Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
and its Aspirations,” a revised version of the American Humanist Associa-
tion's (AHA) “Humanist Manifesto” of 1933 that is not at all reticent about
expressing this creed.
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So far as the AHA is concerned, scientism is the vital key to human
prosperity. Humanism is a “progressive philosophy of life that, without
supernaturalism, affirms our ability and responsibility to lead ethical lives
of personal fulfillment that aspire to the greater good of humanity,” and
the knowledge needed to sustain such progress “is derived by observation,
experimentation, and rational analysis.” Since “science is the best method
for determining this knowledge as well as for solving problems and develop-
ing beneficial technologies,” it stands to reason that the evolutionary science
that accounts for human origins would be the keystone in humanism's arch.
Humans are an integral part of nature, the result of unguided evolution-
ary change. Humanists recognize nature as self-existing. We accept our
life as all and enough, distinguishing things as they are from things as
we might wish or imagine them to be. We welcome the challenges of the
future, and are drawn to and undaunted by the yet to be known.
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In spite of the evolutionary determinism and the positivist view of knowl-
edge avowed by the manifesto's signatories (twenty-two of whom are Nobel
laureates), the group does not hesitate to proclaim the following moral
ideals.
Ethical values are derived from human need and interest as tested by
experience. Humanists ground values in human welfare shaped by human
circumstances, interests, and concerns and extended to the global ecosys-
tem and beyond. We are committed to treating each person as having
inherent worth and dignity, and to making informed choices in a context
of freedom consonant with responsibility.
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There is nothing particularly novel about what is expressed here. What
makes this utterance different is the fact that the moral ideas it expresses are
being made to stand upon the scientific truth of evolution. Thus by signing
this statement, the foremost leader of the NCSE seems therefore to openly
acknowledge that her commitment to evolutionary science entails a similar
commitment to evolutionism.
Were we to ask Eugenie Scott about this, I suspect that she would answer
by appealing to some notion of a public/private split. She would insist
that she speaks for evolutionary science in her public capacity as executive
