Across families
Ethical Culture and Existentialism
Different families with 12 axes in close agreement — the sort of pairing a quiz weighting only the divine axes would never surface. Mean distance across all seventeen axes: 0.09 (0 would be identical).
Deed before creed: a congregational religious life with ceremony, community and moral education, and no theological claims at all. Keeps rather more ritual than secular humanism, which is the cell that separates the two.
No given essence, no external warrant, and therefore total responsibility for what you make of yourself. The highest value in the matrix on individual conscience, and it treats that as a burden rather than as a liberation.
Where they agree
B2 Reading of sacred text
Both sit at metaphorical, or no text at all — a gap of 0.00.
D3 The body
Both sit at leaning to be celebrated — a gap of 0.00.
A3 Plurality
Both sit at strictly one — a gap of 0.02.
B1 Source of truth
Both sit at reason and direct experience — a gap of 0.03.
A2 Personhood
Both sit at impersonal principle or order — a gap of 0.03.
D1 Mechanism of the ultimate good
Both sit at achieved by effort or insight — a gap of 0.03.
A1 Divine reality
Both sit at nothing beyond the natural — a gap of 0.04.
C2 Shape of time
Both sit at one life, then judgment — a gap of 0.04.
E2 Origin of the cosmos
Both sit at beginningless or natural — a gap of 0.05.
E3 Locus of belonging
Both sit at an individual choice — a gap of 0.07.
B3 Institutional authority
Both sit at individual conscience decides — a gap of 0.10.
C1 Survival of the self
Both sit at ends at death — a gap of 0.10.
All seventeen axes
| Axis | Ethical Culture | Existentialism | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| A1 Divine reality | nothing beyond the natural | nothing beyond the natural | 0.04 |
| A2 Personhood | impersonal principle or order | impersonal principle or order | 0.03 |
| A3 Plurality | strictly one | strictly one | 0.02 |
| A4 Locus | leaning wholly beyond the world | leaning wholly beyond the world | 0.15 |
| B1 Source of truth | reason and direct experience | reason and direct experience | 0.03 |
| B2 Reading of sacred text | metaphorical, or no text at all | metaphorical, or no text at all | 0.00 |
| B3 Institutional authority | individual conscience decides | individual conscience decides | 0.10 |
| C1 Survival of the self | ends at death | ends at death | 0.10 |
| C2 Shape of time | one life, then judgment | one life, then judgment | 0.04 |
| C3 The human condition | ignorant but fundamentally sound | leaning ignorant but fundamentally sound | 0.18 |
| D1 Mechanism of the ultimate good | achieved by effort or insight | achieved by effort or insight | 0.03 |
| D2 Centrality of ritual | between essential and prescribed and optional or absent | optional or absent | 0.37 |
| D3 The body | leaning to be celebrated | leaning to be celebrated | 0.00 |
| E1 Exclusivity | many valid paths | leaning many valid paths | 0.14 |
| E2 Origin of the cosmos | beginningless or natural | beginningless or natural | 0.05 |
| E3 Locus of belonging | an individual choice | an individual choice | 0.07 |
| E4 Standing of nature | between creation, given for use and animate and itself sacred | between creation, given for use and animate and itself sacred | 0.20 |
Positions for Ethical Culture rest principally on Adler’s founding addresses and AEU statements of purpose; for Existentialism, on Sartre, Existentialism is a Humanism; de Beauvoir, The Ethics of Ambiguity. Per-cell sources are listed on each tradition’s own page.
The questionnaire places your answers on these same axes and ranks all 65 traditions by how closely they match. Take it.