What must ‘Humanism’ mean? Richard Norman thinks outside the tribe.

Richard Norman, speaking at the BHA Philosophy and the Arts day conference, 2010

If ‘humanism’ means anything at all, it must surely embrace respect and concern for all human beings, whether they are members of our own family or group or society or are people on the other side of the world whom we do not know and will never meet.  It means a responsiveness to the needs of all with whom we share a common humanity.  As humanists we often invoke the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which reflects and translates into political imperatives those shared human needs, and which includes these items:

Article 25:  Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.

Article 26:  Everyone has the right to education…

Article 28:  Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.

But the sad truth is that we have a long way to go before we have an international order in which these rights are fully realized for everyone.  Here are some facts about the world in which we live.

• Around 1.4 billion people still subsist on less than $1.25 a day, the international poverty line defined by the World Bank.
• Around one billion people suffer from hunger.
• Almost nine million children die each year before they reach their fifth birthday.
• Hundreds of thousands of women die due to complications of pregnancy or childbirth every year.
• About 69 million school-age children are not in school. Almost half of them (31 million) are in sub-Saharan Africa, and more than a quarter (18 million) are in Southern Asia. (Data)

Humanists have always been actively involved in organisations dedicated to tackling the challenges of global poverty and injustice. The BHA encourages its members to continue that tradition of involvement, but has rightly avoided duplicating the organisations which are already active in the field.  For this reason there is no specifically humanist movement dedicated to combating poverty and promoting international development.  There are also good reasons, parallel to the ones which Marilyn Mason mentions in the case of climate change, why humanists have not organised as humanists:  we may legitimately disagree about the best way to deal with poverty and global injustice, and we are resistant to being told what causes to support.

But without creating unnecessary new organisations, it’s important that humanists are visible in their support for global justice.  Actions do speak louder than words, and if we’re serious in what we say about shared human values and about living a good life without religion, then we need to put those values into action.  The role of the new interest group ‘Humanists for a Better World’ should be to add a distinctive humanist presence and voice to existing organisations and campaigns.  It should act as a forum for humanists to pool news and information, and to alert one another to important events and campaigns.

Here are some of the issues which I think are currently important.

In the last few years, concern for international development and concern about climate change have become increasingly linked.  The problem of climate change caused by CO2 emissions has been created by the industrialised countries, but it is above all the countries of the global south which are already feeling the effects, with more extreme and unpredictable weather patterns, increased flooding in some areas, and changes in rainfall leading to crop failures and the drying up of pastureland in others.  Action on climate change has to take the form of ‘climate justice’ – enabling the poorer countries of the world to follow a low-carbon route to development and not being forced to pay the price for our failures.  Oxfam and the World Development Movement among others are campaigning for a global Climate Fund which is fair and effective.  See:

• http://www.oxfam.org.uk/get_involved/campaign/climate_change/
• http://www.wdm.org.uk/climatedebt

World poverty is being fuelled by the spike in food commodity prices, which have been artificially inflated by the irresponsible behaviour of commodity speculators.  We need international regulations to curb food speculation – see:

• http://www.wdm.org.uk/food-speculation

Development organisations have increasingly come to recognise that trade is the route out of poverty.  But this requires more than the free-marketers’ mantra of ‘free trade’.  It needs trade justice.  At the level of our daily lives and our own purchases, this is something which we can promote by buying Fairtrade products and raising awareness of the value of Fairtrade.  I’d like to see more Humanist groups committing themselves to using Fairtrade refreshments at their meetings and events.  But it also requires political action, because the scope for trade to benefit developing countries is severely limited by the unfair tariffs and subsidies maintained by the US and Europe.  The Fairtrade Foundation is currently running a campaign against American and European subsidies for their own cotton farmers, which lower world prices and hit cotton-producing countries such as Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali.  See:

• http://www.fairtrade.org.uk/products/cotton/default.aspx

If you share these or related concerns, do please make use of the ‘Humanists for a Better World’ web site at www.h4bw.org.uk to communicate news, ideas and actions, and to work with other humanists for global justice and a better world.

Richard Norman is Emeritus Professor of Moral Philosophy, founder-member of the Humanist Philosophers’ Group, and Vice-President of the BHA. His book On Humanism was released in 2004.

His Discworld books have been read in her household for years, she tells us, but now that Terry Pratchett disagrees with her own view on assisted dying, Cristina Odone “loathes” the author. Quite personally.

Of course,  that would sound churlish. So she tries to blame the disagreement specifically on him attributing the no-to-assisted-dying position to the “far right”.

But ever since I heard Pratchett claim that only the “far Right” had any objections to assisted suicide [link in the original], I have loathed him. For a man blessed with such talent and success, who wields an influence on so many young people, to rubbish life so publicly is disgraceful. For him to misrepresent as “far Right” those who oppose legalising assisted suicide is downright dishonest.

