Chapter Five: How Humanism Meets the Needs of Individuals
CHAPTER FIVE
How Humanism Meets the Needs of
Individuals
Three Basic Needs
Philosophy and religion serve people in various ways. For some
individuals these meet many of their psychological needs, for others
very few. But it can be agreed that in almost all instances
philosophy and religion offer at least to some extent a means of
comfort, a source of ethical standards, and a wellspring of
inspiration, and that by so doing they fulfill fundamental needs.
Most people would concede that the older religions offer these
satisfactions. How do the ideas which are at the core of this
alternative to faith provide motivation, give comfort, give ethical
standards, give inspiration, give motivation for living?
Mental and Emotional Security
Religions and philosophies have traditionally given humans a very
comfortable position in the universe. We had the reassurance of
knowing that we were in contact with a power beyond nature which
gives the human race love and protection. Like those who sponsor an
appeal for funds after any national disaster by saying, "Remember,
God spared you," we know that the Almighty has us constantly in
mind.
Today we still need some kind of basic reassurance about our
relationship to the world in order to know that we have a place, that
we are accepted. Most of the time our friends, family, or work give
us some sense of belonging. However, for many of us there are times
when these are not enough, when we have to turn elsewhere for
security. Then, perhaps feeling lonely or unwanted, we draw renewed
courage and comfort from a reassuring picture of ourselves in
relation to God, or to a larger wholeóthe universe, the world,
or humankind.
How can humanism give this kind of picture? How can a philosophy
which questions whether there is any unique concern for the human
race, either in nature or beyond it, give the equivalence of
religious and philosophical reassurance?
Humanism teaches first that there is an intrinsic, inalienable
value in all human beings. This is not a value that has been given us
by a deity or that we hold only because we have earned it. It is our
birthright. We can have a mystical and poignant depth of feeling
about this, for at the very heart of our philosophy is a warmly
genuine sense of the value in every human, whatever their ability,
however they are circumstanced.
This can be the foundation for an invulnerable sense of
self-respect. The feeling of security that comes to one who has this
kind of self-respect enables one to withstand the incidence of
misfortune and of disgrace. It even stands firm against those savage
attacks that we sometimes level at ourselves. This kind of feeling
about oneself is still appropriate even if one has become entangled
in some shameful mess.
Secondly, humanism encourages us to feel that, no matter who we
are, we have untapped abilities, unknown potentialities, and more
strength, inventiveness, and capacity for survival and progress than
we know. We are to look for strength not outside ourselves but
within. Erich Fromm, in his book Psychoanalysis and Religion,
speaks of the value of having a faith in the power within ourselves
to meet life with courage. Some philosophies and religions stress how
weak, how evil, and how foolish we are by nature. Although they offer
a way of escaping from this lack of strength, virtue, and wisdom,
they first impress on us our deficiencies. How much better it is to
emphasize hope and self-confidence. How much better to know that we
must and can take care of ourselves.
Thirdly, it teaches us to look for courage and for comfort to one
another, to our fellow humans, of whom there are nearly six billion.
We all have experienced the pleasantness of a sense of closeness with
a group of strangers when we suffered some minor mishap together, for
instance the breakdown of a subway train between stops. Why can not
this satisfying sense of solidarity be called up in all of us by the
realization that humankind can expect no special dispensation from
the universe? Is it not stimulating and comforting to acknowledge our
dependence on one another in our unique situation within nature?
Finally, for many humanists the deepest sense of security comes
from feeling themselves an integral part of nature. A. Eustace Haydon
has expressed this beautifully:
The humanist has a feeling of perfect at-homeness in the
universe. He is conscious of himself as an earth child. There is a
mystic glow in this sense of belonging. Memories of his long
ancestry still ring in muscle and nerve, in brain and germ cell.
Rooted in millions of years of planetary history, he has a secure
feeling of being at home, and a consciousness of pride and dignity
as a bearer of the heritage of the ages and a growing creative
center of cosmic life.
This sense of belonging can come to those who realize that we are
in every respect a part of natureóa nature far larger, far
older, than ourselves.
