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Michael Shermer Publishes Journal Article Promoting "Enlightenment Humanism," But Overlooks Basic Philosophy 101 Concepts

7/21/2017

28 Comments

 
​This week, Skeptic magazine publisher Michael Shermer promoted an article he published in Theology and Science (full text here) which constitutes a “manifesto” for “Enlightenment humanism.” The article is an extension of Shermer’s ongoing quest to universalize his own preferences and to argue that the traditional (read: midcentury) American values of his childhood are somehow encoded into the fabric of the universe. 
​The most obvious of Shermer’s blind spots is the fact that he cannot see a difference between scientific conclusions and moral imperatives. We’ve discussed this many times before, so it doesn’t bear too much repeating. Shermer argues that science provides data about moral decisions, and consequently the decisions made in consultation with that data are guided by “objective” reality and are therefore objectively correct moral decisions. This is prima facie stupid. Scientific investigation can tell us the potential consequences of a given policy, but it cannot tell us whether it is “right” to enact the policy. That is a subjective moral judgment that has no connection to scientific fact. For example, a scientific analysis can tell us that a given policy might save X lives if enacted, or Y dollars if not enacted, but it cannot tell us whether saving lives or money is more morally justified. Shermer, however, believes that there are universally applicable rules that can do just that.
 
This time, Shermer fudges his absolutism a little bit by celebrating Enlightenment humanism as the one philosophy that is informed by science and therefore best justified by the objective facts uncovered through science. “The application of scientific naturalism in the human realm led to the widespread adoption of Enlightenment humanism, a cosmopolitan worldview that places supreme value on science and reason, eschews the supernatural entirely and relies exclusively on nature and nature’s laws, including human nature.” This might have been humanism’s self-justification (cf. the Declaration of Independence) but it is not actually true in practice, for nature’s laws are exquisitely subjective, with the observer deciding how to define what is “natural” and “unnatural.” Shermer likes to use simple examples—such as whether to choose to combat disease—but tends to skip over more ambiguous applications. Just as an example, humanists have had a devil of a time deciding whether sodomy is “natural” because it seems to violate the presumed “purpose” of genitals and yet is nearly universal. The ambiguity of the term “natural”—with its implication that nature is both moral and good, something belied by predation and poison—allows a great deal of subjectivity to pass under the name of “objective” morality.
 
But Shermer makes plain his real concern partway through when his high-minded discussion of Enlightenment values takes a nosedive into the parochial concerns of university humanities departments, which Shermer loves for their connection to humanism and hates for their embrace of postmodernism:
Because humanism as a movement became political in the late twentieth century, moving away from its roots in science and objective truth and toward progressive liberal politics and activism. And because at a time when students and funding are fleeing humanities departments, and support for and membership in humanist organizations is dwindling because they’ve alienated all those who do not share their narrow political agenda, the argument that humanism and the humanities are at least good for “self-cultivation” misses their real value, which Bod has forcefully articulated in his 2014 book, The Forgotten Sciences: A History of the Humanities.
​Following his foray into explaining why he would stand against postmodernism by attempting to revitalize the humanities in the image of the natural sciences, he proceeds to argue, unconvincingly, that humanism’s use of science created the objectively correct choice to end slavery, expand civil rights to women and minorities, restrict animal cruelty, etc.—as though the people who enacted the moral evils of the past did not think themselves justified by objective truth. As late as the twentieth century, “science” and “reason” were used to justify discrimination through appeal to the “objective” inferiority of women and minorities.
 
But the fact of the matter is that the social change that Shermer attributes to dispassionate scientific evaluation was just as often the result of emotion, imitation, and convenience—a much more ambiguous legacy. Animal rights are a case in point. The Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II was a child of the Enlightenment, and it certainly shaped his values, but he didn’t act on them through facts and evidence but through ideology and emotion. When Austrian crown lands banned extreme forms of animal cruelty it was not because scientists concluded that cruelty was a moral evil but because the Emperor witnessed cruelty outside his window and was horrified to watch the peasants take pleasure in it. His revulsion was emotional, not rational, born of the values the Enlightenment inculcated rather than dispassionate reason. Similarly, Shermer is rather shortsighted in celebrating the United States Founders for what he says was the scientific spirit of trying things to see what works and checking the results. “Think about the 50 different states, each with its own constitution and set of laws. These are 50 different experiments.” Yeah, well, so were the hundreds of minor territories that made up the patchwork confederations of medieval feudalism. (Each territory of the Holy Roman Empire, for example, had its own traditional customs and laws, guaranteed by imperial edict.) They, too, tried things and imitated that which worked. This isn’t science in action since it occurred before Shermer’s beloved humanism, nor is democracy a prerequisite for federalism. The Austro-Hungarian Empire had a form of it, and it was a quasi-constitutional monarchy.
 
