Some clients and visitors to our web sites may like to know something about the Founder’s philosophy – or not, as the case may be! Anyway, for the curious, here is a distillation - please forgive the slight air of Grumpy Old Men rant.

I am an atheist (sensu Dawkins 2006¹) and have been for many years. It was not something which I realised in a eureka moment, simply a gradual confirmation as fact piled upon fact and accumulated to make religious belief, in the common western sense (I exclude Buddhism and related non-theistic aggregates), untenable. To me as a biologist, the humbug of religion is blindingly obvious. Although I know many disagree, there are probably not a lot of other life scientists among them. This does not mean that I cannot recognise and salute the religiously-associated (but anthropogenic) great works of art, architecture and culture.

As so many in the UK, I went to schools where (Christian) religious teaching was the norm. We were immersed in it, and I was baptised and confirmed – serious at the time, nonsensical superstition in considered objective retrospect. Religion is myth and fairytale. This is not an airy assertion – it is readily shown by any objective logical examination. Religion is as insubstantial as a dawn mist when compared to the majesty and wonder offered by the realms of biology, geology and physics, though it is a powerfully treacherous virus of the mind, particularly pernicious in its manifestation of the indoctrination of innocent children by afflicted, if well-intentioned, adults. This may seem harsh, but I am not intolerant of others’ beliefs – just the corruption of evidential logic, and the imposition of false paradigms on those who are too young, artless or weak to resist. Many children grow up and out of religion’s grasp: I am one.

It helps no-one to make unsubstantiated, contradictory or demonstrably false statements such as “The bible is true because it is god’s word” or “God exists because it is written in the bible” or “The earth is only ten thousand years old”, etc. And I will not even begin to touch upon the truly saddening oppression of women that so demeans humankind and is still common currency in some religions today.

When a persuasive case puts you on the spot, it does not advance the discussion to say “God works in mysterious ways” or “You must have faith.” That is just silly – a “cop-out” in common parlance.

The litany of religious battiness goes on and on.

Alternative ten commandments for atheists

This is my list but it owes much to atheist writers and great modern scientific thinkers such as Richard Dawkins:

1. Use your life as wisely as you can to gain experiences, learn, inform and communicate with others.
2. Strive to avoid causing harm to ecological systems; treat nature and living creatures with respect and protect biological diversity.
3. Take nothing at face value, and doubt the verity of what you are told until you have objective testable reasons for accepting it.
4. Treat other people as you would have them treat you; avoid discrimination or oppression by gender, race or sexual orientation.
5. Be firm in your dealings with those who treat you or others wrongly, but be fair, and be compassionate.
6. Uphold personal responsibility and privacy (other people’s as well as your own), and protect the freedom of speech of others even if you disagree with them: avoid bureaucracy in all its manifestations and those who would diminish liberty through it.
7. Go outside on a clear night now and then, and consider the vastness of the universe, space-time, the future and the past. Then look down a microscope at the teeming life a drop of pond water. Then reflect on the quantum scale of particle physics.
8. Appreciate how scientific method leads to revelation, understanding and fulfilment whilst enhancing your sense of wonder and excitement.
9. Be prepared to change your view, however firmly you have held it, when new facts emerge to show it was incorrect, but do not indoctrinate others, especially children. Rather, demonstrate to them how to consider matters independently and base their arguments on sound objective science.
10. Observe, explore and think.

Energy flows, matter cycles and Einstein’s famous E+MC² equation suggests they are interchangeable. None of us is formed of the same atoms as we were when we were children, and one day all of us will be part of the stars. That is science. We stand on the brink of an unprecedented age of discovery and change - a cure for all disease, an end to ageing, transhumanism, the wonders of nanotechnology and so much else that we shall be able to marvel at and enjoy.

Final thought for the philosophers - we could be living in a computer simulation: I am unable to find a very good reason entirely to reject Bostrom's proposals in that regard. But that is not a reason to opt out of living the life we perceive to the full as best we can.

CJB

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¹There is a good discussion of what this means, with which I agree, in Dawkins, R. (2006), The God Delusion, Bantam Press, London, UK.