Being Wrong: The Virtues of Humility and Doubt

Hugh Taft-Morales Leader, Philadelphia Ethical Society We all like to be right, but should we get more comfortable being wrong? So often we make truth claims and proceed to stake so much on them: our ego, our reputation, our power. Given that every person’s knowledge is limited, shouldn’t we let go of certainty and embrace [...]

Impeachment, Minority Rule, and the Future of Democracy

Kermit Roosevelt Prof. of Law, UPenn; and Author Donald Trump is the only President to have been impeached twice. In each case, the charge was an improper attempt to influence his own reelection. What can we learn from the impeachment? And how does it relate to the prospects for democratic self-governance under our Constitution? Kermit [...]

Exploring Freethought Feminist Helen Hamilton Gardener

Hugh Taft-Morales Leader, Philadelphia Ethical Society In honor of Women’s History Month, explore the life of freethinker and feminist Helen Hamilton Gardner. In partnership with freethinker Robert Ingersoll, Gardener railed against religious institutions that brutally oppressed women. Gardner became vice president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association and played an important role in bringing [...]

Partisanship, Fascism, and the Common Good

Rep. Jamie Raskin US Representative, Maryland's 8th District Congressman Jamie Raskin, (MD 8th District), recently won national acclaim for his role as lead impeachment manager for the 2nd impeachment of former President Trump, and as the primary author of the impeachment article which charged Trump with inciting an insurrection by sparking the storming of the [...]

Spring Festival

This Spring, come celebrate the season of renewal and new growth in humanist style with poetry, music, and community. Our Zoom gathering will be hosted by PES Leader Hugh Taft-Morales.   Join us here!

Women, Work, and Economic Justice: Past Struggles and Future Prospects

Dorothy Sue Cobble History and Labor Studies Professor Emerita, Rutgers University Covid has widened the gulf between rich and poor, transformed work, and intensified the push for economic justice. Katherine Ellickson, raised in Ethical Culture circles in New York, is just one of the many mid-century labor leaders who laid the basis for today's movements for [...]

Rethinking Personal Wealth: Taboos and Transparency

Hugh Taft-Morales Leader, Philadelphia Ethical Society Many Americans feel there is something deeply wrong with the staggering wealth inequality in the United States. Those who seek collective solutions often promote progressive taxation and government support for those on the lower rungs of our economic ladder, but few people feel comfortable even discussing their personal wealth. [...]

Global Health Justice and Governance

Jennifer Prah Ruger Professor of Medical Ethics and Health Policy, UPenn In a world beset by serious and unconscionable health disparities, by dangerous contagions that can circle our globalized planet in hours, and by a bewildering confusion of health actors and systems, humankind needs a new vision, a new architecture, new coordination among renewed systems [...]

Members Platform – Favorite Spots

Hugh Taft-Morales Leader, Philadelphia Ethical Society Hugh Taft-Morales invites members to share descriptions of “a favorite spot” in Philadelphia. It can be a spot in your home or some place in public. Spend most of your description explaining why this is a favorite spot. How does interest you, heal you, or inspire you? Has the pandemic led you to change what spots you [...]

Black on the Wisconsin Frontier: From Slavery to Suffrage, 1725-1866

Christy Clark-Pujara Associate Professor of History in the Department of Afro-American Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison Black Americans were a tiny minority in Wisconsin territory and later the history of the state; nevertheless, the practice of race-based slavery and anxieties about Black migrants led white Wisconsinites to dispute abolition and the rights of Black residents. Enslaved [...]