Beyond Dogma and Relativism: Scientific Skepticism Meets Secular Humanism

Rejecting both postmodern relativism and divine-command dogma, this piece argues for a third path: mixing scientific skepticism with secular humanism. Rather than reflexively “drinking the Kool-Aid,” it urges testing claims, valuing falsifiability, and grounding ethics in human flourishing. Scientific skepticism supplies method—doubt, evidence, reproducibility—while secular humanism supplies purpose—dignity, freedom, pluralism. The essay warns that political dogmatisms, including state-promoted atheism in China, mirror religious authoritarianism. It advocates evidence-based policy on climate, health, and technology; open inquiry; and empathy as civic virtues. In short: Galileo’s method meets the Universal Declaration’s ideals, uniting disciplined doubt with compassionate action within a naturalistic, fallibilist outlook for all.

“Humanism is a progressive philosophy of life that, without supernaturalism, affirms our ability and responsibility to lead ethical lives of personal fulfillment that aspire to the greater good of humanity.”

Humanist Manifesto III (2003)

“Science is more than a body of knowledge, it’s a way of thinking… a way of skeptically interrogating the universe with a fine understanding of human fallibility.”

Carl Sagan

“Evidence… is a good reason for believing something… Beware of ‘tradition,’ ‘authority,’ and ‘revelation.’”

Richard Dawkins

If someone just offers you Kool-Aid, do you simply reject it or accept dogmatically based on prior prejudice, or do you see the Kool-Aid as equal to milk, water, or coffee?

The relativism of the postmodernists never made much sense to me. The divine command of individuals adherent to faith-based systems did not either.

Extreme versions are found in relativist skepticism in one stream and fundamentalist religion in another. I never adhered to either. Inchoate, I had another option present in mind as an agnostic in reason and atheist in heart.

The opposites don’t work either for me. The opposition of a cultural relativist in many ways is an extreme chauvinist, whether what we falsely call the West or East. Their culture, for instance, is superior to all others. That makes little sense to me.

A third option from those first two, neither in-between nor much related to them, a mix of scientific skepticism and secular humanism. A sophisticated contemporary philosophical life stance and empirical moral philosophy. That seems more sensible to me.

In fact, the faith-based systems of a divine command theory can be replicated in formulations of political dogmatism, even state-promoted atheism under the Chinese Communist Party. Dogmatism is the root; political and religious fundamentalists are outgrowths.

A third option became more appealing. A scientifically skeptical stance to doubt, test, verify, and revise, to better comprehend objective reality. A secular humanist stance for freedom, flourishing, and human dignity without the appeal to the supernatural —to see objective reality as a naturalistic process.

Something like Galileo meets the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. A methodology emphasizing evidence and falsifiability with intellectual roots in empiricism, the scientific method, and Enlightenment rationalism. The aim is to distinguish reliable knowledge from deception, error, and superstition.

An ethic emphasizing a nontheistic philosophy grounded in ethics, reason, and justice, with its roots in classical humanism, the Enlightenment, and modern secularism. The aim is empathy and rational moral reasoning.

These two integrate toward the advancement of human understanding through collaborative testing, open discourse, and the correction of error. Secular humanists value human needs, empathy, and consequences rather than divine wrath or benevolence. Scientific skeptics inform ethics through data on well-being and harm.

Secular humanists find purpose in creativity, knowledge, love, and service, while scientific skeptics see awe and wonder in understanding the processes of the universe in an honest manner without the need to invent consoling myths.

Secular humanists find value in equal dignity, pluralism, and the advancement of secular governance, while scientific skeptics advocate policy that is grounded in evidence related to everything, whether climate science, public health, or technology ethics.

Secular humanism is grounded in an objective world and the assessment of conditions related to human suffering and particularly well-being. Scientific skepticism works for quantifying what can be quantified and conceptualized while, with epistemic humility, knowing its limits. An informed decision about individual and collective well-being is not necessarily a perfectly informed one. We are evolved organisms that are part of the natural world and, therefore, have limitations.

These essentially mix into a practice of disciplined doubt expressed through compassion and goodness pursued without the gods.

Just remember: If someone offers you Kool-Aid, appreciation for the gesture would be polite, but make sure it’s actually Kool-Aid first.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen is the publisher of In-Sight Publishing (ISBN: 978-1-0692343) and Editor-in-Chief of In-Sight: Interviews (ISSN: 2369-6885). He writes for The Good Men Project, International Policy Digest (ISSN: 2332–9416), The Humanist (Print: ISSN 0018-7399; Online: ISSN 2163-3576), Basic Income Earth Network (UK Registered Charity 1177066), A Further Inquiry, and other media. He is a member in good standing of numerous media organizations.