Did you know Pratchett had said that? No? You’re not alone.

The article Odone links doesn’t contain this phrase, nor does the video embedded in the page, though Pratchett seems to have made the comment in an interview with Jon Snow on Channel 4 News. At the time when it was filmed and shown (early last year) this comment seems to have been taken as a fairly light-hearted accusation from a man who, as a sufferer of Alzheimers, has a very personal stake in the debate, and the comment was largely ignored, including during the interview by Jon Snow. A search does turn up one response to the “far right” comment by Dominic Lawson. Lawson is able to turn it into the basis of an entire article in which we learn about how those “fanatical” pro-assisted-dying lot are always painting the antis as far right extremists. There are no other examples given.

So Odone’s “loathing” is supposedly based on one comment from over a year ago, inflated originally by one commentator, and now picked over again by herself. “It is of course a favourite trick of the media-savvy Liberal Left,” she tells us, “painting their opponents on any issue as Right-wing extremists.” Again, no other examples are on offer.

Meanwhile, while loudly protesting about Pratchett’s single comic ad hominem and ostensibly writing about the rhetorical ploy of offering false attacks on those you disagree with, Odone goes on to offer several for Pratchett. She describes his position on assisted dying as being to “rubbish life”, says he suffers from an “emotional autism”, and finally decides that “For him, men (and women) are autonomous beings devoid of the connections that make life worth living.”

Anyone who’s heard Pratchett talking about why life, and the right for those suffering to end it, are important, would surely find it hard to support Odone’s interpretation of his position and motivation.

Moreover, it must be like waking up for a dream for Cristina Odone! Presumably she now regrets that her family wasted all that time reading all those life-denying, cold and un-funny, emotionally dead books full of disconnected characters in Pratchett’s meaningless world?

Link: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/cristinaodone/100084004/sir-terry-pratchett-poster-boy-of-assisted-suicide-has-the-bbc-doing-his-bidding/

Sam Harris' The Moral Landscape

Sam Harris is in the UK this week talking about his new book, The Moral Landscape, about how the fact-value distinction has led us astray. Harris argues that far from being outside the purview of science, moral questions are properly scientific questions. Moral questions are, Harris argues, questions about our personal and social welfare, the avoidance of suffering and the promotion of flourishing, happy, productive lives. These questions have real answers which can in the broad sense be determined by science: will this policy solve social problems? will this act cause distress to that person? will this drug cause me long term harm? These are moral and scientific questions and the line is not as distinct as many like to think.

He is interviewed this week by Humanist Philosopher and British Humanist Association Distinguished Supporter Julian Baggini in The Independent and the book is reviewed by Simon Blackburn, another Humanist Philosophers member and also a Vice President of the BHA.

Baggini uses his interview opportunity to put some criticisms to Harris. The Moral Landscape is unusual in that arguably it pits scientists directly against moral philosophers, arguing that much of what philosophers have done for morality is only to cause confusion, whereas science can now come along and clean up the mess. But are things really so clear cut?

[Baggini] But it’s puzzling how science could tell us, for example, how to prioritise between rights of free speech and privacy?

[Harris] There are probably some trade-offs where there isn’t an important difference. So privileging free speech to some degree and privileging privacy to another degree leads you to different circumstances, but perhaps they are not importantly different. If you and I and everyone affected by those changes could live out both lives, and have our brains scanned all the while, and have every marker of our inner lives analysed, we would come out saying they were a little different, but we don’t know which we like better. That is an intelligible prospect and that is why the moral landscape has many peaks and valleys that are different but equivalent in terms of well-being.

Isn’t well-being too ill-defined to be scientifically tractable? Take the classic thought experiment of whether a person who lives a normal life with ups and downs is better or worse off than someone who takes a happiness pill. There doesn’t seem to be a factual answer as to what’s better, discoverable by examining fMRI scans, for instance.

I think we can have a rational discussion about how much we want our states of consciousness, our emotional lives, to track the reality of our lives. We definitely want it to track it for the most part because otherwise, if we’re just taking this perfect narcotic each day, it’s not a sustainable situation. You’re just lying on the couch in bliss, but your relationships have dissolved, you’ve lost your job, and your children have starved to death. It’s materially unsustainable if nothing else. But your love for the people in your life, which you value and which is major component of well-being – your connections to others, your ability to function in the world – all of this is predicated on your states of consciousness tracking the actual reality of your life in the world.

Full interview: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/the-moral-formula-how-facts-inform-our-ethics-2265991.html

Simon Blackburn’s review of the book’s argument, reflecting the view taken of Harris’s argument by many philosophers, insists that there are questions of principle and priority and value which are not reducible to empirical facts.

