Promoting Science and Critical Thinking
My Daughter was telling me yesterday about a dialog within her RE class in school. The teacher (a “really” Christian lady for the understandable reason that is perhaps a requirement for the role), had been delving into the topic of various ethical questions. One example was of a baby who had been born with no brain, was on life support, and … Read more
Oooh this sounds exciting, Dean Burnett, a doctor of neuroscience, writes in the UK’s Guardian all about an exciting new initiative that involves scientists interfering in the daily affairs of religion. So why are they doing this? Well because … The Catholic Church and Church of England have recently been urging MPs to vote against the introduction of mitochondrial … Read more
A rather common religious claim is that by default humans are violent and that without the moral guidance of a god, our natural instincts will lead to great darkness and evil … cue citations for Hitler, Stalin, Mao, etc… and you are then advised either implicitly or even explicitly that this would be you if you do … Read more
Derren Brown, the famous illusionist, came out as gay back in 2007. At the time the rather inevitable happened; because he is famous, some of the tabloids ran with it …. In 2007 he did a “discreet” interview with The Independent where he officially came out. “If you don’t do anything at all then suddenly it’s … Read more
At a deep psychological level people tend to flow with the cultural tide, and so we have the observation that the religious belief people embrace tells us a great deal about their geographical location and the micro-cultures they inhabit, and not much else. Those born into a Sunni family will generally tend to be Sunni … Read more
Ireland rather absurdly has a Blasphemy law, and this is not some archaic dictate inherited from the dark ages, but was introduced in July 2009 by the then Fianna Fáil-led government. Enacting something like this as recently as 2009 would appear to be truly bizarre, because nobody was demanding it should happen, and nobody was particularly bothered about the lack … Read more