Posts Tagged ‘durham’

On Friday, I was invited up to Durham Union Society to speak against the motion “this house has no faith in atheism.”

Durham is always a pleasure to visit as it’s a beautiful place and provides some odd quirks – for example after spending 18 months living in Leeds city centre it’s a novelty to go to sleep in a room with is dark, and quiet. Plus the company of DUHSS is always welcome (though my memory somewhat failed to live up to the occasion – I got half way through introducing myself to Ed before realising we had met just a month before when I spoke to DUHSS in October).

My fellow speakers were Paul Woolley, head of the Christian think-tank Theos, Malcolm Guite, a priest and chaplain based in Cambridge, and Professor Richard Norman, vice president of the British Humanist Association.

I met Richard in the bar beforehand so we could exchange notes. It was great to meet Richard as he is clearly deeply engaged in humanist philosophy while still sharing my passion for the get out there and make a difference approach.

The hospitality on DUS’s part was excellent as well. Not only did they put me up for the night but also provided a three-course meal beforehand where I got the chance to chat with the other speakers and Anna, the current president of the DUS. Anna is one of those people who I find somewhat irritating because they are clearly taking more than their fair share of both intelligence and looks.

I was somewhat worried about the speech itself – having run through it in my room beforehand, I can’t help feeling that everything I had written was nonsense though the feedback I received at the reception after the debate was very positive so it was either a reasonable speech or people being very polite (I suspect it was a cross between the two to be honest!).

Giving the wording of the motion, myself and Richard has concluded that such a debate may be somewhat of a lost cause (though fun all the same!). It was a very pleasant surprise then when we won the vote – apparently, this house does have faith in atheism. The question is, did we actually want that result? 😀

On Thursday I went up to Durham to speak to the Durham University Humanist and Secularist Society based there.

I delivered a talk on “Debating the Theists”, going through the common arguments and counter arguments that you often encounter when talking to believers. It was a talk I had given a few times to LAS in the past, though having lost all the notes and slides it was essentially a fresh talk with a similar theme running through it.

After a few technical problems at the start we finally got up and running and the talk went reasonably smoothly, though I missed out quite a few points I ended up kicking myself for during the question and answers afterward. Nether the less it was an enjoyable evening and I would like to thank DUHSS for inviting me up to speak.

On Monday we headed up to Durham for the Humanist Society’s Reason Week. We were a bit lacking in numbers with only myself and Sophie going up in the end but it was a great chance to have a good chat with Sophie, especially given I don’t currently have a working stereo after last week.

Ellis delivered an excellent talk over lunch and it was reasonably well attended – around 20 people showed up for it which is better than we normally do on the first day of Rationalist Week. The evening screen attracted only half that but was never the less a good event, who can say no to Life of Brian?

Ellis also delivered me a tour of Durham which is a beautiful city and includes lots of cool bars too so it made for a very interesting day. I was very impressed with however together they are in Durham and I’m sure they will have a very successful future.