[Harris's] idea is that with sufficient knowledge, and generous help from neuroscience, we can learn to gauge “wellbeing” and then it is just a technical question of how to maximise it. Not only religion, but moral philosophy with its dilemmas and conflicts, is unnecessary, now that we can observe and calculate. On the dust-jacket, Richard Dawkins enthusiastically endorses the same triumphalist line.

It is one thing to say that behaving well requires knowledge. It clearly does, and the more we know about the world the better (and worse) we can behave in it. But it is quite another thing to think of “science” as taking over the entire domain of morality, and that there is a reason that it cannot do so. While it is one thing to know the empirical facts, it is another to select and prioritise and campaign and sacrifice to promote some and diminish others.

… Striving to maximise the sum of human wellbeing is making oneself a servant of the world, and it cannot be science that tells me to do that, nor how to solve the conflict, which was central, for instance, to the utilitarian thinking of Henry Sidgwick. Harris considers none of all this, and thereby joins the prodigious ranks of those whose claim to have transcended philosophy is just an instance of their doing it very badly.

Full article: http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/2011/03/blackburn-ethics-without-god-secularism-religion-sam-harris/

Concerned primarily with questions of ethics and the good live, learned, “extravagantly erudite”, dog-loving and not at all vain. The philosopher AC Grayling, announced this morning as new President of the British Humanist Association, speaks to the Guardian about this new book, The Good Book : A Secular Bible. Is it his own God Delusion or God is Not Great, the Guardian asks?

“No, because it’s not against religion. There’s not one occurrence of the word God, or afterlife, or anything like that. It doesn’t attack religion, it’s a positive book, there’s nothing negative in it. People may think it’s against religion – but it isn’t.” But then he says, with a mischievous twinkle: “Of course, what would really help the book a lot in America is if somebody tries to shoot me.”

With any luck it shouldn’t come to that, but Grayling is almost certainly going to upset a lot of Christians, for what he has written is a secular bible. The Good Book mirrors the Bible in both form and language, and is, as its author says, “ambitious and hubristic – a distillation of the best that has been thought and said by people who’ve really experienced life, and thought about it”. Drawing on classical secular texts from east and west, Grayling has “done just what the Bible makers did with the sacred texts”, reworking them into a “great treasury of insight and consolation and inspiration and uplift and understanding in the great non-religious traditions of the world”. He has been working on his opus for several decades, and the result is an extravagantly erudite manifesto for rational thought.

In fact everything about Grayling is extravagantly erudite. We meet at his south London home, where he sits surrounded by teetering piles of books, great leaning towers of learning, and the conversation frequently detours into donnish tutorial mode. Spotting me glance at one of the volumes, which bears the title Epiphenomenalism, he launches at once into a detailed explanation of the concept – but then breaks off in delight as his dog trots in and rolls at his feet.

Full article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/apr/03/grayling-good-book-atheism-philosophy

In an article for gay magazine Attitude, Johann Hari lays bare the rhetoric of Christian Voice’s Stephen Green and delineates the “right to speak”, including “the right to say despicable things” –which even homophobes should have – from “choosing to give him a platform”.

Do you deserve to be killed for being gay? Should you be hanged, or shot, or electrocuted? In Britain today, a man who believes you should be – and who actively supports the on-going campaign to hunt down and kill gay people in Africa – is being given prime-time TV slots by the BBC and Channel Four. When Elton John had a baby, he was given the main response on the flagship Six O’Clock News. He is in the rolodex of all the “moral discussion” programs, wheeled on whenever we inch closer to equality for gay people. He is Taken Seriously, and treated as a neutral commentator by shows like Question Time and newspapers like the Daily Mail. His name is Stephen Green, and if he had his way, you’d be reading this from death row.

… Imagine if the BBC, Channel Four and Daily Mail were giving prominent platforms to a man who believed all Jews should be killed, or all black people, or all Muslims. It would – thankfully – be unthinkable. Yet Green is doing precisely that with gay people. On his website earlier this year, he noted the moves in Uganda to execute people for “aggravated sodomy” – and complained they didn’t go far enough. He wrote: “The Bible prescribes precisely the penalty [MP David] Bahati is proposing for sodomy in any situation, whether or not ‘aggravated.’” Kill all the “sodomites.” Not in theory. Now. That’s his response to hearing that innocent gay people are about to be put to death.

Full article: http://johannhari.com/2011/02/09/why-do-our-broadcasters-keep-giving-a-platform-to-a-murderous-homophobe

THE EUROPEAN Court of Human Rights will next week issue a ruling on whether Ireland’s restrictions on abortion violate women’s human rights.

The ruling, which could have significant implications for Irish abortion law, is based on a case taken by three women in Ireland who say their health was put at risk by being forced to go abroad for abortions.

