About Me

My photo
Australian philosopher, literary critic, legal scholar, and professional writer. Based in Newcastle, NSW. My latest books are THE TYRANNY OF OPINION: CONFORMITY AND THE FUTURE OF LIBERALISM (2019) and AT THE DAWN OF A GREAT TRANSITION: THE QUESTION OF RADICAL ENHANCEMENT (2021).

Tuesday, April 03, 2012

Secular Australia: A 10 Point Plan - forthcoming presentation in Melbourne

When I'm Melbourne after Easter, I'll be on this panel at Embiggen Bookswith two wonderful fellow panelists: Meredith Doig and Graham Oppy. It takes place on Thursday evening, 12 April, at 6.30 pm.

As you can see, the topic is Secular Australia: A 10 Point Plan. It probably won't escape you that the topic responds to Sean Faircloth's proposed ten-point plan for a secular United States of America. Indeed, the blurb (when you click on the link) says:
In the USA, Sean Faircloth, the new Richard Dawkins Foundation Director of Strategy and Policy, has put forward a 10 Point Plan for a secular America. In this vein, our top-shelf panel of thinkers asks: What could/should be Australia’s 10 Point Plan be for a truly secular nation?
I expect that we'll all be asking ourselves whether the Sean Faircloth plans needs tweaking (both in general, and if we were trying to apply it to Australian circumstances). There's going to be some great discussion and debate, so come along if you can.

5 comments:

Max Corvini said...

are you a fan of Michael Sandel? I heard him briefly mention (the main topic was something else) that secular reasons should not be privileged over religious ones. Not much more to say at the moment, I need to do some more research but perhaps you can help?

Russell Blackford said...

No, not a fan of him at all. Sorry.

I think he writes pretty bad books. I reviewed his The Case Against Perfection for Monash Bioethics Review a year or so back, but I'm afraid you'll need to track it down yourself, if interested, if you have access to a good university library. Unfortunately, it's not available online - or not as far as I know.

Anonymous said...

I'm going to the GAC and will be arriving on Thursday afternoon from Brisbane. There is no information provided in the post on the blog page of Embiggen books about the address of where this event is, or who to RSVP to. There is a tab on the site for "in store events" and this event is not listed. If you want people to go then the above information would help.

Russell Blackford said...

Do you have the information now? Warren at Embiggen Books says:

Had an email from a GAC attendee saying that it isn't obvious where to go or RSVP to for our Wednesday evening event. In case anyone else is having difficulty, all Embiggen Books events are at our shop, 197-203 Lt Lonsdale st. Between Swanston and Russell behind the state library. You can RSVP through website contact page; to the events@embiggenbooks.com email; by calling the store 03 9662 2062 or; by dropping in.

@blamer said...

Here is Faircloth's "10 Point Vision" :

http://www.lancasterfreethought.org/2011/11/18/sean-faircloth%E2%80%99s-ten-point-vision-of-a-secular-america/