However, there is objective proof that it’s not the case: in several countries, like the Czech Republic, most people are secular, and their streets are not filled with scoundrels attacking the weakest ones.
On the contrary, criminality is lower there than in Catholic countries, to the point that there is a direct relation between religiosity and criminality in countries (not necessarily one causing the other).
Well then, but when you don’t believe in sacred commandments, what else is there to hang on to? How do we define “behave well”?
Actually, if secular humanists don’t believe in religion, that doesn’t mean they believe in nothing at all. Secular humanists are not nihilists or cynical with no values. We value freedom. We value democracy as well.
The thing is that our values come from a different place. They don’t come from sacred tablets sent from above (depending on where you are, sorry). But there are some valid naturalistic ways of identifying what is right and what is wrong.
One of them is your intuition. You know how it feels when something is right or not.
Now, the “gut feeling” is often influenced by your culture–and your acquired prejudices. But psychology researchers have made inquiries about “innate morals” and found that there are some basic social interaction norms that come not only from ancient cave people, but even from other close species like chimps.
Researchers have found that when a chimp fails to reciprocate nice gestures, the other chimp resents it. Loyalty, equality and other apparently abstract values are felt intuitively by chimps, and they have little culture to get in the way of what is right or wrong.
Oh, and there is love, of course. We, as well as every other mammal, feel emotional attachment, desire to please and to protect, and much more. Love is a crucial innate value.
Other higher-level values need to be cultural constructs. This is why there is the “humanism” part in the title of this article. Most agreed humanist values include respect for human rights, which in a way are innate values, but then are negated by other cultural constructs such as “just wars” or “punishment for the infidels,” which we humanists emphatically reject.
There are “official” compilations of humanist values, such as the “Universal Declaration of Human Rights,” which I strongly adhere to. Adopted by the United Nations in 1949, it aimed to end the atrocities committed during World War II, giving clear guidance about what it means to respect fellow humans.
Of course, nowadays, in our polarized countries and societies, we could wonder how much success the Universal Declaration has had, but it is indeed a very valuable reference beacon.
So, we don’t need religion to behave well. We can do with humanism.
Closing Thoughts
Though it may sound easy to adopt the secular humanist approach to life, in practice it’s nothing of the sort. Life in religious countries (I live in a Catholic one) is sprinkled with lots of religious-related things. Take the wedding of a relative, for instance: the religious marriage ceremony is of paramount importance for your close ones. Or suppose a relative is sick and someone in the family organizes a collective prayer to ask for her health. You don’t want to get estranged from your close ones only because there is experimental evidence showing that prayer (when the sick person is unaware of it) has no benefit whatsoever regarding health.
For many religious people, continuing to believe what they were told as children is a virtue, not a shortcoming; even Faith (which is nothing but belief without evidence) is praised. They feel they were “educated that way”, and many are proud of having been raised as Catholics.
It is even part of their identity. If you want examples, just consider Ireland, where Catholics and Protestants have been at odds for centuries. There is a joke where a guy declares to some Irish that he is an atheist, and they ask, “Yes, but are you a Catholic or a Protestant one?”
But even with those struggles, I prefer to believe in what is most likely to be true rather than to carry on with comfortable lies like religious ones. And Secular Humanism is part of who I consider myself.