The court is due to issue its ruling at a public sitting of the court’s grand chamber next Thursday, rather than a more common written judgment.

…

The women – supported by the Irish Family Planning Association – argued before the court last December that they were subject to indignity, stigmatisation and ill-health as a result of being forced to travel abroad for their abortions.

The Government, however, robustly defended the laws and said that Ireland’s abortion laws were based on “profound moral values deeply embedded in Irish society”.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/1210/1224285194291.html

MARGO MacDonald today urged MSPs to heed the strength of public opinion behind her “right-to-die” bill when it is debated in Holyrood this Thursday after polls showed an approval rating of 77 per cent.

The independent Lothians MSP, who has Parkinson’s disease, is championing the End of Life Assistance Bill which would allow people whose lives had become intolerable because of terminal illness or a degenerative condition to ask for help to end their lives.

A VisionCritical poll of 1001 Scots was announced today revealing that 77 per cent of those questioned on the matter were in favour of some form of euthanasia for the terminally ill. Only 12 per cent were against with 11 per cent undecided.

Ms MacDonald said she hoped MSPs would recognise the groundswell of support for her bill, which is at an early stage of legislation, and allow it to progress. She also criticised an opposition group Care Not Killing for “distorting” details of the bill.

Full article: http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/Margo-MacDonald-takes-heart-from.6636018.jp

WALES has taken another step towards becoming the first part of the UK to change the law on organ donation.

The Assembly Government is drafting a legislative competence order (LCO) to transfer powers to Wales to introduce a “soft” opt-out system.

If successful, this would allow the next Assembly Government to change the law.

In a written statement to the National Assembly, Mrs Hart said officials are making “good progress” on the LCO.

… Campaigners believe an opt out system will increase the number of organs for transplantation and prevent people dying while on the waiting list.

Full article: http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/2010/11/18/organ-donation-opt-out-a-step-closer-in-wales-91466-27673680/

An editorial in the Independent backs presumed consent for organ donation.

The British Medical Association and the British Heart Foundation both want to switch to a system of presumed consent, where it is assumed everyone is willing to donate unless they opt out. In the past that idea has met with hostility, partly out of squeamishness, partly because many feel the state is untrustworthy to administer these matters. But countries that use this system have 25-30 per cent more organs available for transplant. Surveys show that 90 per cent of Britons support organ donation and yet the law currently assumes the opposite. Since only 23 per cent of the population have registered their wish to donate, thousands of bodies are buried or cremated with viable organs simply because people never got around to making their wishes known.

Full article: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/leading-articles/leading-article-the-case-for-presuming-consent-2125450.html

Western Australia would be the first state in Australia to initiate opt-out organ donor laws, if a new proposal underway in the state is successfully passed. At the current point of time the only such law in Australia is an opt-in program, in which a person has to opt-in, in order to automatically donate their organs after death.

At the current point of time, there are only 16% people living in Western Australia, who are a part of the national organ donor register. If the proposal is passed, then all Western Australians would have to automatically donate their organs for transplant, until unless they sign an opt-out form to withdraw their consent from organ donation.

Continues: http://www.topnews.co.uk/214736-donor-laws-witness-sea-change-western-australia

In his new book The Moral Landscape, Sam Harris claims that science ‘reveals’ values to us. Kwame Anthony Appiah is one of the many who have pointed out that Harris makes the common mistake of seeking to derive an ‘ought’ from a series of mere ‘is’ statements, a mistake pointed out by David Hume centuries ago.

But the relationship between natural science and normative ethics does raise interesting questions. Let’s assume that Harris is correct in thinking that the right action is that which maximizes overall well-being, and assume also that well-being consists in the greatest balance of pleasure over pain. Pleasantness and painfulness are properties that scientists — psychologists in particular, but others too — can talk about, and if we assume that these properties can be measured in some way or other, then we find that the property that makes actions right is a property that can be studied by natural science.

But what is the relation between rightness and the property of maximizing well-being? In recent years, several naturalistically inclined philosophers have been inclined towards identifying them. So, just as heat turns out to be the same as molecular kinetic energy, so rightness turns out to be the same as maximizing well-being.

Full article: http://www.practicalethicsnews.com/practicalethics/2010/10/science-and-morality.html

You can find Sam Harris’ The Moral Landscape in the BHA Amazon store.

I certainly thought the charge sheet against the pope was a robust one. He is guilty as charged on his opposition to condoms, abortion and equal right for homosexuals, and on the lamentable response to the child-abuse scandal. But it does not follow from the fact that you feel strongly about something and have a right to speak about it, that you therefore should always make as much noise as possible.

