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Humanism: Nature
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Humanism is optimistic regarding human nature and confident in human reason and science as the best means of reaching the goal of human fulfillment in this world. Humanists affirm that humans are a product of the same evolutionary process that produced all other living organisms and that all ideas, knowledge, values, and social systems are based upon human experience. Humanists conclude that creative ability and personal responsibility are strongest when the mind is free from supernatural belief and operates in an atmosphere of freedom and democracy.
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[T]wo of Humanism's greatest luminaries, Thomas Paine and Robert Ingersoll, maintained a hope for an afterlife. On the issue of whether God exists, Ingersoll was agnostic, and Paine believed in a deistic God who established the laws of nature but then stepped away and never intervenes in the world. Those beliefs did not interfere with their ability to lead outstanding humanistic lives.
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Humanism originated with the Renaissance. Its nature remains quite distinct from the twentieth century version.... Like modern humanists, Renaissance thinkers saw man as capable, a being able to make rational decisions. These decisions may be correct or incorrect -- right or wrong -- but they are individual decisions. Man can understand the world and make moral choices which affect his own destiny. Remember, the church taught (ala Augustine) that man could only sin and his choices were limited to choosing sin. Humanism contradicted Augustine.
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Humanism considers the universe to be the result of an enormously long and complex evolution under immutable laws of nature. Humanists affirm this natural world as being wondrous and precious and as offering limitless opportunities for exploration, fascination, creativity, companionship and joy.
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