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The world is explicable by purely natural means!

Desert Island books 1

By on March 10, 2007 in Uncategorized

In a complete rip off of the question asked at the end of the BBC Radio 4 show Desert Island Discs, were the participant is asked what book they would take to the island with them, I’m going to post a few of my favourite books. Incidentally, on the programme they give The Bible and The Complete Works of Shakespeare for the island. At least they’ll be useful for kindling to get the fire going. [Update: See Note 1]

One book i would definitely want to take to the island with me would be Hellstrom’s Hive by Frank Herbert of Dune fame. I’ve just noticed when searching Amazon for a link to put in this post that there is a new edition being published on April 7th. Cool. My copy is about 20 years old and could do with being replaced. I’m a bit reluctant to put too much info here about the plot as it’ll be a spoiler for anyone who wants to read it. Suffice it to say it’s a brilliant story that deals with a human population that have decided to live separately from the rest of humanity and have a society that is modelled on social insects. Which is fine until the Government starts to take an interest…

Hellstrom’s Hive would be one of the books I’d take to the island. Others to follow. Feel free to say what books you would take in the comments.

Hellstromshive

Note 1: Andy Kershaw was on Desert Island Discs this week and he rejected the offer of The Bible and Complete Works of Shakespeare. Good man.

Imagine – Queen & Paul Rodgers

By on January 1, 2007 in General

There is an excellent version of John Lennon’s Imagine performed by Queen and Paul Rodgers at their Hyde Park gig. Why is this entry filed in the Music and the Atheism categories? Roger Taylor’s reaction to the no religion too… line. Apparently in the USA that line is often changed to read as one religion or even taken out altogether.

Roger has form on dislike of religion. His song called The Key (which could be one of my Desert Island Discs) contains the lyric:

Well you can search the whole wide planet
Down to viruses and germs
A sensible religion
Is just a contradiction in terms

Chapter 1 of The God Delusion online

By on October 29, 2006 in Uncategorized

You can now read chapter 1 of The God Delusion online at the NYTimes site. Requires free registration.

There is also a full audio book copy from iTunes UK and Audible USA. I bought the audio version and I’m listening to it rather than reading the book again at present. I’ll read the book again in the future, but the reading pile is huge at present 🙂

A logo for the godless?

By on October 28, 2006 in Uncategorized

There is a thread over on Pharyngula about a suitable logo for the godless to use on websites etc. I like the astronomical symbol for the Sun myself. It is:

200610290014-1
I think this is appropriate as we all came from stardust 🙂

The God Delusion – 6 reprints already!

By on October 20, 2006 in Uncategorized

Wow. It seems that Richard Dawkins’ new book has been reprinted 6 times since it was release in September. it’s selling like hotcakes. A quote from the publisher:

Publishing Director Sally Gaminara, who commissioned the book for Bantam Press, said she had always thought the book would be a success. She said: “We have had the book reprinted six times and it was only published at the end of September. That’s an awful lot for a hardback book. I always have high hopes for my books and always tipped this book to sell well since the day I read the manuscript and thought it was absolutely wonderful. The book is very much of its time, with an increasing amount of conflict over religion. I do see this book on top of the bestseller list at Christmas. It is an ideal present — how many people celebrate Christmas for religious reasons?

Happy days.

Faith schools

By on October 15, 2006 in Uncategorized

So the Government are going to bring forward legislation that will require faith schools [1] to take 25% of their pupils from other faiths and none. This is a good first step as long as those who are not from the faith ethos of the school are not forced to take part in religious and semi-religious activities. There should not be prayers etc. at the end of assemblies without giving everyone (including those whose parents are of the faith of the school) an opportunity to leave the room. It looks like only new schools will have to follow the rules if they are implemented. Why can it not apply to existing faith schools? Surely if the concept is valid for new schools then existing schools could implement it as they take in new pupils each year. Then over a few years the existing schools would be operating under the same rules as new ones.

And why 25%? Why not 50%? If the school is taking state funding then it should be open to all pupils irrespective of their faith. I’d like to see schools that took pupils based on there academic ability and/or proximity to the school. However in the real world this is unlikely to happen for some time given the penetration of faith schools. But 50% of other or no faith seems like a good compromise to me.

[1] Aren’t faith schools a daft concept in the first place. They should be schools, not places where parents belief systems can be forced on children. Teach tham about all religions and none and then let them make up their own minds.