Atheist Ireland | Promoting atheism, reason and an ethical, secular state

18/06/2009 Atheist Ireland

Why I am Not a Humanist

The following is a critique of the basic postulates of humanistic philosophy: it may, in effect, be taken as a concise rebuttal of what humanism stands for, delivered, perhaps unusually, by a secularist and an atheist. My drive to do so has largely been fuelled by the fact that there ...

09/06/2009 Atheist Ireland

Massimo Pigliucci on blasphemy laws in the 21st century

Massimo Pigliucci writes, blasphemy is a strange concept, according to my dictionary it refers to “the act or offence of speaking sacrilegiously of God or sacred things.” By that definition, every religious believer constantly engages in blasphemy — of all the other gods she doesn't believe in. You would think ...

19/05/2009 Atheist Ireland

Justice Minister to Amend New Blasphemy Law

The Minister for Justice is proposing to amend his new blasphemy law by providing, as a defence, that a person accused of blasphemy can “prove that a reasonable person would find genuine literary, artistic, political, scientific, or academic value” in the blasphemous matter. He is not proposing to reduce the ...

18/05/2009 Atheist Ireland

The Clash of Cultures: RTE Radio 1

Atheist Ireland member Micheal Nugent was a guest on Spirit Moves on Sunday, May 17, on RTE Radio 1 at 6:05pm. The other guests are David Quinn, Harry Browne, Fr Brendan Purcell and Claire O'Connell. Courtesy of Irish Shaman Part 1 of 6 (more…)

11/05/2009 Atheist Ireland

New campaign website at blasphemy.ie

Do you want to stop the Irish government from reviving the medieval crime of blasphemy? Do you want to promote a rational, ethical and secular society in Ireland? Atheist Ireland has put a campaign website online at http://blasphemy.ie/ as part of our campaign against this proposed new law. It includes ...

30/04/2009 Atheist Ireland

Atheist Ireland Opposes New Blasphemy Crime

The Irish Government’s new proposed blasphemy crime combines the oppressive religious thinking of 1950s Catholic Ireland and modern Islamic fundamentalism. This proposal should be opposed for three reasons: One, it does not protect religious belief. Instead, it encourages outrage and it criminalises free speech. Two, it treats religious beliefs as ...

23/03/2009 Atheist Ireland

The Agnosticism Fallacy

The term agnosticism owes its origins to the great twentieth century biologist T.H. Huxley, personal friend of Charles Darwin and champion of Natural Selection. Few nowadays understand that it is in fact an antonym of the word “Gnosticism”; referring to a diverse array of early Christian and Jewish religious sects ...

11/03/2009 Atheist Ireland

The Enemy of My Enemy: The Limits of Free-Speech

The Limits of Free-Speech: “Both these individuals have engaged in unacceptable behaviour by inciting hatred against a number of communities,” The above was the justification given by a UK Border Agency spokesman following the recent decision by the British government to prohibit Fred Phelps and his daughter Shirley Phelps-Roper from ...

25/02/2009 Atheist Ireland

God Is Fraud

The following is the contribution by Michael Nugent to a debate at the Philosophical Society of University College Cork, on Monday 23rd of February, in support of the motion that ‘God is Fraud.’ Thank you for inviting me, and it is a pleasure to be here. I am going to ...

13/02/2009 Atheist Ireland

My Religious Education in Ireland

I’ll kick off the section on education in Ireland system by telling of my experience in it. I grew up and went to primary school in the 70s when 95% of schools were Catholic (now it “just” 92%). There were three schools in my smallish town, a boys’ only monastery ...

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