All through history people have been eager to have a close
relationship with the non-human world about them. Humanism makes this
relationship obvious and logical. We can feel a myriad of ties with
other living creatures. We can feel an enriching expansion of
sympathy and interest. Living things are fellow experiencers of life,
knowing fears of rejection and injury and the satisfactions of
acceptance, warm sun, food. We do not claim special privileges and
are ready to face, with other living creatures, the full force of the
joys and tragedies of life and death.
In years past many of nature's processes were considered entirely
unpredictable and strange. The gods served as special protection
against a nature often cruelly hostile. Now that we are learning
through the sciences the chains of cause and effect underlying many
of these events, they tend to seem less mysterious, less frightening.
The idea that there is a kind of basic coherence behind occurrences
gives a measure of security. The as-yet-unknown furthers new
perceptions. There is a strong, deep certainty in nature's laws.
In these several ways humanism can make possible a sense of
security. Certain privileges have been given up but in their place we
have gained self-reliance and a closer bond with all of our fellow
humans and with the universe.
Ethical Standards
A second need felt by humans is for a standard of behavior, for
ethics. Behind many of the moral codes of the past has been the
pressure, the force, of eternal laws, eternal rewards, and
punishments. How does humanism build its ethics and standards of
behavior, how does it enforce them?
Ethics in the humanist view is largely the responsibility we have
for the well-being of others. There are no inflexible rules in
personal ethics, for what will be ethical in one situation will not
necessarily be so in another. The question of right and wrong is a
very practical one. How will behavior affect the well-being of others
at a particular time and place?
Our precious social virtues cannot be pressed into the character
of individuals by precepts or by authority. We should act honestly,
justly, considerately because we feel that this is the natural, the
necessary way to behave.
A sturdy basis for ethical behavior is self-respect. The humanist
knows that if one is of value, so are others; if one has a right to
happiness, self-fulfillment, so have others. And self-respect
develops when an individual achieves personal maturity, when one
understands strengths and limitations, and recognizes the position of
men and women in the scheme of things.
Dr. Rudolf Dreikurs, a psychiatrist, has expressed this thought in
two of his "Ten Premises for a Humanist Philosophy of Life." He
says:
Humanity's greatest obstacle to full social participation
and cooperation is an underestimation of their own strength and
value... The greatest evil is fear. Courage and belief in their
own ability are the basis for all their virtues. Through
realization of their own value they can feel belonging to others,
and be interested in others.
There are ideas deep in this philosophy which encourage one to
feel thus connected with, and interested in, other people.
Humanists gain a bond with others when they recognize that they
must and can help one another in common problems, against common
obstacles.
Humanism also provides the strongest possible motive for
kindliness and consideration, for justice and honesty. If we believe
there will be no second chance in a future life to make amends to
family, friends, and acquaintances for the difficulties and
unhappiness which we cause them, and if we believe there is no future
of bliss for them but that this life we share is all they will ever
know, it becomes paramount that we do what we can to make this
existence a happy one.
We are not quick to condemn the simpler, more elementary
enjoyments. We do not think of these as unimportant or debased. We do
not suggest that the pleasures from line dancing, reading comic
strips, computer addicition, or even watching wrestling matches are
not worth much. Happiness is a great good and we should accept it
where and when it is offered to us and harms no one.
Because we do not make the distinction between an admirable soul
and a less admirable body, we do not separate ourselves into two
parts wherein one part of ourselves is respected while another part
is scorned. We refuse to set up fierce battles between impulse and
conscience and therefore there is no endless inner struggle between
good and evil. The normal sex drive, for instance, is not thought of
as evil in itself. Like all basic human needs it is not intrinsically
wrong but does harm when not directed toward socially useful
outcomes.
Accounts given by anthropologists of ethics in regions as varied
as Samoa, Morocco, and New England are more than merely entertaining.
They show that what is considered right behavior with respect to
one's neighbor or one's father-in-law is different in various parts
of the world. Our standards of behavior have grown up, slowly and
painfully, from the particular experiences of the group into which we
happen to be born.
Aubrey Menen pointed out that early in this century any married
woman in Malabar, India, who wore clothes above her waist was
considered to be aiming at adultery. It was unthinkable for a
cultured adult to sit eating with another, for this would require
putting food into the mouth, chewing, and swallowing in public. As
for sitting in one's own dirty bath waterónever!
