Over the years humanism has helped shape our world. It has helped create many scientific theories and has moved our world forward in this area. As humanism and our world have advanced, people have become more and more focused on small things, which in some people’s eyes are the keys to being successful, at least in this time.
During my life I have been lucky enough to be taught a broader range of information and skills then most people. Instead of my teachers only teaching me the so-called fundamentals, I was also taught the importance of relationships with others. This however is not true for everyone and because of it the majority of our world is being narrowed.
The reason our views have become so narrowed is because people have put so much emphasis on things such as SAT scores, material gains and different techniques to achieve wealth and prosperity. Since most people are focused solely on these items our world has become single minded and therefore is not living up to its full potential.
Being an extremely gifted student or doing well on the SAT’s will only get you so far in life. There are other characteristics that are just as important if not more. These characteristics include how one interacts with other people and how they are mentally prepared for events in their lives.
Because people have forgotten to teach these skills to each other, our world has become a shadow of what it could be. We have become advanced in material things and we will continue to grow here, but how has our social world grown?
It hasn’t, in fact it has possibly declined over time. As our social skills have declined so has peoples lives in general. Only recently have people begun to understand the importance of our social abilities and in this event people are beginning to learn about them once more. It will take time for us to once more be accomplished in this area, but I am confident that if we continue to research and push ahead in this area our society will be a much better place and humanists will once again have the correct balance between social relationships and materialistic thoughts.
This was inspired by David Brooks article on humanism which can be viewed at the following link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/08/opinion/08brooks.html
The Age of Reason Blog 
Hi Nick. Great blog post! You raise a lot of really good points about not just valuing quantifiable success but also things in life that some would argue make us human- our relationships to others and how we interact in groups. I had one comment (it’s not really a question, I’m actually not sure what it is at all) on which I’d love to hear your input. Part of my understanding of humanism is that Greek and Latin texts were studied to better understand human nature, which to me seems like our human relationships would be a part of. It sounds like humanist study lead to a lot of advancement, which I understand your article to state is what pulled people apart. Do you think that the study of human nature made people less social? Sort of like how it’s argued that Facebook makes people antisocial….
Sorry if that’s confusing, and thanks for your post!
Molly
Hi Molly,
What I had meant in my writing was over time people have moved away from studying human nature and therefore we do not understand how to deal with relationships as much as we used to. I feel that if we continue to research this topic we won’t become antisocial, but our means of socializing may change.
Nick
Hey Nick, there seem to be some really interesting ideas here! What do you think the world will be like in 20-30 years when our generation is in its prime if the older generation does not fix the problems you mention? Do you think that we will be able to overcome our shortcomings, or do you think that we will be failures due to the points you highlight?
–Brian
Hey Brian,
I feel that within 20-30 years we will have become advanced in this area and I feel we will overcome our shortcomings. Even though we are not there right now we are not failures, we just have forgotten some of the important things one must learn in his or her life time.
Just a thought, but aren’t some of those statements a bit dramatic? I have a hard time seeing our society as a “shadow of it’s former self,” and it doesn’t seem like civilization is exactly hanging in the balance because we focus to much on SAT scores. Yes, society has changed, but we can’t really know whether or not that change is “bad” yet.
Hi Nick, I really enjoyed reading your blog post! It illustrated the importance of not only learning things like math and science, but also proper social skills and how to maintain healthy relationships. I was wondering how you think the world would be different if more emphasis was put on being taught social etiquette. Thanks!
This is really interesting, Nick! How do you think these choices will affect your college education? I’d be interested to know.
Janine