To his credit, Shermer tries to deal with the criticisms of his contentions, highlighting the is-ought problem and the problem of equating “natural” with “good”:
I think some confusion arises here from what is meant by is or natural. For example, I would agree that the statement, there has always been war, so war must be natural and the way things ought to be, is a fallacy. But here I mean something different by is. I mean the true condition or nature or cause of a thing. When we undertake a study of war in order to understand its causes so that we may lessen its occurrence and attenuate its effects, this is an is-ought transition grounded in the true nature of war. And by nature I do not just mean the biological propensity (or not) of humans to fight. I mean all of the factors that go into the causes of war: biology, psychology, geography, culture, politics, economics, ideology, etc. That is the is we want to understand so that we can do something about it (the ought). In this sense, if morals and values ought not to be based on the way something is--reality—then on what should they be based?
​Did you catch the assumption in there? Shermer assumes that we all agree that war is by definition bad and should be avoided or eliminated. This may be a widespread assumption among modern Westerners, but it is not a prima facie true fact. Cultures that value the individual, as ours does, will likely see war as bad because it takes untold lives and restricts the freedom of individuals. But cultures that value the collective may not agree because they might see the individual life as unimportant compared to the continued success of the society as a whole, a success guaranteed by war. Science cannot tell us which view is “objectively” correct. So even if we grant Shermer all of his conceits and agree that morals and values should rely on science to support their conclusions, science still cannot tell us which morals and values to hold. All Shermer has done is to try to justify his own preferred values with an appeal to science, as though other moral systems could not be justified in similar ways.
 
Thus, when Shermer tries to argue that the universe itself has universal rules of right and wrong, he descends into a parody of a freshman overly enamored with an introductory philosophy course. Consider this: Shermer contends that there are three principles that “prove” that moral values can be derived objectively from scientific laws. These are as follows:
 
First, that there is a “Principle of Moral Good”: “Always act with someone else’s moral good in mind, and never act in a way that it leads to someone else’s moral loss (through force or fraud).” This so-called principle, which is actually a more specific and thus less defensible version of Kant’s categorical imperative, wouldn’t stand through a freshman philosophy course. Must we act with Hitler’s moral good in mind when speaking with him, or is it sufficient to have the Jews’ moral good in mind while treating Hitler in a way that leads to moral loss? Who defines the correct “someone”? Must we always put ourselves last? In what universe do the quarks and protons and molecules, and rocks, and stars give two shits about what one hominin says or does in the presence of another in one random corner of space-time? (You can see my influence from Lovecraft! But that doesn’t make it a wrong question.)
 
Second, that “morality involves how our thoughts and actions effect the survival and flourishing
of sentient beings.” This is another slipshod, solipsistic claim. The universe has no interest in sentience and would indifferently wipe us out through random chance. Even among human beings, this moral principle leads inexorably to ridiculous conclusions: e.g., that we would be justified in executing 10% of our population so long as it meant that the rest of us live longer and better lives and can prolong the species by conserving resources.
 
However, Shermer cops out on this by adding a third rule, which I will paraphrase as it truly is and then give in his fancy wording: Third, that Western individualism is the only scientifically justified lifestyle. Or, as Shermer gussies it up: “The survival and flourishing of individual sentient beings is the foundation for establishing values and morals, and so determining the conditions by which sentient beings best survive and flourish ought to be the goal of a science of morality.” To do so, Shermer offers this justification, with all its paradoxes:
…given that moral principles must be founded on something natural instead of supernatural, and that science is the best tool we have for understanding the natural world, applying evolutionary theory to the ultimate foundation of morality, it seems to me that it is individual sentient beings that is our starting point because (1) the individual is the primary target of natural selection in evolution; and (2) it is the individual who is most effected by moral and immoral acts.
​The trouble is that evolution doesn’t act on individuals; it is a force that governs populations. The individual is not the “target” of natural selection but the random victim of its blind action. The individual lives or dies based on random chance, but (barring an individual who carries a new mutation) no one individual’s life or death makes much of a difference to evolution over the size of a population and the timeframes involved. Instead, Shermer is projecting into the realm of science the individualism of Western societies, one that sits uneasily with the collectivist bent of evolutionary theory. Indeed, just from the perspective of trying to match science with philosophies of roughly similar character, the emphasis on the population over the individual and collective fitness better fits with East Asian communitarian systems, where the good of the population of a whole is prioritized, just as evolution ruthlessly favors the species over the temporary individual—and isn’t too kind to species either!
 