Yet societies have traditionally felt the need not only for codes
of behavior but for some kind of superhuman, eternal justification
for them. There has been widespread belief that what is right and
what is wrong must be eternally right and wrong, and right and wrong
for all. It has often been thought that unless people believe this
they will think too lightly of codes and standards.
However, the realization that ethics are built up by humans for
their use in relations with others is in no respect dangerous. Isn't
there something appealingly practical in the notion that good
behavior is that which leads to human welfare? This point of view
seems the best kind of justification of and encouragement to honesty
and unselfishness.
When a code of behavior is thought to be handed down from a
greater power, one obeys from reverence or from fear. There is often
the added incentive of punishment or reward. Humanists do not have
these forms of persuasion. They like the ones they haveóthe
expectation that people will want to follow those standards which
have proved best for individual and general good, and the recognition
that an individual who is mature in body, mind, heart, and spirit is
eager to work for the common welfare.
And many humanists see beneath all differences in customs and
codes a common denominator. They see the principle of mutual aid as a
law of survival.
This, then, is part of humanist ethics.
Inspiration
We need more than ethics, more than comfort, from a philosophy or
religion or alternative to faith. We need inspiration. We need to
express the upreaching and inspiring impulse in human life.
Inspired by an idea or by a symphony of sensory impressions, we
feel alive. Our senses dance, our spirits soar. The crusts of routine
and monotony are cracked. The concerns of everyday life are seen in a
new perspective, seen in terms of what is supremely worthwhile. Life
takes on a new meaning. A thoroughly inspirational idea also leads to
some kind of purposeful behavior. One is not only inspired but
inspired to act in an unaccustomed direction or to be a different
kind of person.
There is a deeply inspirational quality in humanism. Many are
drawn to it because it has power to inspire them as nothing else
does.
This may seem to be a paradox. How, one could ask, can a point of
view inspire which questions whether there is any absolute and
preordained meaning to human existence? How can a philosophy inspire
which doubts that humans have a role to play in a moral drama
transcending life and death?
Yet it is these very ideas which seem deeply, obviously
inspirational to humanists.
Many years ago John Dietrich put this idea into other words for
his Minneapolis Unitarian congregation:
Although the universe cares not about our ideals and our
morality, we must care for them. All the virtues and all the
values, all there is of goodness and justice, kindliness and
courtesy is of our own creation and we must sustain them, or
otherwise they will go out of existence.
And further,
Against the terrifying background of an uncaring
universe, we may each set a triumphant ësoulí that has
faced facts without dismay, and knowing good and evil, chosen
good.
Many humanists would maintain that here too sharp a line has been
drawn between humans and the rest of nature. They would remind us
that our aspirations and our ideals are related to those larger laws
that govern all natural things. They might point out that any meaning
to life which a person may discover satisfies just because it is in
harmony with the laws of nature. But this is a matter of emphasis, of
difference in response. For some of us it is the idea of our human
isolation and independence which seems particularly meaningful; for
others, it is the idea of our interdependence with the non-human
world. What unites humanists is the conviction that it is to
ourselves we must look if we wish to find a master plan by which to
shape and give direction to our lives. There is no realm, no force,
no personality beyond nature which is the source of meaning and value
or which leads us and directs us. Nor is there a special group of
religious or philosophical leaders in control of the keys to human
virtue and human happiness. We must find them for ourselves.
The reason, of course, why this conviction inspires rather than
discourages is confidence that we can do this. We see a worthwhile
job to be done and believe that it can be done. Little wonder the
humanist feels inspired. A challenge has been given.
For further inspiration the humanist turns to those fundamental
ideas which have given comfort, security, and self-respect.
The sense of unity with all humankind has at times a mystical
quality. It can also be exhilarating. The well-loved phrase, "All
humans are brothers and sisters," has a particular force, a special
ring. The humanist is keenly aware of the plight of Homo
sapiens, a species which although a part of nature has risen
through age-long evolution to a position different from and set apart
from other species. A. Eustace Haydon describes humankind as "the
only thinking things in all the vastness of time and space. Alone
here for a moment between birth and death, a spectacle so pitiful, so
tragic and so grand." It is against this stark picture of our
isolated place in the world, of our sensitivities, our powers, that
the humanist sees all members of our human race wherever they may
beóin Port Moresby, in Paris, or in Houston. The humanist
identifies with all people and sees their problems as human problems.