Consider for a moment why almost every secular, liberal-minded person thought that Pastor Terry Jones was wrong to plan to burn Qur’ans on the anniversary of 9/11. Most would agree he has a right to his views and to express them through legal, peaceful protest. Most non-Muslims would say that burning a Qur’an is not in itself immoral. Still, they recognised the protest was a bad idea, and not just because of the risk of inciting violence. The main problem is that by burning the holy book of all Muslims, the protest would fail to target jihadist murderers and would be seen as vehemently anti-Islam. Bridges, not just books, would be burned.

The kinds of protests against the pope we’re seeing in the UK do not, of course, match the idiocy of Jones’s pyrotechnics. But they too are creating divisions at a time when mutual understanding is already at a low, and – as the alleged terror plot exposed yesterday shows – religious tensions are at a high.

…

I am glad that people are protesting on the key issues that the pope has got very wrong. If only a few people were doing so I might have felt it necessary to sign the petition. But when everyone starts piling in, it is perfectly reasonable for others to say it is time to back off before it gets too ugly. Party lines are the death of rational, free-thought movements: divided we stand, united we fall.

Full article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/sep/17/pope-benedict-visit-protest-ugly

On the day the Pope’s speech to a waiting Britain spoke of “extremist atheism” and belittled secularism and secular morality, we publish Leo Igwe’s speech to the Free Society Institute from last Saturday, about humanist values and secularism in Africa and the world.

Leo Igwe (pictured speaking in London last year)

Leo Igwe delivered the opening address to the 2nd Annual conference of the Free Society Institute of South Africa, co-hosted by the International Humanist and Ethical Union, on Saturday 11 September 2010. This is the full text of his speech.

Dear Friends,

I am glad to be back in South Africa and good to see you all. Thank you for inviting me to deliver the opening of this conference. Once again the FSI has demonstrated its commitment to the mission of promoting free thought and free speech in South Africa. Last year we all met in this hall for the first conference of this Institute co-hosted by the International Humanist and Ethical Union. And I must say that last year’s event remains one of the best humanist programs I have attended in Africa. I was deeply impressed by the quality of the presentations, debates, and discussions. I was inspired by the curiosity for ideas, search for truth, hunger for knowledge, the spirit of inquiry, critical thinking and openmindedness expressed by the participants. I left South Africa deeply convinced that this nation has got in the FSI a befitting humanist group. So I urge you not to relent in your efforts, commitment and support for the FSI and its mission of promoting free thought and free speech in South Africa. I hope that very soon your organisation will be reckoned with as one of the most active and vibrant humanist groups on this continent and in the world.

The emergence of humanist groups in Africa opens a new, exciting and promising chapter in the history of African emancipation and enlightenment. The struggle to promote humanism marks another phase in the struggle by Africans for independence and liberation. It opens another chapter in the quest by Africans for emancipation from mental slavery and other forms of slavery. It marks another defining moment in the struggle by African people for intellectual liberation and mental freedom, for true renaissance and enlightenment.

There are few countries on this continent where active humanist groups like this exist. There are few places in Africa where humanists and free thinkers can meet openly to discuss, interact and express themselves without fear. Even in my own country, Nigeria, there are states(in Northern Nigeria) where events like this will be met with death and destruction. Millions of Africans still live in societies or under conditions where they fear to speak their minds or to express their thoughts freely. That tells us how important this meeting is and why we should not relent in taking this message of hope and renewal beyond Cape Town, to all states in South Africa. That tells you how significant the work you are doing at the FSI is and the potentials in terms of change, transformation and civilization. I hope the FSI will continue to lead the way in terms of promoting free thought and free speech in South Africa and in Africa as a whole. I hope this Institute will continue to champion the cause of realizing a free society in this country. It is only when a society is free that it can fully realize its potentials.

This conference is taking place on a crucial day and date in the history of the world-September 11. Nine years ago some terrorists hijacked planes and caused the death of at least 3000 people in the US. Similar attacks have been planned and executed in other parts of the world.

We are meeting here at a time the forces of religious fanaticism are ravaging the globe, causing suicide bombing, death and destruction, conflicts and instability in many countries. We are gathered here at a time millions of people around the world are living in fear for their lives, safety and security- in the air, on the land and on the seas- due to threats posed by religious fanatics. We are meeting here at the time a new dark age looms around the globe; at a time theocratic governments have taken their jihads and crusades to the United Nations. This conference is taking place at a time people in most countries are confused- or are being confused -as to what constitutes the best moral guide.

The issue of what should be the best guide to moral clarity for humanity stares the world on the face. And we need an atmosphere of freethought and free speech to consider, tackle and resolve it. We need an atmosphere that is free from threats from fanatics, terrorists, suicide bombers, jihadists, religious mercenaries and other armies of God to chart out moral path and discuss, debate, dialogue and decide what is best for ourselves.

