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Debate: Should schools teach creationism? |
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Debate: Should schools teach creationism?
Wednesday 11 February 2009 18:30
Presented by the Edinburgh Group of the Humanist Society of Scotland, in association with the Institute of Ideas and the National Library of Scotland. Speakers include Alex McLellan, Founder and Executive Director of Reason Why
Dave Perks, Head of Physics at Graveney School in London,
Christopher Brookmyre, Novelist, including Boiling a Frog
Julian Baggini, writer and philosopher
Marc Surtees, Paradigm Shift
Chair: Dr Tiffany Jenkins, Institute of Ideas
Wednesday 11 February 2009 18:30
Venue: National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh, George IV Bridge, EH1 1EW
Tickets are free. To book your place(s), get further information, or join the events mailing list, phone 0131 623 4675 or email
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Margot Macdonalds' Bill on Assisted Dying |
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The consultation document for Margot Macdonald's Proposed Member's Bill called 'End of Life Choices (Scotland) can be downloaded from the Scottish Paliament web site here |
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'Atheist Buses' hit the road in Scotland |
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The UK’s first ever atheist advertising campaign launched on Tuesday January 6th 2009, with 800 buses featuring the slogan “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life” running in cities across Scotland, England and Wales, along with 1000 adverts on the London underground and two large LCD screens on Oxford Street.
The campaign, which is supported by Professor Richard Dawkins, the British Humanist Association and The Humanist Society of Scotland, is a response to a series of evangelical Christian adverts running on buses in June 2008, which featured the URL of a website saying all non-Christians were going to hell. Comedy writer Ariane Sherine suggested the rational, positive slogan to reassure people who may have been scared by the evangelical adverts.
The Atheist Bus Campaign’s donation phase launched in October, aiming to raise just £5,500. However, within four days it had raised £100,000 from individual donations from the general public. It has now raised over £135,000, smashing its original target by 2400%.
The campaign was launched in Central London at 2pm today by Professor Dawkins, Father Ted TV writer Graham Linehan, columnist, BHA President Polly Toynbee and the philosopher AC Grayling.
Ariane Sherine, creator of the Atheist Bus Campaign, says: “You wait ages for an atheist bus, then 800 come along at once. I hope they’ll brighten people’s days and make them smile on their way to work.”
Jim Petherick, Chairman of the Humanist Society of Scotland says: “I am delighted, but not surprised by the response of non-believers who are now proud to describe themselves as atheists or, in increasing numbers, Humanists. The days of inequality are fast disappearing and I imagine most people will see this not as ‘fares please’ but ‘fair pleases!’"
The buses will be running in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, York, Leeds, Newcastle, Dundee, Sheffield, Coventry, Devon, Liverpool, Wolverhampton, Swansea, Newport, Rhondda, Bristol, Southampton, Newcastle and Aberdeen.
Since its donation phase began in October, the Atheist Bus Campaign has inspired atheist organisations across the world to launch their own bus campaigns. Spain’s Union of Atheists and Freethinkers is launching buses across Barcelona today with the UK slogan translated into Spanish, Italy’s Union of Atheists, Agnostics and Rationalists is also planning a bus campaign, while the American Humanist Association has brought out atheist bus adverts in Washington DC. |
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Thought for The Day |
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BHA Member Gavin Orland has pledged to e-mail the BBC (today[at]bbc.co.uk) during the week beginning 1st January 2009 to object to "Thought for the Day" but only if 100 other people will do the same. So far more than 1,140 people have supported the pledge. You can sign it too at http://www.pledgebank.com/thoughtfortheday before December 31st 2008. Don't forget to subscribe to the HSS Thought for the World podcasts that will roll out from Darwin Day in February 2009. |
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Humanists have beliefs too |
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Two months ago, the new school year began. For a substantial and growing number of Scottish parents this raised a difficult and continuing challenge. They are the Scots who are non-religious and who are now one Scot in three, according to the Scottish Annual Household Survey (2005). Their children return, in many instances, to a school environment where religion, often largely Christian, predominates, where religious and moral education is a fixed element in the curriculum and where religious observation is the norm, writes HSS Education Officer Bob McKay in The Times Educational Supplement |
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It's official: marriage continues to decline, but humanist weddings in Scotland rise 64% |
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The General Registrar Office of Scotland has just released its statistics on marriage in Scotland in 2007 and they make interesting reading.
