In this recording of Sept 16 2024 NAUA Academy meeting, Dr. Mark Reimers presents an overview of three stages of Humanism.
This recording, as well as all previous NAUA Academy session are available on the NAUA website
The roots of humanism lie in ancient wisdom literature, which reflected on justice, fate and the life well-lived. The Renaissance Humanists rediscovered that literature and advocated for the values of human life, especially clear thought, eloquence, and civic engagement. In the early twentieth century a group of Unitarian ministers advocated a liberal Christianity without a deity as the natural next stage of human evolution, and they claimed the name ‘humanism’ for their movement; but a century of wars and ongoing crises have undermined their confident dream of Progress. In the twenty-first century a new humanism integrates biology and behavioral science into a more pragmatic appraisal of the possibilities and hopes of human life.
How have these various humanisms addressed the perennial concerns of human life: love, meaning, morality, work, and death? What is humanism now? How will humanism evolve to address the challenges of our stone-age minds in a technological age?