It's frustrating to read Shermer’s efforts at philosophy because he speaks with the confidence of the dilettante, convinced that he has discovered the key to philosophy that has eluded the greatest minds in the field for thousands of years. It is doubly frustrating that he is unable to understand that human preference and even so-called human nature does not translate into universal moral rules discoverable through science. If he had confined himself to arguing that his system, as simplistic as it is, was merely the best, the most efficient, or the fairest way to make moral decisions, I doubt I would have paid it much mind. But by claiming that science itself can discover moral rules and then basing that claim on his own myopic preferences as a wealthy, educated, twenty-first century American, he accidentally proves the point the postmodernists, despite their absurd and indefensible excesses, wanted to make: Moral and ethical values are a figment of the human imagination, and right and wrong are relative. Systems designed to be “objective” merely reflect the values of those who design them.
28 Comments
Only Me
7/21/2017 10:41:17 am

Michael Shermer doesn't sound terribly bright. I don't think it gets better from here.

Reply
TONY S. link
7/21/2017 01:07:36 pm

Reply
TONY S.
7/21/2017 01:09:11 pm

The man couldn't even convincingly discredit Graham Hancock's silly ideas in a face to face debate.

Reply
Shane Sullivan
7/21/2017 11:58:47 am

"(1) the individual is the primary target of natural selection in evolution; and (2) it is the individual who is most effected by moral and immoral acts."

This seems a rather arbitrary cutoff point. The "individual"? Why not the cell? That's where the genotype, the real "target" (by way of phenotype) of natural selection, is found, and is arguably more effected by moral and immoral acts.

Reply
TONY S.
7/21/2017 01:15:48 pm

"...he cannot see a difference between scientific conclusions and moral imperatives."

Shermer was already in too much of a fatally flawed position to even think about beginning this type of discussion. He was finished before he started.

Reply
Americanegro
7/21/2017 04:16:40 pm

Sodomy is "nearly universal"? Americanegress and I are going to have quite the conversation this Friday night.

We are machines for replicating DNA. That's the end of the story. Everything else is super enjoyable or super painful gravy.

Reply
Jason Colavito link
7/21/2017 05:04:19 pm

You know damned well that I mean that it is found in all times and all places, not that every individual engages in it.

Reply
What Scolter
7/21/2017 07:06:20 pm

So like appendicitis, birth defects, child rape and sunsets?

AT RISK'S ALTER EGO
7/21/2017 07:30:41 pm

What Scolter... yep, pretty much.

*SLOW CLAP*

Work that one out all by yourself, did ya?

kennethos
7/21/2017 10:36:42 pm

Jason, good to see some critical thoughts directed at Shermer. What I’ve heard of his personal life doesn’t exactly inspire me in terms of skeptical character. Appreciate you holding him to a standard.

Reply
Brian
7/22/2017 12:38:44 pm

Shermer's remarks about evolution and the individual are so far off the mark I have to wonder, did he ever read a book on evolution? Or sit through a decent lecture? Or even watch a National Geographic special? That's the sort of misreading I can't imagine a 10-year-old making.

(I do love, though, how every side of an argument, even the science deniers, try to get "science" to validate their opinions and emotions.)

If this is where the skeptical movement has ended up, then we are truly doomed to darkness. Maybe it's just a result of our less than optimal educational system. I will prefer to look at the broad trend ... and not at individuals. Perhaps Meslier's testament needs to be discussed a bit more.

Reply
Paul S.
7/22/2017 06:36:49 pm

Yeah, the idea that science by itself can give humanity a viable ethical code always struck me as misguided. The physical universe doesn't have ethical rules - those are things that people have to figure out for themselves.