To the question that brought us here today – Is secular viewpoint our best guide to moral clarity? My answer is yes. The secular, not religious, outlook provides us a veritable framework for the expression and realization of moral excellence. Because secular viewpoint is based on evidence, on reason, science, common sense and human beneficence. The secular outlook is open to revision and improvement. Secular morality is a morality for this world and of this world, not for the next; it is a morality for our happiness and well being in the here and now, not in the hereafter. It is a morality for this temporary life not for an eternal afterlife in an imaginary paradise. Secular morality is a morality by us, from us and for us, not a moral decree of God from God and for us ‘wretched’ humans. Secular morality is informed by the quest to be good and to do good for goodness sake, not the quest to be good and to do good for God’s sake or for heaven’s sake or to avoid going to Hell.

Simply put, secular morality is a common sense morality. Secular viewpoint put human moral destiny in human hands, not in the hands of god, godmen and women. But we must note that both secular and religious outlooks are human creations. They are human viewpoints with human limitations. But advocates of religious outlook continue to cause confusion by denying this fact.They have done humanity a great disservice by refusing to tell the world the truth and by lying that the religious moral norms are decrees and commandments handed down as eternal and unchangeable guide for humanity from above ages ago. And it is this dogmatic lie and others told in the name of God, Allah… by the self acclaimed prophets and messengers of the ‘most high’that are responsible for the lack of moral clarity in the religious viewpoint. It is these sacred myths, falsehoods and misconceptions peddled by the supernatural faiths that morally disqualified religions as the best guide for humanity.

A brief analysis of the September 11 attack- what could have motivated the islamist attackers- may help us shed some light on the confusion and contradictions embedded in the religious moral outlook- the dangers religion’s lack of moral clarity poses to the future and survival of humanity, and the risks we human beings run by allowing moral norms guided by supernaturalism, blind faith, primitive superstitions and dogmas to guide the society.

No doubt those who planned and carried out the September 11 attacks must have judged their mission to be morally right- yes morally upright by their own standards –and I should say by the standards of religious morality.

I dont think the terrorists were really anomic individuals, unaware of the pain, agony, death and destruction their actions could cause. The September 11 attackers were not really bereft of conscience, compassion and fellow feeling. Instead I think the terrorists considered doing such grevious harm to their fellow human beings as consistent with their sacred sense of what is good or right; what ought to be done. The religous outlook actually thrives on sacrificing the natural or the human on the altar of the supernatural and the superhuman. Remember the story of the Biblical Abraham whose idiotic and condemnable attempt to sacrifice the son was reckoned as a demonstration of faith. So we must understand this warped sense of morality or sanctity if we are to tackle and eradicate religion and faith based terrorism in the world. We must strive to rid our minds of thess dirty and blood sucking gods that undermine the moral health of our society.

The terrorists believed that their actions were pleasing to Allah who would reward them abundantly for their deeds in the hereafter. Take note of that, reward in the hereafter –whatever that is-72 virgins (are these virgins really men or momen), a palatial home in the divine mansion in the paradise(I dont know exactly)is the driving force of religious morality.

For the Septmber 11 attackers and those who uphold religous moral viewpoint,what is deemed morally good is what is pleasing to Allah or better what is judged or considered(by who?)to be pleasing to Allah; what ought to be done is what Allah says, directs and commands – sometimes through the prophets, priests and sheikhs etc. Or what is said, directed or decreed in Allah’s, Jesus’ or God’s name. And already these commandments and norms are codified in the sacred texts- Torah, Bible, Quran- and traditions, which everyone is expected read, believe and follow without question as regards the author, source or authenticity. Thus, on hearing that hackneyed expression, In Jesus name’ ‘Thus says the Lord or Allah”, Or ‘In the name of Allah, the most gracious and most merciful’, one should be ready to swing into action without minding the consequences to oneself or to others.The religious moral viewpoint is insensitive to our feelings, to human feelings. Because the ‘words’ (or better, supposed words) of God or Allah are ‘yes’ and ‘amen’ and should be obeyed without question, hesitation or examination.

Because Allah-an entity from nowhere, somebody that is nobody- is taken to be the best moral guide for everyone including those who do not believe in him or her. So whatever s/he says or is believed to have said- no matter how stupid it is- holds or must hold everywhere and for everybody in secula seculorum (forever and ever). It is believed that Allah had charted the moral path. Even when there is no consensus among the religious as to what this moral path is. Our duty as human beings is to follow, obey and abide by this recieved moral code. That reminds me of a hymn that is sang in many christian churches. It goes this way:

Trust and obey. For there’s no other way.

To be happy in Jesus. But to trust and obey….

And the question is this – Trust and obey who? An imaginary entity?

Why should I trust and obey him or her or it? Trust and obey what? Texts from questionable sources written centuries ago by ignorant people? Should I trust and obey somebody who should not be trusted? Should I just obey orders that are stupid and harmful?

