I’ve been reading my snail mail. There was an ad for a magazine called “Free Inquiry.” I don’t remember when I first became aware of this magazine. It seems it was quite a while ago. To me, before I got a chance to get a copy and read it, I that was simply promoting freethinking. I was somewhat surprised after reading some copies of the magazine to find it somewhat dogmatic. I guess it has to be because it was founded by a Secular Humanism organization. Secular Humanism is a philosophy that embraces human reasoning, a form of ethics called secular ethics and promotes self-fulfillment without a belief in God.
I mentioned that it was somewhat dogmatic. That could be said of almost every philosophical theory. I’ve always loved exploring philosophical ideas ranging from the first Greek philosophers of the sixth century BC to Judith Butler’s thoughts on feminism and gender philosophy. Why am I saying this? You could reject the magazine “Free Inquiry” without further thought, but you would be doing yourself a disservice. Like most philosophical beliefs it has some extreme points, some weak ones, and some absurd ones. You have to take some time to familiarize yourself with its tenants. Why is that important? The term “secular humanism” is used in political debates as something horrible with nothing to offer. If you do not know what the term means, you can’t make sense when someone derides it. Even more importantly, you can’t fully understand what the person means by using the phrase “secular humanism.” In the field of politics, it’s used as a shorthand way of saying godless and indicating nothing more.
Secular Humanism has much more. Here are a couple of items from a list that will show you how broad their philosophy is – they are taken from the ad I received: “Dangers of Extremism,” and “Whatever Happened to American Compassion?” Every day we are bombarded with ideas and philosophies that challenge us to think. Please don’t reject philosophies until you’ve had a chance to explore them. As I said about philosophical beliefs before, “some extreme points, some weak ones, and some absurd ones.” I believe you can apply all three of those ideas to every philosophical notion.