While marriage overall, and religious marriage in particular, continues to decline, the number of marriages conducted by the Humanist Society of Scotland (HSS) has risen dramatically for the third year running.
In 2007, the HSS conducted 710 legal marriages, 285 more than the 2006 total of 434. This represents an annual rise of 64%, placing it 4th in the GRO’s ‘League Table’, only 48 ceremonies behind the Episcopal Church. The previous year on year rise in 2006, was 429% ( from 82 to 434). The 2007 figure exceeds the Society’s own statistical prediction by 5%. If as seems likely, Humanist weddings continue to rise, the Society predicts they will be more popular than Catholic weddings by 2010.
Over the three years since June 12th 2005, when Humanist weddings were made legal, the HSS has risen from 12th (2005) to 6th (2006) to 4th (2007).
While this is impressive growth by any measure, it becomes more interesting in the wider context, where marriage is generally on the decline. According to the General Registrar Office of Scotland, marriage fell by 9% in 2005, a further 4% in 2006 and 0.1% in 2007; in Scotland, the decline in the number of religious weddings is even greater; they fell by 6% in 2005, 7% in 2006 and 4% in 2007. Since 2005, the number of weddings conducted by the Catholic Church has fallen by 3%, while those conducted by the Church of Scotland have fallen by 13%.
HSS Convenor, Jim Petherick says “We’re delighted to see confirmation of what we’ve known for many years, that Humanism offers a coherent ethical structure that lets people take responsibility for their own lives. Humanist weddings are the one form of ceremony where a couple are truly free to make their own promises to one another. This gives it more meaning, for both them and their families and the rise in demand is a reflection of this.”
To meet the demand, the HSS is currently recruiting new celebrants, several from the more remote parts of Scotland. The next training course will have applicants from Lewis, Orkney and Shetland, and it is hoped other would-be celebrants will apply from islands like Skye and Mull, and the remoter parts of the mainland. The HSS has 68 trained and registered celebrants of whom 42 are authorised by the Registrar General of Scotland to conduct legal weddings.
One advantage Humanist weddings have over those conducted by a Registrar is that they do not require the venue to be licensed but can take place where anywhere deemed ‘safe and dignified’. Consequently Humanist weddings have taken place in all sorts of locations ranging from hotels and castles to beaches, back gardens and the summit of Ben Nevis.
Although Humanist weddings are classified by the Registrar General of Scotland as a form of religious marriage, Humanism is not a religion, but a secular philosophy or belief system that represents the views of millions of people around the world. Stated simply, Humanists believe that we should behave towards others as we would have them behave towards us, that we can lead good and worthwhile lives guided by reason and compassion rather than religion or superstition, and that there are more things that unite humanity than divide it. Or, as we say in Scotland, “We’re a’ Jock Tamson’s bairns” - we’re all the same under the skin.
For more on the philosophy of Humanism, please click here |
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Two stars are born |
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Two stars are born. HSS members Clare Marsh and Derek Young are the headline acts on the latest podcast from the Institute of Humanist Studies and American Humanist Association, Humanist Network News, recorded at the recent World Humanist Congress in Washington DC. The podcast can be downloaded from this webpage. Needless to say, they get top billing and their "segment" lasts for much of the first 15 minutes of the programme, followed by conversations with other Congress delegates from Uganda, the Netherlands, America, Malaysia and Brazil. Derek and Clare's report from the Congress will appear in the next issue of Humanitie. |
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Humanism at the Scottish Parliament |
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On the 11th of June 2008, Humanist Society of Scotland celebrant Juliet Wilson led the Scottish Parliament’s Time for Reflection slot. Juliet was the second representative of the Society to do so, Nigel Bruce being the first, in March 2000. Time for Reflection is open to people of all faiths and none and we greatly hope that Humanists will be invited to speak at Holyrood more often in the future.
Footage courtesy of The Scottish Parliament SPCB 2008 |
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