Fionnuala Ward Article - Atheism in schools

MagicMarker

This was brought up in another thread, it's an article written by Fionnuala Ward, who is an Educate Together Education Officer and ''has responsibility for the introduction of the Learn Together Curriculum as an object of study and professional development within the Colleges of Teacher Education.''

Article can be found here, page 29. Can't paste as it's a PDF, sorry!!

I'm sorry frustrated from reading that tbh. I need to go and calm myself.

Any comments on this, I'm absolutely flabbergasted how uninformed this person appears to be.

nothing

I'm not sure I understand why she keeps referring to the belief in atheism... and the teaching of atheism... as if it's another religious system... I was under the impression that it was a lack of such?

oldrnwisr

MagicMarker wrote: »

This was brought up in another thread, it's an article written by Fionnuala Ward, who is an Educate Together Education Officer and ''has responsibility for the introduction of the Learn Together Curriculum as an object of study and professional development within the Colleges of Teacher Education.''

Article can be found here, page 29. Can't paste as it's a PDF, sorry!!

I'm sorry frustrated from reading that tbh. I need to go and calm myself.

Any comments on this, I'm absolutely flabbergasted how uninformed this person appears to be.

It doesn't get any better when you read the entire article.

Two of my favourite misses:

"Atheism, as a belief system, has never been granted the gravity or significance of its religious counterparts."

"...which is more properly defined as belief in the non-existence of God"

I'm sure this woman ultimately means well but this is just not helping.

nothing

nothing wrote: »

I'm not sure I understand why she keeps referring to the belief in atheism... and the teaching of atheism... as if it's another religious system... I was under the impression that it was a lack of such?

Yeah, she's basically saying "belief in a lack of belief", which doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

I commend her for trying to address the issue, but she's going about it completely arseways. She should learn what atheism actually is for herself, because proclaiming that atheism is a belief system would probably do more harm than good.

magicbastarder

i don't think it's such a big issue. so what if her language is slightly clumsy, she's not writing for an audience on the boards A&A forum, she's writing for a wider audience. it doesn't dilute her message.

Undergod

While the article does contain some factual errors, it's good to see someone is engaging with the discussion of atheism in education. The errors serve to reinforce her point, actually; Ireland's second-largest religious group is widely misunderstood and people need to be better educated about atheism!

I'd be skeptical how well it would work though. When I think of some of the stuff people in my fifth and sixth year religion classes came out with... (I know this is from a magazine for primary teachers, but my point remains)

Delirium

I took it to mean that they would have discussion in a religion class about atheism so as to give students information about the various points of view about belief/lack of belief in deities.

I don't think they mean that they'd sit the students down and tell them that god/gods don't exist. They just want to inform students as to what atheism is since there are quite a few people putting down no religion in the census.

AhSureTisGrand

She doesn't seem to be an atheist herself, but rather liberal and tolerant to the point of being annoying :L

Dades

koth wrote: »

I don't think they mean that they'd sit the students down and tell them that god/gods don't exist. They just want to inform students as to what atheism is since there are quite a few people putting down no religion in the census.

That's all well and good, but it appears this lady herself doesn't know what atheism is.

I think anyone labelling atheism as a belief system is a disaster, as it gives those who oppose a secular system the idea that the religious ones are being replaced by some Stalinesque system which is fed the kids.

We see this all the time here in A&A. It totally misrepresents what is supposed to be happening.

Delirium

Dades wrote: »

That's all well and good, but it appears this lady herself doesn't know what atheism is.

I think anyone labelling atheism as a belief system is a disaster, as it gives those who oppose a secular system the idea that the religious ones are being replaced by some Stalinesque system which is fed the kids.

We see this all the time here in A&A. It totally misrepresents what is supposed to be happening.

Agree with what you say. Was just giving my interpretation of what I thought was the message was, although it was very badly delivered.

MrPudding

I am goingto go ahead and give her the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps she is intentially using language that the average person she is talking to understands? The words and phrases she uses, whilst wrong, are familiar to "normal" people. Perhaps she is trying a baby steps approach. I think that any kind of attempt to open the discussion should be welcomed, the details can be ironed out later.

MrP

liamw

FFS

Dave!

liamw wrote: »

FFS

That's it mate, let it all out

Donatello

nothing wrote: »

I'm not sure I understand why she keeps referring to the belief in atheism... and the teaching of atheism... as if it's another religious system... I was under the impression that it was a lack of such?

The atheist 'faith' is a belief in the non-existence of God. Looking around the created universe, in many ways it takes a greater leap of faith to attribute this to anything but God.

