Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 37, No. 354.
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        Date: 2023-12-19 09:13:23+00:00
        From: Willard McCarty <willard.mccarty@mccarty.org.uk>
        Subject: greetings for the holidays

Some religious and otherwise significant holidays are celebrated at this
time of year. Some have already begun. In my part of the world the days
are short, gloomy, begin surprisingly late and end before we know it. In
others "the heat of Christmas", as one Australia author put it, is the
experience that drives some celebrants to the beach. Observance of the
cozy time in the gloom of London means that Humanist is bound to be
slower, perhaps not burden your inbox at all on some days.

As old-timers will know, it has been my habit since 1987 to send out a
Christmas message, but not only for that reason. Routine gets the job
done for most of the year, but at this time I like to stop for a moment
and reflect on what we do by this means. Even one dose of the 'news' is
sufficient to alert me to the rarity of the chance to engage in the
reasoned discourse that Humanist is here to foster. 

One nearby colleague, a philosopher, asked recently in a fine paper 
on perplexity in Aristotle and his search for the right questions,

> How far does our self-fulfilment through acquisition of pure
> knowledge license our setting aside or downplaying of personal, civil
> and educational responsibilities? (Jardine, forthcoming)

In 1902, Lenin asked of his fellow Bolsheviks, "What is to be done?" For
those who are not activists, for me, this and the Aristotelian question
amounts to 'How do we act by means of words?' Another colleague, an
anthropologist of Melanesia, responded to the situation (with climate
change in view) by suggesting that we look very closely at runaway
economic 'growth', or the imperative to pursue it, and unrestrained
human ingenuity. She traced what the politicians actually mean by
'growth' back to our valorisation of 'life' as a transcendental good, or
as Aristotle said at the beginning of Nicomachean Ethics, the Good for
which all things strive. Having read her paper, I became tuned to the
uses of 'growth', 'innovation' etc. in the news, and thought expansively
of what can be done, what is done, by means of words and how that might
be changed.

In other words, reasoned discourse can be very powerful if exercised
often and well enough. So here we are, with that tool in our hands.

A heavy one. May you have the opportunity to put it down, give it a rest
during the holidays, but then pick it up again and wield it for the Good.

All the very best this Yuletide, in the gloom or in the bright heat or
anyhow in between.

Cheers,
WM
--
Willard McCarty,
Professor emeritus, King's College London;
Editor, Interdisciplinary Science Reviews;  Humanist
www.mccarty.org.uk


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