There is complete and irrevocable committment to the human
adventure.
The humanist is filled with wonder and admiration at the creatures
that are human, at their capacity for accomplishment, for sacrifice,
at the intricacy and precision of that nervous system which has made
it possible for them to stand where they do today in nature's
hierarchy. We are convinced that if we use to an ever greater extent
our unique capacities for discovery and for cooperation, the future
of our race will be a brilliant and a happy one.
Many humanists are moved by the constant realization that all of
us are children of nature in every fiber of our being, in every
fleeting thought. Both exaltation and humility spring from knowing
that we live out our lives within a great enveloping process far
larger, far older, than ourselves. Many people feel this is the very
heart of their life philosophy. Ruth T. Abbott said: "Our relatedness
to the whole of nature is our strength and our source of ethics and
our fire in being." Certainly if we consider our fascinating relation
to the universe, we are both lifted up and humbled, both disciplined
and supported.
Where can one find more astonishing and ironic paradox, more
poetry, more mystery than in this relationship? Nature tenderly
provides us with the most delicate and precise apparatus for our
health and survival. It does the same for the mosquito and the
tubercle bacillus. Humankind is lifted to ecstasy by sunset color on
mountain peaks and may be sickened with disgust by decaying flesh.
Our species feels gratitude for warm sun, full moons, and clean
water; we despair before tornadoes and burning droughts. Freed from
the necessity of thinking that the natural world was created for
human satisfaction or edification, we are able to take nature as it
comes. Knowing that humans are fools to expect any special
consideration, we are spared the shock of disillusionment and are
unencumbered by the notion that nature rewards those we call good and
punishes those we call evil. We can be freed from bitterness and can
feel a single-minded, wholehearted joy and interest in the beautiful,
the orderly, and the awesome aspects of the universe.
Yet for all our calm objectivity we happily confess a
connectedness with nature so close that it is almost complete
identification. Our most dramatic aesthetic and intellectual triumphs
are as much the products of natural processes as the dams of beavers
or the hives of bees. For some of us the really exciting and
fascinating paradox lies in the fact that for all our efforts to be
objective, we cannot set ourselves apart, for in a sense we ourselves
are nature. Our meaning of the word "nature" is expanded to include
all those most delicate, subtle, and noble of our aspirations that
hitherto people have been loath to admit as belonging to the natural
world. To usóand this is perhaps the most difficult thing for
the non-humanist to understandóthe effect of putting humans in
nature is not their debasement but the addition to nature of an
exciting new dimension.
We look upon evolution of living things as one of the elemental
processes in this grand integrated whole. We feel that humans can now
play a decisive role in this process. Imagination, our extensive use
of symbols, our ability to organize yesterday's experience into
tomorrow's dream, set us above all other levels of life. On account
of this we can not only adapt ourselves to nature, but are able to
fashion or recreate parts of the natural world about us. Cora L.
Williams nearly a century ago in Creative Involution gave an
inspiring picture of the human race as master of the evolutionary
process. We may yet awake to the possibilities of directing evolution
by human knowledge, human good will.
Inspired by a sense of solidarity with our fellows, by bright
confidence in the future of the human adventure, and by our relation
with nature, the humanist can be eager for the practical challenge
with which life confronts us.
For most of us this challenge has lain chiefly in the role that we
might play in the building of a better community, a finer nation, a
happier world.
Increasing numbers are also thinking of what their rich and varied
philosophy means in terms of personal living. When all is said and
done, it is the individual's own life and those of others which make
changes possible.
Humanism teaches two things which seem at first contradictory but
which actually complement and strengthen each other. It teaches us on
the one hand how deeply involved we are with nature and with our
fellow human beings. On the other hand it encourages us to be
independent and self-reliant. We cannot play our part well and
responsibly unless we are spiritually weaned. Yet we become more
fully developed only through social relationships.
