Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential, and agency of human beings, whom it considers the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry.
The meaning of the term "humanism" has changed according to successive intellectual movements that have identified with it. During the Italian Renaissance, ancient works inspired Italian scholars, giving rise to the Renaissance humanism movement. During the Age of Enlightenment, humanistic values were re-enforced by advances in science and technology, giving confidence to humans in their exploration of the world. By the early 20th century, organizations dedicated to humanism flourished in Europe and the United States, and have since expanded worldwide. In the early 21st century, the term generally denotes a focus on human well-being and advocates for human freedom, autonomy, and progress. It views humanity as responsible for the promotion and development of individuals, espouses the equal and inherent dignity of all human beings, and emphasizes a concern for humans in relation to the world.
Starting in the 20th century, humanist movements are typically non-religious and aligned with secularism. Most frequently, humanism refers to a non-theistic view centered on human agency, and a reliance on science and reason rather than revelation from a supernatural source to understand the world. Humanists tend to advocate for human rights, free speech, progressive policies, and democracy. People with a humanist worldview maintain religion is not a precondition of morality, and object to excessive religious entanglement with education and the state.
Contemporary humanist organizations work under the umbrella of Humanists International. Well-known humanist associations are Humanists UK and the American Humanist Association.
The word "humanism" derives from the Latin word humanitas, which was first used in ancient Rome by Cicero and other thinkers to describe values related to liberal education.
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Christian humanism regards humanist principles like universal human dignity, individual freedom, and the importance of happiness as essential and principal or even exclusive components of the teachings of Jesus. Proponents of the term trace the concept to the Renaissance or patristic period, linking their beliefs to the scholarly movement also called 'humanism'. Theologians such as Jens Zimmerman make a case for the concept of Christian humanism as a cogent force in the history of Christianity.
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no deities. Atheism is contrasted with theism, which in its most general form is the belief that at least one deity exists. The first individuals to identify themselves as atheists lived in the 18th century during the Age of Enlightenment.
The Ethical movement (also the Ethical Culture movement, Ethical Humanism, and Ethical Culture), is an ethical, educational, and religious movement established in 1877, by the academic Felix Adler (1851–1933). In effort to develop humanist codes of behavior, the Ethical movement emerged from the moral traditions of the secular societies of Europe and the secular society of the United States of the 19th century. In practice, the Ethical movement organized themselves as two types of organization: (i) a secular humanist movement and (ii) a moral movement, with a religious approach.
On the basis of the archives of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Isabelle Vonèche Cardia analyses the action taken by the humanitarian organization during the events in Hungary in 1956 and subsequently into the 1960s. The author brings out a l ...
For 17th century lexicographer and writer Antoine Furetière, the terms pertaining to all arts and sciences are the mortar that holds together the edifice of language. In that sense, Furetière’s language is founded in large part upon the words used to descr ...
Every thesis calls for its antithesis, and every revolution prompts a counterrevolution—this takes place within the same generation as well as across intergenerational oscillations (Gassett 1958, Sennett 1974). Enlightenment thinkers were critical of the H ...