A humanist is someone that worships mankind, though most claim to be irreligious and don't think of it as worshipping. They believe that the nature of people is the most important thing in the world and gives meaning to everything that happens in any inhabited part of the world.
For example, liberal humanist is someone that believes that individual adults of mankind are the source of power and meaning in the world, that no source or authority is higher than all individuals of our own species. Let's consider some concrete examples of real world implications of following liberal humanism:
Democracy with elections
At each election, each adult citizen, at least if not in prison, get to decide who should rule the jurisdiction, regardless of fundamental characteristics, such as race, sex, physical characteristics, or even intelligence, and regardless of level of education. Then a winner is chosen at the end of the election.
This means that no source of authority is higher than the aggregate of voters, in my country that's people at least 18 years of age and not in prison.
There is a source (such as a religious scripture) of authority (such as god) that's higher or knows better than everyone who is, or should be, eligible to vote. Strongly agree, disagree, strongly disagree, agree.
Free market
In a free market, this being in a democracy, the customer has the ultimate authority on what gets produced.
For example, those making home video equipment and media to go with them produce whatever video formats and whatever models of video recorders, DVD-players, etc, that home video customers want to buy. If they don't produce what enough people want to buy, they go bankrupt and close.
Take the battle of V.H.S and Betamax, for those who remember video cassette recorders. Beta had the better picture and better sound, but V.H.S appealed to more people and won the format war. According to the tenants of liberal economics, this shows that V.H.S was, nevertheless, better than Beta.
The whole point of a video recorder was to time-shift television broadcasts that one didn't get to watch as they were broadcast. So individuals who wanted to time-shift (so they didn't miss their favourite shows), these being the first home video customers, had the ultimate authority on what video formats and what models of video recorder got produced.
Geeks who admit that more people bought V.H.S than Beta but claim that Beta was still better than V.H.S are blaming the customer. They think that Sony developed the better video format but most home video customers didn't know what format was best for them.
Another example is the car market. Let's say a committee of the wisest car designers in the world is organised, this includes winners of various Nobel Prize awards. And they come together for a few years with millions of dollars and a lot of help for all the friends of people in the design team. Then this "perfect" car is produced after that time, invented and engineered by the smartest and wisest people in the world. Given the cost of developing and producing this car, it needs to be a model that very rich car buyers would actually like. If plenty of people can afford this expensive car and hardly any buy it, it will fail in the market.
Compare this with a central command economy, this was the system in the communist bloc countries at the time of the iron curtain, where the government does plan what goods people get, they plan the radio receivers and television sets, etc, that ordinary people got.
For example, in East Germany, there were "really wise" people sitting in East Berlin who decided that nearly everyone who needed a car would get a Trabant, with a smoky "lawn mower" engine, and so badly built. Many East German people didn't like it, but that was their problem until the Berlin Wall fell. This car model would never sell in a free market in a democracy, no matter how cheaply it was sold.
It is the duty of successful manufacturers to produce whatever goods enough people want to buy. Strongly Agree, Agree, Strongly Disagree, Disagree
Creativity, such as art and music
During many time frames in history, various cultures had ideas on what creativity and beauty are. And there were, in fact, beliefs in objective criteria to determine creativity, such as how good a given work of art is. Recall how democracy with elections gives those eligible to vote the highest authority on who rules the country and how in a free market, the aggregate of customers is the highest authority.
The liberal humanist approach to art and music, etc, is that beauty is in the eye of the beholder and in the feelings of the person seeing the art, listening to the music, watching the play or film or whatever.
Whether art or music is good or not, what makes it good, and even whether may be considered art, or what might be considered creative is subjective. Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, Strongly Disagree.
The field of ethics
Suppose I lived in the middle ages and I fell in love with another man's wife and I confess to the priest. The priest declares "This is very evil, thou willt go to hell for that, it displeaseth the lord, it sayeth in the ten commandments of Exodus that thou shalt not commit adultery or even covert thy neighour's wife." All involved parties say to the priest that they feel very good about it. "We care not what you feel, your feelings are unimportant, what you feel determines not what is good or evil!"
A liberal humanist would believe in doing whatever feels good. For example, if stimming feels good, find a place to do it. If you feel good about it, there is no outside reason why it should be bad or wrong. For example, there is no reason in the world why you shouldn't stim in private.
They also believe in adults decide which consenting adults to marry (whether of the same or opposite sex) based on their own thoughts and feelings, compare this with arranged marriage. They see no reason in the world why a romantic relationship between consenting adults should be bad or wrong.
There are outside reasons why one shouldn't do something that feels good. Agree, Strongly Agree, Disagree, Strongly Disagree.
Even religious people nowadays refer to liberal humanism.
Ten years ago, at the time of writing, there was a case of Muslims protesting against inclusion of a painting of Muhammed in Wikipedia's Muhammed article. See articles about it in the New York Times, and the Guardian. Their criticisms were based on the feelings of the Muslims, not on the basis of Islamic law. So even religious people, like Christians, Judaists and Hindus may argue against things based on their feelings, not because God forbade it or because of what religious scriptures say.
Education
The main thing education should do is teach students to think for themselves. Strongly Agree, Agree, Disagree, Strongly Disagree.
Note: The methods of learning common in both schools and universities, such as rote learning, active memorisation, etc, are very ineffective at teaching people to think for themselves, and in general, punishment as part of the learning process is also ineffective at that.
21 Sep 2018, 12:40 am