As I noted above, the religious moral viewpoint is mired in vagueness and lack of moral clarity. It has caused many people to abandon doing good, and trying to be good. Instead most people spend (I actually mean waste) much of this short life obeying God or trying to please God. Human beings will continue to wallow in moral confusion and darkness until the advocates of religious viewpoints stop peddling those ‘revealed lies and falsehoods’.

In conclusion, human beings can be good without believing in God. We can be moral without the pretensions of primitive religions. There is no doubt about it. Infact the whole idea of god came about in the attempt by primitive humans to promote and enforce what they concieved to be good-good life and good behaviour. So the religious moral outlook is largely outdated. God is actually a corruption of the good, not the author and dictator of what is good. God has no moral capacity. It does not have the capacity to judge, reward or recognize what is good or evil. Those who think otherwise are greatly mistaken. And it is this mistake that is at the root of religions’ lack of moral clarity. Human beings created God and invested it with all the human and moral attributes in their quest for some order, stability and ‘sanity’ in the primitive times. And religions have blindly adopted this primitive idea of organizing and understanding the world and society. Unfortunately many people across the world want these outdated myths and misconceptions to be the basis of our laws, policies, educational and justice systems in this 21st century. They want the world to continue to wallow in moral vagueness, obscurity and darkness. Humanity needs the best moral guide to make the best of this one life we have. And I hope that with programs like this we can initiate the much needed process of enlightening and morally reawakening people around globe to realize that the secular viewpoint presents us with the best guide to moral clarity.

I wish you all very fruitful deliberations.

Leo Igwe is the International  Humanist and Ethical Union representative in West Africa and Executive Director of the Nigerian Humanist Movement.

A BBC documentary on homeopathy in the NHS in Scotland. Interviewees claim that “magic water” cures cancer, and the BBC reveals how, with no clinical evidence, NHS funding is being spent on homeopathic remedies in Scotland at ten times the level of England.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00tvfw1/Magic_or_Medicine_Homeopathy_and_the_NHS/

Homeopaths in Scotland are offering alternatives to vaccinations that doctors say could leave patients vulnerable to potentially fatal diseases, according to a BBC investigation.

Three alternative practitioners told a BBC investigation they gave patients a homeopathic medicine designed to replace the MMR vaccine.

The documentary also discovered the Scottish NHS is spending more money per person on homeopathy than in England.

The investigation examined claims that members of the Homeopathic Medical Association, which has around 300 members across the UK, were offering replacement vaccines. It approached the association’s six members in Scotland.

Doctors said the replacement of vaccines such as MMR with homeopathic alternatives and remedies was “extremely worrying”.

Dr Vivienne Nathanson, the British Medical Association’s director of science and ethics, told the programme: “Replacing proven vaccines, tested vaccines, vaccines that are used globally and we know are effective with homeopathic alternatives where there is no evidence of efficacy, no evidence of effectiveness, is extremely worrying because it could persuade families that their children are safe and protected when they’re not.

“And some of those children will go on to get the illness.”

http://www.nursingtimes.net/specialist-news/primary-care-news/homeopathic-vaccinations-could-leave-patients-vulnerable/5019224.article

In advance of the pope’s visit, clergymen and commentators are deploying every variety of bogus argument against those who advocate the superiority of secularism. Edmund Adamus, director of pastoral affairs for the Catholic diocese of Westminster, led the way when he denounced the “wasteland” secularism produced. If he had been condemning the atheist tyrannies of communism and fascism, I would have no complaint. However, Adamus was not objecting to Cuba, China or North Korea, but to the wasteland of secular, democratic Britain “with its ever-increasing commercialisation of sex, not to mention its permissive laws advancing the ‘gay’ agenda”.

Rightwing columnists and, depressingly but predictably in these appeasing times, leftwing journalists have joined the moaning chorus. The arguments of Geoffrey Robertson QC and Professor Richard Dawkins that the cops had grounds to ask the pope to account for his church’s failure to stop the rape of children in its care drove them wild. “The hysterical and abusive nature of some of the attacks on the pope will do nothing but discredit secularism,” said Andrew Brown in theGuardian. “I accept, of course, that lots of secular humanists are tolerant and reasonable people,” says the more restrained and judicious Stephen Glover of the Mail. “But there is a hard core which embraces and promotes atheism with the blind fervour of religious zealots.”

Full article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/sep/12/pope-benedict-atheism-secularism

BHA Chief Executive Andrew Copson and Humanist Philosophers member Simon Blackburn debate Richard Harries on Encounter for ABC Radio National (Australia). The question posed by Wendy Barnaby is whether the West has lost its idea of civic virtue. It’s an interesting debate which gets to the heart of much of the tension between conservative and progressive visions of social morality today.