Erich Fromm, Abraham Maslow, Harry A. Overstreet, and others have
made clear how important it is for one to be free, to be independent.
They show that only as one has self-respect can one have wholesome
love for others, can one feel concern for others, can one live
adequately with others in our common life.
H.J. Blackham describes the value of active participation in life
in Living as a Humanist. A humanist says "yes to life" and
should be ready and eager for new responsibilities, new human
relationships, new experiences of every kind. Humanists take full
part in life and at the same time full responsibility for their own
past actions. On occasion it may even be strenuous to say "yes to
life." Blackham writes:
The use and enjoyment of what life in the world offers is
not to be had by wanting, nor merely by asking, but only by
intelligent, instructed and sustained effort.
An unknown Sanskrit writer expresses the daily challenge of
life:
Listen to the Exhortation of the Dawn!
Look to this Day!
For it is Life, the very Life of Life.
In its brief course lie all the
Varieties and Realities of your Existence:
The Bliss of Growth,
The Glory of Action,
The Splendour of Beauty;
For Yesterday is but a Dream,
And To-morrow is only a Vision,
But To-day well lived makes
Every Yesterday a Dream of Happiness,
And every To-morrow a Vision of Hope.
Look well, therefore, to this Day!
Such is the Salutation of the Dawn.
Humanism urges us to recognize in our personal lives the
importance of its fundamental method. Human progress as a whole
depends on freedom to search for truth. Individual progress also
depends, in the same crucial way, on a constant search for truth
about oneself. Only as one grows in self-knowledge will one become
truly free. Only as one understands one's self can life offer its
deeper meanings and be experienced to the full.
Rollo May has pointed out that problems of modern men and women
center very often in a basic emptiness and in indifference to
themselves.
Humanism has a different effect on each person. A clear example of
its value for one particular individual has been given by a marketing
consultant, Alfred E. Smith, who has told how humanist insights have
brightened his life enabling him to transcend devastating
experiences: World War II front-line combat, sudden loss of a
cherished eight-year-old daughter, and six years later the tragic
death of his wife, leaving him alone to prepare two pre-school-age
sons for life. A statement he wrote in 1951 was recently cited at
Phillips Brooks House at Harvard University and printed in the
newsletter of the Humanist Association of Massachusetts:
What Being A Humanist Has Done For Me
(1) Humanism has ended a great aloneness with
which I've had to carry my thoughts and hopes through many years.
How wonderful to be able to share with others the quest for truth
which had always set me apart from those still complacently caught
in the web of traditional beliefs. Just to know that there have
been many before me, that there are growing numbers all over the
world joined in the same quest. . . this gives me new courage and
incentive.
(2) Humanism has given me direction and purpose. It has
dispelled an impatient and often desperate idealism. Humanist
discussions and Humanist literature have helped me to know myself
better. . . have brought me new perspectives on my life. . . have
opened doors to an even wider knowledge of my world and of how I
can help to make it better.
(3) Humanism has given me new values. I have learned
that people and problems are seldom what they seem to be. . . that
fighting them is futile. . . that accepting and understanding them
is the only way to change them. Humanism, with its emphasis on the
scientific method, has taught me to seek facts and underlying
causes rather than theories and opinions. . . to search out all
that the social sciences have discovered to help me. . . to ever
test my own judgment as well as that of others. . . and to direct
my efforts toward that which is possible within the ideal.
(4) Humanism has brought me the realization that complete
intellectual freedom is vital to human progress. . . that our
first line of advance must be to neutralize with truth the
authoritarian forces that seek to enslave the minds of men with
superstition, prejudice, obscuration, and propaganda. How glad I
am to be part of a movement with this dedication!
(5) Humanism has helped me to discover the power of love . .
. for through its insights I have come to know that achieving
the ability to love myself and all others is worth far more than
all the moral codes and religious dogmas ever devised. For me, the
meaning of Humanism is living love and seeking truth. And because
love is limitless and truth is ever-changing, ever-expanding, I
know that Humanism has given me horizons that I will never reach.
For that as much as anything I am thankful.
It is clear that humanism offers comfort, support, guidance,
inspiration, and a summons. In urging us to know not only the world
but ourselves, it offers a quest that will never end.