So I'm sitting here, tapping on my laptop. Who made my laptop? Nobody. It is just a coincidence. Versus the reality: the laptop was designed and built by men (and maybe women :D:D). To imagine that the whole creation is just some random product is hard to believe. And don't mention matter. It made itself out of nothing... ex nihilo nihil fit.

expectationlost

I am goingto go ahead and give her the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps she is intentially using language that the average person she is talking to understands? The words and phrases she uses, whilst wrong, are familiar to "normal" people. Perhaps she is trying a baby steps approach. I think that any kind of attempt to open the discussion should be welcomed, the details can be ironed out later.

magicbastarder wrote: »

i don't think it's such a big issue. so what if her language is slightly clumsy, she's not writing for an audience on the boards A&A forum, she's writing for a wider audience. it doesn't dilute her message.

thats exactly why she should be clear about it!

its really not that hard.

Dr. Loon

Donatello wrote: »

The atheist 'faith' is a belief in the non-existence of God. Looking around the created universe, in many ways it takes a greater leap of faith to attribute this to anything but God.

So I'm sitting here, tapping on my laptop. Who made my laptop? Nobody. It is just a coincidence. Versus the reality: the laptop was designed and built by men (and maybe women :D:D). To imagine that the whole creation is just some random product is hard to believe. And don't mention matter. It made itself out of nothing... ex nihilo nihil fit.

This has been done here plenty of times. Use search. I'm not even gonna dignify this weak ass argument with a refute, and it's not the point of the discussion.

Davidius

Donatello wrote: »

The atheist 'faith' is a belief in the non-existence of God. Looking around the created universe, in many ways it takes a greater leap of faith to attribute this to anything but God.

So I'm sitting here, tapping on my laptop. Who made my laptop? Nobody. It is just a coincidence. Versus the reality: the laptop was designed and built by men (and maybe women :D:D). To imagine that the whole creation is just some random product is hard to believe. And don't mention matter. It made itself out of nothing... ex nihilo nihil fit.

Well clearly
Laptop is the result of the effort of multiple people => Anything complex is the result of many people's efforts => Polytheism => Gods can't come from nowhere => Even more Gods designed them => Conclude: For any natural number N there exists the Ultragods-N who holds dominion over the Ultragods-(N-1).

Exercise:
Show that the Ultragods-N has dominion over all Ultragods-i where i = 0,1,2,..,N-1. (Hint: Use the Axiom of Omnipotence.)

robindch

Davidius wrote: »

Laptop is the result of the effort of multiple people => Anything complex is the result of many people's efforts => Polytheism => Gods can't come from nowhere => Even more Gods designed them => Conclude: For any natural number N there exists the Ultragods-N who holds dominion over the Ultragods-(N-1).

Interesting to read that while bearing in bear in mind that deistic beliefs tend, over large periods of time, to evolve from polytheism to monotheism.

Undergod

Donatello wrote: »

The atheist 'faith' is a belief in the non-existence of God.

The problem is here. There is a difference between belief in non-existence (let's say disbelief) and absence of belief.

Do you believe I am blonde? For the moment I'll assume you do not, because I can't imagine why you would. This does not mean that you believe I am not blonde.

Davidius wrote: »

Well clearly
Laptop is the result of the effort of multiple people => Anything complex is the result of many people's efforts => Polytheism => Gods can't come from nowhere => Even more Gods designed them => Conclude: For any natural number N there exists the Ultragods-N who holds dominion over the Ultragods-(N-1).

Exercise:
Show that the Ultragods-N has dominion over all Ultragods-i where i = 0,1,2,..,N-1. (Hint: Use the Axiom of Omnipotence.)

****, where do I fall in that cosmology?

oldrnwisr

Donatello wrote: »

The atheist 'faith' is a belief in the non-existence of God. Looking around the created universe, in many ways it takes a greater leap of faith to attribute this to anything but God.

Ah, yes the generalizing from self argument. Just because you believe things to be true on faith, doesn't mean that everyone else is that stupid.

"A coward believes all other men are cowards and a thief believes all others are thieves."

Donatello wrote: »

So I'm sitting here, tapping on my laptop. Who made my laptop? Nobody. It is just a coincidence. Versus the reality: the laptop was designed and built by men (and maybe women :D:D). To imagine that the whole creation is just some random product is hard to believe. And don't mention matter. It made itself out of nothing... ex nihilo nihil fit.

You do know what an argument from ignorance is, don't you Donatello? Oh, wait, you're a Catholic, of course you do.