Reply
Clynock
7/22/2017 10:07:16 pm

Shermer has written some good books and his skepticism is agreeable but sometimes I find him frustrating. As someone who's supposedly a sceptic, Shermer seems to sway where ever his political and personal ideas happen to be too often. Being sceptical about a sceptics claims, keep up the good work Jason.

Reply
Bill Morgan
7/23/2017 12:46:21 pm

Michael Shermer is a Credential Inflator and sock puppet disinformation agent for either the CIA or Mossad or both. Anyone who challenges the official government version of an event is automatically called a Conspiracy Theorist without any evaluation of the evidence by Shermer. If you challenge him with a truthful question, he will deflect the question and come back with a question of his own on a different topic. No one should believe him. His job is to obfuscate the nefarious actions of the Intelligence Agencies.

If you disagree, read the article below before you respond.

http://www.veteranstoday.com/2013/07/29/the-puppet-conspracy-theory-detector-michael-shermer/

Reply
Americanegro
7/23/2017 02:18:00 pm

Ah yes, the rascally omnipotent Jews. Jimi Hendrix and Bruce Lee? Both killed by Mossad. Jim Morrison? Mossad. Jon-Benet Ramsay? Mossad.

Reply
Bill Morgan
7/23/2017 02:36:18 pm

You did not read the article I referenced. And I don't dialog with people who present no evidence to substantiate what they have said which in your case is nonsense. You would not recognize a real conspiracy if it hit you in the head. Good by American Negro.

Americanegro
7/23/2017 04:11:16 pm

Actually I did read it and then I fell into my own footprint at the speed of gravity. If I never read about another Khazarian conspiracy it'll be too soon.

Dialog away my friend, just please stop killing Jimi Hendrix!

"In his correspondence to Joshua Blakeney and I, Michael Shermer made a point of denying an accusation we did not make. Shermer claimed he was not a CIA disinfo agent. While Dr. Shermer is not a real professor he frequently plays one on TV appearing, for instance, on the Colbert Report, Dateline, Charlie Rose, Larry King, TED, Oprah, CBC, and A and E. Shermer’s constant torquing of the term “conspiracy theorist” to discredit virtually all interpretations that are analytically skeptical of power’s top-down workings form part of a larger psychological operation whose basic structure is becoming more and more obvious. Jonathan Kay, Daniel Pipes, and David Aaronovitch are also important operatives instrumental in perpetrating this core psy op of the Global War on Terror. A key to their work is a slavish defense of Israeli foreign policy and the repetition of a string of associations equating all so-called “conspiracy theories,” but especially those involving 9/11, with “Holocaust Denial” and “Antisemitism.”"

CIA and Pentagon behind “over 800 major movies and more than 1,000 TV titles”
Australian 60 Minutes exposed the Worldwide Satanic Pedophile Network
MH17 was really MH370
“Dying CIA agent confesses to demolition of WTC-7” FAKE NEWS
The Khazarian Bankster Cult That Hijacked the World
The Hidden History of the Incredibly Evil Khazarian Mafia (Updated)
Israel Pushes Russia and US Toward Nuclear Confrontation Over Syria
The Holocaust Hoax is the Indispensable Centerpiece for the Khazarian Mafia
Origins of the largest Catholic Church pedophile bust in History
Pentagon: Trump presumably got “the Syrian chemical attack” lie from Israel
Take-down of the American Public School System and its Teachers
Want the Truth About What’s Going on in Syria? Listen to Father Daniël Maes
Russia to US officials: Get that through your heads—we’ve got nukes, too
Why Netanyahu Hates George Soros So Much
Russia: The US lied about North Korean mid-range missile
Israel blows up Syrian tank and wants World War III again
Real Reason Trump Jr. Met Russian lawyer
Vladimir Putin: Killing oligarchic schemes economically saved Russia
Is Trump about to dump Israel on Syria?
Russia calls Britain’s new aircraft carrier ‘convenient target’
Amelia Earhart – The Truth
Ukraine Collapses: Donetsk and Luhansk Republics Create their Own State
The U.S. Military Bases in Syria: the Reaction Was Not Slow in Coming
22 Billion Dollars found: Photos of a Mexican drug lord’s home after being raided
Demise of the Saudi Kingdom is approaching
Russia outsmarts the Neocon establishment and warmongers at the G20 meeting
Will the real Paul Joseph Watson please stand up?
False flag fails! ISIS defeated, “chemical weapons” hoax exposed
Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman: We want Assad out of Syria no matter what the cost
The Piri Reis Map – Theories Debunked
The Khazarian Bankster Cult That Destroyed Libya
Godfathers of War and the alien agendas
J-TV Documentary on the ‘Antisemitic’ Goyim (must watch)
Viral: Journalist Rips Trump at G20
Trump team is a major national security risk to the US
The New World Order ideology has infiltrated the medical field
Grenfell Tower investigation hires experts who proved that 1,113 9/11 victims were totally vaporized
The Real Reason Behind the Ultimatum to Qatar to Shut Down Turkish Military Base
Politico finally agrees with VT: Israel is pushing America into World War III
Mass-Murdering Clown Winston Churchill and Independence Day
Qatari princess having sex with seven men
Syrian Army about to Annihilate ISIL
The Unspeakable Crime of Viktor Orbán
Oliver Stone: Putin “bombed the shit” out of ISIS in Syria
Israel and America Push Terrorism and Nuclear War in Syria
Tick Tock… America is Dying
Massive US Airbase established in northern Syria
It was ISIS
It takes a fake person to be a fake president
The New Imperial Roman Empire

