Ow Do?

[Shard]

Hi everyone,

Nice to find this place (thanks to my mate Kyuuketsuki for the recommendation!).  I'm looking forward to some interesting discussion.  

I'm another Brit, now living in Hungary.  I'm a scientist by training (genetics) and an IT architect by profession, although I'm considering a move into bioinformatics at some point (to combine my two fields).  I've been an atheist for as long as I can remember - before I even learnt the word atheist.  Very technically speaking I'm an agnostic atheist, as I neither have any knowledge of the existince of any deities, nor do I believe in any.  I usually just refer to myself as an atheist though.  I've had a fairly cosmopolitan upbringing - Hungary is the fourth country I've lived in for a substantial time (my Mrs is Hungarian, which is why I'm here), the others are the UK, the US and Switzerland.  I tend to think of myself of as more European than English, partly because I was born and occasionally raised in Yorkshire which has long held a somewhat dim view of the rest of England, partly because I've lived and travelled all over Europe.  The Yorkshire bit explains the title to this post as well ('How do you do?' is the translation)!  

As mentioned previously, I'm a friend of Kyu (hi Kyu!) and I worked with him for a few years on the Science, Just Science campaign.  Keeping all kinds of pseudoscience out of science classes is a particular focus of mine, and I'm interested in education in general and science education in particular.  I also have an interest in Philosophy.  I used to be what can only be described as a 'militant evagelical atheist' in my youth, until a couple of things happened - I got more deeply into science and realised the tentative nature and lack of absolute certainty that characterises all of science (and adopted this as my own rationale), and I realised that I was just wasting my time and my breath with some individuals who are apparently immune to all evidence (or all the evidence that challenges their worldview at any rate - 'faith blinkers').  So I'm now a more relaxed atheist - at least until the fundies start jamming creationism into science classes again.  

Shard

[Kyuuketsuki]

Hey dude

Kyu

[Stoicheion]

Welcome, welcome, welcome Shard. Its good to see another intellectual join the forums. We do have the occasional fundie that comes to crash the party, but we usually snuff them out. There is one decent christian here that i know of, Titan. He may be the only active one; all the others run away after a while.  

[karadan]

Welcome, welcome, welcome Shard. Its good to see another intellectual join the forums. We do have the occasional fundie that comes to crash the party, but we usually snuff them out. There is one decent christian here that i know of, Titan. He may be the only active one; all the others run away after a while.  

[rlrose328]

Welcome!  Glad to have you on board.  I am very passionate about keeping relgious dogma out of schools, so you have a fan here.  

[Tom62]

Welcome on board. It is nice to see another European here.

[curiosityandthecat]

Welcome! Any friend of Kyu is a friend of ours.  

[Whitney]

Hi Shard, welcome to the forum.

[Shard]

Thanks for all the welcomes everyone!

Welcome on board. It is nice to see another European here.

Any discussion threads anywhere about nationalism or patriotism?  As I've never been particularly nationalistic or patriotic, I have always noticed how pronounced the nationalism is in US politics.  There even appeared to be arguments about 'who loves America more' in the latest election...

[Tom62]

Any discussion threads anywhere about nationalism or patriotism?  As I've never been particularly nationalistic or patriotic, I have always noticed how pronounced the nationalism is in US politics.  There even appeared to be arguments about 'who loves America more' in the latest election...

If you'd like to see some nationalism then should have joined an US Christian forum   . Here we are dealing mostly with free thinkers and rationalists.

[PipeBox]

Greetings, Shard!

I see you've already made your way through the subforums, and the others have already greeted you sufficiently, so instead take this post as my formal recognition of your presence on these boards.  

But seriously, welcome and enjoy.