Andrew Copson: It’s not true that society has forgotten, that politicians have forgotten, that individual citizens have forgotten how to think about things in a moral way, how to think about things in a values-rich way. … You cannot sit through a debate, certainly in the Westminster Parliament, on any subject and not hear ethical questions being addressed-implicitly almost all the time, and explicitly more often than you think. So it isn’t true that some rampant commercialist, materialist, individualist, economy-centred secularism has shrivelled and wizened our public space down to some sort of valueless prune and that we need to pump it up with all the good juices again of old-time religion. It’s just not true. It’s not true that we need religion to revive public values, and in part one of the reasons that it’s not true is that there hasn’t been a decline in public values in the way that propagandists for a reintroduction of religion into public life like to claim.

You can listen and read a full transcript at: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/encounter/stories/2010/2951160.htm

Every Wednesday morning at Randwick Public School normal classes are suspended so that our nine-year-old son and the other children can be taken off to scripture lessons.

The compulsory allocation of time for religious instruction has been a feature of our state schools for more than 100 years. But a growing number of parents, for a variety of reasons, do not send their children to scripture. Some are non-believers and do not want their children to be told the Bible is historical fact. Others complain that little children should not be traumatised by stories of the crucifixion or the threat of spending eternity ”burning in hell”.

No reliable statistics are available, but it is estimated that about 25 per cent of primary school children now opt out of scripture; in some schools it may be as high as half. They occupy themselves by watching videos, going to the library or, I am told at one school, picking up rubbish.

This year we were offered a refreshing alternative. After seven years of agitation, the New South Wales Education Department agreed to trial ethics classes during scripture time as an option for children. Our school was one of the 10 involved in the trial, which finished at the end of the last term. The classes, designed by Associate Professor Philip Cam of the University of NSW, were run by volunteers: parents who undertook training organised by the St James Ethics Centre.

The weekly topics were designed to encourage children in inquiry rather than instruction, and related to everyday issues such as fairness, lying, telling the truth, virtues, vices and what it takes to lead a good life. The classes were not offered to my son’s year, but parents have told me the trial was an overwhelming success and, most importantly, the children loved it. When asked for their feedback, some children expressed disappointment they could not return to the ethics course next term. Some complained that returning to non-scripture classes would be boring.

Continues: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/churches-dont-have-monopoly-on-good-life-20100712-107sr.html

Guilt, as all right-minded people know, is the unpleasant feeling that one has done something wrong. The source of this feeling, clearly, is one’s conscience. But how is one’s conscience formed?

Cardinal Newman, whom Pope Benedict will beatify when he comes to England in September, believed that God wired the human conscience, making right and wrong the same in any time or place. His, however, is now a minority view. Many more now agree with last year’s bus poster campaign, devised by the British Humanist Association and supported by Richard Dawkins, which proclaimed: ‘There is probably no God’.

Gone, then, from our collective consciousness is not just the vengeful God of the Old Testament, or the gentler but still judgmental Jesus. Now an anarchic libido is all the rage.

‘Stop worrying and enjoy your life’ was the advice appended to the posters.

Full article: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1290607/What-Mafia-Sex-And-The-City-teach-guilt.html

I respect Jane Campbell and others’ desire to prolong their lives and make no judgment call on anyone else’s quality of life. Sadly, I feel this respect is not always reciprocated. Her argument against assisted dying for terminally ill people when distilled is no different from those who trump the sanctity of life above the wishes of those who want to have the choice of an assisted death. Campbell and other anti-choice campaigners seek not only to judge the quality of my death, but to impose their views on me and many others at the end of life – a survey of 3,000 deaths by Professor Clive Seale found that almost one in 10 dying patients asked for help to die.

I am dying of pancreatic cancer. I wish I wasn’t. But dying isn’t a failure on my part, it is part of life. I wish to live as long as possible, but not at the expense of enduring an undignified death. In the final days or weeks of my life, if I consider my suffering to be unbearable, I would like the choice to die at home at a time of my choosing surrounded by my loved ones.

Full article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jun/09/assisted-death-should-be-respected

More on the creation of “a new kingdom” of synthetic life. Ken MacLeod gets in early with some preemptive answers to ethical questions.

But there are no new ethical problems here. Humanity has been playing God with animals and plants since the invention of agriculture, and our domesticated species are already the most prevalent (of their kind) on the planet. Venter has, in a neat reverse application of the precautionary principle, promoted bioethical debate about each step of his programme well before he carried them out. The dangers – of bio-error or bio-terror – may be great, but not in principle greater than those posed by natural organisms put to evil or casual use. The potential benefits, by contrast, are greater in principle. This at least is the conclusion that the United States regulatory authorities have reached. Their reasoning should not be taken uncritically, but neither should it be dismissed with a “They would say that, wouldn’t they?”

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/may/21/synthetic-life-playing-god