Joe Scales
7/25/2017 05:12:34 pm

Just an aside here after a visit to that site, but did you ever notice that Holocaust deniers all want it to happen again? Seem that, and a dearth of intelligence, are what binds them.

Joe Scales
7/24/2017 01:57:29 pm

Shermer a disinformation agent? I never saw him at any of the meetings.

Reply
Bill Morgan
7/24/2017 06:01:01 pm

Your critical thinking and analysis is very impressive. I'm blown away. When did you graduate from Kindergarten? Last year?

Americanegro
7/24/2017 06:46:58 pm

"Good by."

"Good by."

"Good by."

"Good by" on the internet means "Be on the lookout for my next post."

You're still not smart but that leads to you being very funny.

Joe Scales
7/25/2017 11:19:40 am

Kindergarten was some time ago Bill, but I'm fairly certain it was there where I learned how to spell "goodbye". Perhaps a refresher is in order for you, if you can keep your hands off the children.

Bill Morgan
7/23/2017 04:26:13 pm

What you said is not relevant to my main point. You don't seem to get my point, so I will spell it out for you. Michael Shermer is a disinformation hack working for the government. There, I spelled it out for you. Troll someone else. Good by.

Reply
Americanegro
7/23/2017 05:23:13 pm

Your rationale is "Shermer's not very smart and disagrees with me therefore he's part of a gubmint Jew conspiracy because I can't cope with life."

There are some skeptics who just disagree with everything without thinking much through, and you confuse those folks with Mossad disinformation agents. You're not smart.

Boo!

Reply
Bill Morgan
7/23/2017 07:33:32 pm

How can you get so many things wrong?

1 I agree that Shermer is an intelligent man.
2 I have never said anything about a "gubmint Jew conspiracy". You are the one that said that.
3 I'm coping very well in life. Had a successful 43 year career with a Fortune 100 global corporation in management.
4 I'm well educated with a BSIE, MBA and Ph.D. in management from Case Western Reserve.
5 If you don't realize the government engages in lies and cover-ups and can not be trusted to tell the truth, then you are very naive.

-

Americanegro
7/23/2017 08:32:07 pm

"I agree that Shermer is an intelligent man."

Agree with whom? I never said he was intelligent.

---

"I have never said anything about a "gubmint Jew conspiracy". "

You walked in the door saying it bro:

"Michael Shermer is a Credential Inflator and sock puppet disinformation agent for either the CIA or Mossad or both."

I will do you the twin courtesies of staying off your lawn and pointing my directed energy weapons away from your house.

Bill Morgan
7/23/2017 08:35:51 pm

You are hopeless. I have more important things to do. Good by.

Reply
Americanegro
7/23/2017 09:46:24 pm

"I have more important things to do."

Based on your obsessive posting today that's hard to believe.

"Good by American Negro."

"Good by."

"Good by."

Is Mossad is forcing you to post all those "Good by"s?

Reply

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