Topic: Atheism

[Yorkykopite]

No, there's more to atheism than just not believing in a god. It is a different life to a religious person. You often hear religious people say atheists have no morality, but humanism is not nothing. It's a whole philosophy and has just as much validity to be taught as Christianity, especially when you consider that the UK is largely non-religious.

Disagree with you there Kurt. I don't think that atheism does make any grand claims beyond 'there's no evidence that there is a god and it's extremely unlikely that one (or several of them) exist.'

But what that claim does is open up every other field of enquiry. That's the important achievement of atheism. Among other things it allows teachers to teach the history of the Bible or the Koran honestly and treat them as man-made documents. It allows Christian or Islamic thought to be placed within the history of philosophy and to see how both religions drew heavily on older ideas about morality. It allows the unfettered study of geography, science, archaeology and astronomy etc. In other words once atheism is operational the universe is opened up to genuine and rational enquiry and humanity is allowed to indulge its natural curiosity about things. That's enough because that's a lot. 

[KurtVerbose]

I think we've both said the same thing there.

[Yorkykopite]

I'm not sure we have.

[Dench57]

Hadn't really thought about this. Do people think we shouldn't teach RE in schools?

[Riquende]

Hadn't really thought about this. Do people think we shouldn't teach RE in schools?

RE is fine and important if it's taught as almost an extra tranche of History lessons - a 'cultural history' of various parts of the world etc that touches on the basic belief systems of people you might encounter in the world today.

But when I was at school in the 90s the RE teacher was a happy-clappy CofE believer, and once we had an external troupe come in and 'teach' us the importance of remaining virgins until marriage etc. That sort of thing isn't okay (though of course sexual education itself is important).

[rob1966]

Hadn't really thought about this. Do people think we shouldn't teach RE in schools?

I'm quite happy that my kids are taught about religion at school, I think it's important to understand different beliefs, but I don't want them being taught the bible as if its real and fact, although my kids sussed Father Christmas was a made up story quite young and did the same with the bible.

What I'm not happy about is my eldest has HAD to do an RE GCSE, absolute waste of a gcse, he's put no effort in and I've not been bothered as there were areas, such as English lit he's had to focus on and its been an unnecessary distraction.

[Riquende]

What I'm not happy about is my eldest has HAD to do an RE GCSE, absolute waste of a gcse, he's put no effort in and I've not been bothered as there were areas, such as English lit he's had to focus on and its been an unnecessary distraction.

The school where I worked up until 2021 had RE as a mandatory GCSE. I think they considered it a 'free hit' in that the subject was so easy that all the students would be able to bump their number of GCSEs by 1, plus the school got to claim an extra ~250 passes per year.

[rob1966]

The school where I worked up until 2021 had RE as a mandatory GCSE. I think they considered it a 'free hit' in that the subject was so easy that all the students would be able to bump their number of GCSEs by 1, plus the school got to claim an extra ~250 passes per year.

My lad is at the other end - looks like he's getting 7s to 9s in all subjects but RE, he's looking at a 3 or possible 4. I think he must fall asleep in the lesson.

[Riquende]

[So… Howard Philips]

RE is fine and important if it's taught as almost an extra tranche of History lessons - a 'cultural history' of various parts of the world etc that touches on the basic belief systems of people you might encounter in the world today.

But when I was at school in the 90s the RE teacher was a happy-clappy CofE believer, and once we had an external troupe come in and 'teach' us the importance of remaining virgins until marriage etc. That sort of thing isn't okay (though of course sexual education itself is important).

Crème Brûlée?

[lobsterboy]

or even Legz Akimbo?

[So… Howard Philips]

or even Legz Akimbo?

You’re right. I was getting mixed up between Les McQueen’s old band and the role playing Legs Akimbo.